Yefeh Mareh [on the Aggadic portions of the Jerusalem Talmud]

JAFFE, SAMUEL BEN ISAAC ASCHKENAZI

Asher Parenzo for Giovanni di Gara

Venice

1590

Second edition. Printer’s devices on title and verso (Yaari, nos. 18 and 35). Single Oriental signature at bottom of title. Combined Hebrew and Latin marginalium on f.81r concerning geography of Africa

Vinograd, Venice 742; Habermann, di Gara 115; Adams T-112

R. Samuel Jaffe (d. late 16th century), was spiritual leader of the Aschkenazi community of Constantinople. Jaffe is famous for his commentaries to the Midrash Rabbah: Yefeh To'ar and Yefeh Einayim. According to the introduction to Yefeh Mareh, the author composed the commentary to the aggadoth in the Jerusalem Talmud because they oftentimes overlap the aggadoth in Midrash Rabbah, in doing so, Jaffe trod vigin soil. As he points out in his introduction, the only previous attempt to unpack these treasures of the Jerusalem Talmud was the minimal effort by the author of Ein Yaakov, R. Jacob ibn Habib. See EJ, Vol. IX, col. 1266