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An Attack and Defense of the ArtScroll Talmud and Addendum to the Dec. 2007 Book List

An Attack and Defense of the ArtScroll Talmud and Addendum to the Dec. 2007 Book List

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Ohr Yisrael no. 50 (Tevet, 5768); 256 pages. The new issue of Ohr Yisrael, no. 50. has a couple of articles I wanted to highlight. First, they have a section devoted to essentially whether the ArtScroll Gemara is a good thing or not. While in the United States the English version has been around for awhile, only recently has the Hebrew edition been on the market and it appears that it is very popular. Thus, there are those who are…

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The Customs Associated with Joy on Chanukah and Their More Obscure Sources

The Customs Associated with Joy on Chanukah and Their More Obscure Sources

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In previous posts we have discussed some of the customs relating to Chanukah, in this post I wanted to address those customs connected to Simcha (joy) and do so by highlighting some rather unknown sources. Amongst the topics I will discuss are eating a seudah, dairy products, sefuganiot, playing cards and dreidel. 1. Seudah R. Eliezer Ashkenazi (1512-85) writes in the introduction to his classic work on Megliat Esther, Yosef Lekakh (first printed in Cremona, 1576), the reason that only…

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Review of R. Yedidyah Tiyah Weil’s Levushi Badim: With An Eye Towards Yom Kippur

Review of R. Yedidyah Tiyah Weil’s Levushi Badim: With An Eye Towards Yom Kippur

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One aspect of our rich literature that is rarely tapped into properly is the area of Sifrei Derush. We have a complete literature of seforim in this genre from Rishonim until modern times, including many styles, from all kinds of gedolim, from completely different schools countries, etc. There are Sifrei Derush strictly written according to peshat, while others deal with allegorical interpretations, Halakha, Kabbalah, Derush, Mussar and Chassidus. This area is extremely important in our quest for information in many…

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Teffilah Zakah: History of a Controversial Prayer

Teffilah Zakah: History of a Controversial Prayer

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Teffilah Zakah: History of a Controversial Prayer* Yom Kippur has many unique prayers, many of them have been added through the centuries. For instance, R. Hayyim Yosef Dovid Azulai (Hida) has a longer viduy. Another such addition is the prayer known as Teffilah Zakah. In this prayer the person enumerates and connects their various sins with various acts and asks for forgiveness. Additionally, the person forgives any who have caused them pain or harmed them. This prayer was popularized by…

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Candles on Yom Kippur: Reinstating a Lost Minhag

Candles on Yom Kippur: Reinstating a Lost Minhag

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* Introduction “Or Zarua la’tzadik – Light is sown for the righteous.” Each year, we begin our Yom Kippur prayers with these repeated, resounding words which Aruch Hashulchan tells us refer to “great matters that are beyond explanation.” If there is one evening of the entire Jewish year when we most seek the great, inexplicable light of God’s shechina, it is Yom Kippur eve. We enter the synagogue with great expectations, to feel close to the Divine, and to feel…

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Machnesi Rachamim – Praying to Angels

Machnesi Rachamim – Praying to Angels

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For those interested in the topic of the permissibility of praying to angels and the controversy surrounding this topic see the post on Machnesi Rachamim and Plagiarism which has been updated a bit and now includes some interesting scans. One scan in particular, the title page, is a case of a very elaborate and somewhat unique illustrated title page. In the next couple of days I hope to return to this topic and debunk a popular explanation regarding a well-known…

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The Custom of Refraining from Meat on Rosh HaShana

The Custom of Refraining from Meat on Rosh HaShana

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This post is an excerpt of a chapter from his upcoming book on the halachos and minhagim of Rosh HaShana. The post below deals with the statement, whose source is from R. Yosef Karo’s maggid, (known as Mishna), to refrain from eating meat on Rosh HaShana. This statement appears to be contrary to an (actual) Mishna in Chulin. R. Brodt hopes to have this book available for next year Rosh HaShana. אי-אכילת בשר בראש-השנה א. א. כשם שלכמה מן הראשונים…

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Marc Shapiro: What Do Adon Olam and ס”ט Mean?

Marc Shapiro: What Do Adon Olam and ס”ט Mean?

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ס”ט 1. People often refer to me as a Modern Orthodox intellectual. There are actually quite a number of us out there. If you hear someone using words like “ontological,” “existential,” “mimetic,” and now, “tergiversation” you can assume he in in our club. Also, another telltale sign is that when we give divrei Torah you will hear us refer to Philo, the Apocrypha, Pseudepigrapha (if we are confident that we can pronounce the word properly ), Shadal, or Cassutto. Of…

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New Book on Weddings

New Book on Weddings

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Now, with the passing of Tisha B’Av and the three week period, we now enter the wedding season. Appropriately, there is a new book on the laws and customs of weddings. The book, Beyom Chasunaso, by R. Zev Cinamon, is in English with Hebrew footnotes. The book is highly readable and covers just about every practical aspect of a modern Jewish wedding. There is a discussion about untying knots, the recent emphasis on praying under the Chuppah, removing jewelry and…

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No more Bentchers: A Review of a Sefer Given as a Wedding Gift

No more Bentchers: A Review of a Sefer Given as a Wedding Gift

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A wedding carries with it many customs, one of which is an attempt to use this ceremony to disseminate Torah. There was an old custom in many communities for people to write poems in honor of the simchas chasan and kallah. Others even wrote plays in honor of the bride and groom. One example is the Ramchal who wrote the play Ma’ashe Shimshon (as well as other poems for various weddings). In other communities there was a custom for someone…

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The Custom of Akdamut on Shavuot

The Custom of Akdamut on Shavuot

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R. Brodt has already discussed the custom of azharot on Shavous, I wanted to discuss another Shavous custom – akdamut. Akdamut is the poem in Aramaic which is said around the time of the reading of the Torah on the first day of Shavuot. This poem, composed by R. Meir ben Isaac who lived in Worms in the 11th century. He was also know as R. Meir Sha”tz (Shiliach Tzibor). The poem itself describes what happens in heaven when the…

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The Custom of Azharot on Shavous

The Custom of Azharot on Shavous

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The Yom tov of Shavous called Yom Matan Torahsenu as it is the day we received the Torah thousands of years ago at Har Sinai. It has many minhaghim that we do to remind us of this such as putting up grass and flowers or eating dairy dishes. Another minhag which many Jews have is to say azharot today. In this post I would like to discuss a bit of interesting bibliographic information about some specific azharot and their authors….

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The Eighth and Final Volume of Daniel Sperber’s Minhagei Yisrael Has Appeared

The Eighth and Final Volume of Daniel Sperber’s Minhagei Yisrael Has Appeared

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Mossad HaRav Kook has just published the eighth and final volume of Rabbi Prof. Daniel Sperber’s Minhagei Yisrael. This final volume includes a complete and comprehensive index of all eight volumes volumes of Minhagei Yisrael. For this reason alone this volume is worthwhile, as anyone who has used the prior volumes knows, at times topics are spread over multiple volumes, sometimes in footnotes, which makes it difficult to locate particular topics. The first index is comprised of multiple indices; Mishna,…

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Eliezer Brodt – Pesach Drasha of the Rokeach

Eliezer Brodt – Pesach Drasha of the Rokeach

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Every once in a while we are privileged to have the venerable printing house Mikezei Nerdamim release something special from the great rishonim (aside from their great journal Kovetz Al Yad). Last year they published the drasha of R. Eliezer Rokeach for Pesach edited by Professor Simcha Emanuel. In this post I would like to discuss some of the many things of interest in the work and also comment on the great job of Simcha Emanuel did in general with…

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