Editing Slutsk (section)

===Jewish community===
The first indication of Jews in Slutsk is from 1583 when the city was part of Lithuania.<ref name=yivo/> Formal recognition came in 1601.  By 1623, Jews owned 16 homes. In 1691, Slutsk became one of the five leading communities of the Lithuanian Jewish Council.<ref name=yivo/> By 1750 there were 1,593 Jewish people, accounting for one third of the population. In economic life, Jewish people were concentrated in commerce; three-fourths of the town's merchants were Jewish, and a similar share of people in the alcohol business were Jewish.<ref name=yivo/> After annexation by Russia in 1793, growth of the city slowed, in part due to it being bypassed by the railroad. By 1897 the Jewish community numbered 10,264 inhabitants, or 77% of the city population.<ref name=yivo/> They played a central role in the cities markets, particularly in agricultural produce.

[[File:Якаў Кругер. Халодная сінагога ў Слуцку.JPG|thumb|Cold Synagogue (Y. Krouger, 1921)]]
Slutsk was important in terms of Torah study. Among the rabbinic figures who served there were Yehudah Leib Pohovitser, Chayim ha-Kohen Rapoport, [[Yosef Dov Soloveitchik (Beis Halevi)|Yosef Dov Ber Soloveichik]] (1865–1874), and [[Isser Zalman Meltzer]].<ref name=yivo/> The famous [[Slutsk-Kletsk Yeshiva]] was founded in Slutsk in 1883 by Rabbi [[Yaakov Dovid Wilovsky]]. Another outstanding scholar of learning in the Talmud and Torah who was also a Hebrew poet and became a Hebrew educator in the United States was [[Ephraim E. Lisitzky|Ephraim Eliezer Lisitzky]], who was born and grew to his teens in Slutsk before emigrating to the U.S. According to legend the Baal Shem Tov visited Slutsk in 1733 at the invitation of Shmuel Ickowicz.<ref name=yivo/> Despite this, the town was known for its anti-[[Hasidism|hasidic]] [[misnagdim]]. The [[Haskalah]] and modern Jewish political parties also were represented among the population.<ref name=yivo/>