Foundational work: Nefesh HaChaim, first edition, Vilna and Horodna 1824. Copy owned by a student of the author ...

Foundational work: Nefesh HaChaim, first edition, Vilna and Horodna 1824. Copy owned by a student of the author, Rabbi Yaakov Melozin, and Rabbi Yeshaya Chashin. Stamps of the Beit Midrash Eliyahu in Jerusalem. Partially missing.

Nefesh HaChaim, “pamphlets from the holy writings of the true Gaon…Chaim Av Beit Din and Ram in Volozhin who is referred to according to his signature in his writing of the Nefesh HaChaim…”. Mussar and kabbalah of the Gra. This is the most famous book by Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin, one of the greatest students of the Vilna Gaon and founder of the Volozhin yeshiva. In the book he expounds on the doctrines of the Gra, which is intended as an alternative to the innovative ideas of the Chassidic movement. Rabbi Chaim criticizes the Chassidic movement strongly. His grandson, the Brisker Rav, called Nefesh HaChaim the “Shulchan Aruch of Hashkafa.”

This edition (the first) has written in the first chapter of the fourth section: “And now in these generations in our great iniquity, nahafoch hu and the depravity has arisen and is at its peak…”—these lines were removed from later editions in an attempt to dampen the anti-Chassidic bent of the work (this copy of the work shows evidence that readers attempted to erase this line). Stefanski Sifrei Yesod 478. Winograd HaGra 1417. In the original: [6], 17; 10; 8, [1]; 4; 17 leaves.

This copy is missing the first 6 leaves ([6]). A small portion of the title page is preserved, however, and is glued onto a blank first leaf. The first 2 leaves and the 7th are worn and mostly missing. Tears with light damage to leaves 3, 4, 8. A few tears in the upper margins of pages, a few moth holes, stains. Most pages are in good condition. Worn binding (probably original).

Remains of the title page and the last leaf have the signature of the author’s student—Rabbi Yaakov Melozin, and the back of the binding and the blank leaf have the signature of Rabbi Yeshayahu Chashin, “in the chatzer of Rabbi Yehuda HaChassid.” Throughout the book are stamps of the Beit “Midrash Eliyahu”, in memory of the Gra, in Jerusalem. A number of handwritten corrections have not been checked.

Rabbi Yaakov Zeev Melozin (died 1875) was the son of Rabbi Mendel Zeev Teumim and a student of the Gra. He was a leader of those who immigrated to Israel and was one of the most prominent Jerusalem sages from the Prushim community, a founder of the Jewish presence in Israel. He was a great student of the Volozhin yeshiva during the time of Rabbi Chaim of Volozhin. He led the push to get permission to rebuild the Hurva synagogue of Rabbi Yehuda HaChassid and he preserved the “Chotam” given according to tradition by the Gra to his students moving to Israel. He founded Etz Chaim and served as Shadar for Bikkur Cholim. Because he was a well-known medakdek he was sent by Jerusalem sages to Aleppo to confirm the well-known Keter. His son, Rabbi Yehoshua, adopted the surname Jacobson after his father and he is the forefather of the famous Jerusalem Jacobson (Yaakovson) family.

The Midrash Eliyahu beit midrash in the Old City of Jerusalem was founded in 1898 by the Gra’s grandson, Rabbi Eliyahu Landau, 100 years after the Gra’s death, and the emphasis was placed their to construct a library which would gather all of the spiritual treasures of the Jewish people, in an attempt to offer a replacement to the Abarbanel Beit Midrash (later the National Library), which was boycotted then by Jerusalem rabbis.