Elli Fischer
Rabbi Elli Fischer is a writer, translator, editor, and heritage travel consultant. He has rabbinical ordination from the Chief Rabbinate of Israel and is pursuing a doctorate in Modern European Jewish History at Tel Aviv University. His chief interests are rabbinic biography, the history of halakha, and the interaction between religion and state in Israel.His original writing has appeared in a variety of Jewish publications, and he has translated and edited popular and acclaimed books. Prior to moving to Israel, he was the JLIC campus rabbi at the University of Maryland. He maintains a lively social media presence.
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Papers by Elli Fischer
Hoffmann’s halakhic writings have lamented that the almost complete
absence of dates in She’elot u-Teshuvot Melamed Leho’il makes it
impossible to chart Rabbi Hoffmann’s development in this field. However,
close scrutiny of Rabbi Hoffmann’s vast correspondence and of the
chronological record from which Melamed Leho’il was abstracted allows
us to begin to reconstruct his development.
This paper will demonstrate the sources and methods by which this
reconstruction can be accomplished by looking at one particular issue: the
status of sesame oil on Passover. Rabbi Hoffmann addresses the question
in one lengthy (and composite) responsum in Melamed Leho’il and refers
to it obliquely in another. Additional correspondences have come to light
more recently, and a newspaper article from the early 1900s completes the
picture and demonstrates how Rabbi Hoffmann’s position changed over
the course of five years. This is but one example of Rabbi Hoffmann’s
evolution as a halakhist when he took up the mantle of posek during the
last two decades of his life.
We demonstrate that R. Hoffmann both recorded his halakhic decisions in his notebook and copied directly from the notebook into the letters of response to various correspondents. We also show that R. Hoffmann continued to update his notebook through the years, until the end of his life, revisiting previously rendered decisions. Thus, even a single responsum, as printed in Melamed Le-ho'il, may reflect several stages of R. Hoffmann's halakhic thinking about a particular topic over time.
This article adds a new layer of understanding to the genesis of this law by looking at the official and unofficial role of rabbis in Diaspora communities, especially Tsarist Russia and its successor states, birthplaces of most of Israel's founding leaders, and demonstrating the continuities between those arrangements and the arrangements in the new state.
The surprising answer is the comedy of Lenny Bruce - and it betrays something of his own hybrid identity.
Hoffmann’s halakhic writings have lamented that the almost complete
absence of dates in She’elot u-Teshuvot Melamed Leho’il makes it
impossible to chart Rabbi Hoffmann’s development in this field. However,
close scrutiny of Rabbi Hoffmann’s vast correspondence and of the
chronological record from which Melamed Leho’il was abstracted allows
us to begin to reconstruct his development.
This paper will demonstrate the sources and methods by which this
reconstruction can be accomplished by looking at one particular issue: the
status of sesame oil on Passover. Rabbi Hoffmann addresses the question
in one lengthy (and composite) responsum in Melamed Leho’il and refers
to it obliquely in another. Additional correspondences have come to light
more recently, and a newspaper article from the early 1900s completes the
picture and demonstrates how Rabbi Hoffmann’s position changed over
the course of five years. This is but one example of Rabbi Hoffmann’s
evolution as a halakhist when he took up the mantle of posek during the
last two decades of his life.
We demonstrate that R. Hoffmann both recorded his halakhic decisions in his notebook and copied directly from the notebook into the letters of response to various correspondents. We also show that R. Hoffmann continued to update his notebook through the years, until the end of his life, revisiting previously rendered decisions. Thus, even a single responsum, as printed in Melamed Le-ho'il, may reflect several stages of R. Hoffmann's halakhic thinking about a particular topic over time.
This article adds a new layer of understanding to the genesis of this law by looking at the official and unofficial role of rabbis in Diaspora communities, especially Tsarist Russia and its successor states, birthplaces of most of Israel's founding leaders, and demonstrating the continuities between those arrangements and the arrangements in the new state.
The surprising answer is the comedy of Lenny Bruce - and it betrays something of his own hybrid identity.
לכתוב כתיבה מחקרית, מדעית ומחקר ביקורתי מאידך. מאה שנה לאחר פטירתו אנו מבקשים לדון באלמנטים השונים הללו של הגותו ופעולתו המעשית מתוך רצון
להעמיק את הידוע לנו על הרב הופמן, שנעשה מודל עבור חוקרים המבקשים לשלב בין מחקר ביקורתי תוך שהם נשארים נאמנים לאמונתם.
חוקרים העוסקים בהגותו ופועלו של הרד"צ הופמן מוזמנים להגיש הצעות להרצאות בנות 20 דקות.
הכנס מתוכנן ליום שלישי ר"ח שבט תשפ"ב 3 בינואר 2022 באוניברסיטת בר-אילן.
הצעות יש לשלוח עד לתאריך כ"ג אלול תשפ"א ) 31.8.2021 (
לכתוב: [email protected]
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdsq12MK19VulABYSKCWsfwTrrHYZFOEt1wCBZgVpciRWoriQ/viewform
The proposed paper will look at this phenomenon as it pertains to the Jewish, and specifically rabbinic, bookshelf. Jewish books have a rich history of their own and their placement, type, and deployment in the form of citation often reflects particular orientations towards Jewish identity, thought, and theology.
