Alexander Suslin - Biography

Alexander Suslin ha-Kohen was a prominent 14th century rabbinic authority born in Erfurt, Germany. He was one of the most important Talmudists of his time. He flourished in the first half of the fourteenth century. He was rabbi first in Cologne and Worms, and then moved to Frankfort-on-the-Main. He authored Sefer Agudah, a halakhic work (structured by the order of the Talmud's tractates) which was highly regarded by later rabbinic authorities. He was killed in the Erfurt massacre of 1349 during the Black Death era massacres of hundreds of Jewish communities throughout Europe.

Aguddah

Suslin authored the book Aguddah (Collection), the contents of which justify its title. In concise fashion it enumerates the most important legal decisions, based on Talmudic law, made by preceding rabbinical authorities. Its purpose is to render such decisions accessible for guidance in their practical application. A comparison of the Aguddah with Jacob ben Asher's Tur written at the same time in Spain, reveals the deficiencies of the German Jews of that day in matters of method and systematization. While Jacob b. Asher, despite his having partially discarded Maimonides' order and method, exhibited in his Yad ha-Hazakah, presents a comparatively concise compendium of the dinim (laws) in use, the Aguddah shows a conglomeration of legal enactments and personal comments on the Talmud – in which much foreign matter is interspersed – so that it would have proved actually worthless for the practical purpose for which it was intended.

Among the German Jews, however, the Aguddah received a cordial welcome, while Sephardic Jews have almost absolutely ignored it. Such authorities of the beginning of the fifteenth century as Jacob Mölln (Maharil) and Jacob Weil consider Suslin's judgments to be decisive. Its reputation is also shown by the fact that extracts from the same were made a hundred years later (Hanau, 1610), under the title of Ḥiddushe Aguddah (Novellæ from the Aguddah), comprising a selection from Suslin's own explanations in the Aguddah. Characteristic of the author, his work, and the period in which he lived is his decision – upon Ḥul. i. 32 – that the תלמיד חכם ("pupil of the wise") of the present day cannot claim the rights and privileges of the class thus named in the Talmud, because nowadays there is no longer any true talmid hakam. Suslin evidently acknowledged by this the decadence of Talmudical learning in his time and was conscious of his own inferiority.

Jewish Encyclopedia bibliography

• M. Horovitz, Frankfurter Rabbinen, i. 9-11;
• Michael, Or ha-Ḥayyim, No. 476.