Heilprin, Phinehas Menahem
HEILPRIN, PHINEHAS MENAHEM
HEILPRIN, PHINEHAS MENAHEM (1801–1863), Hebrew scholar and anti-Reform polemicist. Born in Lublin, Poland, he moved to Hungary in 1842 and, in 1859, emigrated to the U.S. Heilprin was opposed to reforms in Judaism and the moderation of his critical views on talmudic literature stemmed from a loyalty to Jewish tradition. In 1845 he wrote a sharp polemical work, Teshuvot be-Anshei Aven (signed S.M.N., the last letters of his names), directed against Samuel *Holdheim and his school, in which he expressed the view that Jews have a right to exist as a nation, and not merely as a religious community. Heilprin's second work Even Bo?an (1846), signed "Peli," contains a penetrating criticism of Abraham *Geiger's Melo ?ofnayim, and a critical edition of Profiat *Duran's Al Tehi ka-Avotekha. An article on methods of talmudic textual criticism, "Kevod ?akhamim Yin?alu," was published posthumously in Bikkurim (vol. 2, 1865).
bibliography:
G. Pollak, Michael Heilprin and his Sons (1912); A. Ginzig, in: O?ar ha-Sifrut, 3 (1889–90), 11–12 (fourth pagin.).
[Gedalyah Elkoshi]