Tamar Ron Marvin
@tamar_marvin
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Rabbanit | PhD, Medieval & Early Modern Jewish Studies | Stories from Jewish History newsletter: | שים ספריך חבריך
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Nothing, I'm coming next week.
Genuine question: What's stopping you from making aliyah?🇮🇱✨️
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"Corrected against my own copy, I, Moshe the son of the Rabbi Maimon of blessed memory."
This note appears at the end of Mishneh Torah, Sefer ha-Madda and Sefer ha-Ahava, in the manuscript known as Bodl. Ms. Hunt. 80.
What you're looking at is Rambam's own handwriting.
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Shavua tov, I have my first meeting with our aliyah advisor this week. May all the hostages be released speedily this week please G-d. May it be a good week for Am Yisrael.
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Shavua tov from our new home in Eretz Yisrael.
I was born not far from here. I left Israel at the age of three. We were supposed to be in the States for two years while my father did a postdoc. Two years turned into many. I never stopped missing home. I'm finally back home.
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This Sunday we're hanging out with the one...the only...Ibn Ezra.
Alongside Rashi, R. Avraham Ibn Ezra's commentary on Tanach represents the Sefardi peshat tradition. From this he is known (beloved, consternating) to many. But Ibn Ezra's story is unlike that of any other Rishon.
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I was born in Israel.
My mother was born in Israel.
My grandmother was born in Israel.
Where is the only place on earth I'm going back to?
Hint: it's not Poland.
We got our official aliyah approval this week.
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Here's my take on essential reading in Jewish studies. I go into nerdy detail about how I made the selections at the top. I'd love your feedback (including kvetching!) and plan to keep the lust updated accordingly.
PHEW, that was a tough assignment.
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I'm making a WhatsApp sticker pack of gemara phrases, what should I put in it?
You know, for all those times you need to drop a לאו דווקא or אין הכי נמי into the chat, but cutely.
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If you lack moral clarity about
kidnapping toddlers and the disabled
shooting the elderly in their homes
murdering parents in front of their young children
sexual violation and mutilation of enemy bodies
massacres of civilians
You lack moral clarity. On everything.
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You guys, I'm (officially) writing a book!
Working title: "The Worlds of the Rishonim." Note the plural - so many rich worlds to explore. The goal is to write a narrative history of the medieval period in Jewish life and thought based on primary sources.
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Hey, it's been a while since we did a Sunday hangout with a friendly yet obscure medieval rabbi -
So why don't we spend some time with -
RABBENU DOVID 👑🥤
It had to be you, Rabbenu Dovid.
It's fair Gerona where we lay our scene. Mid-13th century.
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Do not be fooled by the name, Tam. Yes, the Rashi family had a tradition of piety and humility. Yes, he shared a name with Yaakov the tam (mild), dweller of tents. But Rabbenu Tam was fierce.
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Eicha - "How?" - will always be the most perfectly plaintive title for a book about unfathomable destruction and the real, ugly darkness of exile and mourning. It does not try to deny, explain, or soothe away. It just asks, But how could this happen? How?
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Today, with nightfall, is both my Hebrew birthday & civil birthday. My gift to myself is to begin Shas. Daf yomi doesn’t work for me so I’ve come up with a different approach focused on the Perek: Mishnayot, Tosefta, Yerushalmi, last Bavli. No time limit, bli neder hoping 10years
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Today I found my savta's famous long-lost recipe we called "fingers." They are like potato dumplings that are first boiled then deep fried. Has anyone heard of them? Her family was from a little shtetl in Poland near Slonim but I think she got this recipe from a Romanian neighbor
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All about Hebrew between antiquity and "the 1930s," a thread. 🧵
Them: Hebrew was invented in the 30's.
Me: My Siddur was printed in 1863.
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Ready to meet a forgotten rabbi who deserves some love? He's one of my best medieval friends, R Meir ben Shimon ha-Meili. I love a cantankerous overthinker; ha-Meili is nothing if not that. From an A-list Provençal family, rubbing shoulders with Ramban, he wrote invaluable works.
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I have so much "it belongs in a museum" energy right now
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Here's the story.
It's the story of two friends, but really the story of modern Israel.
They meet in the army, of course.
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It's impossible to overstate the significance of Maharam of Rothenburg. Scion of a preeminent Worms family of scholars, he was a prodigy who reportedly sat in the yeshiva of the Or Zarua by age 12.
