1843 English translation of 18 Treatises from the Mishna; also, orangutans

It's definitely worth checking out Eighteen Treatises from the Mishna, an English translation of 18 massekhtos from 1843. See the circumstances surrounding its production in the Preface below (and check out that footnote!*).



This is the not the first English translation of a part of the Mishnah. I believe that honor is due to William Wotton, whom I blogged about here.

* But see here about a question of delicate sensibility in translation, where an English machzor from 1796 translated mei raglayim, and a siddur from 1949 didn't. Of course, the translator of the machzor was an Ashkenazi; the translators of the Mishna were Western Sefardim!

See also the following footnote (pg. 30) on אדני שדה:


Apparently Tiferes Yisrael was preceded by Jost.

On the Aramaic of the Talmud Bavli and Geonic Responsa

I came across an interesting article by Yochanan Breuer about rabbinic Aramaic of the Talmudic period. In his discussion about the Aramaic of the Geonim he makes the following comparison and (to my mind) keen observations:

Here are two typical sentences culled from Geonic responsa:

הכין חזינא דהדא שאלה לא כשאלתא קדמייתא

'So we have seen this question is unlike the first question.'

ופקידנא וקרו יתהון קדמנא ועיננא בהון וקמנא על כל מאי דכתיב בהין ופקידנא וכתבו תשובות דילהין לפום דאחזו לנא מן שמיא

'And we ordered that they read them [the questions] in our presence and we studied them and we investigated all that was written in them and we ordered that they write answers to them according to what we were shown from heaven.'

The language in these snippets differs from the Aramaic of the Bavli in several respects:

• הכין; in the Bavli the final n is dropped, and the form הכי is typical (Berachos 18b, מאי טעמא עבדת הכי).
• הדא; in the Bavli the d has been dropped, and the typical form is הא (Zevachim 44a, כי הא מילתא).
  
• קדמייתא; in the Bavli the d is assimilated to m, so we find קמייתא (Gittin 55b, גזרתא קמייתא).
  
• לנא, קדמנא; in the Bavli the final letter is dropped and forms are קמן and לן (Chullin 11a, כי קא מיבעיא לן רובא קמן).

The explanation Breuer offers, convincing to my mind, is not merely that language changes. This is true, but typically we would expect the Bavli forms to be later, as languages have a tendency to decay, drop sounds and letters, become less flowery than the classical form, not more so. The explanation may be that the teshuvas ha-Geonim were written and therefore preserved a more classical form of Aramaic. The Bavli, however, was oral until it was written down, perhaps early in the period of the Geonim, and so the forms it preserves are actually a later, spoken form of Aramaic.

Azaryah de' Rossi condemns the non-literal reading of the six days of creation

Me'or Enayim, Imre Binah chapter 5:




The context is his evaluation of Philo, who he calls Yedidya of Alexandria. He lists four complaints he has about him. This is the third.

Are you a student at YU and a fan of On the Main Line?

If so please email me.

Thank you.

The teshuva of Arnold B. Ehrlich

The case of Arnold B. Ehrlich, author of Bible commentary מקרא כפשוטו, influencer on young Mordecai Kaplan, is interesting. Having converted to Christianity at a young age, he assisted (or perhaps ghost-wrote) Franz Delitzsch in his Hebrew translation of the New Testament. Apparently he regretted this, so when he arrived in New York the following occurred, as recorded by Gustav Gottheil:

How to become a great 18th century English Hebrew scholar in six to eight weeks

From The Monthly Review, vol. 24, 1797. Review of George Benjoin's translation of Jonah.

Edit:

An example of the attitude scorned here:

A yeshivish joke at R, Joseph H. Hertz's expense from the 1930s

An illustration of the disdain the Eastern European Yeshiva had towards the Anglo-ecclesiastical leadership can be found in an oft repeated comment by one of Jacobs’s teachers in reference to Chief Rabbi J.H. Hertz: “If a reverend is a goy. It must follow that a “Very Reverend” [Hertz’s title] is a ‘great goy’ (a grosser goy).” Hyperbole aside, the sharp remark is illustrative of the degree to which Jacobs’s Yeshiva environment understood itself vis-à-vis the pre-autochthonous institutions of Anglo-Jewry.

Pg. 18, Teyku: The Insoluble Contradictions in the Life and Thought of Louis Jacobs, Phd. dissertation by Elliot Cosgrove (download here).

Photo of R. Samson Raphel Hirsch's parents

Does anyone have this in a viewable format? This is the closest I can get:



Click to enlarge.

