Until she was 25, Frieda Vizel was a member of and lived in the Satmar Hasidic community in Brooklyn, New York. Satmar Hasidism is a branch of ultra-orthodox Judaism founded by Rabbi Moshe Teitelbaum (1759-1841), a Rabbi from Hungary. His descendants became leaders of two Jewish communities now in Romania – one of which was called Szatmárnémeti, now Satu Mare or called Satmar in Yiddish, the namesake of Satmar Judaism.