Last Wednesday night, the 18th of Shevat, a large thong,
headed by rabbonim, roshei yeshiva, admorim, dayanim
and public figures, accompanied the righteous Rebbetzin
Miriam Sofer, o"h, on her last earthly journey. She was
the wife of the Admor of Erloi, yibodel lechaim tovim
ve'aruchim, the rosh yeshiva and president of
Yeshivas Ohel Shimon, and a member of the presidium of the
Moetzes Gedolei HaTorah of Agudas Yisroel in Eretz Yisroel.
She was 75 years old at the time of her sudden
petirah.
Rebbetzin Sofer was born in Tzheilim, on the sixth of Nisan,
5684 (1924). Her father, R' Yaakov Palel, Hy'd, one of
the heads of that city's Jewish community, came from an
illustrious family and was a great-grandson, of R' Meir
Palel, the av beis din of Tat, who is mentioned a
number of times in the responsa of his mechutan, the
Chasam Sofer.
With the outbreak of the Holocaust, Rebbetzin Sofer was
trapped in the jaws of the Nazis. She was transferred from
camp to camp, and underwent all of the horrors of the period,
losing her entire family in Auschwitz. In Auschwitz she had
siyata diShmaya and was assigned to work in the
kitchen. Thus she was able, at great self-sacrifice, to
provide her parents with nourishment while they were in the
camp.
Nonetheless, she and her sister were the only ones of the
family to survive. After the liberation, she married the
gaavad of Erloi, and from that time until her last
day, she assisted him in all of his efforts to spread Torah
and Chassidus and to strengthen Yiddishkeit.
After their marriage, the couple resided in the city of
Erloi, where her husband assembled survivors of the death
camps and continued to the perpetuate the legacy of his
sacred fathers, leading the community and presiding as its
rav. In 5706, he founded a yeshiva for refugees in the city
of Pest.
When the yeshiva was transferred to Erloi, the rebbetzin
served as its mother. Nearly all of the bnei yeshiva
were orphans: Holocaust survivors, broken in body and spirit.
As their merciful mother, she was a source of succor and
strength to them, while her illustrious husband was their
father.
She and her husband arrived in Eretz Yisroel in Elul
5710 (1950) and settled in the Katamon neighborhood of
Yerushalayim. For the first three years, the newly
established yeshiva was located in their home, where the
students actually slept. Her husband delivered shiurim
and inspired them to grow in ruchniyus, while she
assumed the burden of the yeshiva's material upkeep, even
cooking the students' meals. There, too, she became their
mother.
Later, after the yeshiva grew and moved to new, spacious
quarters, the Rebbetzin continued to supervise each student's
needs. She was an especially pious woman, who was known for
the emotion-filled prayers she recited three times a day.
With profuse tears, she would pray for the sick, for the
welfare of the yeshiva students and for her offspring. She
would rise early in the morning in order to daven in
the ezras noshim, and often even before a
minyan had assembled, she was already in her place.
She was outstanding in her acts of chessed and
bikur cholim, and made certain that gedolei
haTorah and other people who lived alone lacked
nothing.
She was cherished by her family and was a model of mesiras
nefesh toward her husband. She devoted her entire life to
him, and attended to the needs of her children, grandchildren
and great-grandchildren with outstanding kindness and
devotion.
On Wednesday, while in Tiveriya for medical reasons, she
suffered a sudden heart arrest. Her levaya proceeded
from the study hall of the Ohel Shimon-Erloi yeshiva in
Katamon, where her bier was accompanied by hundreds of bereft
students and avreichim.
A bitter hesped was delivered by her husband, the
gaavad of Erloi, who bitterly wept the great loss, and
referred to her as a genuine eishes chayil, praising
her unique concern for the yeshiva and her many activities on
behalf of Torah.
Afterward, hespedim were delivered by her illustrious
son, and, in the name of the yeshiva students, by R' Shlomo
Weinberger, the rav of Tshaba.
She was buried on Har Hamenuchos near the grave the Admor of
Belz, R' Aharon Rokach. Her son, R' Moshe, who had arrived
from London, delivered a stirring hesped.
She is survived by her sons, R' Moshe, a rav and ram
in London; R' Yaakov, the rav of the Ksav Sofer community of
Katamon; R' Avrohom Shmuel Binyomin, the rosh yeshiva
of Ohel Shimon-Erloi; R' Shimon, a rosh mesivta in the
Erloi yeshiva; R' Akiva Menachem, a rav in the beis
medrash Yad Sofer of Bnei Brak; R' Zalman, a rav in the
Yad Sofer beis medrash of Boro Park; R' Aharon, the
rosh kollel of Yad Sofer of Bnei Brak, and by
grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
