
Rav
Avraham Sternhartz ("
Kokhav Lev") was recognized as the outstanding Breslev
elder of his generation. Among his disciples were many of the major Breslev
leaders of the past three decades. A great-grandson of Reb Noson Sternhartz, Rebbe Nachman's
foremost disciple, and a grandson of the Tcheriner Rav - Reb Nachman Goldstein,
he was born in the town of Breslev in 1862. Orphaned at a young age, he was
raised by his grandfather in Tcherin. A child prodigy with a phenomenal memory,
he married at age sixteen after having completed the entire Talmud twice. After being
appointed Rav in Kremenchug, he began answering
halakhic questions at
age nineteen. At the age of twenty-two, he was appointed the prayer leader for
Rosh HaShanah in Uman, a post which he held for nearly fifty years. He moved
to Jerusalem's Old City in 1936, but resettled in the Katamon neighborhood,
together with many other Breslever Chassidim during the War of Independence
in 1948. In 1940, after travel to Uman became impossible, he established the
Rosh HaShanah gathering for the Breslev community at the gravesite of Rabbi
Shimon bar Yochai in Meron, in the northern mountains of Israel. He personally
dictated to Rav Gedaliah Kenig, stories about early Breslev history, which formed
the book,
Tovot Zichronot. It was said of Rav Avraham that he was a "living"
Likutey Moharan. Not only did he know the book
Likutey Moharan
by heart, but it was possible to see that his every action was based on Rebbe
Nachman's teachings.