Shabbat – 02/13/10 (29 Shevat 5770)
By rachel-esther | February 6, 2010
For your local Shabbat Candle-lighting times, please go here.
This week’s reading is — Mishpatim (Exodus 21:1-24:18).
This week is Shabbat Shekalim, the Shabbat before Rosh Chodesh Adar. The Maftir reading recalls the census taken in the wilderness (Exodus 30:11-16).
Torah Aliyot and Topics
Aliyah 1: Exodus 21:1-19
The civil law, Jewish bondsmen, “Sale” of a daughter, Murder and manslaughter
Aliyah 2: Exodus 21:20-22:3
Killing of a slave, Penalty for bodily injury, Death caused by an animal, A pit, An animal damaging property, Stealing livestock, Self-defense: payment for theft
Aliyah 3: Exodus 22:4-26
Damages caused by livestock, Laws of custodians, A borrower, Seduction, Sensitivity to the helpless and abandoned, The commandment to extend free loans
Aliyah 4: Exodus 22:27-23:5
Do not curse a leader, Fullness offering and Priestly heave offering, Integrity of the judicial process, Fair dispensation of justice
Aliyah 5: Exodus 23:6-19
Fair dispensation of justice, The Sabbaths of the land and the week, The Three Pilgrimage Festivals
Aliyah 6: Exodus 23:20-25
Promise of swift passage to, and conquest of, the land
Aliyah 7: Exodus 23:26-24:18
Promise of swift passage to, and conquest of, the land, Moses delivers the words of G-d; people accept the mitzvot, Prophecy at the mountain
Maftir: Exodus 30:11-16
The census
Maftir: Exodus 20:19-23
Command to build an altar and bring sacrifices
The Haftorah for this week is II Kings 12:1-17 (Ashkenazi)
Ashkenazi Haftarah Topics
Jehoash king of Judah: The child-king’s devotion to the Temple, Jehoash imposes a new system of Temple maintenance
The Haftorah for this week is II Kings 11:17-12:17 (Sephardi)
Sephardi Haftarah Topics
Jehoiada sealed the covenant and the people destroyed the Baal, Joash assumes the throne, Jehoash king of Judah: The child-king’s devotion to the Temple, Jehoash imposes a new system of Temple maintenance
For more information about this week’s Parsha, please visit these sites.
Orthodox Union
Chabad
Aish HaTorah
United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism
Union for Reform Judaism
Jewish Reconstructionist Federation
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“Chapters On Jewish Literature” – Chapter 21
By rachel-esther | February 6, 2010
Original file: here.
HISTORIANS AND CHRONICLERS
Order of the Tannaim and Amoraim.—Achimaaz.—Abraham Ibn Daud.—Josippon.—Historical Elegies, or Selichoth.—Memorial Books.—Abraham Zacuto.—Elijah Kapsali.—Usque.—Ibn Verga.—Joseph Cohen.—David Gans.—Gedaliah Ibn Yachya.—Azariah di Rossi.
The historical books to be found in the Bible, the Apocrypha, and the Hellenistic literature prove that the Hebrew genius was not unfitted for the presentation of the facts of Jewish life. These older works, as well as the writings of Josephus, also show a faculty for placing local records in relation to the wider facts of general history. After the dispersion of the Jews, however, the local was the only history in which the Jews could bear a part. The Jews read history as a mere commentary on their own fate, and hence they were unable to take the wide outlook into the world required for the compilation of objective histories. Thus, in their aim to find religious consolation for their sufferings in the Middle Ages, the Jewish historians sought rather to trace the hand of Providence than to analyze the human causes of the changes in the affairs of mankind.
But in another sense the Jews were essentially gifted with the historical spirit. The great men of Israel were not local heroes. Just as Plutarch’s Lives were part of the history of the world’s politics, so Jewish biographies of learned men were part of the history of the world’s civilization. With the “Order of the Tannaim and Amoraim” (written about the year 1100) begins a series of such biographical works, in which more appreciation of sober fact is displayed than might have been expected from the period. In the same way the famous Letter of Sherira Gaon on the compilation of the Rabbinical literature (980) marked great progress in the critical examination of historical problems. Later works did not maintain the same level.
