Rabbi Shmuel Berenbaum | |
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Rabbi Berenbaum (left) with Rabbi Yerucham Olshin at a simcha
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Position | Rosh yeshiva |
Yeshiva | Mir yeshiva, Brooklyn, New York |
Predecessor | Rabbi Avraham Kalmanowitz |
Successor | Rabbi Osher Kalmanowitz |
Personal details | |
Birth name | Shmuel Berenbaum |
Born | 1920 Knyszyn, Poland |
Died | January 8, 2008 (age 87) Brooklyn, New York |
Denomination | Orthodox |
Alma mater |
Baranowicze yeshiva, Belarus Mir yeshiva, Belarus |
Shmuel Berenbaum (1920 – January 6, 2008) was an Orthodox rabbi and rosh yeshiva of the Mir yeshiva in Brooklyn, New York.
He was born in Knyszyn, Poland and studied at Ohel Torah Yeshiva in Baranowicze, led by Rabbi Elchonon Wasserman. He later studied in the Mir Yeshiva located in the town of Mir, Belarus. At the onset of World War II, he traveled with the rest of the Mir Yeshiva to Vilna, where they remained for three weeks awaiting visas to travel abroad. After receiving destination visas to Curaçao, a Dutch protectorate in the Caribbean, they were given travel visas by the Japanese Consul in Kovno, Chiune Sugihara. The yeshiva traveled across the Trans-Siberian Railway to Vladivostok in a trip that took over two months. From there they traveled to Kobe, Japan, where they remained for 7 months before being settled by the Japanese Government in Shanghai, China.
Following the war, Berenbaum traveled with the remnants of the Mir Yeshiva to the United States and settled in Brooklyn, New York. He married the eldest daughter of the Mir rosh yeshiva, Rabbi Avraham Kalmanowitz.
In 1964, after the passing of his father-in-law, he became the rosh yeshiva of the Mirrer Yeshiva together with his brother-in-law Rabbi Shraga Moshe Kalmanowitz. His diligence in Torah study was legendary and he was known to spend the entire day in the yeshiva's study hall discussing Torah topics with the students.