This Day in History – 19 Kislev/November 22

19 Kislev

In 5559/1798, Harav Schneur Zalman of Liadi — the Baal HaTanya — was released from imprisonment in the Peter and Paul Fortress in St. Petersburg, where he had been held for 52 days on charges that his teachings threatened the imperial authority of the Czar.

Yahrtzeiten

5533/1772, Harav Dov Ber, zt”l, the Maggid of Mezritch

5578/1817, Harav Shmuel Yehudah Leib, zt”l, mechaber of Teshuos Chen

5676/1905, Harav Menachem Nachum Twersky of Tolna, zt”l

5686/1915, Harav Avraham Aharon Bornstein, zt”l, mechaber of Ner Aharon

5702/1941, Harav Chaim Halberstam, Dayan in Satmar and son of Harav Shalom Eliezer of Ratzfert, zt”l

5625/1864

Harav Yeshayah Banet of Calev, zt”l

Harav Yeshayah Banet was the son of Harav Mordechai Banet of Nikolsburg. His father named him after the Shelah Hakadosh, Harav Yeshayah Horowitz, to whom they were related. Reb Mordechai felt very close to the Shelah; he always davened and bentched from the Siddur HaShelah.

Reb Yeshayah learned under his father, the famed Rav and Rosh Yeshivah of Nikolsburg. He married the daughter of Harav Elazar Lev, Rav of Santov and mechaber of Shemen Rokeach.

Reb Yeshayah was appointed Rav of Calev. In this capacity, he fought all those who wished to do away with authentic Yiddishkeit.

Reb Yeshayah was known as an outstanding masmid; he barely slept at night, due to his extreme love of Torah. Harav Yechezkel Banet attested that Reb Yeshayah would not sleep more than two hours a night, and even that not lying down.

Reb Yeshayah couldn’t tolerate anything less than the truth. This was plain in his rulings as Rav, in which he showed no fear of any member of the kehillah.

A few months before his petirah, Reb Yeshayah was chosen to be a member of a delegation to Vienna on behalf of his brethren. Among the other delegates were Harav Yehudah Assad and Harav Menachem Eisenstadt.

Reb Yeshayah was niftar on 19 Kislev 5625/1864 in Calev, and brought to kevurah there.

Zecher tzaddik livrachah.

November 22

In 1718, English pirate Edward Teach — better known as “Blackbeard” — was killed during a battle off present-day North Carolina.

In 1935, a flying boat, the China Clipper, took off from Alameda, Calif., carrying more than 100,000 pieces of mail on the first trans-Pacific airmail flight.

In 1943, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Chinese leader Chiang Kai-shek met in Cairo to discuss measures for defeating Japan.

In 1954, the Humane Society of the United States was incorporated as the National Humane Society.

In 1963, President John F. Kennedy was shot to death during a motorcade in Dallas; Texas Gov. John B. Connally, in the same open car as the president, was seriously wounded. A suspect, Lee Harvey Oswald, was arrested.

In 1967, the U.N. Security Council approved Resolution 242, which called for Israel to withdraw from territories it had captured the previous June, and implicitly called on adversaries to recognize Israel’s right to exist.

In 1975, Juan Carlos was proclaimed King of Spain.

In 1990, British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, having failed to win re-election of the Conservative Party leadership on the first ballot, announced her resignation.