SEFER ZOHAR HA-RAKIA (COMMENTARY ON RABBI SOLOMON IBN GABIROL’S POETIC NUMERATION OF THE COMMANDMENTS), RABBI SIMEON BEN ZEMAH DURAN, CONSTANTINOPLE: JOSEPH BEN AYYAD KABESI, 1515

The first edition of an important halakhic tract, from the collection of Salman Schocken.

Rabbi Solomon Ibn Gabirol (ca. 1021-ca. 1057), a prominent Spanish philosopher, began writing poetry at an early age, producing his Azharot, a versified listing of the 613 commandments, when he was only 16 years old. The poem achieved great popularity among Sephardic, Romaniote, and Italian communities and was frequently incorporated into their prayer books to be recited on or prior to the festival of Shavuot (first edition: Soncino-Casalmaggiore, 1485-1486). Given its importance in Jewish ritual life, the work became an object of study and analysis. Two commentaries on Ibn Gabirol’s Azharot appeared in Constantinople in 1515: one by Rabbi Joseph ha-Lo‘ez and a second by Rabbi Simeon ben Zemah Duran (1361-1444). The latter, a Spanish physician who left Majorca following the anti-Jewish riots of 1391 and subsequently became a rabbinic judge and leader of the Jewish community of Algiers, wrote his own liturgical poetry but also commented on others’. The present lot, the only book published by Joseph ben Ayyad Kabesi at the press of Samuel ben David Ibn Nahmias, comprises Duran’s exposition of the Azharot. The work would not be reprinted until 1858, when it appeared in Lemberg (Lvov) with Rabbi Joseph Saul Nathanson’s (1810-1875) approbation and selected glosses.