Classes by Mordechai Dinerman

In 1466, a young Jewish moneylender who grew up in Mantua but had spent three years in Bologna asked the duke for permission to return and lend again. The local Jewish community pulled strings to keep him out, treating him as an outsider who endangered everyone else’s livelihood. Rabbi Yosef Colon, the Maharik, ruled on the case, but others challenged his reasoning. The case brings us into the Talmudic discussions of unfair competition and the rights of newcomers. It also offers a close look at the economic realities of Jewish life in Renaissance Italy.

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An Immigration Dispute: Mantua, 1466

A dangerously ill person needs to eat chicken on Shabbos, and nonkosher is available.

Do you feed him the nonkosher chicken, or slaughter one properly and violate Shabbos?

The Raavad’s answer survives in conflicting versions, and the Ramban left a blank space when reaching this topic.

We’ll discuss how that happened, then follow the debate across two centuries.

We’ll find that in France and Germany, the rishonim gave a reason the Spanish rabbis dismissed.

That gap likely reveals how differently these communities felt about their gentile neighbors and their place in those societies.

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Nauseous or Not? Depends on Whether You’re in France or Spain

How and when did the bris take the shape we recognize today? When did the sandek and kvatter enter the ceremony, and what do those words even mean?

Today’s class traces the development of the bris in Ashkenaz between the twelfth and fifteenth centuries. We’ll explore the origins and context of its specialized terms, the deals people made to secure coveted honors, a controversial practice that the Maharam of Rothenburg protested for years without success, and the role women played in the ceremony.

Along the way, we’ll examine a panel painted around 1300 that brings at least one version of the medieval bris into sharper focus.

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What An Honor! The History and Evolution of the Sandek and Kvatter

Today we pick up where we left off: it's just before Rosh Hashanah 1904, and Rabbi Akiva Yosef Shlesinger's plan to sound the shofar on Shabbos looks promising.

Today we find out what actually happened that Rosh Hashanah and why, and how the conversation carried on through the following year, up to Rosh Hashanah 1905, which was also on Shabbos.

And finally, we’ll reach the last scene of the story: the conversation leading up to Rosh Hashanah 1908.

As we go, we'll see how the balance of Rabbi Shlesinger's reasoning shifted, and we’ll also examine how some of his colleagues answered him on his own terms.

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A Blast From the Past: The Shabbos Shofar Showdown in the Early 1900s (Part II)

As Jews prepared for Rosh Hashanah 1904, Rabbi Akiva Yosef Shlesinger took up his pen and wrote to a rabbinic journal in Hungary, laying out why he believed the shofar should be sounded on Shabbos despite the rabbinic ban. In this class, we examine his account of the attempt leading up to Rosh Hashanah 1882, and then again leading up to Rosh Hashanah 1904. We'll trace the steps he took, the halachic and extra-halachic reasoning behind them, and how other famous rabbis reacted.

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A Blast From the Past: The Shabbos Shofar Showdown in the Early 1900s (Part I)

A man wrote to the Tzemach Tzedek, the third Rebbe of Chabad, about fears he couldn’t shake in matters of health and money.

What came back was a long letter working through Torah sources to explain how fear takes hold and how to loosen its grip.

This class takes this remarkable letter line by line, setting the scene, tracing the sources, and drawing out what it asks of us today.

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A Chasidic Letter on Anxiety

HaRav Levi Yitzchak Schneerson spent his final years in exile in Kazakhstan, banished there by the Soviets for his work strengthening Jewish life across the Soviet Union.

Soon after arriving there in 1940, he wrote a brief account of his imprisonment.

It reads like no ordinary memoir: each line is a kabbalistic commentary on his own life, shaped by a deep belief in personal divine providence.

Gathering to honor his yahrzeit on the twentieth of Av, we studied this account and worked to unpack its esoteric terms.

It isn’t the easiest material to understand, but it does paint a vivid picture of this special leader and his worldview.

Click here to follow along in the original Reshima

HaRav Levi Yitzchak, In His Own Words: A Commemorative Study

In 1612, Avraham Portaleone of Mantua published a landmark work of encyclopedic proportions covering all things Beis Hamikdash.

Reading through four of his discussions, we meet a man working under far-from-ideal conditions.

His sefer turns out to be part of a larger story about the struggles of Jewish printing and book possession in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century Italy.

The Rabbi-Doctor Who Wrote a Sefer on the Beis Hamikdash with Both Hands Tied Behind His Back

In 1790, Moses Seixas of Newport, Rhode Island, and Manuel Josephson of Philadelphia corresponded, with Josephson composing what effectively amounts to a halachic teshuvah. Josephson raised concerns about the conduct of the Touro Synagogue in Newport, arguing that elements of the service were not being properly observed. The exchange provides an important window into the religious commitments and halachic awareness of early American Jews. It also stands as one of the earliest examples of a rabbinic-style teshuvah in the formative years of Jewish life in the United States.

From Philadelphia to Newport: An Early American Teshuvah (1790)

In this final class of the series, we will examine the Rebbe’s statements and correspondence regarding going up to Har Habayis.

By studying the available sources, we will seek to better understand what the Rebbe did—and did not—say about this complex and significant question.

This is the fourth and final installment on this topic. 

What Did the Rebbe Say About Going on Har Habayis?