Rabbi Abraham Salomon Simcha Levisson

Abraham Salomon Levisson

• Netherlands, Civil Births, 1811-1915
• Birth: June 8 1902 - 's-Gravenhage, South Holland, Netherlands
• Parents: Salomon Abraham Levisson, Julie Bondi

Abraham Salomon Levisson

• Online Begraafplaatsen - Dutch Cemeteries
• Birth:June 8 1902
• Death date:Apr 25 1945
• Burial place:Diversen, Netherlands
• Spouse:Beer

Abraham Salomon Levisson

• Jewish Holocaust Memorials and Jewish Residents of Germany 1939-1945
• Birth: June 8 1902 - Den Haag
• Death: Apr 25 1945 - Tröbitz

HuygensING

http://zachor.michlala.edu/manhigim/manhigim_t.asp?num=47&chug=manh...

http://he.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D7%90%D7%91%D7%A8%D7%94%D7%9D_%D7%A9%...

https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Salomon_Levisson

https://www.joodsmonument.nl/en/page/28611/abraham-salomon-levisson

After completing the college-preparatory school in The Hague, Abraham Salomon Levisson enrolled at the Nederlands-Israëlitisch Seminarium and the University of Amsterdam, where he took a bachelor's degree in Semitic languages in 1927. He then studied at the rabbinical seminary and at the university in Berlin.

Levisson delivered sermons at the Beth Hamidrasj in Amsterdam and was a teacher at the Nederlands-Israëlitisch Seminarium in Amsterdam as well. His inaugural lecture about consequences and family life was published. In 1935 he was appointed chief rabbi of Friesland. This appointment included responsibility for the district of Drenthe. In 1941 he was also appointed chief rabbi of Gelderland. An announcement in recognition of this appointment appeared on the front page of the Joodsche Weekblad in July 1941.

Abraham Salomon Levisson founded the circle of Jewish academics in Friesland in an effort to retain Jewish intellectuals within the Jewish community. Chief Rabbi Levisson was one of the leaders in the Leeuwarden subcommittee of the committee for special Jewish interests. In the late 1930s Levisson became totally caught up with refugee relief. As chief rabbi of the Drenthe district, he often visited Camp Westerbork in 1939-1940, when the place was still a refugee camp.

Het Joodsche Weekblad, 11 July 1941, 1;

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http://akevoth.org/genealogy/duparc/7263.htm

Raw Abraham Salomon Simcha Levisson, birth 8 Jun 1902 's-Gravenhage, died 25 Apr 1945 Troebitz,

Chief Rabbi Dr-Friesland, son of Solomon and Julie Levisson Bondi

Location: Amsterdam ,1943 09-29 Westerbork. Education: Semitic language studies, Rabbi Berlin seminar,

Occupation: Chief Rabbi teacher. Role (s) 1935 =? opperrabbijn Friesland Chief Rabbi Friesland

1935=? 1935 =? opperrabbijn Drenthe, leraar Ned. Chief Rabbi Drenthe, Ned teacher. Isr. Isr. Seminarium, leraar Beth Hamidrasj, voorzitter Toutseous Chajiem. Seminary teacher Beth Hamidrasj, president Toutseous Chajiem. ( JHM ) to: (JHM) to:

Adele De Beer, birth 28 Dec 1900 Amsterdam, daughter of Leonard de Beer and Jeannette Dinner

Children:

1) Jocheved Esher Chana Levisson

living - details excluded to:

Jouno Birnbaum, birth 4 Apr 1939 Rotterdam, died 33 Sep 1984 Rechovot, Source , Source , son of Henry (Chaim) Birnbaum and Lydia Hausdorf

2) Shabtai Levisson

living - details excluded to:

Ruth Levi

3) Jehuda Levisson

living - details excluded to:

Rivka Vleeschhouwer

4) Levenloos kind Levisson, birth 3 Apr 1938 Leeuwarden, died 3 Apr 1938 Leeuwarden

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http://zachor.michlalah.edu/english/manhigim/manhigim_t.asp?num=23&...