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We're watching Matrix (the first one) with older kiddo.
He says: People from Zion would *not* name their spaceship Nebuchadnezzar!!
This has been bothering me for decades (apple, tree).
Leave it to me to be annoyed that pop culture isn't systematic theology...
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Does it ever stop being a thrill when the Gemara asks your question
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So I started writing my book today.
(!!!)
Wanna be my accountability partner, jwitter? In July we WILL finish chapter one.
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"'It happened at midnight' that I came out of the Egypt of the kingdom of Portugal and came to the kingdom of Castile, to the city on the edge of its border, Segura de la Orden."
So wrote R. Yitzchak Abravanel in 1483. He was 46 years old. He had just lost everything.
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R. Yaakov ben Asher, son of the Rosh, was, it seems, a quiet person. He was not the eldest and did not inherit the choice position of rabbi in Toledo from his famous father, probably in part by inclination. And yet, it was the quiet Tur who would change history.
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Normalize frum women talking about Torah instead of momhood and parenting.
It’s no secret.
We can use more awesome content from women in the frum world.
I hope this new show that I produce helps bridge the gap a bit more.
Show: Not Your Typical Podcast 💛
Host: Charlene Aminoff ✨
Topics: Momhood, Parenting, Life, Connecting to Hashem 🎉
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Cooper Union helped my grandfather rebuild his life after Auschwitz and a death march as a teenager. This is 2023 ⤵️
BREAKING NOW: my sources tell me several Jewish students
@cooperunion
are currently locked in the school library as a pro Hamas rally outside of the cooper Union building learnt the Jews were afraid and sitting in the library, then brought the protest inside and are barricading
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Ready to meet the major manuscripts we have for the Mishnah?
First, a word on why this is important. Don't we have a reliable text of the Mishnah in the Vilna Shas?
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Today's thread is all about manuscripts of the siddur and machzor (weekly and yearly prayerbooks) and if you've been waiting for sumptuous illuminations and gold-leafed everything, you're in for a treat.
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600 years after he put down his pen, Yitzchak Or Zarua's masterpiece was published. Sort of.
But his Torah changed the world. It comes down to us as an authoritative early source of Ashkenazi tradition.
This is the story of R. Yitzchak ben Moshe of Vienna, the Or Zarua.
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Shavua tov, this week I have a duo of fascinating Jews to share: Avraham b. Shlomo Conat & Estellina Conat, a husband-and-wife team of intellectuals & early Hebrew printers. They were active in printing in Mantua, Italy between 1475-7. Their selection of works tells a whole story
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I read this over Shabbat (not all of it).
I know everything in the book but it's watching a master at work how he puts it together. We've needed a definitive book on Ramban for a long time. Was thinking this would be like what he did for Rambam but it's a different sort of book.
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My kid built us a Lego dream house and there is a library room for me. That's me sitting at the desk looking at a manuscript and drinking coffee. The books come out of the bookcase!
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I read this over Shabbat (by myself, since I failed to get my kids interested).
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The two brothers lived in a small town in Champagne, tending their vineyards and sheep. The younger is familiar from the pages of the Talmud, where his acronym ר"ת - Rabbenu Tam - occurs constantly in our Tosafot.
But we're here to see the elder brother. Rashbam.
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In explaining why he undertook the daunting task of commenting on the Torah, despite feeling unequal to the task, Rabbenu Bachya ben Asher says, "I took off the robes of idleness and put on the clothing of productivity...what can I do, for my soul longs for Torah."
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Today I bumped into a new-to-me obscure medieval rabbi, want to meet him?
His name is Chaim Ibn Vivas (ביבש). He was active mid-1300s. We know lots of other Ibn Vivas/Vives/Bibas doing all sorts of interesting things in the late medieval world into modernity. But Chaim, well...
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Across the Jewish world, Bible codices were gloriously illuminated - that is, book versions of Tanach as opposed to Torah scrolls, where decorations other than Tagin (crowns on the letters) are of course prohibited.
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I have thoughts. 🧵
Agree strongly that Hebrew literacy should be a top goal of Jewish education. Same for Jewish text literacy.
As a multilingual person/member of a bilingual household I also think American monolingualism is a system problem, not an individual failing.
Students graduating from 12 years of Jewish day school should be fluent in Hebrew and know how to open a tanach, where is the system going wrong?
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Hi Yiddish Twitter. How do YOU say "thingy," as in "hand me that thingy over there so I can jigger this open"?
