(Saks da Castellazzo) (Editor). Heichal Hashem [collected essays by early Kabbalists]

ASCHKENAZI, YECHIEL

Daniel Zanetti

Venice

(1594)

FIRST EDITION. Title within architectural columns. The Adolph Lewisohn Copy, with his morocco bookplate on front marbled paste-down. On ff. 36-37 there are numerous marginalia in an old rabbinic hand, some of which suggest corrected readings of the text

Vinograd, Venice 793; St. Cat. Bodl. 5654 (libri rari)

A compilation of various Kabbalistic works, including a treatise on reincarnation according to the views of R. Shimon b. Yochai and Pythagoras (f. 36r.), writings of R. Joseph Gikatilla (f. 38r.), Shem Tov Gaon (f. 41r.) and R. Isaac Luria (ff. 44r., 46v.-47r.). Also contains one of the earliest printed versions of the hymn Bar-Yochai by the Tripolitan Kabbalist R. Simeon Labi (ff.44v.-45r). Steinschneider, followed by Jellinek and Weiner (no. 3099) ascribe the first essay, Sepher HaShem, to Moses de Leon since a poem with the acrostic "Moshe" appears on p. 34b. Gershom Scholem however, in one of his early articles (Kiryat Sepher, Vol. I [1924], pp. 45-52) asserts that it is a later work. The author, a member of the Castellazzo family, were of German origin who settled in Castellazzo Bormida, near Alessandria in Northern Italy