On cutting off peyos to comply with a Czarist edict, 1845

This story from a Dublin newspaper, the Freeman's Journal and Daily Commercial Advertise (July 4, 1845) concerns the Tsarist edicts regarding traditional Jewish dress. According to this story, in Berdichev some Jews complied, and showed up in shul with their peyos cut off. They were then attacked by Chassidim. The men explained that they were only complying with the law, and the reply was that the Tsar has no authority in religious law. Interestingly, the article states that they said that the Tsar "might be the God of the Javanim" but not theirs. It explains, correctly but without comprehension, that "so the Jews call the Russians, as properly the Greeks." First time I've seen this noted in such an old source, in English no less. In any case, the article continues to report a rumor that two of the young men were killed! It should perhaps be pointed out that this is exceedingly unlikely, simply because if so then as far as I can tell no one has ever heard of this before (you know, the time Chassidim killed two young men who cut their peyos), and that would be unlikely. The correspondent reports that 15 Chassidim were sent to Siberia, and ironically would have been forced to "change their national dress" with their peyos the first to go.

A copy of the ketubah of a giyoret in New York from 1827

Nice new web site on the CJH site, called the Early New York Synagogue Archive (link). Contains some interesting archival material, including, for example, this bound collection of what are in effect copies of ketubbot from marriages performed in Congregation B'nai Jeshurun between 1826 and 1841.

Here is one example from this book, a marriage performed in 1827. The groom was named Israel Eliezer ben Gershon, and his bride was a convert named Sarah bat Avraham Avinu. Note also that the 200 zuz are also given as dolars ma'ot amerika, "Dollars, the currency of America."

A Christian observer calls attention to the lack of decorum in synagogues, and the lack of attention by London's Chief Rabbi, in 1810

This excerpt from the book The Obligations of Christians to Attempt the Conversion of the Jews (with the Hebrew title הנה מלאך יבוא לך) by an anonymous "Presbyter of the Church of England," (London 1810) compares the prayer that can be seen in London's Great Synagogue to a scene at the Stock Exchange, while "their chief Rabbi" - Solomon Hirschell - sits by "seeming to care for none of these things."

More remarkable than the criticism is the footnote, where the author basically apologizes to Jews if he caused any offense by this description, and even says that he would have kept quiet about it, except that he believes printing it has a to'elet, a purpose, in that it can stir up Christians to remedy the lack of devotion among Jews! you know, by converting them.

The above can be found on pp. 8 - 9 of the 4th edition (1813) ; the above image was digitally manipulated to put it all one one page. It also appears on pg. 9 of the 1st edition, and not one word was changed.

Jewish peddlers

Alsace, 1790. How do you suppose the tied the string to the far branch?

Would you like fries with that?

Or whatever they say.

McDonald's. Thanks, Google.

An amusing foray into philology

Just for fun I thought I'd discuss an amateur foray into the wooly world of groping in the dark for a plausible translation of a - maybe - Latin word in a rabbinic text. A friend of mine is doing some research - on what I have no idea - and asked me if I had any idea what the following word from the Yalkut Shimoni Tehillin 80 (#830) means:

יכרסמנה חזיר מיער" זה רומולוס, "וזיז שדי ירענה" זה האיסקראטורין"

So of course the answer is no, I have no idea. Here's the verse:

יד  יְכַרְסְמֶנָּה חֲזִיר מִיָּעַר;    וְזִיז שָׂדַי יִרְעֶנָּה.

14 The boar out of the wood doth ravage it, that which moveth in the field feedeth on it.

So the first part is easy, it mentions Romulus, the legendary founder of Rome. Plus, in rabbinic symbolism the boar means Rome.

My immediate, definitely mistaken idea, was that the second part referred to Greece, and the reason why is because איסקראטורין, uh, sounds Greek. So I thought really hard about it and concluded that it was a metathesis/corruption of the word aristokratia, and refers to the Greek government.

