BINYUMIN-ZEV HENDLES (HENDELES)

BINYUMIN-ZEV HENDLES (HENDELES) (May 22, 1896-1970)

            He was born in Kalish, Poland, into a Hassidic family.  He studied in religious primary school, yeshiva, and with the Proshker rabbi.  He had private tutors for secular subject matter.  Later, in Warsaw, he received rabbinic ordination.  He was a member of the executive of the high council of Agudat Yisrael in Poland (1931-1936), and one of the heads of the Jewish community of Warsaw.  He was also a member of the executive of the Anti-Hitler Committee of Poland.  He engaged in broad-ranging propaganda on behalf of religious education in Poland.  Until 1938 when he left on an assignment for Agudat Yisrael to the United States, he participated in all public activities and meetings of his organization’s movement and took part in both Knessets of the World Agudat Yisrael (1922 and 1929).  After settling in New York, he remained active in Jewish community and religious life.  He was president of the American Agudat Yisrael and an executive member of the Vaad Hapoel (Zionist general council) of the World Agudat Yisrael.  He began his publicist and journalist activities in 1918 in the Agudat Yisrael newspaper Der yud (The Jew) in Warsaw, and from then on he also wrote for: Dos yudishe vort (The Jewish word), Dos yudishe togblat (The Jewish daily newspaper), Deglanu (Our banner), Haderekh (Our path), Haynt (Today), Darkenu (Our path), Ortodoksishe yugnt-bleter (Orthodox youth pages), and Moment (Moment)—in Warsaw; Dos vort (The word) in Vilna; Di yudishe arbeter-shtime (The voice of Jewish laborers) and Beys yankev zhurnal (Beys Yankev journal) in Lodz; Der veg (The way) in Paris; and other serials.  In America, he wrote for: Forverts (Forward), Morgn-zhurnal (Morning journal), and Tog (Day), but primarily for Dos idishe vort (The Jewish word) in New York, initially as an editor of this weekly newspaper and later as a member of the editorial board.  He also contributed to: Hamodiya (The herald) in Jerusalem; and Di idishe post (The Jewish mail) and Ortodoksishe tribune (Orthodox tribune) in London.  He authored Am hatoyre, eybikeyt un tsayt problemen (People of the Torah, eternal and contemporary issues) (New York, 1961), 408 and 48 pp., in Yiddish with English summaries.  He died in Jerusalem.

Sources: Dr. R. Feldshuh, Yidisher gezelshaftlekher leksikon (Jewish communal handbook), vol. 1 (Warsaw, 1939), pp. 860-61; Hamodiya (Jerusalem) (December 4, 1957).

Khayim Leyb Fuks

[Additional information from: Berl Kagan, comp., Leksikon fun yidish-shraybers (Biographical dictionary of Yiddish writers) (New York, 1986), col. 223.]