Rebbeitzin Shula Kazen

Revered for her fiery personality and rock-solid faith forged during a childhood in the former Soviet Union, Rebbetzin Shula Shifra Kazen nourished, guided, and inspired thousands during decades of communal leadership in Cleveland, Ohio.

She was born in 1922 in Gomel, Belarus, then part of the newly created Soviet Union. The eldest of seven children born to Rabbi Yitzchak Elchanan and Maryasha (Garelik) Shagalov, her life began under difficult circumstances. Russia had been devastated by the terrible civil war that birthed the Bolshevik revolution, and thousands were dying of starvation.

When the family hungered for bread, Maryasha told her daughter Shula to recite Tehillim – Psalms with concentration, and the day would come when they would have more than enough food. Shula prized saying Tehillim, something that would sustain and encourage her for the rest of her long life. She passed this on to her own children and spiritual children.

By law, all children were required to attend public school, where Communist ideals were taught. Determined to raise their family according to Jewish law and tradition, the Shagalovs refused to send their children to the public schools. Eventually, the large family became known to the government, which revoked their rations of food and fuel, and even had them evicted from their home onto the winter freezing weather with no place to live.

The Shagalovs moved into the local synagogue, where Elchanan continued battling for Jewish life, which included serving as mohel (circumciser). He was often accompanied by Shula, who assisted him in his sacred (and illegal) task. Most of the time he would walk at night to be undetected and take his eldest daughter along. He taught her not to be afraid but to rely on G-d alone.In 1937, he was arrested for illegal activities in support of Judaism for the last time. Years later it was learned that he was executed three months after his arrest, but his widow and orphans were left wondering about his fate for decades Facing an unrelenting barrage of pressure from the Communist government, Maryasha had no choice but to send her children into hiding. As the eldest, 14-year-old Shula took a 12-hour trip to the home of Rabbi Bentzion (Bentche) and Esther Golda Shemtov, pillars of the underground Chabad-Lubavitch network of Jewish life.

The Shemtovs sent her to Moscow, where she found work in a knitting factory that Bentzion Shemtov had arranged. It was one of the few places where people could find legal employment that did not require them to work on Shabbat.

Her job was to carry hundred-pound bags of material on her back from the supplier to the factory. After the material was made into scarves or other headgear, Shula would carry it to the buyer, who would pay her. Shula helped support her mother and younger siblings with her earnings.

Shortly after she turned 18, Shula was introduced to her future husband, Zalman Katzenelenbogen (later shortened to Kazen). Like her, he, too, remained steadfast in his observance of Judaism in his youth by attending underground Chabad yeshiva (Torah schools). He had also lost his father to the Communists in the dreadful purge of the fall of 1937.

Shula did not have a single decent outfit in which to meet her future husband. One friend loaned her stockings, another a shawl, a third one a coat, and somehow, she was able to obtain boots. The only thing she owned was a dress and a coat that “grew” with her. She received the coat at age ten, refitted it countless times, and wore it up to her wedding. For her wedding, a friend sewed her a white dress made of inexpensive fabric.

The wedding was held on 12 Elul, 1940, in a forest at the edge of Malachovka, outside of Moscow. Any religious ceremony was punishable by imprisonment or death, including a traditional Jewish wedding, so it had to take place in complete secrecy with but a quorum of ten to make the necessary minyan. The wedding repast consisted of home baked cake and drink. After their wedding, Shula and Zalman settled in Leningrad.

To read the full story of this remarkable woman please order: The Queen of Cleveland by Henya Laine, available on Amazon or your Jewish bookstore.