A Glimpse of Rabbi David Zvi Hoffmann's Methods as a Decisor of Halakhah [Hebrew] אשנב לדרכי עבודתו של הרב דוד צבי הופמן בפסיקת הלכה (original) (raw)

A Glimpse of Rabbi David Zvi Hoffmann's Methods as a Decisor of Halakhah [Hebrew] אשנב לדרכי עבודתו של הרב דוד צבי הופמן בפסיקת הלכה

In this article, we seek to understand the methods by which Rabbi David Zvi Hoffmann (1843-1921) functioned as a posek, a decisor of Halakhah. Close study of R. Hoffmann's written correspondence and of his manuscript "notebook" that forms the basis of Melamed Le-ho'il, the posthumously published collection of his responsa, enables us to trace the process by which he rendered judgment. We demonstrate that R. Hoffmann both recorded his halakhic decisions in his notebook and copied directly from the notebook into the letters of response to various correspondents. We also show that R. Hoffmann continued to update his notebook through the years, until the end of his life, revisiting previously rendered decisions. Thus, even a single responsum, as printed in Melamed Le-ho'il, may reflect several stages of R. Hoffmann's halakhic thinking about a particular topic over time.