“Ira Robinson’s new biography paints a rich and extensively researched portrait of Yudel Rosenberg, the deeply learned but highly eccentric chief rabbi of Montreal, who moonlighted as a faith healer, magical amulet salesman, oracle, halakhic innovator, Hasidic storyteller, and the most aggressively enterprising kosher chicken slaughterhouse supervisor in Canadian Jewish history. … The book’s biographical narrative is followed by insightful chapters focusing respectively on Rosenberg’s unique approach to rabbinical jurisprudence and inimitable skills as a storyteller, preacher, healer, and kabbalist.”
— Allan Nadler, Jewish Review of Books
“[T]he ears of our hearts and minds should be inspired anew by this remarkable book by scholar Ira Robinson… Robinson’s scholarship allows readers to encounter not only the urgent issues faced by Orthodox Judaism in the modern era by relating the life and times of Yudel Rosenberg but by way of a thorough scholarly analysis of Rosenberg’s rabbinic activities, readers will be surprised by a singular portrait of Jewish Orthodoxy that serves as both agent and opposer of modernity. … Robinson’s thorough scholarship enables readers to appreciate why Yudel Rosenberg’s peripatetic rabbinic career in Canada stands in relief as a remarkable counterpoint to the cliché that the mystical pietism of Hasidism really had no influence upon the development of (North) American Judaism at the turn of the twentieth century. With his inimitable nuance and scholarly humility and acumen, Robinson makes the case of a lasting influence and legacy found in archives researched from Savannah, Georgia to Jerusalem back to the Jewish Public Library of Montreal.”
– Aubrey L. Glazer, Religious Studies Review 47, no. 3 (September 2021)
"While Rabbi Yudel Rosenberg may not be a household name, his literary creations are. The famous legends of the Maharal of Prague and the golem come from his Sefer Nifla’ot Maharal mi-Prag im ha-Golem, a great work of either folklore, literature, or forgery, depending on one’s perspective. But if one approaches this biography expecting the legendary golem to be the focus, they have so much more in store for them… [Rosenberg’s] wide-ranging interests and concerns make his biography a nexus of the issues surrounding North American Orthodox Judaism in the 20th century. Highly recommended."
—Daniel Scheide, Florida Atlantic University, AJL Reviews (September / October 2021)
“[A Kabbalist in Montreal is one biography that offers] important contributions to our understanding of the rabbinic experience in North America while simultaneously teaching … readers about the exhilarating successes and the sobering challenges of rabbinic leadership. Historian Ira Robinson’s biography of Rabbi Yudel Rosenberg (1860-1935) represents an important contribution to the field… Explaining how some of the most unmodern Orthodox men, knowingly or not, participated in Jewish modernity is probably Robinson’s most important insight. Certainly, Rosenberg would not have described himself as “Modern Orthodox,” if the term had been coined (as it is used today) during his lifetime. Yet, Rosenberg’s intellectual activities, Robinson argues, are especially “modern”... The [volume] is a fine work of transatlantic history, exploring the intellectual and cultural forces that Rosenberg encountered during his sinuous rabbinical career."
—Rabbi Dr. Zev Eleff, President of Gratz College, Tradition
“After decades of meticulous archival research, Professor Ira Robinson has produced a ground-breaking biography of Yehudah Yudel Rosenberg, a giant in the religious history of Montreal, and annals of modern Judaism. Neither unsympathetic nor hagiographic, Robinson’s book fills a critical lacuna, charting Rosenberg’s evolution from a quixotic interloper to a cultural virtuoso and fearless visionary. As rabbi, even “Rebbe” to several communities on both sides of the Atlantic, and prolific author of Hebrew works in a host of genres, Rosenberg embodied the diverse intellectual streams of nineteenth-century Jewish Poland—rabbinic law, non-allopathic medicine, scientism, and kabbalah—all of which he imported to the Jewish world of urban Canada in his own unique brand. Noteworthy is Robinson’s exquisitely documented account of Rosenberg’s vocation as a modern apostle of the Zohar, which reveals the great pains and personal risks he undertook to pursue that calling. Robinson makes a convincing case for the status of this Montreal kabbalist within the pantheon of twentieth-century pedagogues of Jewish mysticism.”
—Jeremy Phillip Brown, Assistant Professor of Theology, University of Notre Dame
“Robinson has done a magnificent job in revealing the life of an extraordinary Jewish intellectual that has been hidden in plain sight. This biography of Yudel Rosenberg, an eclectic and creative writer who walked between worlds, offers a very different vision of the multiple experiences of Jewish modernity. Robinson's fascinating book is a must-read for anyone interested in North American Jewish life in the twentieth century, and, of course, in the vibrant and unique world of Jewish Montreal!”
—Ariel Evan Mayse, Assistant Professor of Religious Studies, Stanford University
“The book is a pleasure to read and for many reasons. Yudel Rosenberg was a fascinating person. His life story is amazing and amusing; it challenges many well-grounded assumptions about Jewish history. But Ira Robinson presents this biography of a maverick rabbi in an innovative way to catch the larger story behind it: modernization processes of East European Jewry, migration and the often neglected role of Orthodoxy in shaping North American Jewry, and the crisis and transformation of Hasidism. This will be certainly a must-read for anybody interested in those broad subjects.”
—Marcin Wodziński, Head of Taube Department of Jewish Studies, University of Wrocław
“Concordia University professor Ira Robinson’s new biography A Kabbalist in Montreal: The Life and Times of Rabbi Yudel Rosenberg, for the first time, provides a well-researched scholarly treatment of this Hasidic maverick. … While the quality of Rosenberg’s voluminous oeuvre can be debated today, Robinson contends that he is exemplary for his creative and ceaseless attempts to reconcile fundamental Orthodox Judaism with modernity when its future was very much in doubt.”
—Janice Arnold, The Canadian Jewish News
“Part biography, part oeuvre survey, A Kabbalist in Montreal limns the mystical and practical aspects of a fascinating Hasidic sage physically transplanted from eastern Europe into the New World while spiritually aspiring after supernal planes. Robinson’s accessible account depicts the formidable Yehudah Yudel Rosenberg as an ambitious but embattled communal leader keen to establish himself as a rabbinical authority and hopeful for opportunities to secure a more stable professional and financial situation. … Readers interested in kabbalah or in the popularization of notions and narratives will welcome [this] informative and insightful new [work].”
—Brandon Marlon, The Jerusalem Report
