Eliezer Kallir, is considered one of the greatest paytanim.  He authored some of the most well known piyyutim including those said for geshem and tal, as well as many others (although most of his piyyutim that were included in the Rosh haShana and Yom Kippur prayers are no longer said by most).  While his literary output is well-known, "[b]iographical facts about Kallir are shrouded in mystery."  E.J. (new ed.) vol. 11, p. 743. There are many theories about who R. Kallir was and I would like to touch on some of these in this post. (Also see below for a bibliography on R. Eliezer Kallir - provided by a kind reader of the blog.)

R. Shmuel David Luzzato (Shadal) in his Mevo l'Machzor Beni Roma, discusses Kallir and the history of piyyutim at length.[1]  "If you will ask who authored the first piyyut and who followed them, I will answer that the first is Yanni or Yinai, and the second is R. Eliezer Berebi Kalir.  The product of both is apparent to all in the Haggadah as the piyyut "Az Rov Nissim" is from Yanni . . . and the piyyut "Ometz Gevoroteha" is from R. Eliezer berbi Kallir . . ."  Interestingly, "regarding Yanni a nasty rumor has been spread (Zunz found it in a manuscript commentary to the Mahzor), however, anyone who hears it will laugh,  . . . [and the rumor is] that Yanni became jealous of his student R. Eliezer and [Yanni] put a scorpion in [Eliezer Kallir's] shoe and the scorpion killed Kallir."  Shadal, however, dismisses this rumor in light of the fact that Yanni's piyyutim are still said, especially the one mentioned above during Pesach.  Shadal argues that if Yanni was a murderer then there is no way Yanni's piyyutim would be so popular.  Additionally, Rabbenu Gershom mentions Yanni and uses honorific terms, something Rabbenu Gershom would not have done if the rumor is true. 

Shadal then turns to the details of R. Eliezer Kallir's biography.  "In many places R. Eliezer signs his name as 'R. Eliezer beribi Kallir from Kiryat Sefer.' Many of the early ones believed that this indicated Kallir was from the biblical town of Kiryat Sefer, and many thought that Kallir was a tanna, either R. Eliezer the son of Simon ... or R. Eliezer ben Arakh, both of these opinions are recorded in the Sefer HaYuchsin."  Shadal, however shows that it is highly unlikely that R. Eliezer Kallir was a tanna or that he was from the biblical town of Kiryat Sefer. Instead, Shadal quotes the opinion of R. Moshe Landau (grandson of the Noda Be-Yehuda) in his commentary to the Arukh, Maarkhe Lashon.[2]  According to Landau Kallir is a reference to the Sardinian city Cagliari.  Shadal disagrees with Landau.  In the end, after citing other opinions, including identifying Kallir with an Italian city, Pumadisa in Babylon, and Sippara also in Babylon, and to those it should be added, Bari, Ostia, "Civitas Portas, the former port of Rome (Derenbourg); Constantinople; Civita di Penna in the Abruzzi; . . . Normandy, Speyer in Germany . . . Lettere in Souther Italy,  . . . Antioch and Hama in Syria . . . Kallirrhoe in Palestine . .. [and finally] Tiberias."  E.J. p. 744.  As should be apparent, there is no consensus on where Kallir was from.

Turning to his name - Kallir - the starting place is R. Nathan and his Arukh.   He explains that Kallir, means cake (indeed in Greek kalura means cake).  And, Kallir was called "cake" because "he ate a cake that had written on a kemiah (amulet) and, as a result, he became smart."  Arukh erekh klr.  The idea to feed children cake with inscriptions is a well documented one.  R. Eliezer from Worms, the author of the Rokekh records the custom to feed children cakes with the verses from Isaiah 50:4, id.50:5, and Ezekiel 3:3.  The children would eat these when they were indoctrinated into Torah study on Shavout.  [2]  Of course, as noted above, some view the name Kallir as an indication of where Kallir was from.  Indeed, many, including Shadal did not swallow (if I may) the Arukh's interpretation of Kallir.