My interlocutor quickly pointed out that plainly Rome is meant in both parts, and I rethought again and agreed. So my next try was to look at old texts of the Yalkut to make sure our איסקראטורין was at least spelled right. Well, not texts. One text. I looked at the Livorno 1650 edition (link) and noticed that in this text the word "Romulus" is changed to "melekh"/king and reads "האוסטרולוטון." Although I have not yet pursued this lead - forgive me, sometimes I would like to post mid-thought - it definitely indicated to me that we cannot consider איסקראטורין to be a perfect text. Could be a transcription error or corruption. In any event, I looked at a late 19th century edition of the Yalkut which has a glossary and source list on the bottom of the pages, and the editor gave סופרים as the translation.

After an embarrassing few minutes leafing through Masseches Sofrim (including the 1799 Hamburg Latin edition) I realized that he meant to define איסקראטורין, not cite a rabbinic source for it. So thinking Romish I decided that perhaps איסקראטורין is the Latin word scriptor, which means scribe, writer or author. To get at this, we of course disregard the rabbinic plural suffix ין- and also the prefix א, which is common enough in Hebrew, which does not deal well with initial consonant clusters (cf, Achashverosh, aspaklaria, etc.). Left with סקראטור, and armed with the opinion of the Yalkut editor I mentioned, I deemed it close enough to scriptor and hoped no one would know the difference. Finally, I admit that I have no idea how the second part of the verse is supposed to mean Roman scribes or sofrim or scriptor.

Thoughts?

והצדיקו את הצדיק - explaining a bibliographical error in the Seder Ha-dorot

Bernhard Felsenthal wrote an article in the first American Jewish Historical Quarterly (1892) called The Jewish Congregation in Surinam (link). It mentions David Pardo, who left London and lived out his final years in Surinam, until his death in 1713. Pardo is known for his having published his father's abbreviated Shulchan Aruch, the Shulchan Tahor (and also translating it into Spanish), in 1686 in Amsterdam. Felsenthal added the following amusing footnote:

Putting aside for the moment that David Pardo, the Hazzan in London, only published it, but actually his father Joseph was its author - the note states that in the Seder Ha-doros of Rabbi Yechiel Heilprin, 18th century Minsker ga'on and historian/bibliograpaher par excellence, the author of Shulchan Tahor is given as Baer London. And indeed it is.

The excerpt I reproduce above is from the original, first edition of the Seder Ha-doros (Karlsruhe 1769). As it happens, Felsenthal says he used the Warsaw 1882 edition. In any case, Felsenthal explains what happened - or as we shall see, what he thinks happened. Rabbi Heilprin looked at the title page and must have read it quickly for he read "בער לונדן" (Baer London) instead of "בעיר לונדן" (in the City of London), to say nothing of not having properly read that title page at all. Here is the title page of the 1686 Amsterdam edition:

So it says "Printed at the behest of the scholar, sweet singer of Israel [i.e., Hazzan] in the City of London, Rabbi David Pardo." But Heilprin misread - perhaps jotted down a note without looking carefully - and read "be-'ir london" ad "ber london." Adding some flourishes, Felsenthal makes a big deal out of this interesting error and exaggerates that this man who never existed, Baer London, was "made immortal" by Heilprin. Okay, very cute.

In any case, as I said, Felsenthal had the Warsaw 1882 edition in front of him, and he says that here the Seder Ha-doros mentions Baer London twice; once in his list of books - which I showed above - and once in his list of authors. Interestingly, if you look at the 1769 edition you will see that Baer London is not listed among the authors. Here is where Baer London would be listed in the first edition, but he isn't:

These are all the Baers that Heilprin listed as authors.

If you examine later editions, you will see the same thing. So here is the 1858 edition:

And also, there is no Baer London. Baer London is only mentioned in the entry for Shulchan Tahor proper.

