YANKEV (KOPL) MIKLISHANSKI (YA’AKOV K.)

YANKEV (KOPL) MIKLISHANSKI (YA’AKOV K.) (b. June 14, 1911 [1910?])

            He was born in Warsaw, Poland, into a family that drew its lineage back to Rabbi Chaim Volozhiner.  His father was a rabbi and preacher at the great Nożyk Synagogue in Warsaw.  After religious elementary school, Miklishanski studied at the Tachkemoni rabbinical seminary in Warsaw, in the Mir Yeshiva, and later at the University of Paris, graduating with a doctor of law degree.  During the war years, when France was occupied by the Nazis, he fled to Portugal and from there (in 1942) immigrated to the United States.  For a certain period of time, he gave lectures at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York and at Dropsie College in Philadelphia.  From 1945 he was professor of Halakhic literature at “Bet-midrash lemorim” (Teachers’ seminary) in Boston.  He was one of the founders and leaders of the Histadrut in New England.  He was a member of various academic associations.  He began writing in 1935.  He contributed to L’Univers israélite (Jewish world) in Paris.  He was Parisian correspondent for Moment (Moment) and Baderekh (On the road) in Warsaw.  In subsequent years he also wrote in English.  He published essays, journalistic articles, and research work in a series of Polish and French journals.  He also wrote for Di tsukunft (The future) in New York, and in Hebrew for: Hadoar (The mail), Bitsaron (Fortress), Mada (Science), Sefer hashana leyehude amerika (Annual for the Jews of America), and Perakim (Chapters)—all in New York.  He also contributed original and adapted writings in Hebrew-language anthologies, in Yiddish and English encyclopedias, and the like.  In Algemeyne entsiklopedye (General encyclopedia), “Jews H” (pp. 145-69), his piece “Hebreishe literatur in tsofn-amerike” (Hebrew literature in North America), with a bibliography, appeared.  He co-edited “Tur ivri” (Hebrew column) in the English-language weekly Jewish Advocate in Boston.  His books include: a work in French on international penal law (Paris, 1935), 185 pp.; Der farlibter meshugener (The crazy man in love), a monologue (Paris, 1936), 84 pp.; Mekorot letoldot hahalakha (Sources for the history of halakha) (Boston, 1954), 166 pp.; and Toldot hasifrut haivrit baamerika (History of Hebrew literature in America) (New York, 1967), 435 pp., for which he received the Neuman Prize from the Hebrew Academy in America.  He also used such pen names as: K. Miklison and Mikli.  He was last living in Newton Center, Massachusetts.