Yonasan Steif

Who was Yonasan Steif?

Rabbi Yonasan Steif was a senior dayan of Budapest, Hungary, before the Second World War, a man whom Rabbi Moshe Feinstein referred to as the gadol hador. He was a world-renowned posek and halachic authority.

He served as senior dayan together with Rabbi Israel Welcz. The Rosh Beth Din was Rabbi Efraim Fishel Zussman Sofer. While Rabbi Steif may have assumed the role of rosh beth din as the year 1944 approached, he was not such for most of his tenure.

Rabbi Steif was rescued from death in the Holocaust in 1944 as a result of a deal between Rudolph Kastner, and a deputy of Adolf Eichmann. He journeyed on a special train bound for neutral Switzerland along with other prominent Jews including the Satmar Rebbe, Rabbi Joel Teitelbaum; the Debreciner Rov, Rabbi Moshe Stern; and Adolph Deutsch, head of the Budapest branch of Agudath Israel.

He and his wife Bluma had 2 children; a son named Tzvi Yehuda and a daughter named Esther Shulamis. His son died in the Holocaust together with his young son Aron while trying to escape the Nazis. The rest of his family, including his wife, his daughter-in-law Breindel with her two other sons and his daughter Esther with her 2 young sons were rescued with Rabbi Steif, on the Kastner train. His son-in-law Aron Bleier was in the concentration camps at the time but miraculously survived and was re-united with the family after the war. A third son was born to them in 1950.