More than 60 buses will bring worshippers from around the country to a prayer rally Wednesday for a speedy recovery for Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu at 5:30 p.m. (10:30 a.m. EDT at the Western Wall (Kotel). The former Sephardic Chief Rabbi was hospitalized on the last day of Passover last month and underwent an emergency operation following a heart attack. He also suffered a partial stroke.
Sha'arei Tzedek hospital doctors said Wednesday morning that he has miraculously recovered after being in critical condition but then suffered a relapse. He now is conscious and is improving slowly, but it is too early to speculate when he can return home.
Rabbi Eliyahu is considered one of the leading rabbinic figures of the religious-Zionist public in Israel. A noted kabbalist and scholar, he served as Chief Rabbi of the State of Israel, alongside his Ashkenazic colleague, the late Rabbi Avraham Shapira, from 1983 to 1993.