הרב משה גרינוואלד

Rav Moshe Greenwald (11 Shevat 5613/1853–7 Av 5670/1910), known after his responsa as the Arugat HaBosem, was among the great rabbanim of Hungary at the close of the nineteenth century — rav of Chust and forebear of the Pupa chasidic dynasty. Born the eldest son of Rav Amram Greenwald, he learned in Tzehlim (Deutschkreutz) in the yeshiva of Rav Menachem Katz, a talmid of the Chatam Sofer, and under his grandfather Rav Yosef Greenwald; from sixteen he learned in the Pressburg Yeshiva under his rebbi muvhak, the Ksav Sofer, where his close friend was Rav Yosef Chaim Sonnenfeld, later rav of Yerushalayim’s Eidah HaChareidis. Orphaned of his father at seventeen, he carried the family’s parnassah in the timber trade while continuing to learn with tremendous hasmadah, and married his relative Zissel Gestetner.

At twenty-six he entered his first rabbanut, in Humenne in Hungary (today in Slovakia), where he founded a yeshiva; in 5647/1887 he became rav of Kleinwardein (Kisvarda). Though raised in a non-chasidic home that kept the minhagim of the Chatam Sofer, from his youth he became a chasid — a talmid of Rav Yehoshua Rokeach, the second Belzer Rebbe, he traveled also to the rebbes of Shinova and Nadvorna and took to wearing a shtreimel like the chasidim. In 5653/1893 he was called to the rabbanut of Chust, a seat in which great Hungarian rabbanim, the Maharam Schick at their head, had served; succeeding Rav Yoel Tzvi Roth, he built the yeshiva of Chust into one of the largest in Hungarian Jewry, drawing bachurim from beyond the country’s borders and even from America. Many of Hungary’s rabbanim of the twentieth century were his talmidim, and like his rebbeim he stood against the Neolog-Reform movement and every departure from the mesorah.

Beside the responsa Arugat HaBosem he left Arugat HaBosem on the Torah, a Haggadah with the peirush Hillel Nirtzah, Mikveh Taharah on hilchot mikvaot, and Olat Tamid on masechet Tamid. His brother was Rav Eliezer David Greenwald, the Keren LeDavid. Of his sons: Rav Avraham Yosef served in the rabbanut of Makova, Chust, and Ungvar, and his son Rav Yehoshua Greenwald was the last rav of Chust before the kehillah’s destruction in 5704; Rav Yaakov Yechezkiya was rav and rosh yeshiva in Pupa (Papa) and founded the Pupa chasidut, whose center is today in New York, where his son Rav Yosef Greenwald filled his place; and Rav Levi Yitzchak led the kehillah “Arugat HaBosem Tzehlim” in New York. Rav Moshe was niftar on 7 Av 5670/1910.