In the Middle Ages, Jewish histories mostly took the form of uncritical Chronicles, which included legends and traditions as well as assured facts. Their interest and importance lie in the personal and communal details with which they abound. Sometimes they are confessedly local. This is the case with the “Chronicle of Achimaaz,” written by him in 1055 in rhymed prose. In an entertaining style, he tells of the early settlements of the Jews in Southern Italy, and throws much light on the intercommunication between the scattered Jewish congregations of his time. A larger canvas was filled by Abraham Ibn Daud, the physician and philosopher who was born in Toledo in 1110, and met a martyr’s end at the age of seventy. His “Book of Tradition” (Sefer ha-Kabbalah), written in 1161, was designed to present, in opposition to the Karaites, the chain of Jewish tradition as a series of unbroken links from the age of Moses to Ibn Baud’s own times. Starting with the Creation, his history ends with the anti-Karaitic crusade of Judah Ibn Ezra in Granada (1150). Abraham Ibn Daud shows in this work considerable critical power, but in his two other histories, one dealing with the history of Rome from its foundation to the time of King Reccared in Spain, the other a narrative of the history of the Jews during the Second Temple, the author relied entirely on “Josippon.” This was a medieval concoction which long passed as the original Josephus. “Josippon” was a romance rather than a history. Culled from all sources, from Strabo, Lucian, and Eusebius, as well as from Josephus, this marvellous book exercised strong influence on the Jewish imagination, and supplied an antidote to the tribulations of the present by the consolations of the past and the vivid hopes for the future.
For a long period Abraham Ibn Daud found no imitators. Jewish history was written as part of the Jewish religion. Yet, incidentally, many historical passages were introduced in the works of Jewish scholars and travellers, and the liturgy was enriched by many beautiful historical Elegies, which were a constant call to heroism and fidelity. These Elegies, or Selichoth, were composed throughout the Middle Ages, and their passionate outpourings of lamentation and trust give them a high place in Jewish poetry. They are also important historically, and fully justify the fine utterance with which Zunz introduces them, an utterance which was translated by George Eliot as follows:
If there are ranks in suffering, Israel takes precedence of all the nations—if the duration of sorrows and the patience with which they are borne ennoble, the Jews are among the aristocracy of every land—if a literature is called rich in the possession of a few classic tragedies, what shall we say to a National Tragedy lasting for fifteen hundred years, in which the poets and the actors were also the heroes?
The story of the medieval section of this pathetic martyrdom is written in the Selichoth and in the more prosaic records known as “Memorial Books” (in German, Memorbücher), which are lists of martyrs and brief eulogies of their careers.
For the next formal history we must pass to Abraham Zacuto. In his old age he employed some years of comparative quiet, after a stormy and unhappy life, in writing a “Book of Genealogies” (Yuchasin). He had been exiled from Spain in 1492, and twelve years later composed his historical work in Tunis. Like Abraham Ibn Baud’s book, it opens with the Creation, and ends with the author’s own day. Though Zacuto’s work is more celebrated than historical, it nevertheless had an important share in reawaking the dormant interest of Jews in historical research. Thus we find Elijah Kapsali of Candia writing, in 1523, a “History of the Ottoman Empire,” and Joseph Cohen, of Avignon, a “History of France and Turkey,” in 1554, in which he included an account of the rebellion of Fiesco in Genoa, where the author was then residing.
The sixteenth century witnessed the production of several popular Jewish histories. At that epoch the horizon of the world was extending under new geographical and intellectual discoveries. Israel, on the other hand, seemed to be sinking deeper and deeper into the slough of despond. Some of the men who had themselves been the victims of persecution saw that the only hope lay in rousing the historical consciousness of their brethren. History became the consolation of the exiles from Spain who found themselves pent up within the walls of the Ghettos, which were first built in the sixteenth century. Samuel Usque was a fugitive from the Inquisition, and his dialogues, “Consolations for the Tribulations of Israel” (written in Portuguese, in 1553), are a long drawn-out sigh of pain passing into a sigh of relief. Usque opens with a passionate idyl in which the history of Israel in the near past is told by the shepherd Icabo. To him Numeo and Zicareo offer consolation, and they pour balm into his wounded heart. The vividness of Usque’s style, his historical insight, his sturdy optimism, his poetical force in interpreting suffering as the means of attaining the highest life in God, raise his book above the other works of its class and age.
