Yosef Shalom Eliashiv

Yosef Shalom Eliashiv was born in 1910 in Šiauliai

Elyashiv was born in 1910 in Šiauliai, the only child of his parents after 17 years of marriage. His maternal grandfather was the kabbalist Shlomo Elyashiv. As a boy he served as a scribe for his grandfather after the old man's eyesight weakened.

The family moved to the Land of Israel and settled in Meah Shearim in Jerusalem. There he studied Torah on his own in study halls and often consulted Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook. In 1930 he married Sheina Chaya, daughter of Rabbi Aryeh Levin, in a match arranged by Kook, and in 1938 he received rabbinic ordination.

In 1950 he was appointed a judge of the regional rabbinical court in Jerusalem, and later served on the Supreme Rabbinical Court until 1972. He left the court after Shlomo Goren became Chief Rabbi. He also served for many years as rabbi of the Tiferet Bachurim synagogue, where he gave a daily Talmud lesson.

In 1989 he joined the new Degel HaTorah party at the invitation of Rabbi Elazar Shach. After Shach's death he became the spiritual leader of the Lithuanian Haredi public in Israel. He died in Jerusalem in 2012, and about 250,000 people attended his funeral.