However, in the Warsaw 1882 edition we find the following:

Here we see him listed as an author. However, he is in parentheses and the reason is because he, as well as others, were added by the learned editor of this edition, Naftali Maskil Le-Eisan. In other words, the editor of this edition improved upon the earlier ones and added author names missing from the text and the list compiled by Heilprin. After all, if Baer London appears in the list of books, should not his name be given as one of the authors? So although Heilprin did, seemingly, make an error and read "City of London" as "Baer London," he didn't quite immortalize him. More like squeezed him into a lengthy paragraph.

But in any case, it turns out that Heilprin probably made no error at all. No, there was no Baer London. But surely he was capable of reading a simple inscription on a title page, if not the work itself. It turns out that in 1696 a second edition of Shulchan Tahor was published in Franfkfurt. Unfortunately I do not have access to the title page of this edition, however in a wonderful article from 1928 Israel Solomons seems to have independently noticed the same thing as Felsenthal, but he knew more about the Shulchan Tahor itself. In David Nieto and some of his Contemporaries Transactions (Jewish Historical Society of England) , Vol. 12, (1928-1931), pp. 1-101, Solomons writes as follows:

As you can see, whomever put together the 1696 edition somehow managed to misread the title page of the original 1686 edition, and it was that person who read be'ir london as ber london. That person seems to have omitted David Pardo's name, and replace it with "the wise scholar Rabbi Baer of the Congregation of London" (מהרר בער מק"ק לונדין) - which was accurate insofar as Pardo was in London, it just made him Baer. I can only assume that Rabbi Heilprin had before him the 1696 Frankfurt edition and wrote just what it said on the title page. Sure, he omitted מק"ק, but so what? The 1696 Frankfurt Shulchan Tahor said it was printed by Rabbi Baer London, and that is what is repeated in the Seder Ha-doros. The editor of the Warsaw 1882 edition improved it and added all the various author names in the text proper to the list of authors cited in the Seder Ha-doros. If Baer London was "immortalized" it was by Maskil Le-eisan, who plucked a name buried into a paragraph and gave him a real entry. Note that Solomons tells us that the 1696 edition did not even include the introductory paragraphs, that is, all the stuff by and about Pardo. So it is likely that Heilprin did actually read the Shulchan Tahor, it is just that his edition had nothing about the author apart for the mistake on the title page.

Finally, it should be noted that Solomons says that actually it doesn't even say Frankfurt on the title page, but that is what bibliographers say about it. So, for example, we find in the 1826 catalog of the Oppenheimer Collection (Collectio Davidis):

An impression of Jewish Vilna from the 1840s

This appeared in the Jewish Chronicle July 15, 1861. This is Max Lilienthal's account of his first impression of Vilna, which he first visited in 1842. This isn't a particularly obscure account; it is reproduced in Philipson's  Max Lilienthal, American rabbi: life and writings. However, it is interesting because here we see a  carefully chronicled support for the Lithuanian tradition of both velvet and leather yarmulkes.

A Maimonidean political endorsement

Good thing the Rambam has peyos now. החזיר עטרה ליושנה.

e.g., and so on:

Cracking Google Books, a public service announcement

This isn't rocket science, but as per a request, I am posting the following.

A friend of mine, Mar Gavriel, remembered a funny sort of thing. In one of the volumes of the 24-volume strong Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud, its editor James Strachey allowed himself a prim little indulgence, a confession. If he had the chance to redo the project "today" he would have omitted the tedious hyphen in "psycho-analysis," which is no longer used, but for the sake of consistency, the project continued to hyphenate it, perpetuating the archaism. Wait, was it the "tedious hyphen?" Or something else? My friend did not recall and wanted to find the exact words. He came across the page in Google Books - here - and was "pretty sure it used to be searchable," but no longer was. In fact, this happens with Google Books all the time. A book I could search in 2008, now it is a gan na'ul, searchable no more.