Usque’s poem did not win the same popularity as two other elegiac histories of the same period. These were the “Rod of Judah” (Shebet Jehudah) and the “Valley of Tears” (Emek ha-Bachah). The former was the work of three generations of the Ibn Verga family. Judah died before the expulsion from Spain, but his son Solomon participated in the final troubles of the Spanish Jews, and was even forced to join the ranks of the Marranos. The grandson, Joseph Ibn Verga, became Rabbi in Adrianople, and was cultured in classical as well as Jewish lore. Their composite work, “The Rod of Judah,” was completed in 1554. It is a well-written but badly arranged martyrology, and over all its pages might be inscribed the Talmudical motto, that God’s chastisements of Israel are chastisements of love. The other work referred to is Joseph Cohen’s “Valley of Tears,” completed in 1575. The author was born in Avignon in 1496, four years after his father had shared in the exile from Spain. He himself suffered expatriation, for, though a distinguished physician and the private doctor of the Doge Andrea Doria, he was expelled with the rest of the Jews from Genoa in 1550. Settled in the little town of Voltaggio, he devoted himself to writing the annals of European and Jewish history. His style is clear and forcible, and recalls the lucid simplicity of the historical books of the Bible.
The only other histories that need be critically mentioned here are the “Branch of David” (Zemach David), the “Chain of Tradition” (Shalsheleth ha-Kabbalah), and the “Light of the Eyes” (Meör Enayim). Abraham de Porta Leone’s “Shields of the Mighty” (Shilte ha-Gibborim, printed in Mantua in 1612); Leon da Modena’s “Ceremonies and Customs of the Jews,” (printed in Paris in 1637); David Conforte’s “Call of the Generations” (Kore ha-Doroth, written in Palestine in about 1670); Yechiel Heilprin’s “Order of Generations” (Seder ha-Doroth, written in Poland in 1725); and Chayim Azulai’s “Name of the Great Ones” (written in Leghorn in 1774), can receive only a bare mention.
The author of the “Branch of David,” David Cans, was born in Westphalia in about 1540. He was the first German Jew of his age to take real interest in the study of history. He was a man of scientific culture, corresponded with Kepler, and was a personal friend of Tycho Brahe. For the latter Cans made a German translation of parts of the Hebrew version of the Tables of Alfonso, originally compiled in 1260. Cans wrote works on mathematical and physical geography, and treatises on arithmetic and geometry. His history, “Branch of David,” was extremely popular. For a man of his scientific training it shows less critical power than might have been expected, but the German Jews did not begin to apply criticism to history till after the age of Mendelssohn. In one respect, however, the “Branch of David” displays the width of the author’s culture. Not only does he tell the history of the Jews, but in the second part of his work he gives an account of many lands and cities, especially of Bohemia and Prague, and adds a striking description of the secret courts (Vehmgerichte) of Westphalia.
It is hard to think that the authors of the “Chain of Tradition” and of the “Light of the Eyes” were contemporaries. Azariah di Rossi (1514-1588), the writer of the last mentioned book, was the founder of historical criticism among the Jews. Elias del Medigo (1463-1498) had led in the direction, but di Rossi’s work anticipated the methods, of the German school of “scientific” Jewish writers, who, at the beginning of the present century, applied scientific principles to the study of Jewish traditions. On the other hand, Gedaliah Ibn Yachya (1515-1587) was so utterly uncritical that his “Chain of Tradition” was nicknamed by Joseph Delmedigo the “Chain of Lies.” Gedaliah was a man of wealth, and he expended his means in the acquisition of books and in making journeys in search of sacred and profane knowledge. Yet Gedaliah made up in style for his lack of historical method. The “Chain of Tradition” is a picturesque and enthralling book, it is a warm and cheery retrospect, and even deserves to be called a prose epic. Besides, many of his statements that were wont to be treated as altogether unauthentic have been vindicated by later research. Azariah di Rossi, on the other hand, is immortalized by his spirit rather than his actual contributions to historical literature. He came of an ancient family said to have been carried to Rome by Titus, and lived in Ferrara, where, in 1574, he produced his “Light of the Eyes.” This is divided into three parts, the first devoted to general history, the second to the Letter of Aristeas, the third to the solution of several historical problems, all of which had been neglected by Jews and Christians alike. Azariah di Rossi was the first critic to open up true lines of research into the Hellenistic literature of the Jews of Alexandria. With him the true historical spirit once more descended on the Jewish genius.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Selichoth.
