The appearance of HaMahzor HaMeforash and similar publications is a sign of our time, which witnesses a great renaissance of Judaism. Not only the ignorant Jew, but also the educated and learned one, who is well versed in his faith, is hungry for Jewish knowledge, is steadily striving to deepen and widen his understanding of Judaism.
HaMahzor HaMeforash for Rosh Hashana which was recently published in Jerusalem in both a Sefardi and Ashkenazi edition, presents the worshipper with easy to understand Hebrew explanations of the prayers and Piyutim.
The comments on the Piyutim are threefold. Opposite the text is a short, simple Hebrew version of the difficult language of the Paytan. On the bottom are found two kinds of notes.
1) Concise explanations of difficult words. 2) References to the Midrashim which are alluded to in the Piyut.
In addition to the explanations of prayers and Piyutim, you find in this Mahzor: Dinim. Hebrew translations of the Zohar texts and interesting general notes on individual prayers and Piyutim.
The long introduction – spreading over seventy pages- acquaints the reader with various aspects of the festival and the Piyutim. One chapter discusses the two day observance of Rosh Hashana, even in the Holy Land. Another deals with the partakings of certain kinds of food, on Rosh Hashana, as a token of the favorable judgment and the sweet and happy New Year we pray for.
A detailed explanation of the commandment to sound the Shofar forms the subject of yet another chapter. It includes a dissertation on the blowing of the Shofar on Shabbat. Here are presented the views of R. Yitzhak Alfasi, in whose Beth Din the Shofar was blown on Rosh Hashana, which happened to be on a Shabbath, and those of his opponents who could find no justification for his action. Recalled is the attempt of Rabbi Akiva Yosef Schlesinger, about one hundred years ago to renew the sounding of the Shofar on Shabbat in the Holy City. (The author might also have mentioned that in the Palestinian Yeshiva they were blowing the Shofar on Shabbat as late as the twelfth century. See “Sefer Menuha” Hilkhot Shofar 2:9 and my note in Sinai vol: 58, 1966.) Long chapters are devoted to the Paytanim and Piyutim. They speak of Ibn Ezra’s criticism of Kalir’s Piyutim on account of their innovative languague, and of those who wrote in the defense of them: explains the Halakhic problems associated with the insertion of Piyutim into prayers and tell (chiefly on the basis of rabbinic sources) of the Paytanim whose piyutim are included in the Mahzor.
The introduction as well as the explanations and notes on the prayers and Piyutim, reveal the editor and commentator of HaMahzor HaMeforash as a man of wide erudition and a master of exposition.
He is Rabbi Ya’akov Weingarten, a young man, the son of a well known Jerusalem family. He was for many years a studentof the yeshiva of Tshebin and studies now in a Kollel in the Holy City. He is no Panim Hadashot (new face) in rabbinic literature. Two years ago he published Seder Selihot HaMeforash (two different editions). Last year appeared his “Sefer Zemirot Shabbat HaMiforash.” The beautifully printed editions have been received with great appreciation. They are graced with the approbation of leading rabbinic and Hasidic authorities, who praise Weingarten and his work. Interesting is a note about the late “Steipler” in the beginning of Seder Selihot HaMeforash. Writes Weingarten: “When I showed the volume (before it was published) to the great Gaon, Prince of the Torah, Rabbi Yaakov Yisrael Kanievsky, he said that that as a rule he doesn’t give any approbations, but I was permitted to publicize that he had paid me in advance for a copy and wished me great success.”
Rabbi Ya’akov Weingarten is at present working on a further volume of HaMahzor HaMeforash.
The Jewish Press, Friday Oct. 3, 1986 p. 25
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