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Category: Book History

Who Wrote the Mekore Minhagim?(Part II)

Who Wrote the Mekore Minhagim?(Part II)

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This is a continuation of this prior post, in order to fully understand the following it may pay to reread the older post here. Previously, I had attempted to reconstruct when Finkelstein had published his seforim and thus deduce that Finkelstein copied the Mekore Minahgim. Now, through internal evidence I can further bolster that theory and, perhaps, explain exactly what happened. Additionally, I hope to demonstrate that although Finkelstein copied, he was unaware the work Mekore Minhagim had ever been…

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Where’s Shai Agnon?

Where’s Shai Agnon?

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In the latest issue of Yeshurun (a fuller review will be coming shortly), they published a letter from R. Y.M. Gordon to Shai Agnon. In light of this, an erudite reader, Yisroel Rottenberg, was kind enough to provide another instance where Agnon is quoted and in this instance, where Agnon’s name was then removed from a later edition. In the Pirush Ba’al HaTurim al HaTorah by Y. Reinetz, in his introduction (p. 10) he relates the well-known story that R….

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The Pitfalls of Disagreeing with the Gra

The Pitfalls of Disagreeing with the Gra

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Sunday, the second day of Hol HaMo’ad, was the 210th yahrzeit of the Gra. The Gra, a towering figure in modern Judaism, was not immune from criticism. His views, like any other’s were subject to scrutiny. And, at times, there were those who disagreed with the Gra’s conclusions. While this criticism should come as no surprise (and especially so in light of the Gra’s dim view of deference to prior authorities), some felt the Gra should be immune from any…

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Of Tahanun and Yarhrzeit bukhs

Of Tahanun and Yarhrzeit bukhs

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A fascinating anecdote in a recently published biography of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel struck me as very worthy of sharing with the readers of the Seforim blog: [Heschel] confided to Samuel Dresner that in his daily devotions he did not recite the Tahanun prayer, a confession of sin and supplication that was usually omitted only on the Sabbath and festivals. Heschel explained that it was a Hasidic custom to omit these woeful entreaties on the Yahrzeit (anniversary of death) of…

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Two Links of Note

Two Links of Note

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First, just about the entire volume in memory of Dov Rappel is available for free online here. This includes articles by, inter alia, Moshe Halmish, Yosef Tabory, and Stefan Rief. Second, there is a new site which is attempting to compile a complete bibliography of books related to Jewish genealogy here. The site is run by a collector of Jewish genealogy books and hopefully he will be able to satisfy his goal.

Azariah de Rossi on Chad Gadya

Azariah de Rossi on Chad Gadya

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As a somewhat belated followup to an earlier discussion at my AJHistory blog (z”l), I would like to add the following to the list of interesting-academic-footnotes: There is something reminiscent of Jorge Luis Borges in the seemingly infinite series of translations represented in [Azariah] de Rossi’s Hebrew translations of the Latin translation of the Greek account of the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, made only more dizzying by Joanna Weinberg’s English translation of de Rossi’s Hebrew translation of the…

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