Hebrew Literature, Vol. I). See also J.Q.R., VIII, pp. 78, 426, 611.
Abraham Ibn Daud.
Abraham Zacuto.
Elijah Kapsali.
Joseph Cohen, Usque, Ibn Verga.
Elia Delmedigo.
David Gans.
Gedaliah Ibn Yachya.
Azariah Di Rossi.
Topics: Literature | 1 Comment »
Site Updates 02/07/10
By rachel-esther | February 6, 2010
Updated the 10 Minute Topic series.
Updated the Jewish History page by updating the Patriarchs and Matriarchs (10 Trials of Abraham) section.
Updated the Jewish Life Cycles page by updating the Jewish Life Cycles (Jewish life cycle events of engagement, marriage, and divorce) section.
Updated the Jewish Texts page by adding Targum and Aleppo Codex sections.
Updated the Places of the Tanach page by adding more place information.
Updated the Weekly Torah Portion page by adding information about this coming week’s (February 13) reading.
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Friday Tehillim (02/05/10)
By rachel-esther | February 6, 2010
Tehillim 36:1 For the Leader. A Psalm of David the servant of the L-rd.
Tehillim 36:2 Transgression speaks to the wicked, methinks – there is no fear of G-d before his eyes.
Tehillim 36:3 For it flatters him in his eyes, until his iniquity be found, and he be hated.
Tehillim 36:4 The words of his mouth are iniquity and deceit; he has left off to be wise, to do good.
Tehillim 36:5 He devises iniquity upon his bed; he sets himself in a way that is not good; he abhorres not evil.
Tehillim 36:6 Your lovingkindness, O L-rd, is in the heavens; Your faithfulness reaches unto the skies.
Tehillim 36:7 Your righteousness is like the mighty mountains; Your judgments are like the great deep; man and beast You preserve, O L-rd.
Tehillim 36:8 How precious is Your lovingkindness, O G-d! and the children of men take refuge in the shadow of Your wings.
Tehillim 36:9 They are abundantly satisfied with the fatness of Your house; and You make them drink of the river of Your pleasures.
Tehillim 36:10 For with You is the fountain of life; in Your light do we see light.
Tehillim 36:11 O continue Your lovingkindness unto them that know You; and Your righteousness to the upright in heart.
Tehillim 36:12 Let not the foot of pride overtake me, and let not the hand of the wicked drive me away.
Tehillim 36:13 There are the workers of iniquity fallen; they are thrust down, and are not able to rise.
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Shabbat – 02/06/10 (22 Shevat 5770)
By rachel-esther | January 31, 2010
For your local Shabbat Candle-lighting times, please go here.
This week’s reading is — Yitro (Exodus 18:1-20:23).
Torah Aliyot and Topics
Aliyah 1: Exodus 18:1-12
Jethro’s arrival, Jethro rejoices
Aliyah 2: Exodus 18:13-23
Jethro rejoices, Jethro’s advice, The list of requirements for leadership
Aliyah 3: Exodus 18:24-27
The list of requirements for leadership, Jethro leaves
Aliyah 4: Exodus 19:1-6
Arrival at Sinai, G-d’s proposal
Aliyah 5: Exodus 19:7-19
G-d’s proposal, Preparing for the Torah, The day of the Revelation
Aliyah 6: Exodus 19:20-20:14
The day of the Revelation, The Ten Statements
Aliyah 7: Exodus 20:15-23
Command to build an altar and bring sacrifices
Maftir: Exodus 20:19-23
Command to build an altar and bring sacrifices
The Haftorah for this week is Isaiah 6:1-7:6; 9:5-6 (Ashkenazi)
Ashkenazi Haftarah Topics
Isaiah’s vision of the Heavenly Court, Call to prophecy, Aram and Israel attack Jerusalem but they will not succeed, Isaiah praises G-d’s salvation
The Haftorah for this week is Isaiah 6:1-13 (Sephardi)
Sephardi Haftarah Topics
Isaiah’s vision of the Heavenly Court, Call to prophecy
For more information about this week’s Parsha, please visit these sites.
