Book review – Nafshi BiShe’elati: The Halakhot of Mental Health

Ben Rothke

T.J. Hooper was a precedent-setting tort case[1] in 1932. Two tugboats, one of which was The T.J. Hooper, were towing barges. During a storm, the barges sank, and their cargoes lost. The owners of the cargo sued the barge owners, who in turn sued the tugboat owners. The barge owners claimed that the tug operators were negligent because they failed to equip their tugs with radios that would have warned them of the bad weather.

The tugboat companies defended under the prevailing practice theory. They claimed that because no other tugboat operators in the area were using radios, this constituted the industry standard of care.

Judge Learned Hand found the tugboat companies liable because they did not use readily available technology, radio receivers, to listen for broadcast weather reports, even though radio use was not yet standard industry practice 

Judge Hand observed, “Indeed, in most cases, reasonable prudence is, in fact, common prudence, but strictly it is never its measure. A whole calling may have unduly lagged in the adoption of new and available devices. Courts must in the end say what is required. There are precautions so imperative that even their universal disregard will not excuse their omission”.

I thought of the T.J. Hooper case when reading a most remarkable new book Nafshi BiShe’elati: The Halakhot of Mental Health[2] by Rabbi Yonatan Rosensweig and Dr. Shmuel Harris. Mental health is virgin ground in halacha and requires the subtle judgment of the most seasoned poskim. When Rav Asher Weiss used the term OCD in his teshuva in 1994 (Minchat Asher 2:134), it was, as I understand it, the first usage by a posek of the term OCD.

The authors quote Rav Shlomo Zalman Auerbach (1910-1995) who was asked if one may turn on an electronic device on Shabbat to play music for a choleh sheyesh bo sakana who likes it. Rav Auerbach responded, “My son may permit this, but I have difficulty.”

He explained, “When I was growing up, a sick person needed warmth, food, and drink. While I can understand these new psychological needs, like music, are in fact needed—of course you are right—it is very difficult for me to permit them.”

A century ago, giving the sick person, be it one who was physically ill or with a mental malady, warmth, food, and drink was all one could do. This was an era where ear infections were fatal, and those with mental illnesses were considered incapable of being productive members of society or even counted as part of a minyan.

Today, with far-reaching advances in mental health care and pharmacology, a rabbi today who provides a congregant with warmth, food, and drinks instead of a referral for psychological care may have blood on his hands. The authors write that rabbis should avoid trying to provide psychological treatment in place of a licensed professional.

This is required even though the rabbi’s role throughout history as a spiritual guide in whom his disciples and community can confide is still as crucial as ever. He should differentiate between someone in need of sage counsel or an attentive ear and someone with a mental illness who needs professional care. Consequently, it is imperative that rabbis receive mental health training so that they can adequately distinguish between mental states and identify signs that warrant referral for professional treatment.

The authors are a remarkable pair with Rosensweig, the accomplished rabbinic scholar, and Harris, the physician. Rosensweig serves as the Rabbi of the Netzach Menashe synagogue in Beit Shemesh, Israel. He also teaches in various post-high school institutions and is the author of a number of books. In 2021, he founded Maagalei Nefesh[3], on an organization that deals with issues about mental health and halakha.

Harris is a psychiatrist who has served as the former head of psychiatric services at Hadassah Mt. Scopus. He is also the founder of Machon Dvir[4], a mental health organization servicing the English-speaking community in Israel.

The late Chicago-based posek Rav Gedalia Dov Schwartz said when dealing with transgender issues, “They didn’t really prepare me for this in yeshiva.” Schwartz echoed the sentiment that what was studied in the pristine study halls was often theoretical and abstract and didn’t match what was occurring in the real world.

When it comes to mental health, many communal rabbis are finding that yeshiva didn’t prepare them to deal with congregants who have mental health issues. Many of which can be exacerbated by halacha. These rabbis must be educated in various areas and understand the many mental health issues to properly and effectively minister to their congregants.

Eating, for example, plays a large part in Jewish life. Between the weekly Sabbath meals, the Passover seder, and various holiday meals, nearly 20% of the Jewish calendar revolves around meals or a fast.

So when a rabbi has a congregant with anorexia nervosa or other types of eating disorders, how they respond can have life or death repercussions as eating disorders have one of the highest mortality rates in comparison to other psychiatric illnesses, as 20% of anorexia nervosa deaths, are due to suicide. In addition, those with eating disorders are much more likely to engage in self-harm and experience suicidal ideation.

Anorexia nervosa is germane not just to eating but to fasting also. The authors detail situations where a person suffering from anorexia nervosa would be obligated to eat on a fast day, including Yom Kippur.

Most rabbis will wear out their copies of Hamadrich, The RCA Lifecycle Guide[5], as it is the go-to guide for various lifecycle events. Yet when it comes to mental health and halacha, there is no Hamadrich. And that is precisely the gap that Nafshi BiShe’elati brilliantly fills.

The book deals with every area where mental health and halacha intersect: Shabbat and holidays, marriage, divorce, relationships, prayer, kashrut, and much more.

As the authors live in Israel, they quote heavily on Israeli poskim. Readers will be introduced to poskim such as Rabbis Eliyahu Abergel, Reem Hacohen (Rosh Yeshiva of Yeshivat Otniel), Yuval Cherlow (Rosh Yeshiva of Yeshivat Hesder Amit Orot Shaul), and more.

In many areas, halacha addresses the status of the shoteh, someone not in total control of their mental facilities. The concept of shoteh is a difficult one to define and has been applied in relation to many different cases. The most common uses of the term have been reserved for and most closely describe the clinical phenomenon of psychosis, the state in which the individual lacks the ability to distinguish reality from fantasy.

With that, the book open with an analysis of shoteh, and the different levels it entails, including shoteh gamur, general shtut, shoteh ledavar ehad, and more. Defining what and who a shoteh is not an academic exercise. It can, in fact, have life-and-death consequences.

One is allowed to violate the sabbath for someone as the presumption is that it will enable them to observe many sabbaths in the future. One could argue, although the halacha is not like this, that Shabbat may not be violated to save a shoteh, as it will not bring them to observe more Shabbatot.

While a shoteh is exempt from the performance of mitzvot, the Maharil writes that if a man has a son who is a shoteh, he has fulfilled the mitzva of procreation, as writes that the shoteh has a soul, is a bar mitzva, and those of sound mind are cautioned about him.

The authors quote heavily from the late Rav Nahum Rabinovitch (former Rosh Yeshiva of the hesder yeshiva Birkat Moshe in Ma’ale Adumim). Rav Rabinovitch’s genius was matched by his sensitivity to the human condition.

Rav Rabinovitch believed that the very act of performing a mitzva can preserve a sense of being in good health for the shoteh, so it is important for them to perform mitzvot with or without assistance.

In Rupture and Reconstruction: The Transformation of Contemporary Orthodoxy[6] Professor Haym Soloveitchik writes of the swing to the right, where a significant increase in chumras has had significant consequences for Jewish society and the nature of Jewish spirituality.

When dealing with the halachic needs of those with mental health issues, the authors quote valid halahic sources which show how far right and strict things have become as normative halacha. This includes countless things from running and jumping on Shabbat, having non-Jews play instruments on Shabbat for newly married couples (which was the custom in Ashkenaz during the Middle Ages), certain aspects of mikvah usage for women, and more.

As to mikvah use, women with anorexia suffer intensely whenever they must attend to their body or appearance. Cleaning the body and preparing it for mikvah immersion is not a simple affair for them, as it brings negative feelings about their body, sometimes including disgust, to the surface.

The authors write that it is very important for rabbis answering questions from women with eating disorders to be sensitive to their tremendous difficulties and instruct them to go easy on the mikvah preparations and do only the absolute minimum required by Halacha.

Similarly, the mikveh attendants must be aware when someone has an eating disorder and should respect their privacy and do their best to create a pleasant and relaxed environment for them.

The concept of yeridat hadorot is the belief in the intellectual inferiority of subsequent and contemporary Torah scholarship and spirituality compared to that of the past. Yet when it comes to dealing with those who are deaf, mute, or both; and those with mental health issues, one can certainly say it is aliya hadorot. Our ability today to deal with and integrate Jews with those maladies pales in comparison to how they were handled and treated in generations past.

This is a book of unique erudition on a crucial topic, and Nafshi BiShe’elati: The Halakhot of Mental Health is a remarkable guide that is required reading not just for every rabbi but for everyone. Most of us know someone who has a mental health issue or is just one degree of separation from those who do.

It wasn’t that long ago that those with Down Syndrome were never let out of the house, and those with severe mental issues were lobotomized. Society in general, and Jewish society specifically, has come a long way in terms of mental health and how to deal with it. The book shows how Halacha is more than able to deal with these mental health situations. It’s incumbent on every rabbi and member of the Jewish community to understand how to deal with our brothers and sisters suffering from mental health issues.

This extraordinary book should be read by those looking for a serious and scholarly guide about halacha and mental health, a reference completely dedicated to halacha’s fealty.

[1] http://itlaw.wikia.com/wiki/T.J._Hooper
[2] https://korenpub.com/products/nafshi-bisheelati-halakhot-of-mental-health
[3] https://mnefesh.org
[4] https://machondvir.org/
[5] https://korenpub.com/products/hamadrikh-the-rca-lifecycle-guide
[6] https://traditiononline.org/rupture-and-reconstruction-the-transformation-of-contemporary-orthodoxy/

The Anatomy of a Mystery: Kohanim, Dissection, and Medical Training Throughout History

Rabbi Edward Reichman, MD

In September of 2024, I accidentally opened the portal to a priestly mystery. While searching for references to the first Jewish students to attend the University of Gottingen Medical School, I came across an antisemitic work published in 1753 about the general dishonesty of Jews and Jewish oaths.[1] Therein were a few disparaging references to Jewish physicians,[2] one of whom was named Lehmann Isaac Kohen. A parenthetical footnote,³ likely precipitated by the student’s last name, caught my attention. The author references an entry in a German newspaper from 1750 regarding Jewish members of the tribes of Aaron and Levi, ritual defilement upon exposure to the dead, anatomical dissection, and the training and practice of medicine.

Further research revealed that the antecedent to this 1750 reference was a brief entry in an earlier issue of the same German newspaper, Braunschweigische Anzeigen, from 1748,[4] posing a query for the readership:

Can one prove from the Old Testament, as well as from the Talmud, or other Jewish scribes, that a Jew from the tribe of Levi or Aaron cannot or may not become a doctor? And whether God has expressly forbidden this in the Old Testament?

It would be eighteen months until a response to this query was published:[5]

In chapter 21, verses 1-11 of the second book of Moses, it is written: The LORD spoke to Moses saying: Tell the priests, Aaron’s sons, and say to them: A priest shall not defile himself by contact with the dead among his people. If, therefore, the Levites are not permitted to approach any dead person and defile themselves thereby, it follows that they are not allowed to observe dissections of corpses or participate in such procedures. And since they are thus prevented from studying anatomy, which is the very foundation of medicine, it also follows that they cannot properly learn medicine and become true medical practitioners.

Brückmann. D.

As to the precipitant for this query, I can only conjecture. Was it perhaps an encounter of the editor with a Kohen who informed him of this idiosyncratic Jewish law as he contemplated attending medical school? I suspect not, and there is no evidence of such. While the city of Braunschweig (AKA Brunswick) did not have a medical school, there were numerous medical schools in Germany where, by this period in history, hundreds of Jews were attending.[6] More likely, it was a hypothetical academic theological question, albeit with some confusion and conflation of the tribes of Kohen and Levi, untethered to any specific reality.

Introduction to a Priestly Mystery

You may wonder why I draw your attention to this passage, which hardly seems novel. Anyone remotely familiar with medical halakha, or Jewish law in general, is certainly aware of the basic laws of purity as they relate to a Kohen. Yet, what is most extraordinary about these few lines, buried in an obscure German eighteenth century local newspaper, is that as far as I was aware at the time, this was the only reference to the issue of Kohanim, anatomy, and medical training in the pre-Modern era. Prior to the discovery of this passage, I had not encountered a single discussion specifically addressing Kohanim training in medicine in either Jewish or non-Jewish sources prior to the late nineteenth or early twentieth centuries.

The issue of anatomical dissection in medical training is a staple of contemporary medical halakhic discourse.[7] The first halakhic references to general anatomical dissection are in the late eighteenth century, with the famous responsa of the Nodah biYehuda and Rabbi Yaakov Emden, yet they contain no discussion about Kohanim.[8] I have recently uncovered clear evidence that the Jewish community of Padua was dealing with the halakhic issue of cadaveric dissection already since the very time of Andreas Vesalius (16^th century), long before the days of the Noda biYehuda, but also no specific reference here to Kohanim.

The question of Kohanim, dissection and the practice of medicine has been amply discussed in modern rabbinic literature.[9] Male members of the priestly tribe (Kohen-singular, Kohanim- plural) are proscribed from exposure to ritual impurity, the human corpse being the archetypal example. The prohibited exposure entails not just direct contact, but even being under the same enclosure as a corpse (tumat ohel). As hands-on human anatomical dissection, involving direct and prolonged exposure to a corpse, is a sine qua non of current medical training, the anatomy lab serves as a potential impediment for a Kohen interested in becoming a physician.[10]

Due to these halakhic concerns, numerous rabbinic authorities prohibit outright a Kohen from entering the medical profession, though others offer halakhically acceptable options. Indeed, when the Albert Einstein College of Medicine was established by Yeshiva University, the issue of offering admission to Kohanim was raised.[11] In an article written on the occasion of the first graduating class of Einstein, Myron Kolatch addressed the complex interplay of religion and medicine at the institution:

Frequently cited as an example of how the medical school violates the Torah is its willingness to accept students of priestly descent, kohanim. Leviticus, 21: 1-4 states: “And the Lord said unto Moses: Speak unto the priests the sons of Aaron and say unto them: There shall none defile himself for the dead among his people…

Clearly, the issue has never been settled beyond dispute, and Yeshiva’s policy that each kohen who wants to take up medicine must determine his own course, certainly does not indicate a blatant disregard for the Torah.

Some sixty years hence the halakhic landscape regarding Kohanim and medical school remains largely unchanged. There have been and continue to be Kohanim who attend medical school under halakhic guidance, with varied unique modifications.

Here I do not revisit the detailed halakhic analyses but address the historical contours of the discussions. According to Rabbi Bleich, one of the first halakhic authorities to raise the issue of Kohanim physicians and the prohibition of tumah was Rabbi Isaac Shmuel Reggio in 1854.[12] The context of the case was a Kohen physician who was tasked with confirming the death of a patient who was previously pronounced dead by another physician.13] This particular query was made in the historical context of a Western society that collectively questioned the ability of physicians to accurately diagnose death. As such, it was legislated in many European countries that after the initial preliminary diagnosis of death, a physician was legally required to confirm the diagnosis with serial exams over the next few days prior to burial. [14] In the aforementioned case, the physician chosen for this job happened to be a Kohen.[15]

In addition to this unique case, halakhic discussions regarding Kohanim and medicine have largely addressed two issues: 1) The propriety of a Kohen physician attending to a critically ill patient (gosses)[16] given the high probability of the patient’s demise and subsequent conveyance of impurity. 2) The permissibility of a Kohen physician, who in the course of his practice violates the prohibitions of tumah exposure, to participate in Kohen-specific religious ceremonies, such as bestowing the priestly blessing (nesiat kapayim). Even these discussions only begin in the halakhic literature of the 19^th and 20^th centuries, with nary a trace prior, and are limited to Kohanim who were practicing physicians. Contemporary halakhic discussions on the Kohen in medical training proceed with an analysis of primary sources and do not cite any responsa or any other references from the premodern era about a Kohen medical student.

If Jews have been training as physicians for millennia, with presumably many Dr. Cohens among them, how could it be that this halakhic topic seems to have escaped serious rabbinic or any historical treatment until so recently? How do we explain the conspicuous silence in the historical record?

As this source from the Braunschweigische Anzeigen seemed purely academic, is found in a non-Jewish secular periodical, and provided no additional references, it contributed little to our mystery. The portal to the priestly mystery had opened a crack, but no wider.

While this source was discovered serendipitously (i.e., hashgachah), surely a fresh dissection of the halakhic and historical literature today, given the expansive and easy access, would reveal many previously unknown sources addressing Kohanim, dissection, and medical training in the premodern era. Or perhaps not. After an extensive search, to date, I have identified exactly one single additional relevant source before the nineteenth century, albeit of significance.

