Browsed by
Author: admin

What Became of Tychsen?: The Non-Jewish ‘Rabbi’ and his “Congregation” of Jewish Medical Students

What Became of Tychsen?: The Non-Jewish ‘Rabbi’ and his “Congregation” of Jewish Medical Students

Comments 8 comments

This essay was inspired by two recent Seforim blog posts, one on Professor Shnayer Leiman’s contributions, and the other on a topic related to R’ Yonasan Eybeshutz. In November 16, 2006 an article by Dr. Shnayer Leiman appeared in the newly formed Seforim Blog entitled, “Two Cases of Non-Jews with Rabbinic Ordination: One Real and One Imaginary.” The “real” ordination was bestowed upon Olaf Gerhard Tychsen (1734-1815). In 1759, Tychsen received the title of Haver, a lower form of rabbinic…

Read More Read More

Parshanut in English: Rabbinic Bible Commentary in Translation

Parshanut in English: Rabbinic Bible Commentary in Translation

Comments 8 comments

The following revises, expands upon and updates my previous effort on this forum. Originally it was meant as a ten year retrospective, to see not only which works were completed in that time span but also which commentators were first touched upon. Of course, in the course of my research, I found several errors of mine from the earlier edition, and many items I had neglected to include, or was not even aware of before. Technical difficulties have delayed its…

Read More Read More

Of Twice-Told Tales and Ockham’s Razor: A Response to R. Moshe Haberman

Of Twice-Told Tales and Ockham’s Razor: A Response to R. Moshe Haberman

Comments 19 comments

Elli Fischer is an independent writer, translator, and rabbi. He is editor of Rabbi Eliezer Melamed’s Peninei Halakha series in English and cofounder of HaMapah, a project that applies quantitative analysis to rabbinic literature. He is a founding editor of The Lehrhaus, a web magazine of contemporary Jewish thought, and his writing has appeared in numerous Jewish publications. He holds degrees from Yeshiva University, rabbinical ordination from Israel’s Chief Rabbinate, and is working toward a doctorate in Jewish History at…

Read More Read More

Rabbi Zalman Nehemiah Goldberg Eulogizes Rabbi Shlomo Goren

Rabbi Zalman Nehemiah Goldberg Eulogizes Rabbi Shlomo Goren

Comments 33 comments

The recent passing of R. Zalman Nehemiah Goldberg was a great loss. It was not just a loss for one segment of the Torah world, as R. Zalman Nehemiah was unusual in that he was part of both the haredi world and the religious Zionist world. He was respected in both of these camps and spent his life teaching Torah among haredim and religious Zionists. One of the places he taught at was Yeshivat Ha-Idra, which was established by R….

Read More Read More

Kol Nidrei, Choirs, and Beethoven: The Eternity of the Jewish Musical Tradition

Kol Nidrei, Choirs, and Beethoven: The Eternity of the Jewish Musical Tradition

Comments 4 comments

‘s post from 2018. On April 23, 1902, the cornerstone to the Taharat Ha-Kodesh synagogue was laid, and on Rosh Ha-Shana the next year, September 7, 1903, the synagogue was officially opened. The synagogue building was on one of Vilna’s largest boulevards and constructed in a neo-Moorish architectural style, capped with a blue cupola that was visible for blocks. There was a recessed entry with three large arches and two columns. The interior housed an impressive ark, located in a…

Read More Read More

The Twice Told Tale of R’ Yonasan Eybeshutz and the Porger

The Twice Told Tale of R’ Yonasan Eybeshutz and the Porger

Comments 61 comments

Moshe Haberman currently lives in Los Angeles and is a businessman. Originally from New York, he learned in Brisk and publishes the Torah journal Chitzei Giborim. Introduction The only Halachic sefer published in the lifetime of R’ Yonasan Eybeshuts was the ספר כרתי ופלתי which is a פירוש on Shuchan Aruch Yoreh Deah, dealing with issues of treifos, basar b’chalav, taaruvos, etc. The sefer was published in 1763, a year before his death in 1764 in Altona, which at that…

Read More Read More

Shnayer Leiman: In Appreciation*

Shnayer Leiman: In Appreciation*

Comments 14 comments

(משלי כא,כ) In multiple ways, the above-cited biblical phrase, on which the title of this volume is based, calls to mind its distinguished honoree. For one thing, few collections of Jewish writings surpass Shnayer Leiman’s אוצר נחמד – a vast store of literary treasures that encompasses, among much else, an abundance of rare traditional classics. For both its scale and its exquisiteness, the renowned Leiman Library inspires an inevitable sense of awe. This repository of writings, however, attests to more…

