Levites are Jewish males who claim patrilineal descent from the Tribe of Levi. The Tribe of Levi descended from Levi, the third son of Jacob and Leah. The surname Halevi, which consists of the Hebrew definite article "ה" Ha- ("the") plus Levi (Levite) is not conclusive regarding being a Levite; a titular use of HaLevi indicates being a Levite. The daughter of a Levite is a "Bat Levi".
Sepharadi Jews, also known as Sephardic Jews or Sepharadim, and sometimes referred to by modern scholars as Hispanic Jews, are a Jewish diaspora population who coalesced in the Iberian Peninsula. The term Sepharadim, derived from Hebrew Sefarad, also refers to the Mizrahi Jews of Western Asia and North Africa. Although the millennia-long established latter groups do not have ancestry from the Jewish communities of Iberia, the majority of them were influenced by the Sephardi style of liturgy, law, and customs from the influence of the Andalusian schools and Maimonides; many Iberian Jewish exiles later sought refuge in those pre-existing Jewish communities over the course of the last few centuries, resulting in their integration with those communities.
Abraham ben Samuel Abulafia was the founder of the school of "Prophetic Kabbalah". He was born in Zaragoza, Spain in 1240 and is assumed to have died sometime after 1291, following a stay on the small and windswept island of Comino, the smallest of the three inhabited islands that make up the Maltese archipelago.
Mirisch or Mirić is a Jewish surname of Sephardic origin. The family is attested in Ferrara following the Expulsion of 1492. Following the immigration of Sephardic Jews to the wider Balkan area the Marich settle in Banja Luka and later move to Sarajevo. Following the Ottoman rule family members immigrate further East into Serbia and further North into Poland where hundreds of Mirisch will die during the holocaust.
Jewish meditation includes practices of settling the mind, introspection, visualization, emotional insight, contemplation of divine names, or concentration on philosophical, ethical or mystical ideas. Meditation may accompany unstructured, personal Jewish prayer, may be part of structured Jewish services, or may be separate from prayer practices. Jewish mystics have viewed meditation as leading to devekut. Hebrew terms for meditation include hitbodedut or hitbonenut/hisbonenus ("contemplation").
Samson ben Abraham of Sens ,was one of the leading French Tosafists in the second half of the 12th and the beginning of the 13th centuries. He was the most outstanding student and the spiritual heir of Rabbi Isaac ben Samuel ha-Zaken. He is referred also known as "the Rash" or "the Prince of Sens", and within Tosafot as "Rashba".
Meir ben Todros HaLevi Abulafia, also known as the Ramah, was a major Sephardic Talmudist and Halachic authority in medieval Spain.
Abulafia or Abolafia is a Sephardi Jewish surname whose etymological origin is in the Spanish language. The family name, like many other Hispanic-origin Sephardic Jewish surnames, originated in Spain among Spanish Jews (Sephardim), at a time during when it was ruled as Al-Andalus by Arabic-speaking Moors.
Joseph ben Abraham Gikatilla was a Spanish kabbalist, student of Abraham Abulafia.
Ashkenazi is a surname, and may refer to:
A meshulach or SHaDaR is a rabbinical emissary sent to collect charity funds (Halukka). In the original meaning it was for the rescue of the Yishuv haYashan of Eretz Yisrael, the funds were distributed by the Kollelim in form of Halukka.
Erraez and Herraez are variations of the same Sephardi surname. This pedigree belong to a sub-group known as Spanish and Portuguese Jews, whose families remained in Spain and Portugal as ostensible Christians and later reverted to Judaism in France and Italy, some of whom emigrated to the New World in the 18th century as conversos, particularly to Mexico, the Caribbean and South America.
Isaac ben Abraham, also called Rabbi Isaac ha-Baḥur and by its Hebrew acronym RIBA (ריב"א) or RIẒBA (ריצב"א), was a tosafist of the late twelfth and early thirteenth centuries.
Eastern Sephardim are a distinctive sub-group of Sephardi Jews, mostly descended from families expelled and exiled from Iberia as Jews in the 15th century following the Alhambra Decree of 1492 in Spain and the decree of 1497 in Portugal. This branch of descendants of the Jews of Iberia settled in the Eastern Mediterranean.
(Previously, this page expanded into a family history–now in separate entry: q.v. "Pallache family.")
"Pallache" – also de Palacio(s), Palache, Palaçi, Palachi, Palacci, Palaggi, and many other variations – is the surname of a prominent, Ladino-speaking, Sephardic Jewish family from the Iberian Peninsula, who spread mostly through the Mediterranean after the Alhambra Decree of March 31, 1492, and related events.
Todros is a Medieval Sephardic surname and given name that derives from the Greek “Theodoros”, which means "gift/present of God". In some cases, Todros is a literal translation of the Hebrew biblical male name Natan-El.
