(The “Chatham Sofer,” 1762-1839). Autograph Manuscript in Hebrew

SOFER, MOSES

(Pressburg)

n.d.

Novellae concerning Talmud Tractate Shabbath, Perek R. Eliezer DeMilah, f. 132b

Rabbi Moses Sofer (the “Chatham Sofer”) of Mattersdorf and Pressburg was one of the most outstanding Rabbinic leaders of the late 18th- early 19th-centuries. His responsa, novellae and sermons enjoyed unprecedented praise and respect and are to this day assiduously consulted by all Jews universally. Rabbi Moses Sofer’s qualities of moral character, humility and justice, alongside his profound scholarship and leadership, has created some two centuries later, a deeply venerated aura surrounding his personality. Due to his considerable reputation, his legion of descendents (who proliferated into Europe’s most prominent Rabbinic families), deem original handwritten material by the Chatham Sofer to be imbued with an ineluctable level of holiness that serves as both a source of spiritual protection and of blessing