RaMBa”M). Sepher HaMitzvoth [“The Book of Precepts”]. Translated from Judeo-Arabic by Moses ibn Tibbon.

MOSES BEN MAIMON (MAIMONIDES/.

n.p.

Constantinople

c. 1510

FIRST EDITION. Printed without a title page. Initial letter within woodcut border

Vinograd, Const. 63; Yaari, Const. 80; Mehlman 763; not in Adams

Rare First Edition of a Fundamental Rabbinic Text. Maimonides composed the Sepher HaMitzvoth prior to his epic rabbinic code, Mishneh Torah. The author took at face value an Aggadic statement at the end of Talmudic Tractate Makoth to the effect that the Torah received by Moses on Mount Sinai consisted of 613 commandments. In the introduction here, Maimonides lays down the “shorashim,” or criteria, as to how he determined which laws were to be enumerated in this register of 613 precepts. For rather than merely listing the commandments one by one, Maimonides provides halachic reasoning and sources in the Talmud and halachic Midrashim. These sources are invaluable, especially in light of the fact that in Maimonides later Code, the Mishneh Torah, these sources were laid aside.