Elijah Ba'al Shem of Chelm
Encyclopedia
Elijah Ba'al Shem was a Polish
rabbi
who studied under Rabbi Solomon Luria
and later became the Chief Rabbi
of Chełm. He was a co-signer of the Agunah
laws and, according to legend, used the powers of Kabbalah
to create a Golem
creature. Many legends surround his life in regards to this creation. Because of his mastery over the names of God
, he was the first Rabbi to be given the Baal Shem
title. He was the grandfather of Rabbi Tzvi Ashkenazi
and the great grandfather of Jacob Emden
.
Aharon Yehudah ("Elijah son of Judah Aaron"), he studied under Rabbi Solomon Luria
of Lublin
to attain his rabbinical ordination and became Chełm's chief rabbi, a position he would hold for the rest of his life. In 1564, he gathered with other prominent Rabbis, including his teacher, to co-author the "piske denim" (laws) which allowed an Agunah to remarry. He was an avid practitioner of Kabbalah and was said to have created a Golem using the names of God from the Sefer Yezirah. Because of his mastery over the esoteric uses of the names of God, he became the first person to be given the religious title of Baal Shem.
His death is closely associated with the Golem myth. One version of it states that while trying to remove the life-giving name of God in an attempt to destroy the raging beast, Rabbi Elijah was crushed to death under the weight of the Golem as it fell to pieces. Other sources suggest his face was only scratched and that he seemingly died of natural causes years later.
He wrote two books during his life; the Sefer Mif’alot Elohim and the Sefer Toldot Adam.
Two of Elijah's grandsons were great Halakhists
: Tzvi Ashkenazi and his son Jacob Emden. They discussed the legal status of the golem: could the golem be counted in a minyan
, the quorum of ten men required for prayer. Human form and modicum of understanding were not enough to make something human. Also, according to Emden, the destructive potential of the golem could destroy the world.
The tale about Elijah's creation of the Golem was retold in the book Israel der Gotteskampfer der Baalschem von Chełm und sein Golem ("Israel of the God's camphors of the Baal shem of Chełm and his Golem") written by Chayim Block and published in 1920.
Elijah's wishes were carried out after his passing. When the procession neared the church, Christians began their ritual of pelting the coffin and its bearers with rocks and insults, when Elijah miraculously pushed open the coffin and, after consulting the Torah
that was to be buried with him, the earth opened up and swallowed the church and all who were in it. The Rabbi then laid back and became rigid as a corpse again. The Jews stared at each other in utter disbelief and eventually continued on their way once they had recovered from the shock. From this time forward, it was said that the local Christians no longer threw rocks during Jewish funerals.
Until fairly recent times, pupils of the Kheder (Jewish elementary school) of a teacher named Leib Paks claimed that in the cellar, when jumping on a certain set of floor boards, the muffled ring of a church bell could be heard. This led the children to believe their teacher's school was built on the very same spot where the church had sank.
"Bet"
. This was believed to be the final resting place of Rabbi Elijah. Legend has it an angel would appear on the anniversary of his death and etch a letter on a certain brick. Because of this, everyone was afraid to touch the bricks.
saved the life of a young German man surname
d Dolberger. So when the knight
s of the First Crusade
came to siege Jerusalem, one of Dolberger's family members who was among them rescued Jews in Palestine and carried them back to Worms, Germany
to repay the favor. Further evidence of German communities in the holy city comes in the form of halakic
questions sent from Germany to Jerusalem during the second half of the eleventh century.
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
rabbi
Rabbi
In Judaism, a rabbi is a teacher of Torah. This title derives from the Hebrew word רבי , meaning "My Master" , which is the way a student would address a master of Torah...
who studied under Rabbi Solomon Luria
Solomon Luria
Solomon Luria was one of the great Ashkenazic poskim and teachers of his time. He is known for his work of Halakha, Yam Shel Shlomo, and his Talmudic commentary Chochmat Shlomo...
and later became the Chief Rabbi
Chief Rabbi
Chief Rabbi is a title given in several countries to the recognized religious leader of that country's Jewish community, or to a rabbinic leader appointed by the local secular authorities...
of Chełm. He was a co-signer of the Agunah
Agunah
Agunah ; literally 'anchored or chained') is a halachic term for a Jewish woman who is "chained" to her marriage. The classic case of this, is a man who has left on a journey, and has not returned, or has gone into battle and is MIA...
laws and, according to legend, used the powers of Kabbalah
Kabbalah
Kabbalah/Kabala is a discipline and school of thought concerned with the esoteric aspect of Rabbinic Judaism. It was systematized in 11th-13th century Hachmei Provence and Spain, and again after the Expulsion from Spain, in 16th century Ottoman Palestine...
to create a Golem
Golem
In Jewish folklore, a golem is an animated anthropomorphic being, created entirely from inanimate matter. The word was used to mean an amorphous, unformed material in Psalms and medieval writing....
creature. Many legends surround his life in regards to this creation. Because of his mastery over the names of God
Names of God in Judaism
In Judaism, the name of God is more than a distinguishing title; it represents the Jewish conception of the divine nature, and of the relationship of God to the Jewish people and to the world. To demonstrate the sacredness of the names of God, and as a means of showing respect and reverence for...
