Rabbi Yitzchak Zilber was born in Kazan, Russia to a famous rabbinical family a few months before the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917. His father, Rabbi Bentzion Chaim Silber, had come to Kazan from Latvia due to the turbulence of the times. In giving him an authentic Jewish education at home, Rabbi Zilber’s parents insisted that he never attend the anti-religious Communist public school system, which did not prevent him from later becoming a student of mathematics at Kazan State University.
From age 15, Rabbi Zilber was already teaching Torah classes in Kazan, despite the fact that it was forbidden.
As a young man, he married Gita Zeidman, and together, they raised four Torah-observant children—Sarah, Bentzion Chaim, Chava and Fruma Malka—an extraordinary feat given that they lived under oppressive Communist rule.
After World War II, Rabbi Zilber was sentenced to Stalin’s Gulag on bogus charges where, with uncommon self-sacrifice and despite the inhumane conditions, he never violated Shabbos. Upon his release in 1953, Rabbi Zilber returned to his young family in Kazan, continuing to keep and teach the Torah in secret while maintaining his teaching job in public. Rabbi Zilber barred his children from public school on Saturday, triggering an orchestrated harassment campaign by the KGB that cost him his profession and threatened to rob him of his family. In response, Rabbi Zilber fled to Tashkent, Uzbekistan, where his wife and children joined him soon afterwards. In 1972, after much effort, the Zilbers successfully made aliyah to Eretz Yisrael. By the time the family escaped the Soviet Union, defying decades of persecution, Rabbi Zilber had already completed the entire Talmud several times and his son had managed to study a significant portion of it.
Newly arrived in Eretz Yisrael, Rabbi Zilber was shocked at the then-widespread violation of Shabbat among people everywhere. He later recalled that, upon arriving from Yerushalayim, not a single immigrant from Russia who had become a baal teshuvah was to be found.
His life mission was clear. Rabbi Zilber would devote the rest of his life to bringing the Russian-speaking population of Israel closer to the Torah. And in that, he succeeded—so much so that there were times when Rebbetzin Zilber could not light the Shabbat candles because their dining-room table was being used just before Shabbos for circumcisions of newly-returned Russian baalei teshuvah.
Rabbi Zilber also helped hundreds of Jewish women from Russia obtain kosher gittin (divorce papers)—going personally on long trips all around the world to locate missing husbands.
In 2000, Rabbi Zilber founded and served as spiritual leader of Toldot Yeshurun, an organization helping thousands of immigrants from the Former Soviet Union (FSU) to return to the Torah. His outstanding and enduring work in the Russian community has been compared to that of HaRav Shlomo Freifeld zt"l of Yeshivas Shor Yoshuv in New York as well as that of HaRav Noach Weinberg zt"l of Aish HaTorah in Yerushalayim.
Rabbi Yitzchak Zilber passed away on the 8th of Av, 5764 (2004), mere hours before the onset of the Tisha B’Av fast day, the saddest day in Jewish history. His funeral drew thousands from all over Israel who gathered to cry anew for the fallen Temple.
Rabbi Zilber’s lifetime work continues today through his numerous students as well as his children. Rabbi Bentzion Zilber, his only son, now serves as rabbi and spiritual leader of Toldot Yeshurun, and his daughter, Rabbanit Chava Kuperman, runs numerous Toldot Yeshurun programs for women.
Remembering HaRav Yitzchak Zilber On His 19th Yartzheit
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