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Hitzei Giborim, Tzitzit, and R. Meir Mazuz

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Hitzei Giborim, Tzitzit, and R. Meir Mazuz
Marc B. Shapiro
1. In 1969 the journal Moriah appeared, published by Makhon Yerushalayim. From its beginning, this journal published manuscript material from geonim, rishonim, and aharonim, together with Torah articles by contemporary scholars. This created a model that was later followed by a number of other journals. It also became a model for how to publish memorial volumes, as these generally also contain a section of material published from manuscript. Together with the interest in manuscripts, there has developed what can only be described as an Orthodox academic approach, and one can often find articles of this sort that meet a very high scholarly standard. A well-known representative of this genre is Yeshurun, a volume that appears twice a year and includes material from manuscript as well as halakhic and scholarly articles. What is most impressive about Yeshurun is not only its massive size, but the fact that the editors can fill it with so much quality material.
A competitor to Yeshurun has recently appeared on the scene and its title is Hitzei Giborim. Its model is exactly what I have described, with a section devoted to publishing material from manuscript, followed by Torah essays and Orthodox academic articles, many of which are really fantastic. The editor of Hitzei Giborim is R. Yaakov Yitzhak Miller, whose own articles show impressive erudition. Volume 9 recently appeared, but since I haven’t yet had a chance to examine it, let me speak about volume 8 which appeared last year. Volume 8 contains 1030 pages which I think makes it the largest volume of its kind. I wonder if the point of having so many pages was precisely in order to exceed even the largest Yeshurun.
Among the articles that I think will be of particular interest to Seforim Blog readers are R. Eliyahu Nahum Waldman’s ninety page study of Maimonides’ responsa to the sages of Lunel, designed to show that R. Kafih was mistaken in thinking that these are forgeries. I only wonder if such an effort was required on R. Waldman’s part, since it is hard to believe that anyone who examines the matter without preconceptions can agree with R. Kafih.[1]
R. Yehoshua Assaf deals with Rashbam’s commentary to the beginning of Genesis, the portion that ArtScroll censored and which I dealt with in prior posts here and here.[2] In this article Assaf cites R. Hillel Novetsky’s important comments here. Novetsky discovered another manuscript that not only contains the words of Rashbam in his commentary to Gen. 1:31, words that ArtScroll censored, but also the continuation of the passage that was missing until now. In fact, ArtScroll should be happy with this discovery as we now see that Rashbam affirmed that even if “day” started in the morning for the first six days of creation, the Shabbat of creation indeed began at sunset on Friday.[3] Unfortunately, I think that even if ten other Torah scholars would write articles along the lines of R. Novetsky’s and R. Assaf’s it won’t have any effect on ArtScroll.
R. Avraham Yissachar Konig’s article on the international dateline and the dispute between the Hazon Ish and other rabbis is full of interesting points and discoveries (including new material from manuscript) that significantly advances our understanding of this episode. Unfortunately, the language Konig uses about certain rabbis, in particular R. Yehiel Michel Tukatzinsky, is completely improper. Just because Konig’s point is to defend the Hazon Ish does not give him the right to belittle people who were greater than he. Interestingly, this article by Konig was removed from the volume when it was placed on Otzar ha-Hokhmah.Here is the table of contents that is also missing the article.

Here is the uncensored table of contents.
Otzar ha-Hokhmah has become the library for so many of us, and it is thus completely unacceptable for books to be altered no matter what the reason. The editor of Hitzei Giborim insisted that the book be shown in its entirety or taken down, and it no longer appears on Otzar ha-Hokhmah.
In Changing the Immutable, pp. 191 n. 16, 224 n. 46, I noted other examples of censorship on Otzar ha-Hokhmah. I found an additional instance in the Otzar ha-Hokhmah version of The Rabbi Leo Jung Jubilee Volume (New York, 1962). Two articles are deleted, and here is how the table of contents appears on Otzar ha-Hokhmah.

Here is the uncensored table of contents.

I understand why Otzar ha-Hokhmah would want to delete an article by Heschel, but what possible reason could there be to delete R. Isidore Epstein’s article? I can only assume that the person responsible for this mistakenly thought that Epstein was not Orthodox.
Here is a page from Otzar ha-Hokhmah’s version of Peninei Rabbenu ha-Avi Ezri, p. 266.

Here is how the uncensored page looks.

 

Returning to Konig’s article, on p. 770 he prints from manuscript a letter from a Sephardic rabbi to R. Ben Zion Uziel, but the name of the rabbi has been deleted. Konig tells us that he removed the rabbi’s name in order to protect his honor, because his letter shows that had no understanding of the dateline issue. It is indeed true that the rabbi did not understand the matter but that is no reason to delete his name. If we are going to start deleting names of rabbis every time we are convinced that they made a basic error, there would be no end to it. In this case the editor should have insisted that the letter appear in full. After all, everyone makes mistakes and there is no problem is seeing that even a learned rabbi did not understand this complicated issue.
Among the articles in Hitzei Giborim focusing on contemporary issues, R. Eliyahu Levine deals with dina de-malchuta dina. On p. 1012 he notes that the government requires homeowners to keep their property looking nice, and this includes cutting the lawn. R. Levine asks if this is also included in dina de-malchuta dina. He concludes that it is not, and writes the following.
וגם נראה שיסוד חוקים אלו הם מעוגנים בתרבות הגויים, שהעיקר אצלם הוא היופי החיצוני, וכל עמלם ויגיעם הוא ליפות את המראה החיצוני של רכושם, ולכן הם מעונינים שחצירו הפרטית של כל אחד מהם תשלים את מראה המקום כנאה ומטופח, וא”כ דבר זה כלול בדברי הרשב”א והש”ך שחוקים שביסודם הם כשל תוה”ק, אין נוהג בהם דדמ”ד, משום שבשעה שיגיעתו של הגוי היא לצחצח את רכושו, יגיעתו של הישראלי היא להקפיד על דברים אחרים, והמאמץ לעצמו את חוקי וגינוני המלכות, ודאי שמקפיד להיות מתאים להופעת הגוי, ממילא ההרגל בכך מזניח את ההקפדה והטיפוח של הישרליות שבישראל.
גם הרבה מחוקי הבניה והדיור כנראה מקורם בתרבות אמריקאית זו, ומשפחות יהודיות גדולות שעיקר תשוקתם אינה בדוקא בריבוי נכסים, החוקים הנ”ל אינם תואמים להשקפת עולמם, וזוהי עוד סיבה שבמסגרת חוקי הגויים לא נוהג דדמ”ד.
For those who don’t read Hebrew, he claims that zoning laws, and the whole idea of having a beautiful environment, originate in non-Jewish cultural norms, and therefore Jews are not obligated to follow these laws. I guess this means that in a “Jewish” environment, people won’t need to cut their lawns, their property can fall apart etc., since Jews look at what is on the inside and are not concerned with outer appearances. It is no secret that in some segments of the haredi world people assume that zoning laws (and sometimes even fire codes) are not Jewish concepts and thus don’t need to be followed, but to see this sort of approach in print will probably be a surprise for many.[4]
On p. 1121 we find something quite uncommon, an apology that in the previous volume an article appeared that is plagiarized from two other writers. I can’t think of another Torah publication that has ever had such a notice, and it shows both the honesty and the courage of the editor.
Beginning on p. 362, R. Yaakov Yitzhak Miller publishes from manuscript Torah letters concerning shaving one’s beard when the Czarist authority required this. The question that obviously needed to be considered was if this decree was to be regarded as a she’at ha-shemad in which case Jews would be required to martyr themselves rather than obey. Not surprisingly, the rabbis whose letters are published by R. Miller did not go this far. These rabbis are R. Judah Bacharach, R. Jacob Zvi Mecklenburg, and R. Hayyim Wassertzug (also known as R. Hayyim Filipover, from one of the Lithuanian towns he was rabbi in). These letters come from an unpublished volume by R. Wassertzug which hopefully will soon appear in print as it has the potential to be a very significant publication.
Although R. Wassertzug is today unknown, this was not the case in the 19th century, and R. Miller provides a nice introduction which shows some of R. Wassertzug’s originality. In addition to a reputation for being very pious as well as a great scholar, he was also known as a lenient posek who did not feel bound by certain practices which while generally accepted, did not, in his opinion, have a firm halakhic basis. Not surprisingly, this led to conflict with some other rabbis.
Here are two responsa from R. Wassertzug that appeared in Ha-Melitz, 14 Sivan 5629, pp. 225-226. The first permits one to drink non-Jewish milk (especially travelers), and the second permits a married woman to show some of her hair.

Not mentioned by R. Miller is that one of the opponents of R. Wassertzug was R. Isaac Haver. It is reported that he and some other rabbis went to R. Leibel Shapiro, the rav of Kovno, to complain about R. Wassertzug and to gain his support in order to have R. Wassertzug removed from his rabbinic position. Yet they were rebuffed as R. Leibel told them how great R. Wassertzug was and sent them away.[5]
In 2015 R. Mordechai Gifter’s Milei de-Iggerot appeared. This is quite a significant work and anyone interested in the history of American Orthodoxy will want to consult it. On p. 213 he deals with R. Eliezer Berkovits’ liberal halakhic approach. R. Gifter comments that unfortunately R. Berkovits did not follow the path of his teacher, R Jehiel Jacob Weinberg, who was much more conservative in how he approached halakhah.

The person R. Gifter was writing to had asked why R. Gifter was so critical of R. Berkovits’ approach when R. Wassertzug also had a liberal approach. In R. Gifter’s reply he reveals a hitherto unknown piece of information that he received from an elderly Lithuanian rabbi, namely, that one of the responsa of R. Akiva Eger in which there is no addressee given was actually sent to R. Wassertzug. R. Gifter also states that when R. Berkovits reaches R. Wassertzug’s level of piety, then he will be able to forgive him for much of what he has written.
ומה שיביא לי ראי’ מהגאון ר’ חיים פיליפובר זצ”ל, ידע נא ידידי שכשיגיע דר. ברקוביץ לדרגת חסידותו ופרישותו של אותו גאון וצדיק אוכל למחול לו על הרבה מדבריו, אבל באיש של דורנו לא אוכל לתלות דבריו בחסידותו של גאון מדור קדום.
והאמת שמיחס גאוני הדור להגר”ח פיליפובר ז”ל יש לנו ללמוד איך להתיחס לכל דרישה לחלוק על הלכות קבועות אפי’ כשיצאו מפי גאון וצדיק. ועיין תשובת מרן הגרעק”א ז”ל סי’ נ”ה – שקבלתי מפי רב גדול וישיש בליטא שהתשובה מכוונת להגר”ח פיליפובר ז”ל.
Here is the responsum of R. Akiva Eger, vol. 1, no. 55, referred to by R. Gifter.
As you can see, while the addressee is referred to as המופלא, his name and town are not given. R. Eger criticizes R. Wassertzug for his liberal approach in which he disagreed with rishonim and in the case discussed diverged from the Shulhan Arukh. In his conclusion, R. Eger refers to himself as one who is rebuking from hidden love.
While on the topic of criticism of R. Berkovits, here are some other relevant documents that I found in the archive of Chief Rabbi Isaac Nissim at Yad ha-Rav Nissim in Jerusalem. The first is a New York Times article from June 23, 1969. (I have no doubt that the second quote attributed to R. Berkovits in the article – where he mentions reconsidering the “traditional laws” – was taken out of context.)

In response to this story the following two documents were sent out to various Orthodox figures. Since the Hebrew document is not always easy to read, I have provided a transcript and also added paragraph breaks.

בהתרגשות ורגש חרפה קראנו בזמן האחרון בעתון “הניורק טיימס” על דר. אליעזר ברקוביץ, פרופסור בבית מדרש לתורה בשיקגו, שהוא השתתף עם איזה וועידת מתבוללים בקאנאדה: שמתיימרים הם להתחבר שלשת הזרמים של יהדות (אורטודוקס) (קונסורביטיב) (ריפורם). בנאום לפני העתונעיים [!] הגיבו המשתתפים שאין האיסור לאכול חזיר עוד מותאם לנסיבות הזמן: ובשלובי זרע עמהם הגיב דר. ברקוביץ שמצות שמיטה הנוהגת באה”ק היא שערוריה סקנדלית, ולא יתכן שמירת השביעית ב”דת מודרנית”: והיא בכלל יהדות מזוייפת: ולמותר הבהיר דר. ברקוביץ שהוא: “דובר של יהדות אורטודוקסית”, למרות שאין לו שום בסיס להיקרא אורטודוקסי, אחרי שהוא מפורסם כמלעיג עד”ת, שכל דעותיו הן שהאורטודוקסיה “משרשת ומפיגה את היהדות מן ההמונים לרגלי העצמת האיסורים.” והנה אין בעצתו מן החדוש וההפתעה, שכבר שמענוה אצל הקונסוב[ר]טיבים והריפורם כמותו – אמנם איך שהוא מצהיר ומצייר את עצמו בתור חובב ואדוק ביהדות האורטודוקסית הוא תמהון – מאין שאף דר. ברקוביץ שהרומס ברגל גאוה וגסה את עיקרי התורה והמתחבר עם הלצים והמתבוללים יכונה “דובר אורטודוקס”?
ומאידך – הרב אהרן סולביצ’יק, הראש ישיבה של ב”מ לתורה, המראה עצמו כצדיק וחסיד, המחמיר על פרטי התורה – איך הוא לא נרתע ונזדעזע מדברי הפרופסור, ולא שת לבו להסכנה החבויה בתוך הישיבה, דר. אליעזקר ברקוביץ? התירוץ: נחזה לר”א סולביצ’יק בעצמו, שלמשתה השנתי של היוניון אף אורטודוקס קאנג., שהמתחברים ברובם הם קונסורביטיב ומחללי שבת, וכל הגדולי תורה הצהירו בפומבי איסור מוחלט ללכת שמה – ראינו איך שר”א סולביצ’יק הואיל לנסוע להשתתף בועידתם, והם [ושם?] הוא נשא נאום להוכיח בעזרת “פסוקים” שאפשר להתחבר לצורך שעה עם הסטרא דשמאלא! – ומי זה שהיה יכול להעלות על הדעת שהר”מ ר”א סולביצ’יק יואיל להיות מהאורחים נואמים בארגון שכולו טריפה! אמנם היות וקראנו תגובותיו של דר. ברקוביץ הסכמות לנאומי ר”א סולביצ’יק, שמצוה גדולה להתחבר עם הרשעים, מוכרח שבאישורו הבהיר דר. בורקוביץ להעתונעיים, היות ואחרת לא היה מרשה הר”ם להפרופסור להישאר בישיבה, ובפרט בתפקיד מורה דרך על חניכיו בני הישיבה.
כעת לדאבוננו הוסרה [!] הצעיף החופף הדו-פרצוף שלר”א סולביצ’יק, מראה לזולת שהוא צדיק וחסיד, אך אינו מן הנמנע אישורו כ”דובר אורטודוקס” פרופסור המבהיר מינות וכפירה בתורה שבכתב, ובעצמו להתחבר עם המתבוללים, לעומת פסק איסור של כל גדולי התורה.
אדישות של הרמי”ם והרבנים בשיקגו להמצב קטסטרופילי הלזה היא כאובה, והחלה לשכנענו ששתיקתם כהודאתם, וכבר הגיע העת שתיפקחנה העינים והוקיע [!] בפרהסיא בעמוד הקלון את מפירי התורה בב”מ לתורה ולמחות בנזיפה לזבובי מות ושפעת דברים של הראש ישיבה המתבטא לתלמידיו דעות [כפרניות?] תחת החפשת צדקות: המחנף רשעים ומכבד פעלי עוול.
In addition to what it is said about R. Berkovits, R. Ahron Soloveichik is also attacked in these documents for not firing R. Berkovits (he actually didn’t have the authority to do so), and for attending an OU convention, an organization that in the 1960s had many mixed seating congregations which are referred to as “Conservative” synagogues. There is nothing about the latter episode in the book about R. Soloveichik, Ha-Rav Aharon Yeled Sha’ashuim (Jerusalem, 2011), published by his son, R. Yosef Soloveichik. In fact, R. Berkovits is only mentioned on two pages in the book. On p. 244, it is pointed out that R. Soloveichik opposed R. Berkovits’ approach, which is described as advocating “that halacha should be allowed to develop freely to accommodate people’s needs.” On p. 243 we see that R. Berkovits joined with other faculty members in opposition to R. Soloveichik being given any administrative power at Hebrew Theological College.[6]
Let me make one final point about all the journals and memorial volumes, Yeshurun, Hitzei Giborim, and the rest. Numerous selections from commentaries on talmudic tractates have appeared in these publications. The problem is that when it comes to talmudic commentaries, all these publications are basically useless. For example, let’s say Moriah published a portion of an anonymous medieval commentary on a few pages of Tractate Nedarim twenty years ago. Only someone who was “in the sugya” would have been able to appreciate what the commentary was saying when it first appeared. Therefore, 99 percent of the readers twenty years ago skipped over it, and they continue to skip over all of the continuously published selections of commentaries that scholars spend so long deciphering and adding learned notes to. Since almost no one reads these published commentaries, I sometimes wonder if it is a waste of the scholars’ time to work on them. If I finally decide to learn Nedarim this year, is there any chance that I will remember that a few pages of a medieval commentary appeared in Moriah over two decades ago.
Fortunately, there is a solution, and that is to follow the approach of Otzar ha-Geonim. The project I have in mind would take a good deal of effort, but it would be very valuable. What we need is for an individual, or group of people, to go through all the various journals, memorial volumes, etc., and pull out all of the commentaries on the different tractates in order create a compendium. It can be called Otzar Mefarshim or something like that, and it would be divided into tractates, just like Otzar ha-Geonim. With such a work, when someone, for example, is studying Nedarim, he will easily find the 3 page section of the anonymous medieval commentary published years ago in Moriah. This is the only way to rescue so many scattered texts from oblivion.
3. In Changing the Immutable and in earlier posts I have discussed how in previous years in some communities wearing a kippah was not standard as it is today. (I think the only exception is the Syrian community.) R. Ovadiah Yosef even says that unlike in previous years, wearing a kippah today is more than just “midat hasidut,” as it has become a sign of a religious Jew, while going bareheaded is a sign of an irreligious Jews.[7]
I was asked if the same point can be made about tzitzit and it indeed can. It is now pretty standard in the Orthodox world for men to wear tzitzit. We even start little boys wearing them in school at age 3. Yet the practice of wearing tzitzit, i.e., a tallit katan,[8] was unknown in talmudic days and is not mentioned by the geonim or Maimonides.[9] It appears to have begun with the Hasidei Ashkenaz,[10] and eventually became a regular practice in the Ashkenazic world.[11] Yet even in the twentieth century throughout the Sephardic world tzitzit were not generally worn. In these places they regarded tzitzit as a holy item, not something to be given to a child who can easily soil his garment. Even among adults, tzitzit were reserved for the especially pious. (I hope to expand on this in the future, where I will provide sources documenting what I have just mentioned.) In the past half century much has changed, and just as the kippah is now a sign of a religious Jew, so too is tzitzit. As R. Meir Mazuz puts it in a recent issue of Bayit Ne’eman, his new weekly “parashah sheet”[12]:
היום זה סימן היכר בין אדם שומר תורה ומצוות לבין מי שלא כזה, ואפילו שמן הדין אפשר להיפטר מטלית קטן . . . מ”מ מצוה מן המובחר שאדם ילבש טלית עם ארבע כנפות כדי לקיים את המצוה.
Interestingly, R. Joel Sirkes writes that while a father is obligated to provide his minor son with tefillin so that he can learn how to use them, he is not obligated to provide his son with tzitzit, “since even he [the father] is not obligated to buy a four cornered garment.”[13] This view is in opposition to the Tur who writes that a father does have to provide his minor son with tzitzit if the latter is of the age to wear it.[14]
Since I just mentioned R. Sirkes, let me share another interesting view of his. Avodah Zarah 70a quotes Rava as saying: רובא גנבי ישראל נינהו. In context, what this almost certainly means is that the majority of the thieves in Pumbeditha were Jewish.[15] Yet R. Sirkes shockingly understands it to mean that most Jews are thieves! It would be shocking enough if he understood it to mean that most thieves are Jewish (and not just most thieves in Pumbeditha), but explaining the passage to mean that most Jews are thieves sounds like something one would find in the writings of an anti-Semite, not in a work authored by one of the outstanding halakhists. It is true that one can find other negative judgments of the Jewish people in rabbinic literature. For example, the Maharal speaks of Israel’s inclination to sin as something unique to them and not found among non-Jews. He writes:[16]
כי ישראל מסוגלים היו לחטא מה שלא תמצא בכל האומות.
Yet this is part of a theoretical discussion, and although Israel has this negative characteristic, the flip side is that Israel is at a much higher spiritual level than the non-Jews. R. Sirkes’ opinion, on the other hand, is about the real world, here and now, and is said in a halakhic context. See Bayit Hadash, Yoreh Deah 2:6 (kuntres aharon):
ולפי עניות דעתי נראה דבכל שאר עבירות יש להחמיר . . . מה שאין כן בגונב דבר מאכל . . . דאפילו במוחזק בכך הרבה פעמים אין לו דין משומד ותדע שהרי אמרו רוב גנבים ישראל ואם כן לא יהיה סתם ישראל כשר לשחיטה אלא בידוע שאינו גנב וזה לא שמענו לעולם.
When we come across strange passages like this, it is often the case that someone will say that the author never wrote it. Rather, it was inserted by an erring student or someone seeking to undermine traditional Judaism. In this case, we get the next best thing, as R. Shabbetai Cohen, Shakh, Yoreh Deah 2:18, writes that R. Sirkes retracted what he wrote and asked for it to be deleted.
ומה שכתב הב”ח בזה בקונטרס אחרון [ד”ה מומר] כבר צוה הוא ז”ל בעצמו למחקו.
Nevertheless, I wonder if this is actually the case. Is it possible that R. Shabbetai wrote this not because R. Sirkes actually said what he attributes to him, but because R. Shabbetai wanted the embarrassing passage of R Sirkes removed from the public eye? The best way to do this would be to say that R. Sirkes regretted writing it, and this hopefully would lead to it being deleted by future printers.Those who have read Changing the Immutable, especially the last chapter, know that there is plenty of precedent for what I am suggesting. The reason that I think this might be the case is that nowhere else do we have evidence of R. Sirkes saying that what he wrote here should be deleted. Furthermore, in a later work, Sefer Ha-Arokh, Yoreh Deah 2, R. Shabbetai does not mention anything about R. Sirkes giving instructions to delete what he wrote. Rather, R. Shabbetai simply criticizes R. Sirkes for what he regards as his error. If R. Sirkes really said what R. Shabbetai attributes to him in his commentary to the Shulhan Arukh, why doesn’t he mention it in Sefer Ha-Arokh? What sense is there in criticizing R. Sirkes if R. Sirkes himself regretted what he wrote? In Sefer Ha-Arokh R. Shabbetai writes very sharply, accusing R. Sirkes of an error that even an amateur wouldn’t be caught making:

אבל בב”ח (סעיף ו בקונטרס אחרון) כתב דברים בלא טעם ומחלק בין עבירה לעבירה עיין שם ומה שכתב ותדע שאמרו רוב גנבים ישראל וכו’ כאן טעות נזדקר לפניו אפילו בר דבי רב לא יטעו בזה דמה שכתב רוב גנבים ישראל הוא דלא אמרינן דמותר אלא כשיש גנבים בעיר ורוב מהגנבים הם ישראל אבל שיהיה רוב ישראל גנבים חלילה לא תהא כזאת בישראל ועתה ישראל אשר בך אתפאר תקיצנה בבית זה שלא כדעת דברו.
R. Shneur Zalman Hirschowitz also calls attention to what he regards as R. Sirkes’ error. R. Hirschowitz is best known as a student of R. Israel Salanter, and it was he who published R. Salanter’s Even Yisrael, which became a basic text of the Mussar movement.[17] Here is the title page.

R. Hirschowitz’s talmudic notes were included in the Romm Talmud and are now included in the new Talmud editions. His comment about R. Sirkes is found in his note to Hullin 12a:
מצוה לפרסם להסיר חרפה מעל ישראל דהנה אויבי עמינו אומרים כי חז”ל בעצמם העידו עלינו כי רוב גנבי ישראל ומה לה לעיסה שהנחתום מעיד עליה, ובאמת העולם טעה כי חז”ל אמרו זה על כל ישראל אשר בכל כדור הארץ ובכל זמן כי רוב הגנבים ישראל הם, וחלילה לומר זאת וטעות גדולה היא. וכבר טעה בזה אדם גדול הוא ניהו אדונינו רוח אפינו בעל הב”ח זצוק”ל בקונטרס אחרון ליו”ד סי’ א. ולא עוד אלא שנתחלף להב”ח ז”ל במחכ”ת גאון קדשו ועצמותיו הקדושים בין רוב גנבי ישראל ורוב ישראל גנבי . . . וכל הרואה יחרד וישתומם על זה שמשים לכל ישראל בחזקת גנבים . . . אבל לא יאונה לצדיק כל און, כי הב”ח בעצמו צוה בחייו למוחקו כמ”ש הש”ך ביו”ד סי’ ב.
4. Earlier in this post I mentioned R. Meir Mazuz’s parashah sheet, Bayit Ne’eman. You can see recent issues here and you can sign up to receive it here. Each issue is a transcript of his Saturday night shiur, broadcast live all over Israel. Fortunately, the transcript is complete, by which I mean that the people putting it out have not censored it in any way, thus preserving R. Mazuz’s spoken style and his numerous off-hand comments. It is pretty unique which is why I recommend that readers check it out. The people who publish the shiur even claim that it is the most popular shiur in the world, a claim that is supported by a recent media report here that R. Mazuz’s Saturday night shiur has almost twice as many listeners (around 30,000) as R. Yitzhak Yosef’s competing Saturday night shiur.
Readers should be prepared for a good dose of what can only be termed “Sephardic supremacy.” It is with regard to this that I have to correct a point that R. Mazuz has often made, but which is really misleading. R. Mazuz has compared the kelal yisrael sense found in the Sephardic world with the extremism in the Ashkenazic haredi world, an extremism that leads to never-ending disputes and delegitimization of others. It is true that a basic feature of Ashkenazic haredi society is the tendency to delegitimize those who don’t carry the “party line.” This of course does not mean that all haredi individuals have this tendency; however, it is found in haredi society as a whole. In the last decade or so we have seen how, when there are not many opponents outside the haredi world to focus on, the society turns on itself and creates internal battles.
As mentioned, R. Mazuz has contrasted this with the Sephardic approach which has always welcomed people of different outlooks and levels of religiosity, always looking to bring close and not separate one Jew from the other. In contrast to the Ashkenazic world which has used the herem again and again, R. Mazuz states that other than the battle against Spinoza, the Sephardim have never gone for this approach. For R. Mazuz, the upshot of all this is that Sephardic society is a much better reflection of what Judaism and Jewish life are supposed to be.
Before the great split between R. Mazuz and the Shas party, R. Mazuz commented that ש”ס is supposed to stand for שחורה and סרוגה, meaning that the party should include both black kippot and knitted kippot, since the wearers of both were faithful Jews. As many readers know, the head of the Shas Council of Torah Sages, R. Shalom Cohen, instead saw fit to refer to the religious Zionists as Amalek (among other choice comments). This in turn led R. Mazuz to increase his attacks against the leadership of the Shas party which he saw as abandoning the Sephardic tradition and adopting the worst aspects of Ashkenazic haredi culture. Those who follow the Israeli religious scene know that at present there is a battle taking place for leadership of the Sephardic religious world between the two most important Sephardic rabbis. One is R. Yitzhak Yosef, who sees himself as the rightful inheritor of his father’s position and protector of his legacy.[18] The other is R. Mazuz. Among R. Mazuz’s supporters is former chief rabbi R. Shlomo Amar. R. Amar is himself quite popular, but since the passing of R. Ovadiah has subordinated himself to R. Mazuz. Seeing R. Mazuz’s great popularity today, I am proud to recall that the very first English article to deal with him appeared in 2007 on the Seforim Blog here. This post was the first introduction of most readers to R. Mazuz, and since that time I have quoted from his voluminous writings in almost every one of my subsequent posts.
There is a good deal more to discuss regarding the dispute over leadership of the Sephardic world, the strategy of the Yachad party and why it didn’t succeed, and the growing attacks on R. Mazuz from small-minded people who object to his independent mind. (He has even been attacked for quoting poems by Yehudah Alharizi and Hayyim Nachman Bialik in a shiur.) But for now, let me just make a couple of points:
A. Contrary to what R. Mazuz has said, it is not true that the only time Sephardic sages have used the herem is against Spinoza. The scholars of Aleppo, who could be quite extreme, banned the Torah commentary of R. Elijah Benamozegh, a figure whose works are quoted by R. Mazuz.
B. R. Mazuz’s description, while correct in its major points, is offered without any context and therefore leads to a distortion of the historical record. Nothing R. Mazuz describes makes sense without remembering that unlike in the Sephardic world, the Ashkenazic sages were confronted with the Reform movement and later with the East European Haskalah. It is in the context of these battles that the Ashkenazic rabbinic leadership felt forced to resort to bans and other types of exclusionary behavior and language, and this led to the creation of an extremism that is with us until today. Lacking Reform and Haskalah, the Sephardic world could develop in an entirely different fashion, but had the Sephardic world confronted such anti-traditional movements, it is likely that its rabbinic leadership would have reacted exactly as the Ashkenazic rabbis did. In other words, we are dealing with apples and oranges, and it doesn’t make sense to point to characteristics of the Ashkenazic world and contrast them negatively with the Sephardic world without explaining why it is that the Ashkenazic world developed its extremist tendencies.I must, however, point out that R. Mazuz assumes that there is something in the Sephardic spiritual makeup that itself prevents the development of anti-traditional forces. You see this from various comments that he throws out. For example, in a recent shiur, published in Bayit Ne’eman, no. 32 (6 Tishrei 5777), p. 1, in speaking about R. Abraham Ibn Ezra’s piyut Lekha Eli Teshukati, he states: “If only the Ashkenazim had this piyut; I would guarantee them that if they would have recited this piyut, they would not have had maskilim, Reformers, or assimilationists.”

This particular shiur has a number of other interesting points. For example, on p. 2 he discusses the verbal attacks upon haredi soldiers. (So far there have only been verbal attacks, but no one will be surprised when an actual physical attack occurs.) As far as I know, almost none of the Ashkenazic haredi leaders have spoken publicly about this unfortunate development (and if they have, it has not been covered in the Ashkenazic haredi press). The Ashkenazic haredi leadership in both Israel and America has a policy of not criticizing bad behavior on “its side” (unless they are dealing with really bad behavior such as allying with Iran). This is a pattern that has been going on for almost a hundred years. I say this since the leaders of Agudat Israel in Palestine never criticized or took any real action against the extremists who were defaming R. Kook. In fact, when the authentic history of Agudat Israel is written, the question of the culpability of the World Agudat Israel in this entire affair will have to be dealt with, for despite all of its private outrage with what was taking place under the auspices of its branch in Eretz Yisrael, the extremists and their enablers were never distanced from the organization. It seems that it is always much easier to criticize those to your left than to your right.

Thus, had a typical anti-Israel group staged an event in which kids were taught to throw eggs at a car said to be carrying the prime minister of Israel, you can be sure that Agudat Israel would have been at the forefront of attacking this event. So how come when this exact thing happens in the Satmar community there is only silence from the Agudah?

Agudat Israel readily attacks the BDS groups and others who try to delegitimize the State of Israel. Yet how come Satmar can have a rally attacking the State of Israel in a way that gives cover to BDS and all the rest who want to destroy Israel, and we don’t hear a word from the Agudah? If you listen to the propaganda of Satmar, it also gives cover to the anti-Semites, as it uses anti-Semitic imagery in speaking about the all-powerful Zionists who control the media and who through their devious means are able to pull the wool over the world’s eyes.[19] If such imagery is rightfully condemned as anti-Semitic when “outsiders” use it, how is it that Satmar gets a pass when it uses anti-Semitic imagery?

Returning to R. Mazuz’s comments about the haredi soldiers, he says simply: “These soldiers who come to pray are not sinners but are tzadikim! How can we call them sinners? They defend Israel with their bodies!”

3. I am happy to see that a number of new books and articles refer to posts that have appeared on the Seforim Blog. The most recent example of this is that I have know of is Chaim Dalfin’s just-published book, Rav and Rebbe, which deals with the relationship between R. Joseph B. Soloveitchik and the Lubavitcher Rebbe.4. God willing, I will once again be leading Torah in Motion trips to Europe in Summer 2017. You can see the details here.

 

[1] I say this even though R. Yitzhak Barda, Kinyan Torah (Ashkelon, 2014), vol. 3, p. 87, states that R. Kafih is correct. R. Barda’s volume is itself of interest, as he argues that when it comes to Jewish law, Maimonides’ opinion is absolutely binding, even if the Shulhan Arukh disagrees.
[2] Based on conversations and emails, I think that my posts on ArtScroll’s censorship of Rashbam have had a wider impact than any other posts. In fact, not long ago someone in my town who knew that I wrote a book on censorship shared with me that she had heard that ArtScroll censored Rashbam. This person does not read the Seforim Blog, and indeed had never heard of it. She thus had no idea that her knowledge of ArtScroll censoring Rashbam had its ultimate origin in my posts, which I think shows the great reach of this blog.
[3] This idea was earlier suggested by Aharon Marcus. See the note in his edition of She’elot u-Teshuvot min ha-Shamayim (Tel Aviv, 1979), p. 34. R. Yoel Bin Nun was unaware of R. Novetsky’s discovery and because of this offers a mistaken interpretation of Rashbam. See his recently published Zakhor ve-Shamor (Alon Shvut, 2015), pp. 229ff. (called to my attention by Zachary Grodzinski).
In my post here on Artscroll’s censorship of Rashbam, I cite a number of authorities who claim that before the giving of the Torah night came after day. Subsequently, I found that the Malbim says the same thing and cites an interesting proof for this position. See his commentary to Exodus, chapter 12 note 50:
גם הלילה שאחריו שייך ליום ארבעה עשר, כי קודם מ”ת היה הלילה הולך אחר היום, כמ”ש בארבעה עשר יום לחדש בערב תאכלו מצות.
See also R. Meir Mazuz, Bayit Ne’eman, no. 17 (19 Sivan 5776), p. 3 n. 17; R. Moshe Zuriel, Otzrot Rabbi Shmuel ben Meir (Bnei Brak, 2016), pp. 35ff.
[4] In Israel, the mainstream haredi rabbinic opinion is that one can build illegally and ignore the various zoning laws which are not thought to reflect haredi values. (The mainstream hardali rabbinic opinion is that one can build illegally in Judea and Samaria.) One exception to this generalization is R. Asher Weiss who insists that “the world is not lawless” and even haredim must follow zoning laws. See the discussion of his view, and the opposing views of R. Israel Grossman and R. Shmuel Wosner, in Ron S. Kleinman, “The Halakhic Validity of Israel’s Judicial System among Israeli Ultra-Orthodox Halakhic Decisors,” Review of Rabbinic Judaism 18 (2015), p. 227-259. On pp. 250-251, Kleinman reports on a meeting that R. Weiss had with a group of Israeli lawyers. R. Weiss’s important remarks were later published and Kleinman summarizes as follows:
Rabbi Weiss maintains in the meeting that “it is a great challenge, a great and holy undertaking” for Orthodox Jews to engage in all professions, including the practice of law, despite the fact that practicing as a lawyer raises halakhic questions. In his words, “we need lawyers who are punctilious in their observance of the commandments . . . [as well as] judges who are punctilious in their observance of the commandments and who attempt as far as possible to render judgments according to . . . Jewish law.” These judges are important for ensuring that Israel’s judicial system “is not totally alienated from the spirit of the Torah.” He states that “a[n] [Orthodox] judge [in a civil court of law] provides a vital service to the nation” because there are many matter in which the rabbinical courts are not equipped to rule. Furthermore in his opinion, the prohibition against resorting to Gentile courts applies only to litigants and not to judges or lawyers.
As Kleinman notes, one of the points R. Weiss relied on for this last statement (which I have underlined) is  the fact that the Hazon Ish was friends with Yitzhak Kister who was a judge. (Kister would later be appointed to the Israeli Supreme Court, and is the only such justice who identified with the haredi community.) Yet as far as I know, the sentence that I have underlined is unprecedented among rabbinic decisors, even among the Religious Zionist poskim.
A Hebrew version of Kleinman’s article appears in Tehumin 36 (2016), pp. 346-358. The articles are not identical so anyone interested in the topic is advised to consult both the English and Hebrew versions.
[5] David Matityahu Lippmann, Le-Toledot ha-Yehudim be-Kovna u-Slobodka (Keidan, 1930), pp. 226-227. A different version of the story, with the same conclusion, is told by Hayyim Karlinsky, “Ha-Gaon Rabbi Aryeh Leib Shapiro,” Moriah 76 (Sivan 5744), pp. 95-96. The earliest version of the story, and perhaps the original source, is found in Asher Margulies, “Sheloshah Matmonot Hitmin Yosef,” Ha-Melitz, 25 Tevet 5687, col. 76 (called to my attention by R. Yaakov Yitzhak Miller).
[6] While it could not have been easy for R. Yosef Soloveichik to revisit the painful history he discusses, the documents he reproduces are important for the history of American Orthodoxy. The book I have referred to is not the same thing as the 2016 book on R. Ahron Soloveichk, Yeled Sha’ashuim
[7] Yehaveh Da’at, vol. 4, no. 1 (pp. 7-8). Regarding removing the kippah (but still leaving one’s head covered) before entering the bathroom, the following appears in R. Simhah Rabinowitz, Piskei Teshuvot, Orah Hayyim 21 n. 58.
וכן מובא בשם מוהר”א מבעלזא זי”ע שהיה פושט מעליו המלבוש עליון והכובע והגארטל לפני הכנסו לביהכ”ס, ואא”ז זצ”ל היה מקפיד גם על הכיפה והיה מניח במקומו איזה מטלית על ראשו.
Has anyone else heard of such a practice?
[8] Why isn’t this called טלית קטנה? R. Meir Mazuz explains that in the period of the rishonim, when the expression טלית קטן first began, they were not concerned with the grammatical point that a word ending with ת is feminine. See Bayit Ne’eman 29 (14 Elul 5776), p. 4.
[9] See R. Yitzhak Ratsaby, Olat Yitzhak, vol. 2, no. 11 (p. 28).
[10] See R. Yehiel Goldhaber, Minhagei ha-Kehilot, vol. 1, pp. 93ff.
[11] Here is one source that shows that in 12th century Ashkenaz tzitzit were not generally worn: R. Eliezer ben Nathan of Mainz, Sefer Ra’avan, ed. Deblitzky, vol. 1, no. 40:
שאלני חתני רבי אורי. מצוה חמורה כמו ציצית שהיא שקולה כנגד כל המצות, מאי שנא דמקילין בה רוב ישראל שאין מתעטפין בכל יום. והשבתי לו לפי שאין ציצית חובת גברא. מי כת’ לבוש ציצית, ציצית חובת טלית הוא דכת’ ועשו להם ציצית על כנפי בגדיהם, אם יש לך טלית של ד’ כנפים עשה לו ציצית ואם אין לך טלית אינו חייב בציצית. דומיא דמזוזה ומעקה דאם יש לו בית חייב במזוזה ומעקה ואם אין לו בית אינו חייב.
[12] Bayit Ne’eman 18 (26 Sivan 5776), p. 1.
[13] Bah, Orah Hayyim 17.
[14] Orah Hayyim 17:    קטן היודע להתעטף אביו צריך ליקח לו ציצית לחנכו
[15] See Tosafot, Bava Batra 55b s.v. Rabbi Eliezer, and the discussion in R. Zev Wolf Zicherman, Otzar Pelaot ha-Torah, vol. 3, pp. 759ff. (R. Zicherman refers to the Shakh and R. Hirschowitz that I mention.) See also Beitzah 15a: רוב ליסטים ישראל נינהו. The note in the Soncino Talmud to this passage reads: “The Rabbis were broad-minded enough to realize that in a town containing an overwhelming Jewish population the majority of thieves would be Jewish.”
[16] Netzah Yisrael, ed. Hartman (Jerusalem, 1997), vol. 1, ch. 2, p. 20. For R. Jehiel Jacob Weinberg’s negative comments about the Jewish people, see my Between the Yeshiva World and Modern Orthodoxy, p. 183.
[17] Regarding Hirschowitz, see Hayyim Dov Genachovski, Shneur Zalman Hirschowitz (Jerusalem, 1951).
[18] In this video R. Yosef explains why he has spoken out against R. Mazuz and his followers. I have no doubt that there are also political factors involved. The various “religious” attacks on R. Mazuz, especially during the last Israeli election, remind me of the following memorable passage in Solomon Schechter, Studies in Judaism (Philadelphia, 1896), p. 3: “[U]nfortunately religious struggles are usually conducted on the most irreligious principles.”

