Beschreibung:

Two milah notebooks in the handwriting of the Mohel Rabbi Binyamin Wolf Tevin, a leader of the Pressburg community. The notebooks have documentation of more than 1200 circumcisions performed by Rabbi Tevin encompassing a period of 55 years, 1748-1803. The notebooks have thousands of entries of names and important details of hundreds of distinguished families in the area – Kischa (Bad Kissingen), Yergen, Vienna and Eisenstadt, including documentation of the brit milah of Rabbi Akiva Eiger. The first notebook has documentation of 613 circumcisions performed by Rabbi Binyamin Wolf Tevin. It begins with the first brit performed on the 9th of Tamuz 1748: "Today, Friday Erev Shabbat Kodesh… I have begun performing this mitzvah of milah…G-d should fortify and strengthen my hands to bring many of His sons under the wings of the Shechina, amen". The last brit entered in the notebook was performed on the third day of Chanuka 1779 and Rabbi Binyamin Wolf signs with a long list of prayer and thanks that "I have been privileged to complete the count of 613 as the number of mitzvoth (in the Torah)… and this should be considered as if I have brought this amount of sacrifices upon your altar and they shall be my advocates when the time of my death arrives…". At the end of the list, he writes the day of his birth: "Concluded today, Wednesday the third day of Chanuka 1779, in the month I was born in 1733". The second notebook opens with a brit performed by Rabbi Binyamin Wolf on Tuesday, the 10th of Tevet (1779) to his grandson: "G-d has given me the privilege to begin the new count with my daughter's son and I was the sandak and the mohel…". The notebook ends on the 20th of Adar 1803. In the middle of the notebook (Brit 409) Rabbi Binyamin Wolf writes: "Thursday, the 28th of Adar, after G-d has raised me up from my very difficult illness I have been privileged to perform this mitzvah as in former years and have been a sandak and a mohel…". This notebook also documents 613 circumcisions which are followed by a long signature of Rabbi Binyamin Wolf who thanks G-d that he has had the merit "to complete for a second time 613 circumcisions of Jewish boys whom I have circumcised with His assistance, and I hope to G-d that in His goodness, these will join the first 613… and they will be my advocates". Further he writes that he expended much effort "the past 55 years performing this mitzvah" [gleaned from this source and from the date of his birth written in the previous notebook we see that Rabbi Binyamin Wolf started to circumcise at the age of 15!). After this paragraph is the beginning of the third count, one single inscription of a brit milah and sandaka'ut on Rosh Chodesh Nisan that same year. Rabbi Binyamin Wolf mainly performed the circumcisions in his native city, Pressburg but he also did some britot in important neighboring communities such as the adjacent cities Yergen, Kischa, Eisenstadt and Vienna. Some of the circumcisions were performed together with various people as was the custom in those days to divide the mitzvah between two mohalim: One mohel performs the milah (the cut) and the other the Pri’ah. Among the individuals who shared this mitzvah: “HaRav HaGaon Av Beit Din of our community” – Rabbi Yitzchak HaLevi Landau (Rabbi Yitzchak Dukla) author of Amarot Tehorot and Mayanei HaYeshua who served as Av Beit Din of Pressburg at those times, (in the first notebook: Britot 185, 223, 228 and 230). Rabbi Zvi Hirsh Broide Av Beit Din of Kischa, author of Eretz Zvi and Te’omei Zviya (Notebook B, Britot 511, 572), Rabbi Hirsh Levov (dayan in Pressburg and brother-in-law of Rabbi Binyamin Wolf). Other mohalim: Rabbi Kalman Shtemfi, Rabbi Kopil, Rabbi Hirsh Flohen, Rabbi Moshe Trivtesh and Rabbi Isaac Raab (most were well-known rabbis in Pressburg, see Avnei Beit HaYotzer, according to the index). An amazing entry was discovered in the first notebook – the brit milah of the famous Torah genius Rabbi Akiva Eiger in 1762. This is what is writt