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Jacob’s Dream: Reproducing a Talismanic Illustrated Title Page

Jacob’s Dream: Reproducing a Talismanic Illustrated Title Page

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Jacob’s Dream: Reproducing a Talismanic Illustrated Title Page (Illustrations are from the following sources: the Edut Be Yosef, Rabot, Shivim Tekunei Zohar, and Yefeh Anaf are from the Gross Family Collection.  The Minhat Shai is from Dan Rabinowitz’s personal collection, and the rest are courtesy of the internet.) One of the earliest examples of Jewish art are the biblical paintings at the Dura Europos Synagogue, completed in 244-5 C.E. Among those images is that of Jacob’s dream. The importance of…

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Pandemic Bibliopenia: A Preliminary Report of Disease Eradication

Pandemic Bibliopenia: A Preliminary Report of Disease Eradication

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אין חכמת אדם מגעת אלא עד מקום שספריו מגיעין[1]1 ר‘ יצחק קנפנטון (ואין ספריו מגיעין בשעת המגיפה[2]) Pandemic Bibliopenia:[3] A Preliminary Report of Disease Eradication Rabbi Edward Reichman, MD The number of seforim written during, about or related to the Covid 19 pandemic continues to grow at breakneck speed.[4] What has largely gone unnoticed among the other unprecedented aspects of this pandemic, is that since the development of the printing press, we have not seen so much quality rabbinic literature…

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The Significance of Avraham Avinu’s Performance of the Mitzvot

The Significance of Avraham Avinu’s Performance of the Mitzvot

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The Significance of Avraham Avinu’s Performance of the Mitzvot By Michael Landy Perfection for a Jew can only be realized through the performance of the mitzvot [commandments] of the Torah, which were given from G-d to Moshe on Sinai [Matan Torah]. Since man is finite, his thinking and understanding is limited and constrained to factors of time and space. Man is not capable, and it is beyond his intellectual reach, to calculate a finite system that can relate to the…

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Rabbi Steinman and the Messiah, part 1

Rabbi Steinman and the Messiah, part 1

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Rabbi Steinman and the Messiah, part 1 Marc B. Shapiro Since in a recent post I discussed Maimonides and the Principle of the Messiah, let me add one more thing. Yet before doing so, I need to make a few preliminary comments. Many readers know about the Peleg, which has caused all sorts of problems in Jerusalem. After the passing of R. Yosef Shalom Elyashiv, the simmering dispute in the Lithuanian world broke out into the open, and a minority…

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

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

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What Became of Tychsen?: The Non-Jewish ‘Rabbi’ and his “Congregation” of Jewish Medical Students By Dr. Edward Reichman, MD This essay was inspired by two recent Seforim blog posts, one on Professor Shnayer Leiman’s contributions,[1] and the other on a topic related to R’ Yonasan Eybeshutz.[2]                                             In November 16, 2006 an article by Dr. Shnayer Leiman appeared in the newly formed Seforim Blog entitled, “Two Cases…

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Parshanut in English: Rabbinic Bible Commentary in Translation

Parshanut in English: Rabbinic Bible Commentary in Translation

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Parshanut in English: Rabbinic Bible Commentary in Translation Revised updated edition Yisrael Dubitsky The following revises, expands upon and updates my previous effort on this forum. Originally it was meant as a ten year retrospective, to see not only which works were completed in that time span but also which commentators were first touched upon. Of course, in the course of my research, I found several errors of mine from the earlier edition, and many items I had neglected to…

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

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

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Kol Nidrei, Choirs, and Beethoven: The Eternity of the Jewish Musical Tradition The Seforim Blog is reposting Dan Rabinowitz’s post from 2018. On April 23, 1902, the cornerstone to the Taharat Ha-Kodesh synagogue was laid, and on Rosh Ha-Shana the next year, September 7, 1903, the synagogue was officially opened. The synagogue building was on one of Vilna’s largest boulevards and constructed in a neo-Moorish architectural style, capped with a blue cupola that was visible for blocks. There was a…

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מנהג ה’תשליך’ מאת ר’ איתם הנקין הי”ד

מנהג ה’תשליך’ מאת ר’ איתם הנקין הי”ד

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מנהג ה‘תשליך‘ מאת ר‘ איתם הנקין הי“ד [הותקן לפרסום מתוך רשימה מכת“י] .מנהג התשליך מוזכר באופן ברור לראשונה בסוף המאה ה-14, בספר המנהגים לרבי יצחק אייזיק טירנא (סוף מנהגי ראש השנה, ד“ה “ושליח צבור“): “ורגילין לילך על הנהר ולומר תשוב תרחמינו וגו‘, ורואים דגים חיים“ בסמוך לו לפניו מוזכר המנהג במהרי“ל (מנהגים, הלכות ראש השנה אות ט‘): “מה שנוהגין לילך בר“ה אחר סעודה אצל ימים ונהרות להשליך במצולות ים כל חטאותינו, משום דאיתא במדרש זכר לעקדה… ומהר“י סג“ל נהג ג“כ…

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

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

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The Twice Told Tale of R’ Yonasan Eybeshutz and the Porger[1] Moshe Haberman Moshe Haberman currently lives in Los Angeles and is a businessman. Originally from New York, he learned in Brisk and publishes the Torah journal Chitzei Giborim. Introduction The only Halachic sefer[2] published in the lifetime of R’ Yonasan Eybeshuts was the ספר כרתי ופלתי which is a פירוש on Shuchan Aruch Yoreh Deah, dealing with issues of treifos, basar b’chalav, taaruvos, etc. The sefer was published in…

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

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

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

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

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

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“Did The Bach Really Draw a Cow?” Eruvin 20 b – Hagahot HaBach on Rashi “הא אתמר עלה” Eli Genauer Summary The diagram in the first edition of the Bach (1824) is much more accurate than how it is depicted in later editions, especially the Vilna Shas. The Bach’s picture features a long feeding trough, (an אבוס), whereas Vilna and others show it looking more like something attached to the animal. The Zhitomir Shas compounds the error by leaving out…

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

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

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

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

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

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In Praise of Ephemera: A Picture Postcard from Vilna Reveals its Secrets More than One Hundred Years after its Original Publication* by Shnayer Leiman I belong to a small group of inveterate collectors of Jewish ephemera. We collect artifacts that many others consider of little or no significance, such as postage stamps; coins and medallions; old posters, broadsides, and newspaper clippings; outdated New Years cards; wine-stained Passover Haggadot; Jewish ornaments, objects (e.g., Chanukkah dreidels) and artwork of a previous generation;…

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

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

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‘Yikar Sahaduta Dipum Bidatta’ R. Tzvi Hirsch Levin, the Besamim Rosh and the Chida Rabbi Moshe Maimon, Jackson NJ 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…

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Post-Mosaic Additions to the Torah?

Post-Mosaic Additions to the Torah?

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Post-Mosaic Additions to the Torah? Marc B. Shapiro In his post here, Ben Zion Katz deals with medieval rabbinic views regarding post-Mosaic additions to the Torah. Katz refers to The Limits of Orthodox Theology, and I have mentioned many additional sources in Seforim Blog posts. (A couple of people have commented that in a few recent publications on this topic it seems that the authors used my writings without any acknowledgment. I would only say that I don’t have a copyright on any…

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