Levi Yitzchak Schneerson

He was the father of the seventh and last Chabad-Lubavitch Rebbe , Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson .¹ Schneerson was born on the 18th day of Nissan, 5638 (1878) in the town of Podrovnah (near Gomel) to Rabbi Baruch Schneur and Zelda Rachel Schneerson . His great-great grandfather was the third Chabad Rebbe, Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneersohn of Lubavitch . In 1900, Levi Yitzchak married Chana Yanovski , whose father, Rabbi Meir Shlomo , was the Rabbi of the Ukrainian city of Nikolaiev . In 1902, their eldest son, Menachem Mendel was born. He was later to become the Rebbe of Lubavitch . Schneerson lived in Nikolaiev until 1909, when he was appointed to serve as the Rabbi of Yekatrinoslav . In 1939 he was arrested by the communist regime for his fearless stance against the Party's efforts to eradicate Jewish learning and practice in the Soviet Union . After more than a year of torture and interrogations in Stalin 's prisons, he was sentenced to exile to a remote village Chiali in Kazakhstan . Shortly before his death, Levi Yitzchak was able to move to Almaty , where he was warmly welcomed by the small Lubavitcher community . There he died in 1944. Rabbi Levi Yitzchak was buried at a cemetery in Alamty. Very close to the cemetery a Chabad Lubavitch synagogue has been built, and is named in his honour. Schneerson was a distinguished Kabbalist . Some of his writings have been published under the name Likkutei Levi Yitschok . Most of it, however, was burned or confiscated by the Soviet authorities, and has yet to be returned to the Chabad movement.²