However, in no time I showed this to him:

This isn't amazing - it's just that I know that Google often scans multiple copies of the same work, and has an absolutely awful search function. For no good reason that I know you can search for a work by title and Google may give you two copies which it has. Or it may give you one. Or on some days it may give you none. Or if you click the "more editions" link it may give you eleven versions of the same work. Or none. And some may have a "snippet" view, and some may have a regular Preview, and some may have nothing. There seems to be little rhyme or reason. But the point is to know it. If you know it, then you could do as I did: search for The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud, Volume 24 even after you have already come across a version which allows no snippets to appear. And if that didn't work, I would have tried something else. Once I found that this book allows a snippet, I simply put in the word hyphen. And the text was right there. But if it hadn't, then I would have tried tedious, tired, tiresome, as well as words like starting and urge. The idea is to tease Google Books into giving you what you need. You can't always do it, but you can far more often than you'd think, and it's worth trying more than once before prematurely concluding that there is nothing there.

For added fun, now that I know the term is "tiresome hyphen" - and how fun is it that Strachey writes this while he also writes "to-day"? - I searched Google Books again, this time the phrase "tiresome hyphen," and was rewarded with these.

On a guide to decoding Jewish documents and letters (for merchants, you understand) from 1792

Here are a couple of interesting excerpts from a book printed in Leipzig in 1792, the Lehrbuch zur gründlichen Erlernung der jüdischdeutschen Sprache für Beamte, Gerichtsverwandte, Advocaten und insbesondere für Kaufleute* by Gottfried Selig (link).

* Guide for Learning the Jewish-German Language for Civil Servants, Court Officials, Lawyers and Especially Merchants.

It's an absolutely fascinating book (fascinating being relative, I know). As you will understand, the point of this book is to teach one to understand business documents and correspondence written by Jews in Yiddish (oder Judeo-German).

This piece describes the way Hebrew words are given diminutive forms or change gender in Judeo-German; "Rebbe" (Rabbi) becomes Rebbezen, and so on.

This piece, obviously, concerns names. It is interesting because of - the names - and also sometimes how they are written. For example, "Jaunosson," is explained to be Jonathan, David is "Dowid" and so on.

It also includes an extensive abbreviation dictionary, dozens and dozens of examples. We are told, for example, that בל"ט stands for בלשון טומאה, or, Latin, and we see that Groschen were called גדולים, as in ג"ג, or ג' גדולים. German script? גלחות, perhaps meaning "Gothic." It gives עכו"ם as both עובדים כוכבים ומזלות and העובדים כריסטוס ומרים (about this, I blogged here). It also explains ס"ט as סימן טוב.

The dictionary proper includes many interesting entries, naturally, including one for . . . אדוק בזנות (der hurerey nachlausen). For the entry on בענשין there are many examples, in the form of phrases, such as this one: הערט צו רבותי מיר וועלין בענשן.

And so on.

On Yiddish and German, from 1829

Here's an interesting excerpt from a much lengthier multi-part article from 1829, illustrating the differences between Yiddish and German.

One part of the article gives encouragement to Christians in learning how to read and understand Yiddish literature, which is says would be easier than Rabbinic literature:

From The Jews, and Jewish Literature in the Christian Review of 1829 (link).

A rather unsympathetic portrait of the Rebbe of Sadigur from 1887

Here is a rather interesting article, to say the least, about Rabbi Avraham Yaakov Friedmann of Sadigura, from the Salt Lake Weekly Tribune (Jan. 20, 1887). They are not very impressed, is basically the summary. The contents of the article come from the Viennese correspondent in London.

Increase Mather on Gynecandrical Dancing

This is just too much fun.

Here is Increase Mather's pamphlet An Arrow Against Profane and Promiscuous Dancing Drawn out of the Quiver of Scriptures (Boston 1684). You understand, he's against mixed dancing because it may lead to mixed dancing.

Of interest, on p.12 he points out that in the description of Jacob's marriage in Genesis, we read of a marriage, but no dancing! On p. 21 he rhetorically asks, Is this a time for Jigs and Galiards! On p. 23 he explains that David and Miriam's dances were "Religious Dances accomodated to the State of the Old Testament-Church." And, of course, those were not "mixt" dances.

Printing in Roedelheim before Heidenheim?