This passage also derives from a non-Jewish source, the work of Carl Wilhelm Friedrich Grattenauer (1770-1838), a German lawyer and anti-Semitic publicist, though it records a Jewish exchange.

In 1817 Grattenauer published a work devoted entirely to the tribe of Aaron,[17] where in the context of ridiculing the archaic Jewish laws related to Kohanim, and lamenting the “obscurantism” of the Rabbis, we find the following passage:

The previous Chief Regional Rabbi Joseph Jonas Frånkel in Breslau, a generally recognized learned and scientifically educated man, had heard that the medical student HI, who also came from the tribe of Aaron, was preparing anatomy here[18] and was thereby contaminating himself according to the ritual law. He therefore summoned him and asked him whether he wanted to give up this anatomical activity, which was contrary to ritual law, or renounce his privilege as a Kohen to give the blessing. The student replied: I renounce this privilege. I would rather acquire a thorough knowledge of medicine and become a sufficient member of civil society. The Rabbi dismissed him… For 20 years, Mr HI has been one of the most skilled local doctors and he is still a Jew [despite the pronouncements of a fanatical Rabbanite].

Rabbi Joseph Jonas Frankel (1721-1793) served as the Silesian district rabbi. Assuming the veracity of the story, this remarkable exchange raises a number of questions: Was this a rare encounter, or did other rabbis engage in the same practice? Does this reflect Rabbi Frankel’s unique opinion, or the halakhic consensus of the time? Was there any room for leniency with respect to Kohanim training in medicine? HI was approached by Rabbi Frankel to address his halakhically concerning practice. Were there other Kohanim who proactively sought rabbinic consultation before applying to, or attending medical school? Was the response of HI typical of other Kohanim who encountered potential halakhic obstacles to medical training, or perhaps a reflection of the cultural milieu of his time.

All told, we have a grand total of two sources before the nineteenth century referring to Kohanim, dissection and medical training, both found in non-Jewish sources, and one of which is essentially irrelevant. I have yet to find any Jewish historical or halakhic sources. The priestly mystery thus still remains- How do we explain this historical “anatomical” anomaly? In this “priestly offering,” I suggest historical and halakhic reasons for this lacuna. I hope my offering will be accepted.

A Suggested Historical Solution

An understanding of the history of medical training, and in particular, of the training in human anatomy throughout the centuries, might assist us in providing an explanation for this glaring omission.

Apprenticeship versus University Training

Universities developed as educational institutions in Europe in the Middle Ages. With respect to medical training in general, in the Middle Ages and Renaissance, Jews were generally barred, with few exceptions, from admission to European universities, which were under Catholic auspices. Jewish physicians were therefore trained almost exclusively through apprenticeship. Postmortem dissection was not a part of apprenticeship training. As such, there would have been no specific halakhic problem for the Kohen medical trainee, and we would not expect to find any such reference in the literature.

Rav Moshe Feinstein, zt”l, in his discussion of medical training for the Kohen, posits a similar, though variant, explanation of the training of the Kohen physician in the past.[19] Rav Moshe prohibited the medical training of Kohanim today, unexceptionably, is it involved required exposure to tumat met. One parenthetical line in his responsum sheds light on our discussion.

ולא יקילו ממה שמצינו מרבותינו הראשונים שהיו כהנים והיו רופאים שהם בכוחותיהם הגדולים למדו כל חכמת הרפואה במסירת כל דבר בעל פה אף בלא שום ראיה והסתכלות במתים ולא נגעו במת מעולם ולא היו באהל אחד עם מתים, אבל בזמננו שא”א זה לכן ודאי אסור

And do not think to be lenient based on the fact that we find among our rabbis of earlier generations those who were both Kohanim and physicians; their exceptional powers enabled them to learn the entirety of medical knowledge orally without the necessity of even gazing upon a human corpse (i.e., practical anatomy lab). They never touched a corpse nor were they ever under the same enclosure as one. Today, however, when it is impossible to train in medicine [without the direct exposure to a human cadaver] it is prohibited.

Rav Moshe preemptively addresses a possible refutation of his position. If it is prohibited for a Kohen to train in medicine, how is it possible that we have a record of Kohen physicians in the past? Rav Moshe suggests that these Kohanim possessed exceptional abilities which allowed them to study medicine without resorting to the dissection or observation of human cadavers (and its resultant tumah exposure). Medical history supports this general idea. Indeed, all Jewish physicians through the Middle Ages, whether Kohanim or not, studied medicine through apprenticeship, without the need to dissect or even be under the same enclosure as a human cadaver.[20]

Priestly Physicians Throughout the Centuries- The Many Dr. Cohens

Who were these Kohanim physicians that Rav Moshe references? Zimmels[21] and Jakobovits[22] identify numerous Kohanim physicians throughout history, starting from Talmudic[23] times. Some of these priestly physicians provided medical care for kings, doges and popes. In fact, we have ample historical evidence of numerous Kohanim who practiced medicine over the centuries. Nathan Koren in his expansive registry of Jewish physicians has over fifty entries with the names Cohen, Coen, Cohn, Katz, Kohen, Kohn, Kahn, or Sacerdote (priest) ranging from the 15^th to early 19^th centuries.[24]

How did these Kohanim navigate their medical training? A simple explanation is that the majority of Kohanim, along with other Jews who were barred from the universities, trained through apprenticeship, effectively bypassing any halakhic concerns for anatomical dissection. Though there are no available statistics, despite the increasing acceptance and attendance of Jewish students at universities beginning in the sixteenth century, apprenticeship likely remained the predominant mode of medical training for Jewish physicians until the mid-seventeenth to early eighteenth centuries. As apprenticeship training involved no dissection, this would account for the absence of halakhic queries in the literature for this group.

Some Jews however elected to pursue a university education. Jews occasionally attended universities from the Middle Ages onwards, usually requiring special Papal or governmental permission.[25] While anatomy was clearly always part of medical education to varying degrees, and anatomical dissection was performed sporadically across the centuries, the introduction of systematic dissection of the human body as a required part of medical training fully developed only in the sixteenth century. Until this time, even if a Kohen wished to attend medical school, there would have been little halakhic concern.

The status quo would change in the sixteenth century under the guidance of Andreas Vesalius, a young Professor of Human Anatomy at the University of Padua. As divine providence would have it, the very university at which Vesalius established the field of anatomy was the first institution to officially allow, beginning even before the times of Vesalius, Jewish students to train in medicine. By the sixteenth century hundreds of Jews flocked there for this historically unprecedented opportunity.

Given the introduction of systematic anatomical dissection into the medical school curriculum in the 16^th century, how could a Kohen now navigate a university medical education? From this point in history, we would expect to see halakhic discussions about Kohanim attending medical school.

One might suggest that Kohanim, being knowledgeable in the potential halakhic pitfalls, simply refrained from becoming physicians once dissection became an unavoidable aspect of medical training. Indeed, Rabbi Jakobovits maintains that less Kohanim entered the field of medicine in the eighteenth century, a statement he buttresses with reference to articles about the matriculation records of some German universities (Frankfurt and Duisburg), and the low number of those with a priestly name as compared to the percentage of Kohanim in the general population: “Even today, the usual proportion of Jews bearing the name “Cohen” alone (others, too, may be of priestly descent) is at least 2-3%.” He adds that this lower percentage of Kohanim in medical school “can only be explained as reflecting the growing misgivings with which the choice of medical career by students of priestly descent was generally viewed.”[26]

While this may have been true in Germany in later centuries, the archives of the University of Padua reveal a different statistical reality. The archival record of Jewish graduates of the University of Padua from the early 16^th to the early 19^th centuries includes nineteen graduates with the last name of Coen or Sacerdote.[27]

Even if we concede that not all those named Coen, or derivatives thereof, were necessarily Kohanim, many certainly were. Below is the family crest of Samuele Coen as it appears in his Padua medical diploma from 1702.[28] Notice the image of the hand configuration used by the Kohen during the Priestly blessing.

In addition, there are eleven members of the Cantarini family, a family of Kohanim, who graduated as physicians from the University of Padua during this period. Below is the front page of the medical diploma of Grassin Cantarini (1703),[29] here again we find the Kohen’s symbol.

The percentage of Kohanim who attended Padua’s medical school, roughly thirty out of a total of some 350 for this period, is significantly higher than the average percentage of Kohanim in the general Jewish population.[30] How then do we explain the absence of discussion in the literature? It is certainly possible that these relatively few Kohanim, despite their high percentage of the total, simply did not inquire of rabbinic authorities. Alternatively, the few inquiries that did occur where not committed to writing, or did not survive the ravages of time.

More problematic is that some of the Kohen Padua graduates were outstanding Torah scholars and prolific authors, such as Isaac Hayyim Cantarini,[31] Tuviya HaRofe (AKA Tuviya haKohen),[32] and Abraham Sacerdote (AKA Avraham HaKohen).[33] Oe mnight have expected at least one of these scholars to address this issue somewhere in their writings. Yet, there is no mention in any of their extensive writings of any concern with their participation in the anatomy course. Indeed, while Tuviya fondly recalls his medical training in Padua in the introduction to his Ma’aseh Tuviya, there is no mention of any challenge with performing dissection as a Kohen. Cantarini, in his Pahad Yitzhak, devotes a section to a tragic case where a Jewish body was kidnapped by non-Jewish students for the dissection table. Again, no mention of any concern about Kohanim and dissection. In addition, we have an account of Cantarini bringing Abraham Levi, a visiting scholar to Padua, to see the anatomy theater to showcase the highlights of Padua.[34]

While we may not find the names of these three Kohen student scholars etched into the wooden planks of the structure, they all likely took their seats,[35] along with their other non-Kohen Jewish classmates, in the famous anatomical theater at the University of Padua, which was inaugurated in 1595 as the first permanent structure devoted to anatomical dissection, and is still standing to this day.

I suspect that the answer to the conspicuous omission lies elsewhere, based on the history of anatomical training in general, and at the University of Padua in particular.

The Nature of Anatomical Teaching in the Pre-Modern Era

A mention of anatomy lab today evokes an image of a small group of students huddled over a body with dissecting instruments in hand. We also often find reference to the anatomy students designating a name for their cadaver, as they dissect one body for the entire course. Unlike the anatomy labs of today, in pre-Modern times body preservation technologies were not available, and a corpse was only usable for a few days to weeks. The dissections or yesteryear were held in an “anatomical theater.”[36] The format of anatomy teaching involved the professor alone performing the dissection and teaching over the body while others merely observed. Students did not perform any hands-on dissection, partially because there was little time until the decomposition of the body, and thus had no direct contact with the corpse. This can be seen in the frontispiece of Vesalius’ classic work:

This is also reflected in the design of the anatomical theater in Padua, which was built shortly after the tenure of Vesalius, and can be visited today.

There is a central oval table surrounded by coliseum-like concentric rows of progressively elevated platforms. This basic architectural design was copied for other anatomical theaters across the world, such as those below:

University of Bologna: Anatomical Theater (est. 1636)

University of Leiden: Anatomical Theater (est. 1594)

This illustration is from 1610. Parenthetically, the Keeper of the Anatomical Theater of Leiden from 1617-1650 was Professor Otto Heurnius.[37] Heurnius was the promoter for the medical graduation of David de Haro,[38] the first Jewish medical graduate of the University of Leiden.

By the mid 1600’s Jews started attending the University of Leiden in higher numbers. We have numerous matriculation records of Jews with the name Cohen.[39]For example:

Samuel Cohen from Hamburg matriculated to the medical faculty (M) in September 1646.

A Pure Solution

As a medical student in the anatomical theater served only as an observer, and performed no actual dissection, there would have been no concern for impurity conveyed through direct contact with a corpse. The only potential concern for a Kohen in the anatomical theater would have been tumat ohel, whereby impurity is conveyed by being under the same enclosure as a cadaver. While there is general halakhic consensus that impurity conveyed by direct contact applies to the bodies of both Jews and non-Jews, there is a halakhic debate regarding whether a non-Jewish corpse conveys tumat ohel.[40] It is certainly possible that the Kohanim who attended the lectures in the anatomical theater of Padua (and in anatomical theaters at other universities at this time) relied on the permissive position that a non-Jewish corpse does not convey tumat ohel. This would have allowed them to attend dissections without violating any halakhic precepts.

However, there still remained at least a theoretical possibility that the cadaver would be Jewish, in which case the permissive option would no longer apply. For a unique historical reason, this concern was non-existent for the anatomical dissection course at the University of Padua. In fact, the university struggled to provide cadavers for the course and turned to each community represented on campus, including the Jewish community, to provide bodies for the dissection table. However, the Jewish community adamantly refused, citing religious concerns with postmortem dissection. While there was continuous tension about this issue, the Jewish community arranged an agreement to provide large sums of money annually to the university for the privilege of releasing the Jewish community of this obligation. This general agreement, with periodic reassessments and renegotiations, essentially remained in force for some two hundred years.[41] Thus, all the Coens and Cantarinis who attended the University of Padua did not have to worry about the possibility that the cadaver under the scalpel of Vesalius or Fallopius was Jewish.

The Architectural Design of the Padua Anatomical Theater

Moreover, a unique structural feature of the Padua anatomical theater may have further mitigated any potential halakhic concern for a Kohen wishing to study medicine at Padua. The original anatomical theater had a retractable roof[42]  which was opened during dissections to release or eliminate the foul odors of a progressively decaying cadaver. Thus, even tumat ohel may have been a non-issue as in the absence of a roof there would have been no halakhic enclosure to convey impurity. This would have virtually eliminated the halakhic obstacle for a Kohen medical student.

An Alternate Solution for Kohanim

What of a Kohen desirous of a university medical education who would not rely on a permissive ruling regarding tumat ohel and the non-Jewish cadaver? By the 17th century, medical schools struggled to acquire enough cadavers to meet the growing demand of anatomy students. The need to provide a nonperishable substitute led to the production of highly accurate anatomical wax models that were sculpted through direct observation of dissected cadavers. Such models had distinct advantages, as they neither decomposed nor emitted foul odors and were continuously available. They proved essential to the education of generations of medical students who would otherwise, due to the short supply of cadavers, not have access to the anatomical education gleaned from human dissection.[43]

Spectacular wax models were produced throughout Europe, especially in Italy and England, from the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries, some of which can be seen to this day in Museums in Florence (La Specola), Bologna and London.[44]

This seems to me to be an ideal solution for a Kohen who wished to train in medicine in the Early Modern period. The use of wax models, with no human cadavers involved at all, would pose no halakhic problem whatsoever. While I am unaware of any Kohen medical student who ever took advantage of this option, the modern iteration of this concept, as we discuss below, may entirely replace cadaver dissection.

Kohanim in Medical School from the Eighteenth Century Onwards

From the eighteenth and into the nineteenth century, apprenticeship became less accepted and university training was often required for licensure. As a result, Jewish admission to medical schools increased exponentially throughout Europe and the United States. In addition, the anatomy labs began to transition to hands-on dissection for all students. This was simultaneously accompanied by a major cultural movement in Germany, the main location of Jewish medical training at this time, known as the Haskala. This movement was associated with the decreasing religiosity of at least a percentage of the Jewish university students, not to mention the conversion of some to Christianity. A family name of Cohen on a matriculation record in this period, even if identified, is certainly no guarantee of a student knowledgeable or concerned with the issues of tumah.

How would a Kohen navigate medical training in this milieu? The student encountered by Rabbi Frankel in Breslau was training precisely in this context, at the end of eighteenth century. Was the student known by his initials “HI” training in a medical school where he was required to perform hands-on dissection, and this is perhaps why Rabbi Frankel ruled as he did; or perhaps the medical school still had an anatomical theater, as many still did, and Rabbi Frankel did not accept the permissive ruling that tumat ohel does not apply to a non-Jewish cadaver. Was “HI” influenced by the newly forming Haskala movement in Germany at that time, which led him to be less deferential to rabbinic authority?

Two additional examples of Kohanim and medical training from the nineteenth century are illustrative. We have at least one record of a “Cohen” in the early nineteenth century refusing to go to medical school because of the required anatomical dissection. A young Albert Cohen, originally from Paris, describes his initial encounter with anatomical dissection in Vienna in the early nineteenth century:[45]

I went to Vienna, where I pursued my studies at the grammar school and university from 1826-1834. Being now nineteen years old, it became necessary to decide what profession I would adopt. Hitherto all young people of my native place who devoted themselves to literature studied medicine; this was then the only profession open to me. To please my parents, I would have followed the same career, had I ever been able to prevail upon myself to dissect a corpse. Several times I entered the anatomical theatre, but each time I was seized with unconquerable disgust. I therefore requested my parents to allow me to follow my own taste. Henceforth I devoted myself to the study of Oriental languages.

