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NEWS
Rebbetzin Zlata Malkoh Ginsburg, o"h
by A. Cohen

The roshei yeshiva of Yeshivas Ponovezh and other rabbonim and roshei yeshivos took part in the levaya of Rebbetzin Zlata Malkoh Ginsburg, o"h, the wife of the late rosh yeshiva of Yeshivas Mir of the U.S., HaRav Ephraim Mordechai Ginsburg and the daughter of the Mashgiach of Yeshivas Mir and Yeshivas Ponovezh, HaRav Yechezkel Levenstein, on erev Shabbos Parshas Korach. She was buried near her husband in the Zichron Meir Cemetery in Bnei Brak.

Rebbetzin Zlata Malkoh Ginsburg was born in Kelm on 7 Adar 5674 (1914). Her father R' Yechezkel was a talmid of the famed Talmud Torah of Kelm, and her mother Chayoh was the daughter of a local melamed.

At the end of the First World War HaRav Levenstein was summoned to Yeshivas Mir to serve as a temporary replacement for the mashgiach, HaRav Yeruchom Leibowitz zt"l until the latter's return after the dislocations of the War. R' Chatzkel moved to Poland, leaving his wife and two young daughters behind in Kelm for three years, during which the heads of the Talmud Torah in Kelm helped to educate the two girls. After HaRav Levenstein returned to Kelm he was summoned to Yeshivas Kletsk, where the family lived near the rosh yeshiva HaRav Aharon Kotler, zt"l.

Later the family left Kletsk for the town of Mir, where they lived near the yeshiva. There the deceased was married to R' Ephraim Mordechai Ginsburg, a talmid at the yeshiva and a talmid muvhok of the Brisker Rov zt"l. The latter said the Mashgiach had found a great lamdan and tzaddik to be his son-in-law. The Ginsburgs assisted the Mashgiach and his wife throughout the years.

When the yeshiva was displaced and roamed to Shanghai, Mrs. Ginsburg ventured out among the Chinese in search of special foods for the her father the Mashgiach. Her husband stood out for his exceptional ability and erudite Torah scholarship. In Shanghai he would present chaburos to the talmidim.

Upon arriving in the U.S. after the war in 5707 (1947) together with the Mashgiach and the talmidim of the yeshiva HaRav Ginsburg began to engage in harbotsas Torah. When the Mashgiach left the U.S. with his other son- in-law, HaRav Reuven Ginsburg, HaRav Avrohom Kalmanovitz asked HaRav Ephraim Mordechai to serve as a rosh yeshiva of Yeshivas Mir in the U.S. His assiduousness and greatness in Torah and mussar became known throughout the U.S. and he succeeded in harbotzas Torah for many years, together with his wife.

When her husband passed away in 5720 (1960) Rebbetzin Ginsburg assumed the task of raising her sons and daughters. With help from gedolei Yisroel, she succeeding in raising them to lives of Torah in the midst of American materialism. Despite the difficulty in parting from them she sent her sons to Yeshivas Ponovezh, where they were taken under the wings of the Mashgiach, who guided them along the path of Torah and mussar.

Until her last day the deceased maintained her mental clarity, guiding her grandchildren and great-grandchildren and urging them to perpetuate the ways of the greats of the previous generations. Many of the leading figures from Yeshivas Mir and her talmidim in Shanghai and the U.S. would come to her for her sagely advice and to hear her faithfully-rendered anecdotes and hanhogos of the greats from the previous generation.

A model of truth, modesty and simplicity, the deceased followed in her father's path of tzidkus. Toward the end of her life she asked to be eulogized by her sons alone out of a concern that other maspidim might make exaggerated remarks.

Rebbetzin Zlata Malkoh Ginsburg o"h is survived by her sons, HaRav Chaim Yeruchom, a ram at Yeshivas Lakewood, HaRav Eliezer, rosh kollel of Yeshivas Mir and rov of Beis Knesses Agudas Yisroel in Flatbush, HaRav Yisroel, rosh yeshiva of Yeshivas Staten Island, and HaRav Moshe, a ram at Yeshivas Mir LeTze'irim, as well as her sons-in- law, HaRav Avrohom Chaim Levine, rosh yeshiva of Yeshivas Telz-Chicago, and HaRav Zalman Rubin, a ram in New York.

 

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