The first Bostoner Rebbe, Reb Pinchas Dovid Horowitz zy"a

Biography

Reb Pinchas Dovid HaLevi Horowitz zy"a was the first Bostoner Rebbe. He was born in Yerushalayim in 5636 (1876); some English sources also give a civil date of 15 July 1877. He was named Pinchas after a zeide, and Dovid after Dovid HaMelech. His mother was a sister of Reb Dovid Tzvi Shlomo Biderman zy"a, the Lelover Rebbe of Yerushalayim, who is named as his Rebbe. The family is also a scion of the Rebbe Reb Shmelke of Nikolsburg zy"a. In 1913–14 he was sent from Yerushalayim to Galicia in a din Torah over the chalukah funds for the yishuv. The First World War closed the way home. He reached America and settled in Boston. Sources give 1914 or 1915 for his arrival there. The court was named Boston, after the city.

In Boston he gathered a kehillah and conducted himself as a Rebbe. In 1936 he was involved in founding a yeshiva there; some accounts say he partnered with Rav Yosef Dov Soloveitchik zt"l. Hebrew Wikipedia adds that he later closed it, because he did not agree to limudei chol in the afternoons. Around 1939–1940 he moved to Williamsburg, Brooklyn, and opened the Bostoner beis medrash there. He was niftar on 8 Kislev 5702 (28 November 1941) in Williamsburg, at about sixty-six years of age.

In his tzavaah he asked to be buried in Eretz Yisroel, but the war made that impossible at once, so he was first buried in America. After about three and a half years his sons brought the aron to Har HaZeitim in Yerushalayim, beside his father. Accounts of the reinterment say that when the aron was opened, the body was intact. Your kvittel will be brought to his kever on Har HaZeitim.

Historical background

Bostoner Chasidus, named after the city of Boston, was one of the early Chasidic courts in America. It grew out of the Lelov mesorah in Yerushalayim. After the first Rebbe’s histalkus, the court continued in New York through his older son, and was later renewed in Boston itself through his younger son.

Before & after