Sefer ha-Kaneh, Attributed to Rabbi Nehunya ben ha-Kaneh, [Ottoman Empire, ca. 1600]

An important kabbalistic commentary on Genesis.

Many Kabbalists used Sefer ha-Ḳaneh to refer to both the Sefer ha-peliah and the Sefer ha-Ḳanah. The texts were apparently written by the same anonymous Kabbalist toward the end of the 14th or the beginning of the 15th century. Sefer ha-peliah is one of the most intriguing and influential Kabbalistic works. While attributed to various figures it was likely composed in Byzantium around the end of the fourteenth century by a still unidentified Kabbalist. It comprises a lengthy commentary to the opening chapters of Genesis that draws from a large number of earlier sources. The author often incorporates such sources in the form of large unattributed verbatim quotations, most notably the entirety of the book Gan na’ul by the Kabbalist Abraham Abulafia (1240-c. 1292). Another striking feature of this work is the appearance throughout of accounts of heavenly revelations experienced by the author and his family. 

This copy of the work, produced in the Ottoman Empire, belongs to a family of manuscripts that likely originated in a copy owned by Joseph Tirshom, the compiler of the large magical compendium Shoshan yesod ha-olam, and it preserves some of his notes and comments. It also contains an extended introduction that is not found in the standard printed editions of the work. 

Sotheby’s is grateful to Elly Moseson for cataloguing this manuscript.

Provenance

Previous owners include Solomon ben David Matuk and Mordechai ben Hakham Sasson. David Solomon Sasson purchased the manuscript from Hakham Isaac Nisim (1896-1981) on December 3, 1925, in Baghdad. (No. 757)

Physical Description

1160 pages with earlier Hebrew pagination. (8 x 5 ¾ in.; 203 x 146 mm) Missing leaves between pages 752 and 753 (Heb. 375v-376r), between pages 814 and 815 (Heb. 406v-409r) and between pages 818 and 819 (Heb. 410v-412r). The first of these indicate a loss prior to the Hebrew pagination and the other two afterwards. Copied in an Oriental cursive hand. 

Bibliography

Michal Oron, “Hakdamat sefer ha-peliah,” Kobez al yad 11:2 (1989), 273-295 [Hebrew].

Idem, “Ha-peliah ve-ha-kanah: yesodot ha-kabalah she-bahem emdatam ha-datit hevratit ve-derekh izuvam ha-sifrutit,” (Ph.D. Diss., The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, 1980) [Hebrew].

Gershom Scholem, Sabbatai Sevi: The Mystical Messiah, 1626–1676 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1973), 115-117.