[19] This anti-Semitic imagery is already present in R. Joel Teitelbaum, Al ha-Geulah ve-al ha-Temurah, chapters 46, 79.



Engaged Couples, צעירים, and More

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Engaged Couples, צעירים, and More
Marc B.Shapiro
Continued from here
1. Regarding engaged couples having physical contact, this is actually the subject of a section of the book Penei Yitzhak by R. Hezekiah Mordechai Bassan. Here is the title page.
This book was published in Mantua in 1744 by Menahem Navarra who was a descendant of R. Bassan. Navarra, who was at this time a doctor, not a rabbi, was nevertheless very learned in Torah matters. (He would later be appointed rabbi of Verona.[1]) Navarra included three essays of his own in the volume, the second of which is called Issur Kedushah. In this work he criticizes members of the Jewish community for allowing engaged couples to have physical contact before marriage. Here are the first two pages of the work.
Navarra and the others I have referred to are only dealing with an engaged couple touching before marriage, but not with actual sexual relations. Yet this too is mentioned many centuries before Navarra. Ezra 2:43 and Nehemiah 7:46 refer to בני טבעות. A commentary attributed to R. Saadiah Gaon[2] explains this as follows:

בני טבעות: שקלקלו אבותם גם [צ”ל עם] ארוסותיהם קודם שיכניסו אותם לחופה והיו סומכין על קדושי טבעות ומקלקלין עם ארוסותיהן.
What this means is that after kiddushin, which was effected by aטבעת  (ring), but before actual marriage (the two used to be separated, sometimes for many months), the engaged couple would have sexual relations. The children who resulted from this were referred to negatively as בני טבעות. As S. H. Kook points out,[3] R. Saadiah’s explanation is also mentioned by R. Hai Gaon.[4]
R. Hayyim Benveniste, in seventeeth century Turkey, also speaks about how engaged couples would have physical contact. This shows again that there was a divergence between what the halakhah requires and what the people were actually doing (much like you find in a large section of Modern Orthodox society today). Here are R. Benveniste’s words:[5]
להתייחד שניהם כמו שנוהגים פה תירייא ואיזמיר, שאחר השדוכין אחר עבור קצת ימים מתייחדין החתן והכלה ומכניסים אותה לחדר וסוגרין אותן הסגר מוחלט כמו שמסגרין הנשואה אחר ז’ ברכות, מנהג כזה רע ומר הוא, ואיכא איסורא מכמה פנים . . . ועוד שנכשלים באיסור נדה, וברוב הפעמים תצא כלה לחופתה וכריסה בין שיניה, וכמה מהם הודו ולא בושו שבאים עליה שלא כדרכה. אלא א-להים הוא יודע שטרחתי הרבה לבטל מנהג זה פה תיריא ועלה בידי, ועשיתי הסכמה בחרמות ונדויים על זה, ולסבת בעלי זרוע בעלי אגרופין אשר אין פחד א-להים לנגד עיניהם חזר המנהג לסורו רע.
There are a few different points that are of interest in what R. Benveniste writes. The first is that he says that in the majority of cases the bride arrives at the huppah וכריסה בין שיניה. This means that she is pregnant. Even if there is some exaggeration here, R. Benveniste is telling us that many Jewish women were getting pregnant before marriage. Readers might recall my post here where I mentioned R. Ovadiah Bertinoro’s assertion that most Jewish brides in Palermo were pregnant at the time of their wedding.
R. Benveniste mentions how he was able to improve matters by using the power of the herem to keep people in line, but that his success was short-lived as powerful members of the community were able to undermine his authority. This shows us, just as we saw in the text I quoted from R. Eleazar Kalir, that parents were often happy when their children had physical contact before marriage, and they opposed what they regarded as the overly puritanical approach of the rabbis. When R. Benveniste refers to those who באים עליה שלא כדרכה, this means that some of the couples had a sexual relationship, but wanted the woman to be a virgin at the wedding.
R. Jonah Landsofer (Bohemia, died 1712) also testified to the problem we have been discussing:[6]
בבית ישראל ראיתי שערוריה איכה נהיית’ כזאת שאין איש שם לבו להוכיח בשער בת רבים על התקלה וקלקלת שוטי’ שקלקלו והרגלו הרגל דבר עד שנעשה טבע קיים לבלתי הרגיש ברעה אשר ימצאם באחרית הימים והוא אשר נעשה בכל יום ערוך השלחן וצפה הצפית מיום שגומרין שידוכין בין בחור ובתולה מושבים אותם יחד ומוסרי’ הבתולה לזנות בית אביה בחיבוקים ונשוקים ומעשה חידודי’ וכל הקרואים והמסובי’ מחזיקי’ בידו.
Because the masses had no interest in what the rabbis had to say about this matter, R. Landsofer concludes that one need not even rebuke them, as they won’t listen anyway. Not long ago I heard a rabbi going on about the holy communities of Europe of a few hundred years ago, about their support of Torah, the respect they gave to the rabbis, and their commitment to halakhah. All of this is true, but if you look a little closer you find that these communities were actually very much like contemporary Modern Orthodox communities, in that together with a commitment to halakhah, many people also felt that they could determine which halakhot could be ignored. Or perhaps they didn’t even think they were violating halakhah. Maybe they assumed that the rabbis were making their lives difficult with extreme humrot. Either way you look at it, it is very obvious that there were many in traditional Jewish societies who created their own standards of practice which did not always correspond to what the rabbis insisted on, and they had no interest in changing their ways because of what the rabbis were saying.[7]
While the standard rabbinic view has always been that bride and groom are not to have any physical contact until after the wedding ceremony, the rabbis in Germany were a little more lenient. Sefer Maharil records that the practice was for the bride and groom to touch before marriage, but only on the morning of the wedding, a time that also included celebration.[8]
בעלות השחר ביום הששי היה קורא השמש לבא לבה”כ . . . ומביאים הכלה וחברותיה. וכאשר תבא עד פתח חצר בה”כ הלך הרב והחשובים והיו מוליכין את החתן לקראת הכלה. והחתן תופש אותה בידו ובחיבורן יחד זורקין כל העם על גבי ראשן חטין ואומרים פרו ורבו ג”פ. והולכין יחד עד אצל פתח בה”כ ויושבין שם מעט ומוליכין הכלה לביתה.
This detail, that the groom held the bride’s hand prior to the wedding, is found in a number of other German sources.[9] I don’t know how this practice of holding the bride’s hand before the wedding ceremony can be reconciled with what appears in Tractate Kallah, ch. 1:
כלה בלא ברכה אסורה לבעלה כנדה.
The word כלה here means a woman who is betrothed but not yet married.
R. Hayyim Joseph David Azulai, Kisei Rahamim, Kallah, ch. 1, comments on this passage:
כלה בלא ברכה אסורה כלומר אפי’ לחבק או ליגע בה כנדה.
I also find it noteworthy, and strange from our perspective, that Sefer Maharil tells us that for the wedding ceremony the rabbi would bring the bride to the groom, holding her by her robe:[10]
והרב היה תופס אותה בבגדיה והוליכה והעמידה לימין החתן.
R. Israel David Margulies (19th century) cites this text from Sefer Maharil and correctly notes that in medieval times the brides were much younger than in his day. He assumes that the typical bride was under 12 and a half years old, and therefore there was no problem of impure thoughts with such brides.[11]
ואיזה הירהור יהי’ בכלה קטנה או נערה כזאת, ולכן לקח אותה הרב בעצמו אצל מפתן הבית מן יד הנשים, והביאה אל החתן ושארי הנשים נשארו ולא היה להם שום עסק בבהכ”נ ולא היה חשש הרהור במקום קדשו.
2. Recently I heard a shiur where the rabbi said that if there is a Torah or rabbinic commandment to do something, only the talmudic sages can, as an emergency measure, forbid the action. The classic example is the Sages telling us not to blow the shofar if Rosh ha-Shanah falls out on Shabbat. There is nothing controversial in what the rabbi said, and I think most would agree, even if there some exceptions to this general rule. The rabbi further noted that post-talmudic authorities cannot make gezerot as this power is also reserved for the talmudic sages. This viewpoint is shared by many, yet there are important authorities who disagree, and perhaps more significantly there is evidence of post-talmudic gezerot.
I mention this now, after Passover [this post was written a few weeks ago], since those who reviewed the laws of Pesach would have seen Shulhan Arukh 453:5 which states:
האידנא אסור ללתות בין חטים בין שעורים.
“Nowadays, it is forbidden to moisten either wheat or barley [for grinding].”
If you look at the Mishnah Berurah he explains that while the Sages forbid moistening barley because it will easily leaven, according to the Talmud it is permitted to moisten wheat. In fact, according to the Talmud, Pesahim 40a, Rava held that it is an obligation to wash the grains of wheat: מצוה ללתות.
The Mishnah Berurah explains that it is the geonim who forbid moistening wheat since we are not expert at doing it properly, and it might come to be leavened, or we might delay removing the wheat after the moistening (before grinding) and this might lead to leavening. If the geonim forbid something that the Talmud permitted (or even required), isn’t this to be regarded as a gezerah?
3. Let me now mention something relating to Sukkot, which I had hoped to post closer to the holiday, but as the rabbinic saying goes, מה שהלב חושק הזמן עושק.
Shulhan Arukh, Orah Hayyim 649:4 states:
גנות הצעירים של עובדי כוכבים וכיוצא בהם מבתי שמשיהם מותר ליטול משם לולב או שאר מינים למצוה.
[Regarding what has grown in] the gardens of the צעירים of idolators and similar [gardens] of the houses [or: buildings] of their attendants, one is permitted to take from there a lulav or the other minim for the mitzvah.
Who are the צעירים of the idolators? The Taz states that he does not know:
איני יודע פירושו, אבל הוא ענין ממשרתי עבודת אלילים.
It is not just the Taz who doesn’t know, as none of the traditional commentaries have a clue. The Feldheim English translation of the Shulhan Arukh with Mishnah Berurah (which I make use of when I provide translations) doesn’t translate the word הצעירים, and instead simply transliterates it.[12]
In fact, I  am sure that R. Joseph Karo, living in the Muslim world, did not know what the צעירים are either. You might find this a strange assertion. After all, if R. Karo recorded the halakhah, how could he not know what he was writing? However, in this case R. Karo was just recording what appears in R. Aaron Hakohen of Lunel’s Orhot Hayyim (Florence, 1750), Hilkhot Lulav, no. 8, in the name of the Ritva:
כתב הר’ יום טוב אשבילי ז”ל בשם רבו ז”ל הוי יודע שגנות הצעירים והדורסים וכיוצא בהם מבתי הכומרים אינם משמשי ע”ז ולא נויי ע”ז ופירותיהם וכל אשר בהן מותרין בהנאה ומותר ליטול משם לולב או שאר מינין למצוה עכ”ל.
From a halakhic standpoint the importance of the halakhah is that it tells us that one can take a lulav and other other minim from the garden of an idolator, and it is not important exactly what type of idolator the צעירים are.
As mentioned, the halakhah in the Shulhan Arukh is taken from the Orhot Hayyim. It is first quoted in the Beit Yosef, Orah Hayyim 649, where it cited more exactly from the Orhot Hayyim than what appears in the Shulhan Arukh:
כתוב בארחות חיים ]הל’ לולב סי’ ח[ נגות הצעירים והדורסים וכיוצא בהם מבתי הכומרים מותר ליטול משם לולב או שאר מינים למצוה.
In the Beit Yosef (and also in Orhot Hayyim) it says הצעירים והדורסים. Furthermore, instead of מבתי שמשיהם that appears in the Shulhan Arukh, we have מבתי הכומרים, which means the houses (or buildings) of the priests. I have no doubt that the the word שמשיהם is a censor’s replacement of the original הכומרים. In the first printing of the Beit Yosef, Venice 1550, the sentence quoted above appears in its entirety. Yet when the Beit Yosef was next printed, Venice 1564, the entire sentence was deleted, obviously a requirement of the censor. The Shulhan Arukh was first printed in Venice, also in 1564. It thus makes sense that the deletion of the word הכומרים is due to censorship, and it could be that it was this alteration that prevented the entire halakhah from being deleted.
Before we get to הצעירים, what is the meaning of הדורסים that appears in Orhot Hayyim and is copied in the Beit Yosef? If you look at the Ritva that the Orhot Hayyim is citing, he states:[13]
והוי יודע שגנות השעירים והדוכסים וכיוצא בהם מבתי הכומרים, אינם משמשי ע”ז ולא נויי ע”ז, ופירותיהם וכל אשר בהם מותרים בהנאה, ומותר ליטול משם לולב או שאר מינין למצוה וכן קבלנו מרבותינו ז”ל הלכה למעשה.
The first thing to notice is that instead of הצעירים we have the word השעירים. This is a clear mistake, and the editor notes that the word הצעירים appears when the passage is cited in Orhot Hayyim. Unfortunately, the editor doesn’t note that are also least two other places where in speaking about benefit from avodah zarah the Ritva refers to גנת הצעירים.[14]The text from Ritva quoted above also has, instead of הדורסים which appears in Orhot Hayyim, another strange word, הדוכסים. This means “dukes” (or noblemen, princes, rulers, etc.) and makes no sense here since the context is avodah zarah which has nothing to do with a duke’s garden.

So we now have to explain not just what צעירים means but also דורסים or דוכסים. R. Hayyim Joseph David Azulai[15] suggests that צעירים is derived from Zechariah 13:7: והשבתי ידי על הצוערים, “And I will turn my hand upon the little ones.” It is hard to see how telling us that צוערים is related to צעירים helps us to understand the point of the Shulhan Arukh. R. Azulai also refers the reader to Rashi’s commentary on Zech. 13:7:
על הצוערים: על השלטונים הצעירים מן המלכים.
Perhaps I am missing something, but I don’t see what this passage adds other than showing us thatצוערים  and צעירים mean the same thing. Why does R. Azulai have to tell us this? The wordצעיר  is found elsewhere in the Bible, so we already know what it means.
R. Azulai’s short note also refers the reader to Abarbanel’s comment to Zech. 13:7. It is Abarbanel who will help us to understand what is going on with the word צעירים. (As R. Azulai was commenting on the Shulhan Arukh, he did not attempt to explain דורסים/דוכסים which is only found in the Beit Yosef. We shall return to this word soon.)
Abarbanel writes:
והשיבותי ידי על הצוערים שראוי שיפורש כפי זה הדרך על כומרי אדום הדורשים להם אמונתם וכזביהם והם עצמם נקראים אצלם צעירים להורות על ענוותנותם ושפלותם כי בעבור שאלה חטאו והחטיאו את אחרים בלמודם ודרושותיהם [!] אמר השם שישיב ידו ומכותם עליהם.
While this passage has nothing to do with the Shulhan Arukh, R. Azulai saw the relevance of it as Abarbanel makes the connection between צוערים and צעירים as we saw already with Rashi. Abarbanel also specifically connects this to Catholic priests, telling us that these priests would call themselves צעירים as a sign of modesty.
From this we can understand that when the Shulhan Arukh refers to gardens of the צעירים he means gardens belonging to Catholic priests. But who in particular are the צעירים? To answer this question let’s return to the Beit Yosef which referred to both צעירים and דורסים/דוכסים. As already noted, this entire passage is taken from the Orhot Hayyim.
In 1902 R. Moses Schlesinger published the second volume of the Orhot Hayyim. In the introduction he included a helpful list of all the times that the Beit Yosef cites the Orhot Hayyim. When he comes to our example, p. xv, he has a note in which he cites the great Abraham Berliner[16] that the proper reading is גנות הצעירים והדורשים. In other words, instead of דורסים/דוכסים, which appears in the Ritva and the Orhot Hayyim, it should say דורשים. When he wrote the Beit Yosef, R. Joseph Karo probably just copied the word דורסים that was in his copy of the Orhot Hayyim without knowing exactly what it meant (as its exact meaning, while of interest to historians and Seforim Blog readers, is not relevant to the underlying halakhah).[17]
So what does הצעירים והדורשים mean? Berliner explains this as well (and it was actually earlier explained by Leopold Zunz[18]). The two most important medieval Catholic orders were the Franciscans and the Dominicans. The actual name of the Franciscans is the “Order of Friars Minor.” They were often called “Little Brothers” or “Minorites.” Thus, when the Ritva and Orhot Hayyim refer to the צעירים this is just the Hebrew translation of “Minorites”, i.e., the Franciscans. As Abarbanel correctly pointed out, this term was adopted as a sign of humility.[19]As for the דורשים, the meaning of this is obvious (after Berliner and Zunz have enlightened us). The actual name of the Dominicans is the “Order of Preachers,” so דורשים (preachers)=Dominicans. What the Ritva and Orhot Hayyim are telling us is that when it comes to the mitzvah of lulav, one can use that which grows in the gardens of the Franciscans and the Dominicans (and the same halakhah would apply to other Catholic orders. The monasteries would often have gardens and Jews would be able to purchase things from there.)

In Nahmanides’ Disputation[20] he too refers to theצעירים  and the דורשים.
והיו שם ההגמון וכל הגלחים וחכמי הצעירים והדורשים.
In his note, R. Hayyim Dov Chavel identifies the צעירים as the Franciscans. However, he doesn’t know that the דורשים are the Dominicans, and he therefore explains that the word means הנואמים. In his English translation, Chavel writes, “Among them were the bishop [of Barcelona] and all the priests, Franciscan scholars, and preachers.”[21]
It is noteworthy that the fifteenth-century R. Solomon ben Simeon Duran, who lived in North Africa, was apparently also unaware of the meaning of צעירים, and therefore applied it to all young Catholic religious figures, not merely Franciscans. )At least, that is what I think he means, as opposed to understanding his use ofצעיריהם  to refer to young men as a whole.) After contrasting the sexual purity of the Jews with what occurs in surrounding society, he writes, in very strong words:[22]
וצעיריהם הם כולם מטונפים בעריות מנאפים עם נשי רעיהם ובאים על הזכור והטוב שבהם מוציא שכבת זרע לבטלה בידו וזה מפורסם אצלם.
4. Since in a prior post I discussed Jacob’s love of Rachel and Leah, let me share a strange interpretation I recently found, involving love and Jacob’s brother, Esau. The general understanding is that Esau loved Isaac. Indeed, it is very difficult to read the Torah and conclude differently. Therefore, I was quite surprised to find that the medieval R. Abraham Bedersi is of the opinion that, after Isaac gave Jacob the blessing intended for Esau, not only did Esau not love Isaac, but he was ready to cause his death! This would be accomplished by killing Jacob, since Isaac’s great sorrow would bring on his end. To arrive at this interpretation, Bedersi offers a novel understanding of Gen. 27:41: יקרבו ימי אבל אבי ואהרגה את יעקב אחי. The standard understanding of these words is that when the days of mourning for his father arrive, then Esau will kill Jacob. As he didn’t want to cause his father pain, he decided to wait until he was dead to kill Jacob. However, Bedersi understands ואהרגה to mean, “when I will kill Jacob” this will cause my father to die.
Here are his words from his Hotem Tokhnit:[23]
ועשו הרשע ידוע שלא היה אוהב יצחק אביו כמו שתראה שאמר יקרבו ימי אבל אבי ואהרגה את יעקב אחי וביאור נכון בו אהרגה את יעקב אחי ובאמת יקרבו ימי אבל אבי שהוא יצטער על בנו וימות.
As mentioned, this is a strange interpretation so I Iooked around to see if I could find a similar approach. I didn’t see anything in Torah Shelemah. I looked in the ArtScroll extended commentary to Genesis (not the Stone Chumash) and it does not bring any interpretations that suggest that Esau intended to cause Isaac’s death. However, the commentary states as follows:
Ralbag interprets similarly:[24] Even if it accelerates my father’s death [lit. brings near the days of mourning for my father] I nevertheless will kill my brother Jacob (cited by Tur).
I don’t know where they got this from, as Ralbag does not say what is attributed to him. All Ralbag says is that Esau wished to kill Jacob after Isaac’s death. The Tur, who was a contemporary of Ralbag, does not cite him.
R. Abraham Bedersi’s Hotem Tokhnit focuses on Hebrew synonyms and in an era before concordances and computers would have required an enormous amount of work. It found on hebrewbooks.org, but it is not on Otzar ha-Hokhmah.

Among the many interesting things you will find in Hotem Tokhnit is that he says that unlike the word יהודי, the word עברי is only used in the Bible in the context of slavery, and he provides examples of this (p. 152). With this in mind, I can see why some people would prefer the term Mishpat Yehudi instead of Mishpat Ivri.