Read More Read More

Romm Press, Haggadah Art, Controversial Books, and other Bibliographical Historica

Romm Press, Haggadah Art, Controversial Books, and other Bibliographical Historica

Comments 7 comments

Legacy Judaica’s fall auction is next week, September 13, and we wanted to highlight some bibliographical historica. Lot 95 is Elbona shel Torah, (Berlin, 1929), by R. Shmuel Shraga Feigneshon, known as Safan ha-Sofer. He helmed the operations of the Romm Press in Vilna. During his 55-year tenure, he oversaw the publication of the monumental Vilna Shas, among numerous other canonical works that became the model for all subsequent editions. He wrote a history of the press which first appeared…

Read More Read More

Torah & Rationalism – Writings of the Gaon Rabbenu Aaron Chaim HaLevi Zimmerman zt”l

Torah & Rationalism – Writings of the Gaon Rabbenu Aaron Chaim HaLevi Zimmerman zt”l

Comments 60 comments

Deviating from conventional book reviews I shall not enter into a discussion of the author – R. Chaim Zimmerman’s genius, schooling, breathtaking erudition, oeuvre, philosophies or his broader Weltanschauung. I leave that for the biographers, that is, if any will take up the challenge. Nor does this survey qualify as a comprehensive book review as I will explain later on. First, a word on the book itself. When a posthumously published book appears any critical minded reader wonders where the…

Read More Read More

Book Announcement: Volume Five of Amudim beToldot haSefer haIvri

Book Announcement: Volume Five of Amudim beToldot haSefer haIvri

Comments 7 comments

I am very happy to announce the recent publication (and Sale) of an important work, which will be of great interest to readers of the Seforim Blog, the fifth volume of, Amudim be-Toldot ha-Sefer ha-Ivri by Professor Yaakov Shmuel Spiegel, of Bar-Ilan University’s Talmud department. As I have written in the past, Professor Spiegel is one of the most prolific writers in the Jewish academic scene, authoring of over 160 articles and 18 books (16 of those are publications for…

Read More Read More

“Did The Bach Really Draw a Cow?” Eruvin 20 b – Hagahot HaBach on Rashi “הא אתמר עלה”

“Did The Bach Really Draw a Cow?” Eruvin 20 b – Hagahot HaBach on Rashi “הא אתמר עלה”

Comments 5 comments

The diagram in the first edition of the Bach (1824) is much more accurate than how it is depicted in later editions, especially the Vilna Shas. The Bach’s picture features a long feeding trough, (an אבוס), whereas Vilna and others show it looking more like something attached to the animal. The Zhitomir Shas compounds the error by leaving out an essential characteristic of the situation under discussion. The new editions of the Talmud get it much better. The one diagram…

Read More Read More

R. Ahron Soloveichik: “In Defense of My Brother”

R. Ahron Soloveichik: “In Defense of My Brother”

Comments 85 comments

In his recent post here Professor Shnayer Leiman showed how almost magically, things from the past, thought to be lost, can be brought back to life as it were. I recently had the same experience. In my Torah in Motion class a couple of weeks ago (see here) I was discussing the Jewish Observer “eulogy” for R. Joseph B. Soloveitchik. I mentioned R. Moshe Tendler’s strong response in the Algemeiner Journal (see here), and I further noted that R. Ahron…

Read More Read More

Response to Criticism, Part 3

Response to Criticism, Part 3

Comments 21 comments

Continued from here. Let me continue with Rabbi Herschel Grossman’s review. This post will complete my response to around a quarter of his review, so we still have a long way to go. Grossman writes (p. 42) According to Shapiro, “Maimonides would be surprised that . . . later generations of Jews . . . latched onto his earlier work;” and it “is certainly one of the great ironies of Jewish history that the Thirteen Principles became the standard by…

Read More Read More

In Praise of Ephemera: A Picture Postcard from Vilna Reveals its Secrets More than One Hundred Years after its Original Publication

In Praise of Ephemera: A Picture Postcard from Vilna Reveals its Secrets More than One Hundred Years after its Original Publication

Comments 28 comments

I belong to a small group of inveterate collectors of Jewish ephemera. We collect artifacts that many others consider of little or no significance, such as postage stamps; coins and medallions; old posters, broadsides, and newspaper clippings; outdated New Years cards; wine-stained Passover Haggadot; Jewish ornaments, objects (e.g., Chanukkah dreidels) and artwork of a previous generation; photographs and postcards; and the like. The items we collect – all of Jewish interest – take up much space in our homes; they…

Read More Read More