Who knew?

Shadal series #16 - A partial translation of Shadal's letter about the Samaritans and their script

Actually, I plan to complete the translation, but for today it is partial.

In 1851 Raphael Kirchheim - see here about Kirchheim and his cholent - was working on his annotated edition of the Seven Minor Tractates (link) as well as a work about the Samaritans, intended as an introduction to Massekhet Kutim (link). Before these works were finalized at the printer, he asked Shadal to look it over and give comment. Shadal replied that he did not have the time for that, but he would be happy to send him whatever material he had written about the Samaritans, based on his own researches. Most of it was written in Italian, but Shadal rewrote it in Hebrew. Kirchheim printed the entire letter as an appendix in his Karmei Shomron. It contains some interesting thoughts, and here is my partial translation:

I was overjoyed when I heard the news that you are publishing the Seven Minor Tractates, which for many generations languished in obscurity. Today is a holiday! - to find that you are printing them with explanations and notes; among them, your great book Karmei Shomron which, through your broad learning, you elaborated on the history of the Samaritans and all that pertains to them. In your humility, you asked if I would present you with all that I have to say on your words. However, dear friend, time is short, and your printer is demanding. How can I carefully look over and plumb the depths of your work with all the research that your 'pleasant garden' requires [and respond in time]? Therefore, I thought that it would be sufficient for me to present you with all that I have already written (in Italian, for my Grammar of Hebrew, which has yet to be printed) regarding the Samaritan or Old Hebrew script, and on the very old debate about whether the Hebrew script was changed or not. Without elaborating on the matters well known, I will add to that which the researchers have already stated, that if the script was not changed, then it is incomprehensible on what grounds some of the Mishnaic and Talmudic sages would say, from their own minds, such a strange opinion as this, to say that the script with which we write Holy Scriptures is not the original which the Prophets used. Quite the contrary, if the script truly was changed, and some of those sages denied it, we can understand why they would say it: to remove a stumbling block before the masses, for if our Torah is written in a different script from the one Moshe wrote in, this would be bizarre to the weak minded.

However, this proof is external, meaning that it relies on the testimony of the Mishnaic and Talmudic sages. I have an internal proof, from the Holy Scriptures themselves. In my researches, plumbing the depths of our Prophets and Sages, using the critical method, which seeks the truth alone, [this method] not appealing to the old [i.e., traditional Jews] and also not popular among the new [i.e., the Reform Jews], I looked all over the Bible (specifically in the Prophets and Hagiographa, which is not known to them, due to their excess love for the Torah) and found certain words which are errors due to the incompetence of the scribes who copied the books. I did not rush to disclose my findings to the public, because I know about the challenge which such critical research poses, and the many errors which are easy to make. Many scholars and so-called scholars, both uncircumcised and circumcised, boast that they make emendations, but they make errors. In many biblical passages I found what I myself thought was a scribal error, but after days and years I changed my mind and saw that the books' reading was true and correct. With all this, a small bit of the readings which I established in the texts still seem to me correct (now, as a 50 year old man, and after I have passed the passion of my youth) and sustained, above all doubt. Now, of some of these, I discovered that the mistakes happened through the similar appearance of letters, but not in our Hebrew script, but in the Samaritan script.

See how different is the appearance of a yud and a tzade in our Hebrew script (ketav ashuri), but it is the opposite in the Samaritan script, the two letters are almost identical. In Isaiah (11:15) we find: וְהֵנִיף יָדוֹ עַל-הַנָּהָר בַּעְיָם רוּחוֹ (and with His scorching wind will He shake His hand over the River). The root עים is neither Hebrew, nor one of its cognate languages. Therefore it seems to me that Isaiah did not write בעים, but בּעֹצֶם. I wrote this in my notes to Isaiah which I sent the scholar Rosenmueller, alav ha-shalom, and he printed in his 1835 book. Gesenius, in his W?rterbuch, explained עים (following Rabbi Jonah [ibn Janach]) from אָיֹם, but he reversed himself in his great Lexicon, and he took this explanation from me, and wrote that it seems that be-ayam ought to be emended to be-otzem, due to the graphic similarity between the yud and tzade in the Samaritan and other early Near Eastern scripts. [1]

