World of Yesterday

Samuel ben Nathan Loew (Kelin) (ca. 1720-1806) (also "Lōw" or "Löw", Hebrew: שמואל בן נטע הלוי קעלין) was a Talmudist and Halakhist ("Authority on Jewish law"), son of Naṭe ha-Levi (נטע = Nathan), born at Kolin, Bohemia. For nearly sixty years he presided over a yeshiva at Boskovice, Moravia, where he died on May 20, 1806. He had the title Av Beis Din of Boskowitz.[1]

His works were published under the name Machatsith haShekel as follows':

* An extensive subcommentary on Abraham Abele Gombiner's Magen Abraham on Shulhan Aruk, Oraḥ Ḥayyim (Vienna, 1807-1808; 2d ed. 1817; several times reprinted)
* A subcommentary on the Shakh on Shulchan Arukh, Yore De'a Hilkhot Niddah (Lemberg, 1858) and Hilkot Meliḥah (ib. 1860)

These commentaries appear nowadays in most editions of the Shulchan Arukh.

His son Wolf Boskowitz delivered the sermon at his funeral (Ma'amar Esther, Ofen, 1837). His descendant in the fifth generation, Dr. Max Anton Löw, a convert to Roman Catholicism, was the attorney of the anti-Semite Francis Deckert (Mittheilungen der Gesell. zur Abwehr des Antisemitismus, 1896, pp. 45, 48; 1897, pp. 190, 216; Oest. Wochenschrift, 1896, p. 65).

Jewish Encyclopedia bibliography

* Aaron Walden, Shem ha-Gedolim he-Ḥadash, ii.44, Warsaw, 1880;
* Isaac Benjacob, Oẓar ha-Sefarim, p. 321;
* Julius Fürst, Bibl. Jud. s.v. Kollin, Samuel;
* Joseph Zedner, Cat. Hebr. Books Brit. Mus. p. 417.

References

1. ^ By line to Machatsith haShekel on Yore De'a

(from webpage: http://www.worldlingo.com/ma/enwiki/en/Samuel_Loew)