The Seforim Blog

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

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

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 Gelatin, Abraham Goldstein, R. Moses Isserles, and More Marc B. Shapiro Continued from here Among the matters I discussed in the previous post were gelatin and consumption of the human body as part of a medical cure. Believe it or not, consumption of human parts not in the context of medicine is mentioned in a short responsum of R. Joseph Kafih. R. Kafih was asked if it permissible to drink various non-Jewish milk products and also gelatin produced from non-kosher animals….

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Gelatin, Supposed Retractions, and Abraham Goldstein, Part 1 Marc B. Shapiro In my last post I quoted something from Mesorat Moshe and wondered whether R. Moshe Feinstein could have actually said that which is attributed to him. While the Mesorat Moshe series is quite valuable, whenever one deals with “table talk” there is always going to be the issue of how much authority do you give to such reports, especially compared with written texts of R. Moshe. Here is an example of what I…

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Which Direction is North?, Geographical Mistakes, and our Woke Universities Marc B. Shapiro 1. Numbers 34:15 states: “Two and a half tribes have taken their inheritance on the side of the Jordan by Jericho, to the front, eastward.” Rashi comments: קדמה מזרחה: אל פני העולם שהם במזרח, שרוח מזרחית קרויה פנים ומערביות קרויה אחור לפיכך דרום לימין וצפון לשמאל This passage is translated as follows in ArtScroll’s Sapirstein edition: To the Front, Eastward: This means to the front of the world, which…

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Shlomo Yosef Zevin and Yeshiva Students being Drafted to the Army, Views of Women, and More Marc B. Shapiro 1. In an earlier post I wrote about R. Shlomo Yosef Zevin and the famous essay about how yeshiva students need to serve in the army, an essay which is widely attributed to him. See here. In the post I cited important information uncovered by David Eisen that complicates the issue (as we see the Zevin family itself is of two…

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