Derech Emunah [“The Way of Faith”- Kabbalah]

THE FIRST HEBREW BOOK PRINTED IN PADUA. Despite the ancient presence of the University - one of the great institutions of learning in Europe - only two Hebrew books were printed in Padua throughout the 16th-century. See Amram, pp. 338-41 and 387-88. Writen as a Socratic dialogue, Meir ibn Gabbai’s Derech Emunah offers an explanation for the doctrine of the Sephiroth, which he defines as the essence of Divinity. A Kabbalist of the generation of Spanish exiles, the details of Meir ibn Gabbai’s life are uncertain, although it is known he was born in 1480 and died some time after 1539. For a brief biographical overview of the author see A.Yaari, Kiryath Sepher IX (1933), pp. 388-93. In 1988, Derech Emunah was reprinted by KeHoT, the publishing arm of the Lubavitch movement, to celebrate the return of the 1563 edition that had been infamously removed from the Lubavitch Library. Upon the occasion, the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Menachem M. Schneerson spoke at length concerning this work and encouraged his followers to produce a new edition. The editors of this new, annotated edition speculate that the first edition of the Derech Emunah (Constantinople, 1560), of which to date, only two leaves are extant, was in fact never completed.