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"Inside this grave the very light of wisdom is buried, and the world is left blind." This is how Moshe Ibn Ezra eulogized the Rif in 1103 and expressed the magnitude of his loss.
Rif is a golden thread that connects the old world of the Geonim to that of the Rishonim.
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When your dino-obsessed kid says, “Ima, if you were a dinosaur I think you’d be a maiasaura. They took really good care of their young.” Yeah, you melt.
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Thank you
@NewYorker
for documenting these horrific cases in English. I am terrified by the amount of obfuscation, omission, or outright denial I am seeing in English-language press right now.
Please read the two following tweets in the thread if you are able to bear witness.
In one day, Hamas militants massacred, tortured, and abducted residents of a kibbutz, leaving their homes charred and their community in ruins, Ruth Margalit writes.
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Want to hang out with one of the most illustrious unknown Rishonim this evening? Say hi to the anonymous author of Sefer ha-Chinuch 👋
Scholars have lots to say about his identity (we'll get into it ofc) but he remains an enigma. Here's why I think that matters.🧵
BL Ms Or 2855
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If I had to pick just one figure to represent the world of the Rishonim...
...it would be Ramban.
You want Sefard *and* Ashkenaz? How about philosophy and Kabbalah? Halacha, Gemara, or Mikra - how about all of them? Poetry? That too. Galut and aliyah? Yep. He's the apotheosis.
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Want to hear a story abt Jewish astrolabes?
An
#astrolabe
is an astronomical instrument for various calculations, superseded by clocks, calculators, computers
But the astrolabe built the world as we know it & Jews played a key role in transferring this knowledge across cultures
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Avraham ha-Bedersi (of Béziers) c. the 13th cen wrote a poem called אלף אלפין ("A thousand A's") in which every word begins with א. Then his son Yedayah ha-Penini wrote one called בקשת הממין in which every word begins with מ. See, this is how people used their time before Twitter
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This photo was taken in Munkacs in 1942. It's the only photograph (of a photograph) I have of my paternal grandfather's parents. They were murdered in the gas chambers of Auschwitz about two years later.
I'm still trying to reconstruct their experiences and their last days.
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R. Ovadia di Bertinoro, "The Bartenura," was a brilliant but not unconventional scholar. He is best known for his commentary on the Mishnah, heavily premised on Rashi's comments contained within the latter's larger Talmud commentary.
Yet Bartenura was on the leading edge.
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When I read Ibn Ezra on a Mikra, I meet an old friend on the page. Often I physically smile in recognition of his inimitable way. The sun never set, not for Ibn Ezra.
Next week: a deep dive into Ibn Ezra's astrological-philosphical predilections!
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I read this over Shavuot.
As soon as I finished (it's a short book) I turned it back to the first page and started reading it again. Got almost 3/4 of the way back through. Don't think I've ever done that with a book before.
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Ritva (R. Yom Tov ben Avraham Ishvili, "of Seville") took up the mantle of leadership in Aragon (northeast Spain) after the passing of his older contemporaries and teachers, Rashba and Ra'ah (R. Aharon ha-Levi).
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Inspired by
@JYuter
's list, here's my take on essential reads in Modern Orthodox thought. Not "the," "a" as in indefinite article. I find these to be particularly influential and characteristic.
I hope this engenders productive conversation. Have at it!
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I'm still not over Arvei Psachim with a Rabbeinu Dovid, rishus cold seltzer and I just want to check out of life. He's my rebbe.
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"And so, the time has come up to me, myself, on this day, at the fulfillment of 5000 and 60 years, which is the 51st year since my birth..."
So wrote R. Menachem ha-Meiri at the end of his introduction to Pirkei Avot, after detailing the chain of masora beginning with Moshe.
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I read this over Shabbat (the RH section). It's like everything about the chaggim you remember/forgot/know/half-know/know-but not-the-exact-source, neatly compiled in 2 vols. Thank you
@DBashIdeas
for the rec!
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The centuries-old push-pull between Bavel and Eretz Yisrael came to its effective end in a place no Amora could have imagined: the desert of Tunisia, at the hands of Rabbenu Chananel, who commandeered his dual Italian-African background to bring the two traditions together.
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In the mid-1500s, two roads converged: the Rema put down his pen in deference to the Beit Yosef, pledging himself to the project that would become Shulchan Aruch. But it could have been different for Ashkenaz, with its chaotic texts
R. Alexander Suslin gives us a glimpse of this
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I retreated, I wrote (big chunks of chapter 3). "The Worlds of the Rishonim" is taking shape. Thank you
@SefariaProject
for convening and supporting an absolutely amazing group of fellows who are now also dear friends.
