Background
He was a great-grandson of Abraham-Leib Monsohn, one of the founders of the Ashkenazi Old Yishuv of Jerusalem in the early nineteenth century, and a son of Abraham-Leib Monsohn II, a founder of the A.L.
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Menachem Mendel Rabbi
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Career
Monsohn Lithography in Jerusalem. In 1924 Monsohn immigrated to the United States with a group of rabbis from Eretz Israel, settling in Brooklyn, New York, where he served as rabbi of Congregation Ezrath Israel on Gates Avenue, in the Bedford-Stuyvesant section, until his death in 1953. His book, Mi-Peninei Ha-Rambam: Bi’ur ‘al ha-Torah, a compendium of Maimonides’ commentaries on the Pentateuch, arranged by the compiler in order of the Torah chapters, first appeared in Brooklyn c.1925 and was reprinted there several times in the early 1930s.
In 2006 it was re-released by Mossad Harav Kook of Jerusalem, which also published an English translation, Pearls of the Rambam (tr Avraham Berkovits) c.
2008. Some of the early editions included a Yiddish introduction to the life of Maimonides. Monsohn’s intellectual prowess became apparent at an early age: at 16 he received rabbinical ordination (semikhah) from Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, the first Ashkenazic chief rabbi of British Mandatory Palestine.
Diverging from his usual practice, Rabbi Kook gave Monsohn an approbation to be published in his Mi-Peninei Ha-Rambam. But he objected to the press"s printing of a calendar for one of the Jerusalem churches and he quit the press
In Brooklyn, Monsohn eked out a living, devoting most of his time to work on his Mi-Penine Ha-Rambam, which he printed himself, using the skills acquired at his father’s press
In all editions of his book Monsohn noted that he was born in Jerusalem.