I suspect the parental conversation about his career change may have been a bit more dramatic than reflected in this passage. Nonetheless, we learn that it was anatomy that turned this young Jewish Kohen student away from a career in medicine, though it does not appear to have been halakhically motivated.

Around the same time, Sigismund Cohen, a native of Lower Silesia, the area of modern-day Poland and the rabbinic domain of Rabbi Joseph Jonas Frankel a few decades earlier, attended the University of Viadrina (Frankfurt), graduating in 1846. The topic of his dissertation- Talmudic Medicine:

For a Jewish medical student to write a medical dissertation on a Jewish topic was quite uncommon, to say the least.[46] It is somewhat ironic that a thorough analysis of Biblical and Talmudic law might have led Cohen to the realization that there was a potential halakhic issue with his training and may have preempted the necessity for Cohen to write this dissertation in the first place. Nevertheless, as this dissertation is remarkable on many levels, I offer a few comments.

From a medical and medical historical perspective, Cohen acknowledges his professors by name, one of whom was Jan Evangelista Purkinje, who taught him human physiology. Purkinje, a Czech anatomist and physiologist, was one of the most famous scientists in Europe and his discoveries included the so-called Purkinje Cell in the cerebellum and the so-called Purkinje fibres in the electrical system of the heart, structures familiar to any medical student today.

This dissertation also has great significance in the field of Jewish medical history. While we do not know with certainty the nature of Cohen’s Jewish knowledge and religious observance, the dissertation includes a brief biography as an appendix. An excerpt about his early education is below:

While we find reference to the study of “Pentateuchi origine” and “grammatice Hebraica,” Talmudic study is not specifically mentioned, and there is clearly a strong educational focus on secular studies. The 28-page dissertation itself however contains a wealth of Talmudic references.

I also draw attention to three specific sources cited by Cohen, one from a century earlier, the others contemporary.

1) Benjamin Wolff Gintzburger, Medicina ex Talmudicis, inaugural Dissertation 1743

Benjamin Wolff Gintzburger was one of the first Jewish graduates of the University of Gottingen. It was my search for references to Gintzburger that precipitated this contribution.[47] His medical dissertation, referenced by Cohen, is one of the first works written on Biblical and Talmudic medicine.[48]

Apropos our discussion about dissection, Gintzburger is better known in the halakhic world as the questioner of a (now famous) teshuva to Rabbi Yaakov Emden about performing anatomical dissection on Shabbos.[49]

2) Abraham Hartog Israels, Tentamen hist.-med. Exhibens Collectanea Gynaecologica ex Talmude Babylonica (Grongen, 1845)

Israels graduated from the University of Groningen in 1845, just a year before Cohen, and the topic of his dissertation was obstetrics and gynecology in the Babylonian Talmud.

This dissertation gained notoriety for its fourth chapter, on Cesarean section, which suggests that the rabbis of the Mishnah were able to perform cesarean section with maternal survival, something not recorded in secular medical history until around 1500. This was based on an interpretation of a Mishna in Bechorot.[50]  Cohen discusses this chapter in his dissertation.

3) Eliakim Carmoly, Histoire des Médecins Juifs, Anciens et Modernes (1844)

Carmoly served as the major work of reference in Jewish medical history for this period. Selections were translated into English just one year after publication.[51] While the reliability of Carmoly’s work was called into question by critics,[52] it nonetheless contains a wealth of valuable information.

Returning to our student, regarding Cohen’s presumptive status as a Kohen training in medicine, he devotes a chapter of his treatise to anatomy and cites a passage in the Talmud where dissection was performed.[53] More relevant, in his bio, he includes mention and thanks to those who assisted him during his studies in the anatomical theater:

Anatomical dissection did not appear to be an impediment for this Cohen. However, there is one observation, admittedly a possible over-read or mistranslation, which may indicate specific accommodations for Sigismund in his dissection course.[54] In his lengthy list of professors, Cohen simply mentions the subject and the professor. In his mention of the anatomical theater, he adds, “in the anatomical theater there were guides for me….” Could this possibly be an allusion to specific accommodation provided to Sigismund? Perhaps his professors performed the dissection while he observed but did not touch the corpse directly.

Conclusion: The Opening and Reclosing of the Priestly Portal

Halakhic references to a Kohen attending medical school are noticeably absent from rabbinic literature before the nineteenth century. We have suggested plausible explanations for this anomaly. For much of history, Jewish physicians trained through apprenticeship where formal anatomical instruction was not required. As such, there would have been no halakhic issues for a Kohen, as noted by Rabbi Moshe Feinstein. When Vesalius introduced the comprehensive anatomy course into the medical school curriculum, dissections were performed in anatomical theaters, where students never touched the cadavers. At least some Kohanim may have relied on the permissive ruling that non-Jewish cadavers do not convey tumat ohel. When hands-on dissection became the norm, as Rabbi Lord Jakobovits suggested, it is certainly possible that many religiously observant Kohanim elected to bypass medicine as a career choice, or were perhaps discouraged to do so by local rabbis like Rabbi Frankel. Of the Kohanim who opted for a medical career, some may have sought rabbinic approval, though no records exist. Others, whose priestly-sounding names appear in university matriculation records of the period, may have been less Jewishly educated or less religiously observant. Hence no halakhic questions would have been generated from this latter group.

The portal to rabbinic discussion on this topic only fully opened in the twentieth century. In the modern era we have a diverse halakhic landscape regarding the training of Kohanim in medicine, including discussion about the permissive ruling of tumat ohel, as well as creative solutions to potentially allow direct dissection. I leave these discussions to each Kohen student and his posek but leave you with a final thought.

Given current advances and changing perspectives in anatomical training, we may again soon see the portal close to the corpus of responsa related to the Kohen medical student. Some five hundred years after Vesalius introduced anatomical dissection into medical training, which was accompanied by the exhumation of bodies from their graves, we are now on the cusp of the (re)burial of human anatomy lab and its associated cadavers. With advances in imaging technology and simulation, coupled with the ethical re-evaluation of body procurement methods and preservation, the expansive year-long anatomy course with full body dissection is rapidly becoming a relic of medical history.[55] The classic dissection table is gradually being replaced with the likes of the digital Anatomage table:

If this is not sufficient, it is now possible to produce life-like anatomical models with the use of 3D printing.[56] Even dissection of the model may be possible.

These conceptual descendants and updated versions of the Florentine wax models may soon replace cadaveric dissection altogether.[57] The list of medical schools eliminating or significantly curtailing human anatomy lab courses is continually expanding.

While the impact of the diminution of human dissection on medical education remains to be determined, if phased out, it will certainly have a significant halakhic impact and it may return us to the days of the earlier generations mentioned by Rav Moshe Feinstein when students “learn the entirety of medical knowledge without the necessity of gazing upon a human corpse.” This would potentially open the door for Kohanim to attend medical school (at least for the pre-clinical years) with halakhic impunity.[58] We may notice a commensurate rise in the number of Dr. Cohens in hospital registries. The medical halakhic textbooks may no longer include a chapter on “The Kohen in Medical School,” and the halakhic discussions on this topic may again fall silent. If future scholars at some later stage of history ponder the priestly mystery of the intermittent silence of the historical record on Kohanim, dissection and medical training, I suspect their search engines will direct them to this article.

Appendix:

The Importance of the Study of Broadsides in Jewish (Medical) History – The Kohen Physician Today and the Diagnosis of Death

In June of 2024, I participated as a speaker in a conference entitled, “The Role of Broadsides in Jewish Ritualistic and Cultural Space,” organized by Professor Avriel Bar-Levav of the open University of Israel and held at the new National Library of Israel. It was the first conference of its kind, dedicated solely to the integration of Broadsides into the study of Jewish history. Taking a single printed page (the definition of a Broadside) out of Avriel’s playbook, I briefly share an example of the value of Broadsides for the study of Jewish medical history, as it relates to our topic.

As mentioned in the article above, one of the earliest halakhic sources relating to a Kohen and the practice of medicine addresses the case of a Kohen physician who was asked to confirm the death of a patient in order to facilitate burial. The question was asked in the nineteenth century, in the medical historical context of a generation concerned about the misdiagnosis of death and the resultant institution of a three-day delay in burial to medically confirm a patient’s demise.

While the prolonged delay in burial may be a relic of the past, the necessity to confirm death remains a part of modern medical practice. As such, similar halakhic cases of a Kohen physician involved in the confirmation of death occur to this very day. I share one example here which reflects yet another fascinating and complex chapter in Jewish medical history, evidenced by a broadside found in a miscellaneous collection of broadsides in the Library of Congress.

In 1976 Rabbi Moshe Lemberger was asked about the case of an observant Kohen physician who witnessed a cardiac arrest of a man on the street.[59] The person did not survive. While it is generally prohibited for a Kohen to come in contact with a corpse, if this physician were to officially declare death of the person on the scene, and attest to the absence of foul play, the deceased would be transferred directly to the funeral home for immediate burial.

As per the questioner, if the Kohen physician refused to intervene, the patient would be transferred to the hospital. Burial would certainly be delayed, and in addition, there would be a high likelihood of autopsy, with organs often removed from the deceased without consent. Rabbi Lemberger concluded that this would constitute a case of met mitzvah (a deceased person with no one to attend to their burial), and due to these extenuating circumstances, the Kohen could expose himself to impurity to prevent the delay of burial and likely desecration of the body.

This comment “and often organs are removed from the deceased without consent” reflects a reality in Israel at this time.[60] When Israel established its own hospitals and medical system in the early twentieth century, it struggled to navigate a halakhically acceptable path for the allowance of autopsies, an integral part of standard medical practice. While detailed guidelines for the performance of autopsies were established with rabbinic guidance, many members of the medical community rejected any restrictions on their practice. Despite the legislation, the medical establishment flagrantly disregarded the laws and were known in many cases to perform autopsies, including organ removal, without patient or family consent. This evolved into a notorious autopsy scandal in the young State of Israel, which shattered faith in the medical establishment, with reverberations felt to this day. This ultimately resulted in the reformation and greater enforcement of the law.

I recently discovered a lone broadside buried in a miscellaneous collection housed in the Library of Congress,[61] which though undated, was likely printed around the time of the above responsum.

This Broadside was clearly intended to be posted in a cemetery and is divided into two sections.

On the left side is an accusation that the deceased more likely than not underwent an autopsy upon their death, and that the remaining relative, the likely reader of the broadside, did nothing to prevent it.

Dear Brother,
You are now standing beside the grave of your relative who was dear to your heart and whose flame of life was suddenly extinguished.
We wish to ask you if you have considered the possibility that your loved one has undergone extensive dissection [autopsy] and while the body is here, who knows the location of the internal organs of the body. Perhaps they never merited to a proper burial (more than 50% of bodies are dissected in Jerusalem).
What did you do to prevent this from happening?
As you stand beside the grave, the deceased beseeches you to repent for this. How will you answer?
The answer:
Accept upon yourself to protect your loved ones in the future. With all your power and capability seek to prevent the forced dissection by pathologists done merely for personal advancement.
Do this for the honor of both the living and the dead.
Committee for the protection of the honor of man

On the right side of the broadside is a text to be recited by the remaining relative asking forgiveness from their deceased loved one for allowing them to undergo an autopsy.

This unique broadside contributes to the study of the history of autopsies in Israel, provides valuable information possibly not attainable elsewhere, and adds to the relatively few items of material culture in Jewish medical history.

Abraham Rosenberg, R. Chaim Heller, R. Shlomo Zalman Auerbach on Conversion, Abortion, Mercy Killings, and new pictures and videos of R. Jehiel Jacob Weinberg

Marc B. Shapiro

1. In my post here I discussed the enigmatic plagiarizer Abraham Rosenberg. As we saw, in 1923 and 1924 Rosenberg published articles on the Jerusalem Talmud in the Orthodox journal Jeschurun, and he later published Al Devar Tikunei Nushaot bi-Yerushalmi. In this last work, Rosenberg refers to R. Chaim Heller as his friend. I and so many others assumed that “Rosenberg” was a pseudonym, but Moshe Dembitzer, the expert on everything related to R. Heller, has pointed out to me that this appears not to be the case. Here is a letter Dembitzer found in the JDC archives from R. Heller to Cyrus Adler. As you can see, R. Heller mentions A. Rosenberg—the letter that is unclear must be an “A”—and one of his essays on the Jerusalem Talmud. He also mentions that Rosenberg “is considered only one of the ordinary students.”

Dembitzer also found another connection between R. Heller and Rosenberg. Here is a note from R. Charles B. Chavel’s edition of Hizkuni’s commentary on the Torah, p. 525.

Here is Rosenberg’s Al Devar Tikunei Nushaot bi-Yerushalmi, p. 102, where he cites the same explanation that Chavel cited in the name of R. Heller (but Rosenberg takes credit for it himself).

Regarding the plagiarisms of Rosenberg, I must also thank Gershon Klapper who alerted me to other examples. He wrote to me:

Rosenberg’s first article (לחקר תלמוד הירושלמי) opens אין מן הצורך לשנות את הידוע כי תלמוד הבבלי שנחתם לא זזה ידם של חכמי ישראל ממנו, very similar to how R. Heller’s ע”ד מסורת הש”ס בירושלמי begins, אין מן הצורך לשנות את הידוע כי תלמוד הירושלמי הוא עדין כשדה שאין עובד בו. But the next part of his introduction to that article is taken, slightly rearranged, from Steinschneider’s ספרות ישראל vol. 2, p. 103 (it reappears at the beginning of ע”ד תקוני נוסחאות בירושלמי, which includes most of this article’s content), as is the line beginning פעולתם של הגאונים. He does paraphrase some other language from R. Heller in the introduction, but again it isn’t word-for-word.

His second article (פסוקי המקרא שבתלמוד) opens

כי חכמי התלמוד היו בקיאים בכל ספרי התנ”ך עד להפליא, – דבר זה ידוע לכל מי שלמד גמרא, ואפילו למי שהצליף בה סקירה שטחית. כמעט מכל דף ודף שבתלמוד נראה, כי פסוקי התנ”ך, ואפילו המקראות “האובדים והנדחים” שברשימות השמות בעזרא ובדברי הימים היו שגורים על פי התנאים והאמוראים בתכלית הדיוק. בעלי התוספות (ב”ב ד’ קי”ג בד”ה תרוייהו) לא חששו להחליט, שהאמוראים פעמים שלא היו בקיאים בפסוקים. אבל כבר הודו שם בעלי התוס’ עצמם שאין החלטה זו מוכרחת וכמו שכתב הרשב”ם שם. וגם הראיה שהביאו מדברי ר’ חייא בר אבא, שאינו יודע אם נאמר בי’ הדברות טוב או לא (ב”ק נה.) אינה מוכרחת שהרי ברור הדבר, כי דברי רחב”א, אינם אלא דברי בדיחותא, כדי לדחות את השואל.

Almost every word of this comes from an article of the same title by Yisrael Chaim Tawiow which appeared in HaShiloach 29 (July-Dec. 1913). The rest of the second article is taken from Baer Ratner, סדר עולם רבא pp. 103ff. and Samuel Rosenfeld, משפחת סופרים pp. 98, 100, 105, etc.

Klapper also called my attention to Rosenberg’s plagiarism of part of a paragraph in R. Heller’s article that appears in Le-David Zvi (David Zvi Hoffmann Jubilee Volume, Hebrew section). Compare p. 56 there with Rosenberg, Al Devar Tikunei Nushaot bi-Yerushalmi, p. 11. As Klapper notes, it is quite ironic that Rosenberg leaves out the following sentence from R. Heller that occurs in the middle of the passage he plagiarizes:

ויש שיועיל לנו הציון לברוח מן העבירה ולעשות מצוה לאמר דבר בשם אומרו

While on the topic of R. Chaim Heller, first let me share this wonderful picture from R. Ahron Soloveichik’s wedding in which one can see the Rav, R. Heller and R. Yaakov Kamenetsky. As far as I know, this picture has never appeared online. I thank Yoel Hirsch for providing me with the picture.

From R. Kamenetsky’s recently published Emet le-Yaakov al Nakh, vol. 1, p. 185 n. 2, we learn that in 1937 R. Kamenetsky visited Boston to discuss with R. Soloveitchik opening a yeshiva together.

