However, there are a few points I would like to add. In my post here I wrote: To give an example . . . of how [R. Samuel Moses] Rubenstein’s later thought broke with tradition, see his Ha-Rambam ve-ha-Aggadah (Kovno, 1937), p. 103, where he claims that the story of the miracle of Hanukkah is almost certainly a late aggadic creation, and like many other miracle stories in aggadic literature was not originally intended to be understood as historical reality:[2]…
One of the most exciting parts of Seder night for kids is the “stealing” of the afikoman. Children plan well in advance when the best time would be for them to steal it, where they will hide it, as well as what they should ask for in exchange for it. Not surprisingly, toy stores do incredibly good business both during Chol Hamoed and in the days following Pesach because of this minhag. In this article I would like to trace…
אין חכמת האדם מגעת אלא עד מקום שספריו מגיעין, ולכן ימכור אדם כל מה שיש לו ויקנה ספרים, כי דרך משל מי שאין לו ספרי התלמוד אי איפשר לו להיות בקי בו, וכמו כן מי שאין לו ספרי הרפואה א”א להיות בקי בה. דרכי התלמוד לר’ יצחק קנפאנטון A person’s wisdom reaches only as far as his library. Therefore, a person should sell everything he owns and acquire books. For example, one who doesn’t own a set of the Talmud…
1. In a recent post I mentioned R. Leon Modena, so let me note the following. In my article on entering churches, available here, I mention that R. Modena entered churches to hear the sermons. I also quote R. Eliezer Waldenberg’s description of R. Modena as an איש הפכפך. Only after my article appeared did I find that R. Solomon Scheinfeld uses similar language in describing R. Modena : הוא היה גדול בתורה וחכמת העולם, היה גאון בטבעו, אבל כדרך…
Rashi on Parshat Tetzave writes that the priests were anointed with oil, poured in the shape of the Greek letter כי. One would assume this is referring to letter Χ – 22nd letter of the Greek alphabet which sounds somewhere between English K and H . This letter spelled χῖ in Greek, is usually spelled “Chi” in English and indeed if one wanted to write it in Hebrew, he would probably transcribe it as כי (where Chaf is intended without…
הגדולים: אישים שעיצבו את פני היהדות החרדית בישראל, בעריכת בנימין בראון, נסים ליאון, קובץ מאמרים לכבוד פרופ’ מנחם פרידמן ובהשראתו, מגנס מכון ון ליר, 968 עמודים The Gdoilim: Leaders Who Shaped the Israeli Haredi Jewry, Edited by Benjamin Brown, Nissim Leon, The Hebrew University Magnes Press, Van Leer Institute, 968 pages For the most part, academic books are not found or read in regular “layman” or Chareidi circles, nor are those types of books available at most “seforim stores.” From…
Emeritus in the Department of Jewish Thought at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem where he has taught since 1977. He studied philosophy at Columbia University, writing his PhD dissertation under Arthur Hyman. He has written prolifically on medieval and modern Jewish philosophers, e.g. Maimonides, Crescas, and Spinoza. Among his publications is Physics and Metaphysics in Hasdai Crescas (1998). He is an EMET Prize laureate in the Humanities (2009). This is his first contribution to the Seforim Blog. Arthur Hyman, 1921-2017…
If someone were to ask you of an instance where a rabbi was declared the messiah by his followers, the first example that would probably come to mind is the last Lubavitcher Rebbe, R’ Menachem Mendel Schneersohn, who to this very day many of his chasidim regard as the Messiah, despite his death. Many people would struggle to point to any other similar times in history, besides for the Shabbethai Tzvi affair and his various successors , where someone was…
Note: I wrote the following essay outline several years ago, but shelved it upon discovering that most of its novelty and much more had already been published by David de Sola Pool over a hundred years ago. On the sad occasion of the recent passing of my beloved mother I offer it now in her memory. Prayer and divinity were close to her heart. May our prayers be deepened by their study. The Kaddish is one of the most familiar…
It’s been awhile since I posted a list of new seforim. I hope to post an updated list of a few hundred titles within the next few weeks. In this post I want to focus on a few new titles that, aside for being new, all have a connection to one topic. This is also an update to some earlier posts relating to this topic. As a bochur about twenty years ago, I came across a small sefer called Olas…
1. In listening to a recent shiur on Daas Torah by R. Hershel Schachter, I found a number of noteworthy comments. In this shiur, which has been heard thousands of times, R. Schachter states, “If you have an outlook, if you have what I would consider a crooked, a krum outlook on Yom ha-Atzmaut, then your outlook on eruvin is also crooked. I can’t rely on anything that you say.” I find this difficult to accept, since can’t someone be…
All the comments to the previous posting (“A Note on R. Bezalel Alexandrov’s משכן בצלאל and its Prenumeranten”) are deeply appreciated. It’s what makes the Seforim Blog required reading for anyone interested in serious scholarship. I cannot possibly address all the comments. The references in the notes to the essay address some of the issues raised. To Yisrael Dubitsky’s important comments, one should add that privately owned copies of the two parts of משכן בצלאל are available, at the very…
Not much appears to be known about R. Bezalel Alexandrov (circa 1850-1930). Born in Grodno, he would ultimately come under the influence of the teachings of R. Yisrael Salanter (1809-1883), largely through the efforts of R. Yitzchak Blazer, i.e., R. Itzel Peterburger (1837-1907). R. Bezalel considered R. Itzel to be his primary teacher, especially during the period they both resided in Kovno. R. Bezalel was a close associate of R. Yosef Yozel Horowitz (1847-1919) of Nevarodok, perhaps the last of…
1. People continue to send me examples of censorship and altering of texts. If I would discuss all of them, I would have no time for other matters, but I do intend to get to some of these examples. Let me also share an “updating” of a classic rabbinic text that I discovered on my own in the old fashioned way. This is one of those examples that I wish I knew about when I wrote my book. It is…