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Yisrael Meir Lau

Yisrael Meir Lau

1937 CE · Modern · Piotrków Trybunalski

Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau (b. 1937) served as Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Israel from 1993 to 2003 and as Chief Rabbi of Tel Aviv from 2005. Born in Piotrków Trybunalski (Poland), the descendant of 37 generations of rabbis, he was the youngest survivor of Buchenwald — liberated at age seven and brought to Mandate Palestine that same year.

He served as Chief Rabbi of Netanya before being elected Chief Rabbi of Israel. Internationally known as a powerful Holocaust memoirist and a frequent diplomatic interlocutor, he has been honored with the Israel Prize (2005) for his lifetime achievement. His autobiography *Out of the Depths* (2005) is one of the most widely-read Israeli memoirs of the Holocaust generation.

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Stop 1 of 51937–1944Born

Piotrków TrybunalskiפיוטרקובPoland

What they did here

Born in Piotrków Trybunalski, Poland, into a dynasty of rabbis.

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In the same place & time

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Thinkers and teachers of other traditions whose lives overlapped with Yisrael Meir Lau’s — a glimpse of the wider world they lived in. Drawn purely from recorded birth and death years.

Works(2)

Out of the Depths: The Story of a Child of Buchenwaldאל תשלח ידך אל הנער

Tel Aviv · 2005

2005 memoir of his survival as the youngest inmate of Buchenwald and rise to the Israeli Chief Rabbinate.

Full text not yet available in our corpus.

Yachel Yisraelיחל ישראל

Tel Aviv · 1994

Multi-volume collection of his sermons and halachic responsa as Chief Rabbi.

Full text not yet available in our corpus.