In 1924 R. Heller published his study of the Samaritan version of the Torah, Ha-Nusah ha-Shomroni shel ha-Torah (Berlin, 1924). In 1972 Makor, which published so many valuable reprints of old seforim, decided to also reprint R. Heller’s Ha-Nusah ha-Shomroni. The problem was that R. Heller had an heir, and she was the only one with the legal right to reprint his books. This led to the following letters sent by Miriam Heller’s attorney (the letters are found in the Israel State Archives, 14924/3, available here [before the recent cyber attack on the archives], pp. 35ff.). From these letters, we learn that there were other unauthorized reprints of R. Heller’s works.

One final point about R. Heller is the following: In 1912 he was appointed rav of the city of Lomza. Here is a report on his appointment from the newspaper Ha-Mitzpeh, March 29, 1912.

The writer is simply amazed that a Polish city, full of Hasidim, would hire as its rav a “Rabbi Dr.” Of course, R. Heller was a very unique “Rabbi Dr.”

2. Because I discussed conversion in the last post, I would like to call attention to R. Yoel Amital’s discovery of how R. Shlomo Zalman Auerbach’s view on the matter has been presented.[1] The issue R. Amital focuses on is whether a conversion for someone who does not observe mitzvot takes effect. I am referring to one who tells the beit din at the time of conversion that he accepts the mitzvot, but we see later that this was not the case.

In his letter in R. Zvi Cohen’s Tevilat Kelim (1975), R. Auerbach is clear that ex post facto such a conversion is still valid.

The crucial words are:

בכגון דא נלענ”ד שכל המסייעים לגירות כזו, אף שבדיעבד הם גרים גמורים, אפי”ה המגיירים אותם עוברים בלאו של לפני עור וגו’

According to R. Auerbach, because be-diavad such converts are Jewish, to convert them is a violation of lifnei iver. As R. Auerbach explains, before conversion, these people could work on Shabbat and eat non-kosher, but now that they are Jewish they are forbidden to do so. By converting people who will be committing these and other sins, the beit din has violated the prohibition of lifnei iver.

As R. Amital shows, in subsequent printings of R. Cohen’s book, R. Auerbach’s letter is printed with a significant addition (here underlined):

בכגון דא נלענ”ד שכל המסייעים לגירות כזו, אף שהם טועים לחשוב שבדיעבד הם גרים גמורים, אפי”ה המגיירים אותם עוברים בלאו של לפני עור וגו’

And

בכגון דא נלענ”ד שכל המסייעים לגירות כזו, אף אם הם טועים לחשוב שבדיעבד הם גרים גמורים, אפי”ה המגיירים אותם עוברים בלאו של לפני עור וגו’

When this letter was printed in R. Auerbach’s Minhat Shlomo, vol. 1, no. 35:3, the wording was altered further:

בכגון דא נלענ”ד שכל המסייעים לגירות כזו, אף דהם טועים לחשוב שהם גרים גמורים, אפי”ה גם לשטתם המגיירים אותם עוברים בלאו של לפני עור וגו’

In Ha-Ma’yan 56 (Nisan 5776), p. 89, in response to R. Amital’s article, R. Aharon Goldberg, a grandson of R. Shlomo Zalman, published a picture of R. Auerbach’s original letter. The wording is identical to what appears in the first edition of R. Cohen’s book. So how to explain the later additions? R. Goldberg states that it is possible that the later changes were made with the consent of R. Auerbach. Although there is no evidence of this, I find it unlikely that R. Cohen would have altered R. Auerbach’s letter while R. Auerbach was still alive. A general rule of censorship and alteration of texts is that it is done after the author is no longer alive.

Leaving aside the updated version of the letter, there is still a problem that R. Amital confronts. According to R. Auerbach’s original letter, those who convert but do not become religious, their conversion is still valid. However, R. Auerbach also signed a public letter together with the Steipler, R. Shakh, and R. Elyashiv, which states that such a conversion has no validity. So which is it?

R. Mordechai Halpern has shown that R. Auerbach sometimes presented a “public” halakhah that was stricter than his true opinion, but which for some reason he did not wish to publicize.[2] R. Amital suggests that in this case we have a similar example where R. Auerbach publicly advocated a “strict” position regarding conversion that was not in line with his true opinion. (I put “strict” in quotes because while this position is strict in not regarding a conversion as valid, it is also “lenient” in that it tells someone who converted and did not intend to become religious that she can leave her husband without a get, does not need to fast on Yom Kippur, etc.)

R. Amital also claims, implausibly in my opinion, that the public letter R. Auerbach signed does not really stand in contradiction to the letter he sent to R. Cohen. How so? The public letter speaks of people who convert without accepting to observe mitzvot, while R. Auerbach in his letter to R. Cohen is referring to people who in front of the beit din do accept to observe mitzvot, but in their inner heart do not really have such an intention.

Contrary to R. Amital, this is clearly not what the public letter means. It is referring to people who converted in a beit din, but never intended to follow halakhah. It is simply impossible to read this public letter as referring to, in the words of R. Amital: גרים שלא קיבלו עליהם כלל בבית דין לקיים תורה ומצוות. There is no beit din in the world that does not require converts to accept Torah observance. The issue the letter was addressing is converts who, despite their verbal acceptance of mitzvot, do not follow through in practice. According to the letter, such a conversion is not valid. This is so obvious that one wonders how R. Amital could have ever offered his suggestion to explain the contradiction.

R. Halpern himself notes that he knows that R. Auerbach never backed away from his earlier position, as seen in his letter to R. Cohen, that someone who was converted by a proper beit din, but did not intend to observe mitzvot, ex post facto the conversion is still valid. Yet he states that R. Auerbach later concluded that this liberal approach should not be publicized.[3]

Even with the initial two “corrected” versions of R. Auerbach’s letter, R. Auerbach mentions that rabbis who convert people who have no intention of observing Torah violate the prohibition of putting a stumbling block before the blind. R. Auerbach states that until now the person converting violated Shabbat and ate non-kosher food and these were not sins. But now, after the conversion, he is violating the Torah. R. Auerbach concludes his letter as follows:

נמצא שכל המגיירים והמסייעים לכך הו”ל כגדול המחטיאו, ועוברים בלאו של ולפני עור לא תתן מכשול

The implication of this is that ex post facto the conversion is indeed valid, as otherwise there would be no sin committed by the convert and there would be no issue of putting a stumbling block before the blind. In the words of R. Yisrael Rozen:[4]

למדנו מדבריו שהגירות חלה, דאי לאו הכי אין כאן מכשול, שהרי נשאר בגיותו

In fact, we find many poskim who say that we should not convert people who do not intend on observing mitzvot, because then they will be punished for their sins. This shows that these poskim regard a conversion without intent to observe mitzvot as valid ex post facto. In a previous post here I cited a number of examples of this, and here is one more.

R. Raphael Shapiro, Torat Refael, vol. 3, no. 42, has a short responsum about whether to convert a woman who will not be observant. It was sent to R. Mordechai Klatchko of Volozhin, who would later come to the U.S. and serve as a rav in Boston.[5] R. Klatchko was clearly a fine talmid hakham, as can be seen from the two volumes of his Tekhelet Mordekhai. R. Klatchko wrote to R. Shapiro arguing that the woman should be converted even if she was not going to be observant so that her intended husband (or perhaps current husband) could fulfill the mitzvah of procreation (which he could not do if his children would not be halakhically Jewish). R. Shapiro disagrees and states that it is forbidden to convert her, as she will certainly not observe the niddah laws, and this will cause them both to violate a Torah prohibition.

What is important for our purposes is that both R. Klatchko and R. Shapiro assume that one who converts without intending to observe Jewish law is regarded as a valid convert. As long as the person goes through a halakhically proper conversion ceremony, that is what activates the conversion. It is hard for people today to understand how R. Shapiro never even raises the possibility that a conversion is invalid if the person converting intends to routinely violate fundamental Jewish laws by living an irreligious lifestyle. But as can be seen in so many different examples, a widespread view in prior generations—I don’t know if it was the majority view or not—was that as long as the conversion is carried out properly, what happens later, and what is in the convert’s heart at the time of the conversion ceremony, have no legal significance.[6]

Here is one further example of this approach, Be-Mar’eh ha-Bazak, vol. 4, no. 96.[7]

As you can see, the approach of Kollel Eretz Hemdah is that there is no possibility of voiding a conversion carried out by a proper beit din, even if the people converting had no intention of observing mitzvot. At the beginning of the volume, it states that the responsa were reviewed by R. Zalman Nehemiah Goldberg, R. Nachum Rabinovitch, and R. Yisrael Rozen, all significant figures in their own right.

Finally, it is also worth noting that no less a figure than R. Isaac Jacob Weiss refused to void a conversion even though the woman who converted never observed mitzvot. See Minhat Yitzhak, vol. 1, nos. 121-123.

I have a good deal more to say about conversion, but in the interest of space, let me just call attention to a couple of interesting things I recently saw. The first is that R. Moses Sofer states that non-Jews are rewarded in this world if they convert to Judaism.[8] I do not know of anyone else who says that there is a divinely ordained reward for one who converts.

The second interesting discussion about conversion I recently saw is R. Aviad Sar Shalom Basilea, Emunat Hakhamim, ch. 24 (pp. 264-265 in the Jerusalem, 2016 edition). Adopting the type of anachronistic explanation that some commentators have been fond of, R. Basilea assumes that Mahlon converted Ruth and married her with huppah and kiddushin. But this creates a problem, because if Ruth was Jewish, why did Naomi push her away? R. Basilea offers a possible answer: Naomi held like the Rif and the Rambam that since Ruth’s immersion in the mikveh was not before three men, it was invalid even be-diavad. However, Mahlon held like the other poskim that be-diavad, tevilah by oneself if valid.

והנה נעמי היתה סוברת כרי”ף והרמב”ם שאפילו בדיעבד אינה גיורת ולכן השתדלה להרחיקה, ומחלון היה סבור כאותם הפוסקים הסוברים כי גיורת גמורה היתה ולכן נשאה

Does anyone, even from the most traditional communities, still offer explanations along these lines? Here is what R. Shimon Shkop wrote in a different context, and you can see that he was not a fan of this type of explanation.[9]

ודבר זה מביא לידי גיחוך, כעין הפלפולים אם פרעה היה סובר שעבודא דאורייתא

Some time ago I was looking at Abba Appelbaum’s book Rabbi Azariah Figo (Drohobycz, 1907), and he offers the following examples of anachronistic explanations (p. 54):[10]

R. Gershon Ashkenazi (1618-1693), one of the greatest halakhists of his day, also wrote a work of homiletics, Tiferet ha-Gershuni. In his derashah for parashat Mas’ei (p. 236 in the 2009 edition) he portrays the daughters of Zelophehad as arguing from halakhic logic.

In his derashah for parashat Va-Yera (p. 48), in discussing the descendants of Ishmael, R. Ashkenazi suggests that they held that the law of ketubah is rabbinic.

אם כן בני ישמעאל היו סבורים כתובה מדרבנן

Appelbaum also calls attention to R. Meir Schiff’s elaboration at the end of his commentary to Bava Kamma (found in the Vilna Shas). He portrays the incident of Esau selling his firstborn status from a halakhic angle. As such, Jacob’s thoughts were no different than those of a later halakhic scholar:

ונסתפק יעקב באומרו כיום מחמת שני דברים, שגריעותא דבכורה מחמת דבר שלא בא לעולם ומחמת אונאה . . . ויעקב נתיירא או למד הפשט כרש”י ולזה אמר ויאמר השבע לי כמ”ש בח”מ סי ר”ט ס”ד בהגה”ה

Another example, not mentioned by Applebaum, is R. Samuel Edels (Maharsha) in his aggadic commentary to Sanhedrin 57b. R. Edels wonders why Pharoah commanded the Hebrew midwives to kill the newborn Hebrew children, as it would have made much more sense to have Egyptian midwives do this. He explains that the children were to be killed before birth and for non-Jews this would be regarded as murder, which Pharoah wanted to avoid.[11] He thus turned to Hebrew midwives as for them it is not murder to kill an unborn child.

Quite apart from the far-fetched nature of the explanation, as well as its assumption that even before the giving of the Torah the Israelites were bound by Jewish law, not Noahide law, I don’t think any reader of the biblical story would find it reasonable that Pharoah was concerned about anyone violating the commandment against murder. However, the passage is also of interest in seeing how Maharsha regarded the prohibition against abortion.[12] He even portrays Pharoah as thinking that there is no prohibition for Jews to abort a fetus, including right before birth.

דודאי פרעה לא שאל מהם להרוג הזכרים בידים דבן נח מוזהר על שפיכות דמים ולכך לא אמר כן למילדות המצריות שהוזהרו על שפיכות דמים אפילו בעוברים אבל למילדות העבריות אמר שהותר לכם להרוג עובר במעי אמו וראיתם על האבנים קודם שיצא לאויר העולם אם בן הוא וגו’ וכיון שאי אפשר בהם לפטור משפיכות דמים רק בתחילת יציאת הולד קודם שיצא ראשו או רובו הוצרך לתת להם סימנין כמו שכתוב בפרק קמא דסוטה [יא ע”ב]

There has been a good deal of discussion as to how to understand the Maharsha’s words שהותר לכם. Some assume that he meant that Pharoah was in error in thinking that there is no prohibition for Jews to abort a fetus.[13] It is also possible to explain that the prohibition against abortion for Jews is only rabbinic,[14] so at that period of time there was no prohibition. R. Yaakov Farbstein states flatly:[15]

ומבואר במהרש”א דאין איסור לישראל בהריגת העוברים

This notion, that the Maharsha is saying that there is no prohibition for Jews to abort a fetus, is not in line with the overwhelming majority view beginning with the rishonim. However, in one Tosafot, Niddah 44a-b, s.v. ihu, it does state that abortion is permitted for Jews, and it does not mention that there needs to be a good reason for this or provide a timeline after which abortion is not allowed.

וא”ת אם תמצי לומר דמותר להורגו בבטן . . . וי”ל דמכל מקום משום פקוח נפש מחללין עליו את השבת אף ע”ג דמותר להרגו

Pretty much every halakhist who deals with abortion struggles with this Tosafot, as they have found it very hard to accept that any rishon could permit abortion without restrictions. One approach offered is that Tosafot is saying that there is no Torah prohibition, but there would still be a rabbinic prohibition.[16]

R. Moshe Feinstein, in his classic responsum on abortion, claims that there is a mistake in Tosafot, and instead of the two appearances of דמותר it should instead say דפטור ההורגו in both places.[17] This is in line with the phenomenon I have discussed on a few occasions, where R. Moshe is prepared to deny the authenticity of problematic texts. R. Eliezer Waldenberg offered a strong rejoinder to R. Moshe.[18]

והנה עם כל הכבוד, לא אדוני, לא זו הדרך, וחיים אנו עפ”ד גאוני הדורות, והמה טרחו כל אחד ואחד לפי דרכו לבאר ולהעמיד כוונת דברי התוס’ בנדה וליישבם, ואף אחד מהם לא עלה על דעתו הדרך הקלה והפשוטה ביותר לומר שיש ט”ס בדברי התוס’ ובמקום מותר צריך להיות אסור [צ”ל פטור]

While no other authorities agree with R. Moshe that the Tosafot contains a mistaken text, many regard the language of Tosafot as not exact.[19]

Returning to R. Shlomo Zalman Auerbach, I know of another example where he did not want a view of his to be widely shared. R. Amit Kula discusses R. Avigdor Nebenzahl’s argument that according to a variety of sources one who is suffering greatly is allowed to commit suicide. He further adds that it would be permitted to kill another in this circumstance (active euthanasia), for if you are allowed to kill yourself for a good purpose, you can do it to another as well. R. Nebenzahl adds that some of what he says comes from R. Shlomo Zalman Auerbach. He also quotes R. Auerbach that one can take medicine to reduce pain even if it will shorten one’s life.[20]

This information, which appeared in the first edition of R. Nebenzahl’s Be-Yitzhak Yikare, is not found in subsequent editions. R. Kula tells us that in these editions R. Nebenzahl inserted a note that the section was removed at the instruction of an unnamed scholar, and R. Mordechai Halpern quotes R. Nebenzahl that this scholar was none other than R. Auerbach.[21]

I find this of interest because if there is one thing that everyone knows, it is that Judaism does not allow active euthanasia (mercy killing). As is usually the case, matters are more complicated as has recently been shown by R. Yitzchak Roness in an article in Ha-Ma’yan.[22] He notes that R. Moshe Sternbuch does not believe that there is any prohibition for non-Jews to engage in mercy killing, since it is carried out for a good purpose. R. Yitzhak Zilberstein also inclines towards this position, and R. Moshe Feinstein suggests this as well, writing:[23]

אפשר שבן נח אינו אסור ברציחה שהוא לטובת הנרצח ושאני בזה האיסור לישראל מהאיסור לבן נח

R. Moshe and others specifically have in mind a non-Jew engaging in mercy killing of a Jew. The proof brought is the famous story of the death of R. Hanina ben Teradyon (Avodah Zarah 18a) where R. Hanina permits the executioner to raise the flame and remove the wool from his heart, thus actively hastening his death. R. Shaul Yisraeli goes the furthest, and for someone suffering greatly, and near death, he thinks that active euthanasia is permitted even if performed by a Jew.