Orthodox Union
Chabad
Aish HaTorah
United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism
Union for Reform Judaism
Jewish Reconstructionist Federation
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“Chapters On Jewish Literature” – Chapter 20
By rachel-esther | January 31, 2010
Original file: here.
TRAVELLERS’ TALES
Eldad the Danite.—Benjamin of Tudela.—Petachiah of Ratisbon.—Esthori Parchi.—Abraham Farissol.—David Reubeni and Molcho.—Antonio de Montesinos and Manasseh ben Israel.—Tobiah Cohen.—Wessely.
The voluntary and enforced travels of the Jews produced, from the earliest period after the destruction of the Temple, an extensive, if fragmentary, geographical literature. In the Talmud and later religious books, in the Letters of the Gaonim, in the correspondence of Jewish ambassadors, in the autobiographical narratives interspersed in the works of all Jewish scholars of the Middle Ages, in the Aruch, or Talmudical Lexicon, of Nathan of Rome, in the satirical romances of the poetical globe-trotters, Zabara and Charizi, and, finally, in the Bible commentaries written by Jews, many geographical notes are to be found. But the composition of complete works dedicated to travel and exploration dates only from the twelfth century.
Before that time, however, interest in the whereabouts of the Lost Ten Tribes gave rise to a book which has been well called the Arabian Nights of the Jews. The “Diary of Eldad the Danite,” written in about the year 880, was a popular romance, to which additions and alterations were made at various periods. This diary tells of mighty Israelite empires, especially of the tribe of Moses, the peoples of which were all virtuous, all happy, and long-lived.
“A river flows round their land for a distance of four days’ journey on every side. They dwell in beautiful houses provided with handsome towers, which they have built themselves. There is nothing unclean among them, neither in the case of birds, venison, nor domesticated animals; there are no wild beasts, no flies, no foxes, no vermin, no serpents, no dogs, and, in general, nothing that does harm; they have only sheep and cattle, which bear twice a year. They sow and reap, they have all kinds of gardens with all kinds of fruits and cereals, beans, melons, gourds, onions, garlic, wheat, and barley, and the seed grows a hundredfold. They have faith; they know the Law, the Mishnah, the Talmud, and the Hagadah…. No child, be it son or daughter, dies during the life-time of its parents, but they reach a third and fourth generation. They do all the field-work themselves, having no male nor female servants. They do not close their houses at night, for there is no thief or evil-doer among them. They have plenty of gold and silver; they sow flax, and cultivate the crimson-worm, and make beautiful garments…. The river Sambatyon is two hundred yards broad, about as far as a bow-shot. It is full of sand and stones, but without water; the stones make a great noise, like the waves of the sea and a stormy wind, so that in the night the noise is heard at a distance of half a day’s journey. There are fish in it, and all kinds of clean birds fly round it. And this river of stone and sand rolls during the six working-days, and rests on the Sabbath day. As soon as the Sabbath begins, fire surrounds the river, and the flames remain till the next evening, when the Sabbath ends. Thus no human being can reach the river for a distance of half a mile on either side; the fire consumes all that grows there.”
With wild rapture the Jews of the ninth century heard of these prosperous and powerful kingdoms. Hopes of a restoration to former dignity encouraged them to believe in the mythical narrative of Eldad. It is doubtful whether he was a bona fide traveller. At all events, his book includes much that became the legendary property of all peoples in the Middle Ages, such as the fable of the mighty Christian Emperor of India, Prester John.
