Early Life
Yhoshua Leib Gould (or Golde) was born in Munkatch, Hungary in 1925. After the death of the Munkatcher Rebbe, Yhoshua Leib Gould moved with his parents and four sisters to Sighet. His family became close to the Sigheter Rav, Rabbi Yekusiel Yehuda Teitelbaum, and he was Bar Mitzvahed in the synagogue of the Sigheter Rebbe. He was given semicha in Dayanut the same day. It was also in Sighet that he met the Satmar Rav, Yoel Teitelbaum for the first time. With the start of the war, rumors began to reach Hungary of the crimes being committed against the Jews. The elder Mr. Gould asked the Sigheter Rav whether he should flee or stay. He was told to stay, and was deported to Ukraine as slave labor. When he returned to Hungary the Sigheter Rav told him to take his family and flee to Romania. He did, but Yhoshua Leib remained behind to stay with the Sigheter Rebbe. The Germans invaded and they were deported to Auschwitz only to be liberated a few months later. Rabbi Yekusiel Yehuda did not survive, and Yhoshua Leib became loyal to the new Rav of Sighet, Moshe Teitelbaum.
Yhoshua Leib moved to the Old City of Jerusalem, where he became involved first with Agudat Yisrael, then the Edah HaChareidis and a controversial splinter sect led by Amram Blau known as Neturei Karta. When the Israeli War of Independence started, the Jordanian Legion captured the Old City, Yhoshua Leib fled first to Katamon and then to Meah Shearim. He worked for several years as a tutor and yeshivah rebbe, and even as a bricklayer and furniture carpenter.
In 1957 he was appointed a chaver, or expert consultant, of the Edah HaChareidis, having been recognized as an expert in the laws of Marriage and Divorce, then considered important due to the large number of Agunahs following the Holocaust and Israeli War of Independence. Though employed by the Eidah Cheradit, he continued to stay in contact with Amram Blau and Moses Teitelbaum. It was during this time, at the insistence of Moses Teittelbaum, that Yhoshua Leib developed a connection to the Satmar Rav, Yoel Teitelbaum.
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