Mattisyahu Strashun (1817–1885) personified the intellectual environment of 19^th-century Vilna, the “Jerusalem of Lithuania”

Title: The Library Legacy of Vilna

Location: Vilna

Document: Strashun Library Inventory List

Time: Unknown

Approximately three million books lay in the Offenbach Archival Depot by late 1945. Located just outside Frankfurt in the American occupation zone of postwar Germany, the massive warehouse of literary spoils gave silent testimony to the Nazi plunder of Jewish cultural assets, which they carried out with nearly the same zeal they had for exterminating the Jewish People. Among the tomes were nearly 25,000 volumes stolen from one of the most prestigious Judaic collections of prewar Europe, the Strashun Library of Vilna.

Mattisyahu Strashun (1817–1885) personified the intellectual environment of 19^th-century Vilna, the “Jerusalem of Lithuania.” Born into a wealthy and scholarly family, his father was Rav Shmuel Strashun (1793–1872) the Rashash, author of one of the most widely studied commentaries on Shas. Mattisyahu Strashun emerged as both a respected talmid chacham and a scholar of general literature and the sciences, with proficiencies in Polish, Russian, Greek, and Latin.

His crowning achievement and legacy had its roots in his lifelong passion as an avid book collector. Throughout his travels, he researched and purchased valuable manuscripts, incunabula, first prints, and rare books. In addition to all traditional seforim, his personal library included unpublished manuscripts by his father and the Vilna Gaon; rare rabbinic responsa; works on philosophy, medicine, world history, poetry, religion, and grammar; and translated works.

As he left no heirs, his primary concern when nearing his passing was the fate of the nearly 7,000 works in his extraordinary collection. His will and testament stipulated that the library would become the property of the Jewish community of Vilna, accessible to the public free of charge. He also designated a portion of his assets to establish an endowment, which would fund the upkeep and expansion of the library, as well as its operations.

After his passing, the Vilna Jewish communal council duly executed his will, and the Strashun Library formally opened to the public in 1892. Three years earlier, in 1889, a catalog of the collection’s contents was published in Berlin, titled Likutei Shoshanim. In a grand ceremony on Chol Hamoed Pesach 1902, the library moved into a spacious edifice of its own, situated in the shulhoif in front of the Vilna Great Synagogue.

With an impressive reading room seating 100 people, the library soon had 100,000 visitors per year. In order to maximize accessibility for rabbis, yeshivah students, scholars, and the general public, it was open seven days a week, with no writing allowed on Shabbos or Yom Tov. By 1940 the collection’s holdings had increased sevenfold, to over 50,000 works, making it one of the largest Jewish libraries in the world.

The most unique element of the Strashun Library was the diversity of its users. Talmidei chachamim perusing obscure halachic works sat side by side with scholars studying an array of general works; young and old, scholarly and unlettered, all found a place within the walls of the Strashun Library. It was a great equalizer, as the People of the Book all found a place in this great hall of books of all kinds.

In 1903, the library commissioned a Sefer Hazahav (Golden Book), which famous guests were asked to sign. Signatories eventually included Nathan Birnbaum, Marc Chagall, Sholem Aleichem, Baron David Gunzburg, Nochum Sokolow, and Chaim Nachman Bialik. Rabbinical figures included Rav Dovid’l Karliner (Friedman), Rav Chaim Ozer Grodzenski, and Rav Yosef Tzvi Carlebach. There is even a brief entry from 1925 recording the Chofetz Chaim’s visit to the library. (The guest book was lost during the war years).

As the central rabbinical leader of Vilna Jewry for over a half a century, Rav Chaim Ozer Grodzenski had the rare privilege of borrowing books from the library, which he did regularly. When the Imrei Emes of Gur, Rav Avraham Mordechai Alter, arrived in Vilna for a rabbinical conference in 1909, the owner of one of the greatest personal seforim collections and great lover of seforim included a visit to the Strashun Library on his itinerary. A young Rav Ruderman recalled visiting the library every time he was in Vilna; he would then proceed to Rav Chaim Ozer’s home, where the latter would ask him which unique seforim he had chanced upon in the library that day.

Though the Nazis attempted to loot the library of its contents during the Holocaust, some of its more valuable possessions were smuggled out in a daring operation by Jews in the Vilna Ghetto known as the Paper Brigade. As noted earlier, much of the remainder was discovered by the US military at the end of the war.

Beloved Librarian

The legendary librarian of the Strashun Library for nearly half a century was Chaykil Lunski. Hired in 1895 shortly after the library’s opening, he remained at his post until he was murdered by the Nazis in 1942. A scholar and poet in his own right, he published volumes of poetry, and concentrated especially on writing Jewish history, and on Vilna’s Jewish community. As the heart and soul of the library, he was remembered by its patrons as kind, wise, gentle, and always helpful to all visitors, sharing his vast knowledge of the library’s voluminous contents on every conceivable subject.

Community Leader

In addition to corresponding with rabbis and scholars across the spectrum, Mattisyahu Strashun authored and published hundreds of essays in Torah journals on a wide array of subjects. He was independently wealthy through his banking and commercial interests, which frequently brought him into close contact with Russian governmental authorities. He utilized those connections to intercede on behalf of Jewish interests.

He served on the board of Vilna’s Tzedakah Gedolah and other communal institutions, spearheaded pioneering educational initiatives, and was a generous philanthropist for a variety of causes. Strashun was a close friend of Rav Yaakov Dovid Willowski (the Ridbaz) and encouraged him to devote his life to a commentary on Talmud Yerushalmi, offering to pay a portion of the project’s expenses. Strashun died in 1885, long before the Ridbaz completed the classic work, and the Slutzker Rav was forced to travel to America to raise the necessary funds. The rest, as they say, is history.

6 Teves marks the yahrtzeit of Reb Mattisyahu Strashun

The research and writings of Dan Rabinowitz and Rabbi Dovid Kamenetsky were utilized in the preparation of this article. For more on the Strashun Library, see Dan Rabinowitz’s book, The Lost Library: The Legacy of Vilna’s Strashun Library in the Aftermath of the Holocaust (Brandeis University Press, 2018).

(Originally featured in Mishpacha, Issue 990)