Some further account of this semi-mythical monarch is contained in the first real Jewish traveller’s book, the “Itinerary” of Benjamin of Tudela. This Benjamin was a merchant, who, in the year 1160, started on a long journey, which was prompted partly by commercial, partly by scientific motives. He visited a large part of Europe and Asia, went to Jerusalem and Bagdad, and gives in his “Itinerary” some remarkable geographical facts and some equally remarkable fables. He tells, for instance, the story of the pretended Messiah, David Alroy, whom Disraeli made the hero of one of his romances. Benjamin of Tudela’s “Itinerary” was a real contribution to geography.
Soon after Benjamin, another Jew, Petachiah of Ratisbon, set out on a similar but less extended tour, which occupied him during the years 1179 and 1180. His “Travels” are less informing than those of his immediate predecessor, but his descriptions of the real or reputed sepulchres of ancient worthies and his account of the Jewish College in Bagdad are full of romantic interest, which was not lessened for medieval readers because much of Petachiah’s narrative was legendary.
A far more important work was written by the first Jewish explorer of Palestine, Esthori Parchi, a contemporary of Mandeville. His family originated in Florenza, in Andalusia, and the family name Parchi (the Flower) was derived from this circumstance. Esthori was himself born in Provence, and was a student of science as well as of the Talmud. When he, together with the rest of the Jews of France, was exiled in 1306, he wandered to Spain and Egypt until the attraction of the Holy Land proved irresistible. His manner was careful, and his love of accuracy unusual for his day. Hence, he was not content to collect all ancient and contemporary references to the sites of Palestine. For seven years he devoted himself to a personal exploration of the country, two years being passed in Galilee. In 1322 he completed his work, which he called Kaphtor va-Pherach (Bunch and Flower) in allusion to his own name.
Access to the Holy Land became easier for Jews in the fourteenth century. Before that time the city of Jerusalem had for a considerable period been barred to Jewish pilgrims. By the laws of Constantine and of Omar no Jew might enter within the precincts of his ancient capital. Even in the centuries subsequent to Omar, such pilgrimages were fraught with danger, but the poems of Jehuda Halevi, the tolerance of Islam, and the reputation of Northern Syria as a centre of the Kabbala, combined to draw many Jews to Palestine. Many letters and narratives were the results. One characteristic specimen must suffice. In 1488 Obadiah of Bertinoro, author of the most popular commentary on the Mishnah, removed from Italy to Jerusalem, where he was appointed Rabbi. In a letter to his father he gives an intensely moving account of his voyage and of the state of Hebron and Zion. The narrative is full of personal detail, and is marked throughout by deep love for his father, which struggles for the mastery with his love for the Holy City.
A more ambitious work was the “Itinera Mundi” of Abraham Farissol, written in the autumn of 1524. This treatise was based upon original researches as well as on the works of Christian and Arabian geographers. He incidentally says a good deal about the condition of the Jews in various parts of the world. Indeed, almost all the geographical writings of Jews are social histories of their brethren in faith. Somewhat later, David Reubeni published some strange stories as to the Jews. He went to Rome, where he made a considerable sensation, and was received by Pope Clement VII (1523-1534). Dwarfish in stature and dark in complexion, David Reubeni was wasted by continual fasting, but his manner, though harsh and forbidding, was intrepid and awe-inspiring. His outrageous falsehoods for a time found ready acceptance with Jews and Christians alike, and his fervid Messianism won over to his cause many Marranos—Jews who had been forced by the Inquisition in Spain to assume the external garb of Christianity. His chief claim on the memory of posterity was his connection with the dramatic career of Solomon Molcho (1501-1532), a youth noble in mind and body, who at Reubeni’s instigation personated the Messiah, and in early manhood died a martyr’s death amid the flames of the Inquisition at Mantua.
The geographical literature of the Jews did not lose its association with Messianic hopes. Antonio de Montesinos, in 1642, imagined that he had discovered in South America the descendants of the Ten Tribes. He had been led abroad by business considerations and love of travel, and in Brazil came across a mestizo Indian, from whose statements he conceived the firm belief that the Ten Tribes resided and thrived in Brazil. Two years later he visited Amsterdam, and, his imagination aflame with the hopes which had not been stifled by several years’ endurance of the prisons and tortures of the Inquisition, persuaded Manasseh ben Israel to accept his statements. On his death-bed in Brazil, Montesinos reiterated his assertions, and Manasseh ben Israel not only founded thereon his noted book, “The Hope of Israel,” but under the inspiration of similar ideas felt impelled to visit London, and win from Cromwell the right of the Jews to resettle in England.
