Tzemach David [historical chronicle]

David Gans (1541-1613), disciple of R. Judah Löw (MaHaRa”L) of Prague, was a multifaceted individual, in every way a product of the enlightenment of the Rudolfine Era. The Tzemach David is Gans’s best known work. It is divided into two parts, the first containing the annals of Jewish history, the second those of general world history. For this second part, the author consulted the writings of Spangenberg, Laurentius Faustus, Hubertus Holtzius, Georg Cassino and Martin Borisk. Tzemach David is the first work of its kind among the Aschkenazi Jews - indeed in his preface to the second volume, Gans deemed it necessary to justify himself for having dealt with so secular a subject as the annals of general history and endeavored to demonstrate that it indeed was permitted to study history on the sacred Sabbath-day. See André Neher, Jewish Thought and the Scientific Revolution of the Sixteenth Century: David Gans and His Times (1986).