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Category: Cemeteries & Epitaphs

Lithuanian Government Announces Construction of a $25,000,000 Convention Center in the Center of Vilna’s Oldest Jewish Cemetery

Lithuanian Government Announces Construction of a $25,000,000 Convention Center in the Center of Vilna’s Oldest Jewish Cemetery

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Lithuanian Government Announces Construction of a $25,000,000 Convention Center in the Center of Vilna’s Oldest Jewish Cemetery by Sid Leiman According to Russian statistics, Vilna had close to 200,000 inhabitants just prior to World War I, roughly forty percent of whom were Jewish, more than thirty percent were Polish, and about twenty percent were Russian and the rest consisted of small Lithuanian, Byelorussian, German and Tartar minorities.[1] In 1919, the Paris Peace Conference was convened by the winning parties of…

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Who is Buried in the Vilna Gaon’s Tomb? A Contribution Toward the Identification of the Authentic Grave of the Vilna Gaon

Who is Buried in the Vilna Gaon’s Tomb? A Contribution Toward the Identification of the Authentic Grave of the Vilna Gaon

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Who is Buried in the Vilna Gaon’s Tomb? A Contribution Toward the Identification of the Authentic Grave of the Vilna Gaon by  Shnayer Leiman 1. Prologue            This essay attempts to identify the authentic grave of the Vilna Gaon (d. 1797).1 As will become apparent, it surely is not the grave that Jewish pilgrims are shown today when they visit Vilna. We shall attempt to identify his authentic grave by applying the biblical rule: על פי שני עדים יקום דבר “a matter is…

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?האם אמנם קבר רחל אמנו נמצא בבת לחם

?האם אמנם קבר רחל אמנו נמצא בבת לחם

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?האם אמנם קבר רחל אמנו נמצא בבת לחם נכתב ע”י משה צוריאל Rabbi Moshe Zuriel has published numerous works in virtually all areas of Torah scholarship. The Seforim Blog is grateful that he has chosen to publish his latest essay here. מפורסם באומה כי קברה של רחל נמצא בבית לחם. יש שם גם מבנה ומצבה המציין כך. וכך כתוב בתורה “ויהי עוד כברת הארץ לבוא אפרתה ותלד רחל ותקש בלדתה וכו’. ותמת רחל ותקבר [נפעל] בדרך אפרתה היא בית לחם….

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Birkat Ha-Hammah in the Old Jewish Cemetary of Frankfurt

Birkat Ha-Hammah in the Old Jewish Cemetary of Frankfurt

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Birkat Ha-Hammah in the Old Jewish Cemetery of Frankfurt by Shnayer Leiman On Wednesday, April 5, 1617 (= 29 Adar Sheni, 5377), birkat ha-hammah was recited throughout the Jewish world. Two witnesses – both were present in Frankfurt on that day – left accounts of the ceremony as it was commemorated in Frankfurt.[1] The first witness is R. Yosef Yuzpa Hahn (1570-1637), in his Yosef Ometz[2] (Frankfurt, 1723):[3] לסוף כל מחזור גדול ביום ד’ הראשון בחודש ניסן שבו התקופה נופלת…

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Shnayer Leiman: Notes on Rabbinic Epitaphs I

Shnayer Leiman: Notes on Rabbinic Epitaphs I

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Notes on Rabbinic Epitaphs: I by Shnayer Leiman The newly recovered tombstone of R. Yosef Trani (1568-1639), the Maharit, among the greatest of the early aharonim,[1] is a truly remarkable event. The discoverer, the noted bibliophile and book dealer R. Shlomo Epstein, had searched all the Jewish cemeteries in Istanbul (formerly: Constantinople), but could not locate the Maharit’s grave. On a recent visit to Safed, where he went to pray at the tomb of R, Moshe Alshekh (circa 1520-1593), he…

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Akiva Leiman: Gravely Mistaken

Akiva Leiman: Gravely Mistaken

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Gravely Mistaken by Akiva Leiman R. Leiman teaches high school at the Yeshiva of Greater Washington in Silver Spring, Maryland. Additionally, he leads trips to sites of Jewish interest in Eastern Europe. This is his first contribution to the Seforim blog. One hardly need go far to find errors in published materials, but when even moderate research would suffice to unearth correct information lack of such an effort would seem egregious. Jewish burial sites have often been lost: Nazis or…

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