אליהו שפירא

Rav Eliyahu Shapira (c. 5420/1660–8 Nisan 5472/1712), known for all generations as the Eliyah Rabbah after his sefer, and in English sources as Elijah Spira, was a dayan, rosh mesivta, and darshan in Prague and one of the pillars of Ashkenazi psak in hilchot Orach Chaim. He was born in Prague to Rav Binyamin Wolf Spira, darshan and dayan of the city and later its av beit din and rav of the state of Bohemia. In his youth he traveled to Poland and learned in Kalisz under Rav Avraham Abele Gombiner, the Magen Avraham, and in Prague under Rav Shmuel Helman; his rebbe muvhak was his grandfather Rav Aharon Shimon of Prague, the city’s av beit din and rosh yeshiva, whom he cites throughout his sefarim as “my grandfather the gaon.” Around 5448/1688 he became rav of Kolin, later returning to Prague as a dayan of the kehillah’s chief beit din, and in about 5459/1699 the kehillah of Tiktin in Poland invited him to serve as its rav. He was a brother-in-law of Rav Yaakov Reischer, the Shevut Yaakov, and, through a later marriage of his sister, of Rav David Oppenheim.

His two sefarim follow the Levushim of Rav Mordechai Yoffe. The Eliyah Zutta, a short pirush on the Levushim paralleling Orach Chaim, he printed twice in his lifetime, and it appears since in editions of the Levush. The Eliyah Rabbah, his long pirush, was printed only after his petirah by his talmidim, who set it on the Shulchan Aruch rather than on the Levush — a change from the mechaber’s intent, for its words address the Levush — and the original manuscript, together with other writings of his on Tanach and Talmud, teshuvot and derashot, was lost in the great Prague fire of 5514/1754, so that the sefer survived only in a copy. Chiddushim of his on six masechtot of the Talmud were printed by his grandson.

The Eliyah Rabbah and Eliyah Zutta became foundation sefarim of Ashkenazi psak, and the Mishnah Berurah cites the Eliyah Rabbah constantly as a source of its rulings. Rav Eliyahu was niftar in Prague in his father’s lifetime, on 8 Nisan 5472/1712, and rests in the old beit hakevarot of Prague.