;.l1,6,60,66,1,0,10,75,192,2,15,20,25,127,10,0,
=shnote1
From 

=am061195
FURTHER NOTES ON THE SHETL OF AMDUR
----------------------------------------------------------------
SHTETL OF AMDUR:  GEOGRAPHICAL NOTES

	Reference in Shetl Finder

Amdor, Indura; (Vav may be transliterated O or U; so Amdur=Amdor,and Indura=Indora.  However the first two letters seem to varybetween A-M  (Aleph-Mem) and I-N (Ayin(?)-Nun).  Hence Indora mayreflect a derivation of Amdur from Ein Dor .(my speculation -sa).
Can also be transliterated:  Indora
    Indura, S. of Grodno
Close to Grodno.  1897 - Jewish population was 2,194, 82% of totalpopulation.  1912 -- Ruben ben Shimeon HaCohen Katz, b. 1880,Olshani, Vilna District ["Gubornia"=district?], was rabbi here. Kagan, 481. [Source is Kagan 481?)
   from:  Shetl Finder, Diaspora Museum.

	Reference in Columbia Gazeteer:

Indura -- 1931 population 2650.
     W. Grodno oblast
     Belorussian SSR, 15 m. south of Grodno, near Polish border. Distilling, brewing.

Listing, probably from Where Once we Walked:  A Guide to JewishCommunited detroyed in the Holocaust, by Gary Mokotoff & SallyannAmdur Sack: 

Indura, Pol. (Amdor, Amdur); pop. 1,709; 62 km. NE of Bialystok;5327'/2353'
CAHJP, COH, GUM3, GUM5, HSL, HSL2, JGFF, LDL, SF
[I don't know what those abbreviations stand for
I don't know the date of population]

Apparently this is a summary bibliographic entry from  Jewishgeneology society index:              

Byel[orussia:] Indura
Amdur (1210)
Efron, Goldberg, Jaffe 1367 

Efron may be Yedidya Efron:  Amdur, mi Geboirn-Shtetl
I don't know what the other two references are.
---------------------------------------------------------------

Amdur, Amdursky
town Indura, Grodno
Yid. = Amdur , AMTER
[OK: Amter is a new variant spelling to me.
I'm still not clear which the Yiddish are:

Amdur (This is apparently the Yiddish; it is the only name Efronuses for the Shtetl in Amdur, Mi Geboirn-Shtetl. 
Hamdura (
[is Hamdura a variant of Indura?? -- which is the Russian??]
Not listed in the Encyclopedia Judaica
Listed in an old Jewish Encyclopedia, which I've not again found. R. Ben Zion Gold showed it to me at Harvard Hillel, in the 1970s;as I recall listed as Hamdura (but maybe Indura).
----------------------------------------------------------------

It is recorded as INDURA at the Yad v'Shem "Valley of DestroyedCommunities."                                                  
The Hebrew characters, which I assume are the Yiddish name, areAINDORaH:  Aleph-Yud-Nun-Dalet-Vav-Resh-Heh

------------------------------------------------------------------
.p
SHTETL OF AMDUR:  HISTORICAL NOTES:

In about 1800 it was the meeting-place of the 'Council of FourLands', the Jewish self-governing body.   That would have been arather important meeting.
[N.B.:  David Herzberg's translation from Amdur mi Pueblo Natalereads "Rabbi Reb Dovid [son of Rav Yisroel of Amdur] signed forthe first time the enactment of the Meeting of Amdur on the 6th ofShevat 1720] 

I have the following notes from a passage which Menachem Kallustranslated orally for me ca. 1987; I did not note title of thebook.  I am not sure that there was any further information aboutAmdur in that book.
l2

START TRANSLATION:

Amdur:  A city in Lithuania which was the place where the Councilof Lithuania met after it split from the Council of Four Lands on6th Shevat 1720.

Names of its rabbis:
(1) R. David ben R. Yisrael Zack, head of the Court of Zablodviand Bierz.  R. Yisrael was the son-in-law of the discourser andkabbalist R. Josef Yoska, who was the head of the Rabbinic Courtof Dubno.  R. David was the offical authorizer of the decreesissued at the Council of Amdur 16th Sevat 1720.

(2)  R. Shmuel, author of "The Responsa Shmuel".  Son of R. Josefben R. Shmuel, who wrote "Beit Shmuel", a commentary on theShulchan Aruch section pertaining to marriage and divorce, whopassed away [my notes illegible -- sa] 1777 in the [city?] ofRackov, near Minsk.

