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Bibliophile reproduction of a learned discourse based on a quote from Avot de Rabbi Nathan (ch. 18) delivered by R. Abraham ben Israel Jehiel ha-Kohen Rappaport on the date of his bar mitzvah. The title page has an architectural frame typical of sixteenth century Cracow and in the center an escutcheon with the hands of the Kohen delivering the priestly blessing, above a crown, below a bird, presumably a raven, the symbol of the Rappoport family. On [2a] is a brief statement that this is R. Abraham Katz Rappaport Schrenzel’s bar mitzvah derasha, and on the verso of that page is that this, the second printing since publication of Naki Kapaim u-Bar Mitzvah in Cracow in 1595, is being published by Aron Freimann in honor of the bar mitzvah of Akiva ben Joseph Parsitz, Shabbat ve-Yakhal Pekudei 1925 in Hamburg.
R. Abraham ben Israel Jehiel ha-Kohen Rapoport, (1584–1651), a Talmudist and halakhic authority, studied under R. Meshullam Feivush of Zbarazh. He married the daughter of Mordecai Schrenzilsh, a wealthy man of distinguished ancestry, and adopted his surname, becoming known as Abraham Schrenzel of Schrenzilsh. In Lvov he studied under R. Joshua ben Alexander Falk. Although one of the outstanding scholars of his time, R. Rapoport did not take up a rabbinical position, and taught in a voluntary capacity for more than 40 years in the yeshivah of Lvov. He was prominent in the Council of the Four Lands; he was in charge of the collection of funds for the needy in Erez Israel. R. Rapoport’s most important work is Eitan ha-Ezrahi (Ostrow, 1796). It is in two parts, the first more than 50 responsa, the second sermons arranged according to the weekly sections of the Pentateuch, with a commentary on the Megillot, parts of Psalms and Proverbs. R. Rapoport left many writings in manuscript, which were destroyed during various upheavals which occurred after his death.
Aron Freimann (1871–1948) was a German scholar, historian, and bibliographer. He worked at the municipal library in Frankfort, assembling one of the richest collections of Judaica and Hebraica in the world. After the Nazis came to power he emigrated to the United States serving, from 1939 to 1945, as consultant in bibliography to the New York Public Library. Freimann was a prolific author. Among his most works are a systematic catalog of the Judaica collection of the Stadtbibliothek in Frankfort a. Main, which he was unable to complete. In the Thesaurus Typographiae Hebraicae Seculi XV (1924–31) Freimann provided a complete collection of samples of facsimiles of all known Hebrew incunabula; this work also remained incomplete, missing the introduction and the discussion of the facsimiles. His A Gazetteer of Hebrew Printing (1946) lists all the cities where Hebrew books were known to have been printed. |
