376 A History of Judaism
Since the authority of a rabbi depended primarily on perceptions of
his wisdom and knowledge, rabbinic religious influence was often
shared with other, less learned, teachers. A popular preacher (maggid )
was characteristically appointed alongside a rabbi by Russian and Pol-
ish communities from the seventeenth century for the edification of the
congregation and could have a more direct effect on the spiritual life of
Jews than even the most learned of rabbinic sages, as emerges from the
records of his preaching preserved by Judah Leib Pukhovitser in Poland
in the second half of the seventeenth century:
It was our pattern to preach words of ethical rebuke each day, thereby
fostering humility. Every Sabbath I would preach novel interpretation of
the Torah pertaining to the weekly lesson, based primarily upon the novel-
lae in the works of Alsheikh and those in the Sefer haGilgulim attributed to
the Ari ... This was followed by ethical content from the Zohar and other
ethical writings ... It was also our pattern to admonish about some of the
laws that are neglected, in accordance with the talmudic statement ... It is
necessary to appoint in every Jewish community a great scholar, advanced
in years, one who has feared God from his youth, to reproach the masses
and point the way back through repentance ... That scholar must also
exert himself to know the sins of those in his community, even if they are
not apparent ...Preaching repentance was an integral part of the job.^18
For an increasing proportion of Jews in the early modern period, rel-
igious edification could come from personal reading. Ts’enah uReenah,
a popular Yiddish miscellany written in the 1590s in Poland, containing
a paraphrase of the Torah readings in the synagogue and the haftaroth
(readings from the Prophets following the Torah readings in synagogue
liturgy), combined with legends, homilies and selections from the bib-
lical commentaries of Rashi and others, was repeatedly reprinted
throughout the seventeenth century, making available to those with
insufficient Hebrew an insight into the main teachings of Judaism. The
book became standard reading for pious Jewish women over the fol-
lowing centuries, with hundreds of reprints. There were also multiple
printings from the late sixteenth century of tehinnus (a Yiddish word
derived from the Hebrew tehinnot, ‘supplications’), pious prayers, often
with a mystical content, written in Yiddish and intended to be recited
voluntarily and privately, primarily by women. Also widely available
were anthologies addressed specifically to what were seen as women’s
concerns, such as lighting the Sabbath candles, taking the hallah portion