On p. 202  he quotes an otherwise unknown comment of Ibn Ezra that the meaning of the word סלה is “truth”.
כי ענין סלה אמת ונכונה ועל זה אמר אשרי יושבי ביתך עוד יהללוך סלה (תהלים פ”ד ה’) באמת וביושר.
Beginning on p. 1 in the second section, there is a long letter from Samuel David Luzzatto. He refers to an unnamed scholar who could not accept that Rabad, in his comment to Hilkhot Teshuvah 3:7, would say that people greater than Maimonides thought that God had a physical form. He therefore suggested changing גדולים וטובים ממנו to גדולים וטובים מעמֵנו (tzeirei under the mem).
Luzzatto completely rejects this point, arguing that גדולים וטובים מעמנו means people greater than our nation, i.e., non-Jews. Furthermore, he adds, where do we find Rabad, Rashi, etc. using the word עמנו to refer to the Jewish people.
On p. 2 Luzzatto records the following lines from one of Bedersi’s poems, in which one word summarizes each of Maimonides’ Thirteen Principles:
נמצא כיִחודו והֶבדלו                    קדמות עבודתו נבואתו
משה ותורתו אֲנצחַ                       ידע גמול גואל בהחיותו
Luzzatto also publishes a long poem from Bedersi together with Luzzatto’s commentary, without which it would be very difficult to understand much of what Bedersi was saying. One of my favorite lines is found on p. 13:
ולא תבין שפת כל-עם בשירים        לבד טרחם, כפז על גב בעירי
What this means is that poems are difficult for the masses, of every nation and language, to understand. They regard them as a burden, much like an animal, if you place gold on its back, won’t appreciate what it is carrying. It will only feel the burden of the weight.
5. Since I mentioned Mendelssohn in the last post, let me note the following. I recently saw that Eliezer Segal, in his wonderful book, Introducing Judaism (London and New York, 2009), p. 110, uses a picture of Mendelssohn. You can see it here. (Copyright prevents me from posting the picture.) We are told that the image is from the 18th century, yet there is no doubt that this is not a picture of Mendelssohn. You can look at authentic pictures of Mendelssohn here and they look nothing like this image. Incidentally, in a student’s description of Mendelssohn’s 1777 meeting with Kant, he is described as  having a goatee.[25]
6. In a comment to my last post, Maimon wrote: “On the subject of R. Bachrach’s responsum – it bears noting that the pre-reform homogeneous [should be: heterogeneous] Jewish society (especially in Germany) contained people of varying levels of observance from across the spectrum and as such many behavioral patterns that would be unthinkable in contemporary Orthodox society are detailed in the Halakhic writings from that era.” Maimon is correct, and it is not only in recent centuries or in Germany that one finds communities with people of different levels of religious observance. This is how Jewish societies have always been, in every era and place, at least until the second half of the twentieth century and the creation of haredi societies. I have already cited numerous examples that justify this statement, but let offer one more that shows how even in medieval times young men and women would socialize in a way that Maimon might say “would be unthinkable in contemporary Orthodox society.” I would only add that instead of “contemporary Orthodox society,” I prefer to say “contemporary haredi society,” since as mentioned already, Modern Orthodox society still has significant variations in level of observance. (When I speak of variations in level of observance, I have in mind bein adam la-Makom halakhot. I am not referring to halakhot having to do with monetary issues and dina de-malchuta dina, regarding which I believe the Modern Orthodox community is superior to what we find in the haredi world.)
R. Meir of Rothenburg was asked about young Jewish men and women who were drinking together. As a joke, one of the young women asked one of the men if he would betroth her. He took a ring and threw it to her, and recited the text of kiddushin. (At a future time I can discuss the halakhic arguments that R. Meir used to free the woman from having to receive a get.) One cannot overlook the fact that the way the young men and women were socializing together, much like you would find among kids at Modern Orthodox high schools, shows that there was no strict separation between the sexes. Here is the question, as it appears in Irving Agus, ed., Teshuvot Ba’alei ha-Tosafot, no. 85.

R. Meir of Rothenburg’s answer is found in She’elot u-Teshuvot Maharam mi-Rothenburg, Prague ed., no. 993.7. Two people have asked me to comment on Rabbis Yitzchok Adlerstein’s and Michael Broyde’s article here arguing that hasidic schools shouldn’t be forced to offer secular education. While the Seforim Blog is not the place for commenting on these sorts of matters, after reading the article I felt I had to make one point. Adlerstein and Broyde cite the famous Supreme Court case which allowed the Amish to opt out of secular education and they apply this logic to the hasidic communities. While it is true that if it went to court the hasidic communities would probably prevail, there is a big difference between the Amish and the hasidic communities. The Amish do not take welfare, food stamps, and other forms of government assistance. Thus, they make choices and live with the consequences. However, the hasidic communities refuse to provide their children with the basic skills needed to function in the modern economy, and as a result rely heavily on the welfare state. No one who believes in limited government and is opposed to the welfare state can support a situation where kids are allowed to grow up almost guaranteed to be in need of public assistance.[26]

 

[1] Regarding Navarra, see Cecil Roth, “Rabbi Menahem Navarra: His Life and Times. 1717-1777,” Jewish Quarterly Review 15 (1925), pp. 427-466.
[2] Perush al Ezra ve-Nehemiah (Oxford, 1882), p. 30.
[3] Iyunim u-Mehkarim (Jerusalem, 1959), vol. 1, p. 259.
[4] Ginzei Kedem 4 (1930), p. 52. While there is no historical evidence for this explanation, it does show that the practice of using a ring for kiddushin existed already in the geonic period. For other sources from this era, see Mordechai Margaliot, ed., Ha-Hilukim bein Anshei Mizrah u-Venei Eretz Yisrael (Jerusalem, 1938), no. 25. For a very detailed discussion of use of a ring for kiddushin, see Pardes Eliezer: Erusin ve-Nisuin (Brooklyn, 2010), vol. 4, ch. 30.
Only in Yemen did the practice of using a ring not become widely accepted (though even there it was used in some places). See R. Yitzhak Ratsaby, Shulhan Arukh ha-Mekutzar, vol. 7, pp. 27-28. There is no mention of using a ring for kiddushin in the Talmud. It does, however, appear in Tikunei Zohar, nos. 5, 10 (as pointed out by R. Moses Isserles, Shulhan Arukh Even ha-Ezer 27:1), but Tikunei Zohar does not date from the tannaitic or amoraic period. The Sefer ha-Hinukh, no. 539, says that the reason we use a ring for kiddushin is so that every time the woman looks at her hand she remembers the following things (which apply to all means of kiddushin, but wearing a ring allows her to remember them).
שהיא קנויה לאותו האיש ולא תזנה תחתיו ולא תמרוד בו ותתן לו יקר והוד לעולם כעבד לאדוניו.
Regarding what I have underlined, even if today some men like being treated like that, going into a contemporary marriage expecting to get this sort of treatment is a recipe for marital disaster.
The ring for kiddushin has nothing to do with the engagement ring. I always wondered why the practice of giving a diamond engagement ring was not condemned as hukkot ha-goyim, especially by those who have an expansive understanding of this halakhah. Even if it is not halakhically forbidden, it is clearly a practice that came from non-Jewish society. How is it that people who refuse to have anything to do with things like Mother’s Day or Thanksgiving have no problem giving a diamond ring as an engagement present? R. Chaim Rapoport pointed out to me that R. Zvi Hersh Ferber of London (d. 1966) condemned the giving of engagement rings as hukkot ha-goyim. See Kerem Tzvi: Bereishit, vol. 1, p. 132.
As for wedding rings for men, R. Meir Mazuz states that there is absolutely no problem with a man wearing a ring. See Asaf ha-Mazkir, p. 194, Bayit Ne’eman, pp. 441ff. He calls attention to Shabbat 62a, וחילופיהן באיש, from which we see that this was not regarded as a problem. He also quotes Kaf ha-Hayyim 161:31 who writes (summarizing an earlier source):
דת”ח שתורתם אומנתם וכן בעלי בתים שעוסקים במו”מ ואין להם מלאכה גרועה א”צ להסיר הטבעות בשעת נט”י אע”ג דמהדקי טובא.
R. Mazuz states that on his wedding day his father, the great R. Matzliach Mazuz, gave him a ring to wear, and that in Tunisia this was the general practice, that a groom received a ring and wore it for the rest of his life. However, upon coming to Israel R. Mazuz saw that it is not accepted for talmidei hakhamim and “fearers of heaven” to wear a ring so he stopped wearing it. (This is his language in Asaf ha-Mazkir. In Bayit Ne’eman he writes that the haredim do not wear rings.) R. Mazuz adds that he does wear the ring on the night of Passover to commemorate the words of Genesis 15:14: “Afterward shall they come out with great substance.” (“Great substance” includes jewelry.)
R. Mazuz notes that in a picture of the Moroccan sage, R. Isaac Bengualid (1777-1870), author of the responsa work Va-Yomer Yitzhak, he is wearing a ring. Here is the picture.

He also mentions a picture of R. Elijah Hazan (1848-1908) of Alexandria, author of the responsa work Ta’alumot Lev, where he is wearing a ring. I have not been able to find this picture. See also here where S. has a picture of R. Bernard Illowy wearing a ring as well as a picture of R. Samson Wertheimer’s wedding ring.
R. Hayyim Amselem, here (from May 5, 2105), writes very strongly against those who oppose wedding rings on religious grounds, using the opportunity to once again blast the Ashkenazic haredim.
איפה ההגיון הבריא?
הבוקר בעתון ישראל היום ובערוץ 7 מפרסמים בהבלטה ובהתפעלות פסק הלכה “חדש” המתיר ואפילו ממליץ בעידן המודרני לגברים נשואין לענוד טבעת נישואין, בעולם הדתי והחרדי, שוללים זאת כי זה “מנהג גוים”, לדעתם וכו’ וכו’ .
מה שהם אינם יודעים שאין כאן כל חדש ובעדות הספרדים היה זה מנהג פשוט שרבים מאוד מהגברים ענדו על ידם טבעת נשואין, או טבעת בכלל ולא היה פוצה פה ומצפצף, ידועות כמה תמונות של גדולי תורה והלכה שבאצבעם טבעת כגון תמונתו של הגאון רבי יצחק בן וואליד רב ודיין בעיר תיטואן במרוקו, וכן עוד רבנים, שכך עשו מעשה, עיין בספר אסף המזכיר עמוד קצ”ד.
מה הבעיה? הבעיה היא שהרבנים האשכנזים ובעיקר החרדים, מה שהם חושבים בדעתם שזה אסור, ובמיוחד אם זה דומה להנהגה לא “חרדית” אז זה כבר אסור וחילול השם וכו’ והם לא מסוגלים להכיל בסובלנות דעה אחרת, מה גם שהם בטוחים לגמרי שהתורה היא רק שלהם ואין לאחרים זולתם כלום, וכמובן ההמון הפשוט שומע ונוהה אחריהם בעינים עוורות.
גם אם תוכיח להם שאפילו בתלמוד כך משמע [עיין מסכת שבת (דף ס”ב ע”א)] לא יעזור כלום, ואם תעיז גם להביע את דעתך, אוי ואבוי אתה חולק על גדולי ישראל? אתה נגד “ההשקופע” החרדית, דמך בראשך.
איי איי איי איפה היהדות השפויה והמתונה נעלמה?
[5] Keneset ha-Gedolah, Even ha-Ezer 66, Tur no. 1.
[6] Meil Tzedakah, no. 19.
[7] In the prior post I gave examples of takanot forbidding an engaged man to enter the house of his fiancée. For another example from 1594 in Italy, see R. Solomon ha-Levi, Divrei Shlomo (Venice, 1594), p. 299a. R. Hayyim Palache mentions that in nineteenth-century Izmir they also proclaimed such a takanah. See Hayyim ve-Shalom, vol. 2, no. 89, Masa Hayyim, ma’arekhet shin, no. 124 (p. 27a). R. Elijah ha-Levi (16th century) of Constantinople, Zekan Aharon, no. 117, discusses the matter as well. He states that in his community there is no “evil practice” of having the engaged couple spend time together at her home, which leads to all the problems that have been mentioned.However, he notes that this was an old practice in some places in the Ottoman Empire, and therefore in order to prevent serious sins the rabbis instituted that at the engagement the wedding blessings were recited and the woman would also go to the mikveh at this time.
Regarding the engaged couple before the wedding, it is also worth noting that among some hasidic groups from the Chernobyl line, there is a festive meal, called a חתן מאהל, the evening before the wedding. At this time, the future bride and groom dance together using a long handkerchief or gartel. At the wedding itself, the practice in a number of hasidic groups (and not only among the Hasidim) is that the bride and groom dance together actually holding hands. See Pardes Eliezer: Erusin ve-Nisuin, vol. 5, p. 538; Ohel Moshe 7 (Kislev 5750), p. 67. Here are two examples of this from Youtube.

Regarding dancing while holding hands, I found something quite interesting in R. Joseph Hahn (d. 1637), Yosif Ometz (Frankfurt, 1928), p. 344:
המספר מעות לאשה כדי להסתכל בה אף על פי שמלא תורה ומעשים לא ינקה מדינה של גיהנם וכל שכן הנוגע בידה ממש, ובמחול של מצוה המדקדקים כורכים סביבות ידיהם בגד שקורין וטשינלן, ואם יודע בעצמו בודאות שלא יבא לידי הרהור שרי.
R. Hahn tells us that during a Mitzvah dance, when there are men and women dancing together, those who are careful about halakhah would wear a type of glove. This means that even if they held hands with a woman they would not touch her skin. R. Hahn says that one who knows that he will not be driven to sexual thoughts is permitted to do this.
R. Ezekiel Feivel, Toldot Adam (Jerusalem, 1987), ch. 15 (p. 215), says that R. Shlomo Zalman of Vilna (the brother of R. Hayyim of Volozhin) used to dance with brides holding their hand. A handkerchief or something other covering ensured that he didn’t touch their skin::
אחז ביד החתן ודבר עמו דברי תורה אשר זורו במזור האמת והאמונה . . . אחר כן רקד עם הכלה אחוזי יד על ידי מטפחת בנועם לב ופנים מאירות ובסדר מתוקן ונעים מאד.
R. Abraham Hayyim Schorr, Torat Hayyim: Avodah Zarah 17a, was very opposed to this practice of holding the bride’s hand, even if separated by something like a handkerchief, which he says was done by some talmidei hakhamim. (He means actually holding hands with the handkerchief ensuring that skin does not touch. He is not referring to when the man and woman each hold a different end of the handkerchief. See R. Yosef Rapoport’s letter in Or Yisrael 24 [Tamuz 5761], p. 245.)
ונר’ דאסו’ ללכת במחול עם הכלה בשבעת ימי המשתה אפי’ אינו אוחז בידה ממש אלא בהפסק מטפחת כדרך שנוהגין מקצת ת”ח שבדור הזה אפ”ה לאו שפיר עבדי.
I will deal with the larger issue of mixed dancing, and the rabbinic responses, in a future post.Regarding R. Shlomo Zalman covering his hands, we are told that he never touched the pages of a sefer with his bare hands. He always turned the pages while wearing gloves or with a handkerchief. One time he didn’t have either with him, and he turned the pages with his lips. See Toldot Adam, p. 214.

We are also told that when he slept he wore gloves in order that his bare hands not touch his body. This way when he woke up he could start studying Torah immediately without washing his hands, so careful was he not to waste even a moment away from Torah study. See Toldot Adam, p. 218. This approach of R. Shlomo Zalman ignores the main reason offered for washing in the morning, namely, that it is to remove the ruah ra’ah. Therefore, R. Hayyim Eleazar Shapira could not believe that the story of R. Shlomo Zalman wearing gloves was true. See Nimukei Orah Hayyim, 4:1

 

על כן אין להאמין על אותו צדיק טעות ומעשה כזה

.
See also R. Ovadiah Yosef, Yabia Omer, vol. 4, Orah Hayyim no. 2:8-9; and R. Moshe Yehudah Leib Rabinovich’s letter at the beginning of R. Zev Zicherman, Otzar Pelaot ha-Torah, vol. 1 (Brooklyn, 2014)..

[8] Ed. Spitzer (Jerusalem, 1989), p. 464.
[9] See Yaakov Yisrael Stall’s note in R. Judah he-Hasid, Sefer ha-Gematriot (Jerusalem, 2005), p. 309 n. 71. (R. Judah he-Hasid states that the groom would lift up his future bride.)
[10] Sefer Maharil, p. 465.
[11] Har Tavor (Pressburg, 1861), p. 33b. Regarding the age of Jewish brides in medieval times, See Avraham Grossman, Hasidot u-Mordot (Jerusalem, 2001), ch. 2. He makes the following interesting point (Pious and Rebellious, trans. Jonathan Chipman [Waltham, 2004], pp. 47-48):
The phenomenon of beating wives may also have been exacerbated by marriage of girls at an early age. The fact that at times the wife was extremely young led the husband to relate to her as he would to his own daughter. This was particularly true in those places where young girls were married to husbands significantly older than themselves, which was, as we have seen, a common phenomenon in Jewish society, and particularly in Muslim countries. Moreover, it may well be that the beating of the wife, which was a part of the life of the young couple, also continued thereafter.
[12] R. Yihye Moses Abudi, Magen Ba’adi (Jerusalem, 1904), vol. 2, p. 30b, also doesn’t know what the word means. What he thinks is the obvious meaning is, as we will soon see, mistaken.
ול”נ פשוט כיון שהם קורין לה גנות הגדולים אנו מכנים להם שם לגנאי לקרות להם גנות הצעירים.
[13] Hiddushei ha-Ritva: Sukkah 29b, Mossad ha-Rav Kook ed., cols. 278-279.
[14] Hiddushei ha-Ritva: Avodah Zarah 51b, Mossad ha-Rav Kook ed., col. 259; Hiddushei ha-Ritva: Rosh ha-Shanah 28a, Mossad ha-Rav Kook ed., col. 264.
[15] Birkei Yosef, Orah Hayyim 649:3. R. Moses Sofer also refers to Zech. 13:7. See the Makhon Yerushalayim ed. of Shulhan Arukh, ad loc.
[16] Abraham Berliner was an outstanding representative of German Orthodoxy. He was a member of R. Azriel Hildesheimer’s separatist Orthodox community, and he taught for many years at the Rabbinical Seminary of Berlin. Nevertheless, the annual Yerushatenu, which is devoted to the study of all aspects of German rabbinic history, prayers, customs, etc., saw fit to publish a letter which attacks Berliner and places him in what the letter-writer regards as the “anti-Torah” camp. See Yerushatenu 3 (2009), p. 396. This was an unfortunate lapse in judgment by the editors of what is otherwise a fabulous publication. The editors intended to show their open-mindedness by publishing even the nonsense of an extremist, but the job of the editors is to ensure the high quality of their publication, and this means that they have to reject that which is unsuitable.
[17] Unfortunately, the Makhon Yerushalayim edition of the Beit Yosef simply points out that instead of דורסים the text should perhaps read דוכסים. In other words, the editors were unaware that דורשים is the correct reading. Hopefully, in the next printing they will correct this matter. If they do so, based on this post, it will be my second “contribution” to this magnificent edition. Here is the Makhon Yerushalayim Tur, Even ha-Ezer 173, p. 539.

In note 3 at the bottom of the page it refers to a קושיא גדולה printed in the journal Or Torah in 1992 (Heshvan 5753, no. 23). This was a question I asked R. Meir Mazuz and he replied that instead of ונשא בתו the text should apparently read ונשא בת אשתו .
[18] Zur Geschichte und Literatur (Berlin, 1845), p. 181.
[19] In his defense of R. Moses Hayyim Luzzatto and his circle, R. Jacob Hazak uses the phrase גנות הצעירים to make a nice melitzah. See Iggerot Ramhal u-Venei Doro, ed., Shriki (Jerusalem, 2008), p. 357:
ואל יחשבו אותנו כמורדים וכפושעים ח”ו, וכל מי שתורת אלקיו בקרבו, ואהבתו ית’ גברה בו, ילבש בגדי קנאה ולא ישמע גנ”ות הצעירים.
[20] Kitvei Rabbenu Moshe ben Nahman, ed. Chavel, vol. 1, p. 308.
[21] Ramban: Writings and Discourses (New York, 1978), vol. 2, p. 668.
[22] Milhemet Mitzvah (Leipzig, 1855), p. 14.
[23] (Amsterdam, 1865), p. 16.
[24] The word “similarly” makes no sense here, as the commentary does not previously cite an interpretation similar to the one given by “Ralbag.”
[25] See Paul Mendes-Flohr and Jehuda Reinharz, eds., The Jew in the Modern World (Oxford, 1995), p. 61.
[26] According to the last census, Kiryas Joel has a higher percentage of residents receiving food stamps than any other city or town in the entire country. See here. The taxpayer should never be required to subsidize communities when the poverty is self-imposed.


