9/20/2019 Abraham ben Samuel Cohen of Lask - Wikipedia

Abraham ben Samuel Cohen of Lask

Abraham ben Yechiel-Michel Catz Ha Cohen of Lask (Y echiel-Michel was the grandson of the marty r Y echiel-Michel Ha Cohen of Nemirov ). Abraham was a Jewish ascetic who flourished at the end of the 18th century . He went to liv e at
Jerusalem in 17 85, but afterward trav eled through Europe as an agent for the collection of donations for the Polish Jews in the Eretz Y israel, making Amsterdam his center; he died as Hakam at Safed, during a riot against the Jews, who had
protested against excessiv e taxation. Another v ersion say s he was punished by the Turks, in Jerusalem, (see below) and died in Safed, in 17 99, there he was buried. He did not hav e children.

Abraham (brother of Samuel Catz of Lask) was an ascetic of a remarkable ty pe; he fasted six day s of the week, from Sabbath night to Sabbath ev e, but feasted quite luxuriously on the Sabbath. Often he dev oted entire day s and nights to the study
of the Torah, standing upright during that time. He took his daily ablutions in the riv er before offering his pray ers in the morning, often breaking through the ice in winter for this purpose. Y et in spite of all this austerity he was a man of
uncommon v igor.

Once in the Holy Land, together with a number of Jewish scholars, Abraham was dragged to prison by some Turkish officials, and subjected to the bastinado, for no other reason than that it was the usual method pursued by the Turkish
gov ernment for extorting money from the Jews. Abraham and another rabbi alone surv iv ed. At ev ery stroke receiv ed Abraham uttered the rabbinic phrase, ‫"( גם זו לטובה‬This, too, is for the best"). He was held in rev erence by the best men of the
time as "the holy man of God."

He published sev eral kabalistic homilies, one under the title of Weshab ha-Kohen (The Priest Shall Return), Leghorn, 17 88; another, Wechishab lo ha-Kohen (The Priest Shall Reckon), Fürth, 17 84; a third, Bet Y a'akob (Jacob's House),
Leghorn, 17 92; and a fourth, Ayin Panim ba-Torah (Sev enty Meanings of the Law), Warsaw, 17 97 . The last work giv es sev enty reasons for the order of the sections in the Pentateuch, as well as sev enty reasons why the Law begins, "In the
beginning God created the heav ens and the earth" (Gen. i.1). All are filled with fantastic numerical and alphabetical combinations.

Jewish Encyclopedia bibliography

Münz, Rabbi Eleazar Shemen Rokeach, pp. 29–31;
Joseph Zedner, Cat. Hebr. Books Brit. Mus. s.v.;
Julius Fürst, Bibl. Jud. ii.223.

References
This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Singer, Isidore; et al., eds. (1901–1906). "article name needed". The Jewish Encyclopedia. New York: Funk & Wagnalls.

External links
Jewish Encyclopedia article on Abraham ben Samuel Cohen of Lask (http://jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=564&letter=A&search=Abraham%20ben%20Samuel%20Cohen), by Kaufmann Kohler.

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This page was last edited on 1 April 2019, at 18:54 (UTC).

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