, he was the first Rabbi to be given the Baal Shem
Baal Shem
The traditional Baal Shem healer and exorcist used Kabbalistic methods in sanctity. Nistarim mystical brotherhoods sought wider outreach, from which Hasidism emerged...
title. He was the grandfather of Rabbi Tzvi Ashkenazi
Tzvi Ashkenazi
Rabbi Tzvi Hirsch ben Yaakov Ashkenazi , known as the Chacham Tzvi , for some time rabbi of Amsterdam, was a resolute opponent of the followers of the false messiah, Sabbatai Zevi. He had a chequered career, owing to his independence of character...
and the great grandfather of Jacob Emden
Jacob Emden
Jacob Emden also known as Ya'avetz, , was a leading German rabbi and talmudist who championed Orthodox Judaism in the face of the growing influence of the Sabbatean movement...
.
Life
Born Eliyahu benBen
Ben is often a shortened version of the given name Benjamin, Benvolio, Benedict, or less commonly Bentley, although it is also used as a formal given name in its own right...
Aharon Yehudah ("Elijah son of Judah Aaron"), he studied under Rabbi Solomon Luria
Solomon Luria
Solomon Luria was one of the great Ashkenazic poskim and teachers of his time. He is known for his work of Halakha, Yam Shel Shlomo, and his Talmudic commentary Chochmat Shlomo...
of Lublin
Lublin
Lublin is the ninth largest city in Poland. It is the capital of Lublin Voivodeship with a population of 350,392 . Lublin is also the largest Polish city east of the Vistula river...
to attain his rabbinical ordination and became Chełm's chief rabbi, a position he would hold for the rest of his life. In 1564, he gathered with other prominent Rabbis, including his teacher, to co-author the "piske denim" (laws) which allowed an Agunah to remarry. He was an avid practitioner of Kabbalah and was said to have created a Golem using the names of God from the Sefer Yezirah. Because of his mastery over the esoteric uses of the names of God, he became the first person to be given the religious title of Baal Shem.
His death is closely associated with the Golem myth. One version of it states that while trying to remove the life-giving name of God in an attempt to destroy the raging beast, Rabbi Elijah was crushed to death under the weight of the Golem as it fell to pieces. Other sources suggest his face was only scratched and that he seemingly died of natural causes years later.
He wrote two books during his life; the Sefer Mif’alot Elohim and the Sefer Toldot Adam.
Two of Elijah's grandsons were great Halakhists
Halakha
Halakha — also transliterated Halocho , or Halacha — is the collective body of Jewish law, including biblical law and later talmudic and rabbinic law, as well as customs and traditions.Judaism classically draws no distinction in its laws between religious and ostensibly non-religious life; Jewish...
: Tzvi Ashkenazi and his son Jacob Emden. They discussed the legal status of the golem: could the golem be counted in a minyan
Minyan
A minyan in Judaism refers to the quorum of ten Jewish adults required for certain religious obligations. According to many non-Orthodox streams of Judaism adult females count in the minyan....
, the quorum of ten men required for prayer. Human form and modicum of understanding were not enough to make something human. Also, according to Emden, the destructive potential of the golem could destroy the world.
The Golem of Chełm
According to the "Jewish Life and Work in Chełm" chapter of the Commemoration Book of Chełm (Poland) (Yisker-bukh Chełm),"No one was allowed to enter the attic of the Old SynagogueSynagogueA synagogue is a Jewish house of prayer. This use of the Greek term synagogue originates in the Septuagint where it sometimes translates the Hebrew word for assembly, kahal...
. No one even knew where the key to the attic could be found. One person whispered to another the secret that in the attic there lies the golemGolemIn Jewish folklore, a golem is an animated anthropomorphic being, created entirely from inanimate matter. The word was used to mean an amorphous, unformed material in Psalms and medieval writing....
of the famous Rabbi Elijah Ba'al Shem.
It was said that Elijah Ba'al Shem created from clay a golem [by means of the Sefer YetzirahSefer YetzirahSefer Yetzirah is the title of the earliest extant book on Jewish esotericism, although some early commentators treated it as a treatise on mathematical and linguistic theory as opposed to Kabbalah...
