The Biblical Priesthood of Israel Aharon, the Kohanim, and the Eternal Covenant According to the Torah and Jewish tradition, the priesthood of Israel was granted by the God of Israel to Aharon, the brother of Moshe, and to his male descendants after him as an eternal covenant. ברית מלח עולם An eternal covenant of salt…
Rabbi Avraham Yaakov ben Meir Hakohen Pam (Vidz, Lithuania 1913 – Brooklyn NY 2001) was the rosh yeshiva of Yeshiva Torah Vodaas in Brooklyn, New York. Rabbi Pam related how his father Meir, was a diligent torah scholar who pressed himself in his studies to the point of fatigue, upon dozing off he would return to his…
In addition to all of the religious-from-birth kohanim, many kohanim today are baalei teshuva, the aim of this article is to discuss some of the halachic factors involved in determining the status of the said kohen – namely the scope of איתרע חזקתיה (the weakening of his chazaka) and whether or not the specified kohen…
Rabbenu Avigdor ben Rabbenu Eliyahu HaKohen Katz a tosafist born is Austria, functioned as Rabbi in Vienna. His brothers where Rabbenu Eliezer HaKohen and Rabbenu Shneur of Neustadt. A talmid of Rabbi Simcha of Speyer and Rav Elazar ben Shmuel of Verona – apparently his brother in law – Rabbenu Avigdor later penned a commentary to…
Rabbi Nathan HaKohen Adler (Frankfurt 1741 – Frankfurt 1800) he won the admiration of Rabbi Chaim Yosef Dovid Azulai (The Chida), who had visited Frankfurt when Nathan was 11 years old. As a child, Nathan attended the Yeshiva of the Penei Yehoshua, who was at that time rabbi at Frankfurt, but his principal teacher was…
Rabbi Ahron HaKohen of Luniel lived at Narbonne, and suffered from the expulsion of the Jews in 1306. He emigrated to Majorca, and there, composed his famous work אורחות חיים (The Paths of Life). A compilation of Talmudic laws; the first part of which deals with the laws of the daily prayers, Shabbat, and Yom Tov,…
In Halacha, challal is a term used to define a male descendant of Ahron who is permanantly disqualified from functioning as a kohen. The disqualification is usually due to a circumstance beyond the challal’s control; such as his biological mother being a divorcee or a convert (a kohen may not marry a convert woman).
Medrash tells us how לעתיד לבא (in “the future era”) the kohanim will be authenticated to the level of “kohen meyuchas”- the Rambam writes that מלך המשיח (King Messiah) will do the validating, while sefer Ezra (The Book of Ezra) implies that the authentication process will be done by the kohen gadol and the Urim and…
Can you tell a kohen from across the room? some people swear that they can. Many are quick to quote the known talmudic phrase that kohanim are קפדנים – strict personalities by nature, but from this torah and chazal point of view, is this the only quoted trait that kohanim have? is it really possible to “know”…
Although the the torah indeed calls kohanim “levi’im” this isn’t the custom of usual talk. Thus, in terms of the laws of nedarim, halachically speaking, kohanim and leviim are separate.