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The Study of the Hebrew Bible in Sixteenth-Century Italy1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 January 2019

Frank Rosenthal
Frank Rosenthal*
Affiliation:
Drake University
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Extract

When one thinks of the vast scholarship in the Christian world that has developed during the last four hundred years in the field of Semitic languages and culture, one may feel that it is highly proper to speak of a Hebrew Renaissance along with the Latin and Greek Renaissance. This term may not be taken to imply a very sudden awakening of interest and establishment of critical apparatus; it is nearer to the Latin revival than to the Greek, since Hebrew—though not so much on the surface as Latin—had been known to Christian scholars and studied by them, even if not in a formal grammatical sense, throughout the preceding centuries. Now however, men will work on the biblical and Hebrew materials with the objective freedom of intellectual inquiry and with an historical and philological exactitude hitherto unknown.

Type
Research Article
Information
Studies in the Renaissance , Volume 1 , 1954 , pp. 81 - 91
Copyright
Copyright © Renaissance Society of America 1954

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Footnotes

1

This paper was read, under the title “The Renaissance of the Bible—Beginnings of Semitic Studies in Italy,” at the South-Central Renaissance Conference at Fayetteville, Arkansas, May 8, 1954.

References

2 Cf., among other monographs: Smalley, Beryl, The Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages (Oxford, 1941)Google Scholar; Diestel, Ludwig, Die Geschichte des Alten Testamentes in der Christlichen Kitche (Jena, 1869)Google Scholar, and Bacher, Wilhelm, Die hebr. Sprachwissenschaft vom 10. bis zum 16. Jahrhundert (Trier, 1892).Google Scholar

3 Blau, Joseph Leon, The Christian Interpretation of the Cabala in the Renaissance (New York, 1944).CrossRefGoogle Scholar See also the recent article by Bouwsma, Wm. J., “Postel and the Significance of Renaissance Cabalism,” journal of the History of Ideas, XV (1954).Google Scholar

4 Of the many studies in this field, this writer wishes to call attention to Geiger, Ludwig. Das Studium der bebr. Sprache in Deutschland vom Ende des 15. bis zur Mitte des 16. Jahrhunderts (Breslau, 1870)Google Scholar; Hirschfeld, H., Literary History of Hebrew Grammarians and Lexicographers (Oxford, 1926)Google Scholar; Kluge, Otto, “Die hebr. Sprachwissenschaft in Deutschland im Zeitalter des Humanismus,” Zeitschrift für die Geschicte des Judentums in Deutschland, III (1931), 81–97, 180-93Google Scholar; IV (1932), 100-129; Rosenthal, Frank, “The Rise of Christian Hebraism in the Sixteenth Century,” Historia Judaica, VII (1945), 167-91Google Scholar; pertinent articles in the various encyclopedias, and the indispensable Steinschneider, Moritz, Bibliographisches Handbuch über die Theoretische Literatur für hebräische Sprachkunde, 2d ed. (Jerusalem, 1937).Google Scholar

5 See Roth, Cecil, History of Jews in Italy (Philadelphia, 1946).Google Scholar Among the outstanding Jews of Italy of this period we might mention Elia del Medigo (1463-1497), the teacher of Pico della Mirandola; Abraham de Balmes (d. 1523), physician, philosopher, and translator; Leo Hebraeus (d. 1535), author of the Dialoghi di Amore.

6 The story of Hebrew printing is told in Amram, D. W., The Makers of Hebrew Books in Italy (Philadelphia, 1909)Google Scholar; cf. also articles by Freimann, A., Marx, A. & Bloch, Josh. Of great value is Alexander Marx, Studies in Jewish History and Booklore (New York, 1944).Google Scholar

7 Amram, , op. cit., 146 ff.Google Scholar, and Perles, Joseph, Beiträge zur Ceschichte der hebräischen und aramäischen Studien (Munich, 1884), 209 ff.Google Scholar

8 Geiger, Ludwig, Jobann Reuchlin, sein Leben und seine Werke (Leipzig, 1871), 205 ff.Google Scholar, and Amram, , op. cit., 158 ff.Google Scholar

9 Marx, , op. cit., 307 ff.Google Scholar, and Steinschneider, Handbuch, no. 110.

10 Levi, J., Elia Levita und seine Leistungen als Grammatiker (Breslau, 1888)Google Scholar is a sound biography of the scholar. Additional data on his life and work are also found in Bacher, Geiger, Kluge (see nn. 2 and 4 above) as well as the pertinent articles in the Jewish Encyclopedia, etc.

11 On Fagius and Münster see Rosenthal, , Hist. Judaica, VII (1945), 181-91.Google Scholar

12 These introductory grammars were the MAHALACH of Moses Kimhi (ed. Princ, Pesaro, 1508) and the LESHON LIMMUDIM of David ben Salomon ibn Yachya (Constantinople, 1506). Levita published the first work with short notes in 1508 (Pesaro) and again in 1546 (Venice), and Münster edited the second treatise with a Latin translation in 1531 at Basel; see Steinschneider, nos. 1051 and 983 resp. David Kimhi's studies were printed as follows: the MIHLOL at Constantinople, 1530-32 and again by Levita with annotations at Venice, 1545; and the SEFER SHORASHIM (Liber Radicum) s.d.e.l., before 1480 in Italy and again by Levita at Venice, 1546; see Steinschneider, nos. 1049 and 1050.

