Born Pessah Panitsch in Kolno, Poland, to a Zionist, Haredi family, he was educated in a Jewish orthodox school and in yeshivas.

For a period, he lived amongst Bedouins near Amman, Bet She'an, and Kuneitra in order to learn their lifestyle.

[1] Part of his motivation for this endeavor was to understand why many of the ancient Kings of Israel were originally shepherds.

In 1932 he participated in one of the first movies made about the Jewish Yishuv in the British Mandate of Palestine, called "Sabra", directed by Aleksander Ford.

[1] In 1939, he married Dorothy Kahn, an American journalist who fell in love with the Land of Israel, and the two moved to the Blumenfeld house in Moshav Merhavia.