הרב אלימלך מליז'נסק

Rebbe Elimelech Weisblum of Lizhensk (5477/1717–21 Adar 5547/1787), known for all generations by his sefer as the Noam Elimelech, was among the greatest talmidim of the Maggid of Mezritch and the father of chassidut in Poland and Galicia. Born in Tikotzin to Rav Elazar Lipman and Mirel, he was the brother of Rebbe Meshulam Zusha of Anipoli — Reb Zushe — and the two are bound together in chassidic telling as “the holy brothers,” who wandered the towns in self-imposed galut. Having learned the kabbalah of the Arizal in his youth, he joined his brother at the court of the Maggid in Rovno and entered the inner circle of his talmidim. He married Sprintza, daughter of Rav Aharon Rokach, and after her petirah, Gittel, daughter of Rav Yaakov Margaliot.

After the Maggid’s histalkut in 5533/1772 the leadership spread among his talmidim across Eastern Europe, and it was Rebbe Elimelech who carried chassidut into Galicia and Poland. He set up his beit midrash in Lizhensk, and his name went out as a tzaddik and baal mofet, a master of guiding people in avodat Hashem and above all in bringing them back in teshuvah.

The Noam Elimelech — his torah on the Chumash together with Likutei Shoshanah on pesukim and maamarei Chazal — was written down from his Shabbat torahs by his son Rav Elazar, who by his father’s instruction brought it to print only after his petirah, in 5548/1788. One of the first sefarim of chassidut, it gives the classic formulation of the doctrine of the tzaddik: the tzaddik as the channel who raises his flock with him and draws the shefa down into the world, to whom a Jew must bind himself in order to fulfill his avodah — and whom the community must therefore sustain. Many fix a seder in it every Shabbat to this day. He also left the Tzetel Katan, a short list of daily practices for the oved Hashem, and the Tefillah Kodem HaTefillah said as a preparation for Shacharit; several of his nigunim survive among his descendants.

From his talmidim came the leadership of Polish chassidut in the next generation: the Chozeh of Lublin, the Maggid of Kozhnitz, Rebbe Menachem Mendel of Rimanov, the Apter Rav — Rav Avraham Yehoshua Heshel — and Rav Kalonymus Kalman Epstein, the Maor VaShemesh, among many others; chassidic tradition tells that before his petirah he set his hands on his closest talmidim and divided his powers among four of them. He was niftar in Lizhensk on 21 Adar 5547, and his son Rav Elazar served there after him. His tziyun in Lizhensk became a place of pilgrimage: thousands travel there each year for the hilula of 21 Adar, and in most chassidic minyanim Tachanun is not said on that day.