Again, as we have seen there is a bit of debate when it comes to Kallir, one of the more interesting debates regards which piyyutim can be attributed to him.  While in many Kallir provides his name in an acrostic, according to R. Shelomo Yehuda Rapoport (Shir) one can also attribute those piyyutim that there is a gematria that equals some permutation of Kallir's name.  That is, Kallir sometimes signed his name Eliezer haKallir, Eliezer beribi Kallir, Eliezer Kallir me-Kiryat Sefer, and a combination of any of these.  Thus, according to Shir, if in the first line equaled any of these Kallir was the author. 

R. Efraim Mehlsack, however, took issue with Shir's use of gematria. Specifically, Mehlsack wrote Sefer ha-Ravyah, Ofen, 1837, against Shir.  Mehlsack was a prolific author, he supposedly authored some 72 seforim, but the only published sefer was this one.  But before we get into the details regarding Mehlsack we need to discuss his critique of Shir.  Mehlsack went to town on Shir and showed that using the gematria for the first line of a book, Mehlsack could make Kallir the author of just about every important Jewish book.  Mehlsack goes through Tanakh and uses the first verse of each book to equal some form of Kallir's name.  For example, the first verse in Berashit equals 913 which equals "meni ha-katan Eliezer Kallir." The first verse in Joshua equals 1041 which equals "ha-katon Eliezer beribi Kallir."  Mehlsack doesn't stop with Tanakh, he then moves to Mishna noting that the first mishna in Berkhot is 2362 which equals "ani Eliezer berbi Ya'akov ha-Kallir mi-Kiryat Sefer yezkeh be-tov amen."  As a final shot at Shir, Mehlsack has the gematria of I am Shelmo Yehuda Rapoport = 1164 to Eliezer beRebi Yaakov Kallir =1164.  Indeed, Mehlsack was not content to provide some 40 odd examples, he had even more and as a result of already printing the pages, the Sefer Ravyah is an interesting bibliographical oddity in that these gematrias appear on page 18 and then continue.  Well Mehlsack includes an alternative page 18 in the back which has more examples of these gematrias. Thus, the book goes until page 32 and then there is another page 18.  Both versions appear below.

אלבוגן, התפלה בישראל בהתפתחותה ההסטורית, 233 - 239

יוסף זליגר, "לתולדות הפיוט והפיטנים (ר' אלעזר קליר)", כתבי הרב ד"ר יוסף זליגר, לאה זליגר מו"ל, ירושלים תרצ, צז - קב

שלמה דוד לוצאטו, אגרות שד"ל א, 464 ואילך

---, הליכות קדם, גבריאל פאלק, אמסטרדם תרז, מחלקה שניה, 56 - 64.

צבי מלאכי, "הפייטן אלעזר הקליר - לחקר שמו ומקומו", באורח מדע: פרקים בתרבות ישראל מוגים לאהרן מירסקי במלאות לו שבעים שנה, צבי מלאכי, מכון הברמן למחקרי ספרות, לוד תשמו, 539 - 543

אהרן מרקוס, ברזילי: מסה בתולדות הלשון העברית, ירושלים: מוסד הרב קוק תשמג, 346

עזרא פליישר, תרביץ נ, 282 - 302

---, "לפתרון שאלת זמנו ומקום פעילותו של ר' אלעזר בירבי קיליר", תרביץ נד ג, ניסן - סיון תשמה, 383 - 427

שלמה יהודה ראפאפארט, תולדות גדולי ישראל, 24 - 55

יעקב שור, ספר העתים, 364 – 365

בנועם שיח: פרקים מתולדות ספרותנו, מכון הברמן למחקרי ספרות, לוד תשמג, 114 - 156

המעין טז א, תשרי תשלו, 3 - 14. המשך: ב, טבת תשלו, 32 - 52.

Repackaged Rulings: The Responsa of R. Elyashiv

by: Yitzhak of בין דין לדין

Wolf2191 recently wrote:

N.B. I believe I noticed that some of the pesakim that R' Elyashiv issued when he was part of the Beis Din Ha-Gadol together with Chacham Ovadiah and Harav Kappach were republished in a kovetz under R' Elyashiv's name only, but I would need to check again.]

