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Bidding Information
Lot #    23635
Auction End Date    6/9/2009 11:20:30 AM (mm/dd/yyyy)
          
Title Information
Title (English)    Three works by R. Isaac Ergas
Title (Hebrew)    ויעתר יצחק, מנחת יוסף, פרי מגדים
Author    [Ms.] R. Isaac Ergas
City    Livorno (Leghorn) - Jerusalem
Publication Date    <1822
          
Collection Information
Independent Item    This listing is an independent item not part of any collection
          
Description Information
Physical
Description		    [87] pp., 175:135 mm., light age staining, ink on paper, neat Sephardic rabbinic script,signed.
          
Detailed
Description		    Collection of three works written by the shedar R. Isaac b. Raphael Moses Ergas (d. 1835). Firstly pp. 1v-13f is ויעתר יצחק novellae and notations on the Pentateuch. Following are מנחת יוסף on pp 13v-26v and פרי מגדים on pp. 27f-42v authored by his grandfather, R. Joseph b. Emanuel Ergas (1685–1730), rabbi, kabbalist, and author of books on halakhic and kabbalistic matters. R. Joseph, who was of Marrano descent, was born in Leghorn. The headdress of a knight engraved on his tomb in Leghorn perhaps indicates descent from a noble Spanish family. R. Samuel of Fez was his teacher of halakhah and R. Benjamin ha-Kohen Vitale of Reggio taught him Kabbalah. As a young man, he traveled throughout Italy and preached public sermons, urging repentance. For a while he stayed in Pisa where he founded a yeshiva, Neveh Shalom. Later, he was appointed rabbi in Leghorn, and remained there until his death. R. Ergas became famous for his pamphlet Tokhahat Megullah, the polemic against the Shabbatean Nehemiah Hayon, and an addition to it called Ha-Zad Nahash (London, 1715). His kabbalistic works include: Shomer Emunim (Amsterdam, 1736), in which he explains the principles of the Kabbalah in the form of a dialogue between Shaltiel, who believes only in the revealed Torah, and Jehoiada, the victor in this argument, who believes also in the esoteric aspect of the Torah; Shomer Emunim includes Mevo Petahim, an appendix to the former, a selection from R. Luria's doctrine, and an introduction to the Kabbalah, and Minhat Yosef, an ethical-religious anthology and the rules for the study of the kabbalistic doctrines. R. Ergas was an enthusiastic believer in the importance and sanctity of the Kabbalah in general and of the Zohar in particular, despite his view that marginal annotations had been introduced into the proper text of the Zohar. He opposed philosophy, which he considered alien to Judaism and an invention of heretics. He opposed Maimonides' explanations of the stories of the Creation and the visions of Ezekiel in the spirit of Aristotle's natural philosophy. R. Ergas' style is distinguished by its clarity.

The manuscript concludes with a three page personal note by R. Isaac regarding his debt and other affairs. The works were printed by him in Livorno in 1827 as he was concluding a shedar journey to North Africa which began in 1822.
          
Paragraph 2    שער הספר שנדפס: מנחת יוסף ...מספרי קדמאי ... לקוטי ... דינים ועניינים הערות ואהזרות[!] ... הכינם וגם חקרם ... הוליך ומוסיף ... לשבר מתלעות עול כת הפלוסופים המתחכמים נגד מע' התו' ... ונוסף ... קצת הקדמות ... [בעניני קבלה, מאת] ר' יוסף אירגאס זצ"ל ... הובא לבית הדפוס ע"י ... ר' יצחק אירגאס נר"ו ... דפוס יעקב טובייאנא, שנת ל'א' ה'מ'ד'ר'ש' ה'ו'א' העיקר לפ"ג )תקפ"ז)
          
Reference
Description		    EJ; Enc. Hakhmei Erez Israel v. 2, col. 169
        
Associated Images
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Listing Classification
Period
19th Century:    Checked
  
Location
Israel:    Checked
Italy:    Checked
  
Subject
  
Kabbalah:    Checked
Novellae:    Checked
  
Characteristic
First Editions:    Checked
Language:    Hebrew
  
Manuscript Type
  
Kind of Judaica