NAHUM, MENAHEM, OF CHERNOBYL:
Ḥasidic leader in the last part of the eighteenth century. He was a pupil of Baer of Meseritz, by whom he was sent to Galicia to disseminate the teachings of Ḥasidism. In 1772, when Ḥasidism was endangered by the death of Baer of Meseritz and by the violent attacks of Elijah of Wilna, Nahum came forward with other leaders and established the dynasties of the miracle-workers, the Ẓaddiḳim. He himself was the founder of a dynasty in Little Russia, in which he was succeeded by his son Mordecai. The various Ẓaddiḳim were tributary to a chief Ẓaddiḳ:, a son of Baer of Meseritz. Nahum was the author of "Me'or 'Enayim," cabalistic homilies on the Pentateuch (Slobuta, 1798; often reprinted), and of "Yismaḥ Leb," cabalistic expositions of the Talmudic haggadot (ib. 1798; Zolkiev, 1800; Lemberg, 1848).
- Grätz, Gesch. xi. 102, 112;
- Fürst, Bibl. Jud. ii. 352;
- Walden, Shem ha-Gedolim he-Ḥadash, i. 106;
- Benjacob, Oẓar ha-Sefarim, p. 275, No. 33; p. 233, No. 476.
