Jewish books in Christian hands: theology, exegesis and conversion under Gregory XIII (1572-1585) 9788821009471

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JEWISH  BOOKS  IN  CHRISTIAN  HANDS Theology, Exegesis and Conversion under Gregory XIII (1572-1585)

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STUDI E TESTI 498

Piet van Boxel

JEWISH BOOKS IN CHRISTIAN HANDS Theology, Exegesis and Conversion under Gregory XIII (1572-1585)

CITTÀ DEL VATICANO

B iblioteca A postolica Vaticana 2016

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Pubblicazione curata dalla Commissione per l’editoria della Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana: Marco Buonocore (Segretario) Eleonora Giampiccolo Timothy Janz Antonio Manfredi Claudia Montuschi Cesare Pasini Ambrogio M. Piazzoni (Presidente) Delio V. Proverbio Adalbert Roth Paolo Vian

Descrizione bibliografica in www.vaticanlibrary.va

Proprietà letteraria riservata © Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 2016 ISBN 978-88-210-0947-1

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TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 Chapter 1: Church Policy towards the Jews . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Chapter 2: The Preachers’ Manuals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 Chapter 3: The composers of the Collections . . . . . . . . . . .

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Chapter 4: Procedure of the Compilations . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Chapter 5: The Exegetical Criteria . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87 Chapter 6: Scope of the Undertaking . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131 Chapter 7: A Jewish Encyclopaedia and Dictionary for Christians . . . 151 Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 169 Appendices I Vat. lat. 14628 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . II Vat. lat. 14630 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . III Vat. lat. 14629 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . IV Borg. lat. 149 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . V . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . VI Vat. lat. 14628, 250r . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . VII . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

173 182 185 190 192 202 203

Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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Index of Sources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221 General Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 225

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

In the long process that has led to the completion of this book I have received support from many people and institutions. I am indebted to the staff of the Bibliotheca Apostolica Vaticana, who helped me to navigate its incomparable resources and, in particular, provided me with the means of spending countless hours reading and re-reading the manuscripts that are the subject of this book. In my own Bodleian Library the staff were always helpful and supportive. During my years as Fellow Librarian at the Oxford Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies, I was fortunate to receive constant assistance from the Library staff, César Merchan-Hamann and Milena Zeidler. The unparalleled collections of the British Library were indispensable for my work. My research greatly benefited from the three semesters that I spent at the Herbert D. Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Pennsylvania, where the Center’s Director David Ruderman stimulated debate and fruitful intellectual exchange. Although we do beg to differ, Amnon Raz-Krakotzkin has animated my own study of censorship. The countless discussions with my colleague Arthur Kiron, the Curator of Judaica Collections at the University of Pennsylvania Library, have been a continuous source of inspiration and intellectual stimulus. A special debt of thanks goes to Theodor Dunkelgrün who shared my enthusiasm for the subject and was always on the lookout for relevant sources that would aid my research. Michela Andreatta generously shared with me her important findings in the Biblioteca Universitaria di Bologna. I am indebted to Laura Macy for her exemplary copyediting of the manuscript. Over the years my wife Joanna Weinberg has been my precious supporter and invaluable guide through the intricate world of Hebraic scholarship.

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PREFACE

This is a book about Hebrew books, their owners and readers. Seven manuscripts from the Vatican Library, dating from 1578 to 1583, provide the basic evidence for this study. Unravelling the complex interrelation between these manuscripts, I attempt here to explore the multifarious ways that Hebrew books were read, analysed and judged by members of the highest echelons of the Roman Church. Throughout the sixteenth century a wealth of Jewish literature had been made accessible to all readers. Christian printers with Jewish collaborators produced a wide range of Hebrew books for a Jewish as well as Christian clientele. One of the most prolific printers, the Flemish entrepreneur from Antwerp, Daniel Bomberg, set up a printing press in Venice in 1515. Bomberg printed nearly 200 Hebrew books over the course of 30 years. His first major publication (1516-17) was the so-called rabbinic Bible (Mikraot Gedolot): the Hebrew Bible with the Targum (Aramaic paraphrases), accompanied by a selection of medieval commentaries. In subsequent years it was republished with both some additions and some significant omissions. For Christians, in particular, the various rabbinic Bible editions represented a virtually complete summa of Jewish exegesis. In 1520-23 Bomberg also published the Babylonian Talmud. The Church’s appreciation of Jewish books was not unequivocal, shifting from high appreciation to condemnation, from printing to burning. As ever, the centrepiece of Jewish tradition, the Talmud, became a target for negative assessments of Jewish writings. But other works, such as the medieval biblical commentaries, also ran the risk of suffering the same fate. After the burning of the Talmud in September 1553 and the introduction of censorship of Hebrew books eight months later, Hebrew books continued to be read, but were also scanned with ever more intensity for their supposed heretical content. Under Gregory XIII the scrutiny of Jewish literature went hand in hand with a renewed effort to show the Jews the errors of their ways and persuade them to convert. Representatives of the Jewish community were made to attend obligatory sermons. The success of these sermons is difficult to gauge. We do not know the exact numbers of Jews who turned to the Casa dei Catecumeni during Gregory’s reign in order to receive instruction leading to baptism. The unease with

