Afikoman – “Stealing“ and Other Related Minhagim
…as well. For example, in his informative memoir about life in Lithuania in the 1880s, Benjamin Gordon describes stealing the afikoman with the help of his mother,[6] and going back…
Names of Seforim I
…D’Israeli the father of Statesman Benjamin (Isaac was the one to remove himself and his family Benjamin included and convert them to Christianity after Isaac was angered over his synagogues…
Tevie Kagan: The Enigmatic R. David Lida
…that refer to the libel case. One of the prominent members of the Sephardic congregation, R. Nissan ben Judah Leib, the brother in law of R. Isaac Benjamin Wolf ben…
Rabbi Steinman and the Messiah, part 3
…guess could be translated as “imbecile.” He gives another example of Reuben’s foolishness in that when attempting to reassure Jacob that he would bring Benjamin back to him after taking…
An Autopsy in Antebellum America: Exhuming a Forgotten 19th Century Halachic Debate on Cadaveric Dissection Part I
…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,…
Truth be Told[1] Comments on Changing the Immutable: How Orthodox Judaism Rewrites its History by Marc B. Shapiro
…will this revelation ultimately lead to a terrible hillul Hashem, but it will undermine peoples’ trust in the rabbinic establishment. In this regard R. Benjamin Lau has observed:[20] The rabbi is…
Dorshei Yichudcha: A Portrait of Professor Elliot R. Wolfson
…is this insistence on the truth, the guardedness with which he approaches each and every text, which marks Wolfson’s works through and through. This attention, what Benjamin (quoting Malebranche) called…
Disenchantment with Zionism? Leon Roth and Yeshayahu Leibowitz on the Qibyā Raid
Disenchantment with Zionism? Leon Roth and Yeshayahu Leibowitz on the Qibyā Raid Warren Zev Harvey[1] The infamous Qibyā reprisal raid (peʿulat tagmul), led by Major Ariel Sharon, later to become…
The Medical Training and Yet Another (Previously Unknown) Legacy of Rabbi Dr. Abraham J. Twerski, zt”l
…Steipler’),” in Benjamin Brown and Nissim Leon, eds., The Gedolim: Leaders Who Shaped the Israeli Haredi Jewry (Jerusalem: Magnes, 2017), 663-674 (Hebrew). A full biographical treatise on The Steipler Gaon…
The Legend of R. Yehuda Halevi’s Death: Truth or Fiction?
…cousin, Abraham Ibn Ezra. Later he writes that he is buried with R. Yehuda Bar Elayh in Tzefas. In the Travels of R. Benjamin of Tudela, written around 1170 –…
The Ethics of the Case of Amalek: An Alternative Reading of the Biblical Data and the Jewish Tradition
…Kish is the Benjaminite Kish, the father of Saul (1 Samuel 9:1),[29] yet no mention is made of the most illustrious and pertinent ancestor — King Saul. Moreover, Jair is…
Was Professor Saul Lieberman “Orthodox” or “Conservative”? [1]
…at JTS should be sh’lomei emunei yisrael and that the students and graduates should beshomrei torah u-mitzvot ka-rauy v’khayaut.” Lieberman did not care about labels but rather about substance, and in this…
In Praise of Ephemera: A Picture Postcard from Vilna Reveals its Secrets More than One Hundred Years after its Original Publication
…as a pogrom. On the other hand, to label those events a mere “disturbance” does not begin to capture the malevolent intent of the perpetrators directed specifically against Jews, and…
Shnayer Leiman – The New Encyclopaedia Judaica: Some Preliminary Observations
…are hardly in. Not for nothing did we label these comments “preliminary observations.” Much more needs to be investigated before one can judge how well NEJ has captured the totality…
The “Doctored” Medical Diploma of Samuel, the Son of Menasseh Ben Israel: Forgery or “For Jewry”?
…with Griffith’s analysis assume the answer to be a resounding yes, some even labelling it a “brazen” forgery.[33] There is no evidence of any suspicion of the document’s veracity during…