(3)  R. Tuvya, and after he left Amdur he was appointed the headof the Jewish court in the city of Metz in the province of Tiktin.

(4)  R. Hayim Heikel from the school of Ger and Kotsky.      

END TRANSLATION

Notes:  Grodno Gibornia (Country, District) was part of Russiafrom 1795-1914.  It was was part of the Pale [area to which Jewswere restricted] from 1835-1917.  
1940:  Soviet occupation of Lithuania.                             ---------------------------------------------------------------
.P
BIBLIOGRAPHIC NOTES

Notes on Masha Greenberg, The Jews of Lithuania:  A history of aremarkable community, 1316-1945.  Gefen Publishing House,Jerusalem, 1995;  Gefen Books, POB 6056, Jerusalem 91060; GefenBooks 12 New St., Hewlett, NY 11447.  Printed in Israel. Available from Jerusalem Post Books, about $30.  pp405.
Reviewed, Jerusalem Post, 12 MAY 1995 (Cecil Bloom)
Index gives no references to Amdur.
Grodno is generally given as Gardinas.
I'm sure this is a good general introduction, but I don't thinkone could call it a professional nor scholarly work.
                                                                  
  			
.P
NOTES ON EMIGRATION TO ISRAEL FROM LITHUANIA, PARTICULARLY FROMTHE VILNA-GRODNO REGION

In 1747, 1764, and 1772 (about 300 persons), groups of hasidimcame from Lithuania to Israel, settling in Jerusalem, Hebron, andTiberias.  Groups of followers of the Vilna Gaon came 1808, 1809,and 1810.  Most settled in Jerusalem and Zfat; when Zfat wasdevestated by an earthquake in 1837, they moved to Jerusalem.  MeaShe'arim became a center for them.
[COMMENT: So we could have distant relatives all over Israel.  Andif one knows the precise date of immigration to Israel, and placeof settlement, one might know the hasidic/mitnoged affiliation.]


Hebron yeshiva:
R. Moshe Modechai Epstein directed the Slobodka yeshiva 1896-1933,and gave it a strongly musar character.  In 1925 a branch of theSlobodka yeshiva was opened in Hebron, under R. Moshe Finkel, "sonof the founder" , with an enrollment over 150, 25 of whom werekilled in the 1929 riots.  The yeshiva then moved to Jerusalem,and has since been known as the Hebron yeshiva.  [I gather it isstill flourishing in Jerusalem.]
[COMMENT:  This makes it likely that there were people named Amdurin Hebron prior to 1929, as I had been told by someone I metcasually on a street in Jerusalem, shortly after I first arrivedin Israel.]  In
---------------------------------------------------------------
.P
NOTES FOR POSSIBLE GENEOLOGIC FOLLOW-UP:

From =am060895

AMDUR'S IN OTHER DOROT TREES:

Tree #00102 is Sallyann Amdur Sack --
She is descended from Gedalyia ben Zalkin v. Malka
b. 1869, Braslaw, Vilna
d. 1919
Amdur, David b. Gedalyia v. Roehe, 1902, Polotsk
CHECK FOR REFERENCES TO THESE PEOPLE IN AMDUR, MI PUEBLO NATALE
------------------------------------------------------------------ AMDUR'S IN THE xUSSR:

During the High Holiday at the Old Synagogue on Rhodos, 1994, Imet a woman, an olah [immigrant to Israel]  from the Grodno area,who remarked that she knew of some Amdur 's &/or Amdur - ski's inthat region.  I neglected to take her name/address,
-----------------------------------------------------------------
.p
IV.  AMDUR HASSIDISM

Amdur Hassidism is the topic of Chapter 3 (pp121-143) of LithuaniaHasidism, by Wolf Zeev Rabinovitch, forward by Simon Dubnow,Schoken,,New York 1971, (Schoken, 1971; ISBN 0 853 03021 9), atranslation by M.B. Dagut (University College of Haifa) from theHebrew original, ,     (HaHasidit HaLitait)published by Moshe Bialik, Jerusalem.
Cf. esp. ppxi, xii, p33; 
Amdur hassidism was a branch of Lithuanian hasidism, especially inthe wake of the mitnaged bans of 1781.
I have a xerox of that chapter; pp.: 18 including author's notes

A brief summary of earlier references in this work to Amdurfollows:

	The shetls of Karlin and Amdur were in area of Grodno, theprinciple community.  Rabinowitsch regards Karlin hassidism andAmdur hassidism, in that order, as two of the three branches ofLithuanian hassidism.  There was bitter sectarian strife betweenmitnagim and hasidim for 30 years.   In 1781, in the face ofmitangid "bans and boycotts", Karlin and Amdur were "the refuge ofLithuanian hasidism."  