From the Samson Raphael Hirsch Jubilaeums in Der Israelit No. 25, Jun. 6, 1908 (pg. 7 of the Hirsch section). You (or I) could have bought this issue on auction a few years ago. (link.) But in the meantime, all I've got is this bad scan on Compact Memory.

Edit: Thank you, Neil Harris, for providing the following:

A censored text from a Lakewood high school Jewish history class

A cache of high school הסטוריה notes and teacher handouts from a Lakewood Bais Ya'akov recently came into my possession. The important thing to remember is that the following is 100% authentic.




As you can see, this is a quote from I. B. Singer, Yiddish Nobel laureate, from Conversations with Isaac Bashevis Singer. You can also see that text is blotted out (probably with white out). What was so bad about the few words written after "baron," and later, "proud," that it was judged unsuitable for these students?

Luckily these days you don't have to own the book (I don't) or go to the library (closed on Jan. 1). I hit GBS (Google Book Search), snippet view and all and saw that it was these:







I found it interesting that this was so unsuitable, but I. B. Singer is, in general, acceptable as a source for reinforcing a point. The truth is, this is really a kind of קבל את האמת thing, is it not?

Personally I dislike the idea of presenting texts with the censor's line blatantly present. I realize that such schools are doing the right thing and voluntarily separating and forming an enclave where they can teach whatever they wish. This, rather than forcing it onto others, is proper. However, I can't get behind being so blatant about censoring texts in this way, as opposed to showing texts at the outset that don't require snipping out a phrase here and there.

On the other hand, that reflects my own values. From their point of view, this may not have been a sloppy job at all, but an overt message for the students: "We may feel that 99% of a certain source is appropriate for you, so we will show you 99% of it. The fact that we feel that 1% is inappropriate neither means that we will show you that 1%--alas--or show you none of it. The 99% will not lose out on account of the 1%. And we're happy to let you know that this is how we feel and see exactly how we do it."

Either way, it's interesting that the problem seems to be simply calling attention to the fact that men notice how women look.

I propose a maskilic* solution to a 40 year old question by R. Dovid Cohen

*Maskilic - see here.

The answer is: because they're Muslims.

Allow me to explain.

About 40 years ago Rabbi Dovid Cohen published some volumes called ספר ואם תאמר containing hundreds, indeed well over a thousand, of questions arranged according to the calendar, a sort of daily points to ponder. (Buy it here.) They cover a very wide spectrum and certainly testify to his broad learning at a relatively young age. Inside volume ii:

קושיא יומית
ליקות של 383 קושיות מסודרות
לפי הלוח השנתי
רובן לפי ענינא דיומא

In the month he calls חשון, page מא we find a great question:

הרמב"ם כתב (פי"א ממאכלות אסורות ה"ז) שהישמעאלים אינם חשובים כעובדי עבודה זרה. וצ"ע מהא דחולין (לט, ב) הנהו טייעי דאתו לציקוניא יהבו דוכרה לטבחו ישראל אמרי להו דמא ותרבא לדידן משכא ובשרא לדידכו ופרש"י שהיו ישמעאלים שאינם אוכלים אלא בשר שחוטה ורצו הדם והחלב לעבודה זרה שמתוך שהיו טרודים בעסקיהם היו נותנים לטבחי ישראל לשחוט ולהפשיט עי"ש הרי שישמעאלים עובדים לעבודה זרה

This is a powerful question. On the one hand, the Rambam rules that Ishmaelites are not considered idol-worshippers. On the other hand, Rashi explains the action of the Ishmaelites referred to in the Gemara Chullin 39b to be related to their idol worship. צ"ע.

So I thought about it for a second and noticed that perhaps it is possible that one can tentatively think about suggesting that maybe sometime between the Ishmaelites mentioned in Chullin in Talmud Bavli and the Rambam something happened in the history of monotheistic religion, perhaps concerning the peoples designated ישמעאלים? I mean, you never know.

(Soncino translation FYI: Certain Arabs once came to Zikonia and gave the Jewish butchers some rams to slaughter, saying: ‘The blood and the fat shall be for us, while the hide and the flesh shall be yours’. )

Did Ozzy Osbourne ever moonlight as Abraham Geiger?

Of course not. They were born about 140 years apart. But close to three years after making the observation that they really, really look alike, finally: proof that I am not the only one who noticed it:





This person was searching and found this.

[sic] דעת בעלי בתים היפוך דעת תורה

(Click to enlarge)





Heh heh.

How do I do it?