The paper will be divided into two parts. The first part will address historical and theoretical elements of how one would “display” a bookshelf given technological constraints. It will also consider the potential role of COVID-19 and the ubiquity of video-conferencing in the shifting cultural role of the printed book. The second part will address concrete recent examples and analyze both what the curators of the shelves are trying to say about themselves and what various audiences actually perceive. It will include examples from rabbis, public figures, Israeli lawmakers, and others.
Conference program: http://www.open.ac.uk/arts/research/book-history/sites/www.open.ac.uk.arts.research.book-history/files/files/Full%20programme%20Bookshelves%20Conference%2001_10_2020.pdf
With regard to rabbinic authority, information technology has played a significant role in periodization and in shaping the corpus of knowledge that the rabbinic arbiter must master in order to be considered an expert. At the major junctures of the post-classical era—during the shift from oral to written text, and then from written to printed—changes in the mode of transition of information has produced anxiety among the “old guardians” of knowledge, who (correctly) perceived the new technologies as dangers to their authority. In each case, however, adjustments were eventually made that allowed rabbis to project expertise and authority.
During the past several decades, digital text has steadily replaced printed text. Even if eulogies for paper books are premature, the changes in the culture of rabbinic learning have been dramatic. With massive databases like the Bar-Ilan Responsa Project, Hebrewbooks.com, Otzar Ha-hokhma, and others, which grant instant access to texts and are easily searched and excerpted, a Torah scholar with reasonable familiarity with the rabbinic corpus can accomplish what could only be accomplished by the greatest sages just a generation ago. Moreover, accessibility constrains the halakhic arbiter’s ability to assert the correctness of one particular view over others, as the alternatives will easily be found after a mere few keystrokes. This has all taken place even as new forms of communication and social media have generated new forums for rabbis in which rabbis may project expertise and authority and given individuals unprecedented choice of rabbis and opinions.
As can be expected, these innovations have produced anxiety among some leading halakhic decisors, especially those whose authority is based on knowledge that can be simulated and even surpassed by the new technologies. Several writings published by Rabbi Hershel Schachter of Yeshiva University/RIETS clearly demonstrate this anxiety in their direct appeal to halakhic authority. In fact, they echo some of the writings produced during other periods of technological transition.
It is reasonable to assume that the new technologies will not spell the end of rabbinic authority, and though it is impossible to predict the new shapes it will take in response to the advances of the Information Age, certain trends that are present in the writings of some 21st century halakhists may offer some indications of what the future holds in store.
But his dichotomy between a walled-in Judaism and a Judaism open to hybridization crashes on the rocks of Chabon's own ignorance. If you want pastiche and mongrels, you need to know something first.
The seminar is a visible expression of the explosion of biblical commentary that has emerged in " the Gush, " as Herzog College, the Beit Midrash for Women–Migdal Oz, and their parent institution, Yeshivat Har Etzion, are collectively known, over the last four decades. These institutions have come to be identified with a distinctive new derekh halimud (way of learning) in their approach to the Bible. This provides an important shared vocabulary of study, but what allows this intellectual subculture to take root and thrive has been its inclusion in the beit midrash, the noisy, boisterous, uniquely Jewish " house of study. " Even if one were to conclude, as some academic Bible critics do, that Gush Tanakh is merely religiously correct, watered down pseudoscholarship that avoids examining or undermining orthodoxies, one must still understand it as an extraordinary and surprising phenomenon that has not been replicated in other circles of Jewish learning.
The full version was published in "Artifacts of Orthodox Jewish Childhoods", edited by Dr. Dainy Bernstein (Ben Yehuda Press, 2022). https://www.benyehudapress.com/books/artifacts-of-orthodox-childhoods/
On Monday, January 3rd, join me, Emmanuel Bloch, Elli Fischer, Adam Ferziger and others at Bar-Ilan University for a special conference marking a century since the death of this incredible figure -- to study his life, intellectual gifts, and the questions and ideas left to us today.
The obligation to circumcise a newborn boy who dies before his parents can enter him into the covenant of Abraham is settled halakhah and thus codified in Shulḥan Arukh. By its very nature, the fulfillment of this obligation is hidden from the eye. It is not performed festively or before a large crowd, and it seems that the Jewish masses are unfamiliar with it and with the details of its performance, even though it is carried out to this day by ḥevra kadisha (burial society) members around the world. This article describes the history of this practice, which is possibly halakhah, possibly custom, possibly a balm for the soul of a mother who has lost a child, and possibly a practice that stems from beliefs about the nature of the afterlife. Along the way, it traces the development of this practice, from the responsa of the Babylonian
Jewish Thought 4 (2022): 7-39
Geonim in the ninth century through Italy, Spain, and the Rhineland to fourteenth-century Provence. The historical-geographical journey presented below will show that the practice of circumcising the stillborn also provoked much opposition, and its supporters advanced different reasons for upholding it. Between them, a unique conception of the function of the commandments and the nature of life after death emerges, and the journey through the history of this neglected corner of Jewish practice becomes a journey among Jewish cultures. Indeed, they all address a single brief responsum from one of the Babylonian Geonim, and they all return to it while using it to meet their needs.