R. Roness then notes that there is a dispute if one suffering great pain is allowed to commit suicide. For the side that permits this, R. Zilberstein adds that if it is permitted for the suffering individual, it will also be permitted for another to assist (active euthanasia). R. Roness also cites R. Hershel Schachter who states that active euthanasia, with the agreement of the patient, is not to be regarded as murder. He even suggests that for one suffering greatly, active euthanasia should be permitted:[24]

ההורג את חברו ברשותו יש לומר דאין בו לאו דרציחה אלא רק לאו דאך את דמכם, דלא גרע הורג חברו ברשותו מההורג את עצמו . . . ולמנוע א”ע מלסבול ייסורים דינו כפקו”נ, וכמשמעות התוס’ הנ”ל. ואם באמת כ”ה גדר היתר זה, א”כ אף בחולה הסובל יסורים קשים ומתחנן לאחרים ליטול את נפשו, אם נאמר כנ”ל, דבכה”ג אין לומר דבטלה דעתו וכו’, ג”כ הי’ צ”ל מותר מטעם פקו”נ ועיין בזה

And finally, here is what R. Chaim Kanievsky responded when asked if a Jewish patient near death could allow a non-Jew to end his life. R. Chaim does not say this is murder. On the contrary, he is inclined to permit it.[25]

אם שוהה אדם בבית חולים דעכו”ם ויש לו יסורים רבים במחלתו האנושה, ורוצה הרופא לחסוך לו היסורים ולקרב מותו ושואל ממנו רשות, האם מותר לו להסכים לזאת. והשיב רבנו שליט”א “יתכן שיש ללמוד זה ממעשה דרחב”ת” . . . והיאך הסכים רחב”ת שהעכו”ם יקרב מותו, והשיב רבנו: “איפה שהחולה מרגיש שזה טובתו יתכן שמותר כמו שמותר להתפלל עליו שימות.”

My question is, how come the “liberal” views I have mentioned are not better known?

7. In my last post here I included the first-ever color pictures of R. Jehiel Jacob Weinberg. These went around the world very quickly, and as is the nature of the internet, where the pictures came from was soon forgotten. In fact, within 24 hours someone who does not read the Seforim Blog sent them to me as a great new discovery. When I told him that I am the one who published the pictures he was at first incredulous, stating that he just got them from his cousin.

Here are two more pictures of R. Weinberg that he sent to his family. They are from before World War II when he was still in Germany. In the picture where he is lying the ground, I do not know who the couple next to R. Weinberg is.[26]

And for an extra treat, here are the only known videos of R. Weinberg, and one of them is in color. I thank Noam Cohn for putting this together, at my request, from his family’s collection. The first part has R. Weinberg with R. Arthur Ephraim Weil, the rav of Basel, and R. Leo Adler who succeeded Weil as rav of Basel in 1956. The second video, in which you can see R. Weinberg in color together with R. Samuel Brom, the rav of Lucerne, is from winter 1958-1959 at the Silberhorn kosher hotel in Grindelwald. The hotel had just inaugurated its new mikveh, and it was important to the family who owned the hotel that R. Weinberg give his approval to the mikveh.[27] At 1:12 and 3:20 you can also see the famed educator and student of R. Weinberg, Dr. Gabriel H. Cohn. Here is a picture from the event and you can see R. Brom and Dr. Cohn standing next to R. Weinberg.

Regarding R. Adler, before coming to Basel he studied ten years at the Mir Yeshiva, including in Shanghai. After the war he was in New York where he taught Torah at Yeshiva University.[28]

8. In my last post here I had the following quiz questions.

Please identify the following and email me your answers:

1. There are two se’ifim in the Shulhan Arukh that only contain two words.

2. There is one siman in the Shulhan Arukh whose number is the gematria of the subject of the siman.

The answer to no. 1 is Yoreh Deah 65:6: נוהג בכוי, and Even ha-Ezer 126:42: מותרת בויו

The answer to no. 2 is Orah Hayyim no. 586. This is the laws of shofar, and the gematria of shofar is 586. This was noted by R. Jacob Emden and I mentioned this in my article “‘Truth’ and Authorial Intent in the Study of Torah,” available here.

A number of people provided the correct answers for no. 1 and no. 2, but no one got both of my intended answers. However, Moshe Schwartz got no. 2 right with a different answer than I was thinking of (meaning he answered both questions correctly). He noted that Yoreh Deah 107 speaks about cooking eggs, and the gematria of ביצה is 107.[29] Also, shortly before this post was completed, Sol Reich provided another example: Yoreh Deah 334 is about הלכות נידוי וחרם and the gematria of נידוי וחרם is 334.

9. Information about my summer tours with Torah in Motion to Central Europe and Spain is available here.

* * * * * * *

[1] “Ha-Im Giyuram shel Gerim she-Einam Shomrim Mizvot Hal Be-Diavad? Berur Da’at ha-Gaon Rabbi Shlomo Zalman Auerbach ZTL,” Ha-Ma’yan 56 (Tishrei 5776), pp. 43-46.
[2] Halpern, Refuah, Metziut ve-Halakhah (Jerusalem, 2011), pp. 35ff.
[3] Amital, “Ha-Im Giyuram,” p. 45.
[4] Ve-Ohev Ger (Alon Shvut, 2010), p. 161 n. 1.
[5] See R. Hayyim Fischel Epstein, Teshuvah Shelemah, vol. 2, Even ha-Ezer, nos. 29-30, and R. Elijah Klatzkin, Hibbat ha-Kodesh, no. 11, where they respond to R. Klatchko’s question about a get written in Roxbury (a neighborhood in Boston), but the get only mentioned “Boston”. This is mentioned by Hayyim Karlinsky, Rabbi Hayyim Fischel Epstein (New York, 1963), pp. 26-27.

This R. Klatchko should not be confused with an earlier R. Mordechai Klatchko of Lida who also wrote a book titled Tekhelet Mordekhai. It is noteworthy that R. Klatchko of Lida wrote a lengthy haskamah for the Mishnah Berurah. Regarding R. Klatchko of Lida, see here.[6] For another example, see R. Dov Cohen, Va-Yelkhu Sheneihem Yahdav (Jerusalem, 2009), pp. 333-334. Here R. Cohen describes how, at the direction of R. Isser Yehudah Unterman, he converted a woman intent on marrying a completely irreligious Jew. This is the sort of conversion that today would not be allowed in Israel or in any of the batei din recognized by the Israeli Chief Rabbinate. See also R. Avraham Shapiro, Kuntres Aharon in his edition of R. Isaac Jacob Rabinowitz, Zekher Yitzhak (Jerusalem, 1990), p. 396, who suggests that according to Maimonides, when it comes to conversion and acceptance of mitzvot,  כיון שקבל בפה אין דבריו שבלב דברים.

For a convert who is not observant, there is one halakhic consequence, at least according to many authorities: When they divorce the get should not say ben (or bat) Avraham avinu, but ploni ha-ger. See R. Shimon Yakobi, Bitul Giyur Ekev Hoser Kenut be-Kabbalat ha-Mitzvot (Jerusalem, 2009), pp. 103ff. (This is an official publication of the Israel rabbinical courts.) See also ibid., p. 105, for the shocking statistic that from 1996-2008, 97% of converts who divorced in the State of Israel were irreligious. There is no reason to doubt that the number of non-divorced converts who are irreligious is similar. If only 3% of converts in Israel are religious, then, as Yakobi rightly notes, it raises serious concerns about the conversion process.
[7] A similar responsum dealing with the same case appears in Be-Mar’eh ha-Bazak, vol 3, no. 89.
[8] Derashot Hatam Sofer, vol. 2, p. 301c. s.v. yeshalem.
[9] Hiddushei Rabbi Shimon ha-Kohen (Jerusalem, 2011), vol. 4, p. 324 (Kuntres Likutim, no. 5).
[10] I can’t say whether there is any plagiarism in this book, but another publication of Appelbaum was plagiarized from Abraham Berliner. See Nehemiah Leibowitz, “Al Devar ha-Takanah be-Venetzia,” Ha-Tzofeh le-Hokhmat Yisrael 13 (1929), p. 90.

Regarding anachronistic explanations, I think most would also include in this category R. Moses Sofer’s statement that Joseph wished to pray with a minyan rather than pray vatikin by himself. See Hatam Sofer al ha-Torah, vol. 1, p. 227.
[11] The same approach is independently suggested by R. Judah Rosanes, Parashat Derakhim, Derush 17, and R. Pinhas Horowitz, Panim Yafot, Ex. 1:15.

R. Ishmael holds that abortion is treated as murder for non-Jews (Sanhedrin57b) and Maimonides rules this way (Mishneh Torah, Hilkhot Melakhim9:4). This halakhah has often been cited as proof that the crime of abortion is stricter for non-Jews than Jews, and that public policy should be in line with this. Yet in Sanhedrin 57b the Tanna Kamma disagrees with R. Ishmael and does not regard abortion as murder. In fact, according to the Tanna Kamma, abortion would seem to be permissible for non-Jews. R. Jeremy Wieder has raised the question, which I would like someone to offer a serious reply to, that while Maimonides and other authorities accept R. Ishmael as the binding decision, who says that non-Jews have to accept this? Why can’t non-Jews “poskin” like the Tanna Kamma? See here at minute 35:30.

R. Shneur Zalman Fradkin,Torat Hesed, Even ha-Ezer, no. 42:5 (in the note), suggests that Tosafot,Niddah 44a, that I discuss in the text, adopts the Tanna Kamma’s position, not the view of R. Ishmael. See Tzitz Eliezer, vol. 14, p. 184. The implications of this with regard to non-Jews are obviously significant.

See also R. Jacob Emden, Em la-Binah (Jerusalem, 2020), p. 197:

בילדכן את העבריות: לא גזר על שפיכות דמים אלא על העוברים

R. Emden seems to be saying that abortion is not regarded as murder for non-Jews. Perhaps relevant to this, it is worth noting that R. Meir Mazuz states that one should encourage a non-Jewish woman pregnant by a Jewish man to have an abortion. SeeMakor Ne’eman, vol. 3, no. 1509. See also R. Hanan Aflalo,Asher Hanan, vol. 8, no. 74. R. Joseph Babad, Minhat Hinnukh, 296:7, states that abortion is not murder for non-Jews, and therefore there is no law of rodef when it comes to a non-Jew seeking to kill a fetus. (Since later in this post I mention suicide, it is worth noting that R. Babad also states that non-Jews are not prohibited from committing suicide. See Minhat Hinnukh 34:8.)

Regarding abortion for Jews, R. Hershel Schachter has an interesting shiur here. His approach is, I think, the most lenient among contemporary poskim, as he states that for the health of the mother abortion is permitted up until the end of pregnancy, which is long after the time that the fetus is viable.

R. Schachter’s approach might be identical with the very lenient perspective of R. Abraham Isaac Bloch. See R. Mordechai Gifter,Milei de-Iggerot, vol. 7, p. 341:

בגדר האיסור דהריגת עוברין בישראל, שמעתי מאדמו”ר הגאב”ד ור”מ דטלז ז”ל הי”ד, שהוא מגדר בל תשחית, אשר לפי”ז כל שהוא לצורך רפואה או פגם משפחה, אין בזה גדר האיסור דהשחתה

[12] I would have thought that the Maharsha’s words could have halakhic significance, but R. Nahman Yehiel Michel Steinmetz states otherwise, noting אין לומדים הלכה מדברי הגדה. See Meshiv Nevonim, vol. 6, p. 250. See also R. Weinberg’s comments regarding the Maharsha in Seridei Esh, vol. 3, no. 126.
[13] See e.g., Siftei Maharsha: Shemot, pp. 16-17.
[14] For opinions that the prohibition against abortion is only rabbinic, see R. Yishai Yitzhak Shraga, Torat ha-Ubar (Jerusalem, 2017), pp. 72ff.
[15] Ohalei Yaakov: Shemot, p. 1.
[16] See R. Eliezer Waldenberg, Tzitz Eliezer, vol. 9, p. 231, vol. 14, p. 184.
[17] Iggerot Moshe, Hoshen Mishpat 2, p. 295. There are a couple of strange things in this responsum, which first appeared in the R. Yehezkel Abramsky Memorial Volume. For example, see p. 298 how R. Moshe describes R. Joseph Hayyim’s responsum in Rav Pealim. (The word שהחכם in the bottom line right column should be שהתחכם, as it appears in the R. Abramsky Memorial Volume.) Yet as R. Waldenberg points out, Tzitz Eliezer, vol. 14, p. 186, R. Moshe’s summary of Rav Pealim is inaccurate and he also does not show much regard for R. Joseph Hayyim, leading R. Waldenberg to write: והוא פלאי, ושרי ליה מריה בזה. See Tzitz Eliezer, vol. 14, p. 186. (R. Moshe actually ends his own responsum by saying ושרי ליה מריה בזה about R. Waldenberg.)

R. David M. Feldman wrote to R. Waldenberg that R. Moshe did not write the responsum on abortion, and that could explain what he saw as various problems in this responsum. SeeTzitz Eliezer, vol. 20, p. 140.

I find this approach completely untenable, although in conversation with me R. Feldman insisted on it. Some might suggest that others were involved in writing the responsum, and that explains the passage dealing with Rav Pealim. I find this impossible to accept, and would prefer to assume that at least with regard to the inaccurate Rav Pealim description, that R. Moshe did not have the text in front of him and was citing from memory from what had earlier been shown to him. As such, it is easy to imagine how he could have forgotten the details, as we have all had similar experiences. For more on this responsum, see my post here.
[18] Tzitz Eliezer, vol. 14, p. 183.
[19] See R. Zvi Ryzman, Ratz ke-Tzvi, vol. 2, p. 295.
[20] Tehumin 37 (2017), p. 124.
[21] Refuah, Metziut, ve-Halakhah, p. 28.
[22] “Ha-Im Muteret ‘Hamatat Hesed’ al Yedei Amirah le-Goy,” Ha-Ma’yan 62 (Tamuz 5782), pp. 54-64.
[23] Iggerot Moshe, Hoshen Mishpat 2, p. 313.
[24] Ginat Egoz, p. 74.
[25] R. Yosef Aryeh Lorintz, Mishnat Pikuah Nefesh, p. 26.
[26] The pictures in this post are now kept at Ganzach Kiddush Hashem in Bnei Brak.
[27] All the big rabbis stayed and ate at the Silberhorn hotel, and yet until 1975 it had no hashgachah. People knew the family that owned it to be absolutely reliable in matters of kashrut, and like the other kosher hotels in Switzerland, the kashrut was trusted without any hashgachah. In 1974 the Swiss rabbinate informed the various kosher hotels that they would need to acquire a hashgachah, thus ending the era of religious owners’ kashrut being trusted without any outside supervision. (Thanks to Dr. Joshua Sternbuch who passed on this information from the family who owned the Silberhorn hotel.)

Regarding the pious practice of eating eggs at seudah shelishit, see Kaf ha-Hayyim 289:12.

An Autopsy in Antebellum America:
Exhuming a Forgotten 19^th Century Halachic Debate on Cadaveric Dissection
Part I

By Shimon Garrel

Shimon Garrel is a current M.D. candidate at SUNY Downstate Health Science University. He is a graduate of Touro College and studied in various yeshivas in New York and Israel. 

Halachic Considerations

This article is part I of II that will seek to address two points. The first and primary goal is to bring to light a somewhat forgotten and unacknowledged controversy regarding the permissibility of cadaveric dissection of Jewish bodies that took place in the heart of New York in 1856. A secondary aspect of this study which will appear in Part II is to examine the primary halachic responses to this debate especially in light of the contemporaneous halachic literature on the subject of performing a Post-Mortem.

