Vișeu was the site of an Orthodox community which was established at the beginning of the nineteenth century. At the beginning of the twentieth century three large synagogues and several religious and social associations were functioning. Several Hasidic courts had adherents in Vișeu, many were Vishnitz Hasidim but there were Spinka and Sighet Hasidim too. In 1921 Menachem Mendel Hager the descendent of the famous Vizhnitz Hasidic Dinasty, became the Rabbi of Vișeu. Hager and his father, Israel Hager arrived in Transylvania as refugees during the WWI. During Hager’s rabbinate, the Vișeu Yeshiva student numbers grew up to 348 which made it the largest Yeshiva in the region. The Yeshiva had a small printing shop and also published a rabbinical journal, the Degel HaTora, between 1922 and 1929. Rabbi Hager died in 1941, and his body was conveyed in 1965 to Israel, where he was buried next to his father in B’nei Brak.