שלמה אלישיב

Rav Shlomo Elyashiv (originally Elyashov; 12 Tevet 5601/1841 – 27 Adar 5686/1926), known as the Leshem or Baal HaLeshem after his sefer, was among the foremost mekubalim of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and the grandfather of Rav Yosef Shalom Elyashiv. Born in Zager, Lithuania, to Rav Chaim Chaikel, he was a sharp talmid chacham who learned by his father, by Rav Gershon Tanchum of Minsk, and in the yeshiva of Telz, where he took kabbalah from the town rav, Rav Yosef Reisin. He learned as a chaver with Rav Meir Atlas and Rav Tzvi Yehuda Rabinowitz-Teomim, and taught kabbalah to the young Rav Avraham Yitzchak HaKohen Kook in the years Rav Kook served as rav of Zeimel.

In his later years, through the intervention of Rav Kook — by then rav of Yerushalayim — the aged mekubal was able to settle in Eretz Yisrael together with his son-in-law, daughter, and young grandson, the future Rav Yosef Shalom Elyashiv. He made his home in Yerushalayim and, with his son-in-law, established the beit midrash Tiferet Bachurim. Besides his own writing, he had a hand in printing the works of earlier mekubalim.

His life’s work is Leshem Shevo VeAchlama, in four parts — Hakdamot u’She’arim (Sefer HaKadosh), Drushei Olam HaTohu (Sefer HaDei’ah), the Chelek HaKlalim, and the Chelek HaBeiurim, a commentary on the Etz Chaim of Rav Chaim Vital — in which he sets out and widens the system of the Arizal and takes issue with other kabbalists. He held to the path of the Vilna Gaon in kabbalah, its close adherence to the sources of Chazal. He was niftar in 5686 and buried on Har HaZeitim, Yerushalayim.