Alexander Zusia Friedman (Hebrew: אלכסנדר זושא פרידמן; 9 August 1897 – November 1943)[1] was a prominent Polish Orthodox Jewish rabbi, communal activist, educator, journalist, and Torah scholar.

His father, Aharon Yehoshua Friedman, was a poor shamash (synagogue caretaker); his mother supplemented the family income by selling wares in various fairs and markets.

[1] Postwar Poland was full of new reforms and political movements that caused many Jewish youth to rebel against traditional Torah observance.

He was also the chairman of Keren HaTorah (the educational fund-raising arm of Agudath Israel), head of the Federation of Yesodei HaTorah Schools (the network of boys schools run by Agudath Israel), member of the National Executive of the Bais Yaakov movement in Poland, and director of the Bais Yaakov Teachers Seminary in Kraków.

His speeches combined deep knowledge of the Torah with original insights, and he was the second most popular speaker for the Agudath Israel of Poland, second only to Rabbi Meir Shapiro, the Rav of Lublin.

[4] Friedman visited Palestine in 1934 as part of a delegation led by World Agudath Israel activist Rabbi Yitzhak-Meir Levin.

His sister, who had married Rabbi Avraham Mokatowski (known by his pen name, Eliyahu Kitov), immigrated to Palestine before World War II, as did his parents, but he opted to remain in Poland because of his communal responsibilities.

[4] On 20 November 1939 Friedman was arrested together with 21 other Polish Jewish leaders and jailed for one week to prevent them from resisting the construction of the Warsaw Ghetto.

These schools, operating under the guise of kindergartens, medical centers and soup kitchens, were a place of refuge for thousands of children and teens, and hundreds of teachers.

Historians believe that this position grew out of Agudath Israel's belief that armed opposition would cause the Germans to liquidate the Ghetto.

When the Joint resumed its operations clandestinely between October 1942 and January 1943, Friedman rejoined the organization to assist religious Jews.

[4] In March 1943 Friedman received a Paraguayan passport from Rabbi Chaim Yisroel Eiss, the Agudah rescue activist in Zurich, Switzerland, but he did not show it to the German authorities.

[10][11][12] Other published works include Kesef Mezukak (Refined Silver) (1923), a book of chiddushim on the principles of Talmudic study,[2] and Kriah LeIsha Yehudit (Readings for the Jewish Woman) (1921).