Ponevezher Rav - Rav Yosef Shlomo Kahaneman

Rav Yosef Shlomo Kahaneman (1886–1969), the Rav of the town of Ponovezh in Lithuania, founded the famed Ponevezher Yeshiva in Eretz Yisroel. After the war, along with the Chazon Ish, the Ponevezher Rav began the construction of a yeshiva in Bnei Brak that was to be named after his kehillah that had been destroyed in the Churban. During this period, Rav Kahaneman devoted himself entirely to this project, telling all those with whom he met that he was in the process of establishing a yeshiva for five hundred bochurim! This was at a time when the total number of bochurim learning in yeshivos in the entire country numbered only several hundred. All those who heard his ambitious words showed sympathy for him, knowing that he had lost his entire family in the Churban, as well as his kehillah. Most people simply assumed that the tragedies had affected his mental stability. Yet as we know today, he eventually merited to establish not just one but several yeshivos, with many thousands of bochurim learning within their portals.