(Rabbeinu Yonah). Sha’arei Teshuvah [“Gates of Repentance.”] FIRST EDITION.

GERONDI, JONAH

Gershom Soncino

Fano

1505

* Bound with: Hai ben Sherira Gaon (attributed). Musar Haskel BeMelitzah [“Moral Lessons in Rhyme.”] FIRST EDITION. With nikud (vowel points), printed in two columns. * And: Gerondi, Jonah ben Abraham. Sepher HaYir’ah [“The Book of Awe.”] Second edition. Together, three works (as issued). First, printed without a title page. On front flyleaf, signature of former owner, censors' signatures on verso of final page: “[Re]visto per mi Fra[te] Luigi” (cf. Wm. Popper, The Censorship of Hebrew Books, pl. IV, no. 1.) Telltale signs of censorship: On f. 22v. the words “minim” [heretics] and “mumarim” [renegades] have been erased; on f. 24v. the words “haminim vehameshumadim” [apostates] have been stricken. Extensive scholarly Hebrew marginalia in an early Italian hand. Artistic design on final page, signed Elchanan ben Tabaël.

Vinograd, Fano 9.

Rare First Edition of Sha’arei Teshuvah, a Classic Ethical Treatise by the great Rabbeinu Yonah (1200-63). This highly significant treatise on repentance is in fact the earliest work of ethical literature. It is divided into four portals: The first is devoted to a definition of repentance; the second to a description of the various ways by which a man should arouse himself to penitence; the third, a classification of the precepts and the punishments meted out for their transgression; and the fourth, a discussion of the conditions of forgiveness. The Musar Haskel, by R. Hai ben Sherira Gaon (939-1038), last of the great Ge’onim of Babylon, is a lengthy didactic poem of 189 double verses in the Arabic meter. See H. Brody, Piyutim VeShirei Tehillah MeRav Hai (1937); Meyer Waxman, History of Jewish Literature I (1938), p. 216; JE, Vol. VI, pp. 153-155; EJ, Vol. VII, cols. 1130-1132. Also see A.T. Shrock, Rabbi Jonah ben Abraham of Gerona: His Life and Ethical Works (1948).