Over seven decades after the Ruzhiner’s midnight ride from Russia to Austria, his descendants were to complete his journey
Ruzhin-Sadigura has been one of the most influential dynasties in the history of the chassidic movement. One of its defining features is its derech hamalchus — regal way. The magnificent courts established by Rav Yisrael Friedman — “der Heiliger Rizhiner” — and his descendants spread the chassidus across Ukraine, Galicia, and Romania throughout the 19th century.
Rav Yisrael Friedman was born into chassidic aristocracy in 1796, as a direct descendant of the Maggid of Mezritch and his son Rav Avraham Hamalach, as well as of Rav Nachum of Chernobyl. Orphaned as a young child, he rose to prominence after his elder brother’s passing, and assumed a position of leadership at the tender age of 17. After the passing of Rav Avraham Yehoshua Heschel, the Apter Rav, in 1825, Rav Yisrael — by now having settled in Ruzhin — was to become the dominant chassidic leader in the southwestern districts of the Pale of Settlement.
After his imprisonment by the czarist government on trumped-up charges, the Ruzhiner ultimately escaped across the border to Austria in 1842, where he settled in Sadigura. The Ruzhin dynasty flourished in its new home. The descendants of Rav Yisrael of Ruzhin built courts reflecting the regal way of their illustrious forebear. With multitudes of chassidim distributed over a wide geographical area that included Bukovina, Romania, and Galicia, the dynasty was to have a tremendous influence on chassidus for the next century and beyond.
Over seven decades after the Ruzhiner’s midnight ride from Russia to Austria, his descendants were to complete his journey. The mayhem of World War I brought the battlefield to the shtetls of Galicia and its environs. Czar Nicholas II was fighting the Austrian Habsburgs, and the great courts of the Sadigura branches were in the line of fire.
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