SHOLEM ZILBERFARB

SHOLEM ZILBERFARB (b. 1915)

           He was born in Sulița, Botoșani district, Romania, into a rabbinical household.  He studied in religious primary school, yeshiva, and through self-study he acquired secular knowledge.  For a time he worked as a Hebrew teacher, later becoming a member of the Botoșani rabbinate.  He was one of the administrators of Zionist Mizraḥi work in Romania.  He was to have taken part in the illegal “Briḥa” (Flight) from Transylvania across Poland to Israel.  From 1942, he was living in Israel.  He served as secretary of “Hapoel hamizraḥi” (Mizrachi workers [religious labor party]) in Haifa and was a member of the local Vaad haḥinukh (Educational council).  He began writing in 1934 in the daily newspaper Unzer tsayt (Our time) in Kishinev, in which he ran the section “Fun unzer altn oytser” (From our ancient treasury).  He contributed as well to the Hebrew periodical Darkenu (Our way) in Czernowitz, Netiva (Path) in Tel Aviv, and in the Hapoel hamizraḥi press in Yiddish and Hebrew in various countries.  He was last living in Haifa.

Source: D. Tidhar, in Entsiklopediya leḥalutse hayishuv uvonav (Encyclopedia of the pioneers and builders of the yishuv), vol. 5 (Tel Aviv, 1952), pp. 2171-72.