The Golden Age of the Lithuanian Yeshivas tells the story of the last chapter of Jewish rabbinical schools in Eastern Europe, from the eve of World War I to the outbreak of World War II.
The Lithuanian yeshiva established a rigorous standard for religious education in the early 1800s that persisted for over a century and continues to this day. Although dramatically reduced and forced into exile in Russia and Ukraine during World War I, the yeshivas survived the war, with yeshiva heads and older students forming the nucleus of the institutions. These scholars rehabilitated the yeshivas in their original locations and quickly returned to their regular activities. Moreover, they soon began to expand into areas now empty of yeshivas in lands occupied by Hasidic populations in Poland and even into the lands that would soon become Israel.
During the economic depression of the 1930s, students struggled for food and their leaders journeyed abroad in search for funding, bu
