Goldschmidt Machzorim On Sale Magnes Press is having a sale on the Goldschmidt Yom Tov Machzorim (edited by Yonah Frankel). The sale price is $43 for all three – Pesach, Shavout, and Sukkot. They can be purchased here. Marc B. Shapiro: “Mi-Yosef ad Yosef Lo Kam ke-Yosef” Seforim blog contributor Dr. Marc B. Shapiro, professor of Judaic Studies at the University of Scranton, has just published a review essay (“Mi-Yosef ad Yosef Lo Kam ke-Yosef”) in English of the following three books Hayyav, Mishnato u- Mahalkhav ha-Politiyim shel ha-Rav Ovadiah Yosef by Zvi Aloush and Yossi Elituv (Ben Porat Yosef: Or Yehudah, 2004); Maran Ovadiah Yosef: Ha-Biographyah by Nitzan Chen and Anshil Pepper (Jerusalem, 2004); Mi-Maran ad Maran: Mishnato ha-Hilkhatit shel ha-Rav Ovadiah Yosef by Binyamin Lau, (Tel Aviv, 2005) in Meorot Journal – A Forum of Modern Orthodox Discourse, formerly The Edah Journal, published byYeshivat Chovevei Torah. To download Professor Shapiro’s article, see here [PDF]. Review: Jay Berkovitz’s”Rites and Passages: The Making of Jewish Culture in Modern France” (Hebrew) מסורת Merkaz Zalman Shazar has published Jay Berkovitz’s book discussing French ומהפיכה-תרבות יהודית בצרפת בראשית העת החדשה Jewry and specifically the changes and challenges of modernity. This book is an expanded version of the English Rites and Passages: The Beginnings of Modern Jewish Culture in France, 1650-1860 (UPenn Press) which is available at the previous link and here. Both versions are invaluable for viewing French Jewry and France gernally, a county typically neglected in milieu of Jewish history which tends to focus on Central or Eastern Europe. But, as France experienced emancipation in the late 18th century it is important to see how French Jews dealt with their new found freedom. As Berkovitz correctly points out to understand the impact of emancipation, one needs to examine the history beforehand as well – thus he begins in the 17th century. Additionally, this book is important in some of the persons it discusses. For instance, there is an extensive discussion of R. Aaron Worms the author of the Me’ori Or. The Me’ori Or – a seven volume work which some may be familiar due to his suggestion that one should recite the blessings of “thank God for not making me a woman or a non-Jew” silently. (See Tradition 29:4 and the articles by Joel B. Wolowelsky and Emanuel Feldman and Shu”t Beni Banim 4:1). While this is perhaps his most well known opinion, this work contains a treasure trove of information. As is evident from R. Yosef Zechariah Stern, a rather erudite person in his own respect, who cites the Me’ori Or extensively. As one can tell from R. Aaron Worm’s opinion for the blessings, he was a sort of iconoclast. While there have been a handful of articles discussing R. Aaron, this book now places him in his full historical context. Berkovitz fleshes out how R. Aaron fits with French change generally and further develops the thought and impact of R. Aaron. Aside from his Me’ori Or, R. Aaron was also part of the Sanhedrin which Napoleon convened, and Berkovitz includes R. Aaron’s address to that body. And while Rabbi David Sintzheim is perhaps the most well known, Berkovitz discusses the (important) impact R. Aaron had on this body. This impact is not limited to the Sanhedrin, but a deeper understanding of what R. Aaron was advocating places him in the forefront of modernity. All in all, Berkovitz’s book is a worthwhile contribution to understanding modernity and some of the methods that prior generations have adopted in dealing with its challenges. Uncensored Books (Dr. Marc B. Shapiro) Uncensored Books Marc B. Shapiro Dan Rabinowitz has provided many examples of censorship in seforim (examples which I look forward to using – with acknowledgment of course – in my own forthcoming book on the subject). What I would like to call attention to are two examples where the publishers would have certainly censored these texts had they known whom was being discussed. Presumably, what I mention now has already been pointed out to them and will be excised if the books are reprinted. 