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Fred MacDowell Profile picture
Fred MacDowell
@onthemainline
'banned book purveyor sounds like your job'
Joshua Cypess Profile picture 1 subscribed
Jun 15, 2023 • 10 tweets • 2 min read
Rabbi Nathan Marcus Adler here is holding a book which does not exist; *his* book, which definitely did exist, but (probably*) not in this form.

His commentary on Targum Onkelos, which he called Nesina Lager, is depicted in his hand. Image This is the title page. He published it as part of a mikraos gedolos chumash which he called Toras Elohim (yes, that), and had it printed in Vilna by the Romm press, in 1874. Image
May 17, 2023 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
In the 1620s Rabbi Joseph Solomon Delmedigo wrote:

"No teacher or father gives over the full content of their heart to their student or child, and because of this the truth suffers. But I swear: in my book Basemath I do not defer to anyone but Chazal and I do tell all unadorned. Image If I am mistaken to do so, God is good and atones me."

Of course now you are wondering, what does he say in his Sefer Basemath. It sure would be nice to know, as ironically, we don't have it!
Apr 2, 2023 • 5 tweets • 1 min read
The four stages of an Ashkenazi maskil, through charoses: 1. Making it heavily date based, because of the Rambam and how Sephardim have more accurate and sensical halachic system.
Feb 27, 2023 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
New schnitzel Image Schnitzel abroad Image
Nov 20, 2022 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
This is a letter from the rabbis of Hebron to a Jew in New York, appointing him representative to collect tzedaka. This is 1763.

What is interesting is that this is a *printed form letter* which they evidently sent to communities throughout the world. His name is *written in.* Preceded by the printed formulaic honorific:

ה"ה הגביר יקר ונעלה לשם ולתהלה [איש] חסד אוהב התורה ולומדיה כמה"ר
Nov 17, 2022 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
In this page of milah registry, the brit milahs of a 56 year old man, and his 3 sons, aged 24, 20, and 17 are indicated.

What gives? Image Almost 200 years after masses of Jews were forcibly converted to Catholicism in Spain and Portugal, some of the descendants of those people were still glad to get the heck out and join Jewry outside of the Iberian Peninsula.
Nov 8, 2022 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
In this account, a Jewish apostate to Christianity describes how his shidduch was sealed (in 1775) - his prospective father in law had his two sons in law examine him for Talmudic proficiency. Normally this was done by the father in law, so one imagines that the father in law probably was not much of a scholar; his qualification to get scholars for sons in law was his wealth.
Nov 2, 2022 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
The cover sheet of a letter sent by Rabbi Isaac Nieto, chief rabbi of the Sephardim in London, to the Jews of China in 1770.

'Epistle on behalf of the Jews of London to the honorable gentlemen brother Jews who dwell in China, God grant them blessings and life without end.' Here is the letter itself. As you can see, it asks the Jews of China 9 questions about themselves:
Oct 23, 2022 • 10 tweets • 2 min read
18 year old Jacob Pass was executed in London in 1743. He was from Bordeaux, studied in yeshiva in Amsterdam age 12, and wandered through various countries - all over Europe, Turkey, and the Carribean, before landing in England, engaging in theft, and swinging from the gallows. Image "His Father bred Abraham to trading, for which most of that Nation have a genius; but he was of so light and giddy a Disposition, that by no means he could be restrained to abide in his Native Place,
Oct 23, 2022 • 7 tweets • 3 min read
Ai prompt: unrealistic beauty standards: Here's another.
Sep 13, 2022 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
Here is Rebbetzin Esther Jungreis's heavily annotated Hertz Chumash.

Honestly, if the rest of it is as annotated as this, I really think it should be published. Here is a beautiful and sweet card that young Esther Jungreis gave to a friend in a DP camp. She must have been about 11, or a little older? I can't tell if this is hand drawn (or if so, drawn by whom?). It says הנה מה טוב ומה נעים שבת אחים גם יחד!
Sep 12, 2022 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
Entire article? Probably a first. More than a few words in Yiddish? Not the first. Someone writing to the NY Times in 1902 claims that because Yiddish is so adaptive, freely acquiring words from other languages, that the Jewish immigrant from eastern Europe acquires English faster than other immigrants.
Sep 12, 2022 • 20 tweets • 4 min read
This is how you get adults who say it wasn't a big deal, didn't happen too much, didn't happen to them, if it happened to *their* kid they'd "beat the rebbe up," (unlike the actual dads who never do), etc. Another thing is that a lot of times these particular problematic rabbeim were not always on (or off?). Many of them could be nice when they weren't angry, or didn't feel a loss of control.
Sep 9, 2022 • 8 tweets • 2 min read
Not only that, the average bochur has NO IDEA that shas Bavli is situated within the Persian Empire of the time and many couldn't even tell you that Bavel is in what's today Iraq (or that it's next to Iran, ie, Persia). That's not necessarily a bad thing per se! Not everyone has to know who Queen Shushandukht is or even James Madison. Knowing who a random person in history is not education, but an occasional mention of the existence of a person, basically context free, is also not instruction.
Sep 7, 2022 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
X is for the excesse and abuse of sports. See Prou. 21.17 Image Bit more context. Image
Jul 20, 2022 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
Thinking about the erotic thriller film where a young man gives Jennifer Lopez a priceless "first edition" copy of Sefer Tehillim Here's the Iliad.
Jul 18, 2022 • 91 tweets • 26 min read
Okey doke.

ngl.link/onthemainline The history of the Jewish book, sort of like the History of Jewish Literature by Israel Zinberg and a similar work by Mayer Waxman. Most people have no idea of the extraordinary breadth of types of Jewish books, seforim, that there really were over more than one thousand years. Image
Jul 15, 2022 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
This is a really nice read. I love excavations of the self, to show ourselves (or others) how we got here. That's as far as the autobiography of @DBashIdeas' youthful reading.

I also like the "I read over shabbos" thing, and I'll tell you why. Anything someone spends hours on, tells me something about them. I have perceptions of various people, and seeing what they read, adds something more.
Jul 14, 2022 • 4 tweets • 2 min read
Here's Ruth wearing her best gleaning/meet Boaz outfit. See here for details, post by @hchesner

blogs.cul.columbia.edu/rbml/2018/05/1…
May 30, 2022 • 1712 tweets • >60 min read
1650

1651

May 5, 2022 • 9 tweets • 2 min read
An 1829 book advises young men to say nice things about their actual babies to their wives: "It is an old saying, 'Praise the child, and you make love to the mother.'" This is "Advice to Young Men, and, incidentally, to Young Women, in the middle and Higher Ranks of Life," by William Cobbett (London, 1829).