Recently people have been asking me "where do you come up with your posts?" I don't think it's egotistical to admit that I think my posts are interesting. Of course they interest me! Anyone else who is interested enough to read or ask seems to find some of them interesting too. I was thinking about doing an "Anatomy of an On the Main Line post," and I'll do that sometime. But for now, I'll reveal some of my secrets, which should not be such a secret. First, there are generally two kinds of OtML posts. One is an analysis of a topic, be it some kind of biblical question concerning language or interpretation, or a historical question. The other is of the "here is a cool picture/ paragraph/ quote/ article/ essay/ antiquarian something-or-other." There used to be a third kind, a rant about something (generally Jewishly) political, or cultural, but I've gotten most of that out of my system! Here I will concern myself with the second type of post.

The answer is that I read a lot. Point a leads to point b, and that leads to point z, and sometimes it leads to point zxwr3$35. You never know. I don't have an amazing collection of seforim, books and periodicals, but I believe what I do own is judiciously chosen to interest me. I find material and leads there. I also go to libraries when I can, sometimes in search of something specific, sometimes not. But I usually come away with something of interest to explore further.

But then there are the riches and resources that are online, some free and some available via subscription.

Google Book Search is free, and it gets better every month (despite some real flaws). Not only is it a good resource, but if you play around with it you can even crack some of it's limitations. Their new agreement will only make it better.

Sometimes books which are unavailable there can be read (at least the parts I want) on amazon.com or bn.com. You never know, always check.

There are other digitization projects to check out, like the one on archive.org. The University of Michigan's Mirlyn library catalog was and is a good resource, as it incorporates all of the books Google has scanned from them but not placed online (provided there is no copyright issue).

Recently many libraries joined with U Mich and formed the Hathi Trust, which is like Mirlyn, only includes many more libraries. It will work as a backup of Google Books, and at the moment includes many things which Google did not yet put online.

There are free collections of digital material on many university web sites, such as this:

http://www.bodley.ox.ac.uk/ilej/

and this

http://cdl.library.cornell.edu/moa/moa_browse.html

and this

http://quod.lib.umich.edu/m/moajrnl/browse.journals/

Many Jewish universities and libraries have valuable material.

There is the JNUL which has these:

http://www.jnul.huji.ac.il/eng/digibook.html
http://jnul.huji.ac.il/dl/newspapers/index1024.html

TAU which has

http://jpress.tau.ac.il/view-hebrew.asp

JTSA's digital site is small, but really good

http://sylvester.jtsa.edu:8881/R?RN=710246460

There is this

http://www.compactmemory.de/

Then there are paid archives, which one can access through university subscription if one has such access, which one, of course, does.

There is JStor, there are databases by Proquest, Gale and Chadwyck-Healy.

There is the amazing, amazing hebrewbooks.org. There is still the very valuable seforimonline.com. There is Otzar Ha-chochma, the Bar Ilan Responsa Project, Daat, and there are great friends who I send things to and who send things to me. Of course, there are also the most valuable comments, emails I receive and posts by other bloggers to stimulate and inform me.

I can go on, and maybe later I will. But in short, there are TONS of material available for my posts, or any sort of posts. If my passion was the history of invention I could probably run a fascinating blog about that, at least one that fascinated me.

Ishim U-shitos figured it out.

What on earth is a "taghmical"?

Some time ago I came across a work on the trop from 1698 called The Taghmical Art ; or, the Art of Expounding Scripture by the points usually called Accents, but are really Tactical : a Grammatical, Logical, and Rhetorical instrument of interpretations by Walter Cross.

And it looks like this:



and includes gems like this:




Here's a fun table:



A reviewer from 1824 had this to say:



It seems this book fascinated and confused quite a lot of people who only wanted to learn about how the Jews cantillate their Bible!

For a long time I wondered what the heck he meant by "taghmical." It seemed to be a neologism, a word coined by himself. From context I understood that it related to the biblical accents. Did it mean "pertaining to the taggin"? That made no sense, but that doesn't always stop everyone.

Then I had a brainstorm: the Oxford English Dictionary.

And they came through:




Taghmical is from טעמים, with Cross taking the liberty of wackily transcribing the ע as gh. Clever.

(Other clever English words of that era: mecubalist and alcoran. But I bet you can tell what these mean)

Put away your Ben-Ze'ev books; where JL Benzeev wrote them and where he died

Here's a very funny notice from a 1928 issue of Beis Va'ad Le-chachomim:



As you can see, it suggests retiring the most famous works by Yehuda Leib Ben Ze'ev, who was one of the Me'assfim, and part of Mendelssohn's circle. As a great hebraist, the works mentioned here were hugely popular in eastern Europe, giving the keys to the Hebrew language and grammar to many generations. The footnote (citing Lev Ha-ivri) claims that he wrote תלמוד לשון עברי on shabbos, never married and died on the toilet!



