הרב ישראל פרידמן מרוז'ין

Rav Yisrael Friedman of Ruzhin (3 Tishrei 5557/1796–3 Cheshvan 5611/1850), the holy Ruzhiner, was the founder of the house of Ruzhin, father of the courts of Sadigura, Chortkov, Husiatyn, Shtefanesht, and Leova, and, through his children and grandchildren, of Boyan and Bohush as well. Born in Prohobisht in Podolia to Rav Sholom Shachna, son of Rav Avraham HaMalach and great-grandson of the Maggid of Mezritch, with his mother’s line from Rav Menachem Nachum of Chernobyl, the Meor Einayim, he was given the name Yisrael after the Baal Shem Tov. His father was niftar when he was six, and he was raised by his elder brother Rav Avraham; at thirteen he married in Botoshan, and at sixteen, on his brother’s passing, he took his place at the head of the chasidim. From Prohobisht his court moved to Skvira and then to Ruzhin in Volhynia, from which his name went out; thousands streamed to him, and he became the greatest of the admorim of Ukraine in his day.

He conducted his court in the derech hamalchut — a palace, a carriage, garments of princely elegance — teaching that this royalty comes to show the greatness of Yisrael, who are children of kings, and to give honor to Heaven. For himself he lived in kedushah and prishut, eating almost nothing and sleeping little, and he said of himself, as Rebbi Yehudah HaNasi had said in his generation, that he took no benefit from this world at all. Tzaddikim of the generation traveled to see him — Rav Chaim of Sanz, Rav Moshe of Kobrin — and admorim after him took up the derech hamalchut he opened.

In the spring of 5598/1838, after an informer’s denunciation, he was imprisoned by the government of Tsar Nicholas over an accusation touching the death of two informers; he sat nearly two years, with no charge ever brought and no trial ever held. Freed in 5600/1840, he crossed the border with the help of his chasidim, and after hard wanderings settled in 5602/1842 in Sadigura in Bukovina, under the shelter of Austria. There he built his court anew, greater than before: his beit midrash held three thousand, and chasidim crossed the borders from Galicia, Russia, and Romania to reach him.

The Apter Rav had placed him at the head of Kollel Volhynia, and he carried the support of the chasidic yishuv in Eretz Yisrael, urging his chasidim to settle there. In 5603/1843, on hearing that the Tsar sought to buy the ground beside the Kotel HaMaaravi, he charged the Yerushalmi chasid Rav Nissan Beck to buy the plot first — and it was bought, days before the Russian consul received his orders. He was niftar at fifty-four on 3 Cheshvan 5611/1850 and rests in Sadigura; on that ground in Yerushalayim his son Rav Avraham Yaakov of Sadigura completed the shul dedicated in 5632/1872 and named for his father — Tiferet Yisrael.