Loca Præcipua Fidei Christianae, collecta, et explicata.

WEIDNER, PAUL.

S. Hosch

Vienna

1562

Latin with smattering of Hebrew. Title within architectural arches. With coat-of-arms featuring the two-headed eagle representing the Dual Monarchy of Austro-Hungary and the imperial crown of the Holy Roman Empire. Initial letters historiated. Title, initial letter and coat-of-arms finely hand-colored.

Loca Præcipua Fidei Christianae is an attempt to persuade the Jews of the truth of Christianity. The work displays a mastery of Hebrew and Christian sources. The author, Paul Weidner (1525-85) was a learned Jewish convert to Christianity. Born in Udine, Italy, as Asher Judah b. Nathan Ashkenazi, he studied medicine at Padua and was invited by the estates of Carinthia to practice there, in a province where Jews were not permitted to reside. After a period of spiritual struggle he embraced Christianity in Vienna in 1558. Weidner enjoyed the substantial patronage of the Austrian emperors, whom he served as physician. After repeatedly postponing the expulsion of Bohemian Jewry, in 1560 Ferdinand I ordered all its Hebrew books to be brought to Vienna; they were checked by Weidner, who found no fault in them and had them returned.