The קובץ תשובות

Three volumes of Rav Elyashiv's responsa have been published in Yerushalayim under the title קובץ תשובות, the first in 5760, and the latter two in 5763. None contain any preface, introduction or critical apparatus, except for the following brief prefatory paragraph, which appears verbatim in all three volumes:

קובץ זה נאסף ונלקט מספרים קובצים וכו'. וזאת למודעי כי ברוב התשובות לא היה גוף כתה"י לנגד עינינו, וסמכנו על הנדפס ויש מהם שבאו בחסר ושינויי לשון, כך שאין מקום כלל לקבוע דבר מהם. התשובות נלקטו ונסדרו ע"ד בלבד ואם שגינו אתנו תלין משוגתנו, ואנו תפלה להשי"ת שלא יצא דבר תקלה ח"ו מתח"י.

The title pages state merely that these responsa have been

נאספו נלקטו וקובצו מספרים וקובצים תורניים

A striking difference between the three volumes is in the sourcing of the individual responsa. The table of contents of the first volume contains sources for all the responsa, that of the second leaves many unsourced, particularly in the Even Ha'Ezer and Hoshen Mishpat sections, and that of the third dispenses entirely with sources.

Why does the second volume omit some sources? Rav Dovid Soloveitchik used to say (and probably still does) "We may only ask 'what does it say', not 'why'", so let us rephrase the question; which sources does the second volume omit? The crucial clue is in the fact that the table of contents of the first volume mysteriously gives the sources for many of the responsa as 'פ"ד', whereas that of the second volume contains no such references. 'פ"ד' clearly stands for פסק דין, or perhaps more precisely, פסקי דין, and indeed, most of the unsourced responsa in the second volume seem to be excerpts of rulings originally published in the פסקי-דין של בתי הדין הרבניים האיזוריים בישראל, which explains their concentration in the aforementioned sections.

I have hunted down the sources for a half dozen responsa from the beginning of the Hoshen Mishpat section of the second volume of the קובץ תשובות:

The remainder are left as an exercise for the reader.

Of the six cases listed above, five were apparently decided unanimously, and the published opinions are recorded simply as the courts' rulings. The third case in the above list yielded a split decision; one opinion appears over the names of R. Elyashiv and a colleague, and another opinion over the name of the third member of the panel. The קובץ תשובות' inclusion of these opinions implies that they have been authored by Rav Elyashiv himself, although the careful reader will notice that the editors do not explicitly attribute them to him; his signature is not appended, as it is to many of the responsa in the work.

The פסקי דין

We have mentioned the פסקי דין; a few words about this invaluable work are in order. At more than eight thousand pages in more than twenty volumes, it is the largest, and unquestionably the most important, published collection of casefiles in the areas of Hoshen Mishpat and Even Ha'Ezer. The decisions are lengthy and intricately argued, and they include copious citations of earlier literature as well as much important original analysis. Many of the בתי הדין הרבניים are represented, as are many of the most eminent Talmidei Hachamim and experts on Hoshen Mishpat and Even Ha'Ezer of the latter half of the twentieth century. Here is a list of some of the best known of these scholars:

• אליהו בקשי דורון
• E. Bazri
• מרדכי אליהו
• יוסף שלום אלישיב
• זלמן נחמיה גולדברג
• עובדיה הדאיה
• S. S. Karelitz
• יצחק נסים
• יוסף קאפח
• אליעזר יהודה ולדנברג
• שאול ישראלי
• עובדיה יוסף
• בצלאל זולטי