[1] If someone says, maybe Gesenius did not see what you wrote and came up with it independently, much the same way you yourself, [Shadal], in your youth derived "tanur" from "aton nora" without seeing Gesenius - the response is, I have a Latin letter from Rosenmueller dated 24 April 1835, and he wrote this: "Gesenius reviewed all the pages, including your notes, and approved of them." This is not the only thing which Gesenius took from me [Shadal gives three more examples, and the places they can be found in Gesenius' writings - S.]. 

Also the aleph and tav are of similar appearance in the Samaritan alphabet, and from this we can understand what we find in Jeremiah 3:8, "  וָאֵרֶא, כִּי עַל-כָּל-אֹדוֹת אֲשֶׁר נִאֲפָה מְשֻׁבָה יִשְׂרָאֵל, שִׁלַּחְתִּיהָ, וָאֶתֵּן אֶת-סֵפֶר כְּרִיתֻתֶיהָ אֵלֶיהָ; וְלֹא יָרְאָה בֹּגֵדָה יְהוּדָה, אֲחוֹתָהּ--וַתֵּלֶךְ, וַתִּזֶן גַּם-הִיא," "And I saw, when, forasmuch as backsliding Israel had committed adultery, I had put her away and given her a bill of divorcement, that yet treacherous Judah her sister feared not; but she also went and played the harlot." There is no doubt that Jeremiah did not write "וָאֵרֶא," "And I saw," but ותרא, "And she saw." The opposite (e.g., a tav replacing a proper aleph) occurs in 1 Samuel 24:11[sic; it's actually 10]: "וְאָמַר לַהֲרָגְךָ, וַתָּחָס עָלֶיךָ," "and some bade me kill thee; but mine eye spared thee." But its true reading is "."

Next follows quite a few other example, which I will return to and translate, but in the meantime, the two (one and a half, actually) above will suffice. 

Returning to our subject, that the scribal errors we mentioned arose, without a doubt, because of the graphic similarity of letters [only] in the Samaritan alphabet, is in my view a faithful witness that the script changed and that our books were not originally written in our Ashuri script, but in the one which remained in use among the Samaritans. It is true that changing the script, and writing the holy books in a new script, not previously used by the Prophets for their books, does seem extremely odd. Not for nothing was the matter difficult to accept for many Jewish scholars and non-Jewish ones, so it seemed to them false, and they accepted the wrong opinion [i.e., that Ashuri was older]. But all this is because they didn't understand the reason, they merely heard the idea that the Jews changed the script, but lacked any idea about why, until they were left with the wrong view, that it never happened. If they had known the reason, and the circumstances which caused the Jewish sages to change the script, they would have been able to accept it, and would actually have thanked their predecessors [i.e., the sages, for changing it]. For it is known that the Samaritans tampered with their Torah and introduced many changes into it, large and small. This thing was a stumbling block for the simple Jews, because the Samaritans could, for example, point to what is written in their Torah at the end of the Ten Commandments, "And it will be when the Lord, your God, will bring you to the land of Canaan, which you have come to inherit, and you will establish large stone monuments and write this song upon them, etc. and when you will cross the Jordan you should establish these stones which I command you this day on Mt. Gerizim and build their an altar, etc. - from here is proof to say that their Temple [on Mt. Gerizim] was the spot chosen by God, and not the Temple in Jerusalem. So because of such changes by the Samaritans, the Jewish sages were smart and figured out a way to stop this problem and make a clear, lasting change between our proper books and their improper ones. They found no greater change than to write our scrolls in another script, so that even a simple person could see a Torah of a Samaritan and discern immediately that it is unfit. 