For an earlier list of books one ought not read, see here, same publication.

(Since I can't resist mentioning Shadal, the Jewish advocacy for the utility of Syriac for plumbing the depths of Aramaic, and therefore Hebrew, is often attributed to him. But he himself attributed the inspiration for the idea to Ben Ze'ev, although it was Shadal who first mastered Syriac and showed how it could be useful. See Ohev Ger (2nd ed. pg. 93):



This was called to my attention in the course of reading Rubin's translation of Shadal's Prolegomeni. Shadal mentions Giuda Löwe ben Zeev here.)

Speaking of Syriac, Here is R. Isser Zalman Meltzer, Even Ha-azel vol. vi Korbonot 1.8, pg. 2, quoting Kohut:



Verily, the line of progress that made this passage possible begins among Jews with Ben Ze'ev, goes through Shadal, to Kohut, and then to R. Isser Zalman.)

An interesting contemporary critique of R. Nathan Marcus Adler's Nethina La-ger on Targum Onkelos

In the 19th century there was a great deal of Christian missionary activity directed toward the Jews emanating from England. This activity was concentrated in the lands under British imperial rule, but also in eastern Europe, and in England itself. For example, there was the London Society for Promoting Christianity Among the Jews. This society, and others, produced Hebrew and Yiddish translations of the New Testament, and printed Hebrew Bibles without Jewish commentaries for distribution among Jews. Many of the missionaries were themselves Jewish. It is my sense that there was no small amount of evangelical Jewish Christians in England during that century.

Famous among them was Christian David Ginsburg, but there were others as well. (You can hear a most interesting lecture by Shnayer Leiman on a former Chassid, Ezekiel Stanisław Hoga, who translated a famous missionary tract into Hebrew, here. The tract was The Old Paths by Alexander McCaul [1837], and was translated as נתיבות עולם by Hoga. The lecture discusses various Jewish legends surrounding the mis-identified author of this book, including a story told by R. Kook)

Previously I had posted on some interesting information by one such Jewish missionary, Moses Margoliouth (here and here). Margoliouth was born in 1820, became a Christian in 1838, was ordained a minister in 1844, and died in 1881. In an obituary I read, it was noted that he had been a student of the aforementioned McCaul in his youth. He wrote a number of books aimed at refuting Judaism, and was editor of a journal called The Hebrew Christian Witness, from which the following very interesting material is culled.

The first is a review of an amazing Rabbinic Bible (מקראות גדולות) published in 1874 by British Chief Rabbi Nathan Marcus Adler, under the title תורת אלהים. Take a look at this:




As you can see, in addition to a very good choice of rabbinic commentaries, the edition includes the rare Masorah of the Targum Anqylas, with notes by Shadal, as well as publishing for the first time the apparently anonymous commentary on that targum, which had been known as the יאר, after the date (רי"א is יאר , that is 5211, or 1451 CE) written in the manuscript, which was then residing in the British Museum (I think). It's previous owner was Shadal. It was he who discovered this manuscript (as a teenager, in a dusty geniza in his hometown) and he made great use out of it in his commentary אוהב גר on the Targum , as well as in his המשתדל commentary on the Torah. Rabbi Adler also refers to this commentary by its true title, as identified by Shadal: Pathshegen פתשגן, (from Esther 3.14), as it is now known. In addition to that commentary, he also included his own commentary on Targum Onkelos (י"א Anqylas) called נתינה לגר.

Here is the preliminary review by Margoliouth:



As you can see, he was not a fan of Adler, and took to harping on the name of his commentary as a means of ridiculing him. In truth, it is highly unlikely that Adler did not remember the origin of the term netina la-ger; rather, in keeping with the spirit of melitzah (for better or worse) he chose a clever name for his work.

What follows is from a later issue, allegedly a letter received from a reader (as opposed to written by Margoliouth). As you can see, this critic takes the interesting tack of attacking Adler for writing his magnum opus in rabbinic Hebrew, rather than English, and publishing it in Vilna, rather than in Britain. He assumes that Adler did so to basically hide it from his public.

I review the Koren siddur

Rabbi Elli Fischer of ADDeRabbi has already reviewed the forthcoming The Koren Sacks Siddur (here), but I was sent a copy too, so I feel I should review it as well (which is, after all, why I received it).

