Seder Olam Rabah ve-Zuta u-Megilath Ta’anith [“The Order of the World, Major and Minor” and the “Scroll of Fasts”: Three early historical narratives]. With commentary by Jacob Emden

(EMDEN, JACOB).

Christian Simon Schröder

Hamburg

1757

FIRST EDITION WITH EMDEN’S COMMENTS

Vinograd, Hamburg 87; Raphael, Areshet III, p.270, no. 28-1

The Talmud ascribes composition of Megilath Ta’anith to the school of Chananiah ben Chizkiyah. This “Scroll” was the first portion of Oral Law to be committed to writing. (See Rashi, Tractate Shabbath 13b). It consists of a list of commemorative dates in the course of the year when fasting is forbidden. A critical edition was published by H. Lichtenstein, “Die Fastenrolle,” HUCA, Vols. VIII-IX (1931-32), pp. 257-351. See EJ, Vol. XI, cols. 1230-1. Seder Olam Rabah is traditionally attributed to the second-century tanna R. Yosé ben Chalafta. The anonymous Seder Olam Zuta is a much later work. Emden speculates that it was composed at the end of the Savoraic period with later additions. Modern scholarly opinion wavers between the sixth and seventh centuries. Prof. Chaim Milikowsky of Bar Ilan University has produced a critical edition of Seder Olam, scheduled for publication by the Israel Academy of Sciences. See EJ, Vol. XIV, cols. 1091-3. Emden has appended to these historical texts a halachic discussion of the Birkath ha-Chamah (Blessing of the Sun), recited once in twenty-eight years, as well as affidavits related to his bete-noire, Sabbatianism (the lingering belief in the messiah-hood of Shabbetai Tzevi). These include eyewitess testimony given in Satanow, concerning sexual improprieties by the daughter of the notorious Elisha of Rohytin