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26 days since Black Shabbat.
I'm constantly talking to family/friends in Israel, making donations, keeping on with our plans for aliyah plus the only other thing I can do: share the truth on social media.
Here are my observations re: social media from the past 26 days 🧵
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During the lifetime of Raavad, Binyamin of Tudela, traveler extraordinaire who circumvented much of the known Jewish world, visited his yeshiva in Provence (there is debate about the timing, but c. the 1160s). Binyamin recorded his impressions thus:
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The more you pay attention to parshiyot the more artificial the perek divisions become.
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A fuller DNA analysis on 6 of the 17 bodies, including those of children, found in a medieval Norwich well, which since early analysis over a decade ago were thought to be Jewish victims of violent antisemitism. Background here (2011 article):
In the 1100s, Ashkenazic Jews
- had already developed an identifiable genetic profile consistent with today's Ashkenazim
- in England had an Eastern Mediterranean profile
- were not Khazars, like some ppl still think
- were persecuted
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Open up a Talmud to Nedarim, and there, where you'd expect to find Tosafot, you find, instead, the Ran. Tosafot, meanwhile, have shifted to the outer margin. And Rashi there, well, he's not Rashi.
It's not every day a rabbi wends his way to the heart of the daf. But Ran, well...
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Next time, one way ticket ב"ה.
Next time, may we have no need for these posters, because all the hostages are home safe.
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That time in the summer of 1280 when Avraham Abulafia went to Rome to try to convert the pope to Judaism and then the pope dies and he gets thrown in prison, later censured by Rashba for his messianic prophecies.
BNF Ms hebr 763 f27r. Anyone know how to use the diagrams exactly?
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Up until now I've been highlighting lesser-known rabbis in my Sunday threads, but let's try something new this year: sitting down for a visit with the giants.
I figure over the year we can hang out with most of the most influential Rishonim.
Good? Good!
First up is RASHI.
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The most cogent and accurate explanation I've seen for the disturbing act of ripping down hostage posters.
The denial of Jewish humanity is antisemitism, Tomer Persico explains.
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Kiddo is building a replica of the Kotel in Minecraft and asking me a lot of highly specific questions about scale. Obviously, I love this a lot.
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The more teshuvot I read, the more I come to appreciate the individual nature of psak, and just what a brave and generous act it is to publish shu"t so that others can learn from them.
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It was a busy chag but I finished Yehoshua and learned Shoftim over yomtov/Shabbat.
Also, an opportunity to warmly recommend the Mahadurat Tziyon Koren. It's my favorite. Lightweight but stellar tools, like cross refs in the margins.
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I mostly did re-reading and reference reading over Shabbat (hi, it's me, I read reference books like novels) but I also started reading this.
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I read some of this over Shabbat.*
* And it blew my mind how generators work and how that affects halacha. The part about automatic generation of electricity did not answer all my questions.
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I remember when Columbia was a place where I took courses in medieval history, shuffled through the library stacks, and trudged through the quad pregnant (all the times). Now it’s hosting openly pro-terrorism events and marshaling its intellectual resources to justify them.
Imagine receiving services from a Columbia-educated social worker who believes burning families, killing babies, and gang-raping women is a "counteroffensive" and "revolutionary violence [central] to anti-imperialism".
Pro-Hamas posturing isn't uncommon in social work schools.
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There is so much Torah and so little time. (On the other hand, there is so much Torah!)
How do you decide what to learn next?
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I'm writing this in English, as did the person extolling the continuity of Irish in supposed contradistinction to "artificial" Hebrew. Seemingly lost on them: the very fact that we both chose to use English and not our ancestral languages is due precisely to British colonialism.
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Yet again my mind is being exploded by just how much is condensed into the Beit Yosef, and how lucidly. And he did this for...every halachic topic basically. B"Y is such a different beast from Shulchan Aruch, it's astounding.
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I started reading this over yom tov/Shabbat. Doing a cover-to-cover read. Starting with the hakdamot, hadn't read them before - brief, but their personalities definitely come through.
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In memory of my teacher Dr. Menahem Schmeltzer z"l, whose Shloshim is today, a thread on Hebrew paleography (different styles of handwriting used in manuscripts).
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