Since Reb Elli dealt primarily with translation and it's treatment of women-friendly and Israel centered themes, I feel I should comment on other aspects.

First of all, it is beautiful. It so happens that I love the Koren font, but that is only part of it. It is layed out neatly, and the binding seems to be exceptional -- very important for a siddur that is to be used daily for many years. Elli already commented on the innovative move to place the Hebrew on the left and the English on the right. It does indeed take getting used to (say, a minute) but once you do it seems so complementary and natural. A good layout technique; my compliments to whomever thought of it. There are little quirky things which look nice; an asterisk marks the aliyos in the section of weekday Torah readings. A tiny sideways isosceles trinagle marks the point where the chazzan reads from. The English is in normal font, rather than italics (coughyouknowwhocough). From a layout-design perspective, the only complaints I have is that there is too little variation in font size. This isn't really a problem for someone who is comfortable with a siddur, but I can see this being difficult for some. Also, the section on berachos is not found after shacharis, as in most siddurim. Again, not a huge deal, but unless there is some significant improvement, changing the familiar layout should be reconsidered.

In the comments at Elli's review, someone suggested that the te'amim (cantillation signs) be included on all biblical verses. That may be extreme, but they are properly included for the Shema. However, I wondered why they were not included for Az Yashir; while it is a kabbalistic custom to say Az Yashir with the trope, this siddur does not eschew the kabbalistic influence on the siddur generally. Thus, all the expected le-shem yichuds are included, even if a little note that "some say" them precedes. I noticed, with my approval, that morid ha-gshm is pointed with segols.

I didn't get the chance to read the commentary and translation extensively (besides, Elli already commented on the quality of the translation), but I have a few words about it. British Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks's erudition and inspirational ability is known to all who have heard or read works by him. The little I did preview didn't reveal any earth-shattering commentary, but that is to be expected (preferred?) in what should be a popular and reliable siddur. I noticed that he had fun in his translation of the zemer Yah Ribbon Olam; in keeping with the rhyming Aramaic (ve-olmaya, malchaya, ve-simhaya, le-hachavaya, etc.) he rhymed all the stiches in English (adored, Lord, applaud, accord), keeping it true for all five paragraphs. Pretty cool. Upon request, I'll scan that page if anyone wants to judge how well he accomplished this.

I began to compile a list of sources cited in the commentary, but did not get very far. I noticed R. Joseph Ber Soloveitchik, R. Samson Raphael Hirsch, R. Jacob Zvi Mecklenburg, Ibn Ezra, Radak, R. Avraham Maimonides, and, of course, the siddur of Rav Amram, and Tolstoy. A great deal of the commentary seems to be original; at least that is the assumption I make for unattributed commentary. Since the edition is still not released, and improvements can yet be made, I'd like to go on record suggesting a complete bibliography at the end!

Finally, a little thing I noticed and thought was interesting. In Az Yashir (pg. 80, Ex. 15.3) we see יהוה איש מלחמה translated as "the Lord is a master of war." In the introduction to the Birnbaum siddur we find some of the principles which Birnbaum followed, and the reasons why he felt his siddur was a vast improvement over those which had come before him. We find the following example:

"Every student of Hebrew knows that בן is not always equivalent of a son. It frequently denoted age, membership in a definitive class, or the possession of some quality. Similarly, איש and בעל are often used interchangably to characterize a person. Thus, איש לשון, (Psalm 140.12) means a slanderer, and איש מלחמה, (Exodus 15.3) a warrior. Hence, the rendering "the Lord is a man of war" is erroneous and nothing short of sacrilegious." (Ha-siddur Ha-shalem; pg. xiv). Birnbaum goes on to call this type of "literalness . . . typical of what has crept into the Siddur's translation as a result of copying from men unfamiliar with idiomatic Hebrew."

Is R. Sacks's "master of war" the same as "man of war"? Maybe, maybe not. In any event, Birnbaum was not a native English speaker; Sacks is. Speaking of idiomatic English, I couldn't help but to think that "master of war" evokes - at least unconsciously - Bob Dylan's Masters of War. I can't imagine that Sacks wished to apply the message of that song to God; but I can imagine that the phrase was rolling around in his mind, just as it is in the mind of everyone who knows that song, and to him it seemed very good idiomatic English, that is, normally a phrase like that would seem stilted, but in this case "the Lord is a master of war" seems very natural to the reader.

In all, I like the siddur very much. I like how it looks, how durable it is, how relaxed with itself and its modern Orthodox ideology it is, how halachically normative it is, and that font! Love it. You also get R. Sacks's commentary on Pirke Avot free. You won't be disappointed if you buy it.

