Collection ID: 0002 | Metadata type: TEI | TEI XML | Data

Title

Pinkas of the Hevra Mishnayot Anshai Sforad Congregation, Roxbury, Massachusetts
פנקס חברה משניות אנשי ספרד, רקסבורי, מאססאטשוסעטס

Other related names

• Kaplan, Arnold Harvey, 1939-, donor
• Kaplan, Deanne, donor

Call number

MS 56, Codex 020.1
(420 Walnut Street, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19106-3703, University of Pennsylvania, Library at the Herbert D. Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies)

Alternate identifiers

• bibid: 9977544382703681
• http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1105931959
• https://colenda.library.upenn.edu/catalog/81431-p3ff3n15c

Publisher

University of Pennsylvania

Language

In Hebrew

Origin

Date

1918-1925

Summary

This is a manuscript of a large ledger created by the Ḥevrat Mishnayot of the Anshei Sforad Congregation of Roxbury Massachusetts, one of the earliest congregations in the United States to follow the Nusaḥ Sefarad rite. The body of the manuscript, including the original bylaws and likely the record of individual group members and leaders, was completed on Monday night, 7 Adar 678 (19 February 1918) in Roxbury, Massachusetts, mentioning the original president, chairmen, and trustees (f. 4r); further bylaws were created on Sunday, 14 Iyyar 681 (22 May 1921, f. 9r); further additions were recorded on Sunday of Parashat ṿa-yetse 686 (December 1, 1925) with a change in chairman and vice-chairman (f. 12r.) The patron of the volume is mentioned as the philanthropist Avraham-Zalman b. Yiśrael Nidel, whose name appears alone on a page surrounded by a decorated shield (f. 3r). The first set of bylaws include the requirement to study the Mishnah with the commentary of R. Ovadiah Bertinoro, to pay a fine of 10 cents per day of neglected study, and to pay annual dues of twenty-five cents. Rewards for the study group include a guaranteed aliyah and returning of the Torah to the ark on the weeks of reading the Ten Commandments (a desirable honor); the inscribing of learning achievements in the pinḳas; study of Mishnayot by the group on behalf of a member who had passed away for the internment period and 30 days since burial (sheloshim), and the further study on the member's yahrzeit; and the honor of a member's wife as a member ("zekhut ke-baʻalah"; in the layout of the manuscript, a member and his complete name and surname are recorded on the verso side, with his wife on the facing recto with only her and her father's Hebrew name; f. 8r-9r). The bylaws of 1921 include the obligation to finish the six orders of the Mishnah twice yearly, on 7 Adar and the first day Seliḥ̣ot are recited, and the neglect of dues will result in the writing of that member having no part in the group in the pinḳas under their name (many names are thus inscribed in the manuscript), and a fine for the calumny of one of the chairpeople (f. 9r, 11r); finally, the 1925 bylaws record the removal of members who ignore appeals for dues, including those who aggressively refuse ("lo hen ṿe-lo śekharan", translated as "not them and not their bounty", taken from Talmud Bavli Berakhot 5b), and the charge of twenty-five dollars to enter the study group (f. 12r). Lettering is stenciled bold black lettering filled in with gold with late Ashkenazic square script below listing yahrzeit or removal from the group.The names continue until f. 255r, with one entry written in 1964 in a cursive hand with a ballpoint pen created to document a yeshiva, not necessarily still in Roxbury, mentioning R. Bernitzky, a visiting rabbinical student from the yeshiva in Lakewood (New Jersey), with the mention of the names of the Rabbis heading the yeshiva: Rabbis Heiman, Rosenson, Wasserman, Kaufer, Trevis, and Mailer, signed by the "steward of the pinḳas" (f. 298r). Folios are heavy varnished paper, with the second free-end featuring a watermark reading "Old Suffolk Mills"; bound in a heavy black leather on board binding with noticeable faux-bands on the spine; also with a red shield in the center of the upper board enclosing the title, likely original.

Extent

533 leaves : 410 x 273 mm bound to 422 x 285 mm

Support

Paper

Provenance

• Presented to the Penn Libraries in 2012 by Arnold and Deanne Kaplan (Collectify accession no. 2010.02.17.00001).
   

Subjects topical

• Bet midrash gavoha (Lakewood, N.J.)
• Jews
• Pinkasim
• History
• Massachusetts--Boston
• Anshe Sfard (Boston, Mass.)--History--Sources
• Bet midrash gavoha (Lakewood, N.J.)--History--Sources
• Pinkasim--20th century
• Jews--Massachusetts--Boston--20th century
• Roxbury (Boston, Mass.)--History--Sources

Genres

• Sources
• Codices (bound manuscripts)
• Manuscripts, Hebrew--20th century
• Bylaws (administrative records)

Licenses

• Text

  These images and the content of Library at the Herbert D. Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies MS 56, Codex 020.1: Pinkas of the Hevra Mishnayot Anshai Sforad Congregation, Roxbury, Massachusetts are free of known copyright restrictions and in the public domain. See the Creative Commons Public Domain Mark page for usage details, http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/.

  URL

  http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/

• Text

  Metadata is ©2024 University of Pennsylvania Libraries and licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License version 4.0 (CC-BY-4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode. For a description of the terms of use see the Creative Commons Deed https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.

  URL

  https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode

Table of contents

• fol. 1r — Title page
• fol. 4r — Original bylaws completed 7 Adar 678 (19 February 1918)
• fol. 9r — Further bylaws created 14 Iyyar 681 (22 May 1921)
• fol. 12r — Further additions recorded Parashat va-yetse 686 (December 1, 1925)

Decorations

• fol. 3r — Decorated shield with name of patron philanthropist Avraham-Zalman b. Yisrael Nidel