Dialogos Entre Dos Hermanos, Obadia ben Israel, y Andres Antonio, sobre la Falcedad de los Evangelios y Verdad de la Ley de Mosseh...compuesto en Maruecos

(POLEMIC)

The Hague

1741

Large Handsome Manuscript in Spanish. Brown sepia ink on paper. Two parts (First Dialogue and Second Dialogue) in single volume. Wide margins. The Duke of Susex Copy. Elegantly bound in mottled calf with gilt extra

“Dialogue Between Two Brothers, Obadia ben Israel, and Andres Antonio, Concerning the Falsity of the Evangels and the Truth of the Law of Moses.” The storyline of this fictional dialogue is as follows: A Flemish Christian by the name of Andres Antonio learns that his brother Bernardo Antonio converted from Christianity to Judaism. Determined to find him, Andres departs Flanders for Morocco, where he discovers his brother living under the name "Obadia Ben Israel" and so the dialogue ensues. Several copies of this anonymous work are mentioned in the bibliographic literature - with some differences in title. Our manuscript is very similar to the copy in the Ets Haim collection in Amsterdam (ms. EH 48 A 171) described by Fuks no. 249. The copy that Kayserling records was written in Rotterdam in 1710. See Kayserling, p.41; L. Fuks and R.G. Fuks-Mansfeld, Hebrew and Judaic Manuscripts in Amsterdam Public Collections (1975), Vol. II, pp.131-32, nos. 249-50; De Rossi, Bibl. Antichr., p. 30, no. 41; M. Steinschneider, Catalog der Hebräischen Handschriften in der Stadtbibliothek, Hamburg (1898) nos. 349-50