Current Status and Availability

According to the Hebrew University catalog entries (See the Main Catalog entries (not JNUL) here and here) twenty two volumes of rulings have been published to date, plus three index volumes. I believe that the cost of the print version is exorbitant, but the wonderful people at HebrewBooks.org have made most of the volumes available for free download, in PDF format; search for פסקי דין. They apparently have the same material that my local library has, nineteen volumes of rulings plus index volumes. [My library has one index volume, covering volumes one through fifteen, they have two, covering volumes one through five and six through ten, and the Hebrew University collections have all three.] They seem to have duplicate copies of volumes eleven through eighteen, and the publication dates of their first series, titled אוסף פסקי דין, are all given as תש"י, which is obviously incorrect (this is the date of the appearance of the first volume, as we shall presently see), but this is mere carping; their making (most of) the work available for free online is a great boon for anyone interested in Hoshen Mishpat and Even Ha'Ezer.

Present At the Creation

Wolf2191 has shown me Dr. Zerah Warhaftig's personal account of the founding and subsequent evolution of the project:

An important innovation in the history of the responsa literature was inaugurated in Israel with the decision to publish the rulings of the Rabbinical High Court of Appeal and those of the district rabbinical courts. The rulings are published together with the arguments on which they are based, as presented in court. Indeed, I myself proposed the publication project, and was charged with its implementation, a responsibility I viewed as a great privelege and sacred trust.

Previously, the Rabbinical High Court of Appeal followed the traditional system of issuing brief rulings while at the same time compiling a full account of the halakhic deliberation on the case in pamphlet form for circulation among judges. Deliberation and discussion are an essential part of the legal process, allowing the individual judges an opportunity to convince their colleagues of the validity of their arguments, so that a decision can be reached. The pamphlets were intended to facilitate this process, rather than explain the rulings to the litigants involved, so that they could understand why they had won, or lost, their cases.

There was no appeal against a ruling of the Rabbinical High Court, nor were there establishe procedures for appealing the rulings of district rabbinical courts. (Interestingly, these pamphlets often served as the basis for volumes of responsa published by their authors years later.)

The idea of publishing, in an organized fashion, both the courts' rulings and their grounds, and that of appending abstracts of the laws cited in the rulings, as is customary in law reports, to allow for ease of reference and study, was thus entirely new. Accordingly, the Chief Rabbinate, which had to approve the proposal, had to be convinced of its merits. This entailed some negotiation, in which, as head of the Ministry of Justice's Research Institute for Jewish Law, I was much involved.

In due course an agreement in principle was reached between myself and the Chief Rabbinate. After some administrative changes were carried out, the first collection of rulings of the Chief Rabbinate's Rabbinical High Court of Appeal was finally published in 1950. Assisted by S. B. Feldman, S. Z. Cahana and P. Galevsky, I served as editor. In the foreword to the volume, I wrote:

The selection of the rulings herein published was guided by the desire to accurately portray the workings of the court. Most of the rulings relate to family law and public endowments; the others are devoted to monetary matters. The opinions of the judges, with a few exceptions, are not published as written, but have been abstracted by the editors from the contents of the pamphlets appended to the case files. This volume thus does not constitute a formal record and the editors assume full responsibility for the adaptation and wording of the judicial opinions.

...

It was found that publication encouraged rabbinical courts judges to communicate their opinions in a clear and orderly manner comprehensible to those unschooled in Jewish law, whether jurists or members of the public. Over time, rulings of the Rabbinical High Court of Appeal and the district rabbinical courts began to be handed down in a form that allowed them to be published as written, with no editing. Accordingly, it was decided to publish the rulings of the district rabbinical courts, and later, those of the Rabbinical High Court of Appeal, on a monthly basis. ...

In addition to the inaugural volume of rulings of the Rabbinical High Court of Appeal, eleven volumes of rulings of Israel's rabbinical courts had been published by 1960. These well indexed volumes alone contain a wealth of decisions on questions of family and monetary law and on matters of vital public interest.

So in addition to Wolf2191's point about the republication of the panels' rulings as specifically Rav Elyashiv's, Warhaftig tells us that the rulings in the first volume of the פסקי דין (at least one of which is included in the קובץ תשובות, as above) are actually abstracts written by the editors, and not the original opinions penned by the Dayyanim in the first place!