Sepher Nitzachon-Liber Nizachon

MUELHAUSEN, YOM-TOV LIPMANN.

Wolfgang Endter

Altdorf

1644

FIRST EDITION . Edited by Theodor Hackspan. Engraved Hebrew title with additional Latin letter-press title. Hebrew text followed by Hackspan’s Latin notes. Includes Teshuvoth Rada’k LaNotzrim [Responses of R. David Kimchi to the Christians] (pp. 196-200). Wide margins.

Vinograd, Altdorf 1.

An important polemic. A defense of Rabbinic Judaism and an attack upon Christianity and Karaism. The intent of Muelhausen’s Sepher Nitzachon was to serve as an instruction to the ordinary Jew as to how to respond if confronted by Christians seeking to prove the veracity of their religion over Judaism. Following the Biblical order, Muelhausen here refutes the Christian interpretations of the Bible and the doctrines derived from them, and in so doing, provides many exegetic insights. His method is to expose the Christian lack of understanding of Hebrew sources with their linguistic and contextual associations. For and in-depth treatment of Muelhausen, see Judah (Even Shmuel) Kaufman, R. Yom Tov Lipmann Muelhausen (1927); J. Rosenthal, Anti-Christian Polemics from Its Beginnings to the End of the 18th Century, Aresheth II, pp.142-146; Carmilly-Weinberger, pp.186-87; EJ XI, cols. 499-502.