אפרים מבונא

Rabbeinu Efraim ben Yaakov of Bonn (4892/1132–c. 4957/1197) was among the baalei Tosafot of Ashkenaz, a posek, paytan and the great chronicler of his generation’s suffering. Of a distinguished family, he learned under Rav Shmuel ben Natronai and under Rav Yoel HaLevi, father of the Raavyah — and when Rav Yoel moved to Cologne, Rabbeinu Efraim succeeded him as av beit din of Bonn, with the young Raavyah second to him. With his brother Rav Hillel the pair were called “the two sons of fresh oil.” His teshuvot, often written jointly with the chachamim of his generation, are brought in the Mordechai.

At thirteen he lived through the Second Crusade, sheltering with the Jews of the Rhine in the castle of Wolkenburg — and bearing witness became his life’s second calling. His Sefer Zechirah records the persecutions of the kehillot of Germany, France and England between 4906 and 4956, among them the massacre of the Jews of York in 4950/1190; contemporary chronicles confirm the accuracy of his account, written with a survivor’s knowledge and a posek’s precision. It is through him, too, that klal Yisrael received the story of Rabbi Amnon of Mainz and the birth of U’Netaneh Tokef, told in his name and carried into the machzorim forever.

As a paytan he stood among the important composers of Ashkenaz: some twenty-three piyutim, threaded through with the persecutions and the kedoshim — his Elokim Tzivita for a brit milah entered the rites of Ashkenaz, and his Aramaic selichah Ta Shema, a mosaic of dozens of Talmudic phrases, closes by begging that the tannaim and amoraim themselves stand as Yisrael’s advocates. He wrote as well a commentary on the piyutim of the machzor, a wellspring for the commentators who followed.