History of the Jews in Russia and Poland (Vol. 1-3). Dubnow Simon

taking for his model the old casuistic method of the Tosafists,92 which consisted in a detailed criticism and an ingenious analysis of the Talmudic texts. In this spirit he began to compose his remarkable commentary on the Talmud (Yam shel Shelomo, "Sea of Solomon"93), but succeeded in interpreting only a few tractates.

      In all his investigations Luria manifested boldness of thought and independence of judgment, without sparing the authorities whenever he believed them to be in the wrong. Of the Shulhan Arukh and its author Luria spoke slightingly, claiming that Joseph Caro had used his sources without the necessary discrimination, and had decided many moot points of law arbitrarily. In consequence of this independence of judgment, Solomon Luria had many enemies in the scholarly world, but he had, on the other hand, many enthusiastic admirers and devoted disciples. In the middle of the sixteenth century he occupied the post of rabbi in the city of Ostrog, in Volhynia. By his Talmudic lectures, which attracted students from the whole region, he made this city the intellectual center of Volhynian and Lithuanian Jewry. The last years of his life he spent in Lublin, where to this day there exists a synagogue which bears his name.

      Luria and Isserles were looked upon as the pillars of Polish rabbinism. Questions of Jewish ritual and law were submitted to them for decision, not only from various parts of their own country but also from Western Europe, from Italy, Germany, and Bohemia. Their replies to these inquiries, or "Responsa" (Shaaloth u-Teshuboth), have been gathered in special collections. These two rabbis also carried on a scientific correspondence with each other. As a result of their divergent character and trend of mind, heated discussions frequently took place between them. Thus Luria, in spite of all his sobriety of intellect, gravitated towards the Cabala, while Isserles, with all his rabbinic conservatism, devoted part of his leisure to philosophy. The two scholars rebuked each other for their respective "weaknesses." Luria maintained that the wisdom of the "uncircumcised Aristotle" could be of no benefit, while Isserles tried to prove that many views of the Cabala were not in accord with the ideas of the Talmud, and that mysticism was more dangerous to faith than a moderate philosophy.

Isserles was right. The philosophy with which he occupied himself could scarcely be destructive of Orthodoxy. This is shown by his large work Torath ha-`Olah ("The Law of the Burnt-Offering," 1570),94 which represents a weird mixture of religious and philosophic discussions on themes borrowed from Maimonides' "Guide of the Perplexed," interspersed with speculations about the various classes of angels or the architecture of the Jerusalem temple, its vessels and order of sacrifices. The author professes to detect in all the details of the temple service a profound symbolism. Notwithstanding the strange plan of the book there are many chapters in it that show the intimate familiarity of Isserles with the philosophic literature of the Sephardim, a remarkable record for an Ashkenazic rabbi of the sixteenth century.

      The intimate connection between rabbinic learning and Jewish life stood out in bold relief from the moment the "Council of the Four Lands" began to discharge its regular functions. The Council had frequent occasion to decide, for practical purposes, complicated questions appertaining to domestic, civil, and criminal law, or relating to legal procedure and religious practice, and the rabbis who participated in these conferences as legal experts were forced to accomplish a large amount of concrete, tangible work for themselves and their colleagues. Questions of law and ritual were everywhere assiduously investigated and elaborated, with that subtle analysis peculiar to the Jewish mind, which pursues every idea to its remotest consequences and its most trifling details.

      The subject as well as the method of investigation depended, as a rule, on the social position of the investigator. The rabbis of higher rank, who took an active part in the Kahal administration, and participated in the meetings of the Councils, either of the Crown or of Lithuania, paid particular attention to the practical application of Talmudic law. One of the oldest scholars of this category during the period under discussion was Mordecai Jaffe (died 1612), a native of Bohemia, who occupied the post of rabbi successively in Grodno, Lublin, Kremenetz, Prague, and Posen. Towards the end of the sixteenth century he presided a number of times over the conferences of the "Council of the Four Lands." Though a pupil of Moses Isserles, Jaffe did not consider the Shulhan Arukh as supplemented by his teacher the last word in codification. He objected to the fact that its juridical conclusions were formulated dogmatically, without sufficient motivation.

For this reason he undertook the composition of a new and more elaborate code of laws, arranged in the accepted order of the four books of the Turim,95 which is known as Lebushim, or "Raiments."96 The method of Mordecai Jaffe differs from that of Joseph Caro and Isserles in the wealth of the scientific discussions which accompany every legal clause. At first Jaffe's code created a split in the rabbinical world, and threatened to weaken the authority of the Shulhan Arukh. In the end, however, the latter prevailed, and was acknowledged as the only authoritative guide for the religious and juridical practice of Judaism. Apart from his code, Mordecai Jaffe wrote, under the same general title Lebushim, five more volumes, containing Bible commentaries, synagogue sermons, and annotations to Maimonides' "Guide," as well as Cabalistic speculations.

Jaffe's successor as leading rabbi and president of the "Council of the Four Lands" was, in all likelihood, Joshua Falk Cohen (died 1616), Rabbi of Lublin and subsequently rector of the Talmudic yeshibah in Lemberg. He attained to fame through his commentary to the Hoshen Mishpat, the part of Caro's code dealing with civil law,97 which he called Sepher Meïrath `Enaïm, "A Book of the Enlightenment of the Eyes"98 (abbreviated to SeM`A). He also framed, at the instance of the Waad, a large part of the above-mentioned regulations of 1607,99 which were issued for the purpose of establishing piety and good morals more firmly among the Jews of Poland.

A more scholastic and less practical tendency is noticeable in the labors of Joshua Falk's contemporary, Meïr of Lublin (1554–1616), known by the abbreviated name of MaHaRaM.100 He was active as rabbi in Cracow, Lemberg, and Lublin, delivered Talmudic discourses before large audiences, wrote ingenious, casuistic commentaries to the most important treatises of the Talmud (entitled Meïr `Ene Hahamim, "Enlightening the Eyes of the Wise"), and was busy replying to the numerous inquiries addressed to him by scholars from all parts (Shaaloth u-Teshuboth Maharam). Laying particular stress on subtle analysis, Rabbi Meïr of Lublin looked down upon the codifiers and systematic writers of the class to which Isserles and Jaffe belonged. The trifling minuteness of his investigations may be illustrated by the fact that he considered it necessary to write a special "opinion" about the question whether a woman is guilty of conjugal infidelity, if she is convicted of having had relations with the devil, the latter having visited her first in the shape of her husband and afterwards in the disguise of a Polish nobleman.

In the domain of dialectics Rabbi Meïr found a successful rival in the person of Samuel Edels, known by the abbreviated name of MaHaRSHO101 (died 1631), who occupied the post of rabbi in Posen, Lublin, and Ostrog. In his comprehensive expositions to all the sections of the Talmudic Halakha (Hiddushe Halakhoth, "Novel Expositions of the Halakha"), he endeavored principally to exercise the thinking faculties and the memory of his students by an ingenious comparison of texts and by other scholastic intricacies. The dialectic commentary of Edels became one of the most important handbooks for the study of the Talmud in the heders and yeshibahs, and is frequently used there in our own days. His commentary on the Talmudic Haggada is strewn over with Cabalistic and religio-philosophic ideas of the conservative Jewish thinkers of the Middle Ages.

In the middle