Lamdan
Lamdan is a late Hebrew expression for a man who is well informed in rabbinical literature, although not a scholar in the technical sense of the term - i.e. "talmid hakham"; it does not seem to have been used before the 18th century.
- Ezekiel Katzenellenbogen decided that rabbinical scholars were exempt from paying taxes even though scholars then were not scholars in the proper sense of the word, "for the law does not make a difference between lamdan and lamdan".
- Jacob Emden speaks of Baer Kohen, the founder of the Klaus in Hamburg, as having been somewhat of a scholar.
- Authorities of the sixteenth century, when they have to speak of the difference between a scholar in the technical sense of the word and a well-informed man, do not use the term "lamdan," but say "tzurba me-rabbanan", צורְבָא מֵרָבּנן, literally "enflamed from Rabbinic literature".
People