This Day In History 25 Elul/September 28

First day of Creation, “In the beginning Hashem created the heaven and the earth” (Bereishis 1:1). (According to Rabi Eliezer in Rosh Hashanah 10:2; according to Rabi Yehoshua it was on 25 Adar.)

In 3428/333 B.C.E., Nechemiah completed the rebuilding of the walls of Yerushalayim which had been in ruins since the destruction of the First Beis Hamikdash 88 years earlier, as related in Nechemiah (Perek 6).

Yahrtzeiten

3862/102 C.E., the Tanna Rabi Elazar, zt”l, son of Rabi Shimon bar Yochai. (There is some disagreement about this date.)

5661/1901, Harav Aharon Abuchatzeira, zt”l

5665/1904, Harav Dovid Halberstam of Kshanov, zt”l

5542/1782, Harav Yechiel Michel of Zlotchov, Zy”a

Harav Yechiel Michel was the son of Harav Yitzchak of Drohovitch. He was born in 5486/1726.

From his youth, he showed signs of greatness. Rav Yechiel Michel was one of the inner group of Chassidim of the Baal Shem Tov, whom he accepted as his Rebbe. After the petirah of the Baal Shem Tov, Rav Yechiel Michel traveled to the Maggid of Mezeritch, zy”a.

Although he was a Chassid of the Maggid, Rav Yechiel Michel conducted his own tisch. Rav Yechiel Michel is considered one of the foremost disseminators of Chassidus in Galicia. Due to disputes with the misnagdim, Rav Yechiel Michel was forced to leave Brody, Galicia, settling in Zlotchov. Later he moved to Kolki and then to Yampol in Volyn.

He was a talented baal menagen. One of the niggunim he composed became famous as the Zlotchover Niggun because of what took place at the deathbed of his Rebbe, the Baal Shem Tov.

As the family gathered around the Baal Shem Tov for the final moments of his life, he asked the Zlotchover Maggid to sing a niggun. Hearing it, the Baal Shem Tov promised that whenever that niggun is sung here in this world, he would hear it and try to help from the World to Come.

That niggun is sung at all Zhviller family occasions, the Yamim Nora’im and at shalosh seudos, because the Zlotchover Maggid was niftar then.

He called his five sons “the five Chumashim.” They were Reb Yosef of Yampol, Reb Yitzchak of Radvil, Reb Zev of Zbarazh, Reb Moshe of Zhvil, and Reb Mordechai of Kremenitz.

He was niftar on 25 Elul 5542/1782.

Zechuso yagen aleinu.

Sept. 28

In 1066, William the Conqueror invaded England to claim the English throne.

In 1542, Portuguese navigator Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo arrived at present-day San Diego.

In 1850, flogging was abolished as a form of punishment in the U.S. Navy.

In 1928, Scottish medical researcher Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin, the first effective antibiotic.