Rabbi Avraham Shlomo (Solomon) Levisson – Holland

One of Holland’s most important rabbis who was active during the Shoah.

Born: 4 Sivan 5662 (1902) in The Hague, Holland.

Perished: 12 Iyar 5705 (April 25, 1945) on The Lost Train, near the town of Troebitz (East Germany).

Rabbi Levisson’s parents were Shabtai, a Torah scholar and prominent member of the Jewish community of The Hague, and Adela (nee De-Bar), the daughter of the head of the Mizrachi movement in Holland.

[NOT CORRECT PARENTS. Adele was his wife.]

He studied in the Rabbinical Beit Midrash in Amsterdam and in the Rabbinical Beit Midrash in Berlin and was ordained rabbi in 1935. He also studied Semitic languages at university. In 1935 he was appointed as chief rabbi of the Friesland and Drente regions. He lived in Leeuwarden.

In 1938-39, a few years after he started serving as rabbi, German refugees started arriving in Holland, and the Dutch authorities set up for them a camp in Westerbork near the community of Leeuwarden. Rabbi Levisson would visit Westerbork’s residents on Shabbat and holidays and offer them spiritual activities. Many called him “Reb Simcha,” because his visits and his assistance to the Jews were a source of joy in the camp.

During the Shoah:

Continuing his concern for the Jewish refugees in the camp before the war, he greatly assisted them during the evacuation of Westerbork in May 1940 upon the German invasion to Holland.

Rabbi Levisson tried to prevent the camp’s Jews from falling into German hands and quickly found Jewish families from the community of Leeuwarden to welcome each refugee. This adoption project continued for about a month, until the Jews were forced to return to the camp.

In addition to his role as chief rabbi, he was also the representative of the Jewish Council in the region. In both these roles, the rabbi continued to accompany the Jews who streamed in from all over Holland to Westerbork camp, as it changed from a refugee camp to a camp from which Jews were deported to extermination camps in the East. Incredibly the authorities gave him a free hand, and he fully took advantage of this by trying to provide all of the religious needs of the place.

A unique undertaking of the rabbi was his attempts to prevent the situation of an agunah. He corresponded with his rabbinical colleagues. After halachic discussions, he organized the writing of conditional gittin for the Jews in Westerbork through delegates of the Rabbinical Court in Amsterdam or other ways. Some of these gittin were sent to London to be safeguarded. Rabbi Levisson was himself deported in 1943 to the very same Westerbork camp, and then to Bergen Belsen.

One of the testimonies on Seder night relates that the rabbi gave his elderly father a potato. When the rabbi was asked what he would eat, he responded: “It’s not worth discussing. My father has never eaten non-Kosher food, how can I see him in his old-age eat chametz on Passover?” And he, the son, said he would eat chametz with no other option available. He probably took part in writing the special prayer which was said upon eating chametz on Passover.

Havel Herzberg, who documented life in Bergen Belsen, testified about him: Rabbi Levisson of Leeuwarden was a hero who refused to eat swine even though it was expected that he would die of starvation.”

Rabbi Levisson grew weaker and weaker, and passed away immediately after liberation. He was on what was known as the Lost Train which had left Bergen Belsen two weeks previously. Together with others who perished on the train, he was buried in the village of Troebitz in East Germany. He passed away on the 12th of Iyar 5705.

In Rabbi Levisson’s personal archives, letters were found with halachic questions of the times. In one of the replies from the summer of 1942, he tells one of the rabbis of The Hague about the issue of transferring a mass grave to proper Jewish burial: “Do not transfer the bodies in a coffin, and do not do the tahara procedure, but bind them in shrouds only.”

Sources:

• Dasberg Eliezer, “And You Shall Tell Your Son” – a memorial booklet for the Dasberg family members who perished during the Shoah.
• Farbstein, Esther, Hidden in Thunder- Perspectives on Faith, Halachah and Leadership during the Holocaust (Mossad Harav Kook, 2007), pages 350-354.
• Michman, Dan, “Rabbinical Leadership in Holland” in Research Papers on the Shoah, Haifa University, 5749.
• Samson, Shlomo, He’emanti Ki Adaber, Reuven Mass 5750