	R. Hayim-Heikel, a follower of R. Aharon of Karlin  andsubsequently( or simultaneously?)  of the Maggid of Mezritch,established a hasidic center in Amdur 1772-1773.  Rabinowitschremarks: "R. Hayim-Heikel's extreme and uncompromising antirabiism still further exacerbated therealtions between rabinismand hasidism in Lithuania." 
	R. Hayim-Heikel (d. 1787) was succeeded by his son, R. Shmuelof Amdur (active 1798) ; his other disciples are R. Shmuel ofRosh, and R. Moshe of Shershov.  Amdur hasidism did not continuethereafter; Rabinowitsch attributes that to mitnaged opposition.
                                  
That gives us then the following geneologic fragment for R. HayimHeikel of Amdur:
	Member of hevra kadisha, 1768; also melamed
	1772-1773:  established hasidic center in Amdur 
	d. 1787
	Son:  R. Shmuel of Amdur, active 1798
	Son-in-law:  R. Nathan of Makov
	Great-grandson active in Jerusalem, re-published Hayimv'Hesed, date not given.  The volume I saw (from R. Joel Glock)appeared to be fairly recent, at least 1950s or later.

.p

R. HAYIM HEIKEL OF AMDUR: Teachings

Distinguished figures associated with the shtetl of AMDUR include 
Reb Hayim Heikel of Amdur ("the Amdurer"), author of the 18thcentury kabbalistic book Chaim v'Hesed, republished in Israel.  
(First edition Warsaw 1891; published in Jerusalem (no date givenby Rabonowitsch, loc. cit.)) with an introduction by the author'sgreat-great grandson.    Prior to first publication the manuscripthas been preserved in the archives of R. Aharon the Second inStolin (Karlin hasidim).
Hayim v'Hesed is a kabbalistic work that could only be translatedby a specialist.

Rabinowitsch notes "In 1768, about 2 years after the influence ofhasidism had beun to make itself felt in Lithuania, his nameappears in the Amdur communal register as an ordinary member ofthe Hevra Kaddisha."  


Martin Buber mentions him in his book Hassidic Masters, and RabbiZalman Schacter translated a short selection from his writings inFragments for a Future Scroll.

I have found one reference to him in transcripts by R. ShlomoCarlebach, who seems familiar with his work.

As a disciple of the Maggid of Mezritch, he is mentioned inpassing in Yitzchak Dorfman, The Maggid of Mezritch (Targum Press,22700 W. Eleven Mile Rd., Southfield, Mich 48034; 1989.)
In Lithuanian Hasidism (cited above), Rabinowitsch notes that hewas also a disciple of R.Aharon the Great of Karlin, notes that hehad "in his youth been a hazan in Karlin", and speaks of his"extreme and uncompromising anti-rabinism' -- apparently criticalof the rabbinic method of Talmudic study.  His son was R. Shmuel,who is also referred to a a tzadik; his disciples are listed as R.Shmuel of Rosh, adn R. Moshe of Sherpshov.
	It may be that some at the hassidim at the Karliner shul inTiberias (on the waterfront promenade) would know of him.   

Kaplan, The Hasidic Anthology (Arononson, 1987) lists him as adisciple of the Mezritzer, and gives his date as d. 1787, with thefollowing quote, which Kaplan references to Mazkereth ShemhaGedolim, by M.S. Keinman, Piotrkov, 1908 (Hebrew)

l2
"Said Rabbi Hayyim Heikel Amdurer:  We read, 'How shall Jacobstand, for he is small.'  (Amos 7.2).  The teaches us thefollowing lesson.  If Jacob posses the knowlege that he is small,and if he subdues any sense of self-importance, he will stand. For the LORD will repay him in the same measure, and makingHIMself small, HE will provide for him as for a son.  But if Jacobholds his head high and forgets meekness, Providence too, willhold back HIS abundance on high."
.p