Jewish geographical literature grew apace in the eighteenth century. A famous book, the “Work of Tobiah,” was written at the beginning of this period by Tobiah Cohen, who was born at Metz in 1652, and died in Jerusalem in 1729. It is a medley of science and fiction, an encyclopedia dealing with all branches of knowledge. He had studied at the Universities of Frankfort and Padua, had enjoyed the patronage of the Elector of Brandenburg, and his medical knowledge won him many distinguished patients in Constantinople. Thus his work contains many medical chapters of real value, and he gives one of the earliest accounts of recently discovered drugs and medicinal plants. Among other curiosities he maintained that he had discovered the Pygmies.
From this absorbing but confusing book our survey must turn finally to N.H. Wessely, who in 1782 for the first time maintained the importance of the study of geography in Jewish school education. The works of the past, with their consoling legends and hopes, continued to hold a place in the heart of Jewish readers. But from Wessely’s time onwards a long series of Jewish explorers and travellers have joined the ranks of those who have opened up for modern times a real knowledge of the globe.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Benjamin Of Tudela.
Petachiah Of Ratisbon.
Abraham Farissol.
David Reubeni.
H. Wessely.
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Site Updates 01/31/10
By rachel-esther | January 31, 2010
Updated the Jewish Messiah page by adding information to the introduction section.
Updated the 10 Minute Topic series.
Updated the Jewish Theology page by adding Original Sin and Teshuva sections and updating the Biblical Covenants section.
Updated the Weekly Torah Portion page by adding information about this coming week’s (February 6) reading.
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Happy Tu B’Shevat 5770 (2010)!
By rachel-esther | January 29, 2010
Tu B’Shevat is January 30, 2010.
Tu B’Shevat, the Jewish Ecology Day, occurs on 15 Shevat (in January or February). Tu B’Shevat is an agricultural holiday that celebrates the earth and its produce. It is the new year for the purpose of calculating the age of trees for tithing (Leviticus 19:23-25). It is celebrated through prayer, celebration, and eating the seven types of plant produce that are cited in Deuteronomy 8:8 (wheat, barley, grape, fig, pomegranate, olives, and date-honey). Other customs include eating a new fruit on this day, planting trees on this day, collecting money for trees for Israel, and holding a seder.
Additional Information: Tu B’Shevat: The New Year for Trees :: Tu B’Shevat :: Tu B’shvat :: Celebrating Nature’s Bounty :: Tu BiShvat
Family Activities: Tu B’Shvat Seder
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Friday Tehillim (01/29/10)
By rachel-esther | January 29, 2010
Psa 35:1 A Psalm of David. Strive, O L-rd, with them that strive with me; fight against them that fight against me.
Tehillim 35:2 Take hold of shield and buckler, and rise up to my help.
Tehillim 35:3 Draw out also the spear, and the battle-axe, against them that pursue me; say unto my soul: ‘I am Your salvation.’
Tehillim 35:4 Let them be ashamed and brought to confusion that seek after my soul; let them be turned back and be abashed that devise my hurt.
Tehillim 35:5 Let them be as chaff before the wind, the angel of the L-rd thrusting them.
Tehillim 35:6 Let their way be dark and slippery, the angel of the L-rd pursuing them.
Tehillim 35:7 For without cause have they hid for me the pit, even their net, without cause have they digged for my soul.
Tehillim 35:8 Let destruction come upon him unawares; and let his net that he has hid catch himself; with destruction let him fall therein.
Tehillim 35:9 And my soul shall be joyful in the L-rd; it shall rejoice in His salvation.
Tehillim 35:10 All my bones shall say: ‘L-rd, who is like unto You, who delivers the poor from him that is too strong for him, yea, the poor and the needy from him that spoils him?’
Tehillim 35:11 Unrighteous witnesses rise up; they ask me of things that I know not.
Tehillim 35:12 They repay me evil for good; bereavement is come to my soul.
Tehillim 35:13 But as for me, when they were sick, my clothing was sackcloth, I afflicted my soul with fasting; and my prayer, may it return into mine own bosom.
