Shalom haLevi Rozenfeld

Shalom haLevi Rozenfeld, known as Rabbi Shalom of Kaminka (1800–1851), was a Galician scholar in Hasidic Judaism known as a zaddik and kabbalist.^[1] His sayings or lessons often appear in collected works of Hasidic stories or tales.^[2] He was the rabbi and Av Beit Din^[3] in Novyi Yarychiv and in Kamianka-Buzka; both were located in the Austro-Hungarian province of Galicia not far from Lviv.^[4][5][6][7]

Rozenfeld was born in 1800.

As a young man, he was a student in Torah of Rabbi Shlomo Kluger and in Kabbalah and Hasidism he was a disciple of Rabbi Naftali of Ropshitz.^[8][9] After the latter’s death in 1827, he became a disciple in Kabbalah and Hasidism of Rabbi Sholom Rokeach of Belz.^[6][10][11] Additionally, he was a disciple in Kabbalah and Hasidism of Rabbi Tzvi Hirsh of Zidichov. He was a close friend of Rabbi Chaim Halberstam of Sanz.^[3][7]

He wrote many chidushim on the Torah but preferred that they not be printed.^[3]

He died in his early fifties in 1851. Because this was a relatively young age for religious scholars in that time, he never served as a rebbe, although his contemporaries held him in great esteem.^[7]

His only son, Joshua (1830–1897), succeeded him as Rabbi of Kamianka-Buzka after his death. Rabbi Joshua was very stringent in his observances.^[12]