Rav Yochonon Perlow zt"l
הרב יוחנן בן ישראל פרלוב זצ"ל
Kislev 21 , 5716
Rav Yochonon Perlow zt"l
Rav Yochonon Perlow, the seventh Rebbe (sixth, according to Yated 2006) of the Stolin-Karlin dynasty, was born in Stolin, a suburb of Pinsk, White Russia, to Rav Yisrael, the “Yanuka” of Stolin. After his father was niftar in 1921, his six sons split the succession: Rav Moshe became Rebbe in Stolin; Rav Avrohom Elimelech took over in Karlin; Rav Yaakov moved to the U.S. in 1923 to lead the Karlin community that already had four shuls in New York and one shtiebel in Detroit. He became known as the Detroiter Rebbe. Rav Yochonon moved to Poland where he became a Rebbe in Lutsk, capital of the Volhynia district. Among the 41,000 people in Lutsk were eighteen thousand Jews. After the Nazis entered Lutsk on June 25, 1941, they herded the Jews into a ghetto in December, and the following August, they dragged 17,500 of them outside the town and murderously gunned them down. The last survivors, Jewish workers in the local labor camp, mounted a heroic but hopeless revolt on December 11, after learning that they, too, were about to be liquidated. Only about 150 Lutsk Jews survived the war. Rav Yochonon, his wife, and two daughters fled into the surrounding forests and made their way deep into Russia with groups of partisans. After being deported to Siberia and personally burying his wife and elder daughter there on the same day, Rav Yochonon somehow survived the war. He lost almost his entire family; only one daughter, Faige, survived. He moved to Haifa in 1946, then to America two years later. While in New York, he founded the Karlin-Stolin Torah Institutions and published the new Siddur Bais Aharon v’Yisrael, comprising Karlin-Stolin minhogim. Rav Yochonon’s grandson, Rav Boruch Yaakov Meir Shochet, became the next Stolin-Karlin Rebbe. He composed the poem “Kah Echsof Noam Shabbos” that is printed in most editions of Shabbos Zemiros.
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Rav Yochonon was born in the month of Av 5660/1900 to Rav Yisrael Perlow, the Yanuka of Stolin. He was named after his grandfather, Rav Yochonon of Rachmastrivka.
After his father was niftar, he was crowned Rebbe in Lutsk although just a newly married yungerman. He gathered around himself many Karlin Stoliner Chassidim from Volhyn.
When the Germans invaded Lutsk during WWII he fled to the woods together with his wife and two daughters. There he fled deep into Russia with the partisans. He lost his wife and daughter in Russia on the same bitter day and he himself had to bury them. Along with his hardships and travails he remained weak and sickly for the rest of his life.
When the war ended, he arrived in Germany through Serbia and did not reveal his identity to anyone, living a life of want, privation and hunger. Somehow someone recognized him and the Chassidim did their utmost to make efforts to bring him to Eretz Yisrael to become Rebbe for all the Karlin-Stoliner Chassidim whose numbers in Yerushalayim were significant. In Iyar of 5706 he arrived in Eretz Yisrael and established himself in Chaifa.
Under his guidance and leadership, Karlin-Stolin was reinvigorated; new botei medrash opened and mosdos – institutions – opened and grew.
In 5708 he left for the USA and lived with his brother Rav Yaakov. While in New York he published the Bais Aharon VeYisrael Siddur with the customs of davening in the nusach of Karlin-Stolin, along with important correspondence and letters from the Rebbes of the dynasty.
In 5714 he moved back to Eretz Yisrael and began building Yeshivas Karlin in Yerushalayim. He returned to the USA to help fund the project and complete the building, hoping to return, but he was niftar shortly after he arrived in the US.
He was brought back to Eretz Yisrael and laid to rest in Teverya on 18 Adar 5717.
His petira created a split in Karlin. Some of the Chassidim crowned the Pinsker as the next leader. However, most of the Chassidim crowned Rav Boruch Yaakov HaLevi Shochet, the son of Rav Yochonon’s daughter, as the next Karlin-Stoliner Rebbe.
After Rav Yochonon’s petira, the Chassidim reprinted the Bais Aharon, by the second Rav Aharon of Karlin, in his name and memory.
Stories of Rav Yochonon Perlow zt"l
In the year tov-shin-ches, Rav Yochonon of Karlin-Stolin was in Teverya for Yom Kippur. A certain bochur, not a Stoliner Chassid, arrived from Kiryat Ata to spend the holy day with the Rebbe. To his astonishment, after Shacharis, the Rebbe Rav Yochonon approached him and ordered the bochur to go and make Kiddush and eat! Needless to say, the bochur did not do so on Yom Kippur! However, a short while later, again the Stoliner Rebbe, Rav Yochonon, came by and seeing as how his previous words had fallen on deaf ears, raised his voice and said, “Didn’t I tell you to go make Kiddush and eat?!” The bochur was frightened and taken quite aback at this outburst, and dared not disobey the Rebbe’s clear command.
The next day the bochur took to bed ill. He was so sick that he was rushed for emergency medical attention. When the doctors in the hospital concluded their examination, one of them asked the sick bochur, “I know that yesterday was Yom Kippur. Tell me the truth – did you fast yesterday?”
When the bochur admitted that he had in fact eaten as per the Rebbe’s orders, the doctor seemed surprised and relieved. “What good fortune! You are one lucky young man! It’s a good thing you ate when you did. In fact, had you fasted you probably wouldn’t be alive today!” (Me’orei Aish, chapter 8 - page 515)
Once, during a certain Rosh HaShana that the Rebbe, Rav Yochonon of Stolin, spent in Yerushalayim, a yungerman fainted in his home and no one was able to revive him. His family rushed to the Rebbe and begged him to rouse heavenly mercy on his behalf. The Rebbe ordered them to drip several drops of wine into his mouth, and this they did. To the amazement of all present, as soon as several drops of wine entered the unconscious man’s mouth he immediately woke up. By the next day he had completely recovered and he himself arrived in the Bais Medrash for davening.
Afterward, the Rebbe was overheard remarking, “I simply switched the letters of his heavenly decree from spelling negef, which means “struck down”, to gefen which means “fruit of the vine” – and I succeeded in saving his life through the wine. (Me’orei Aish, chapter 8 - page 515)