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Yehuda Alharizi, also Judah ben Solomon Harizi or al-Harizi (, ), was a rabbi, translator,
poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator (thought, thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral t ...
, and traveler active in
al-Andalus Al-Andalus () was the Muslim-ruled area of the Iberian Peninsula. The name refers to the different Muslim states that controlled these territories at various times between 711 and 1492. At its greatest geographical extent, it occupied most o ...
(mid-12th century
Toledo, Spain Toledo ( ; ) is a city and Municipalities of Spain, municipality of Spain, the capital of the province of Toledo and the ''de jure'' seat of the government and parliament of the autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Castilla ...
? – 1225 in
Aleppo Aleppo is a city in Syria, which serves as the capital of the Aleppo Governorate, the most populous Governorates of Syria, governorate of Syria. With an estimated population of 2,098,000 residents it is Syria's largest city by urban area, and ...
, Ayyubid Syria). He was supported by wealthy patrons, to whom he wrote poems and dedicated compositions.


Life

Yehuda al-Harizi was born in Toledo in the mid-12th century to a family originally from
Jerez Jerez de la Frontera () or simply Jerez, also cited in old English-language sources as , is a city and municipality in the province of Cádiz in the autonomous community of Andalusia, Spain. Located in southwestern Iberia, it lies on the Campi ...
and was educated in Castile. An Arabic biographer and a contemporary, Ibn al-Sha’ar al-Mawsili (1197–1256), provided the only known physical description of al-Harizi: "a tall silver-haired man with a smooth face". As was the practice for educated men of the period, he traveled extensively throughout the region, visiting Jewish communities and various centres of learning across the Mediterranean and the East. He was disappointed by the poor quality of Hebrew learning across the region. He translated many Arabic works into Hebrew, including Maimonides' ''
The Guide for the Perplexed ''The Guide for the Perplexed'' (; ; ) is a work of Jewish theology by Maimonides. It seeks to reconcile Aristotelianism with Rabbinical Jewish theology by finding rational explanations for many events in the text. It was written in Judeo-Arabic ...
'' and al-Hariri's ''Maqamat''. In addition to the many translations, he also produced original works in Hebrew and in Arabic. He wrote a book of his travels, '. He also composed an original
maqama The ''maqāma'' (Arabic: مقامة aˈqaːma literally "assembly"; plural ''maqāmāt'', مقامات aqaːˈmaːt is an (originally) Arabic prosimetric literary genre of picaresque short stories originating in the tenth century C.E.Qian, ...
in Hebrew, with the title of ''Sefer Tahkemoni''. His ''Maqama'' imitated the structure of
Badi' al-Zaman al-Hamadani Badi' al-Zamān al-Hamadānī or al-Hamadhānī (; ; 969 in Hamadan، Iran – 1007) was a medieval poet and man of letters. He is best known for his work the ''Maqamat Badi' az-Zaman al-Hamadhani'', a collection of 52 episodic stories of a rogu ...
and al-Hariri, but his work also reflects his Jewish identity in a society that was in transition, shifting from al-Andalus to Christian Iberia. He is generally regarded as one of the great classical Jewish authors. He died in Aleppo, Syria in 1225.


Work

Alharizi was a rationalist, conveying the works of
Maimonides Moses ben Maimon (1138–1204), commonly known as Maimonides (, ) and also referred to by the Hebrew acronym Rambam (), was a Sephardic rabbi and Jewish philosophy, philosopher who became one of the most prolific and influential Torah schola ...
and his approach to rationalistic Judaism. He translated Maimonides' ''
The Guide for the Perplexed ''The Guide for the Perplexed'' (; ; ) is a work of Jewish theology by Maimonides. It seeks to reconcile Aristotelianism with Rabbinical Jewish theology by finding rational explanations for many events in the text. It was written in Judeo-Arabic ...
'' and some of his ''Commentary on the Mishnah'', as well as the ''Mahbarot Iti'el'' of the Arab poet al-Hariri, from the
Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...
to
Hebrew Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and ...
. Alharizi's poetic translation of the ''Guide for the Perplexed'' is considered by many to be more readable than that of
Samuel ibn Tibbon Samuel ben Judah ibn Tibbon ( – ), more commonly known as Samuel ibn Tibbon (, ), was a Jewish philosopher and doctor who lived and worked in Provence, later part of France. He was born about 1150 in Lunel, Hérault, Lunel (Languedoc), and die ...
. However, it has not been very widely used in Jewish scholarship, perhaps because it is less precise. It had some influence in the Christian world due to its translation into Latin. Alharizi's own works include the ''Tahkemoni'', composed between 1218 and 1220, in the Arabic form known as
maqama The ''maqāma'' (Arabic: مقامة aˈqaːma literally "assembly"; plural ''maqāmāt'', مقامات aqaːˈmaːt is an (originally) Arabic prosimetric literary genre of picaresque short stories originating in the tenth century C.E.Qian, ...
. This is written in Hebrew in unmetrical rhymes, in what is commonly termed
rhymed prose Rhymed prose is a literary form and literary genre, written in Meter (poetry), unmetrical rhymes. This form has been known in many different cultures. In some cases the rhymed prose is a distinctive, well-defined style of writing. In modern literar ...
. It is a series of humorous episodes, witty verses, and quaint applications of Scriptural texts. The episodes are bound together by the presence of the hero and of the narrator, who is also the author. Another collection of his poetry was devoted to preaching ethical self-discipline and fear of heaven. Alharizi undertook long journeys in the lands of the Middle East. His works are suffused with his impressions from these journeys. He not only brought to perfection the art of applying Hebrew to secular satire, but he was also a brilliant literary critic and his maqama on the
Andalusia Andalusia ( , ; , ) is the southernmost autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community in Peninsular Spain, located in the south of the Iberian Peninsula, in southwestern Europe. It is the most populous and the second-largest autonomou ...
n Hebrew poets is a fruitful source of information.