To fully appreciate the background of this controversy we will begin with a short review of some of the primary halachic positions on autopsies leading up to 1856. Any discussion on halachic autopsies begins with Rabbi Yechezkel Landau, author of the Noda Be-Yehuda. The Noda Be’Yehuda’s landmark teshuva, Tinyana Y.D. 210, was the first teshuva of a world renown posek to directly address the permissibility of autopsies. Since its publication, the body of teshuvos and literature addressing the subject has grown almost exponentially. The question posed to the Noda Be’yehuda, was whether the body of a patient who passed away from a suspected gallstone[1] may be dissected to understand the pathology of the disease.

Regarding your treatise, which you sent to me, and which offers a presentation of the issue that you were asked about by the holy community of London: It happened that someone was ill with a gallstone. The physicians performed surgery, as usual for such an affliction, but it did not cure him, and he died. The sages of that city were asked if it is permissible to dissect the cadaver in that place to see evidence of the root of the affliction, and to learn from it for the future practice of medicine, so that if such a case occurs again, they know how to perform the surgery necessary for a cure without incising him too much, thus minimizing the risks of the surgery. Is this prohibited because it constitutes desecration and disgrace of this corpse, or is it permitted because it leads to the future saving of lives, so that they may take the utmost caution in their craft.

…In our case, there is no ill person who needs this. Rather, they want to study this discipline in case they encounter a sick person who requires it. We certainly do not supersede any Torah prohibition or even a rabbinic prohibition due to such a slight concern. For if you call this concern “an uncertainty pertaining to a life,” then any task related to healing—grinding and cooking medicine or preparing a scalpel for bloodletting—will be permitted on Shabbat, perhaps they will encounter a sick person who requires it that night or the next day. It is also difficult to distinguish between concern for the need arising in the near future and concern for the need arising in the distant future. Heaven forfend that such a thing should be permitted. Even gentile physicians do not gain surgical experience with just any corpse, but only with those put to death by the law[2] or with those who themselves consented to it while living. If we, God forbid, are lax in this matter, they will operate on every corpse to learn anatomy and physiology, so that they may know how to cure the living. Therefore, this is all unnecessarily lengthy, and there is no lenient approach whatsoever.[3]

For the next century, many if not all halachic deliberations on the matter of autopsies centered around the conditions set by the Noda Be-Yehuda’s ruling. The Noda Be’Yehuda’s perspective on this is clear. An autopsy may only be permitted in a matter of life and death that is “lefanenu”, where performing the autopsy can immediately benefit a high-risk patient. Post-Mortem examinations with the intent of simply studying “ in case they encounter a sick person” does not rise to the level of pikuach nefesh which would permit violating various prohibitions of desecrating a body. The Chasam Sofer, Y.D. 337 commenting on the Noda Be’Yehuda’s psak, agreed to the essence of the teshuva and introduces another element not cited by Rabbi Landau, which is that of a dead body being forbidden to derive benefit from. Without a direct beneficiary of the knowledge gained by the medical autopsy, writes the Chasam Sofer, it is forbidden to conduct a dissection both on grounds of Nivul Ha-Meis, desecration of the dead, and Issur Hanah, the inability to derive any benefit from a dead body.[4]

Rabbi Yaakov Ettlinger, the famed German Talmudist and Posek, took an even more hardline approach than the Noda Be-Yehuda and the Chasam Sofer. In Teshuva 170 published in his Binyan Tzion, he quotes the Noda Be-Yehuda and argues that even if there would be a deathly ill patient who may benefit from the knowledge gleaned from the dissection of a Jewish corpse it is absolutely forbidden to save one’s self by desecrating another body.[5]

We have now seen a brief collection of the positions of some of the most widely respected poskim of the late 18^th and early 19^th century Europe. The consensus of these poskim with the notable exception of Rabbi Ettlinger, would be to allow an autopsy only in a case where there is a patient who will directly benefit from the anatomical and pathological knowledge derived from that dissection.

Jews’ Hospital of New York

By the year 1848, the New York City Jewish population had swelled from an estimated count of 950 in 1826 to 13,000.[6] The increase in Jewish population in New York reflected the influx of Jewish immigrants that had begun making their way to the United States. This wave of immigration consisted mainly of Jews hailing from Central and Western Europe. Like many immigration stories, a mix of push and pull factors like political instability in the rapidly changing German confederacy, the economic needs of Jewish families due to the rapidly increasing industrialization, and perhaps a spirit of adventure, caused many German Jews to journey to America.[7]

Sampson Simson

With large amounts of immigrants settling in the slums of New York, it came to the attention of some of the wealthier Jews in New York, that a gaping medical void needed to be filled. While immigrant Jews requiring medical care could get it at city hospitals like Bellevue Hospital, many faced discrimination and it certain cases, may have even been refused treatment. With the unabated Jewish population growth, the urgency to open a Jewish hospital became more and more pronounced. On January 15^th, 1852, a small group of nine friends, most of them prominent members of “high society” as well descendants of some of the earliest Jewish families in America, gathered in the Trustees’ room of Shearith Israel, the historic Spanish Portuguese Synagogue, and incorporated “The Jews’ Hospital of New York”. The nine represented a cross section of some of the most important and connected Jews in New York who had worked together on other charitable causes. The leader and most senior member of the group was 72-year-old Sampson Simson. Simson, a Columbia College graduate who studied law under Aaron Burr, had been involved in many other charitable enterprises after his early retirement spent the rest of his life involved in public affairs and charity.[9] The other eight were each men of repute, Rev Samuel M. Isaacs, famous for being on of the officiating clergy men of President Lincoln’s funeral. The others, John I. Hart, Benjamin Nathan, John M. Davies, Henry Hendricks, Theodore J. Seixas, Isaac Phillips and John D. Phillips were wealthy businessmen who had participated in varies Jewish charities and were eager to contribute to this much needed project. With Sampson elected as president of the first board of Directors of the Hospital, the mission statement was defined as to provide “medical and surgical aid to persons of Jewish persuasion and for all other purposes appertaining to Hospitals and Dispensaries”.

Within a few months, funds were raised, and a location was purchased by Sampson on 28^th street between 7^th and 8^th Avenues, which at the time was away from the hustle of lower Manhattan and in the “rural” part of Manhattan Island. By Fall of 1853, the cornerstone had been laid and construction had commenced. On May 17^th 1855, the Jews’ hospital was opened in a religious ceremony that was led by Reverend Jacques Judah Lyons, the Suriname born rabbi of the Shearith Israel, as well as Ansel Leo, a nephew by marriage to Simpson and leader of congregation B’nai Jeshurun, the second oldest orthodox shul in Manhattan after Shearith Israel.[10] And finally, on June 5^th 1855, the first patient was accepted to Jews’ Hospital of New York. With great fanfare the first Jewish hospital in New York, and the second in the country,[11] was opened to the Jewish public.

Figure 2 From the Picture Collection of the New York Public Library. Jews’ Hospital in New York. Printed on border: “Incorporated February, 1866. 138 and 140 West Twenty-eighth Street, between Seventh and Eighth Avenues.” In 1866 the hospital ceased acting as a sectarian institution.

A “Dissection” for the sake of Heaven

The house staff of Jews’ Hospital consisted of what today would be called an all-star team. As detailed in “The story of the first fifty years of the Mount Sinai Hospital, 1852-1902”; pg’s 22 -23.

The first Staff, announced by the Board of Directors on May 21, 1855, included some of the most prominent physicians and surgeons practicing in New York. These men had faith in the efforts of Sampson Simson and his associates. There were four Consulting Physicians. One was Chandler R. Gilman, a witty conversationalist who in his younger days had supplemented the meagre earnings of his early medical career by writing.49 He was Professor of Obstetrics and Diseases of Women and Children at the College of Physicians and Surgeons, having been appointed in 1841; and in 1894 he was one of the few contemporary physicians to insist that there was such a thing as criminal insanity and that such criminals should have special treatment. Another was William Detmold, a German, who had introduced orthopedic surgery in New York, had founded an orthopedic clinic at the College of Physicians and Surgeons in 1841, and was to be the first President of the New York County Medical Association in 1884. William H. Maxwell was the third Consulting Physician, while the fourth was Benjamin W. McCready, a highly respected physician and an early contributor to the funds of the Hospital. The two Attending Surgeons were Israel Moses, an Army surgeon who also had contributed toward the building of the Hospital, and Alexander B. Mott, the son of Valentine Mott … He was an excellent surgeon in his own right, and the founder of Bellevue Medical College. There were three Consulting Surgeons: the great Valentine Mott; Thomas M. Markoe, one of the founders of the New York Academy of Medicine eight years earlier; and Willard Parker, a leader in surgery, a brilliant lecturer who had taught at Berkshire County Medical College and the College of Physicians and Surgeons, and a co-founder with Daniel Drake of the Cincinnati Medical College in 1835. The Resident and Attending Physician was Mark Blumenthal.[12] A member of the Portuguese Congregation, Mark Blumenthal was its official doctor in its help of the sick.

With an impressive roster of physicians and large financial backing from the Jews of New York, the Jews’ Hospital at the time of its opening was placed in the unique position of being unencumbered by prehistoric medical practices and policies while being run by some of the most forward-thinking and innovative physicians in New York. With a top-of-the-line staff, the introduction of some newer methodologies was not long in coming. On December 5^th of 1855, exactly 6 months after the hospital’s opening, a meeting was called at the behest of Dr. Blumenthal, the house physician of the hospital and important to note, a practicing Jew. Dr. Blumenthal asked for permission to perform a post-mortem dissection on a deceased patient, as a “justification” to defend himself against the consulting physician who disagreed with Dr. Blumenthal’s assessment on the cause of death.[13] The use of post-mortem examination to determine cause of death was a fairly new phenomenon for the 19^th century.[14] Advances in anatomic as well as histologic pathology had begun to take root in medical practice in Europe. French physician and “Father of Histology” Xavier Bichat (1777 -1802) famously wrote that “we should dissect in anatomy, experiment in physiology, and make necropsy in medicine; this is the threefold path without which there can be no anatomist, no physiologist, and no physician.”T[15] The spirit permeating western European hospitals especially was that a great physician wedded clinical medicine with knowledge gleaned from anatomic and pathologic examinations. Blumenthal, besides serving as the deputy coroner of New York city in 1853, spent part of 1854 visiting hospitals in London, Paris, and Munich.¹² There is no doubt he bore witness to some of the attitudes and practices present in these hospitals and took some of what he learnt back to New York.

At the convened meeting, Dr. Blumenthal’s request was discussed, and the Board of Directors approved the post-mortem examination. It wasn’t long before word of the autopsy began to circulate and the Board of the Jews’ Hospital met once again on January 14^th to appoint a committee to investigate whether a carte blanche policy to post mortems at the hospital should be allowed. The committee decided to submit the question to Rabbi Dr. Nathan Adler, Chief Rabbi of England, to decide whether autopsies should be permitted under “any circumstances.”[16]

Endnotes

[1] While frequently assumed to be referring to gallstones, Rabbi Dr. Edward Reichman has convincingly argued that it is in fact a case of bladder stones. See Reichman, E. (2021). The anatomy of Jewish law: A fresh dissection of the relationship between medicine, Medical History & Rabbinic literature. OU Press. pg’s. 344 -350. Although mention should be made of the work of the French anatomist and Surgeon Jean-Louis Petit who reported and advocated for performing cholecystostomy in the early part of the 18^th century. See Clark BB., Livingston WT. Evaluation of Cholecystostomy. AMA Arch Surg. 1956;72(2):218–223. For an overview of Jean-Louis Petit’s life, see Markatos, K., et al; Jean-Louis Petit (1674–1750): a pioneer anatomist and surgeon and his contribution to orthopaedic surgery and trauma surgery. International Orthopaedics (SICOT) 42, 2003–2007 (2018). I have left “אבן בכיס” as gallstones to maintain the original Sefaria translation.
[2] Interestingly, criminal bodies were the most common source of cadavers in England beginning with the English Murder Act of 1752. England of the early 18^th century was experiencing concurrently a growth in the number of medical schools in the country as well as a perceived rise in crime. Hoping to “kill” as it were, two birds with one stone, Parliament passed the Murder Act in which bodies of executed criminals were to be used as medical cadavers. The hope was that this would both serve as a deterrent to criminals as it preyed on commonly held Christian religious sentiment about the need for proper burial. Similar laws were soon passed throughout parts of Europe and no doubt the Noda Be’Yehuda was aware of these codes. Understanding this also helps provide important perspective into the psak of the Noda Be’Yehuda. For a comprehensive legal and historical background on the passing of the Murder Act See Tarlow S, Battell Lowman E. Harnessing the Power of the Criminal Corpse (2018). Cham (CH): Palgrave Macmillan; 2018. Chapter 4, Murder and the Law, 1752–1832.
[3] Translation taken from Sefaria.
[4] Regarding the Chasam Sofer’s psak that studying medicine from dissections is considered Issur Hanaha see שו“ת נצר במטעי סי‘ לא and She’elot U’Teshuvot Be’er Moshe(Danishevsky) Y.D. 52 who discuss and challenge this assumption.
[5] The novel ruling of Rabbi Ettlinger, that one may not be saved by way of desecrating a dead body has been challenged by many other Poskim. See the direct response of the Maharam Schick to Rabbi Ettlinger in She’elot U’Teshuvot Maharam Schick 336. See further Rabbi Ettlinger’s reply in She’elot U’Teshuvot Binyan Tzion 171.
[6] Oppenheim, S. D. (1918). The Jewish Population of The United States. The American Jewish Year Book, 20, 31–74. http://www.jstor.org/stable/23600990
[7] On the German Jewish immigration to America, see generally Barkai, Avraham. Branching Out: German-Jewish Immigration to the United States, 1820-1914. New York: Holmes & Meier, 1994 and Diner, Hasia R. A Time for Gathering: The Second Migration, 1820–1880 (1992).
[8] Isaacs, M. S. (1902). SAMPSON SIMSON. Publications of the American Jewish Historical Society, 10, 109–117. http://www.jstor.org/stable/43059667
[9] Mount Sinai Hospital (New York, N., Benedict, J. (1944). The story of the first fifty years of the Mount Sinai Hospital, 1852-1902. New York. See pages 5 and 6 for a detailed account of each of the founding directors.
[10] Ibid. pg 9.
[11] The first “Jewish” hospital in the United States was the aptly named Jewish Hospital of Cincinnati. It was founded around the year 1850. See pg. 4 of the December 9^th 1853, edition of the Asmonean, a 19^th century Jewish weekly, for an amusing letter to the editor by the board of the Cincinnati Jewish Hospital “clearing up” that they were the first Jewish hospital incorporated in the United States.
[12] See the entry on Blumenthal from the Jewish Encyclopedia available at https://jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/3434-blumenthal-mark for more information.
[13] Jews’ Hospital Minutes of the Board of Directors December 5th, 1855. Arthur H. Aufses, Jr., MD Archives, Mount Sinai Hospital.
[14] With the publication of the first serious work on pathology, De Sedibus et causis morborum per anatomen indagatis “Of the seats and causes of diseases investigated through anatomy” in 1761 by Giovanni Battista Morgagni, the connection between anatomy and disease had just begun to solidify.
[15] King LS, Meehan MC. A history of the autopsy. A review. American Journal of Pathology. 1973 Nov;73(2):514-44.
[16] The Occident, Vol XIV, Nu. III, pg 128.

The Anatomy of an Auction: A Previously Undissected Body of Literature on the History of the Jews and Postmortem Dissection

 Rabbi Edward Reichman, MD 

The issue of autopsy and postmortem dissection has been exhaustively explored in halakhic literature.[1] If I were to ask where and when we find the first halakhic discussion about this topic, the immediate response would invariably be the teshuva of the Noda biYehuda, from the late eighteenth century.[2] It may be time to rewrite the medical halakhah history books. On Sunday, May 21 Genazym Auction House held its fifteenth auction. Lot #133 was a work entitled Pachad Yitzchak.

There are multiple works throughout history that bear the title Pachad Yitzchak. The modern reader will surely think of the work of Rav Yitzchak Hutner. The reader of this blog may also think of the first multi-volume halakhic encyclopedia, authored by Rabbi Dr. Yitzchak Lampronti (1679-1756). The volume offered for auction by Genazym is an earlier lesser-known composition of the same name by Yitzchak Hayyim Kohen me-haHazzanim (AKA Isaac Vita Cantarini)[3] published in 1685. 

