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Rabbi Daniel Hirtzke Frisch – 
Baal H’Matuk M’Dvash

(11/1/1935-24/1/2005)

The Zohar mentions in Parshas Vayera that “in the 600 year of the sixth millennium (Hebrew year of 5600) the gates of wisdom on high and the wellsprings of wisdom below will open and the world will be prepared in the seventh millennium (for the final red redemption) in the same manner in which a man prepares for Shabbos on a Friday afternoon”. The Hebrew year of 5600 roughly corresponds to the secular calendar year of 1839. Both Kol HaTor says in the name of the Vilna Gaon at the revelation of wisdom mentioned in the Zohar refers both to secular earthly knowledge and heavenly Torah knowledge. Rabbi Menachem Mendel of Lubavitch, the Tzemach Tzedek, in Derech Mitzvotecha says that this refers to the esoteric Torah teachings spread by the Baal Shem Tov that prepare the world for the times of the Mesiah. The increase in revelation of the hidden esoteric teachings of the Torah will come to strengthen Jews in the times of great spiritual darkness that lead up to the final redemption.

Anyone thinking about gates of wisdom opening and the city of Leiden will probably think of the great research institutes the city has and its famous university – in which many new inventions and developments have seen their first light. But where are the esoteric teachings in Leiden which isn’t famous even a little bit for esoteric Torah studies yet we know from quite a few commentaries that these two will go together.

What is much less known is that a young boy by the name of Daniel Frisch, who was destined to enlighten the eyes of the Jewish people with one the most popular contemporary commentary on the Zohar, would open that same holy book for the first time somewhere in a small corner of the Leiden Synagogue…

Nanash
The town of Nanash, Hujdunanas  is know to have had a very big Jewish history. It was the hometown of the two famous Chassidic Rebbes. 
Reb Yoseph Nanasher and Reb Michael Nanasher who moved there to learn by Rabbi Yitzchak Aizik Taub of Kaliv who arrived in Nanash about
50 years before the 1st world war.

The men of the town were known to spend their evenings engrossed in Jewish studies in the local Beis Midrash. Besides the synagogue it had it’s own Jewish schools and a Yeshiva. From 1862 till 1898 it was led by Rabbi Ephraim Hershel Sofer, one of the last students of Rabbi Moshe Sofer, also know as the Chatam Sofer of Pressburg (German for Bratislava, the capital city of Slovenia) and it always remained a town very loyal to it’s Jewish heritage.

Rabbi Daniel Frisch was born unto Naftali Hirtzka Frisch and Sarah Beker in the year 1935. The story goes that even before he was born his maternal greatgrandfather Daniel Palatshek called in the mother, his granddaughter, and told her that “My life on this earth is about to come to an end. In another few months I’ll have to part from you and depart as do all men. In that same period a boy will be born unto you, he’s have a very high soul that will enlighten the eyes and hearts of the Jewish people. My request from you is to give your son the name “Daniel” which will be a great kindness for him!” Sure enough long afterwards grandfather passed away after which a young boy was born and so she named the boy after her grandfather: Daniel. Little Daniel was orphaned from his mother at age 3 after which his father remarried Freidel (Adler) .

Rabbi Frisch was known for his piety already at a young age, as per government degree all young children in Nanash had to learn secular
studies and even though he’d refuse to do so and would read Jewish books under his table, he was nevertheless able to answer questions 
by the teacher who’d try to publicly embarrass him for not paying attention.

To be continued

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