De Arte Cabalistica libri tres [kabbalah]. Text in Latin with extensive use of Hebrew type.

REUCHLIN, JOHANNES

Thomas Anshelm

Hagenau

1517

FIRST EDITION. Large woodcut device on title. The Duc de Gotha Copy, with his crest on upper cover.

Adams R-381; Scholem, Bibliographia Kabbalistica (1933), p.127

A CLASSIC OF CHRISTIAN KABBALAH. Born in Pforzheim, Baden in 1455, Johannes Reuchlin was one of the formost figures of German humanism and the pioneer of Greek and Hebrew scholarship in Germany. He first turned to the study of Hebrew in Paris in 1473. His main interest was Kabbalah, aroused by Pico della Mirandola and Jacob b. Yechiel Loans, who also taught him Hebrew. He sensed an affinity between the neo-Platonic elements in Kabbalistic teaching and the basic conceptions of the great German Platonic philosopher, Nicholas of Cusa (Cusanus), whom he deeply admired. It was probably his interest in Kabbalah that was the motivating force behind his defence of Jewish literature against the apostate Johannes Pfefferkorn during the so called “Battle of the Books.” He searched in the Kabbalah for an esoteric Christianity and studied the major contemporary works, especially Gikatilla’s Ginath Egoz and Sha’arei Orah. De arte Cabalistica is Reuchlin’s mature interpretation of kabbalistic thought. Writen in the form of a Socratic diologue between “Simon” the Jewish Kabbalist, “Marannus“ the Muslim and “Philolaus”, representing Pythagorrean mystical philosophy. In three parts, the first and third discuss the Kabbalah at considerable length, with a fair amount of sympathy. The second part contans a long dialogue on Pythagoras’ philosophy. Reuchlin more or less identifies himself with the Jewish Kabbalist. Citing many passages from his sources, he lays equal stress on the theosophic school of Kabbalah as he does on Abulafia and Gikatilla’s teachings of the Holy Names and their permutations and combinations, disassociating himself from the magical misuse of such speculations. Reuchlin also exponds his views on a necessary reform of late medieval jurisdiction, which classed Jews together with slaves, and pleaded for application of the old Roman canonical law granting the Jews equal rights. The work is dedicated to Pope Leo X and an historically significant appendix contains a letter to him regarding Reuchlin’s polemical work against Pfefferkorn; Augenspiegel, which in turn provoked Jacob Hoogstraaten’s reply, Destructo Cabale (Cologne, 1519). See EJ, XIV col. 108-111.