Everything about Joshua Falk totally explained
Joshua Falk (
Hebrew: יהושע בן אלקסנדר פאלק)(also:
Joshua ben Alexander HaCohen Falk) (
1555 -
1614) was a Polish
Halakhist and
Talmudist, best known as the author of the
Beit Yisrael commentary on the
Arba'ah Turim as well as
Sefer Me'irat Enayim (סמ"ע) on
Shulkhan Arukh. His name also occurs as the Hebrew
acronym "
RaFaK" ("
R[abbi]] Falk Kohen") and "
Ma-HaRWaK" ("
Morenu ha-Rab Walk Kohen").
Biography
He was a pupil of his relative
Moses Isserles and of
Solomon Luria, and became the head of the
yeshiva of
Lemberg. Many celebrated rabbis were his pupils, among them being
Joshua Höschel ben Joseph of
Cracow, the author of "
Maginne Shelomoh".
Falk was a great authority on rabbinical matters. At the meeting of the
Council of Four Lands in 1607, during the
Kremenetz fair, many of his proposals were approved.
In 1611 Falk and
Enoch Hendel ben Shemariah issued a bill of divorce at
Vienna which occasioned lengthy discussions among the celebrated rabbis of the time, including
Meir Lublin and
Mordecai Yoffe (see "
She'elot u-Teshubot MaHaRaM", Nos. 123 et seq.).
He was
Rosh Yeshiva in
Lemberg and served on the
Council of Four Lands.
Falk was opposed to the reliance on law codes to the exclusion of study of the original sources. Towards this end he composed a series of commentaries on the most influential
codes, Rabbi
Jacob ben Asher's
Tur and Rabbi
Joseph Karo's
Shulkhan Arukh. He spent his early life composing extensive analytical commentaries on the
Talmud, which were later lost in a fire.
Falk died at
Lemberg (now Lviv,
Ukraine)
March 29,
1614.
Note on the name "Joshua Falk"
Until the early
19th century, the names of most
Central European
Jews consisted of a
Hebrew first name, a
German second name, the patronymic "ben ... " (son of ...) and, if an upper one, the class -
HaCohen (or "Katz") or
HaLevy. Those whose
given name was Yehoshua, Josua, or Joshua had the second name of Falk, Valk, Walk, Wallik or Wallich. (One theory is that "Falk", here, derives from the German for
falcon: just as a falcon circles its prey, so
Joshua circled and explored the
Holy Land before swooping down on it. Some derive "Valk" from an acronym of
Leviticus 19:18: "
ve'ahavta lere'akha kamokha" - "Love thy neighbor as thyself"). The name Falk was thus not a
family name until the 19th century, when it was adopted by those whose immediate
ancestors had "Falk" as a second name.
Encyclopedias will therefore have several entries under "Falk", where "Falk", strictly, isn't a surname. References to Rabbi Falk are therefore often via "Yehoshua Falk ben Alexander HaCohen" or "Joshua Falk ben Alexander Katz" or "Joshua Falk Katz".
Works
Beit Yisrael is a twin
commentary on the
Tur, composed of the
Perishah, a straightforward explanation, and the
Derishah, deeper discussions on specific problems. The
Perishah clarifies the
rulings of the
Tur, by tracing them to their sources in the
Talmud and
Rishonim. The
Derishah is devoted to extensive analysis and comparison of the various interpretations and
decisions proposed by various Talmudic authorities.
Rabbi Katz also wrote:
- Sefer Me'irat Einayim, a commentary to the Choshen Mishpat section of the Shulkhan Arukh, containing all the decisions of the Rishonim, with an index of their sources.
- Kontres 'al Dine Ribbit, a discourse on the laws relating to the prohibition of usury, followed by some "takkanot" (ordinances by the Rabbis), Sulzbach, 1692;
- Pene Yehoshu'a, homilies in the order of the parashas, Zolkiev, 1742;
- Sefer ha-Hosafah a supplement to the Darhkei Mosheh of Moses Isserles, printed with the Choshen Mishpat, Dyhernfurth, 1796;
- Novellae on Talmudic treatises.
Bibliography
Azulai, Shem ha-Gedolim, i.50, 70;
Giovanni Bernardo De Rossi, Dizionario, i.116;
Solomon Buber, Toledot Anshe Shem, No. 197.Further Information
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