Pinchas David Horowitz

Rabbi Pinchas David Horowitz, (1876 – November 28, 1941) was a Hasidic rebbe and the founder of the Boston Hasidic dynasty, one of the first Hasidic courts in America.

Biography

Born in Jerusalem, he was sent as a representative and arbitrator by the Jerusalem community to Russia in an important European rabbinic dispute. The outbreak of World War I prevented his return to Palestine. In 1915 he went to Boston to collect tzedakah and decided to stay in the city and become a Rebbe. He managed to attract a small group of followers but soon left Boston for New York. He became known for his love of his fellow Jew and his uncompromising adherence to the highest standards of rabbinic law. In the classic Chasidic tradition, he traveled to many Jewish communities throughout the northeast, spending special weekends infusing spirituality and Chasidic warmth in the lives of many Jews. Religious Jews from as far as San Francisco would travel to Boston to spend Sabbath and the holidays with their Rebbe (Chasidic leader). In 1939 Rabbi Pinchas D. Horowitz relocated his congregation to the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn, remaining there until his death on November 28, 1941.

Rabbi Horowitz's successors were his sons, Rabbi Moshe Horowitz, the Bostoner Rebbe of New York, and Rabbi Levi Yitzchok Horowitz, the Bostoner Rebbe of Boston and Har Nof, Jerusalem.