Forgeries & Fabrications – The Seforim Blog

The Illusory Portrait of R. Yom Tov Lipmann Heller: Deceptive Art and Jewish Images in Vienna

February 5, 2025 Dan Rabinowitz Comments 5 comments

For if I am deceived, I am. for he who is not, cannot be deceived; and if I am deceived, by this same token I am. Wolfgang Kemp after St Augustine of Hippo (Epigraph to Rembrandt Hoogstraten: Colour and Illusion) On October 8, 2024, Vienna’s Museum of Fine Arts, the Kunsthistorisches Museum, opened the exhibit “Rembrandt – Hoogstraten Colour and Illusion.” The museum’s permanent collection features remarkable works by Rembrandt, including a self-portrait and a now-confirmed portrait of his son,…

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The Enigma of Abraham Rosenberg, R. Yitzchak Scheiner, Mordecai Kaplan, and Prof. Marvin Fox

November 20, 2022 Marc B. Shapiro Comments 25 comments

Abraham Rosenberg made his first appearance during the dispute over Solomon Friedlaender’s forged Yerushalmi Kodashim. He portrayed himself as a student of Friedlaender. Here is the title page of his booklet Aneh Khesil in which he defends Friedlaender from the attacks of his critics. Rosenberg also wrote some other things in defense of Friedlaender, including an article in the Frankfurt Orthodox paper Der Israelit and letters to various figures who were involved in the dispute over the Yerushalmi Kodashim. Who…

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“Ha’Rotzeh Lichanek, Hitaleh B’Ilan Gadol”: Notes on some Literary forgeries of Jewish works in the the Late Modern Period (1756-1965)

November 11, 2022 Ezra Brand Comments 6 comments

Ezra Brand is an independent researcher based in Tel Aviv. He has an MA from Revel Graduate School at Yeshiva University in Medieval Jewish History, where he focused his research on 13th and 14th century sefirotic Kabbalah. He is interested in using digital and computational tools in historical research. He has contributed a number of times previously to the Seforim Blog (tag), and a selection of his research can be found at his Academia.edu profile. He can be reached at…

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Some Notes on Verifying the Authenticity of the Alleged Rav Yisrael Salanter Photographs

April 11, 2022 Shnayer Leiman Comments 14 comments

There are some who claim that the photographs of R. Yisrael Salanter’s sons can be used for the likeness of their father, since we have testimony that the sons looked almost exactly like their father. Let us examine the evidence. 1. Aside from the 3 published photographs of R. Yisrael’s son R. Yitzchak (see “The Recently Published Photographs of R. Yisrael Salanter”), the only other extant sketch of a son of R. Yisrael Salanter is the portrait of Lipman Lipkin…

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R. Yudel Rosenberg, R. Mordechai Elefant, and Sexual

March 24, 2022 Marc B. Shapiro

1. Many readers of the Seforim Blog are aware of R. Yudel Rosenberg, the fascinating talmid chacham and posek who for some reason was also drawn to forgeries. Ira Robinson has recently authored a complete biography of Rosenberg, A Kabbalist in Montreal: The Life and Times of Rabbi Yudel Rosenberg. This wonderful book is certainly deserving of a complete review on the Seforim Blog, but here I would just like to comment on a criticism of me. On p. 219…

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The “Doctored” Medical Diploma of Samuel, the Son of Menasseh Ben Israel: Forgery or “For Jewry”?

March 23, 2021 Edward Reichman Comments 2 comments

Menasseh ben Israel is a prominent figure in Jewish history known for his role in the return of the Jews to England in the time of Oliver Cromwell, as well being the first to establish a Hebrew printing press in Holland. Menasseh had two sons and a daughter. His son Samuel, born in 1625, was a Hebrew printer, publishing a number of his father’s works, and also assisting his father with his diplomatic endeavors in England. Here we focus on…

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‘Yikar Sahaduta Dipum Bidatta’ R. Tzvi Hirsch Levin, the Besamim Rosh and the Chida

July 7, 2020 Moshe Maimon Comments 20 comments

Some of the worst epidemics we have known in our history have indirectly been the catalyst for important contributions by scholars who produced their valuable works under quarantine. Eliezer Brodt has published in these pages considerable lists of such scholarship, from bygone plagues down to the current terrible epidemic, which highlight the vast scope of this literary bounty. I recently came across a very interesting sefer-epidemic connection which I have not seen mentioned yet. This material highlights the contribution of…

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An enigmatic Pseudo-Shklov edition of Barukh She’amar

