The Responsa of Rabbi Solomon B. Freeho
See a bibliography of Lauterbach in his Rabbinic Essays, pp. 3-20. For a survey of his responsa, see Walter Jacob and Moshe Zemer [eds.], Dynamic Jewish Law(Tel-Aviv and Pittsburgh : Rodef Shalom Press, 1991), pp. 98-101.
10. See my introduction to The Responsa of Professor Louis Ginsberg (New York and Jerusalem : Jewish Theological Seminary Press , 1996), p. 24.
11. Studies in Bibliography and Booklore 5(1961), pp. 3041(Hebrew section). In December 1957 and November 1959, Freehof wrote to Boaz Cohen urging him to publish a new, enlarged edition of Kuntress Hateshuvot.(The letters are preserved in the Boaz Cohen Archives. Rare Book Room, Jewish Theological Seminary , Box 9,“Freehof, Solomon .”) Cohen must have replied in the negative, leading to the publication of Freehof’s list.
12. Reform Judaism and the Legal Tradition— The Tintmer Memorial Lecture,(New York:Association of Reform Rabbis, 1961), p. 10, hereafter: Legal Tradition. In the
introduction to Recent Reform Responsa, p. 7, Rabbi Freehof says that the Responsa Committee has received 200 questions per year for the last decade.
13. By way of comparison, Rabbi Shlomo ben Adret (1235-1310), who was considered to be one of the most prolific responders of all time, was rumored to have written 6,000 responsa of which 3,373 have been published. See S. Z. Havlin in Teshuvot Sh elot L"harashba( Jerusalem : 5737[1977]), p. 8, note 4. 14. The responsa written for the Responsa Committee are found in Walter Jacob [ed.], American Reform Responsa(New York : Central Conference of American Rabbis, 1983). Rabbi Jacob (above, note 2), says that Rabbi Freehof published 433 of his own responsa, but some of the responsa deal with a few different topics, hence the total of 450.
15. Legal Tradition, pp. 2-5.
. Ibid. pp. 7-10.
<Ioid, p21. p. 75,218.
. Ibid., p. 22. For the phrase“guidance but not governance,” cf. p