Mordecai de Abraham de Soria. Oracion Panejirico Doctrinal Sobre la Mala Tentacion[oration about the Evil Inclination…recited by a disciple of the Author on the day that he entered Bar Mitzvah, the first day of Sukoth].

(IBERIAN / SEPHARDIC LITERATURE)

Juan Pablo Fantechi

Livorno

1751

FIRST EDITION. Spanish interspersed with Hebrew.

Kayserling p. 104.

A sophisticated (and lengthy!) Bar-Mitzvah speech, in which, among other topics, the symbolism of the Tabernacle festival`s Four Species is presented (pp. 126-144). In what appears an original interpretation, the author maintains that the ethrog represents the First Cause, the lulav the Angelic World, the hadas the Spheres, and finally, the aravah or willow branch the Terrestrial or Sublunar realm (p. 140). That the book is in Spanish rather than Italian is not at all surprising, for the majority Sephardim of Livorno were still Portuguese and Spanish speaking until the beginning of the 19th-century. Kayserling notes with consternation that Church officials found fault with this text and placed it on the Index of 1755.