This reason for the change of script was hypothesized by my beloved son Ohev Ger, the Lord keep and strengthen him. It is possible that this was what was intended by Jerome on Ezra (from his version of the Chronicon by Eusebius): "[Ezra] collected the holy Scripture, that they might not be mingled with the Samaritans, [and] changed the Jewish letters." [I reject] the understanding of this passage in Eusebius by Rabbi Azariah, that the  script was changed in order to prevent the physical mixing of the Jews and Samaritans, but in order that the Torahs should not mix! - as he wrote, "divinas scripturas"  

Actually, the change in the script did not occur in the days of Ezra, but later, for we find also in the book of Ezra and Chronicles scribal errors which are due to the similarity of lettes in the Samaritan script. Furthermore, when they changed the script they only prohibited its use for Scriptures, but they still used it for other writing (like the rabbis said, it was left for the plain folk). This is the cause of why we find coins from the Hasmonean era in the Samaritan script. In those times there were two Jewish scripts, one used for secular and one for holy writing. In the end the holy script prevailed, and the earlier script which was left for plain folk, was also abandoned, and remained in use among the Samaritans only. 

Now we will discuss the names which the Samaritan script was known by in earlier times. In the Talmud we find it called Ktav Ivri, and also the Samaritans themselves called it Ktav Ivri, for they called our script Ktav Ezra; see their letter to Scaliger of the year 5349 (1589), which was printed in the book Repertorium fur biblische und Morgendlaendische Litteratur vol. 13 [pp. 257 - &c.]. Now, Rashi to Sanhedrin 21 explained "Ktav Ivri" as "of the people who dwelled over the river [i.e., Euphrates]." This explanation is justified on account of Sabbath 115 and Megillah 18, which refer to Coptic, Ivrit, Elamit, Medite, and Greek, and the intention there is to foreign languages. But how could this explanation pertain to the script in which the Torah was given, which was the ancient Jewish script, similar to the Phoenician script used by the people of Tyre and Sidon? Perhaps Rashi believed that the Samaritan script truly came from over the river, and was used in Eretz Yisrael in the time of Abraham, and from their it came to Israel, only he did not know (and it was impossible for him to know) that also the people of Tyre and Sidon used this script. And when I looked into it, and realized that Ktav Ivri [in this Talmudic text] did not mean a script used in the Land of Israel, and this was at the beginning of the Second Temple era, when Israel was reigned by the Persians. The Persians, who dwelled in the east, called the land of Israel and her environs to the west, "Ever Nahara" (Ezra 4, 5, 6, 7). From the expression of the king and the nobles, the Jews themselves, as well as the Samaritans, began calling their script by the name Ktav Ivri; note that the expression "ever ha-nahar" doesn't refer to any one side of the river. It's primary meaning is either side of the river, and depends upon the perspective of the speaker or listener. (To learn more in depth about "ever" see Gesenius' Thesaurus p. 986 and also what I wrote in Hamishtadel at the beginning of Deuteronomy) After the dissolution of the Persian Empire, the term "Ivri" returned slowly but surely to its original meaning, Aram Naharayim (hence the Talmudic list, Ivrit, Elamit, Medit) and the word "Ivri" as referring to Israel was from then only used in the phrase "eved Ivri" (for so it is called in the Torah), and Ktav Ivri (for this was its name as it was used by the Samaritans, who actually used the script). For this reason R. Abraham de Balmes, R. Azariah de Rossi and others who did not call the Samaritan script "Ivri" but "Ktav Ever Hanahar" were being inexact. 