Oh, that rapscallion William Wickes

Haw, haw.

Yossele Rosenblatt phonograph ad

Menorah Journal 1918 (Back cover)

Rabbis gowns - you have to buy them somewhere

From 1905.

Bochurim, 'Remember! Your blood is no redder than the blood of others.' A message to Israeli yeshiva bochurim from E. E. Urbach and others, 1967

I found the following interesting message to the yeshiva bochurim of Israel from an English periodical from 1967 called Steps at http://www.hebrewbooks.org/. Steps issued from the "Movement For Torah Judaism," based in Jerusalem, and the articles apparrently are from their Hebrew publications He-hadash yitkadesh we-ha-kadosh yithaddesh ("The New will be Sanctified and the Sainted Renewed") and Mehalechim ("Steps"). The former name (He-hadash etc.) was coined, I think, by Professor E. E. Urbach in his speech at the dedication of the Hebrew University in 1925. Articles in this publication were written by Urbach, Eliezer Shimshon Rosenthal and others. You can read the opening address by Urbach at the Movement for Torah Judaism's initial meeting here.

Who am I?

Oy, vay! That quintessentially Jewish expression is Greek?

"Elementi grammaticali del caldeo biblico e del dialetto talmudico babilonese," pg. 105, by Shadal.



At least "oy" is Hebrew. (link, etc.)

Those 127 years of Sarah's life, interpreted by Rashi

If I'd have had the time, this post would have appeared last week in honor of חיי שרה.

The first verse reads

וַיִּהְיוּ חַיֵּי שָׂרָה מֵאָה שָׁנָה וְעֶשְׂרִים שָׁנָה וְשֶׁבַע שָׁנִים שְׁנֵי חַיֵּי שָׂרָה

And the life of Sarah was a hundred and seven and twenty years; these were the years of the life of Sarah (Gen. xxiii.i).

The very well known comment on this verse appears in Rashi's commentary:

ויהיו חיי שרה מאה שנה ועשרים שנה ושבע שנים - לכך נכתב שנה בכל כלל וכלל, לומר לך שכל אחד נדרש לעצמו, בת מאה כבת עשרים לחטא, מה בת עשרים לא חטאה, שהרי אינה בת עונשין, אף בת מאה בלא חטא, ובת עשרים כבת שבע ליופי

And the life of Sarah was one hundred years and twenty years and seven years The reason that the word “years” was written after every digit is to tell you that every digit is to be expounded upon individually: when she was one hundred years old, she was like a twenty-year-old regarding sin. Just as a twenty-year-old has not sinned, because she is not liable to punishment, so too when she was one hundred years old, she was without sin. And when she was twenty, she was like a seven-year-old as regards to beauty. — from Gen. Rabbah 58:1]

(Judaica Press translation from here).

Indeed, Genesis Rabbah reads

ויהיו חיי שרה מאה שנה (תהלים לז) יודע ה' ימי תמימים ונחלתם לעולם תהיה כשם שהן תמימים כך שנותם תמימים, בת כ' כבת ז' לנוי, בת ק' כבת עשרים שנה לחטא

Modern Orthodoxers and children of little faith have wondered, for decades at least, at this exegesis. It would seem to them that beauty is the more noticeable characteristic of twenty year old women than seven year old girls, while innocence most properly characterizes seven year olds over twenty year olds. A lot can happen in thirteen years.

Shadal commented:

כלל שאתר הפרט (נתיבות השלום) ; ונ"ל כי טעות נפלה בלשון המדרש שהביא רש"י וצריך לומר בת ק' כבת כ' לנוי בת כ' כבת ז' לחטא, ומפני שמצא רש"י הנוסחא הפוכה (כבת כ' לחטא כבת ז' לנוי) נדחק לפרש שאינה בת עונשין והמילות הללו אינן במדרש. ואח"כ מצאתי כדברי בפירוש קדמון כ"י על בראשית רבא הנמצא בקובץ היקר הכולל פי' סי יצירה לר"י ברצלוני, אחוזת הגבירים היקרים בני המנוח משה אריה טריאסטי ז"ל, וכן כתוב בו : היה לו לומר מאה ועשרים ושבע שנה, אלא כך הוא אומר בת מאה כבת עשרים לנו

In my opinion, an error fell into the language of the midrash that Rashi cited [Bereshit Rabbah 58], and it ought to say, "When she was a hundred, she was like twenty in regard to beauty; when she was twenty, she was like seven in regard to sin." But since Rashi found the text reversed ("like twenty in regard to sin, like seven in regard to beauty"), he was forced to explain that [at age twenty] she had not yet reached the age of responsibility, and these words are not in the midrash.

