Zelig Reuven Bengis - Rav in The Holy Land

Rav in The Holy Land

In 1932, after the death of Rabbi Yosef Chaim Sonnenfeld, Bengis was asked to become rosh av beit din (Ravad) - 2nd Chief Rabbi - of the Edah HaChareidis in Jerusalem. At that point, however, he declined the offer, since his rival there would be Rabbi Avraham Yitzchak Kook - a fellow student of the Netziv of Volozhin.

However, the leadership of the Edah repeated their offer in 1937. Since Rav Kook had died, Rabbi Bengis accepted the offer, and moved from Lithuania to Palestine - shortly before World War II broke out.

In 1947, he and Rabbi Yosef Tzvi Dushinsky, the Chief Rabbi - Gaavad - of the Edah, appeared before a United Nations commission which was to decide the future of the British Mandate of Palestine. They spoke against the establishment of a Jewish state there, requesting the UN to recognize Jerusalem as a holy city which should not be part of any state, but should be ruled by the UN itself as an international city. He also requested the commission to allow the immigration of homeless Jews who had survived the war in Europe.

When Rabbi Dushinsky died in 1948, Bengis succeeded him as govad of the Edah. Simultaneously, he also fulfilled the position of Rosh Yeshiva at Yeshivas Ohel Moshe, also in Jerusalem.

Bengis died on the 7th of Sivan, 5713 (21 May 1953). He was almost 90 years old, and had fulfilled rabbinical roles in Lithuania and Jerusalem for over 60 years. He was interred on Har HaMenuchot.