Sanhedrin 22, we find Ktav Ivri called "Ro'etz," and in Yerushalmi Megillah (first chapter) we find it called "Ra'atz" (i.e., without the vav). The scholar R. Moses Landau writes in his book Geist und Sprache, p. 104, that Ra'atz is like La'az. However, the word "la'az" was well known and used constantly in the language of the Mishnah and Talmud, so who could believe that it was mistakenly changed to ra'atz? Or to say, as a few scholars do, that the idea of ra'atz means a broken script (Fractur) is impossible, since the root of ra'atz doesn't mean broken in scriputral Hebrew, but only in the Hebrew language of the Mishnah and Talmud. When I looked into it, this is what I concluded. Now, the Samaritans refer to our script as "Ktav Ezra Ha-arur", the Script of Ezra the Accursed, (see their letter in the aforementioned Repertorium 13 pg. 273). Therefore the Jews, to retaliate, also coined a term of opprobrium for their script, and took the name of Ezra, which they used in referring to ours, and changed the letters around, also exchanging the letter zayin for a tzade, and came up with the term ra etz, intending "breaking." What is this like? Like Bar Kokhba, whose name they changed to Bar Koziva, or like Evangelion, which they changed to Even Gilyon - even though the terms "kazav" and "aven" are atypical for Mishnaic language, and are only used in Biblical Hebrew. [i.e., so it does mean "Broken" after all, and a clever inversion of "Ktav Ezra"] 

When the Talmud asked, "What is Ktav Ivri?" Rav Hisda replied, "Ktav Livuna'ah." Many think this is one of the names for Ktav Ivri (including Gesenius). To me it seems that as the Samaritans lived in Israel, and not in Babylonia, and Ktav Ivri was unknown in Babylonia, so when they asked Rav Hisda "what are the hedyotot" he answered "the Samaritans." Then they asked him, "What is Ktav Ivri" but Rav Hisda did not know to answer "the Samaritan script," since he was unfamiliar with it. So he answered "Ktav Livuna'ah," which did not mean exclusively the Samaritan script, and it must have been a script known at the time in Babylonia, and [perhaps] it was somewhat similar to the Samaritan. And truly these writings are found in the ruins of Babylon and Nineveh on bricks. Some of these [=cuneiform] slightly resemble the Phoenician and Samaritan (see Kopp "Bilder und Schriften" II 152, 154) and Layard in "Nineveh" (Paris 1850) p. 173). R. Moses Landau in his book Ma'archei Lashon (p. 875) explained the word "Livuna'ah" from the term "levenah," (brick), but this is impossible. First, because of the vav after the beit, as it is written in the earlier printed editions, as well as my old manuscript of the Aruch, under the entry Ktav. The second reason is that the bricks [=tablets] in Babylon are not at all similar to the Samaritan, most are written in cuneiform, only the tiniest fraction are alphabetic. So I say that the term Livuna'ah does not refer to the Samaritan alphabet, but another script, and the true meaning of it is not possible for us to determine.

After this follows several pages on the poetic language of the Samaritans.

This is sufficient because of the lack of time. You my dear lerned friend, rejoice in your work, and rejoice all who love Torah and her aids. Peace to you and yours, signed Padua 9 Sivan 5611, your friend Shadal.

An execution by guillotine described in 1818

The execution of a Jew by guillotine - I assume - is described here. Note that the Jews accompanying the man "carefully removed ... even the smallest traces of blood" - to bury with the body.

A Detroit family's conversion to Judaism in 1916

This story is from the Tageblatt (English section) exactly 94 years ago - Jan. 1, 1917.

Kalman Wagner of Brisk came to this country as a child. An orphan, he became a Christian, married, and had five children. One night, he said, his father appeared to him in a dream and told him to return to Judaism. After some resistance from his wife, she agreed, and she and his children were converted. And that is how a whole Detroit family converted to Judaism in December of 1916.

Must have been some concert - a night of leining in 1844

This is an ad for a fun night out in Boston, November 12, 1844. As you can see, Mr. Henry Phillips was to be assisted by Miss Stone and put on a real show, featuring Irish songs and a performance of leining, as taught to him by a Polish rabbi, Dr. Herschel. Afterwards he was to prove that the te'amim are ancient, sing Az Yashir, and then some more songs, including one about Robin Hood.



Detail:

Bareheaded Polish Jews in traditional garb in a Polish church?

This is the demonstrations to which it refers.

Dr. Yastrow is, of course, Marcus Jastrow. See here about this incident.

From the Israelite.