מאיר בן ברוך הלוי

Rav Meir ben Baruch HaLevi of Vienna (niftar 5166/1406), known as the Maharam Halevi, the Maharam Segal, and — for his birthplace — the Maharam Fulda, was among the foremost rabbanim of Ashkenaz in the generations after the Baalei HaTosafot. Little is known of his early life. His father was killed al kiddush Hashem in the gezeirot of 5109 and is called for that reason the holy Rav Baruch. Before those decrees he learned in Erfurt under Rav Alexander Susslin HaKohen, author of the Agudah. He afterward served as rav of Erfurt, where Rav Hillel of Erfurt learned by him, and of Frankfurt. In 5143/1383 he went to Nuremberg to head the yeshiva there, but returned to Frankfurt some two years later, and during that second period in Frankfurt a false charge was brought against him and he was imprisoned. He was released on 23 Adar 5152/1392.

He then moved to Vienna and was appointed rosh yeshiva there beside Rav Avraham Klausner. It was said of him that he brought with him the whole tradition of the chachamim of the Rhineland, all the roots of its practice and its minhagim, and that move marks the passing of the center of Ashkenazi Torah from Germany to Austria for the generations that followed. In Vienna he married Henzis, daughter of the banker David Steuss. Among his talmidim were the Maharash of Neustadt, who took his place at the head of the Vienna yeshiva, and Rav Yaakel of Eger, later rav in Krems; the Maharil learned by him in his youth and brings his teachings by name. Many of his talmidim were killed in the persecutions in Vienna in 5181.

Although he didn’t write seforim, his rulings reach us through the works of the generations after him — the Maharil, the Terumat HaDeshen, and Mahari Weil. He held firmly that there is no claim of hasagat gvul in the rabbanut and that any rav may rule in halacha even where a rav already sits: who, he asked, gave me a boundary or left me one, that another may not enter it. At the same time he ruled that a man may not decide halacha without explicit permission and semicha from him, and that position placed him at the center of the ordination dispute in France. Rav Yeshayah ben Abba Mari of Savoy, contesting the claim of Rav Yochanan Treves to his late father’s title as head of the rabbanim of France, obtained from him a document of semicha granting Rav Yeshayah alone the right to appoint rabbanim in the kingdom; the Rivash, who held that the Maharam’s authority to issue such decrees did not extend past Ashkenaz, nonetheless wrote of him as the great eagle, wide of wing, filled with Torah. His name is entered in the memorbuch lists of Worms, Frankfurt and other kehillot beside those of Rabbeinu Gershom, Rashi, Rabbeinu Tam and the Maharam of Rothenburg.