Yeshiva Rabbi Chaim Berlin

Yeshiva Rabbi Chaim Berlin was established in 1904 as Yeshiva Tiferes Bachurim in Brownsville, Brooklyn, by Jews who moved there from the Lower East Side of New York City,^[1] thus making it the oldest yeshiva in Kings County.^[2] At the suggestion of Meir Berlin (Bar-Ilan), it was renamed in 1914 for his brother, Chaim Berlin, Chief Rabbi of Moscow and later Jerusalem, and who had also served in Valozhyn, from where several of the yeshiva's founders came.^[1][3] Through the help of philanthropist Jacob Rutstein,^[4] in 1940 the yeshiva purchased the seven-story former Municipal Bank Building at Pitkin and Stone Avenues^[5] (now Mother Gaston Boulevard) in Brownsville.^[6]

The founding Rosh Yeshiva, Yaakov Moshe Shurkin, was given the task in 1936, by Shraga Feivel Mendlowitz and a group of Brownsville NY community leaders, to establish a Yeshiva high school & post high school Yeshiva (”Bais Medrash”) in the Brownsville neighborhood of Brooklyn, NY - a neighborhood of over 80,000 Jews. This new fledgling yeshiva was to be attached to a neighborhood elementary school named Yeshivas Rabbeinu Chaim Berlin (est. circa 1904,) with the new high school & bais medrash divisions to be named “Mesivta Rabbeinu Chaim Berlin.” (For the yeshiva elementary school’s first four decades, no person held the title of Rosh Yeshiva.)

In 1937, the Rosh Yeshiva Yaakov Moshe Shurkin learned that an acclaimed student of the Lithuanian yeshiva world, Yitzchok Hutner, had arrived in America. Shurkin, having taken notice of Hutner’s reputation as a genius, invited him to join the yeshiva’s faculty and oversee administrative affairs.

In 1942, with the yeshiva then having been established through a 3rd year post high school bais medrash, (Shurkin giving daily Talmudic lectures to those first 3 year post high school classes, and having hired 4 veteran Talmudic scholars to teach the high school grades,) Hutner entered the study hall and told Shurkin how he will now also give talmudic lectures and they will be to 4th year and higher post high school students, effectively a higher position than that of Shurkin’s. With Hutner’s powerful personality and Shurkin’s ultimate humility, Shurkin acquiesced, and Hutner began giving his own monthly lectures to those older students as rosh yeshiva from 1943 to 1980. Shurkin continued his daily teaching until his passing in 1963.

In the late 1970s, a branch was opened in Jerusalem called Yeshiva Pachad Yitzchok (Fear of Isaac) "Pachad Yitzchok" being the title of Hutner's books.^[7]

After Hutner's death, the New York yeshiva was headed by his disciple Aaron Schechter, and the Jerusalem branch was headed by his son-in-law, Yonason David,^[7] who also serves nominally as co-head of the New York branch. When Schechter died in 2023, the leadership of the yeshiva passed to his son-in-law, Shlomo Halioua.^[8] Halioua died on 27 October 2024, after leading the yeshiva for only a year and a half.^[9] The leadership then passed jointly to Halioua's son Yosef Halioua and son-in-law Tzvi Fink.^[10]

The position of mashgiach ruchani (spiritual supervisor) has been held by (among others) Rabbis Avigdor Miller,^[11] Asher Zimmerman, Shlomo Freifeld,^[12] Shlomo Carlebach, Shimon Groner, and Mordechai Zelig Shechter (a son of Aaron). It has been vacant since the latter's passing in September 2023.

Chaim Berlin consists of a preschool, a yeshiva ketana (elementary school), a mesivta (high school), a college-level beth midrash, and Kollel Gur Aryeh, its post-graduate kollel division. Total enrollment for all divisions approaches 2,000 students.^[13] The mesivta acts as a feeder school for the beth midrash.^[14][15] For a time, while located in Far Rockaway,^[16] the mesivta was headed by Shlomo Freifeld.^[17]

The yeshiva maintains a summer location, Camp Morris, in Sullivan County, New York.^[18] The Yeshiva also runs a summer youth program in Brooklyn with the name Chaim Day Camp.

Notable alumni include many who served in rabbinic capacities throughout the world.

• Shalom Z. Berger (born 1960), Senior Content Editor of the Koren Talmud Bavli
• Shlomo Carlebach (1925–2022), former mashgiach ruchani of Yeshiva Rabbi Chaim Berlin^[19]
• Shlomo Carlebach (1925–1994), rabbi, religious teacher, spiritual leader, composer, and singer^[20]
• Yonasan Dovid David, co-rosh yeshiva of Yeshiva Rabbi Chaim Berlin
• Yaakov Feitman (born 1948), rabbi of Kehillas Bais Yehudah Tzvi, Cedarhurst, New York^[21]
• Aharon Feldman (born 1932), rosh yeshiva of Ner Israel Rabbinical College
• Shlomo Freifeld (1925–1990), founding rosh yeshiva of Yeshivas Shor Yoshuv^[17]
• David Weiss Halivni (1927–2022), rabbi and professor of Talmud^[22]
• David Hartman (1931–2013), American-Israeli rabbi and philosopher of contemporary Judaism, founder of the Shalom Hartman Institute.^[23]
• Yitzhak Aharon Korff (born 1949), Grand Rabbi of Zvhil-Mezbuz, Boston, and The Jerusalem Great Synagogue
• Simcha Krauss (1937–2022), retired rabbi of the Young Israel of Hillcrest, Queens, and leader of the Religious Zionists of America
• David Lefkowitz (1875–1955), chaplain United States Marines^{[citation needed]}
• Aharon Lichtenstein (1933–2015), rosh yeshiva of Yeshivat Har Etzion, Alon Shevut, and rosh kollel of Yeshiva University's Gruss Kollel, Jerusalem
• Yaakov Perlow (1931–2020), the Novominsker Rebbe of Borough Park^[24][25]
• Yechiel Perr (1935–2024), rosh yeshiva of Yeshiva of Far Rockaway
• Zvi Aryeh Rosenfeld (1922–1978), Polish–American rabbi and educator associated with the Breslov Hasidic movement
• Nota Schiller (1937–2025), rosh yeshiva of Ohr Somayach, Jerusalem
• Ahron Soloveichik (1917–2001), taught at Yeshiva University, Hebrew Theological College and Brisk Rabbinical College
• Pinchas Stolper (1931–2022), former Executive Vice-President of the Orthodox Union and founder of NCSY
• Noah Weinberg (1930–2009), co-founder of Yeshivas Ohr Somayach, Jerusalem; founder of Yeshivas Aish HaTorah
• Yaakov Weinberg (1923–1999), rosh yeshiva of Ner Israel Rabbinical College
• Yisroel Eliyahu Weintraub (1932–2010), rabbi

• Yeshiva Torah Vodaath – another yeshiva in Brooklyn
• RIETS