Raphall, Morris Jacob. Nethiv al Maveth. The Path to Immortality, as Held by the House of Israel. On Repentance, a Future State and the Resurrection of the Dead.

Before arriving in America, Raphall was a prominent figure in British Jewry, serving as one of its chief exponents to the Christian world, fighting for the political rights of Jews and opposing defamation against Judaism. In 1849 Raphall migrated to the United States to serve as rabbi of the B’nai Jeshurun Synagogue in New York. There, he associated himself with Isaac Leeser and S. M. Isaacs and preached against the Reform Movement. Raphall states in the introduction to the present work: “Experience has taught me that discussions on dogmas are so abstract and altogether unpractical as the resurrection, are not likely to interest the public. At the same time I was struck by the fact, that those Jews, whose reading is limited to English, possess no work, elementary or otherwise, in which the important and practical doctrines of repentance and of a future state as held by the house of Israel, are placed within their reach. As I had to write on the subject of the resurrection, I determined to say something likewise respecting these other equally important and more practical doctrines; and this led me to to publish the present little essay.”