I have since found an explanation similar to mine in an ancient commentary in manuscript on Bereshit Rabbah, which is found in the precious collection that also includes a commentary on the Sefer Yetsirah by Rabbi Y. Barceloni, in the possession of those beloved masters, the sons of the late Moses Aryeh Trieste. This is what it says: "The text should have said me'ah ve-esrim ve-sheva shanah ["one hundred twenty-seven years"], but this is how it says it: [me'ah shanah ve-esrim shanah ve-shevah shanim, lit. "one hundred years and twenty years and seven years," meaning] when she was a hundred, she was like twenty in regards to beauty." (elegant and accurate trans. by the intrepid Shadal scholar Dan Klein.)

In his critical edition of Rashi on the Torah, R. Abraham Berliner is inclined to agree that the the emended version is preferable--or at least he cites it in his footnote (link). He refers the reader to Shadal, but also Yalkut Tehillim 37, which actually reads this way:

ודע ה' ימי תמימים כשם שהם תמימים כך שנותיהם תמימים, בת ק' כבת כ' לנוי, בת עשרים כבת שבע לחטא

Note that Genesis Rabbah is an exegesis of Psalm 37 as well. Thus, we have two conflicting readings. Assuming one is an error (as opposed to these being two independent exegeses), might it not be the one that raises questions?

Rabbi Hertz has "the rabbis" interpreting the verse according to the emended version (well, the Yalkut's version, which is not emended. He simply doesn't mention Rashi here.). It then informs the reader that 'This, according to Luzzatto and Berliner, was the original form of the saying.' Thus, two kinds of readers are addressed. Those who are unfamiliar with Gen. Rabbah or even Rashi's comment are given the smoother reading. Those who would be thinking "That's not what Rashi said!" are informed the yichus of the version presented in this commentary.

An ass walks into a bar and orders a glass of wine

I spent many hours of my childhood learning with my grandfather. He was a very precise person , and did everything he could to counter my childish tendency to accept generality and 'basically getting the gist,' whether in terms of pronunciation, phrasing or translation. All three were very much neglected in my formal education, and he posed a frustrating but valuable counterweight. He always used to say that you have to pay attention to where the חמר is. Is it in the barn or in a barrel?*



Midrash Kohelles Rabbah i. iv

חנינא בן אחי ר' יהושע אזל להדיה כפר נחום ועבדון ליה מינאי מלה ועלון יתיה רכיב חמרא בשבתא, אזל לגביה יהושע חביביה ויהב עלוי משח ואיתסי, א"ל כיון דאיתער בך חמרא דההוא רשיעא לית את יכיל שרי בארעא דישראל, נחת ליה מן תמן לבבל ודמך תמן בשלמיה

I found this footnote here, a publication from 1910 called The Monist, a Quarterly Magazine Devoted to the Philosophy of Science, Vol. XX..

The footnote continues, and it's amazing:



In other words, Lowe saw the חמרא--which חנינא was riding, no less (רכיב חמרא)--and put it in the barrel, or in the wine goblet as the case may be. Wow!

Unfortunately not every dusty old tome is online in digital form (yet) and I don't have any scheduled appearances in a great library for a little while, so I did not get the chance to see what exactly William Henry Lowe's The Fragment of Talmud Babli Pesachim: Of the Ninth Or Tenth Century in the University Library, Cambridge says. So I'm taking the Monist's word for it (for now).

What of W.H. Lowe? He is quoted in this very book in JQR vol. xiii, 1901 The Talmud in History by Abram Isaacs of NYU:




That is, he was a friend of the Talmud. Just not necessarily one who allowed his love of חידוש to get in the way of common sense.

* Thinking about it, this doesn't sound like the sort of quip that is original. I wonder, if it is not original, when and from whom did he hear it?

Rabbi Hertz on the Mesilas Yesharim, the emerging mussar movement, and Rabbi Leone da Modena

I came upon this interesting passage in an appendix to the Proceedings of the Sixth Biennial Convention of the Jewish Theological (1898) by Rabbi J. H. Hertz (1872-1946). Hertz, as you'll recall, would go on to become the Chief Rabbi of the British Empire, but at the time he was the first rabbinical graduate of the JTS and about to begin a position as rabbi in Johannesburg.

The appendix is called "Bachya, the Jewish Thomas À Kempis." (All spelling a formatting preserved accurately.)

