The Steipler was born in Hornesteipel in 1899 after his father, Rav Chaim Peretz, a sixty-year-old widower, received a beracha from the Hornesteipel Rebbe, a son-in-law of Rav Chaim of Sanz (Divrei Chaim), that if he remarried he would be zocheh to (merit) a son, after having only daughters. His father was a shochet, a great masmid and yerei shomayim, and his young mother a great Tzaddeikes. Together they had three sons, the oldest being Rav Yaakov Yisrael. In his youth, Rav Yaakov Yisrael contracted life-threatening typhus, and, although he survived, it caused permanent damage to his hearing.
After learning Torah from his father in his early years, at age ten his father sent him to Kremenchug to learn in a Talmud Torah organized by talmidim of Yeshivas Slabodka. A year later, his father was niftar. Yaakov Yisrael was called home to be with his broken mother, but when a contingent from Yeshivas Novardok came to the town to recruit on behalf of the Alter of Novardok, Rav Yosef Yoizel Horowitz, his mother jumped at the opportunity to send her eleven-year-old son away from poverty to a place where he could fulfill his only dream of learning Torah and be provided with food at the same time.
At age nineteen, Rav Yaakov Yisrael was sent to Rogatchov to open a branch in the Novardok network of Yeshivos, which spanned Russia. It was during this time that he was drafted into the Russian Army to fight in the Bolshevik Revolution. Many stories exist regarding his unyielding determination to keep the mitzvos.
After he was freed from the army, the situation in Russia for the Jews deteriorated to the point where talmidim were sneaking across the border on a steady basis. This was a very dangerous undertaking and being caught could be fatal. When Rav Yaakov Yisrael's turn came, they were to be smuggled by a farmer who divided up the group among various family members. Rav Yaakov Yisrael was sent with the farmer’s daughter. Worrying about Yichud (the issur of being alone with her), he ran away, straight into the arms of the Russians. He was jailed but soon managed to escape.
On his next attempt, he needed to stop to relieve himself. Despite the fact that he could have waited until he crossed and his group refused to wait, he broke off from his group and missed his turn, not wanting to violate the aveira of Bal Teshaktzu. During his next attempt, it was Mincha time and he didn't want to miss the Z’man. He went to a quiet place in the forest to daven and spent much time speaking to his Creator, oblivious to the whole world; when he finished, he realized his group had long gone. Lost in the forest, he started wandering until he found himself next to a Bais Medrash. When he asked someone where he was, they told him he was in Slutzk, Poland. He had finally made it across the border!
From there, he went to learn in Bialystok under Rav Avrohom Yoffen, a son-in-law of the Alter. He published his first sefer in 1924, at which point word of his greatness in Torah spread. The Chazon Ish, who was then already in Bnei Brak, suggested Rav Yaakov Yisrael as a match for his sister, after seeing his sefer Shaarei Tvuna that was published in 1925. Indeed, he eventually married her. He then went on to become Rosh Yeshiva in the Novardok branch in Pinsk. In 1934, he moved to Eretz Yisrael and settled in Bnei Brak, the town of his brother-in-law, the Chazon Ish.
The Steipler Gaon spent the rest of his life shunning the limelight, despite being the unofficial successor of his brother-in-law, the Chazon Ish, upon his petira in 1953. He spent most of his time in his modest surroundings learning Torah. Such greatness cannot be kept a secret, however, and an audience with him was priceless for the throngs who came to learn from him, ask him questions, seek his advice and receive his beracha. He was a role model of uncompromising determination in kiyum of each and every one of the Taryag (613) Mitzvos. His Torah is treasured by Bnei Torah across the globe. Most of all, his fiery image and example are forever etched in the forefront of our minds.
The Steipler Gaon returned his holy Neshoma to its Maker on the 23rd of Av, 5745/1985. It is said that 200,000 people attended his Levaya (funeral), the largest ever in Bnei Brak. Yehi Zichro Boruch!
