Purim of the Curtains
Nine years after the death of the Maharal, and a year after the last volume of Rabbi Heller’s Tosfos Yom Tov commentary on the Mishna was initially published in Prague, […]
Four Rare Commentaries on Esther
With the approach of Purim, Chaim Eleazar Reich, Boro Park’s publisher of rare books, has put out reproductions of four old commentaries on Esther. R. Zecharya Ibn Saruk was an […]
The Custom of Hanging an Effigy of Haman
Since the times of the Gemara there has been a custom to not only hang Haman in effigy, but to burn the figure as well. Today, though, you’d be hard […]
Purim of Cairo
For more than four centuries, up until the the years between the creation of the State of Israel in 1948 and the Suez Canal Crisis in 1956, when a mass […]
Purim Vinz
In 1614, one thousand three hundred eighty Jews – the entire Jewish community of Frankfurt, including its rav, Rabbi Isaiah Horowitz, author of the Shlah (Shnei Luchos HaBris) – were […]
The Story of a Good Vort
Several years ago, on the occasion of Purim, I cited in this column a story from Rabbi Paysach J. Krohn’s , The Maggid Speaks, that is often related by Rabbi […]
Mishloach Manot of Rabbis and Scholars
Rabbis, scholars and writers used to send on Purim—in addition to the traditional Mishloah Manot—spiritual food to their dear ones: a song, a study, even an entire book, they had […]