Large Manuscript
Shu”t Rabbi Tia Weil
Av Beis Din of Karlsruhe, son of Korban Nesanel
Germany, c. Late 18th Century
280 written pages in a large format containing sixty-four interesting halachic teshuvos spanning all areas of Torah from Rabbi Yedidiah Tia Weil, one of the great sages of Ashkenaz in his generation.
The manuscript was likely copied by a family member of the author or one of his disciples. Bound at the beginning of the sefer is an index page for the teshuvos, written in 1839 by Rabbi Yitzchak Itzik Weil – apparently a descendant of the author and resident of Karlsruhe (where Rabbi Tia Weil had lived and served as Rav) – who had in his possession manuscripts of Rabbi Tia Weil’s Torah writings.
The responsa also includes teshuvos from his father Rabbi Nesanel Weil, author of ‘Korban Nesanel’, as well as from the Noda BiYehuda, other rabbanim and dayanim, and members of the Weil family.
Several questions bear historical significance, such as: “Is it permissible to dwell in the women’s gallery [of the synagogue], given that in 1744 the entire city of Prague burned down?” or, “In 1754 there was a great flood, in which many people drowned, including an elderly man… who was never found – is mourning required for him?”
The first question addresses the direction of a synagogue toward Yerushalayim, and is accompanied by a large diagram showing the layout of the synagogue and its directional alignment with the sun!
Leaf 175 features an important gloss written in different writing.
Rabbi Yedidiah Tia Weil, Av Beis Din of Karlsruhe (1722–1806), was the son of the Korban Nesanel and prime disciple of Rabbi Yehonasan Eibeschitz. He authored many works, including Shu”t Rabbi Yedidiah Tia Weil in several volumes, Marbeh Lesaper on the Pesach Haggadah (Karlsruhe 1791), Ginzei HaMelech, and others.
Some of the teshuvos were printed shortly after their writing (in Shu”t Toras Nesanel, Fuerth 1795, and Shu”t Nesiv Chaim, Fuerth 1779). The present manuscript was published in Jerusalem in 1983 under the title ‘Shu”t R’ Yedidiah Tia Weil’.
Karlsruhe? – c. 1780s–1800s.
Page Count: [280] written pages.
Size: Large format, 35 cm, wide margins.
Condition: Generally good. In several leaves (particularly in the diagram in the first question) there is ink corrosion with damage to several words. Typical high-quality German paper, slight wear. Original binding (worn) with a new leather spine.
On the inner side of the binding appears the stamp of Rabbi Menachem Mendel Kirshenbaum, Av Beis Din of Frankfurt-am-Main, who owned this copy during the Holocaust, in which he was murdered Hy"d. A pencil annotation from him appears on p. 220, signed and dated “Wednesday, Parshas Nitzavim–Vayeilech, 1940”!