R. Yair Hayyim Bachrach as a Writer of Romance?, A Non-Jewish Song Made Holy, Love (and More) Before and After Marriage, and Memoirs that Maybe Tell Too Much

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R. Yair Hayyim Bachrach as a Writer of Romance?, A Non-Jewish Song Made Holy, Love (and More) Before and After Marriage, and Memoirs that Maybe Tell Too Much
Marc B. Shapiro
Continued from here
There is an interesting responsum of R Yair Hayyim Bacharach, Havot Yair, no. 60, that deals with a man and woman who were in love and get married despite the strong opposition of the woman’s father. The story is quite romantic. It describes how during an epidemic in Worms in 1636 the beautiful and intelligent only daughter of one of the rich leaders of the local Jewish community falls ill. There is a man who had fallen in love with her and wants to take care of her in her illness. We are told that this man is tall and handsome, yet he comes from “the other side of the tracks” (i.e., from the lower class). He is able to get the agreement of both the father and daughter that if he takes care of the woman, which would be at great personal risk to himself, and she recovers, that they will marry. The woman indeed recovers but the man himself becomes sick, and the roles are reversed. The woman now takes care of him, which is only fitting since he caught the illness taking care of her. She too has fallen in with him and fortunately he survives, meaning that they are now able to marry. However, the father wishes to go back on his side of the agreement, which obligated him to provide a dowry, and that is the halakhic matter that the responsum focuses on.

Elchanan Reiner has argued that the entire story is a fiction, and what R. Bacharach, one of the most important 17th century halakhic authorities, has done is create a love story in line with the romantic stories that were appearing at this time in general literature. The story can therefore be seen as similar to a parable that is created for use in a sermon.[1]
The story R. Bacharach records is about a woman, indeed an only daughter, from a rich and important family. On the other side you have a poor man with no financial future. These are two people who in traditional Jewish society (and general society as well) normally would never be allowed or even want to come together. Yet because of the unusual circumstances of the epidemic, the man who dreams of the woman he could normally never have, is able to arrange a way to spend time with her and cross the boundary that otherwise would have kept them apart.
In the end we are inspired to see how love conquers all. For the sake of love the woman defies her father and gives up all the wealth that would be hers if she would only listen to her father and reject what her heart is telling her. It is a case of love vs. money, position, and power, and love wins. R. Bacharach mentions that when the father refuses to allow the marriage, the daughter says to him שעל כל פנים תזדקק לו הן בהיתר הן באיסור. What this means is that she threatens her father that if he doesn’t allow her to marry the man she loves, that she will be with him, i.e., sleep with him, anyway. For his part, the father says that he will not give her a dowry, and in the end ולקחה המשרת חנם. In other words, they married, but without any money from her father. They did what virtually no one else in 17th century Jewish society did. They married for love, choosing their own partners, without concern for status or money. According to Reiner, what R. Bacharach has given us in abridged form is nothing less than a Jewish version of Romeo and Juliet or West Side Story.
The late R. Raphael Posen responded to Reiner’s article, rejecting completely the latter’s hypothesis.[2] He acknowledges that the case described in R. Bacharach’s responsum may be theoretical, and notes that there are many such theoretical cases in the responsa literature. As for the romantic elements in the responsum, he states that in responsa one can find much “juicier” stories than the one discussed by Reiner, and there are also cases of lovers’ entanglements from completely different eras. Posen refers in particular to two responsa that appear in the Tashbetz. These responsa predate R. Bacharach by a couple of centuries. They also were written in North Africa, a place that did not have the sort of romantic literature that according to Reiner was the model for R. Bacharach’s responsum.
Reiner has a short and somewhat biting response to Posen.[3] He states that Posen’s article shows the very mentality that created the need for R. Bacharach to “cover up”, as it were, the love story he inserted into his responsa.
לא ניתן היה להעלות על הדעת דוגמא טובה הימנו להציג לקורא את פניה התרבותיים של השכבה החברתית שמפניה היה על חיים יאיר [!] בכרך מוורמס להסתיר לכאורה את סיפורו: שכבה העשויה מתלמידי חכמים בינוניים ובעלי בתים למדנים למחצה, הקוראים את הטקסט באופן חד ממדי, מפרשים אותו פירוש אחד ויחיד, שאינו סוטה מערכי היסוד הבסיסיים ביותר של סביבתם.
Reiner also states that what upset Posen was that Reiner’s portrayal of R. Bacharach diverges from the standard portrayal of “gedolei Torah” in that Reiner assumes that R. Bacharach was aware of the world around him and responded with originality to its intellectual challenges. Reiner obviously did not know Posen, as he assumed that Posen was an unsophisticated haredi ideologue with no appreciation for complexity in great rabbinic figures. The truth is that Posen, who represented the best of the German Orthodox tradition, was the exact opposite of this, as anyone can see by examining his essays in Ha-Ma’yan and elsewhere. As for the substance of the dispute between Reiner and Posen, I would love to hear which side readers come down on.
Regarding love prior to marriage, which we also discussed in the last post, it is noteworthy that there is a non-Jewish song focused on this theme that was turned into a religious song. Here is a Yiddish version of the original song, recorded by R. Yekutiel Yehudah Greenwald. It would have originally been sung in German or Hungarian [4]
וואַלד, וואַלד, ווי גרויס ביסטו
ראָזא, ראָזא, ווי ווייט ביסטו
וואָלט דער וואַלד ניט גרויס געווען
וואָלט דאָך מיין ראָזא נענטער געווען
וואָלט מען מיך פון וואַלד אַרויסגענומען
וואָלטן מיר זיך ביידע צוזאַמענגעקומען
This translates as:
Forest, Forest, how large you are,
Rosa, Rosa, how distant you are,
If the forest was not so large,
My Rosa would be closer,
If I would be taken out of the forest,
We would both come together.
By changing only a few words, R. Isaac Taub, the Kaliver Rebbe (1744-1828) turned this love song into a religious song, the title of which is גלות, גלות.[5]
גלות, גלות, ווי גרויס ביסטו
שכינה, שכינה, ווי ווייט ביסטו
וואָלט דער גלות ניט גרויס געווען
וואָלט דאך די שכינה נענטער געווען
וואָלט מען מיך פון גלות ארויסגענומען
וואָלטן מיר זיך ביידע צוזאַמענגעקומען
All this is well known in the hasidic world. It is so well known that one can only wonder how R. Yaakov Moshe Hillel could attempt to deny what I have just mentioned. In his Va-Yashav ha-Yam,[6] R. Hillel states, “Heaven forbid” to believe that any love songs were ever turned into religious songs by great rabbis:
(וכן מה שמפיצים שמועות כאלו על גדולים אחרים שהיו שומעים מהגוים שירי עגבים ומעתיקים אותם אל הקדושה, להלחין עליהם גם שירות ותשבחות גם קדישים וקדושות) אנא דאמינא ולא מסתפינא דחלילה להאמין כזה על גדולי ישראל שכבר כתבנו לעיל דלדעת כל הפוסקים אסור לשמוע שירי עגבים, ובעצם השמיעה לבד יש איסור, ואיך יתכן שגדולי ישראל יתעסקו בדברים מכוערים כאלו, חלילה להעלות כן על הדעת.
I have often written about how people are sometimes so convinced of something that when they are confronted with an alternative perspective in the writings of authoritative sages or in a report by a trustworthy person, they argue that the text is a forgery or the report is fraudulent, because gadol X never could have said or done such a thing. The situation with R. Hillel is even beyond this. The fact that the Kaliver Rebbe took a love song and turned it into a religious song is something that is known by all pretty much all educated Hungarian Hasidim (and not only Hasidim). It is worth noting that he didn’t just take the tune and add religious words, which is the case with other songs taken from the non-Jews. He actually kept the words, just changing a few of them.[7] Yet R. Hillel refuses to believe any of this. R. Hillel is a Sephardic Jew from India who probably knows close to zero about the history of Hasidism. Yet somehow he feels that he can declare that all the people who know the truth about this matter are not only incorrect, but are also degrading the honor of the Kaliver Rebbe.
Regarding love between husband and wife, I found an interesting passage from R. Levi Yitzhak of Berditchev.[8] He asks, why does the Torah tell us that Isaac loved Rebekkah? He answers that there are two ways a man loves his wife. One is that he loves her because of his physical lusts, “and this means that she is not his wife at all, rather, he [really] loves himself.” The other way of loving ones wife is because she is the “vessel” by which he can fulfill God’s commandments,[9] just like a person loves other mitzvot. “This is what it means that Isaac loved her, because he didn’t think at all about his physical desires, but was only intent on fulfilling God’s commandments.”
ויש אדם שאוהב אשתו ואינו מחמת תאות גוף שימלא תאותו רק מחמת שהיא כלי לקיים על ידה מצות הבורא ית’ שמו כמו שאדם אוהב שאר מצות וזה נקרא אוהב את אשתו וזהו ויאהבה יצחק שלא חשב כלל מחמת תאות הגוף שלו רק כדי לקיים מצות הבורא ית’ שמו ויתעלה זכרו.
R. Daniel Eidensohn has called attention to a similar approach attributed to the Baal Shem Tov, that you should love your wife as you love your tefillin. That is because with each of them you have the opportunity to fulfill mitzvot. See here. I don’t think this sort of interpretation will find much appeal in modern times, as it completely ignores the most obvious, and most important, type of love from husband to wife, which one hopes is present in every marriage. In fact, it is not only in modern times that such an interpretation would not be appealing, as all of the pre-modern sources that speak about loving one’s wife are indeed referring to real love.
R. Levi Yitzhak’s stress on love of one’s wife since she gives one the ability to perform mitzvot (i.e., purely utilitarian) is also at odds with other hasidic sentiments. For example, there is a famous story about a hasidic rebbe who was ill. A Lithuanian rabbi came to visit him late one night. He knocked on the door and when the rebbe answered the door, the rabbi said, “I have come to fulfill the mitzvah of bikur cholim”. The rebbe replied, “It is very late now, and I am tired and not in the mood to be the cheftza for your mitzvah.” This story is told among hasidim as a way to knock the non-hasidim. The lesson is that the Lithuanian rabbi should have come to visit the rebbe because he had the basic human emotion of wanting to show empathy to another who was suffering. Instead, he showed that this was foreign to his way of thinking, and his primary goal was simply to fulfill the mitzvah. And for that, the rebbe was not interested in taking part.
Since we are talking about love, I can’t resist sharing the following story told about R. Jacob Lorberbaum of Lissa. Like all of these types of stories, we can’t say if it actually occurred, but the fact that it is told is itself significant even if in this case I find it hard to believe that the sentiments expressed would be widely shared by any group. The story is found in R. Israel Beckmeister’s Ahavat Yisrael (Tel Aviv, 1976), pp. 49-50.

According to the story, a student once came to R. Lorberbaum and told him that since his wife hadn’t given birth in ten years he wished to divorce her. R. Lorberbaum asked him what his wife says about this, and he replied that she doesn’t want to be divorced as she loves him greatly. He also added that he too loves his wife greatly. R. Lorberbaum told him that he shouldn’t love her so much, and he should return home and God would grant him a child.
The student could not understand what R. Lorberbaum was telling him, since how could he tell a husband not to love his wife so much. When he returned home his wife asked him what R. Lorberbaum said, and he replied sharply that it does not concern her. This led to an argument and he slapped his wife, causing her to faint and leading to a great rift between them. The wife’s parents intervened and they were able to make peace between the couple, and following this the wife became pregnant and had a son.
R. Lorberbaum, who served as sandak, asked his student if he followed what he told him, i.e., not to love his wife so much. The student replied that he did, and that he also slapped her. R. Lorberbaum told him that the slap was too much, but that he should know that the scientists have stated that if a husband and wife are very much alike they cannot have children. Thus, when he heard that his student and his wife loved each other greatly, he understood why they couldn’t have children, and that is why he told the student that he shouldn’t love her so much. In other words, only if there is some distance between them will they be able to have children. (The nonsense that earlier generations believed in never ceases to amaze me. I realize, of course, that future generations might think the same about us.)
Another relevant text is found in R. Hayyim ben Betzalel of Friedberg’s Sefer ha-Hayyim. As part of my Torah in Motion tour of Germany this summer, we are going to Friedberg. The most famous of the rabbis of Friedberg was R. Hayyim ben Betzalel, the brother of the Maharal and a great scholar in his own right. In preparation for the trip I am reading material by and about R. Hayyim, and the following is one of the fascinating things I found.
In his Sefer ha-Hayyim,[10] R. Hayyim notes that the demons want to connect themselves with scholars or even with any men. However, this is difficult since men are on the highest spiritual level, and thus distant from the demons. Therefore, the demons connect themselves to women who are on a lower spiritual level than men, and thus closer to the demons. In other words, at the bottom you have demons, women are above them, and men stand at the top. As R. Hayyim explains, both demons and women share an important characteristic, namely, that they are naturally defective: חסירי היצירה. As proof for this contention about women, he cites Sanhedrin 22b:
אשה גולם היא ואינה כורתת ברית אלא למי שעשאה כלי
“A woman [before marriage] is a shapeless lump, and concludes a covenant only with him who transforms her [into] a [useful] vessel.”
The fact that the Talmud refers to a woman as a “shapeless lump” is proof for R. Hayyim that she is on a lower level than a man, and this basic division is not altered after marriage.
This then leads R. Hayyim to call attention to Exodus 22:17 which states מכשפה לא תחיה, “Thou shalt not suffer a sorceress to live.” He asks, why is only a sorceress mentioned, and not a sorcerer מכשף? He also calls attention to Avot 2:8, מרבה נשים מרבה כשפים, “The more wives, the more witchcraft,” which also makes the connection of sorcery to women. R. Hayyim explains that because of the closeness of women and demons the Torah was concerned that women would seek to “go down” and achieve completeness by connecting themselves with the demonic forces below them. This wasn’t such a worry when it came to men since they were “two levels above” the domain of the demons.
All of this is quite interesting, and R. Hayyim ben Betzalel was very happy with this explanation (which must be causing some readers to pull their hair out.) After offering it he expressed pride in what he wrote:
והנה לא קדמני אדם בפירוש זה והוא ענין נכון אצלי.
So what does this have to do with what I have been discussing in the post? R. Hayyim warns men not to be too connected to women (which includes their wives) since this will mean that they are trying to complete themselves and find perfection by means of someone who is on a lower level than them. I believe this to be in complete opposition to the modern romantic notion that men and women can be soulmates, for one cannot be a soulmate with one whose soul is literally on a lower level.[11]
Since I mentioned love between future husbands and wives, I should also note that there was concern that because young men and women were engaged, that they might initiate a physical relationship before the marriage. This explains the takkanot in Candia (1238) and Corfu (1663) forbidding an engaged man to even enter the house of his future father-in-law (where his fiancée lived).[12] The Corfu takkanah also states that an engaged woman is not permitted to be in the house of her future husband. The Corfu takkanah does make an exception that a month before the wedding the man and woman can be in the homes of their future in-laws. This is because there are wedding plans that need to be taken care of. But the takkanah specifies that the engaged couple must not be left alone.

The Candia takkanah states that if for some reason the man has to enter his future father-in-law’s home, he has to bring two men with him to act as his “guards”. The only exception to this rule is if the young man is studying Torah with his future father-in-law. In that case he can be at the home, since “the study of Torah is such as to weaken the force of the tempter.”

Solomon Buber records a 1776 oath signed by a man in Lvov declaring that he will not enter the house of his future bride under any circumstanced.[13] This was no doubt required by the rabbi. According to the text of the oath, if the man violates his pledge

אהיה נדון כעובר על השבועה בכל מיני עונשין וקנסים עצומים וחרפות ובזיונות בלי שום המלטה בעולם
R. Jonathan Eybeschuetz, in a sermon delivered in Metz in 1744, declared that “from this point on” he would only write a betrothal contract if the man and woman give their solemn agreement not to touch one another until after the wedding.[14]
As is clear from the sermon of R. Eybeschuetz just referred to,[15] many engaged couples were ignoring the law of negiah. Even Mendelssohn did not follow it, as we see from a letter he wrote to his fiancée. “Even the kisses that I stole from your lips were mixed with some bitterness, for the approaching separation made me heavy of heart and incapable of enjoying a pure pleasure.”[16]
In his autobiography, R. Leon Modena records the following about his young fiancée who was on her deathbed. He was 19 years old at the time.
On the day she died, she summoned me and embraced and kissed me. She said, “I know that this is bold behavior, but God knows that during the one year of our engagement we did not touch each other even with our little fingers. Now, at the time of death, the rights of the dying are mine. I was not allowed to become your wife, but what can I do, for thus it is decreed in heaven. May God’s will be done.”[17]
This story reminded me of an incident R. Jacob Emden records in his autobiography, although the details are entirely different. The translation of this lengthy passage is by Jacob J. Schacter in his outstanding dissertation on R. Emden.[18]
A miracle also occurred to me, especially relevant to matters spiritual. (It was) a miracle similar to that of Joseph the righteous and (even) slightly more so. I was a young man, tender in years, in the full strength of my passion. I had been separated from my wife for a long time and greatly desired a woman. A very pretty unmarried young girl who was my cousin happened to meet me there and was alone with me. She brazenly demonstrated great love to me, came close to me and almost kissed me. Even when I was lying in my bed, she came to cover me well on the couch, in a close loving manner. Truthfully, had I hearkened to the advice of my instinct she would not have denied my desire at all. Several times it (indeed) almost happened, as a fire (consumes) the chaff. Frequently there was no one in the house with me but her. They (i.e. the members of her family) were also not accustomed to come for they stayed in the store on the marketplace, occupied with their livelihood all day. Had God not given me great strength, the excellency of dignity and the excellency of power (Gen. 49:3), to overcome my fiery instinct which once almost forced me to do its bidding, (and) were it not for the grace of God which was great upon me, (I would have been unable) to withstand this very powerful temptation, greater than all temptations. I was a man at the prime of my strength and passion. There was a very pleasant beautiful woman before me who demonstrated for me all manner of love and closeness many times. She was related to me, unmarried, a tender child and recently widowed. She may have been ritually pure or would have ritually purified herself had I requested it. If I had wanted to fulfill my passionate desire for her, I was absolutely certain that she would not reveal my secret. I controlled my instinct, conquered my passion and determined to kill it. My heart was hollow and I did not . . . Blessed be the Lord who gives strength to the weary for I was saved from this flaming fire.
Schacter does not translate the next sentence in the memoir in which R. Emden expresses the wish that as a reward for standing firm, he and his descendants until the end of time will be protected from sexual temptation.
Here are the pages from the Warsaw 1896 edition of Megilat Sefer, pp. 82-83.
In 2012 a new edition of Megilat Sefer appeared, edited by R. Avraham Yaakov Bombach. Here is page 106 from this edition.
As you can see, the Bombach edition has omitted the entire story R. Emden tells. While R. Emden thought it was important for people to know about how he overcame his evil inclination, and he therefore recorded it for posterity, Bombach obviously felt that this is “too much information.” Instead of discussing the significance (and strangeness) of R. Emden allowing us entry into his most personal memories, Bombach chooses the other path and censors that which he is uncomfortable with.
On the other hand, in the introduction to the recently published memoir of the Sephardic scholar, R. Joseph Hayyim Abuhbut,[19] the editor calls attention to the very passage I have quoted, and which was censored by Bombach. He notes how much value the reader can derive from this passage in seeing how R. Emden was able to overcome temptation.
מה מאוד מופלאים הם דברי הגאון יעב”ץ זצ”ל . . . כמה תועלת תצמח לקורא כאשר יווכח לראות באיזה נסיונות נתנסה זה האיש המרעיש ארץ, מי מילל ומי פילל.
R. Elijah Rabinowitz-Teomim mentions in his autobiography that he lived in the home of his future father-in-law together with the girl he was engaged to.[20] At that time he was around sixteen years old and she was under fifteen. He mentions that she was in love with him: והיא דבקה אחרי בלבה. As with R. Emden, he makes a point of telling us that although he engaged in much conversation with her, as they had become very close (“like brother and sister”), he never touched her in all the time he lived in her home. Unlike R. Emden who tells us how much he was tempted and that he “greatly desired a woman,” R. Rabinowitz-Teomim tells us that his relationship with the girl was purely platonic, and he never even thought about her in a sexual way. 
בשלהי שנת תרי”ט העתיק אאמו”ר ז”ל משכנו לעיר ראגאלי ועמו יצאו כל ב”ב, ונשארתי לבדי בשילעל בבית המחותן . . . בכל משך היותי בבית המחותן לא הייתי רחוק מהמשודכת והיינו מדברים זע”ז, ובשגם אחרי נסע בית אאמו”ר ז”ל משם ונשארתי בבית אביה, כל היום, והיא דבקה אחרי בלבה, כאשר ראיתי וידעתי גם שמעתי כי יקרתי בעיני’. . . היינו קרובים זה לזה כאח לאחות, לשוחח כנהוג בבני הנעורים, אבל לא עלה לבי על דבר אחר, חלילה, ולא נגעתי בה אפילו באצבע קטנה כל משך שבתי עמהם, כדת שלת תורה.
So we have three memoirs by leading rabbis, all of which mention them with a girl. Both R. Emden and R. Rabinowitz-Teomim feel it is important to inform the reader that they never touched the girl. As we have seen, R. Emden was very proud of how he overcame his evil inclination and that is why he tells the story. I don’t know why R. Rabinowitz-Teomim thought it was important to mention the matter, especially as no one would have assumed that he had any physical contact before marriage.
I found another interesting source in R. Eleazar Kalir’s Havot Yair.[21] R. Kalir, who died in 1801, was the rabbi in Kolín, today in the Czech Republic. He discusses the common phenomenon of engaged couples having physical contact, and he tells us that no rebuke can stop the practice. He also says that the fault for this must be placed mostly upon the parents, since they are happy to see this behavior by the engaged couple and thus make no efforts to stop it.
בעו”ה רבו המספחת זו בישראל שתיכף אחר התקשורת התנאים, החתן הולך אל הכלה ואינו נזהר מח”ו [חיבוק ונישוק], והיא גם היא אסור לו משום נדה שהיא בכרת . . . ובעו”ה הדבר הזה הוא כמנהג הקבוע, ואולי הוא ממנהגות סדום ודור המבול שהשחיתו את דרכם, והיתר זה אינו בא רק כמאמרם, עבר ושנה נעשו לו כהיתר, ובעו”ה אין התוכחה מועלת בזה, שאמר יאמר מה בכך, שאני הולך אל הכלה שלי, שהיא המיועדת לי, על זה סיים הנביא וכלה מחופתה שאינה נקראת כלה אלא לאחר חופתה, ואז רשאי ליחד עמה, ואמרו כלה בלא ברכה אסורה לבעלה כנדה, וק”ו בעודה לא טהרה מטמאת נדתה.
ולא על החתן לבד יש להתלונן אלא ביותר על אבותיהם שרואים דבר זה, ולא די שהם שותקים אלא אף משמחים אלי גיל בראותן מעשים הללו בעיניהן ממש כצאן לטבח יובל . . . והוא מסייע ידי עוברי עבירה, בראותו תולדותיו כיוצא בזה ולא די דאינו מוחה אלא אף מסייע לדבר עבירה, ואדרבה מוטל על האבות להיות מוחים ובפרט מי שסיפק בידו לעשות.
Elsewhere in his book, we see that R. Kalir told his female congregants that on Shabbat morning they should leave the synagogue and go home before the end of services. This was to prevent men and women mixing which would happen if the women were still there when services ended.[22] It is hard to believe that he found much of a receptive audience for this request.
To Be Continued
1. In my last post I mentioned Maxine Jacobson’s new book on R. Leo Jung. Anyone who is interested in purchasing a soft-cover copy of the book for $25 can contact her directly at maxine.jacobson at sympatico.ca.

