In 1864, Rabbi Bernard Illowy of New Orleans write a letter to Der Israelit asking for assistance on thefollowing issue. A Jewish man married a non-Jewish woman and they had a son. The boy was not Jewish butthe parents wanted to have the son circumcized in infancy to facilitate a possible conversion when he reaches maturity.Rabbi Illowy forbade thi…

Between 1881 and 1924 over two million Jews immigrated to America, mainly from Eastern Europe.This lecture will explore how the Eastern European rabbinate addressed this issue; did they approve or disapprove ofthis phenomenon? We will examine the wrings of Rabbi Moshe Weinberger, a rabbi who immigrated to New York in 1880 and wroteabout his experin…

This lecture will explore the manner in which European Jews viewed American Jewry in the years preceeding and during the Civil War and the effect on this attitude of General Grant's edict to expel the Jews from the Department of Tennessee in 1862.We will study the views of Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch in Frankfurt who called General Grant "a thousan…

Rabbi Kalsicher served a rabbi in a small town in Prussia in the first half of the nineteenth century. He was the founder of modern active messianism as expressed in the desire to renew sacrifices thereby leading to the bringing of the Messiah. This lecture will explore the origins of this philosophy and the reactions to his activity. How was this …

This lecture will explore the establishment of private Jewish schools for girls in Vilna and St. Petersburg in the 1800s.What was the background that led to the creation of these schools? What was the curriculum and the manner of fund raising? Most importantly, what role did these schools play in the modernization of the Russian Jewish communities?…

The Responsa volume Besamim Rosh was published in 1793 by Rabbi Saul Berlin, a respected rabbinic scholar,and claimed to contain responsa written by the famed early fourteenth century rabbinic authority, Rabbenu Asher.Rabbis at the time of its publication argued that it was a forgery and this is the accepted view in the rabbinic and scholarly commu…

In 1772, the Duke of Mecklenburg issued an edict requiring the Jews to wait three days after death prior to burial in order to prevent the premature burial of a live person. The Jewish community approached Rabbi Yaakov Emden and Moses Mendelssohn. Emden and Mendelssohn disagreed about the role of medical evidence in a halakhic ruling and the defini…

Many of the Jews of Poland in the sixteenth and seventeenth century relied on trading non-kosher wine in order to make a living. This lecture will explore the interplay between the rabbis and the community regarding deriving profit from non-kosher wine which the rabbis had declared to be forbidden. How did the rabbis address the fact that Jews at t…

The Rabbinic ban or herem was utilized by the Jewish communities until the beginning of thenineteenth century to punish those Jews who violated Jewish law and communal practice. This lecture will explore the beginning of the breakdown of the effectiveness of the herem through the study of two cases in Hamburg in which Jews challenged the authority …

This lecture will explore the stablishment of private minyanim in Lemberg, Galicia under the Habsburg rule. These minyanim were authorized by government officials and were not under the jurisdiction of the Jewish community. Why was the government interested in these minyanim? What do this minyanim tell us about the evolving Jewish community in Gali…

Today there are almost 70 Hesder Yeshivot in Israel which combine yeshiva learning and army service.Although there is a debate about the exact origins of the Hesder movement, the idea of integrating learning and servicein the IDF originated 10-20 years after the founding of the State of Israel. This lecture will explore the challenges and criticism…

In 1921, Rabbi Abraham Isaac Ha-Kohen Kook was appointed the first Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi of Modern Israel. In that same year, he founded Mercaz Ha-Rav which he designed as the "Universal Yeshiva" to which students would come from around the world and after six years of study would return to provide rabbinic leadership fortheir communities. This lec…

This lecture will survey the history of the Ashkenazi community in Jerusalem in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. How did this traditional community react to the introduction of schools that taughtsecular subjects? How did this community respond to the relocation of the Slabodka Yeshiva to the Land of Israel and how does this reaction s…

Hazon Ish is considered the "grandfather of the Charedi movement in Israel". This lecture will explore the fascinatingbiography of Rabbi Avraham Yeshaya Karelitz from his early life in Lithuania through his years as the rabbinic authority in Bnei Brak, Israel. We will analyze his approach to halakhic decision making which differed from the traditio…

The end of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries brought many modernizations to the Jewish comunities of Eastern Europe. How did the halakhic works address these innovations and cahnges in reality? This lecture will explore the approaches of Arukh Ha-Shulhan and Mishneh Brurah to halakhic codification during this period. The works focused on…

The Misnagdim criticized he Hasidim as rejectors of the traditional halakhah. This lecture will explore the Hasidic attitude to halakhah and evaluate whether the Misnagdim were correct. We will explore the Shulhan Arukh of Rabbi Shneur Zalman of Lyady and several halakhic decisions of the nineteenth century Hasidim. How did the Hasidim balance thei…

This lecture will explore the process by which the Rema's commentary on the Shulhan Arukh was accepted throughout Poland. We will examine the alternative codes of Rabbi Solomon Luria and Rabbi Mordechai Jaffe and explain why these codes were not considered authoritative. Then, we will analyze the battle between the authors of the Shach and the Taz …

The Shulhan Arukh was first printed in Venice in 1564. The lecture will explore whether the code of Rabbi Joseph Caro was immediately accepted as authoritative among the Jews of the Spanish diaspora and the role that this code played in the unification of these Jews in the century following the expulsion from Spain. The code of Rabbi Moses Isserles…

Rabbi Joseph Caro and Rabbi Moshe Isserles brought an end to the ear of codification in Jewish history. This lecture will explore the journey of each of these great rabbinic scholars through their lengthy commentaries on the Tur to their concise codes in the Shulhan Arukh. Why did both Rabbis Caro and Isserles choose to later their styles from the …

When Rabbenu Asher, the leading rabbinic authority left Germany for Toledo in 1302, it brought an end to the creative rabbinic tradition in Germany. Rabbenu Asher was accepted in Spain. Yet, his outlook and much of his rabbinic work reflects his German heriatge. His son, Rabbi Jacob, integrated the Franco-German and Spanish traditions in his Code e…

The Rambam writes in the Introduction to his Mishneh Torah that his work will replace all rabbinic literature so that each Jewish library needs only a Tanach and a Mishneh Torah. When confronted regarding the arrogance of this statement by his colleagues, he retreats and explains that this was not really his intention. Yet, the Rambam took a bold a…

This lecture will explore the transition from the Gaonic tradition of the Moslem period to the rabbinic tradition of the Ramban in Christian Spain. In what ways did the Ramban integrate the traditions of the Gaonim and his predecessors in Moslem Spain with the approach of Tosafot and the Franco/German school of rabbinic teaching? Why is the positio…

This lecture will explore the transmission of Jewish learning and halakhah in Franco-Germany in the eleventh through thirteenth centuries. Rashi's commentary on the entire Talmud served to make the Talmud the authoritative text in Ashkenaz and to make the gemara "user-friendly." Tosafot introduced the study and reconciliation of the entire Talmud. …