Buried in Cantarini’s obscure work, in a section peripheral to the main theme of the book, we find a vivid and poetic description of a tragic incident relating to anatomical dissection.[4] Viewed in isolation, this incident merits historical attention due to its gravity. Yet, it merely reflects a much larger historical chapter about the Jews and postmortem dissection which long preceded the time of the Noda biYehuda and has remained largely undissected until now. But first a word about this work, its provenance and its author. 

The Work- Pachad Yitzchak (Amsterdam, 1685)[5]

The main subject of this work is the tale, told in poetic fashion, of the miraculous salvation of the Jewish congregation of Padua during the Austrian-Ottoman War in the year 1684. War erupted between the Austrian and Ottoman Empires in the year 1684 over the city of Buda (today part of Budapest). The virulently anti-Semitic Christian ruler of Padua spread a libel accusing the Jews of supporting the Muslim Turks in their battle against the Austrian Empire. His incitement caused an enraged crowd to break into the Padua Ghetto, yet the Jews miraculously persuaded the Venetian government to subdue the outburst. The Jews of Padua declared the 10th day of Elul as their Second Purim in gratitude for their miraculous salvation. This holiday was celebrated for many generations thereafter. 

However, the work also includes many additional unknown details of the history of the Jewish community and its rabbis. It is from this aspect of the book that we draw our discussion. 

Provenance

Regarding the item’s provenance, it was previously part of the William Gross Family Collection,[6] a significant portion of which has been recently sold at auction by both Kedem[7] and Genazym auction houses. Gross is a well-known prominent collector of Judaica and Hebraica and the selling of his collection is of historic significance. To see the collection of precious items united under one roof now become redistributed and disseminated across the world necessitates a moment of pause and reflection. Yet, this is the life cycle in the world of bibliophilia.[8] For centuries, passionate bibliophiles spent lifetimes amassing extraordinary and unique collections, only to have them subsequently sold piecemeal (for a variety of reasons) while still alive, or by less passionate heirs after death. Sometimes, however, collections are sold en bloc. An allusion to one such example is the image which appears on the bottom of the title page of the copy of Pachad Yitzchak sold at auction.  

This stamp, which is not mentioned in the catalogue description, indicates that this volume was previously part of the collection of Professor Lelio Della Torre. Della Torre was an Italian Jewish scholar of the nineteenth century, and prolific author, who served as a professor of Talmud and rabbinics at the rabbinical seminary in Padua, where Shadal also taught, from 1829 until his death in 1871. During this time, he was an avid collector of Hebraica. David Kaufmann, himself a renowned scholar and bibliophile, sought to procure Delle Torre’s collection upon the latter’s death. Kaufmann not only acquired Della Torre’s collection, but also that of Marco Mortara, a student of Shadal, and later Chief Rabbi of Mantua. Mortara’s collection in turn contained the library of Samuel Della Volta, whose life, work and library we discussed in this blog.[9]  All of these collections are now housed in the Hungarian Academy of Sciences Library in Budapest, to which Kaufmann bequeathed his library. This volume from Della Torre’s library somehow escaped the grasp of Kaufmann and traversed a different path, ultimately landing instead in the Gross Family Collection.[10]

The Author- Yitzchak Hayyim Cantarini (1644-1723)[11]

The Cantorini family were a prominent family of Kohanim who were also associated with the cantorial profession – hence the name Cantarini, or MinHaHazanim, as their Hebrew name reflects. Isaac Cantarini graduated from the University of Padua Medical School on February 11, 1664, one of many Cantarinis who earned their medical degrees from the university.[12] He authored a number of congratulatory poems in honor of Padua medical graduates.

After graduated from Padua, Cantarini went on to become a leading figure in Italian Jewry. He is considered one of the greatest Torah sages of his time, and his responsa have been published in both Yitzhak Lampronti’s Pachad Yitzhak and Samson Morpurgho’s Shemesh Tzedakah.[13] Cantarini wrote halakhic, historical, and homiletic works, as well as medical treatises in Latin. He was a poet, author, physician, and consummate orator; non-Jewish clergy and lay people attended his Shabbat sermons. In the year 5460 there were so many non-Jewish visitors in synagogue when he spoke that the regulars had to ascend to the women’s section (ezrat nashim) to pray.[14] He was a teacher of both Rabbi Moshe Hayyim Luzzatto (Ramchal),[15] as well as Rabbi Yitzchak Lampronti.

Non-Jews sought Cantarini’s sage advice as well, as evidenced by his correspondence with the Christian intellectual Theophilio Ungar.[16]

Cantarini was known by his initials יחכם. He was also quite adept at word play, and Shadal mentions but one small example of his utilizing the acronym of his name in the introduction to a kinah he composed upon the passing of Rabbi Yehuda Briel:[17]

Shadal takes a stab at solving the riddle.

A Fearful Story in Pachad Yitzchak

The following story appears in the pages of Pachad Yitzchak.[18] On the 17th of Shevat 5440 (שנת מ”ת as per Cantarini), a young man by the name of Hananel (AKA Graziadio) Levi[19] died in the Ghetto. His body was prepared for burial, but in the interim, a band of raucous students from the University of Padua stormed the Ghetto, kidnapped the body, and whisked it away to the anatomy room in preparation for dissection and medical student instruction. The Jewish community was in an uproar, riots ensued, and all political channels were pursued to secure the return of the body. When initial efforts failed, some members of the Jewish community on their own initiative attempted unsuccessfully to enter the anatomy lecture hall under cover of night to procure the body. Ultimately, after one week, negotiations succeeded, and the Jews were promised by the University that they needn’t worry about similar infractions in the future, and that the bodies of the Jewish community would no longer be forcefully taken for anatomical dissection. 

Anatomy, the Jews, and the University of Padua- An Undissected Body of Literature

This frightening incident recounted in Pachad Yitzchak is significant in its own right, but here we situate it as part of a much larger narrative of anatomy, the Jews and the University of Padua, which began over a century earlier.

Since the Middle Ages, individual Jewish students experienced numerous hurdles to the completion of their medical training, many rooted in discrimination and antisemitism. It was sometime around the 16thcentury, however, as the result of the synchroneity of two major historical developments, that Jews, as a group, first encountered a new major challenge to their medical education. This challenge, unlike any previous, did not originate with their non-Jewish colleagues or institutions, but was self-imposed by the Jews. Its consequences however were no less severe.

In the beginning of the fifteenth century, the University of Padua became the first European university to officially allow admission of Jewish students for medical training.[20] This policy led to a gradual influx of Jewish students and the creation for the first time in history of a significant Jewish presence and recognizable entity in a consistent fashion on a university campus.[21] This positive development for the broader Jewish community[22] unwittingly evoked unanticipated consequences.

Simultaneous with the expansion of the Jewish community in Padua, a young professor on campus was quietly revolutionizing the study of anatomy. Andreas Vesalius, who arrived in Padua in 1537, began to hold frequent public and private anatomical displays and approached the study of human anatomical dissection in a systematic fashion not previously attempted.[23] He would later come to be known as the founder of modern anatomy. With his innovations came the expansion of the anatomy course in Padua. Anatomy became identified from then on as the most essential course in medical training, and Vesalius, along with the University of Padua, were leading the revolution. 

The Ramifications of Vesalius’ Contribution for the Jewish Community

Vesalius’s work formalized and expanded the teaching of human anatomy at the University of Padua, as well as at medical schools throughout the world. With the expansion of the course came the necessity to supply more cadavers for the dissection tables. To procure cadavers for the anatomy course, the university turned to both the judicial system as well as its students and their communities. Executed criminals served as one steady source of cadavers, but this did not suffice. 

Grave robbing became commonplace in order to supplement the source of bodies. The practice was even encouraged by Vesalius and, though technically illegal, was unofficially tolerated by the government. A ducal document from 1549, during Vesalius’s tenure in Padua, condemns grave robbing,[24] but the ever-present fear and reality of the practice also affecting the Jewish cemeteries.[25] Indeed, one scholar has suggested that one of the historiated letters in the Fabrica specifically depicts a scene of the grave robbing of a body from a Jewish cemetery.[26]

The scene depicts putti (cherubic figures common in Renaissance art) removing a body from a grave. The “o” on the flag held by one of the putti was the symbol Jews were required to wear on their clothing and may reflect that this was a Jewish cemetery depicted.

The emphasis on anatomy begun by Vesalius would continue long into the future. Soon the university would further invest in this venture by building the first example in the world of a permanent anatomical theater, completed in 1595 (after the death of Vesalius), created for teaching anatomy through the dissection of corpses. The theater still stands to this day. 

The supply of cadavers was a perennial challenge for the medical school, and as a result, the university sought additional creative ways to address the issue. At some stage they instituted each community which sent medical students for training at the university would be required to provide a certain number of bodies for the dissection table.[27] The Jewish community, like others on campus, was expected to provide cadavers for the yearly anatomy course. However, the Jewish students and community took issue with this expectation. As elated as Jews were to walk the halls of a premier university for the first time in history, this privilege would not compel the abrogation of ancient Torah principles. Jewish law forbids the dissection of the human body after death absent mitigating circumstances yielding direct and immediate life-saving benefit from the procedure.[28] The prohibitions of desecrating and deriving benefit from the corpse, as well as the obligation to bury the body preclude routine dissection or autopsy. 

This refusal of the Jews to provide bodies sparked outcry from both the university and its students. The tension created from this conflict would play out over centuries. It is reflected, for example, in multiple recorded incidents of Padua medical students attempting to kidnap Jewish bodies to provide for the anatomy course.[29] Although we have no starting date, already in the earliest Vesalian and post-Vesalian days in Padua a compromise was struck with the Jewish community providing a hefty financial compensation to absolve them from the cadaver obligation. However, this was not a one-time incident, and the anatomy issue persisted, with frequent renegotiation of terms over the years and increased tension resurfacing periodically. Despite the Senate’s repeated pronouncements, frequently the graves in the Jewish cemetery were violated. It was not uncommon for gravely ill patients to be transported out of Padua for fear of being dissected upon their death.[30] The Jews were compelled to construct secret hiding places in the Ghetto where the bodies could be concealed until the funeral. Often, they buried the dead under the cover of night to avoid the dissection table.[31]

One would have expected to find halakhic responsa from 16th and 17th century Italy discussing this topic, but the extant halakhic literature is silent. The first cases discussing autopsy only surface in the late 18th century. We do however find reference to this ongoing issue in the Padua Jewish community archives as well as in the administrative records of the city and University of Padua. We share these documents here, many for the first time. While not enshrined in the extant responsa literature, this community response to anatomical dissection surely reflects the considered rabbinic opinion and halakhic analyses of the local Padua rabbinate, to whom the community deferred on such matters. Prominent rabbis who served the Padua community, or were connected with the medical students during the period under discussion include Maharam Padua (1482-1565), Rabbi Yehuda Arye de Modena (1571-1648) and Rabbi Yehuda Briel (1643-1722), Rabbi Dr. Isaac Hayyim Cantarini (1644-1723), Rabbi Dr. Isaac Lampronti (1679-1756), and Rabbi Dr. Shimshon Morpurgo (1681-174), among others, and it is more than likely that they were involved, to some extent, in the discussions of the Jewish community regarding the provision of bodies to the medical school. 

The Padua Jewish Community Archives[32] 1624-1626

The Jewish community archives of Padua contain at least five entries from 1624 to 1626, discussed below, which directly address the anatomy issue. Daniel Carpi, the scholar of Italian Jewish history who transcribed and edited the archives, noted that since the Jews first settled in Padua the medical students requested from the Jewish community to provide to the university a specific percentage of Jewish bodies for use in the teaching of anatomy. The Jews refused and arranged a compromise to pay an annual ransom to absolve them from this obligation. However, the tension related to this matter never ceased, be it because the university continually raised the fee, or because they sometimes would only suffice with the supply of actual corpses for dissection. 

It is in this context that a tragic incident occurred in 1624 which frightened even the non-Jewish community. A group of students, led by a young anatomy professor, interrupted a Jewish funeral procession and attempted to kidnap the body. The agreement discussed in the first archival entry below appears to come on the heels of this incident in the hopes of preventing similar occurrences in the future.

April 19, 1624 (entry #545) compromise with the students during the season/days of dissection

In that the spirit of God has enlightened the esteemed philosopher Senior Cesare Cremonin to declare freedom (from dissection) for our deceased, through the continued annual designated payment to the students of the College of Arts, generation after generation. As a result, they are obligated to allow us to properly bury our dead during the season of dissection, lest anyone fear. Any violators will be fined, and they have coordinated with us to obtain from the government permission for a required fine for all who violate this agreement in a way amenable and sufficient for our needs. The aforementioned master Cesare and Yehudah Katz have already spoken on this matter and have begun discussion regarding the amount the Jewish community is willing to pay for this privilege. Therefore, to facilitate successful completion of these dealings, which will result in a salvation for our community, we present a parti to designate two members of our community,[33] even though they are not members of the committee, to negotiate directly with the aforementioned esteemed philosopher a sum which will then be presented to the community and the committee for a majority vote. 

Subsequent entries reflect the lengthy process of negotiation, implementation, and enforcement. A follow up entry from July 15, 1624 (entry # 554) states that the negotiations had been completed and a sum had been agreed upon with the government representative. The request is to approve the amount and facilitate payment. 

 An entry in the Padua University Archives from December 28, 1624 (pictured below) sheds a slightly different light on the negotiations, which may not have been officially ratified by the university.[34]

Here the university confirms an earlier privilege granted to the Jewish community by which those Jews studying medicine were granted free access to the anatomical theater, and the corpses of deceased Jews were to be left untouched by anatomical dissections due to strong religious objections to the procedure. For this privilege the Jews paid an annual sum of 100 Venetian pounds. The entry concludes, “the final decision on this proposal was delayed until the arrival of the “perillustris domini syndic.”[35] Parenthetically, this reveals that the agreements between the Jewish community and the university regarding Jewish cadavers date back to an earlier time.

An entry in the Jewish community archives some three weeks later (Entry # 566- January 21, 1625) corroborates the delayed decision of the university. It reiterates the need to arrive at an agreement between the Jewish community and the university to prevent the taking of Jewish bodies. A maximum fee of ten Ducat is set. This may have been a counteroffer to the much higher request of 100 ducats and explains why a specific number is mentioned here but not previously. 

May 17, 1626 (Entry #616)
Yet another entry reveals a creative solution to prevent grave robbing during the semester of anatomy.

Regarding designating two community representatives with the power to negotiate with Aharon Altarini to allow temporary burial[36] on his property (for community members) during anatomy season. They are granted permission to spend as much as necessary to appease those who oppose this practice.

While grave robbing was typically done secretly under the cover of night, some claims for Jewish bodies were more brazen. The entry of November 15, 1626 (Entry # 627) mentions a disturbing incident (mikre bilti tahor) of the interference of the medical students of Padua with the Jewish funeral procession of the wife of Moshe Fano (miPano). The incident, reminiscent of earlier similar episodes, appears to have been minor and fortunately did not escalate. Nonetheless, it precipitated another plea to find a long-term compromise with the university regarding the anatomy issue.

The Decree of 1672[37]

 On November 23, 1672, there was a decree reaffirming the Jews’ exemption from providing bodies for dissection and warning those who attempt to disturb the funerals or graves of members of the Jewish community. This decree appears in Jewish and governmental documents discussed below. It is unknown to me if or whether a specific historical event precipitated this reaffirmation.

The Case of Graziadio Levi and the Riots of 1679 

Here we position the story from Cantarini’s Pachad Yitzchak, occurring over a century after Vesalius’ expansion of the field of human anatomy with its subsequent creation of major halakhic and social problems for the Jewish community and its medical students. The event described by Cantarini which transpired in 1679[38] may have been the tipping point which led to a more serious and sustained response from the university. Following the death of a young Jew, Graziadio Levi, armed students stormed the Jewish ghetto in great numbers, kidnapped the corpse and brought it to the medical school in preparation for dissection. Riots ensued[39] and much effort was marshaled to rescue the body and provide a proper Jewish burial. The incident led to the issuance of a ducal letter dated February 27 of that year which rued the incident and emphatically reaffirmed the commitment by the university to protect Jewish corpses.[40]  As we have discussed, the events surrounding that fateful night in 1679 were recorded for posterity by Isaac Hayyim Cantarini in his Pachad Yitzchak. In the context of his recounting of the Levi affair, Cantarini mentions the earlier decree from November 23, 1672, protecting the bodies of the community from dissection. 