2. One of the most prolific authors of halakhic works in English is Rabbi Ari Enkin. His most recent book (which is his eighth such publication) is Halichot V’halachot. Anyone who is interested in modern issues and their halakhic ramifications will enjoy this book and his previous volumes. The topics he discusses run the gamut, from Shabbat and holidays, to kashrut, interpersonal issues, and civil and monetary law. As one can see from the numerous references in each essay, Rabbi Enkin has great erudition in the responsa literature, particularly the modern halakhic authorities. He cites these authorities no matter which ideological camp they are found in, and as such should be a model for all. Those who wish to order the book can contact the author at rabbiari at hotmail.com. His website is here.

3. On June 5, 2016, in honor of Yom Yerushalayim, I will be speaking at the Community Synagogue of Monsey, 89 West Maple Avenue. The title of my talk is “R. Shlomo Goren: The Revolutionary Chief Rabbi.” The talk will follow minhah which is at 8:15pm.

[1] See Reiner, מעשה שאירע בק”ק ווירמייש”א ברעש הגדול שנת שצ”ו, Ha-Aretz, Oct. 4, 2006, available here.
[2] See Posen, מגדלים פסיכולוגיסטיים, Ha’aretz, Oct. 17, 2006, available here.
[3] See Reiner, שערי פירושים לא ננעלו, Ha’aretz, Oct. 24, 2006, available here.
[4] Toyznt yor Idish lebn in Ungarn ([New York, 1945]), p. 173.
[5] See ibid.
[6] Vol. 2, no. 7 (p. 145).
[7] See R. Avraham Mordechai Katz, “Be-Inyan Shirat Nigunim ha-Musharim Etzel ha-Goyim,” Minhat ha-Kayitz 8-11 (2006), pp. 73-74, who makes this point and responds to R. Hillel. Regarding using non-Jewish music, Dov Weinstein called my attention to this shiur on the Yeshivat Kise Rahamim website which begins with music from Abba’s song “Dancing Queen.” I can’t imagine that the person who inserted the music has any clue where it comes from.
The Kise Rahamim website is where you can find R. Meir Mazuz’s shiurim, but a number of short videos are not included on the website. For example, this video appeared on Yom ha-Zikaron 2016:



R. Mazuz refers to the day as “kadosh ve-nora” and calls for synagogues to recite the prayer for Israeli soldiers every Shabbat. As he notes, if someone donates ten shekalim you make a blessing for him, so how could you not make a blessing for one who spills his blood for the Jewish people? I understand full well why haredim don’t say the prayer for the State of Israel. Yet I have never understood how haredi society could refuse to recite a mi-sheberakh prayer for the soldiers, the same soldiers who are the only reason why there can be a haredi society in Israel in the first place. Interestingly enough, in all the conversations over the years that I have had with haredim regarding this matter, to my recollection I have never met one who agreed with, or was willing to defend, his community’s avoidance of the prayer. (I am referring to mainstream haredim, not Satmar or other anti-Zionists.)

[8] Kedushat Levi (Warsaw, 1902), p. 15b, s.v. ויביאה יצחק
[9] The text has מצות which could be read as singular or plural.
[10] (Jerusalem, 1993), p. 153 (Sefer Selihah u-Mehilah, ch. 10). See Byron Sherwin, “In the Shadows of Greatness: Rabbi Hayyim Ben Betsalel of Friedberg,” Jewish Social Studies 37 (Winter 1975), pp. 49-50.
[11] Since this post has dealt a good deal with love, let me add one more point about a different sort of love. There is an old question, why when the kohanim bless the people do they say וצונו לברך את עמו ישראל באהבה? Where do we find that the kohanim were told to bless the people “with love”?  A number of different answers have been given, and one famous answer, intended as a joke, is as follows.
Before giving us the text of the priestly blessing , the Torah, Numbers 6:23, states:
דבר אל אהרן ואל בניו לאמור, כה תברכו את בני ישראל אמור להם.
This word, אמור, sounds a lot like the French and Italian words for love, so we see that God is telling the kohanim to love the people.
As mentioned, this is a famous answer. Not so famous is that it was actually stated by R. Leon Modena with reference to Italian. He, of course, also intended it as a joke. See Ziknei Yehudah, no. 127:
ואמרתי על דרך צחות דכתיב כה תברכו אב”י אמו”ר להם אמור בלע”ז היינו באהבה.
[12] See Louis Finkelstein, Jewish Self Government in the Middle Ages (New York, 1964), pp. 271-272, 279, 320-321.
[13] Solomon Buber, Anshei Shem (Cracow, 1895), p. 132.
[14] See Ya’arot Devash (Jerusalem, 1988), vol. 1, p. 62, s.v. ואתם עם ה’. The last three sources I have cited are mentioned by Salo Wittmayer Baron, The Jewish Community (Philadelphia, 1942), vol. 3, p. 206. For other relevant sources, see David Biale, Eros and the Jews (Berkeley, 1997), pp. 70ff.
[15] See Ya’arot Devash, vol. 1, pp. 61, 62
[16] Alexander Altmann, Moses Mendelssohn (Portland, 1998), p. 93.
[17] The Autobiography of a Seventeeth-Century Venetian Rabbi, trans. Mark R. Cohen (Princeton, 1988), p. 91.
[18] “Rabbi Jacob Emden: His Life and Major Works” (unpublished doctoral dissertation, Harvard University, 1988), pp. 55-57.
[19] Meoraot Yosef (Elad, 2014), p. 14 (first pagination).
[20] Seder Eliyahu (Jerusalem, 1983), pp. 22-23.
[21] (Jerusalem, 2004). p. 76.
[22] Ibid., p. 75.


Some Recollections of R. Jehiel Jacob Weinberg, Love Before Marriage, and More

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Some Recollections of R. Jehiel Jacob Weinberg, Love Before Marriage, and More
Marc B. Shapiro
1. In my last post I mentioned R. Nosson Zvi Finkel, the Alter of Slobodka, so let me add the following. There is a transcript of a 1965 taped conversation between R. Jehiel Jacob Weinberg and R. Yaakov Herzog.[1] Herzog had come to Montreux to speak to R. Weinberg, and here is a picture from that meeting which appears in Michael Bar-Zohar, Yaacov Herzog: A Biography.

R. Weinberg, who knew R. Finkel very well, stated as follows.

הרב ויינברג: דער אלטער ז”ל (דער סלאבאדקער, זאגט מען דער אלטער), ר’ נטע הירש, ער איז דאך א צדיק.

הרצוג: אבער נישט קיין למדן.

הרב ויינברג: נישט קיין גרויסער למדן. ער האט געקענט לערנען, אבער ער איז נישט געווין קיין גרויסער למדן. אבער ער איז געווען א חכם, א גרויסער.

הרצוג: יא, דער חכם פון סלאבאדקע.

הרב ויינברג: און ער איז געווען א איידעלער מענטש זייער.

Some sections of this conversation appeared in the English Yated Ne’eman, Nov. 5, 1999. Yet as is to be expected, they appeared in a censored form as Yated Ne’eman would never record R. Weinberg’s statement that R. Nosson Zvi Finkel was not a great talmudic scholar. This judgment is not to be regarded as a put-down, as everyone in the Lithuanian yeshiva world knew that R. Nosson Zvi Finkel’s original insights were focused on Mussar, not analytical Talmud study.[2] Needless to say, the Alter always made sure that outstanding talmudic scholars were on the Slobodka faculty.
Speaking of censorship, here is another example. In the Yated Ne’eman article just mentioned, we find the following passage which is a quote from R. Weinberg.
I was intimately acquainted with R. Eizik Sher. . . . His son-in-law, R. Mordechai Shulman, visited me in Berlin and wanted to hear shiurim from me. I told him: This is not your place. Return to Slobodke.[!] Maybe you will some day become the son-in-law of R. Eizik.
This is what R. Weinberg actually said to Herzog:

ויינברג: ער איז ארויפגעקומען צו מיר אין סעמינאר. ער איז געווען אין בערלין, זיך ארומגעדרייט צוויי מאנאטן. געוואלט אריין אין סעמינאר. האב איך אים געזאגט: הערט זיך איין, ר’ מרדכי, ער איז א טיקטינר. דו וועסט נישט ווערן קיינמאל קיין דאקטאר. און אויב דו וועסט זיין א דאקטאר אפילו, וועסטו קיינמאל נישט קריגן קיין רבינער שטעלע אין דייטשלאנד. וואס טויג עס דיר? וועסט נישט מאכן קיין קאריערע. איז גיי אוועק צוריק אין סלאבאדקע. אמאל קען זיין, דו וועס זיך פארליבן אדער זי וועט זיך אין דיר פארליבן, די טאכטער פון ר’ אייזיק’ן, וועסטו ווערן ר’ אייזיק’ס א איידים.

.הרצוג: וכך הווה

 .ויינברג: און איך האב אים דערמאנט דאס. אז איך האב עס אים אמאל פאראויס געזאגט

R. Weinberg tells us that R. Mordechai Shulman, who was from Tiktin and later became Rosh Yeshiva of Slobodka in Bnei Brak, wanted to enroll in the Rabbinical Seminary of Berlin. Yated doesn’t want its readers to know this, so it “translates” the passage as saying that R. Shulman “visited” R. Weinberg and “wanted to hear shiurim” from him. R. Weinberg told him that he would never get a doctorate, and even if he did he would not get a rabbinic position in Germany, so he should return to Slobodka. R. Weinberg adds that when he returns it could be that he “will fall in love” with the daughter of R. Isaac Sher, or she will fall in love with him, and he can then become the son-in-law of R. Sher, the rosh yeshiva of Slobodka. In fact, this is exactly what happened.[3]
The Yated “translation” omits anything about R. Shulman and R. Sher’s daughter “falling in love.” This is because there is no such concept in the haredi world (and in traditional Jewish societies, in both the Ashkenazic and Sephardic worlds, such a notion was hardly found at all). Any love between husband and wife is said to come after marriage, and the biblical support for this concept, repeated in numerous texts (both haredi and pre-haredi[4]), is found in Genesis 24:67: “Isaac brought her into the tent of his mother Sarah, and he married Rebekkah. So she became his wife, and he loved her.” This verse states that Isaac loved Rebekkah, but only after he married her.[5] R. Gamaliel Rabinowitz goes so far as to state that any love that is found before marriage arises from sin, as there is no room for “feelings” before marriage.[6]
האהבה באה רק לאחר הנישואין, כל אהבה שלפני הנישואין מקורה בחטא רח”ל, ענין ה”רגשות” בכלל אין לו מקום לפני הנישואין, וזה דבר פשוט וברור שאין צריך לבארו.
R. Reuven Margaliyot mentions an interesting interpretation in support of this perspective.[7] There are two contradictory biblical verses. Proverbs 18:22 states מצא אשה מצא טוב, while Ecclesiastes 7:26 states ומוצא אני את האשה מר ממות. The contradiction can be explained as follows.
In earlier years parents would arrange marriages for their sons, and the overwhelming majority of the marriages succeeded. This is alluded to by the verse in Proverbs: מצא אשה מצא טוב. Now, however, things are different, and young men find their own brides, “and most of the time there isn’t peace between them after the marriage.” This is alluded to by the verse ומוצא אני את האשה מר ממות . In other words, if I find a wife for myself, most of the time it will turn out to be “more bitter than death.”
I think there might be another text that speaks to this concept, though I have not seen anyone who has made this point. The sixth of the sheva berakhot recited at a wedding states שמח תשמח רעים האהובים. The words רעים האהובים mean “beloved friends” or “beloved companions.” I don’t think one would use the word רעים to describe a man and woman who are “in love.” I believe that the words of the blessing mean a love that is found between two friends, rather than romantic love. 
R. Moses Gruenwald writes as follows:[8]
וענין חתונה א”א אלא בין רעים האהובים דמי שאינם אוהבים זה את זה א”א להם להתחתן.
What he says is that people who do not love each other cannot get married. I believe that he means the sort of “friendship love” I mentioned in the previous paragraph, rather than romantic love. I find his formulation particularly interesting, since R. Gruenwald was a Hungarian rav typically viewed as being on the extreme side of things. Yet here he is saying that there needs to be a sort of love between the bride and groom.
Could this really have been the norm in R. Gruenwald’s Hungarian (non-hasidic) community? Maybe some readers who come (or descend) from this type of community can offer some comments. I have also wondered what hasidim mean when they say רעים האהובים, since the people getting married hardly know each other. A friend from the hasidic world acknowledged that he doesn’t know if these words can be reconciled with the current reality. He also suggested that perhaps the words can be understood like יומת המת in Deuteronomy 17:6. In this verse the word המת does not mean one who is dead, but rather one who will soon be dead. So perhaps האהובים means “the ones who are in the process of becoming אהובים.”
I found another interesting passage that speaks about love of bride and groom. It is attributed to R. Isaac Luria by R. Hayyim Vital. As part of his explanation of a verse in Song of Songs, R. Luria writes:[9] מחמת רוב אהבת חתן לכלה. These words are explained allegorically, but their simple meaning also reflects a reality, one in which there is real love between bride and groom which could only have flowered prior to the wedding.
Returning to the traditionalist value that love only comes after marriage, this is all fine and good, but R. Weinberg specifically spoke of falling in love before marriage, and that this could lead R. Shulman to become R. Sher’s son-in-law. From the Yated “translation” the reader would assume that R. Weinberg was telling him to return to Slobodka and become a big learner, and that this might lead to him becoming R. Sher’s son-in-law.[10]
Regarding love letters, the following appears in R. Nathan Kamenetsky, Making of a Godol, p. 802, and was one of the passages that led to the book being banned:
A reliable source reported that R’ Aaron [Kotler] wrote a letter to his fiancée of which her father, R’ Isser-Zalman Meltzer, disapproved. When it was shown to the Alter, he rejoined, “I did not tell you he was a tzaddiq. I said he had other qualities, but he will yet become so frum that everyone will suffer from him.”
Many who read Making of a Godol assumed that the letter allegedly sent by R. Kotler was a love letter. In order to counter this understanding, in the second edition of Making of a Godol Kamenetsky added: “This author conjectures that the letter concerned an impressive hasbarah he had delivered.” This conjecture doesn’t seem to fit with the Alter’s reply about R. Kotler not being a “tzaddiq” and becoming “frum”. If R. Isser Zalman was upset because he thought that the young R. Kotler was a bit too impressed with himself, then the Alter would presumably have replied differently. The words that he allegedly used, “tzaddiq” and “frum”, have a certain meaning, and it thus is not surprising that the family of R. Kotler was so strongly opposed to the book and viewed this passage as insulting. (Another report has it that R. Kotler had suggested that his fiancée read a certain book and that was what upset R. Isser Zalman.)
In the second edition of Making of a Godol, the last sentence of the passage in question was altered to read, “But his frumkeit will yet become so great that everyone will suffer its brunt.” 
In my review of Making of a Godol, I wrote as follows:
Another problematic element of the book, admittedly found only on occasion, is its use of unnamed sources. This is acceptable in journalism, but not in scholarship. For example, the evidence for one of the most controversial passages in the book, concerning R. Aaron Kotler, his future wife, and his future father-in-law, R. Isser Zalman Meltzer, is “a reliable source” (p. 802). I understand why the source would not want his or her name to be given, but when repeating such a loaded story, which one knows will be controversial and its veracity challenged, the author is obligated to name the source, thus allowing the reader to judge its reliability. After all, if the source is R. Kotler’s daughter, its authenticity is more apparent than if it is another example of what X heard from Y. If the source does not wish to go on the record, it is best for the story to be omitted. (In my own biography of R. Weinberg, I was forced to leave out a number of “juicy” details, precisely for this reason.)[11]
I have previously discussed R. Samuel Archivolti’s book of melitzah letters, Ma’yan Ganim, and how it was misused by R. Baruch Epstein. See here.[12] This book is described in the Encyclopaedia Judaica as follows: “Archivolti’s most important works are . . . Ma’yan Ganim (Venice, 1553), divided into ‘passages’ containing 25 letters in metrical form designed to serve as models for students of this classic literary genre.”[13] It is worth mentioning Ma’yan Ganim now because on pp. 39ff. Archivolti includes two love letters. It appears clear to me that the focus of these letters is an unmarried couple, and first letter begins with the following heading: אגרת חושק לחשוקתה. 

Also of interest is this picture that appears at the beginning of each section of the book. As I learnt from Shimon Steinmetz, urinating putti were a common theme in the art of Archivolti’s day. You can read about it here. 

While Ma’yan Ganim is a book of melitzah letters, not responsa, R. Archivolti (1515-1611) was indeed a halakhic authority who served as rabbi of Padua. His pesak in the famous Rovigo mikveh controversy appears in Palgei Mayim (Venice, 1608), p. 15a.
 