February 2, 2020 Marvin J. Heller Comments 23 comments

A title-page describing the work as an 1820 Shklov press publication is indicative of an enigmatic pseudo-edition of Baruch She’amar, a halakhot work pertaining to Sefer Torah, tefillin, and mezuzot by R. Simeon bar Eliʻezer (d. c. 1360). The author of Barukh She’amar, R. Simeon bar Eliʻezer (d. c. 1360), was born in Saxony, Germany and died in Eretz Israel. Orphaned at the age of eight, Simeon was adopted and raised by R. Issachar, a scribe who taught Simeon his…

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Further On A Forged Letter of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik

December 4, 2019 Mosheh Lichtenstein Comments 53 comments

Rabbi Mosheh Lichtenstein is a co-Rosh Yeshiva of Yeshivat Har Etzion. He is a grandson of Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik. It was recently brought to my attention that various readers of the Seforim Blog have expressed skepticism regarding the determination that the letter found in President Chaim Herzog’s archives and supposedly written by my grandfather, Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik zt”l (hereafter, “the Rav”), is a forgery. Moreover, some of the commentators have engaged in various conspiracy theories regarding the motivation…

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Special book offer: Besamim Rosh

May 27, 2019 Eliezer Brodt Comments 6 comments

One of the most famous forgeries in Jewish literature is the Shu”t Besamim Rosh. This work was brought to print by Saul Berlin in 1793. Shortly after it was detected as a forgery. Over the years the Seforim Blog has featured many essays about this work (here, here, here, here, here, here). For a valuable post about the subject see here. For some very recent work on the BR see the three-part series by Rabbi Chaim Tessler, (PDF’s available upon…

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Correction and Apology For an Earlier Post

February 25, 2019 Dan Rabinowitz Comments 64 comments

A few months back we featured a fascinating two-part post about newly discovered documents from Rav Herzog’s Archive. One of the discoveries of the post was a document about Meir Kahane written to President Chaim Herzog by Rabbi Joseph B. Soloveitchik in the summer of 1984 which was surprisingly supportive of Kahane. A careful examination of the document by the family of Rabbi Soloveitchik reached the opposite conclusion. This letter is a crude forgery. Their conclusion was not derived because…

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Foie Gras “Fake News”: A Fictitious Rashi and a Strangely Translated Ethical Will

October 15, 2018 Ari Z. Zivotofsky Comments 0 Comment

Controversial topics can sometimes lead to contrived sources, i.e. fake news. That is certainly true with the effort by vegetarians to find traditional sources to support their position. In the past I have shown how a booklet claiming Judaism supports vegetarianism was full of misquotes (here here ) and how a “quote” of the Rema was fabricated ( here ). Here I will expose two fake quotes that have been used by vegetarians in the battle against foie gras. Foie…

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Legacy Judaica Auction March 6th: A Sampling of Forgeries and other Eclectic Lots

March 4, 2018 Dan Rabinowitz Comments 3 comments

Legacy Judaica’s next auction will occur on March 6, 2018. The 220 lots include very rare books such as the first edition of the Yerushalmi and a letter from R. Tzvi Ashkenazi (Hakham Tzvi) (the entire catalog can be accessed here), there are many other interesting books and letters. Conditional marriage has been applied since at least the talmudic period if not early. The exact circumstances and necessary predicates have evolved over time and especially in the modern period when…

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The 93 Beit Yaakov Martyrs: A Modern Midrash

July 24, 2017 Ari Kahn Comments 1 comment

On January 8, 1943 an article appeared in The New York Times which the fate of 93 young women who took their own lives rather than serve as prostitutes for the German enemy. The article makes reference to a letter written some time earlier in which the plight of these young women was described in “real time.” 11 August 1942 My dear friend Mr. Schenkalewsky in New York, I do not know whether this letter will reach you. Do you…

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Who can discern his errors? Misdates, Errors, Deceptions, and other Variations in and about Hebrew Books, Intentional and Otherwise: Revisited

July 3, 2016 Marvin J. Heller Comments 1 comment

Marvin J. Heller is the award winning author of books and articles on early Hebrew printing and bibliography. Among his books are the Printing the Talmud series, The Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century Hebrew Book(s): An Abridged Thesaurus, and collections of articles. R. Eleazar once entered a privy, and a Persian [Roman] came and thrust him away. R. Eleazar got up and went out, and a serpent came and tore out the other’s gut. R. Eleazar applied to him the verse,…

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