A record of the full 1679 decree is found in the Padua Civic Archives,[41] a copy of which I procured and present below. The name of Graziadio Levi is explicitly mentioned in the decree.

Ciscato transcribed the full text of the decree.[42]

The Central Archives of the History of the Jewish People possesses yet another record of the anatomy decrees. This unadorned document is a certified “copia” of the two decrees of 1672 and 1679.[43]

This was perhaps intended for archival records as opposed to public display. 

University (Governmental) Decrees Regarding Jewish Cadavers from 1672 to 1721

The Central Archives of the History of the Jewish People possesses yet another document, even more remarkable, related to the Padua anatomy decrees.[44] It includes not only one or even two decrees, but appears to be a summary or record of multiple decrees on the subject of cadavers, anatomy training at the medical school of Padua, and the Jewish community, spanning from 1672-1721. It includes the decrees of November 23, 1672, and February 27, 1679, as well as others. Furthermore, the presentation of these decrees, as an attractive broadside with calligraphy and illustrated header, indicates that it was likely intended for public display.[45]

Conclusion

In an obscure work published in 1685, recently offered for auction, appears an account of a tragic event involving the Jewish community and the dissection of human cadavers at the University of Padua. We have placed this seemingly isolated incident into a much broader historical context, fleshing out this chapter with new supportive archival material. For hundreds of years, beginning in the late sixteenth century, the Jewish community negotiated with the university for the right not to have Jewish bodies used for the anatomy course. There is no question that the local rabbinate of Padua must have been involved in these discussions and negotiations, though to what extent remains unknown. Refusal of the Jewish community to provide cadavers for dissection created major problems for both the many Jewish medical students who attended the university as well as for the Jewish community at large. The Jewish community’s restrictive position was premised entirely on halakhic grounds and would not have been sustainable throughout this lengthy period without significant rabbinic backing and support. Thus, while the extant published literature on autopsy begins with the Noda biYehudah in the late eighteenth century, there is little doubt that the halakhic discourse on the topic of anatomical dissection began long before.[46]

[1] For general discussions on anatomy and autopsy in Jewish law, see Kalman Kahana, “The Dissection of the Dead in Jewish Law: A Bibliography,” (Hebrew) haMa’ayan 7 (Tevet, 5727), 45-72; Avraham Steinberg, HaRefuah KiHalakhah 6 (Jerusalem, 2017), 512-550; Zev Farber and Irving Greenberg, “Autopsies I: A Survey of the Debate,” in Zev Farber, ed., Halakhic Realities (Maggid Books: Jerusalem, 2017), 323-417.
[2] For a discussion of the historical context of this teshuva, see Edward Reichman, “A Tale of Two Stones,” in The Anatomy of Halakha (Maggid/OU/YU Presses, 2022),
[3] Cantarini and Lampronti share at least one thing in common. They are both graduates of the University of Padua Medical School. Indeed, the passage in Cantarini’s work upon which I draw relates directly to the medical training at the university.
[4] This incident we describe transpired years before the so-called Purim of Buda (or Padua).
[5] The description of the work is drawn from the William Gross Collection Item Description, which is reproduced in the Genazym catalogue. See also M. Heller, The Seventeenth Century Hebrew Book (Brill, 2011), 1077.
[6] On Gross and his collection, see Shalom Sabar, Emile Schrijver, and Falk Wiesemann, Windows on Jewish Worlds: Essays in Honor of William Gross, Collector of Judaica on the Occasion of his Eightieth Birthday (Zutphen: Walburg Pers bv., 2019).
[7] In Kedem’s recent auction of items from the Gross Family Collection (Auction 92, May 2, 2023) we find two items of medical historical interest, one less obvious than the other. The first item is Mikne Avram (Venice, 1523), a Hebrew grammar work written by Avraham de Balmes (Auction 92, Part 1, Lot 4). De Balmes was a physician and his medical diploma from Naples, from the auspicious year of 1492, is the oldest extant Jewish medical diploma, now housed in the Braginsky Collection. On this diploma see, Giancarlo Lacerenza and Vera Schwarz-Ricci, “Il Diploma di Dottorato in Medicina di Avraham ben Me’ir de Balmes (Naploli 1492),” Sefer Yuhasin 2(2014), 163-193. De Balmes was also a student of Yehuda Messer Leon, who has been mentioned numerous times on this blog. Less known is that De Balmes is considered to be the first physician in history to perform a human-to-human blood transfusion. His patient was none other than Pope Innocent VIII. De Balmes transfused blood from three young boys, each of whom was paid a ducat, and infused the blood into the veins of the Pope. According to different reports, the Pontiff “either died or recovered.” See H. M. Brown, “Beginning of Intravenous Medication,” Annals of Medical History 1:2 (1917). Shortly thereafter we find him working in the printing press of Daniel Bomberg.  De Balmes was an expert in Hebrew language and grammar and was sought after by Christians for instruction. Mikne Avramwas published posthumously. A scholarly edition of this work was recently published placing it in the context of contemporaneous linguistic scholarship. See Dror Ben Arye, Mikneh Avram by Avraham de Balmes (Hebrew) (Ramat Gan, Bar Ilan University Press, 2022).

The second item (Auction 92, Part 2, Lot 115) is the spectacular medical diploma of Moshe ben Gershon Tilche from the University of Padua Medical School (1687), which we discussed in Edward Reichman, “Jews, Medicine and the University of Padua: A Behind the Scenes Tour of a New Exhibit at the Jewish Museum of Padua (November 2, 2022- December 31, 2022),” Seforim Blog (https://seforimblog.com), December 1, 2022.
[8] For a lament about the sale and loss of access to great Jewish book collections, see E. Reichman, “The Lost Library by Dan Rabinowitz and the ‘Burial of Souls’ by Yehuda Leib Katznelson: Different Expressions of the Same Sentiment,” The Seforim Blog (April 3, 2019), available at https://seforimblog.com/2019/04/the-lost-library-by-dan-rabinowitz-and-the-burial-of-souls-by-yehuda-leib-katznelson-different-expressions-of-the-same-sentiment/.
[9] E. Reichman, “Samuel Vita Della Volta (1772-1853): An Underappreciated Bibliophile and his Medical ‘Diploma’tic Journey,” Seforim Blog (https://seforimblog.com), November 5, 2021.
[10] When Kaufmann transferred Mortara’s library from Italy to Budapest a number of volumes were also “lost” on the way. See Asher Salah, “La Biblioteca di Marco Mortara,” in Mauro Perani and Ermanno Finzi, eds., Nuovi Studi in Onore di Marco Mortara nel Secondo Centenario della Nascita (Firenze: Giuntina, 2016), 149-168, esp. 157.
[11] On Cantarini, see, Harry A. Savitz, Profiles of Erudite Jewish Physicians and Scholars (Spertus College of Judaica Press, 1973), 25-28; C. Facchini, “Icone in sinagoga: emblemi e imprese nella predicazione barocca di I.H. Cantarini”, in Materia Giudaica, 7 (2002), 124–144. I thank Professor David Ruderman for this last reference. Cantarini’s Jewish legal responsa were published in both Yitzḥak Lampronti’s Paḥad Yitzḥak and Samson Morpurgo’s Shemesh Tzedakah. For his correspondence with the Christian intellectual Theophilo Ungar, see Y. Blumenfeld, Otzar Nehmad 3 (Vienna, 1860), 128-50.  For the definitive work on the Cantarini family, see Marco Osimo, Narrazione della Strage Compiuta nel 1547 Contro gli Ebrei d’Asolo e Cenni Biografici della Famiglia Koen-Cantarini (Casale-Monferrato, 1875). For a comprehensive bibliography on Cantarini, see Asher Salah, La Republique des Lettres: Rabbins, Ecrivains et Medecins, Juifs en Italie au XVIIIe Siecle (Brill: Leiden, 2007), 120-124.
[12] Modena and Morpurgo, Medici, 118; see D. Ruderman, Jewish Though and Scientific Discovery in Early Modern Europe (Yale University Press, 1995), 113-114, regarding families with multiple graduates from the university.
[13] On Morpurgo, See Edward Reichman, “The Illustrated Life of an Illustrious Renaissance Jew: Rabbi Dr. Shimshon Morpurgo (1681-1740),” Seforim Blog (https://seforimblog.com), June 22, 2021.
[14] S. Y. Glicksberg, Ha-Derashah Be-Yisrael (Mosad HaRav Kook, 5700), 203-20.
[15] Ramhal wrote a eulogy for Cantarini. See R. Moshe Hayim Luzzatto, Sefer Ha-Shirim, ed. Y. Zemora (Mosad HaRav Kook, 5710), 4.
[16] This correspondence was published by Shadal. See Y. Blumenfeld, Otzar Nehmad 3 (Vienna, 1860), 128-50.
[17] Ibid.
[18] 45a- 46a.
[19] I discovered a wedding poem written a number of years earlier Graziadio (Hananel) Levi, assumedly the same person, for the wedding of Saul Lustro and Allegra Barukh in 1676. See JTS Library B (NS)CR2.
[20] The university admitted non-Catholics, which included, for example, both Protestants and Jews. On the history of the Jews and the University of Padua, see Edward Reichman, “How Jews of Yesteryear Celebrated Graduation from Medical School: Congratulatory Poems for Jewish Medical Graduates in the 17th and 18th Centuries- An Unrecognized Genre,” Seforim Blog (https://seforimblog.com), May 29, 2022; idem, “Jews, Medicine and the University of Padua: A Behind the Scenes Tour of a New Exhibit at the Jewish Museum of Padua (November 2, 2022- December 31, 2022),” Seforim Blog (https://seforimblog.com), December 1, 2022.
[21] The University of Montpellier was sporadically frequented by Jews in the Middle Ages, but does not compare to Padua, where Jews attended in far greater numbers and had their own student organizations.
[22] To be sure there were residual discriminatory practices towards the Jews at the university. In addition, while the Italian Jewish community viewed this development in a positive light, the Jewish communities in Poland and Germany were more concerned about the possible assimilation of the Jewish students and dilution and diminution of Torah study.
[23] We discuss the relationship of Vesalius to the Jews in Edward Reichman, The Anatomy of Jewish Law (Maggid/OU/YU Press, 2022).
[24] See Ciscato, Gli Ebrei in Padova, p. 297. Later documents, as discussed below, address body snatching in the Jewish community specifically.
[25] Carpi, op. cit., parti 616, discusses a request to delay burial during the season of anatomy at the medical school to preclude grave robbing.
[26] Jeffrey Levine, “Jewish History in Vesalius’s Fabrica,” September 17, 2014 (https://jmlevinemd.com/jewish-history-vesalius-fabrica/).
[27] Paul Grendler, The Universities of the Italian Renaissance (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004).
[28] See Steinberg, Avraham Steinberg, HaRefuah KiHalakhah 6 (Jerusalem, 2017), 512-550. I realize it may be anachronistic to mention these specific halakhic concerns or formulation, as these were developed later in history starting with Rabbi Yechezkel Landau. Nonetheless, they are halakhic prohibitions and obligations that apply to dissection.
[29] For more on the history of anatomy and graverobbing in rabbinic literature, see Edward Reichman, The Anatomy of Jewish Law (Maggid/OU/YU Press, 2022).
[30] This practice might have violated the prohibition of moving a goses, the halachic equivalent to a “dying person.” A similar question was posed to Rabbi Moshe Stern: Could one move a critically ill patient out of the hospital for fear that, upon his death, his body would be taken for autopsy and dissection without family consent? Rabbi Stern ruled in the negative. See his Be’er Moshe 8, nos. 239, 240, 241, 243. Likewise, Rabbi Moshe Lemberger was asked whether a Kohen physician could expose himself to tum’ah in order to establish cause of death and prevent a likely autopsy. Rabbi Lemberger argues that the Kohen must do so, as this case is akin to a met mitzvah (one who dies without family or friends to bury him). See Lemberger, Ateret Moshe, Yoreh De’ah 2:244.
[31] Hebraische Bibliographie 16 (1876), p. 37.
[32] See Daniel Carpi, Minutes Book of the Council of the Jewish Community of Padua Volume Two: 1603-1630 (Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, 1979). All references to the Padua Jewish community archives are from this source. I thank Pia Settimi for kindly bringing these documents to my attention. See also Ciscato, 209-212.
[33] According to Pia Settimi, one of these was Avraham Catalano, who would later coordinate the community response to the plague in Padua in 1631 and author the diary Olam Hafukh about the experience.
[34] ASUPd, ms. 655, f. 13r. I thank Francesco Piovan, Chief Archivist of the University of Padua Archives, for procuring a copy of this document for me.
[35] I am unsure to whom this refers.
[36] The idea of temporary burial was suggested and debated by some prominent rabbinic authorities in the nineteenth century regarding the situation in Cincinnati, OH where graverobbing was rampant. See Reichman, Anatomy of Jewish Law, op. cit., 223-226.
[37] See below for discussion of this decree.
[38] Cantarini lists the Hebrew date of the event as 17 Shevat, 5440. Standard Hebrew date converters place this in 1680, but the Italian decrees all clearly place the year at 1679.
[39] There were broader political issues at play during these riots which are discussed by Cantarini.
[40] See Ciscato, Gli Ebrei in Padova, pp. 299–300; Hebraische Bibliographie 16 (1876), 37. The latter reference discusses an unpublished manuscript by Chaim (Vital) Moshe ben Elisha Cantarini that details this incident. I have been unsuccessful in locating this manuscript. Cantarini, member of an illustrious Italian family comprising many rabbi/physicians, graduated from the medical school in Padua and apparently taught in a yeshiva there as well. As discussed in this essay, this incident is described in great detail by his relative Isaac Chaim Cantarini in the latter’s Pachad Yitzchak.
[41] Archivio civico antico Ducali volume 13 carta 3r. I thank Antonella Ortis for her assistance in procuring this document.
[42] Ciscato, 299. The date of this decree is February 27, 1679. He lists the location as Ducali, Reg. N. N. 123 c. I r.
[43] Ducale: Che sia conservata agli ebrei la facoltà di eseguire le sepolture secondo il loro rito (Emessa in seguito alle proteste degli ebrei contro gli studenti di Anatomia). IT-Pa-47-ovs, Padova – Jewish Community 1679. I thank Ariel Viterbo of the National Library of Israel for bringing this document, as well as the others from the Central Archives, to my attention, and I thank Yochai ben Ghedalia, Yael Franklin and Tami from the Central Archives of the History of the Jewish People for so kindly providing copies of these documents.
[44] 206 Pergamena interessantissima concernente le violazioni di cadaveri degli israeliti che si permettevano gli studenti col pretesto  degli studi anatomici ” =IT-Pa 126 ovs. This broadside does not appear to have been mentioned by Ciscato or Roth, though the decrees were known to them. The Central Archives has another catalogue entry on the dissection of Jewish cadavers in Padua- Sulle violazioni dei cadaveri degli israeliti che si permettevano gli studenti col pretesto degli studi anatomici.  Archivio della Comunità di Padova, n. 206. 8 frames. HM-5157. This is a (poor) microfilm copy of the above broadside, thought the Archives does not identify it as such.
[45] Though he had not seen this document before, Francesco Piovan, the Chief Archivist of the University of Padua remarked, “As far as I can tell from the image, it’s just a summary of laws and decrees. Such summaries (even in print) of private documents and legal norms were quite normal: they can be found, for example, in processual documents. The interesting fact is that your document looks like a kind of ‘manifesto’ (placard), written in beautiful handwriting, and perhaps to be displayed, hung in a frame or fixed on a wooden tablet. In short, it seems destined for public viewing.”
[46] As a postscript, despite the religious limitation of providing bodies for dissection, there was at least some evidence of the interest and fascination amongst the Jews with the new discipline of human anatomy. When Padua’s anatomical theater was first built in 1595, the benches were not only occupied by the registered Jewish medical students, there is record of Jews from the community (non-students) attending dissections. See Cynthia Klestinec, “A History of Anatomy Theaters in Sixteenth Century Padua,” Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences 59:3 (2004), n. 74. Furthermore, years after the publication of Pachad Yitzchak, when a young Abraham Levi was visiting Padua on his travels, his guide, our very same Rabbi Dr. Isaac Cantarini, as part of showcasing the highlights of the community, included a visit to an anatomy lesson where a cadaver was dissected. Shmuel Feiner, The Jewish Eighteenth Century: A Jewish Biography, 1700-1750 (Indiana University Press, 2020), 242.