R. Archivolti is referred to as מ”ד which stands for מרא דאתרא. In Renaissance Italy this title was only used for very important rabbis,[14] unlike today when all communal rabbis are given the title.
Interestingly, I found that a Hebrew manuscript from R. Archivolti’s era includes a love charm. The woman is told to write יריש ליאוש פילוש on her left hand, and this will cause the man she desires to fall in love with her.[15]
R. David Cohen, the Nazir, is an example of one who fell in love before marriage. In fact, his relationship with his future wife, Sarah, is a great love story. They were separated from each other for twelve years. He was in Europe and Eretz Yisrael and she was in Russia and later trapped behind the Iron Curtain. Throughout these long years they remained committed to each other, and the Nazir kept her picture on his desk. As reported by R. Avraham Remer, R. Zvi Yehudah Kook saw fit to mention this last point at the Nazir’s funeral.[16]
אמר עליו: “אור מופלא”, וציין אז שתי נקודות בחייו של רבי דוד: האחת, תחילת הנזירות בעת היותו באוניברסיטה, כדי לשמור על הפיאות והזקן. והשניה, שעל שולחנו הציב תמונת ארוסתו, כדי שחס-ושלום לא יתן עיניו באחרת.
R. Shear Yashuv Cohen tells us that the Nazir and Sarah also exchanged wonderful love letters during this time, letters which have not been made public:[17]
שמורים בארכיון המשפחה מכתבי-האהבה הנפלאים, ואף קטעי-יומן מלא רגש רוטט שנכתבו על ידי אבא מארי זצ”ל בימי הפירוד שנתמשכו הרבה מעבר למתוכנן ולמצופה . . . הכלה הצעירה מונה ימים ושנים, ונשארת בנאמנותה לבחיר לבה. אף הוא שומר לה אמונים ומתנזר מכל אפשרות של ברית או קשר אחר, בקפידה ובנאמנות יסודית.
When Sarah finally made it to Jerusalem, the Nazir was in the midst of a ta’anit dibur. R. Kook summoned R. Zvi Pesah Frank and R. Yeruham Fishel Bernstein so that they could sit as a beit din and void the ta’anit dibur, thus allowing him to speak to his soon-to-be bride.[18]

Regarding falling in love before marriage, R. Jehiel Jacob Weinberg, in his Oct. 12, 1960, letter to Samuel Atlas, states that R. Soloveitchik came to Berlin intending to marry R. Hayyim Heller’s daughter:
השידוך בטל. ס’ התאהב בזו שהיא עתה אשתו.
According to members of the Soloveitchik family, there is no truth to this, and R. Weinberg was simply repeating a rumor. But it is true that the Rav fell in love with his future wife in Berlin. R. Ronnie Ziegler writes as follows here:
The Rav’s most important and fateful encounter in Berlin was that with his wife, Dr. Tonya (Lewit) Soloveitchik (1904-1967). A student at the University of Jena, where she obtained a Ph.D. in education, she was introduced to Rav Soloveitchik by her brother, a fellow student at University of Berlin. Although a scion of the illustrious Soloveitchik family was expected to conclude a match with the daughter of a prominent rabbi or at least a successful businessman, Rav Soloveitchik fell in love with Tonya Lewit and married her in 1931 despite her family’s undistinguished lineage and lack of means.
R. Ziegler continues by describing the deep connection between the Rav and Tonya.
As mentioned in the previous lecture, the Rav’s relationship with his wife was one of the two most significant relationships in his life. He had unlimited esteem for her – his dedication of “The Lonely Man of Faith” reads: “To Tonya: A woman of great courage, sublime dignity, total commitment, and uncompromising truthfulness.” He respected her opinion and heeded her advice, both in practical and in intellectual matters. It was on her advice that he changed the topics of his annual Yahrzeit (memorial) lectures for his father, which attracted thousands of listeners, to matters which non-scholars could relate to (such as prayer, Torah reading, and holidays). [The halakhic portions of some of these lectures are collected in the two volumes of Shiurim Le-zekher Abba Mari z”l.] In a poignant passage in a teshuva lecture delivered after his wife’s death, he recounted how he used to consult her before speaking:
The longing for one who has died and is gone forever is worse than death. The soul is overcome and shattered with fierce longing. . . . Several days ago, I once again sat down to prepare my annual discourse on the subject of repentance. I always used to discuss it with my wife and she would help me to define and crystallize my thoughts. This year, too, I prepared the discourse while consulting her: “Could you please advise me? Should I expand this idea or cut down on that idea? Should I emphasize this point or that one?” I asked, but heard no reply. Perhaps there was a whispered response to my question, but it was swallowed up by the wind whistling through the trees and did not reach me.” (On Repentance [Jerusalem, 1980], p. 280)
Rav Soloveitchik’s wife was his best and perhaps only real friend. His natural proclivity towards loneliness, which we will encounter repeatedly in his writings, was heightened in his philosophy to an ideal, which expresses itself in an invigorating sense of one’s own uniqueness. One can be lonely even, or perhaps especially, when surrounded by friends, colleagues, and family. This is a constructive force which propels a person toward his individual destiny, while also propelling him to seek a depth-connection with God and with his fellow man. Aloneness, as opposed to loneliness, is a disjunctive emotion – it is a sense of lacking companionship, of being abandoned and forlorn. The passage above highlights the Rav’s almost unbearable sense of aloneness following his wife’s death in 1967 after a long struggle with cancer. He is reported to have said, “After my father’s death, I felt like a wall of my house had fallen down. After my wife’s death, I felt like the entire house had collapsed.”
Concerning the matter of falling in love before marriage, it is noteworthy that the great R. Hayyim Joseph David Azulai (the Hida) was in love with the woman who would later be his wife, and whom he knew for a number of years before they were married. Here is what Meir Benayahu has to say about this.[19]
את אשתו השניה, רחל בת משה הלוי מפיסה, הכיר כחמש שנים לפני שנשא אותה ונקשר עמה בקשרי אהבה. החלומות שחלם עליה לפני הנישואין מעידים על יחסו הנכבד לאשה. הוא שאף ל”נשואים רעננים” ובהנשאו לה ראה שהוא מתעטר בכבוד והדר. בנסיעותיו רכש לה מתנות ומסר לה אותם לפני הנישואין. כסף הרבה הוציא עליה למלבושיה ולהנאותיה, ומותה בשנת תקס”ד הקדיר עליו את עולמו.
Benayahu mentions the Hida’s dreams. Here is a passage that the Hida recorded from one of his dreams.[20]
תשרי תקל”ו . . . וראיתי בחלומי שהייתי בא על אשתי [שהיתה כבר נשואה עמי ולא זכרתי מי] ומוציא בתוליה ורואה דם. [קמ]תי והלכתי אצל אמ”ן [אבי מורי נ”ע] ושאלני ברמז והשבתיו ברמז . . . ונתעוררתי. ותכף הבנתי שהוא תשו’ שאלה מיום [ראש השנה?] לטובה. וב”ה שלא אירע לי שום מקרה ח”ו. הוא ית’ ירחם וייטיב אחריתי מראשיתי לאי”ט וש”ח.
Most people will probably feel uncomfortable reading this sort of passage. Yet the performance of the mitzvah the Hida discusses appears very natural to him and nothing to be ashamed of. Perhaps it is only uncomfortable to read because we have become overly puritanical regarding these matters which are also part of Torah. Nevertheless, it does remind me of other “uncomfortable” passages found in R. Jacob Emden’s autobiography.
I found another interesting passage that deals with love between a bride and groom in R. Aaron Fried’s Zekan Aharon (Munkacz, 1904), p. 52a. Here is the passage.
I am quite surprised by the example the author uses. In commenting on the rabbinic derashah connecting the words מורשה and מאורסה,[21] he uses an example that portrays a romantic relationship. He tells of a rich man, apparently newly married, who loved his wife and tried to woo her by telling her how greatly he loved her. “His love for her increased in quantity and quality beyond how other grooms love their brides.”
This type of description would be unusual enough in a rabbinic work. Yet it gets even more unusual when R. Fried continues by telling us that the rich man showered her with hugs and kisses and placed an expensive necklace around her neck as a sign of his love. R. Fried also elaborates on why, despite all these signs of affection, the woman did not reciprocate with any feelings of love. Later he explains that since the Torah is to us like one bound with erusin, that is why we show it love, decorate it with silver and gold, and even kiss it, just like a groom does with his bride! It happens to be a clever derashah, and ends with how if you want the Torah (i.e., God) to love you back, it is not enough to only support the Torah. One must also support the poor Torah scholars, the “relatives” of the Torah.
Is it just me, or is anyone else surprised by this derashah? I can’t imagine using the imagery found here as part of a derashah before a haredi audience in order to inspire them to be generous with their support of Torah scholars. With the mention of hugging and kissing the bride, I don’t even think this would go over well in front of a Modern Orthodox audience. [22]
I am doubly astounded by the fact that the derashah we have just seen was written by an outstanding student of the Hatam Sofer, one who also showed his halakhic expertise by authoring a volume of responsa titled שו”ת מהרא”ף.
I found the derashah so unusual that I was curious to see if anyone cited it. Using Otzar ha-Hokhmah I found two citations. The first is by a Hungarian rabbi, R. Efraim Balati, who authored Hamudei Efrayim (Galanta, 1935). In vol. 1, p. 35, he cites R. Fried’s comment.
Once again, I am surprised that a Hungarian rabbi would include such information in a derashah, even if, in R. Balati’s retelling, he leaves out the words ומחבב אותה בחיבוק ונישוק. Even though he doesn’t mention how the rich man showed his affection with hugs and kisses, he does include the rest of R. Fried’s words, including how we kiss the Torah just like a groom kisses his bride.
The other source I found that cites R. Fried’s passage is R. Barukh Moskovits, Tenuvot Barukh (Jerusalem, 1969), vol. 2, pp. 326-327.
If you examine the passage, you will see that he is quoting from R. Fried’s text, not R. Balati’s version. Yet R. Moskovits also alters R. Fried’s words ומחבב אותה בחיבוק ונישוק. In R. Moskovits’ text this appears as ומחבב אותה מאד. Since R. Moskovits copied R. Fried’s text basically word for word, I don’t understand why at the end of the passage he writes שמעתי. Why doesn’t he tell the reader the source of the passage? 
To be continued
2. The most recent book to appear in my series with Academic Studies Press is Maxine Jacobson, Modern Orthodoxy in American Judaism: The Era of Rabbi Leo Jung. Anyone with an interest in the history of Orthodoxy in America will want to read this book, and I am very happy that I was able to include it, together with other high quality works, in my series, “Studies in Orthodoxy.” Rather than offer my own description of the book, here is an “official” description, which appears on Amazon.
This work presents the issues of Modern Orthodox Judaism in America, from the decades of the twenties to the sixties, by looking at the activities of one of its leaders, Rabbi Dr. Leo Jung, pulpit rabbi, community leader and writer, whose career spanned over sixty years, beginning in the 1920s. Jung is a fulcrum around which many issues are explored. Rabbi Jung’s path crossed with some of the most interesting people of his time. He worked with Chaim Weizmann, the first president of Israel, with Albert Einstein to promote Yeshiva College, with Herman Wouk, American author and Pulitzer Prize winner, and with Pearl Buck, a Nobel Prize laureate and Pulitzer Prize winner.
Modern Orthodoxy went from being a threatened entity on the American scene to a well- recognized and respected force in Judaism. Orthodoxy, at first, was seen as alien to the American environment. Marshall Sklare, perhaps the most influential exponent of this notion, wrote in the 1950s that the history of Orthodoxy in America could be written in terms of a case study of institutional decay. He realized the errors of his ways in the 1970s. This is the story of the renaissance of American Modern Orthodoxy, from the disorganization of the older Orthodoxy to the new spirit of confidence that emerged after World War Two. The phenomenon of Modern Orthodoxy is examined in the context of Orthodox invigoration and change. This book has relevance for further studies in various areas. It is part of the study of religious acculturation, of the conflict between tradition and modernity and of religious reinvigoration in a secular society.
Another noteworthy recent book is Michael J. Harris, Faith Without Fear: Unresolved Issues in Modern Orthodoxy. In my blurb that appears on the back cover, I write: “A proud and sophisticated manifesto of Modern Orthodoxy, one which builds on past thinkers but does not hesitate to chart new ground as well.” Rabbi Harris deals with a number of issues such as the role and status of women, mysticism, academic biblical scholarship, and religious pluralism. He generally comes down on the more “liberal” side of what is known as Modern Orthodoxy. (An exception to this generalization is his chapter on academic biblical scholarship.) Anyone who is interested in the intellectual trends of Modern Orthodoxy will want to read Harris’s book, as it is engaged scholarship at its best.
I would also like to call attention to R. Shimon Szimonowitz’s just published Haggadah shel Pesah: Aleh Zayit.[23] I know that there are a lot of Haggadot out there, but for talmidei hakhamim this is one of the special ones. I say this because of the many learned comments, including full-length essays, that are found in the volume. Of particular interest to me is R. Szimonowitz’s lengthy article on le-shem yihud. It is crucial reading for anyone interested in the dispute over the le-shem yihud formulation, in particular the positions of R. Ezekiel Landau, R. Eleazar Fleckeles, and R. Moses Sofer. Among other noteworthy things found in this Haggadah are an article by R. Chaim Rapoport and the Yiddish version of a few beloved Passover songs.
3. On June 5, 2016, in honor of Yom Yerushalayim, I will be speaking at the Community Synagogue of Monsey, 89 West Maple Avenue. The title of my talk is “R. Shlomo Goren: The Revolutionary Chief Rabbi.” The talk will follow minhah which is at 8:15pm.

[1] Israel State Archives, Yaakov Herzog Collection, 2989-4/פ. R. Yaakov David Herzog was the son of R. Isaac Herzog. He was named after R. Yaakov David Wilovsky, the Ridbaz, from whom R. Isaac Herzog received semikhah. In addition to his public role in government and as a diplomat, Yaakov Herzog was also a rabbinic scholar. In 1945 he published a translation and commentary of Mishnah Berakhot, Peah, and Demai. This translation was actually ready for publication by the end of 1942, before Herzog was even 21 years old (he was born Dec. 11, 1921). See Michael Bar-Zohar, Yaacov Herzog: A Biography (London, 2005), p. 50.
In Iggerot Moshe, Hoshen Mishpat no. 1, R. Moshe Feinstein critiques an article of R. Isaac Herzog that appeared in Ha-Pardes. R. Moshe’s own article originally appeared in installments in Ha-Pardes, Tamuz and Av 5703. Yaakov Herzog defended what his father wrote in Ha-Pardes, Elul 5704, pp. 36-38, and Tishrei 5705, pp. 25-27. He was only 23 years old when he wrote these articles.
After the retirement of R. Israel Brodie, Herzog was offered, and accepted, the position of British Chief Rabbi. The common view is that Herzog’s health problems prevented him taking up the post, but the truth is more complicated. See Bar-Zohar, Yaacov Herzog, ch. 13.
Since I have spoken in prior posts about religious men not wearing kippot, Herzog should be added to the list. Not only did he go bareheaded when representing the State of Israel in the Diaspora (and also in his famous debate with Toynbee), but as you can see from pictures in Bar-Zohar’s book, he also did so in Israel, while at work in various important government positions. Bar Zohar writes, “Even as a very young man, when he was working at the Foreign Ministry and then in the Prime Minister’s office, Yaacov did not wear a skullcap, except when saying blessings or praying.” (Yaacov Herzog, p. 111) Because of the vast changes that have taken place in Israeli society, it is hard for us to appreciate why, in the early decades of the State of Israel, some religious men, even those who were not of German background, felt that government work required removing their kippah.
You can listen to the Herzog-Toynbee debate here.
In a previous post here I referred to Yitzhak Nebenzahl as not wearing a kippah, and I mentioned that this German practice continued into his old age. In 1974 Nebenzahl was a member of the Agranat Commission which investigated the Yom Kippur War. In pictures of him from this time you can see that he was still without a kippah. A couple of people emailed me to say that by the 1980s he had abandoned the galut custom and indeed wore a big black kippah. One of them even sent a picture of him and Nebenzahl together.
In the post referred to in the previous paragraph, I also discussed Aharon Barth, who like Nebenzahl came from Germany and did not wear a kippah while at work. Subsequent to the post I found that Zorach Warhaftig mentions that after the death of Chaim Weizman, Ha-Poel ha-Mizrachi recommended to Ben Gurion that Barth be a candidate for president of the State of Israel. Warhaftig reports that Ben Gurion rejected this since Barth was too religious and thus not an appropriate representative for the average citizen. See Warhaftig, Hamishim Shanah ve-Shanah (Jerusalem, 1998), p. 116.
[2] Shlomo Tikochinski, Lamdanut, Musar ve-Elitizm (Jerusalem, 2016) p. 111 n. 131, cites Israel Zissel Dvortz and Dov Katz who claim that R. Finkel was indeed a “gadol” in talmudic learning, but he hid this knowledge even from those who were close to him. Some will no doubt regard this judgment as motivated by “religious correctness,” especially as R. Weinberg had a particularly close relationship with R. Finkel and was privy to all sorts of private information. See, however, Nathan Kamenetsky, Making of a Godol, pp. 777ff., who cites additional sources testifying to R. Finkel’s talmudic knowledge.
[3] R. Shulman’s early shiurim were not very successful in drawing a following. Ben-Tsiyon Klibansky writes (Ke-Tzur Halamish: Tor ha-Zahav shel ha-Yeshivot ha-Lita’iyot be-Mizrah Eiropah [Jerusalem, 2104], p. 342):
בסלבודקה הורגשה אי-נחת כשמינה בה הרב יצחק אייזיק שר את חתנו מרדכי “טיקטינר” שולמן לר”מ בשנת 1935. בישיבה הוא היה תלמיד ותיק נודע, ולאחר נישואיו ב-1929 הועיד את כל זמנו להתעלות בלימודיו. אולם משהחל להרצות את שיעוריו בישיבה לא מצאו בחוריה הדעתנים לנכון להשתתף בהם, ובשיעורים הראשונים נכחו חניכים יחידים בלבד.
Here is a picture of R. Weinberg and R. Shulman in Montreux. It appears in Joseph Friedenson, Heroine of Rescue (Brooklyn, 1984), p. 230.

[4] R. Samson Raphael Hirsch, in his commentary to Gen. 24:67, writes as follows:
Like the marriage of the first Jewish son [Jacob], Jewish marriages, most Jewish marriages, are contracted, not by passion but by reason and judgment. Parents, relations and friends consider which young people are really suited to each other, bring them together, and then love grows more and more, the more they get to know each other. But most non-Jewish marriages are made by what they call “love”, and one has only to glance at the novels depicting life to notice what a gulf there usually yawns between the “love” before marriage and after, how rapid and insipid everything then seems, how different from all the glamour one had imagined etc. etc. Such “love” is blind, every step into the future brings disappointment. But of Jewish marriage it says: ויקח את רבקה ותהי לו לאשה ויאהבה. There the wedding is not the culmination but the seed, the root of love!
The Malbim is another pre-haredi figure who speaks of love coming after marriage and cites Gen. 24:67. See his commentary to Deut. 24:1 (p. 169b). Yet he differs from others who make the same general point in that he acknowledges that at the beginning (which appears to mean even before marriage) there is indeed a “spark of love,” זיק אהבה. In context, these words might only mean a healthy attraction. The Malbim continues that the essence of love between a man and woman comes only after marriage:
ונמצא שעקר האהבה היתה נגלית רק אחר הנשואין.
R. Hayyim Hirschensohn, whose outlook was as far from a haredi perspective as can be imagined, also points to Gen. 24:67 as providing the proper approach to love and marriage. He even throws in a negative comment about American mores which is not what most would expect to come from him. See Apiryon 3 (1926), p. 29:
ותהי לו לאשה ויאהביה, לא כמנהג אמריקא שהאהבה בא קודם הנשואין ומתה עם הנשואין, אבל יצחק אהב את רבקה אחרי הנשואין.
Reading all of these passages shows us how much has changed both culturally and sociologically. I don’t think there is a parent in the Modern Orthodox world who would support a child’s marriage if the son or daughter was not convinced that he/she loved the future spouse.
I asked a friend if in the haredi world people would ever say that the bride and groom loved each other (i.e., before marriage). He replied:
לא היו אומרים, אבל אצל הישיבתיים זה בסדר גמור – ואולי גם יותר טוב – שיהיה אהבה ביניהם, אבל לא היו מביעים את זה, קוראים לזה chemistry, רוצים שיהיה chemistry ביניהם לפני שסוגרים את השידוך. אצל חסידים זה לא מקובל.
Radak, in his commentary to Gen. 24:67, is not concerned with using the verse to show that love should only come after marriage, and indeed, in his day this was generally not even an option. Yet in discussing the verse he makes a very telling comment, as true today as in his times:
רוב בני אדם אוהבים נשותיהם.
“Most men love their wives.” If you read Hirsch’s grand rhetoric you feel carried away with the purity and perfection of Jewish love after marriage. Radak, however, brings you down to the real world, where unfortunately the truth is that not all men really love their wives.

