This 14th and 15th century Ashkenazi copy of the Sefer Moreh Nevukhim (Guide to the Perplexed) by Moses Maimonides is the Hebrew translation of the work made in 1204 by Samuel ben Judah Ibn Tibbon (1150-1230). This copy also includes a preface from the commentary to the Moreh Nevukhim by Shem Tov ben Joseph ben Shem Tov, a 15th century Spanish rabbi and vigorous defender of Aristotelian and Maimonidean philosophy. In the 16th century, this manuscript was owned by Johann Buxtorf II, and used as the base for the latter's Latin edition of the Doctor Perplexorum (Basel, 1629). (iss)

Online Since: 03/19/2020

This medieval Hebrew lexicographical and scientific miscellany dates back to 1290 and encloses three highly important texts, used as the base for published editions and studies. These are: the Maḥberet Menahem by Menahem ben Jacob Ibn Saruq (died c. 970); an anonymous Hebrew prose translation of the very popular Old French version of the lapidary by Marbode of Rennes (12th c.) and lastly, an anonymous abridged version of the talmudic and midrashic lexicon entitled Sefer ha-Arukh by Natan ben Yehiel Anav of Rome (1035-1110), called the Berner Kleiner Arukh. The particularity of this copy is the presence of Old West Yiddish and Old French glosses. Furthermore, among the numerous later notes, there are more significant additions which abound in the blank pages and margins of the manuscript, the most unusual of which is a charm in Middle High German in Hebrew characters, relative to Hulda, a German goddess comparable to Venus, taken from the Tannhäuserlied. Moreover, this manuscript belonged to several famous Jewish and Christians owners, whose scriptural witness testifies to the manuscript's remarkable stature as a treasured source of knowledge from the time it was compiled at the end of the 13th century, to its possession by Christian Hebraists in Switzerland during the 16th and 17th centuries. (iss)

Online Since: 12/12/2019