מסלת ישרים (Mesillath Yesharim), a short ethico-ascetic book of rare beauty. It is more interesting to-day than it ever was, as it is fast assuming a semi-canonical character in the eyes of the "Men of Morals," (בעלי מוסר) Baale Mussar, a sect-in-the-making in Russia, founded twenty years ago by R. Israel Salanter.

From pg. 31, n. 20.

Note 21 is not nearly so interesting, but worth quoting as well:

"Geographical Judaism" is more or less a reality. It would, however, require a great deal of scholarship, coupled with ethnic psychological training, to explain why Spanish Judaism has found its ethical expression in the Chaboth Ha-lebaboth, German Judaism in the Sefer Chassidim and Italian Judaism in the Messilath Yesharim (or would Leo Modena's Tzemach Tzaddik better typify a synagog which two hundred years ago allowed a rabbi to speak of the "divine Diana" in the pulpit?). We doubt not but some day it will be done.

English lo'azim, qerobatz or qerovos?

An interesting book called שטרות Hebrew Deeds of English Jews Before 1290 was published in 1888 in conjunction with the Anglo-Jewish Historical Exhibition. (Read or browse through it here.)

The introduction contains a useful table of what amounts to English lo'azim:


שמיץ for "smith" strikes me as interesting. It appears to me that the reason why צ was used for "th" - however it was pronounced, either as /t/ or /th/ (thorn, theta) was because the צ sounded very much like an /s/ in the pronunciation, at least of the writer of that particular deed. This dovetails with my pet theory as to why the tav without dagesh is pronounced as an /s/ among Ashkenazim - /s/ being a Germanic form of /th/. In addition, this dovetails with a theory of R. Elijah Levita regarding the traditional - yet certainly mistaken - name for a type of liturgy, namely the kind that are traditionally called קרובץ. According to a traditional explanation, this word is a notarikon for קול רינה וישועה באהלי צדיקים (Psalm 118.15). Not convinced by this (as Artscroll machzorim are), Levita noted that the correct term ought to be קרובות. Where then did the spelling with the צ, which is no word, become traditional, and then the explanation? He theorized that it occurred under the influence of French Jews who had been expelled, winding up in German Ashkenazic lands. According to him, their pronunciation of the צ was very much like their pronunciation of the ת. This led to the confusion as to what the word proper was, and so on. Incidentally, in traditional German Ashkenazic, the צ does sound very much like an /s/.




Sefer Tishbi, Pg. 215, Isny edition (thanks hebr.books.)

Also of interest: Richard is (of course) transliterated as ריקרד, instead of what one might erroneously expect based on how this name is now pronounced: רישרד.

About the Collectio Davidis

The library of Prague's Chief Rabbi David Oppenheim (1664-1736) is famous. He is regarded as the first real collector of Jewish books, amassing about 6000 seforim and 100 manuscripts. His collection was so complete and so impressive that it formed the basis for one of the landmark books in the history of Jewish bibliography, Johannes Christoff Wolf's 4-volume, 5000 page Bibliotheca Hebraea (1715-1733). Incidentally, if it seems odd for an אב"ד to allow his seforim to be examined and cataloged by a Christian Hebraist for a major bibliography written in Latin and aimed at the wider scholarly world, one considers that the oddity is with thinking it odd.

The details regarding this library, the fact that R. Oppenheim was unable to keep it in Prague with him due to fear for the safety of his most valuable collection, can be read elsewhere. However, where it ended up and how it got there is most interesting. After he died, his library was kept in crates, in the home of a relative. It was offered for sale, with a catalog created for that purpose in 1764, but for decades no interested buyer purchased it. It's value was presumed to be high. Moses Mendelssohn estimated it should fetch 60,000 Thaler. Later, it was estimated to be worth over twice that. Ultimately, the Bodleian Library at Oxford made what has to be considered one of the best deals of all time (at least for a bibliophile) and bought it for 9000 Thaler, in 1829. This was the equivalent of £1350 (a rough search on the internet reveals that this was equivalent to about £95,000 pounds in 2007. A very, very good price. Ultimately, this library formed the core of the Bodleian's great Hebrew collection.

Solomon Schechter reminisced about the rumors surrounding this famed collection of Hebrew books in his native country:




Prior to the sale, it was cataloged once again (in 1826, by Isaac Metz) and printed as Collectio Davidis, or קהלת דוד. This fascinating book is now available online (link). You can also view a digital version of one of Oppenheim's manuscripts here (Ms. Opp. 154; a 15th century work called by its author משל הקדמוני.)