Chaim Kanievsky

Chaim Kanievsky was born in 1928 in Pinsk

Kanievsky was born in 1928 in Pinsk, then part of Poland. He was the eldest son of Yaakov Yisrael Kanievsky and Pesha Miriam, sister of Avrohom Yeshaya Karelitz. In 1934 the family moved to Mandatory Palestine and settled in Bnei Brak.

He studied at Tiferet Zion yeshiva in Bnei Brak and briefly at his father's Beit Yosef yeshiva. He then moved to Lomza Yeshiva in Petah Tikva, led by Reuven Katz, where Elazar Shach was among his teachers. During the 1948 war he was assigned to guard duty as a student.

In 1951 he married Batsheva Esther, daughter of Yosef Shalom Elyashiv. The couple settled in Bnei Brak, where he studied for decades at the kollel later named Kollel Chazon Ish. In the late 1970s he edited the Tevuna commentary on the Jerusalem Talmud.

His public role began with the founding of the Degel HaTorah party in 1988. After the death of Aharon Leib Shteinman in 2017, he led the Litvak community alongside Gershon Edelstein. He issued rulings on many subjects, including smartphones and the reporting of child abuse to the police.

He died of cardiac arrest at his home on March 18, 2022. Israel Police estimated that around 500,000 people attended his funeral in Bnei Brak.