[5] See, however, Gen. 29:18, 20, where it says that Jacob loved Rachel, and this was before he married her. In Gen. 29:30 the verse states: ויאהב גם את רחל מלאה. Most understand this to mean that while Jacob loved Leah, he loved Rachel more. However, according to one interpretation of the Tosafists, Jacob did not love Leah at all. See Tosafot ha-Shalem al Torah, Nevi’im, u-Khetuvim, vol. 3, p. 145:
ויבא גם אל רחל ויאהב גם: ב’ פעמים גם, אין ריבוי אחר ריבוי אלא למעט, מיעט את לאה מן האהבה, שלא אהב אותה כלל, שנאמר “וירא ה’ כי שנואה לאה”.
See also Nahmanides, Commentary to Genesis 29:31: ולכן שנאה יעקב. He also offers an alternative explanation.
[6] Tiv ha-Emunah (5769 ed.), p. 142.                                         
[7] Devarim be-Itam (Tel Aviv, 1959), p. 57.
[8] Arugat ha-Bosem (Huszt, 1913), parashat Emor, p. 52a.
[9] Humash in Perush ha-Arizal (Jerusalem, 1993), Song of Songs 6:5 (p. 295).
[10] There is a story in yeshiva circles that before R. Isaac Hutner went to Berlin, he was supposed to marry R. Sher’s daughter, whose name was Chava Miriam.
R. Weinberg mentions both R. Sher and R. Shulman in his letter to Samuel Atlas, dated Jan. 17, 1950. (The letter is found in the Jewish Theological Seminary Library, Samuel Atlas collection.) The young rosh yeshiva R. Weinberg refers to is R. Chaim Kreiswirth, who was the son-in-law of the martyred R. Abraham Grodzinski. In this letter R. Weinberg frankly explains why he could not accept a position at Hebrew Theological College in Chicago.
וכן הדבר בשיקאגו. הרב המנוח שאול זילבר כתב לי קודם פרוץ המלחמה ואח”כ כמה וכמה מכתבים ובקשני שאבוא אליהם. גם ידידי הרב רגנסבורג כתב לי. ויש לי שם ידיד אוהב ומעריץ גדול, הרב ר’ אפרים עפשטיין, אחד מחבשי הקוראטוריום של בית המדרש לתורה וגם הוא הפציר בי לבוא לאמיריקה. ובכ”ז לא זכרו אותי בשעה שנפנתה משרת “ראש הישיבה” ונתנוה לאחר. אפשר שרצו באדם צעיר ואפשר שיד סלאבודקי באמצע. הראש ישיבה החדש הוא חתנו של ר’ אברהם ווארשאווער הי”ד, מי שהי’ מנהל ישיבת סלאבודקי. שמעתי שהוא דרש שיתנו לו משרה בישיבת סלאבודקי אשר בבני ברק. טען טענת ירושה. אבל ר’ אייזיק שער נ”י וחתנו ר”מ שולמן שהם כוננו את ישיבת סלאבודקי בבני ברק דחוהו ולפיכך הצטרכו למצוא לו מקום חדש . . .
עכ”פ אי אפשר לי עכשיו לחשוב ע”ד קבלת מינוי בביהמ”ד אשר בשיקאגו. הנ”ל הוא ראש הישיבה ולי אי אפשר לעמוד תחת מרותו של אדם צעיר, ואפילו יהי’ גדול שבגדולים. וצריך אתה לדעת, כי לביהמ”ד זה יש אופי של ישיבה ונוהגים בה כל מנהגי ישיבה, בכבודים ובתוארים וכו’ וכו’ וא”כ איך אפשר לי לעמוד במחיצתם והם ינהגו בי מנהג זלזול כנהוג בישיבה למי שאינו “הראש”.
ב”ה יש לי תלמידים שתופסים משרות רבנות בערים גדולות וגם בבמשלה העברית שבא”י יש לי תלמידים. ומשום כבודם בלבד אסור לי להעשות אסקופה בשביל פרנסה.
Regarding broken engagements, here is the front page of Doar ha-Yom, April 28, 1926 (called to my attention by Moshe Dembitzer).

As you can see, there is an ad wishing R. Kook mazal tov on the engagement of his daughter, Basya, to R. Hayyim Walkin, the son of R. Aaron Walkin. R. Hayyim Walkin would later break this engagement and marry the daughter of R. Yaakov Shapiro, who was the Rosh Yeshiva of Volozhin. After R. Shapiro’s death R. Walkin became Rosh Yeshiva (and was later martyred in the Holocaust). See here.           
[11] Edah Journal 3:2 (Elul 5763), p. 8, available here.
[12] Regarding R. Baruch Epstein’s supposed conversations with his aunt, Rayna Basya – conversations that I have argued here were invented by R. Epstein and thus cannot be regarded as having any historical value – see also Eliyana Adler’s fine article, “Reading Rayna Batya: The Rebellious Rebbetzin as Self Reflection,” Nashim 16 (Fall 2008), pp. 130-152. Another completely fictional account is provided by R. Hayyim Haikel Greenberg in Beit Yaakov 8 (Tevet 5720).

Greenberg has R. Hayyim Ozer Grodzinski pull out Ma’yan Ganim from his bookshelf and read from it during a discussion about the Beis Yaakov school system. Had R. Hayyim Ozer actually had this rare book in his library he would have known that it is a book of melitzah letters, not a book of responsa as stated by Greenberg. (R. Epstein was responsible for creating the false notion that Ma’yan Ganim is a book of responsa. As shown in my post referred to in the previous paragraph, R. Epstein never actually saw Ma’yan Ganim, and I can now add, neither did Greenberg.)
[13] Encyclopaedia Judaica, vol. 3, col. 397.
[14] See Robert Bonfil, Rabbis and Jewish Communities in Renaissance Italy, trans. Jonathan Chipman (London and Washington, 1993),  p. 139.
[15] See Max Grunwald, “Kleine Beiträge zur jűdischen Kulturgeschichte,” Mitteilungen zur jűdischen Volkskunde 19 (1906), p. 112. We know of love charms from ancient times as well. Sefer ha-Razim, which was written in either the tannaitic or amoraic period, records a spell that will cause a woman to fall in love with you. See Michael Satlow, Jewish Marriage in Antiquity (Princeton, 2001), p. 130. Mif’alot Elokim is a book of segulot that has been printed many times since first appearing in 1710. Here is the title page of the Lemberg 1858 edition.

In ma’arekhet aleph, s.v. אהבה, it contains a number of segulot to help women get rid of their “love sickness.” Shimon Steinmetz pointed out to me that R. Jacob Zahalon (17th century), Otzar ha-Hayyim (Venice, 1683), p. 58b, also explains איך יתרפא חולי אהבה. Yet unlike the segulot that appear in Mif’alot Elokim, Zahalon actually has some real psychological insight. His advice is to think about the flaws of the person you are infatuated with, to occupy yourself with other things (that way you won’t be focused on the object of your infatuation), and to move to a different city.
The phrase חולי האהבה is used by Maimonides in Mishneh Torah, Hilkhot Teshuvah 10:3 (חולת אהבה appears in Song of Songs 2:5). He states:
What is the love of God that is befitting? It is to love the Eternal with a great and exceeding love so strong that one’s soul shall be knit up with the love of God, and one should be continually enraptured by it, like a love-sick individual, whose mind is at no time free from his passion for a particular woman, the thought of her filling his heart at all times, when sitting down or rising up, when he is eating or drinking.
Although some have described Maimonides as akin to Spock when it comes to emotions, anyone who reads the passage just quoted will see that Maimonides understood very well what being in love is all about.
[16] Gadol Shimushah (Jerusalem, 1994), p. 47. 
[17] Mishnat ha-Nazir (Jerusalem, 2005), pp. 26-27.
[18] See Mishnat ha-Nazir, pp. 27-28.
[19] Rabbi Hayyim Yosef David Azulai (Jerusalem, 1959), vol. 1, p. 161.
[20] Ibid., p. 559. Benayahu informs us that the first passage in brackets is written above the text in the manuscript.
[21] Actually, מאורשה, see Berakhot 57a.

[22] A friend in the haredi world commented as follows: “Why is this different than the imagery used in שיר השירים? Or in the zemer written by the אריז”ל and sung at my Friday night seudah every week: יחבק לה בעלה?” To this I replied that if someone today would write an erotic poem and say that it really represented God’s love for Israel, it would nevertheless be put in herem.
[23] Regarding the words עלה זית (and עלה תאנה), Samuel David Luzzatto points out that in Biblical Hebrew the word עלה is used for singular and plural. This is similar to how the word פרי is singular and plural in biblical Hebrew. Later Hebrew created the words עלים and פירות. That is why people began to write עלי זית, something which upsets the purist Luzzatto. See his letter at the end of R. Abraham Bedersi, Hotem Tokhnit (Amsterdam, 1865).


Assorted Matters

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Assorted Matters
Marc B. Shapiro
My next post will take some time to prepare, but there are some other matters that I want to bring to readers’ attention, in particular a few books that I recently received. Due to space considerations, I couldn’t include these in my last post.
1. For those interested in the history of Lithuanian yeshivot, the last few years have been very fruitful. In 2014 Ben-Tsiyon Klibansky’s Ke-Tzur Halamish appeared. This book is a study of the yeshivot from World War I until the destruction of European Jewry. 2015 saw the appearance of Geoffrey D. Claussen’s Sharing the Burden: Rabbi Simhah Zissel Ziv and the Path of Mussar.[1]In January 2016 Shlomo Tikoshinski’s long-awaited book appeared. Its title is Lamdanut, Musar ve-Elitizm: Yeshivat Slobodka me-Lita le-Eretz Yisrael. The book can be purchased here. Eliezer Brodt is also selling the book and a portion of each sale will go to support the efforts of the Seforim Blog, so I also encourage purchasing from him.

This outstanding book is full of new information, and Tikoshinski had access to a variety of private archives and letters that help bring to life a world now lost. Lamdanut, Musar ve-Elitizm is also a crucial source in understanding the development of religious life in Eretz Yisrael in the two decades before the creation of the State.

When you read about the Slobodka students, and later the students of Chevron, it is impossible not to see how very different the student culture was then from what is found today in haredi yeshivot, including the contemporary Yeshivat Chevron. Some of this differences can be explained by the subtitle of the book where the word “elitism” is mentioned. Unlike the situation today, Tikoshinski discusses an era when very few people studied in yeshivot. Those who chose to devote themselves to Torah study were regarded by the traditional community, and more importantly they regarded themselves, as the elite of Jewish society. One should not underestimate how such a self-image impacted the lives of the students.
R. Moshe Finkel was a part of the story Tikoshinski tells. He was the son of R. Nosson Zvi Finkel and son-in-law of R. Moshe Mordechai Epstein, and taught at the yeshiva both in Slobodka and in Chevron. Unfortunately, he unexpectedly died in 1925 at the young age of 43. Here is a photo of R. Moshe Finkel with his wife Sarah. (This picture does not appear in Tikoshinski’s book.)
Among the pictures included in Tikoshinksi’s book is the following. Can anyone guess who the one on the right is?
2. In the last post I included a picture of R. Moshe Feinstein and R. Soloveitchik. Here is another picture of R. Moshe, the Rav, and R. Shneur Kotler.

Here is a picture of R. Soloveitchik walking down the aisle at a wedding. Next to him is R. Samuel Walkin, and in front of R. Walkin is R. Moshe Feinstein.. I thank Dr. Dov Zakheim for sending me this picture.

In older pictures you find rabbis walking down the aisle at weddings. Has anyone been to a wedding where this is still done?
3. Yeshiva University recently acquired the archive of the late Rabbi Louis Bernstein (1928-1995), an important Modern Orthodox pulpit rabbi in the second half of the twentieth century. The collection contains an interesting letter from R. Jehiel Jacob Weinberg, in which R. Weinberg mentions that R. Soloveitchik used to sometimes come to his shiurim at the Berlin Rabbinical Seminary. R. Weinberg also speaks about how outstanding R. Soloveitchik was, and how even in his younger years his greatness was recognized by all the Torah sages of the generation.[2]

Also of interest in the collection is material relating to a controversial incident, or actually two incidents, that R. Bernstein was involved with. In 1985 R. Bernstein, who at the time was president of the Rabbinical Council of America, agreed to deliver a speech at the Conservative Rabbinical Assembly convention. That would have been controversial enough. However, things got even more heated when it was announced that the RCA would be reciprocating by having the head of the Rabbinical Assembly, Rabbi Alexander M. Shapiro, speak at the RCA convention.
This became a major dispute not just between the RCA and the more right wing elements in Orthodoxy, but within the RCA itself. The New York Times even covered the matter. See here. Unfortunately for R. Bernstein, the weight of all the opposition came down on him even though the decision for him to speak at the RA convention, and to have Rabbi Shapiro speak before the RCA, was not an individual decision but was voted on by members of the RCA’s Executive Committee.
In a future post I will discuss this matter in greater detail, and also deal with the role of R. Soloveitchik. For now, let me share this strong letter from R. Nissan Alpert to R. Bernstein, in which in addition to protesting Rabbi’s Shapiro upcoming speech, R. Alpert states that if the event goes forward he sees no way that he can remain a member of the RCA.[3]

4. Recently, Ha-Mashbir, vol. 2, appeared, edited by R. Yissachar Dov Hoffman and R. Ovadiah Hoffman. This volume, which can be purchased at Biegeleisen, is dedicated to R. Ovadiah Yosef and is full of worthwhile articles. Particularly noteworthy are the contributions by R. Meir Mazuz, R. Baruch Simon (focusing on R. Ovadiah’s shiurim at Yeshiva University), R. Pinhas Zebihi on the practice in Gibraltar that men in mourning do not wear a tallit on Shabbat (actually, this is only the case for the first month of mourning), and an important and lengthy article by R. Eliyahu Kohen on R. Ovadiah’s attitude towards Zionism, the State of Israel, and the army. The various articles in the book are supplemented by notes from the two editors, each of whom is a scholar in his own right.
I would also like to call attention to the wonderful introduction to the book by R. Ovadiah Hoffman. He speaks about the need to reject religious extremism that leads to the delegitimization of Torah scholars just because they belong to a different camp. As I mentioned in my last post, this is a great problem in Israeli haredi society, and R. Ovadiah Yosef in particular was subjected to all sorts of attacks from small-minded people who could not recognize the simple truth R. Ovadiah Hoffman speaks about.
דא עקא, קול חרדה שמענו, פחד ואין שלום. בפרי מעללינו הובלנו לעידן של מצוקת הדעת, בו דעות מיעוט ודוקטורינות דתיות של רב אחד ותלמידיו שאינן עולות בקנה אחד עם ההשקפה המסורתית המקובלת של רב אחר וקהלתו, מבוססות ככל שיהיו, לא די שאינן מופרכות לפי כללי התורה ובאופן רציונלי אלא נדחות בשאט נפש ומבוטלות כלאחר יד, ופעמים בדעת קדומה של ביטול הדברים למפרע. . . . כל יום שני שומעים על עוד אדם ש”נפסל” או “נמחק” ונרדף עד לחייו בנסיבות עלובות. מלבד שהיום אין דנין דיני נפשות, גם אין אחידות או סמכות מקובלת או מועצה מוכרת בין כל קהילות ישראל, אפילו את”ל הוא חטא בניו ובנתיו מה חטאו? כמה משפחות נהרסות על חשבון הרודנות הזאת. ברור כי עוד לא זכינו להמשך הנבואה: ושקט ושאנן ואין מחריד (ירמיה ל, י).
I thought of R. Hoffman’s point this week when I received a copy of a new book that needs to be seen to be believed. (Thanks to Meir Yosef Frankel for sending it.) The title that appears on the top of each page is שרידי-אש זרה, and the book is designed to show that R. Jehiel Jacob Weinberg was a complete heretic. Interestingly, the author doesn’t know how old I am as he refers to me as a student of R. Weinberg: פרופסור אחד מתלמידיו הותיקים. I will discuss this book in more detail in a future post.Returning to Ha-Mashbir, the second page, where it gives information on how to submit material, states as follows:

בעז”ה ית”ש בכרכים הבאים יודפסו גם מאמרים שאינם מרוכזים על משנת רבינו, הלכה מנהג ומחקר, ויפתח”ו שערי”ה תמיד לציבור הרחב. . . . גם לתגובות ולביקר”ת מבוא פתחים, כולם יתקבלו בברכה.
I have underlined certain words that have double apostrophes. This is a sign that there is a melitzah play on words, something that the editor R. Ovadiah Hoffman is quite good with. The first example, ויפתח”ו שערי”ה תמיד, is a play on Isaiah 60:11: ופתחו שעריך תמיד. The second example, ולביקור”ת מבוא פתחים, is quite clever. It is a play on Proverbs 8:3: .לפי-קרת מבוא פתחים
5. The ever-productive Menachem Kellner has just published a new book, Gam Hem Nikraim Adam: Ha-Nokhri be-Einei ha-Rambam, available here. This is not just a work of academic scholarship, but is what we can call “engaged scholarship,” in other words, scholarship that is also intent on making a difference in the real world. One of the things that troubles Kellner about contemporary Orthodox Judaism (and he specifically deals with such figures as R. Shlomo Aviner, R. Hershel Schachter, and the authors of Torat ha-Melekh) is the recent turn (or perhaps better, return) to negative portrayals of non-Jews and their spiritual worth. Kellner discusses this in the first section of the book which is titled גילוי דעת, and you can read it here. See also his interview with Alan Brill here.
In the book, Kellner argues that Maimonides sees no essential difference between Jews and non-Jews, and it is this view that Kellner wishes his readers to adopt. He refers to it as “Maimonides’ universalism.” Responses to Kellner’s book will be of two types: Those that deal with his interpretation of Maimonides and those that focus on what Kellner has to say about the contemporary scene and how Maimonides relates to it. This is a very exciting book which further establishes Kellner as an important public intellectual, and shows us once again why Kellner’s work has had a significant impact on the study of medieval Jewish philosophy. I hope to take up some of Kellner’s points in a future post.
7. R. Simcha Feuerman has recently published Et Lifrosh ve-Et le-Ehov. This small book, available at Biegeleisen, focuses on issues of shelom bayit. What makes this book significant is that R. Feuerman is also a licensed social worker with great experience in the field. This makes his book different than many previous books on the topic authored by well-intentioned people who never actually had any practical experience. As is fitting for a book like this, sexual matters are also discussed, and R. Feuerman mentions (p. 13) that the book was shown to rabbis and dayanim. Yet other than R. Gavriel Zinner, who penned a haskamah, none of the other rabbis chose to be public in their support because of their fear of being attacked by extremists who don’t think that these matters should be publicly discussed.
R. Feuerman also deals with the matter of psychological counseling and possible conflicts between the role of the psychologist, who is not supposed to be judgmental, and the traditional obligation to rebuke those who are sinning. As part of this essay (pp. 88ff.), R. Feuerman discusses the value of Freud’s insights (and notes the advances that have been made since his time). I find this significant since for many in the haredi world, and they are the ones who will be reading this book, Freud is almost up there with Darwin when it comes to objects of derision. It is also worth noting that the author uses “lomdus” to make psychological arguments.
8. For anyone who hasn’t yet picked up my new book, Changing the Immutable, the YU Seforim Sale is selling it at a great price. See here. Regarding Changing the Immutable, let me also add that because of the book’s last chapter, a number of people have been upset and have even characterized me as a haredi apologist. That is not the case at all, and Adam Ferziger, in his just-published review here, gets it right.

 

[1] Also worthy of note is Ernest Gugenheim, Letters from Mir: A Torah World in the Shadow of the Shoah (New York, 2014). One piece of interesting information appears on p. 106, where in a 1938 letter Gugenheim writes: “Tomorrow [the day before Purim] will be a day of fasting. Here, they are rather meikil with respect to this viewpoint, and many bachurim, too weak, do not fast completely. It is true that every day for them is a day of half-fasting, such that they are quite weakened.” Thanks to Jonathan Hirsch for calling this passage to my attention.
[2] R. Weinberg’s letter is found in the Rabbi Louis Bernstein archives, box 3. I thank the Yeshiva University Archives for granting me permission to publish it.
[3] R. Alpert’s letter is found in the Rabbi Louis Bernstein archives, box 6, Folder no.: RCA etc. 1985. I thank the Yeshiva University Archives for granting me permission to publish it.


An Unknown Picture

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An Unknown Picture
Marc B. Shapiro
In the post that went up earlier today, I mention that in the future I plan to share an unknown picture of R. Moshe Feinstein and R. Joseph B. Soloveitchik. My intention was to include this picture in a future post, but that could be awhile, so here it is.

 

It was taken at the wedding of R. Moshe Dovid Tendler’s daughter, Rivka, to R. Shabtai Rappaport. The man on the left is R. Isaac Tendler, R. Moshe Dovid’s father. The wedding took place at the Pioneer Country Club, Greenfield Park, N.Y., on June 17, 1971. I thank Jack Prince who was at the wedding for allowing me to make a copy of the picture in his possession.