Menahem ben Moshe Bavli

Last updated
Menahem Ben Moshe Bavli
Died1571
Other namesMenahem Ben Moses Bavli, Menahem ben Moshe ha-Bavli, Menahem ben Moshe HaBavli, Recanati, Menahem ben Moses ha-Bavli Recanati and Menachem Ben Moses HaBavli Rekanati [1]
OccupationRabbi and author
Years active1500–1570s

Menahem ben Moshe Bavli (Bavli meaning from Mesopotamia), also known as Menahem Ben Moshe ha-Bavli, [2] (died 1571) was a Jewish rabbi and author of the 1571 book Ta'amei Ha-Misvot ("The Reasons For The Precepts").

Contents

Life

Although many details about his life are unknown, different stories say he was originally from Italy or Baghdad until moving to a variety of places. In 1522 and 1525, he was a dayan in Trikkala, Ottoman Greece [3] until moving to Erez and also Safed, both in the Land of Israel (Ottoman Syria at the time), where his father and brother, Reuben, accompanied him, where they worked in wool dyeing. Menahem was also a correspondent of Joseph ben Ephraim Karo. Menahem was considered one of the town's best scholars and published Maran le-Even ha-Ezer in which he insinuated being a student of Jacob Beran. He visited Egypt until returning to Safed and eventually going to Hebron in 1540, where was one of a group of important Sephardic Jewish scholars living there in the 16th century, [4] after acquiring land from the Karaites. [5]

Russian-Hebrew poet David Vogel used one of Menachem' works after Vogel visited Paris and Palestine. [6]

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References

  1. "Menahem ben Moses, ha-Bavli, -1571". social Archive.iath.Virginia.edu. Retrieved August 23, 2015.
  2. David, Abraham; Orda, Dena (2010). To Come to the Land: Immigration and Settlement in 16th-Century Eretz-Israel. University of Alabama Press. p. 243. ISBN   978-0817356439 . Retrieved August 23, 2015.
  3. Heller, Marvin J. (2007). Studies in the Making of the Early Hebrew Book. BRILL Publishers. p. 110. ISBN   978-9047423928 . Retrieved August 23, 2015.
  4. Cohn-Sherbok, Dan (2011). A Dictionary of Kabbalah and Kabbalists. Impress Books. ISBN   978-1907605178 . Retrieved August 23, 2015.
  5. Auerbach, Jerold S. (2009). Hebron Jews: Memory and Conflict in the Land of Israel. Rowman & Littlefield. p. 40. ISBN   978-0742566170 . Retrieved August 23, 2015.
  6. "Haaretz Exclusive / Noa Limone reveals a previously unknown novel by David Vogel". haaretz.com. January 20, 2012. Retrieved August 23, 2015.