Sholom Klass

Rabbi Sholom Klass (1916–2000) was the co-founder, publisher and editor of The Jewish Press, a large Jewish circulation newspaper. He also authored Tales from our Gaonim[1] and the halachic work Responsa of Modern Judaism (3 volumes). Rabbi Klass received smicha (rabbinical ordination) from Yeshiva Torah Vodaas.[2] Prior to starting The Jewish Press, he was a co-publisher of The Brooklyn Daily[3] (now defunct).

Causes

He used The Jewish Press to support both what should seem obvious (Torah, Israel, Jewish civil rights)[4] and a range of causes that were not getting much publicity, from the Iggud Harabbonim (Rabbinical Alliance of America)[5] to matters dealing with honoring the power of Beis Din.

Legacy

His daughter's "Dear Dad",[6] written for his ninth yahrtzeit, contains examples of one of Rabbi Klass' major accomplishments: the popularization of the use of a dash in writing G-d's name, in English, as the normative form by Orthodox Jews.

He and Rabbi Meir Kahane, whom he hired, broke this barrier, the latter also expanding upon this in the books he authored.

Although Rabbi Klass turned over his halachic Questions & Answers column to his nephew Rabbi Yaakov Klass well before his death, one way in which the column affected worldwide Jewry was as the inspiration of the acronym AYLOR - Ask Your Local Orthodox Rabbi. [7][8] Some have attempted to change AYLOR by having "O" stand for "Ordained.".[9]

Rabbi Klass' point was that information in his column was meant to educate, not to provide an absolute ruling.

References

  1. ↑ http://lccn.loc.gov/67006223, LCCN 67006223, 1967, parts of which were serialized and reprinted in The Jewish Press
  2. ↑ The Jewish Week, Jan 21, 2000.
  3. ↑ Jews of Brooklyn, by Ilana Abramovitch, Sean Galvin, ISBN 1-58465-003-6, p. 287.
  4. ↑ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2009-04-14. Retrieved 2009-07-03.
  5. ↑ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2011-09-21. Retrieved 2009-07-03.
  6. ↑ http://www.jewishpress.com/content.cfm?contentid=37965&sContentid=1
  7. ↑ http://forums.torah.org/viewtopic.php?t=24853&start=75&sid=5df2fb594c005133119acbdc70fc5bb5%5Bpermanent+dead+link%5D
  8. ↑ http://www.ottmall.com/mj_ht_arch/v6/mj_v6i04.html, a British site
  9. ↑ http://www.plexoft.com/SBF/A12.html
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