Tehillim 35:14 I went about as though it had been my friend or my brother; I bowed down mournful, as one that mourns for his mother.
Tehillim 35:15 But when I halt they rejoice, and gather themselves together; the abjects gather themselves together against me, and those whom I know not; they tear me, and cease not;
Tehillim 35:16 With the profanest mockeries of backbiting they gnash at me with their teeth.
Tehillim 35:17 Lord, how long will You look on? Rescue my soul from their destructions, mine only one from the lions.
Tehillim 35:18 I will give You thanks in the great congregation; I will praise You among a numerous people.
Tehillim 35:19 Let not them that are wrongfully mine enemies rejoice over me; neither let them wink with the eye that hate me without a cause.
Tehillim 35:20 For they speak not peace; but they devise deceitful matters against them that are quiet in the land.
Tehillim 35:21 Yea, they open their mouth wide against me; they say: ‘Aha, aha, our eye has seen it.’
Tehillim 35:22 You have seen, O L-rd; keep not silence; O Lord, be not far from me.
Tehillim 35:23 Rouse You, and awake to my judgment, even unto my cause, my G-d and my L-rd.
Tehillim 35:24 Judge me, O L-rd my God, according to Your righteousness; and let them not rejoice over me.
Tehillim 35:25 Let them not say in their heart: ‘Aha, we have our desire’; let them not say: ‘We have swallowed him up.’
Tehillim 35:26 Let them be ashamed and abashed together that rejoice at my hurt; let them be clothed with shame and confusion that magnify themselves against me.
Tehillim 35:27 Let them shout for joy, and be glad, that delight in my righteousness; yea, let them say continually: ‘Magnified be the L-rd, who delights in the peace of His servant.’
Tehillim 35:28 And my tongue shall speak of Your righteousness, and of Your praise all the day.
Topics: Tanach | No Comments »
Shabbat – 01/30/10 (15 Shevat 5770)
By rachel-esther | January 23, 2010
For your local Shabbat Candle-lighting times, please go here.
This week’s reading is — Beshalach (Exodus 13:17-17:16).
This week is Shabbat Shirah, the Shabbat when Parsha Beshalach (Exodus 13:17-17:16) which includes the Son at the Sea is read.
Torah Aliyot and Topics
Aliyah 1: Exodus 13:17-14:8
The route to Eretz Yisrael, Pharaoh’s change of heart
Aliyah 2: Exodus 14:9-14
Israel panics, G-d’s assurance
Aliyah 3: Exodus 14:15-25
G-d’s assurance, The sea splits
Aliyah 4: Exodus 14:26-15:26
The water crashes down upon Egypt, The salvation, The Song by the Sea, The women sing, Marah: Israel tests G-d
Aliyah 5: Exodus 15:27-16:10
Marah: Israel tests G-d, Manna: Food from heaven
Aliyah 6: Exodus 16:11-36
Manna: Food from heaven, Quail, Equal portions, Preparation for the Sabbath
Aliyah 7: Exodus 17:1-16
Test and contention: water from a rock, Amalek, The eternal struggle against Amalek
Maftir: Exodus 17:14-16
The eternal struggle against Amalek
The Haftorah for this week is Judges 4:4-5:31 (Ashkenazi)
Ashkenazi Haftarah Topics
Deborah and Barak: Canaanite opression: Jabin and Sisera, Zebulun and Naphtali mustered, Sisera’s flight, Jael lures Sisera and kills him, The Song of Deborah, The new situation after the war, The respons of her fellow Jews, The miraculous rout of Sisera’s army, Jael: Blessed for her valor, Sisera’s mother years
The Haftorah for this week is Judges 5:1-31 (Sephardi)
Sephardi Haftarah Topics
The Song of Deborah, The new situation after the war, The respons of her fellow Jews, The miraculous rout of Sisera’s army, Jael: Blessed for her valor, Sisera’s mother years
For more information about this week’s Parsha, please visit these sites.
Orthodox Union
Chabad
Aish HaTorah
United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism
Union for Reform Judaism
Jewish Reconstructionist Federation
Topics: Parsha | No Comments »
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