Editions and translations

*
Iudae Harizii macamae
', ed. by Paulus Lagarde (Göttingen: Hoyer, 1883). * Al-Harizi, (''Tahkemoni''), ed. Toporowski (Tel Aviv: Maḥbarot le-sifrut, 1952) * Al-Harizi, ''The Tahkemoni of Judah al-Harizi'', trans. by Victor Emanuel Reichert, 2 vols (Jerusalem: Cohen, 1965-1973) * Judah Alharizi, ''The Book of Tahkemoni: Jewish Tales from Medieval Spain'', trans. by David Simha Segal (B'nai B'rith Book Service, 1996) (repr. Littman Library of Jewish Civilization (Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2003), https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv4rfr1p, )
High-quality scans of an 1899 edition of the ''Tahkemoni'' in Hebrew
from daat.co.il
Another scanned edition of Tahkemoni in Hebrew, Istanbul 1578
from hebrewbooks.org *
Saul Isaac Kaempf Saul Isaac Kaempf (born at Lissa, Posen, May 6, 1818; died at Prague October 16, 1892) was an Austrian-Bohemian rabbi and Orientalist. Life He received his first lessons from his father, Aaron Jacob Kaempf, a Talmudic scholar, and then entere ...
,
Nichtandalusische Poesie andalusischer Dichter aus dem elften, zwölften und dreizehnten Jahrhundert: Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Poesie des Mittelalters
', vol. 1 (Prague: Bellmann, 1858) (here a considerable section of the ''Tahkemoni'' is translated into German). *
Moses Gaster Moses Gaster (17 September 1856 – 5 March 1939) was a Romanian, later British scholar, the ''Hakham'' of the Spanish and Portuguese Jewish congregation, London, and a Hebrew and Romanian linguist. Moses Gaster was an active Zionist in Rom ...
Hebrew MS 95,
John Rylands Library The John Rylands Research Institute and Library is a Victorian era, late-Victorian Gothic Revival architecture, neo-Gothic building on Deansgate in Manchester, England. It is part of the University of Manchester. The library, which opened to t ...
, 14th-15th century Hebrew and Judeo-Arabic manuscript scanned folios,


Literature on Alharizi's influence in the Christian world

* * * * * *


Notes


References

* Much of this article was translated from יהודה אלחריזי (Yehuda Alharizi) in the Hebrew-language Wikipedia. Retrieved March 14, 2005. Both articles are licensed under the
GNU Free Documentation License The GNU Free Documentation License (GNU FDL or GFDL) is a copyleft license for free documentation, designed by the Free Software Foundation (FSF) for the GNU Project. It is similar to the GNU General Public License, giving readers the rights ...
, which allows translation with acknowledgement. * See, on the ''Tahkemoni'', Saul Isaak Kaempf: ''Die ersten Makamen aus dem Tachkemoni des Charisi'', Berlin 1845


External links


Al-Ḥarizi, Judah B. Solomon B. Hophni
in the Jewish Encyclopedia of 1901-1906


Further reading

*J.N. Mattock, "The Early History of the Maqama," "Journal of Arabic Literature", Vol. 25, 1989, pp 1–18 {{DEFAULTSORT:Alharizi, Yehuda 13th-century Castilian rabbis Harizi Harizi Harizi Harizi Harizi Spanish male poets Maqama Medieval Jewish travel writers 12th-century travel writers 13th-century rabbis in al-Andalus