Posts by Raif Melhado
265 posts
Today in a class I mentioned the Zilkha seminary in Baghdad. I said that famous rabbis such as Abdallah Somekh and the Ben Ish Hai studied and taught there. They are young enough that it’s not their fault, but they had never heard of either Rabbi.This makes me wonder: is there a handy list of alumni of the Zilkha seminary? The Wikipedia page on it (Midrash Bet Zilkha) exists only because I tran...
Does anyone here have experience with making Hebrew fonts? I’d love to see more offerings from our manuscript tradition.
Does anyone have the S&P birkat hamazon typed out for someone to copy?
Is any of our communities reading the Megilla live on zoom?
Majorly discounted: $12.54 instead of $40
Many serious academic works about Gershom Mendes Seixas repeat as fact that he officially “participated in the ceremonies” at the inauguration of George Washington. He did so as one of “fourteen clergy” so invited.According Jacob Rader Marcus, the source of this is the opinion of an important personality at Shearith Israel, N. Taylor Phillips. Based on the references in the footnote pictured here...
[Acknowledging that this is off-topic, but due to our actual topic and the comment history, I know some here may be interested:]Or Veshalom in Atlanta is a Balkan Sephardi congregation that has gone full egal in the past 2-3 years (edit: or moving in that direction). Prior to this change, when they still had an area with separate seating and participation at the Teba was male, I helped them with ...
Is there a synthetic history of the judeo-Spanish Jews of Seattle?
I’m curious if this airline or any other would make such a booklet today. What a different world!
We’ll see if it happens
Good news: https://jewishnews.timesofisrael.com/breaking-city-of-london-rejects-tower-which-threatened-future-of-uks-oldest-synagogue/?fbclid=IwAR2HqP2tOZ7WmScy-QDhgEgpaF6kFA7D714GSd49FE0zvPNVtjA9Cxp4s14
Good books or articles on the Crypto-Jews of Portugal?
In another group, someone shared the following image attributing a pejorative quote about Ottoman Sephardim to Rabbi David de Sola Pool. I then shared a link showing that the quote actually appears in a 1913 article in the AJ Yearbook written by someone else, five pages before Rabbi de Sola Pool's much more friendly-oriented article beings.Devin E. S. Naar, do you recognize the image, which looks...
I know it’s treading familiar ground, but back to the Tallet question: I had another experience on Shabbat of the Superman style being presented as normative. This time from a really nice person who is also learned. Therefore I felt that he would enjoy seeing a primary source that responds directly to the Shulhan Arukh OH 8:4 which says that one “puts two tsitsiyot in front of him and two behind...
Morir habemos
A friend bought this and asked if it was WS. I explained that it was probably North African, but I couldn't say much more than that. Any ideas: https://imgur.com/a/JUxBH4L?fbclid=IwAR2lQN_aHVoMiQwxiiYxQL7Z6ZkqPFNoHYG7Jw2ns2sSR3FW0iv__oIs1To
Oh man there’s some fun stuff in this!
Someone in the “Seforim” group made a google drive folder with all 10 Vols Of Rev Isaac Leeser’s “Discourses”!https://drive.google.com/drive/u/1/mobile/folders/1kEiCNJKffoddRcz08lv7OF-865rwJ8km?fbclid=IwAR1EGtDKLZzhSl3yRH2qjdPljzHZNw2NvbWgIG5x6NERAjz88ht5egCR24M
Speculative evidence for kasher diet in the pre-resettlement English Jewish community: https://www.medievalists.net/2021/04/medieval-jewish-dietary-practices/?fbclid=IwAR1HyKUQR__Dm4MLco4Ct5WiiSmm9rrHA1B2z_YHTq_DExxQENcjeJ1IZ7g
What's your favorite *video rendition of "Barukh Haba" (melody of Az Yashir) in our minhag? Points if it has the right ambiance/visual aesthetic.
If you're the kind of person who likes to have something to check off each day, here's an Omer counter with the days of the month of this year's civil calendar.(If you catch a mistake I can fix it)
Found inside book by a book dealer in a group devoted to the trade of Jewish books. A fond farewell from HP Mendes
https://blog.nli.org.il/en/one-of-the-worlds-oldest-esther-scrolls-comes-home/?utm_source=facebook_Holocaust&utm_medium=organicgroup&fbclid=IwAR14RL_BwZDSQaI2kyvyeWseX-yFlJcVdJ7_kft_CYWAWQ8Ou2KTcvS5Qkk
Possibly a bit of a splurge, but this just showed up. Thanks for the recommendation!
When people say "muchos años" this is a short form of a longer greeting. I have heard people say "muchos años y buenos" but then there is that book about our Judeo-Spanish cousins by Gursan-Saltzmann called "anyos muchos i buenos." Which is preferred and why?