] who would stand on market days with an ax in his hand, and as soon as he saw that a peasant was going to beat up a Jew, the golem killed the peasant.
An entire week the golem served the Rabbi, the Rabbi's wife, and he performed the manual labor in the Beit Hamidrash [A Jewish house of study where the study of the Torah is undertaken].
When the local landowner found out about the golem's might, the Ba'al Shem led the golem to the attic, withdrew from him the ineffable name of God, and converted the golem into a heap of clay. The Ba'al Shem locked the door, took with him the key, and since then the attic remained bolted."
The tale about Elijah's creation of the Golem was retold in the book Israel der Gotteskampfer der Baalschem von Chełm und sein Golem ("Israel of the God's camphors of the Baal shem of Chełm and his Golem") written by Chayim Block and published in 1920.
Funeral
According to popular legend, Elijah's greatness was witnessed in dramatic fashion soon after his death. It was said that during his time, the only road to the Jewish cemetery passed directly in front of a Russian church. Whenever a Jewish funeral procession passed by, local Christians would come outside to throw rocks and cause trouble. Elijah knew of this and requested in his will that no one move or run away if the Chrisitans did the same following his death.Elijah's wishes were carried out after his passing. When the procession neared the church, Christians began their ritual of pelting the coffin and its bearers with rocks and insults, when Elijah miraculously pushed open the coffin and, after consulting the Torah
Torah
Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five books of the bible—Genesis , Exodus , Leviticus , Numbers and Deuteronomy Torah- A scroll containing the first five books of the BibleThe Torah , is name given by Jews to the first five...
that was to be buried with him, the earth opened up and swallowed the church and all who were in it. The Rabbi then laid back and became rigid as a corpse again. The Jews stared at each other in utter disbelief and eventually continued on their way once they had recovered from the shock. From this time forward, it was said that the local Christians no longer threw rocks during Jewish funerals.
Until fairly recent times, pupils of the Kheder (Jewish elementary school) of a teacher named Leib Paks claimed that in the cellar, when jumping on a certain set of floor boards, the muffled ring of a church bell could be heard. This led the children to believe their teacher's school was built on the very same spot where the church had sank.
Grave
Within the Chełm cemetery, there was a grave without a tombstone which was covered in bricks arranged in the shape of the Hebrew letterHebrew alphabet
The Hebrew alphabet , known variously by scholars as the Jewish script, square script, block script, or more historically, the Assyrian script, is used in the writing of the Hebrew language, as well as other Jewish languages, most notably Yiddish, Ladino, and Judeo-Arabic. There have been two...
"Bet"
Bet (letter)
Bet, Beth, Beh, or Vet is the second letter of many Semitic abjads, including Arabic alphabet , Aramaic, Hebrew , Phoenician and Syriac...
. This was believed to be the final resting place of Rabbi Elijah. Legend has it an angel would appear on the anniversary of his death and etch a letter on a certain brick. Because of this, everyone was afraid to touch the bricks.
German-Jews of Jerusalem and the Crusades
According to Rabbi Elijah, German Jews lived in Jerusalem during the 11th century. The story is told that a German-speaking Palestinian JewPalestinian Jew
A Palestinian Jew is a Jewish inhabitant of Palestine at various points in the region's history . Jews in Palestine prior to the establishment of the State of Israel are more commonly referred to as "Yishuv"...
saved the life of a young German man surname
Surname
A surname is a name added to a given name and is part of a personal name. In many cases, a surname is a family name. Many dictionaries define "surname" as a synonym of "family name"...
d Dolberger. So when the knight
Knight
A knight was a member of a class of lower nobility in the High Middle Ages.By the Late Middle Ages, the rank had become associated with the ideals of chivalry, a code of conduct for the perfect courtly Christian warrior....
s of the First Crusade
First Crusade
The First Crusade was a military expedition by Western Christianity to regain the Holy Lands taken in the Muslim conquest of the Levant, ultimately resulting in the recapture of Jerusalem...
came to siege Jerusalem, one of Dolberger's family members who was among them rescued Jews in Palestine and carried them back to Worms, Germany
Worms, Germany
Worms is a city in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, on the Rhine River. At the end of 2004, it had 85,829 inhabitants.Established by the Celts, who called it Borbetomagus, Worms today remains embattled with the cities Trier and Cologne over the title of "Oldest City in Germany." Worms is the only...
to repay the favor. Further evidence of German communities in the holy city comes in the form of halakic
Halakha
Halakha — also transliterated Halocho , or Halacha — is the collective body of Jewish law, including biblical law and later talmudic and rabbinic law, as well as customs and traditions.Judaism classically draws no distinction in its laws between religious and ostensibly non-religious life; Jewish...
questions sent from Germany to Jerusalem during the second half of the eleventh century.