1. In the recently published volume of R. Eliyahu Dessler’s letters (Bnei Brak, 2004), p. 166, there is a 1942 letter to Dr. Dov Hyman discussing the Gateshead Kollel. After mentioning how the kollel includes the best young bochurim in England, those who studied in the great yeshivot in Eastern Europe, he writes: יש שמה צעיר א’ יליד מנשסתר (הוא היחיד מילידי המדינה) ולא אגזם אף מה שהוא אם אומר שמעודי לא ראיתי עלוי בעמקות יחד עם שאר הכשרונות כמוהו זולתי אחד, הוא גדול גדול ממש וכמעט א”א לרדת לסוף עומק דעתו This passage is referring to none other than the late Rabbi Louis Jacobs — then referred to as Leibl — who was born in Manchester in 1920. In Jacob’s autobiography, Helping with Inquiries (London, 1989), pp. 42, 54, 59 he writes: When I joined the Kolel, soon after its inception, the other members had all studied at one or other of the famous Lithuanian Yeshivot – Telz, Mir, Slabodka, Kamenitz, Baranowitz, Grodno, and Radin – before coming to England, with the exception of a fiery young Hungarian, Zusya Waltner. As the “babe” of the Kolel (I was only twenty years of age, while some of my colleagues were several years older) and as one who had only studied in a Lithuanian Yeshivah in spirit (I was, so to speak, an honorary Telzer) I was welcomed very good-heartedly by the other members, but with an amused tolerance. Before leaving my account of the Gatesehad Kolel, I feel it would be incomplete unless I said something more about Rabbi Dessler, one of the most remarkable men I have ever met. .I cannot and do not want to forget what I owe to Rabbi Dessler. Although I was never officially his pupil, he was, in many respects, my teacher par excellence. He taught me and so many others to see Judaism in sophisticated terms. He was a great man whose place among the Gedoley Yisrael of the twentieth century remains uncontested. 2. Recently many books by the Gaon R. Eliyahu Rabinowitz- Teomim (the Aderet) have appeared, by publishers with very different hashkafot. The volume of teshuvot, Ma’aneh Eliyahu, was published by Yeshivat Or Etzion in Israel, whose Rosh Yeshivah is R. Hayyim Druckman. It is obvious that the editors have no knowledge of American Jewish history, otherwise, the words I quote (from p. 352) would never have been allowed to appear. The editors no doubt assumed that the Aderet was attacking some phony. The name Jacob Joseph means nothing to them. וידענו היטב היטב את האיש ואת שיחו תהלוכותיו ותחבולותיו מתחילה ועד סוף . ואותו הרב ר’ יעקב, שלא שמש תלמידי חכמים ומלך מעצמו, ע”פ תבונתו, כי פקח גדול הוא, אינו מגיע לקרסולי תלמידי תלמידיו של הגאון חתם סופר ז”ל, לא בתורה ולא במעשים טובים, והרי לפנינו שעזב עיר ווילנא תפארת ליטא, והלך לנוע אל ארצות אמעריקא להיות שם רב ראשון בנויארק כחלומו אשר חלם. והרואה דברי הר”מ פ”ו ה”א מדיעות, יעוי’ שם היטב בלשונו, יראה עד כמה מלאה לבו יראת שמים לעשות כן He goes on demeaning the Chief Rabbi of New York, but you get the picture. As long as I am talking about the very interesting sefer Ma’aneh Eliyahu, let me also call attention to something in it that is relevant to what is in the news today. I refer to the problem of rabbis covering up cases of sexual abuse. In no. 32 the Aderet deals with a case where a girl was raped by two young Jewish men. Her family wanted to report this to the police, so that the rapists would receive a fitting punishment. The Aderet writes: ודברתי אל לבם להשקיט הדבר, לבל יתחלל שם ישראל בעמים מהפקרות ופריצות צעירי הנערים, לאנוס ולנאוף ולחלל שבת ולרצוח, וגם יש סכנה בדבר לריב עם עזי פנים כמותם, ושמעו אלי We see from this that the practice of covering up these sorts of things is hardly a recent phenomenon. R. Eliezer Waldenberg’s Hilkhot HaMedinah In light of the previous post regarding the Hilkhot HaMedinah, I have been able to obtain further information of the ban. The BaDaTz issued an Issur (reproduced below) noting that Hilkhot HaMedinah was published without the permission of the descendants of R. Waldenberg and the descendants object to its publication. Although Hilkhot HaMedinah is not mentioned by name – instead only “the books printed after his [R. Waldenberg’s] death” – to my knowledge the only book published after his death has been Hilkhot HaMedinah. What is ironic is R. Waldenberg appears to have addressed this very issue – people printing books of those who have died without the permission of the descendants. R. Waldenberg (in Tzitz Eliezer, vol. 20, no. 51, pp. 129-130) was asked about books published where the author reserved the right to publication and is now dead and his descendants are not going to publish it can it be published without their permission? R. Waldenberg responded that in such a case one is allowed to republish such a book. R. Waldenberg marshals the case of the where the author of the Kitzur Shulhan Orach, R. Ganzfried, was asked to republish his own work with the commentary of the Mesgeret haShulhan. R. Ganzfried declined. But, when R. Ganzfried died the author of the Mesgeret haShulhan did exactly that – he republished theKitzur with his own commentary. The Mesgeret haShulhan obtained haskamot to justify what he did, one from the author of the Shaul u-Mashiv who explicitly permitted the republication even though the author objected during his lifetime.