13 A second edition of this work was prepared by Levita at Isny in 1542. I used the Berlin edition of 1767, from which the above excerpt was translated. For the complete bibliography of this treatise, see Steinschneider, no. 1159.

14 Amram, , op. cit., 238-40Google Scholar; Marx, , op. cit., 321-41Google Scholar; Pedes, , op. cit., 36 ff.Google Scholar, and Steinschneider, nos. 1160, 1165, 1167, 1166.

15 “Dieser Streit zeigt, ja bestimmt fortan wesentlich den Charakter der alttestamentlichen Forschung. Die Vertheidiger der Vokale üben eine Polemik, welche, den vergeblichen Kampf dogmatischer Postulate mit den klaren Thatsachen der Textgeschichte darstellend, zur Sophistik greifen muss. Sie kennzeichnet sich durch den Versuch, jedes einzelne Argument zu entkraftigen oder doch zu schwächen—meist auf Grund positiver Voraussetzungen, die in den verschiedenen Argumentationsreihen sich widersprechen,— ohne eine klare Gesammtanschauung des Sachverhalts oder doch mit Vorstellungen, welche duxchaus unnaturlich, oft widersinning sind, aber auch der schärfsten Logik nicht weichen wollen. Dadurch verliert die theologische Arbeit nach und nach den gemeinsamen Boden mit der ganzen Wissenschaft und gewöhnt sich an ein isoliertes Dasein, ihres hohen Berufes für das Gesammtgebiet des Erkennens vergessend. Die ganze Art der Vertheidigung gewann einen so festen Charakter, dass sie, umgeben mit dem Nimbus frommer Kirchlichkeit, bis auf den heutigen Tag sich fortgepflanzt hat. Immerhin aber ward durch den Streit die Textgeschichte wesentlich aufgehellt”; p. 338. The bibliographic data on these various masoretic writings are presented in Levi, , op. cit., 59–63.Google Scholar Hody, , De Bibliorum Textibus Originalibus, Versionibus Graecis & Latina Vulgata, IV (Oxford, 1705)Google Scholar and Chr. Ginsburg, D., The Massoreth Ha-Massoreth of Elias Levita (London, 1867)Google Scholar discuss this controversy in detail. A more recent study in the same field has been prepared by Robert Gordis, The Biblical Text in the Making—A Study of the KETHIB-QERE (Philadelphia, 1937).

16 These and additional posthumous tributes to Levita are listed in Levi, , op. cit., 24 ff.Google Scholar

17 Psalterim Hebreum, Grecum, Arabicum, et Chaldeum cum Tribus Latinis Interpretationibus et Glossis … Aug. Iuistiniani Genuensis Praedicatorii Ordinis Episcopi Nebiensis in Octaplum Psalterii ad Leonem. X. Pontif. Maximum Praefatio… . Genuae Calendis Augustii M.D.XVI. (All this material is then repeated in the other languages.) The writer used a copy of the Psalterium in the possession of Mr. Charles J. Rosenbloom of Pittsburgh.

18 Perles, , Die in einer Münchener Handschrift aujgefundene erste lutein. Übersetzung des Maimonidischen “Führers” (Breslau, 1875, 76 pp.)Google Scholar, as reprinted from Monatsschrift der Gesellschaft für die Wissenschaft des Judentums, XXIV (1875).

19 On Guidacerius see H. Galliner, “Agathius Guidacerius, 1477?-1540, an Early Hebrew Grammarian in Rome and Paris,” Historia Judaica, II (1940), 85-101; and on Pagninus, Wetrer und Welte's Kirchenlexikon (1895), IX, 1270, and La Grande Encyclopédie, XXV, 794, as well as Wind, E., “Sante Pagnini and Michelangelo,” Gazette des Beaux-Arts, Series 6, XXVII (1945), 211-46.Google Scholar

20 “Tischgespräche,” Sämmtliche Werke, ed. Itmischer (Erlangen, 1830+), LXII, 314, 112. In the preface to his Latin Bible with annotations by Vatable (Paris, 1545), Robert Estienne states: “Nam Sancti Pagnini versionem, sicut omnium doctissimam confitentur, qui iudicio sunt in hoc genere excellentiori, sic paulo obscuriorem esse queruntur, quod verbum verbo reddere studuerit.”

21 Much of Renaissance intellectual history is characterized by a quiescence of institutional scholarship but great richness of personal scholarship. The considerable personal migratory history of Christian Hebraists back and forth across Europe may serve as a case in point—omitting the most famous humanist of all, Erasmus, who was not a Semitic scholar:

  1. 1.

    1. before 1500: Peter Nigri (Schwartz)—Bohemia, Germany, Spain, Germany, Hungary

    Guil. Raimundus—Spain, Italy, Germany, Italy

    Joh. Reuchlin—So. Germany, France, Austria, Italy, Germany

  2. 2.

    2. 1500-1540: (in addition to the travels of the various Italians mentioned in the text)

    Joh. van Campen—Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Poland

    Guillaume Postel—(traveled constantly all over Europe)

  3. 3.

    3. after 1540: Paulus Fagius—Germany, Switzerland, England

    Albrecht Widmanstadt—Germany, Italy, Austria

    Andreas Masius—Germany, Italy, Low Countries, Austria

    Peter Tremellius—Italy, Switzerland, Germany, France, England.