Moses ben Joseph di Trani ( he, משה מטראני) the Elder, known by his acronym Mabit (

Salonica Thessaloniki (; el, Θεσσαλονίκη, , also known as Thessalonica (), Saloniki, or Salonica (), is the second-largest city in Greece, with over one million inhabitants in its metropolitan area, and the capital of the geographic region of ...

, Rumelia Eyalet in Ottoman Greece 1500 –

Jerusalem Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...

Ottoman Empire The Ottoman Empire, * ; is an archaic version. The definite article forms and were synonymous * and el, Оθωμανική Αυτοκρατορία, Othōmanikē Avtokratoria, label=none * info page on book at Martin Luther University ...

1580) was a 16th-century rabbi in

Safed Safed (known in Hebrew as Tzfat; Sephardic Hebrew & Modern Hebrew: צְפַת ''Tsfat'', Ashkenazi Hebrew: ''Tzfas'', Biblical Hebrew: ''Ṣǝp̄aṯ''; ar, صفد, ''Ṣafad''), is a city in the Northern District of Israel. Located at an elev ...

. His father had fled to Salonica from

Apulia it, Pugliese , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = , demographics1_footnotes = , demographics1_title1 = , demographics1_info1 = , demographic ...

three years prior to his birth. While still a boy Moses was sent to

Adrianople Edirne (, ), formerly known as Adrianople or Hadrianopolis ( Greek: Άδριανούπολις), is a city in Turkey, in the northwestern part of the province of Edirne in Eastern Thrace. Situated from the Greek and from the Bulgarian border ...

to pursue the study of the

Talmud The Talmud (; he, , Talmūḏ) is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law ('' halakha'') and Jewish theology. Until the advent of modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the ce ...

under the supervision of his uncle Aaron. At the age of sixteen he went to

and completed his studies under Jacob Berab. In 1525 he was appointed

rabbi A rabbi () is a spiritual leader or religious teacher in Judaism. One becomes a rabbi by being ordained by another rabbi – known as '' semikha'' – following a course of study of Jewish history and texts such as the Talmud. The basic form o ...

of Safed; he held this office for some fifty-five years, when he eventually moved to

. According to a 16th-century Jewish traveler who visited Safed in 1567, Rabbi Moses di Trani was still living in Safed:

Works

Moses di Trani was the author of: * ''Bet Elohim'' (Venice, 1576), a moral and philosophical work on prayer, atonement, and the fundamental principles of faith * ''Kiryat Sefer'' (Venice, 1551), a commentary on the

Bible The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus ...

, the ''Talmud'', and difficult passages in the commentaries of

Maimonides Musa ibn Maimon (1138–1204), commonly known as Maimonides (); la, Moses Maimonides and also referred to by the acronym Rambam ( he, רמב״ם), was a Sephardic Jewish philosopher who became one of the most prolific and influential Torah ...

* ''Sefer ha-Tehiyyah weha-Pedut'' (Mantua, 1556; Wilna, 1799; Sudzilkov, 1834; Warsaw, 1841), a commentary and notes on ch. vii and viii of

Saadia Gaon Saʻadiah ben Yosef Gaon ( ar, سعيد بن يوسف الفيومي ''Saʻīd bin Yūsuf al-Fayyūmi''; he, סַעֲדְיָה בֶּן יוֹסֵף אַלְפַיּוּמִי גָּאוֹן ''Saʿăḏyāh ben Yōsēf al-Fayyūmī Gāʾōn''; ...

's ''Emunot we-Deot'' * ''She'elot u-Teshubot'' (vol. i, ib. 1629; vol. ii, ib. 1630), a collection of 841 ''

responsa ''Responsa'' (plural of Latin , 'answer') comprise a body of written decisions and rulings given by legal scholars in response to questions addressed to them. In the modern era, the term is used to describe decisions and rulings made by scholars ...

'', with an index

References

External links

Bet Elohim
(Venice, 1576) - free scanned version in DJVU format
She'elot uTeshuvot
(Lvov, 1861) - free scanned version in PDF format 1505 births 1585 deaths Rabbis from Thessaloniki 16th-century rabbis from the Ottoman Empire Rabbis in Ottoman Galilee Rabbis in Safed Burials at the Old Jewish Cemetery, Safed Authors of books on Jewish law {{Judaism-bio-stub