A rabbi without equal

摘要

HE WAS exceptional in several ways. Brought up in the shtetls of what is now Belarus, Aharon Yehudah Leib Shteinman was the only member of his family to survive the Holocaust. He then devoted his life to buildingthe ultra-Orthodox Jewish community in Israel. Such was his piety that other religious Jews came to regard him as Gadol Ha-dor-the greatest of his generation. But he remained exceedingly modest, sleeping on the same mattress for six decades. During the day it would serve as a sofa for anyone wanting his guidance. Parents, ministers and tycoons passed through his damp one-bedroom flat.