5 - On Libraries Private and Public

Summary

THE INCREASED AVAILABILITY of printed books brought with it an increase in the number of libraries, both private and institutional.

The growth of private Jewish libraries consequent on the spread of printed books is, unfortunately, an area in which little information is available. However, the published will of the eighteenth-century rabbi Pinhas Katzenellenbogen, who served in communities in east Galicia, southern Germany, and Moravia, which appeared at the beginning of his autobiographical work Yesh manḥilin (There Are Bequeathers), shows that he purchased books, that he gave them to his son, and that he bequeathed them to his wife. This suggests that he saw them as valuable belongings and not only as a vehicle for study. One can assume that it was because he saw books in this way that he owned several editions of important works as well as manuscripts.

The catalogue of books in Katzenellenbogen's library gives us information both about the extent to which ethical literature in Hebrew had penetrated Jewish communities and about how far Yiddish literature and kabbalistic works had expanded their readership. Most were talmudic and halakhic works, but a considerable number were neither required reading in the established system of Torah study nor the halakhic works favoured by scholars: there were also kabbalistic works, ethical works, and books in Yiddish. His holdings in these latter categories are summarized below.The list of works in Yiddish shows that literature generally regarded as being aimed at women and children was nevertheless important enough for an eighteenth-century rabbi to list in his library.However, while these books may indeed have been read by other members of Rabbi Katzenellenbogen's household, it would be wrong to think that the contents of a collector's library would accurately reflect the type of books that were read by the Jewish masses. Even so, the relatively large number of more popular pamphlets and books in Katzenellenbogen's library—ninety-three, to be precise—does tell us that the interest in such publications was not necessarily limited to the lower strata of Jewish society. Likewise, the availability of books in Yiddish describing and explaining various rituals and other customs of kabbalistic origins would have undoubtedly influenced the spirituality of the members of the household as they related to actions that were part and parcel of everyday life.