| Orthodox Religious Traditional Values | Hasidic |
The current community of Kashau (קאשוי) (also often spelled, as pronounced by most Ashkenazic Jews, Kasho) is a hasidic dynasty founded in the USA by Rabbi Raphael Bloom of blessed memory.
The Kashau Rebbe, R’ Rafuel Blum (1911–2005), was a talmid from R’ Shaul Brach, zt”l (1865–1940), Rav, Rosh Av Beis Din, and Rosh Yeshiva of Kashau, and formerly of Magendorf and of Kruleh. R’ Rafuel Blum learned in R Shaul Brach’s yeshiva for twenty-five zmanim thereby making R’ Shaul Brach his Rebbe Muvhak and role model. The Rebbe was liberated from the Nazis on January 18, 1945 to the city of Arad in Romania and in the summer of 1945, the Rebbe returned to Kashau.
In 1948 the Rebbe arrived in Brooklyn, New York and began the work of transferring his yeshiva from Kashau. The Rebbe founded Kehillas Kashau in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn still located today on Ross Street in Willamsburg, Brooklyn. The Rebbe started yeshivos and a secluded village for Kashau hasidim in the forests of Westchester County, outside Bedford Hills. The village is known as Kiryas Kashau today. R’ Rafuel’s piety and brilliance were widely acknowledged. Talmidim from the Rebbe’s yeshivos are an influential presence in many branches of Hungarian Chasidus today.
Kashau is most associated with Kiryas Kashau, although many hasidim live in Williamsburg and Monsey, New York. R’ Rafuel’s oldest son, Eleizer Chaim, the current Kashau Rebbe, resides in Monsey.