Krengel, Menahem Mendel

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KRENGEL, MENAHEM MENDEL

KRENGEL, MENAHEM MENDEL (1847–1930), Polish rabbinical author and bibliographer. Krengel was a pupil of Simon Schreiber-*Sofer of Cracow. His important contribution to Jewish scholarship is his edition of Ḥ.J.D. *Azulai's dictionary of scholars and their works, Shem ha-Gedolim ha-Shalem, which he enlarged and provided with a biography of the author, a bibliography of his works, and extensive annotations (vol. 1, 1905; vol. 2, 1930; new ed., 3 vols., 1958); among other additions are the names of Cracow scholars that Azulai had omitted. Krengel also published commentaries on the Song of Songs, Tirat Kesef (1897), the Pentateuch, Devash ve-Ḥalav (1911), and the Haggadah (1896), to which he also appended the commentary of *Isaiah di Trani, the Elder, Sha'arei Ge'ullah, his own commentary being entitled Zekher le-Fesaḥ. His account of the heated controversy with H.A. Horowitz, Cracow's rabbi, over the latter's eruv arrangements in the town appears in Torat Eruvim (1888).

[Itzhak Alfassi]

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