Alkabetz, Solomon Halevi

AUCTION 34 | Tuesday, September 12th, 2006 at 1:00

Exemplary Hebrew Books: The Library of Joseph Gradenwitz, Esq.

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Lot 6

Alkabetz, Solomon Halevi

Shoresh Yishai [“The Root of Jesse”: Kabbalistic commentary to the Book of Ruth, with text]. Title within architectural arch. Text of Ruth provided with nikud (vowel points), wrap-around commentary of Alkabetz in Rashi script. ff.96. Former owner’s inscription on title. [Vinograd, Const. 221; Yaari, Const. 163; Adams B-1327]. Constantinople: Solomon ibn Usque, 1561 * Bound with: ASCHKENAZI, ELIEZER BEN ELIJAH, THE PHYSICIAN. Yoseph Lekach [commentary to the Book of Esther, with text]. Title within historiated architectural arch. ff. 83. (Our copy without additional blank at end.) [Vinograd, Cremona 47; Benayahu, Cremona 44; Adams B-1335; no copy in the JNUL]. Cremona: Christoforo Draconi, 1576 Light stains in both works; otherwise a crisp copy. Later vellum, starting.4to

Est: $2,000 - $2,500

PRICE REALIZED $2,600

Solomon Halevi Alkabetz (c.1505-84) a native of Adrianople, Turkey, settled in Safed in or around 1535. He was the brother-in-law of the great systematizer of Kabbalah, Rabbi Moses Cordovero. See EJ, Vol. II, cols. 635-7 Eliezer Aschkenazi (1513-86) held rabbinic positions in widely scattered Jewish communites: Egypt; Famagusta, Cyprus; and Italy, to the major centers of Poland. He died in Cracow. His Biblical exegesis is permeated with the contemporary rationalistic spirit. Aschkenazi dedicated the work to his patron Don Joseph Nasi (the legendary Duke of Naxos). It has been observed that many of the Vilna Gaon’s comments to the Scroll of Esther were reminiscent of Yoseph Lekach. Yosef Lekach was the last Hebrew book printed in Cremona, which for a little over twenty years was a center of Jewish learning and printing, despite the rigid censorship of the Church. See D. Amram, The Makers of Hebrew Books in Italy (1963), pp. 306-319; and M. Benayahu, Ha-Defus ha-Ivri be-Cremona (1971), pp. 232-4