Abraham Lewin was born in Warsaw in 1893, in a strictly Orthodox Hasidic family. Lewin gradually distanced himself from Hasidism, giving up traditional dress at the age of twenty. His father died when Lewin was in his teens and he had to support his mother and sisters. In autumn 1916 he was appointed to teach Hebrew, Biblical Studies and Jewish Studies at the private Yehudia Girls' School, despite having no formal qualifications. In 1926 the school was accredited to administer matriculation examinations by the Polish Ministry of Education. The staff roster was impressive, and included Emanuel Ringelblum.

Lewin married another teacher at the school, the deeply Zionist Luba Hotner, and in 1928 they had a daughter, Ora. Lewin's marriage intensified his Zionism. He visited Palestine, but opted to remain in Europe.

In 1930 Lewin passed the government teacher training examinations, and in 1934 he published a history book on young Jewish conscripts in the early nineteenth century Tsarist army.

When the Germans occupied Poland the Yehudia school continued teaching despite a ban on Jewish education. "Lessons were conducted in a different place every day, in the houses of teachers or pupils." Most of the teachers and pupils died in the Great Deportation.

Lewin became active in Ringelblum's clandestine archive, Oneg Shabbes. He kept a diary from mid-1941, which was eventually buried along with the rest of the Oneg Shabbes material. He started writing in Yiddish, but later decided to write in Hebrew instead. The diary is a very useful source, but unfortunately the portion predating March 1942 is still missing.

"Eclipse of the sun, universal blackness" Abraham Lewin, on the deportation of his wife

On 12th August 1942, the day before her daughter's fifteenth birthday, Lewin's wife Luba was picked up on Gesia Street and taken to the Umschlagplatz. Lewin survived the Great Deportation, but felt intensely guilty that he had not been taken with Luba. He and his daughter are presumed to have died during the January Aktion (beginning on 18th January 1943), as the last entry in his diary is for 15th January 1943.