הרב יהודה ליווא בן בצלאל

Rav Yehuda Loew ben Betzalel (c. 5282/1522–18 Elul 5369/1609), known for all generations as the Maharal of Prague — Moreinu HaRav Loew, in English sources Judah Loew ben Bezalel — was av beit din and rosh yeshiva in Nikolsburg, Poznań, and Prague, and one of the great masters of machshava in Yisrael at the opening of the new era. He was born, apparently in Poznań, to Rav Betzalel, whose family came from Worms in Ashkenaz; a family tradition traces the line to the reish galuta Bustanai and through him to David HaMelech. His brothers were all talmidei chachamim, among them Rav Chaim of Friedberg, author of Vikuach Mayim Chaim. The name Loew — the lion — is the old kinnui for Yehuda, whom Yaakov Avinu blessed as a gur aryeh, and from that bracha the Maharal titled his first sefer.

In 5313/1553 he became av beit din of Nikolsburg and rav of all the kehillot of Moravia, serving twenty years and enacting many takanot, a good part of them curbing luxury. In 5333/1573 he moved to Prague as a private man and founded a great beit midrash at the Klaus, deliberately withholding from it the name yeshiva to mark his break with the pilpul method then ruling the yeshivot of Ashkenaz; in those years he also founded the chevra kadisha of Prague, whose takanot became the pattern for such chevrot across Europe. Passed over for the rabbanut of Prague in 5343/1583, he served four years as rav in his native Poznań, returned to Prague as its leader in fact though without title, and in Adar 5352/1592 was received at court by Emperor Rudolf II together with his brother Rav Sinai — a conversation whose substance was kept hidden. That spring he went back to Poznań as rav of Greater Poland, where he composed his Netivot Olam; and after Rav Mordechai Yaffe left Prague he was raised at last, in 5359/1599, to av beit din and rosh yeshiva of Prague, stepping down in 5364/1604 at about eighty-two in favor of Rav Shlomo Ephraim of Luntschitz.

His sefarim opened a new road in the understanding of aggadat Chazal: Gur Aryeh on Rashi on the Torah (Prague 5338/1578), Gevurot Hashem (5342/1582), Derech Chaim on Avot (5349/1589), Be’er HaGolah in defense of divrei Chazal, Netzach Yisrael, Ohr Chadash, Ner Mitzvah, and Tiferet Yisrael (Venice 5359/1599). Where earlier peirushim explained aggadot piecemeal, the Maharal showed them to be deep chochma spoken with exactness, and drew from them a whole shita on Torah, galut and geula, and the nature of Yisrael. In learning he demanded order — mishna before gemara, step before step, honest peshat before pilpul — a program his talmid Rav Yom Tov Lipmann Heller carried forward in the Tosafot Yom Tov, written to set Mishnah learning before the community; another talmid, Rav David Gans, author of Tzemach David, joined his rebbi in contact with the astronomer Tycho Brahe. His torah later watered the springs of chassidut, which arose more than a hundred and fifty years after his passing.

The Maharal stood against the blood libels of his day and disputed with priests until the emperor set the libel aside. Later generations told that he formed the golem of Prague to guard the Jews of the city; the story is a later tradition, first appearing in print in the nineteenth century, and is found neither in his own sefarim nor in those of his talmidim. His son Rav Betzalel, rav in Kolín, was niftar in his father’s lifetime in 5360/1600. The Maharal himself was niftar in Prague on 18 Elul 5369/1609 and rests beside his wife Perel in the Old Jewish Cemetery of Prague, where his matzeivah, crowned with the lion of his name, stands whole to this day. His shul and gravesite are still heavily visited in modern day Prague, Czech Republic.