Baruch Sorotzkin

Rephoel Baruch Sorotzkin (February 5, 1917 – February 10, 1979) was the Rosh Yeshiva (dean) of the Telz Yeshiva in Cleveland.

He was born on February 5, 1917 (13th of Shevat, 5677) in Zhetl, in the Grodno Governorate of the Russian Empire (present-day Belarus). His father, Rabbi Zalman Sorotzkin was the town's rabbi. As a young man, Sorotzkin studied under Rabbi Elchonon Wasserman in the Baranovich Yeshiva, and then under Rabbi Baruch Ber Lebovitz in Kamenitz.

In 1940, Rabbi Boruch Sorotzkin married Rochel Bloch, daughter of the Telzer Rav and Rosh Yeshiva, Rabbi Avraham Yitzchak Bloch.

Sorotzkin was involved in the "tension" over visas needed to flee: the two factions were "those from Lithuanian versus Polish Yeshivot;" control of the Kobe committee was by "students from the Polish yeshivot." The rabbi and his wife fled Europe at the start of World War II, via Shanghai, and made their way to the United States. There, they joined his wife's uncles (and his own cousins) Rabbi Eliyahu Meir Bloch and Rabbi Chaim Mordechai Katz who had re-established the Telz Yeshiva in Cleveland, Ohio.

Teaching In 1943 Sorotzkin began delivering classes in the yeshiva. In 1953 Sorotzkin was appointed associate dean of the yeshiva.

In 1962 Sorotzkin became dangerously ill and the name Rephoel was added to his name. and Yisrael Sorotzkin, rosh yeshiva in Lomza and Av Beit Din in Petah Tikva.

His sons include Rabbi Yitzchok Sorotzkin, dean of the Telz Yeshiva and Mesivta of Lakewood, New Jersey.

Many of his lectures on Talmud were posthumously published by his children under the title Sefer Habinah V’habrachah.