A FOURTEENTH-CENTURY HEBREW POET AND PHILOSOPHER
The year 1306 was a fateful one in the annals of the Jews in France. At the beginning of that year Philip IV, surnamed Le Bel, issued an edict of expulsion against all the Jews living in his dominions. The edict practically confiscated all their property, and its terms were so rigorous that any Israelite found on French soil after a certain time became liable to the penalty of death.
Philip's mandate was promptly executed by the royal officers, and some 100,000 Jews were mercilessly driven out from their native land—a land in which their forefathers had resided long before Christianity had become the dominant religion there. In consequence of this expulsion, several famous Jewish seats of learning, such as those at Béziers, Lunel, and Montpellier ceased to exist. Among the refugees was Yedaya En-Bonet ben Abraham Bedaresi, the subject of the present essay. Yedaya, known also under the poetical pseudonym of Penini, has left no documentary evidence concerning the incidents of his life. The best biography, however, of a man like Yedaya is that which is found in his own works. There is some diversity of opinion among biographers as to the exact date of Yedaya's birth, for while Bartolocci, Wolf, and de Rossi say that he was born in 1298, Steinschneider and Neubauer put the year of his birth between 1255 and 1260, without, however, attempting to fix the year of his death. Graetz, again, maintains that Yedaya was born in 1280, and died about 1340, and that his birthplace was Béziers and not Barcelona, as some biographers believe[[72-1]]. The only indisputable fact in connexion with Yedaya's early education is that he entered the school of Rabbi Meshullam of Péziers when he was fifteen years old. From Yedaya's numerous writings it is obvious that he was a philosopher and moralist, a Talmudical scholar and an expert in medicine, and above all a clever writer of Hebrew prose and poetry. It is chiefly to his ability in this direction that he owes his prominent position among the Jewish savants of the Middle Ages, and for that reason special attention will have to be paid in the course of this essay to his chief work entitled Bechînath Olam, “The Examination of the World.” It is true that Graetz finds fault with this poetical composition, which he condemns for its empty grandiloquence and artificiality. But, on the other hand, Munk, in his Mélanges, p. 495, and Buxtorf, in his Bibliotheca Rabbinica, speak very highly of Yedaya's poetical talent; and the latter calls “The Examination of the World” an excellent literary production. And, indeed, the same opinion will be shared by all those readers of the Bechînath Olam who, like Munk and Buxtorf, are not prejudiced against it, on the ground that its style is not so pure, elegant, and clear as that met with in some of the writings of the most prominent representatives of the so-called Spanish and Italian schools of Hebrew poetry. It has, in fact, always enjoyed an extraordinary popularity among the Jews; and it is remarkable to notice the comparatively large number of MSS. of the original, and of the commentaries on it, which are to be found in various libraries. It may further be mentioned that it has passed through more than forty-four editions, issued both with and without commentaries, at various times and in various countries, and has been frequently translated into German and into Jargon, while there were Latin, English, French, Italian, and Polish versions as well. It is interesting to note that the eleventh and twelfth chapters of one of the German editions, issued at Prague in 1795 by Moses Kunitz, were rendered into German by Moses Mendelssohn; and that the French translation, published in Paris in 1629 by Ph. d'Aquin, was dedicated to Cardinal Richelieu. The English version, which appeared in London in 1806, was inscribed by its author, Rabbi Tobias Goodman, to “The Most Reverend Solomon Hirschell, Presiding Rabbi of the German Jews”; and the Latin one, which has for its title Examen mundi, R. J. Bedrishitae, latina interpretatione, was done by Uchtman, and issued at Leyden in 1650.
Curiously enough the editor of the first of the forty-four known editions of the Bechînath Olam, printed, as some biographers think, at Mantua between 1476 and 1480, was a lady called Estellina, the wife of a certain Abraham Conath. She was assisted in her task by Jacob Levy of Tarascon. The last known edition of the book, or rather the greater part of it, was published only a few years ago by Dr. Harkavy, of St. Petersburg, from a MS. in his possession. Dr. Harkavy is also the owner of a hitherto unpublished commentary thereon, composed in 1508 by Isaac Mançon of Reggio. In some prefatory lines the author states that he was induced to write the commentary, because he had noticed that many young men in his country were in the habit of learning the original by heart, without knowing anything about its contents.
As regards the style and composition of the Bechînath Olam, which seems to have been composed by Yedaya after the expulsion of the Jews from France in 1306, it must be admitted at the outset that the general reader will not find them quite in harmony with modern taste. De Lacy, in his Magasin encyclopédique, III, p. 321, censures the author for his use of certain Biblical phrases in a sense different to that which they bear in the Bible. But he readily admits that the Church fathers during the Middle Ages, and certain Arabic writers, at all times, have taken the same liberties with the Scriptures and the Koran respectively. The greatest of the Spanish-Jewish poets, not excluding Ibn Gabirol himself, allowed themselves the same licence, while Charizi often made his happiest points by the witty misuse of a familiar Biblical phrase. Despite this defect, it cannot be denied that the Bechînath Olam possesses a peculiar charm of its own.
Those who are acquainted with the Hebrew Bible, the Midrash, and the Talmud, cannot fail to appreciate the art with which Biblical phrases, used with an occasional striking play on words, are worked into a mosaic. Take, for instance, the following sentences which occur in chapter IX:—
אפס כי לא תהיה תפארת הממנות נמשכת—עוד מעט ויצאה רוח אלהים לבזור רכושיך—ויהיו כלא היו חמשים אלפי זהב אשר בקנינם מכרת נפשך• תתהפך הזמן כמעט רגע לקחת חן וכבוד מעל ראשך—תרד אש האלהים מן השמים ותאכל אותך ואת חמשיך•
“By no means let thy pride in thy wealth endure, for at any moment a blast may come from God, which will scatter and disperse all thy treasures. Then will vanish as naught the fifty thousand ducats for which thou hast bartered thy soul, and thy former honour and glory will likewise depart at thy sudden reverse of fortune. Or a fire may come down from heaven, and devour thee along with thy five myriads of ducats.”
Here it will at once be seen how cleverly the author uses for his own purpose certain phrases found in the second chapter of 2 Kings in connexion with the prophet Elijah, and how ingenious the play on the word חמשיך is.
As this peculiar mode of composition is a marked feature of the Bechînath Olam, a few more examples of a somewhat different kind may be given here for the sake of illustration. In chapter IV we read as follows[[74-1]]:—