<<(Rabbeinu Yonah).>> Sha’arei Teshuvah [“Gates of Repentance.”] <<FIRST EDITION.>>

Auction 94 | Thursday, June 17th, 2021 at 11:00am

Rare & Excellent Hebrew Printed Books: From the Library of Arthur A. Marx

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Lot 168

GERONDI, JONAH

<<(Rabbeinu Yonah).>> Sha’arei Teshuvah [“Gates of Repentance.”] <<FIRST EDITION.>>

<<* Bound with:>> Hai ben Sherira Gaon (attributed). Musar Haskel BeMelitzah [“Moral Lessons in Rhyme.”] <<FIRST EDITION.>> With nikud (vowel points), printed in two columns. <<* And:>> Gerondi, Jonah ben Abraham. Sepher HaYir’ah [“The Book of Awe.”] Second edition. Together, three works (as issued). First, printed without a title page. On front flyleaf, signature of former owner, censors' signatures on verso of final page: “[Re]visto per mi Fra[te] Luigi” (cf. Wm. Popper, The Censorship of Hebrew Books, pl. IV, no. 1.) Telltale signs of censorship: On f. 22v. the words “minim” [heretics] and “mumarim” [renegades] have been erased; on f. 24v. the words “haminim vehameshumadim” [apostates] have been stricken. <<Extensive scholarly Hebrew marginalia>> in an early Italian hand. Artistic design on final page, signed Elchanan ben Tabaël. ff. 45. Slightly stained and wormed, final leaf laid to size, trimmed. Later morocco, spine titled in gilt, marbled endpapers, extremities scuffed. 8vo. Vinograd, Fano 9.

Fano: Gershom Soncino 1505

Est: $40,000 - $50,000

PRICE REALIZED $40,000

<<Rare First Edition of Sha’arei Teshuvah, a Classic Ethical Treatise by the great Rabbeinu Yonah>> (1200-63). This highly significant treatise on repentance is in fact the earliest work of ethical literature. It is divided into four portals: The first is devoted to a definition of repentance; the second to a description of the various ways by which a man should arouse himself to penitence; the third, a classification of the precepts and the punishments meted out for their transgression; and the fourth, a discussion of the conditions of forgiveness. The Musar Haskel, by R. Hai ben Sherira Gaon (939-1038), last of the great Ge’onim of Babylon, is a lengthy didactic poem of 189 double verses in the Arabic meter. See H. Brody, Piyutim VeShirei Tehillah MeRav Hai (1937); Meyer Waxman, History of Jewish Literature I (1938), p. 216; JE, Vol. VI, pp. 153-155; EJ, Vol. VII, cols. 1130-1132. Also see A.T. Shrock, Rabbi Jonah ben Abraham of Gerona: His Life and Ethical Works (1948).