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Preface

this Catholic endeavour, on the part of the Jews, seems to be reflected in a letter to Cardinal Guglielmo Sirleto by the renowned Roman legal expert Lazarus de Viterbo. In his letter Lazarus defended his coreligionists against the old accusations of having falsified those portions of Holy Scripture which seemed to contain proofs of the truth of Christianity. It seems that such charges were proclaimed even from the pulpit1. Lazarus’ letter is a rare testimony. Extant documents rarely inform us how Jews experienced and reacted to Christian evaluations of their own tradition. From the Christian side, however, we have rich documentation, as will be argued in this study, about the way Jewish texts were read and then used both in sermons and in other contexts. The manuscripts discussed in this study preserve a unique testimony to the way Christian theologians set about their task of reading Hebrew books.

1   David Kaufmann, ‘Lazarus de Viterbo’s Epistle to Cardinal Sirleto Concerning the Integrity of the Text of the Hebrew Bible’, in Jewish Quarterly Review 7 (1895), 278–96 at 281–2.

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CHAPTER 1

CHURCH POLICY TOWARDS THE JEWS

In his travel diary of a journey through Italy in 1581, the French philosopher Michel de Montaigne provided the reader with a vivid description of his stay in Rome. For Montaigne the most memorable Roman experience was probably his encounter with the Dominican Sisto Fabri (15401594). As the Master of the Sacred Palace from 1580 to 1583, Fabri was the personal theologian to the Pope and advisor to the Congregations of the Inquisition and the Index. According to the entry written by Montaigne’s secretary, who accompanied him on his journey, “his cases had been inspected by the customs men as he entered the city, and every last piece of his baggage had been searched, whereas in most other Italian towns these officers had been satisfied simply to have the cases put before them; furthermore, all the books that had been found in his cases had been taken from him to be examined”1. Montaigne’s meeting with Sisto Fabri concerned one of these books, his Essais. He recalled “that the Maestro del Sacro Palazzo had only been able to judge the book in the light of some French monk’s report, since he had no knowledge of our language; and he was so well satisfied with the explanations I gave on each of the points which this Frenchman had raised, that he left it to me to revise anything which in conscience I felt to be in poor taste”2. Montaigne’s description of the way the Master of the Sacred Palace, as advisor to the Congregation of the Index, handled his disputed Essais is more than an unusual anecdote jotted down by a relieved author, who in dialogue with the Roman officials was prepared to revise the first edition of this work. Though probably not reliable in every detail, his account seems to challenge the prevailing perception of Church censorship in sixteenth-century Italy as a purely oppressive and imposed mechanism.   Malcolm Smith, Montaigne and the Roman Censors (Geneva, 1981), 15.   Smith, Montaigne cit., 16. See also Peter Godman, The Saint as Censor: Robert Bellarmine between Inquisition and Index (Leiden, 2000), 45-8. For the objections of the Roman censors and the revised edition of the Essais see Mihaela Carla Caponegro, Roman Censorship and the Shaping of Montaigne’s Essays (PhD diss., Princeton University, 2013). 1 2

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Chapter 1 – Church Policy towards the Jews

When Montaigne describes his farewell to Sisto Fabri and his collaborators, in April of that year, he reveals an interesting insight into internal ecclesiastical censorship: “It seemed to me that I left them highly pleased with me; and to excuse themselves for having so meticulously examined my book and condemned it in some respects, they cited to me several contemporary books by cardinals and religious of very high repute which had been censured for a few such imperfections, which in no way affected the reputation of the author or the work as a whole”3. One theologian of the highest repute, whose work was to be the subject of ecclesiastical examination some years later, was the Jesuit Robert Bellarmine (1542-1621), professor of controversial theology at the Collegio Romano from 1576 until 1589, who was made a cardinal in 1599. Bellarmine’s view that Papal authority was strictly spiritual and that the Pope had no direct jurisdiction over secular state affairs had aroused the anger of Pope Sixtus V (15851590), who had every intention of putting the first volume of Bellarmine’s Disputationes on a revised Index he himself had prepared4. When it was examined by his colleague, the Jesuit Stephanus Arator, the censurae and Bellarmine’s responses took the shape of a proper theological discussion, in which Bellarmine countered the censor’s objections in no uncertain terms5. In defence of his confrere, the Superior General of the Jesuits, Claudio Aquaviva, managed to persuade several influential cardinals to espouse Bellarmine’s cause. In a letter of 23 February 1590, six months before the Pope died, Aquaviva advised Bellarmine, who at the time was on a diplomatic mission in France with Cardinal Enrico Caetani, to ensure that the vocabulary used in the next edition would not cause any irritation6. In similar terms, he advised him two months later not to call   Smith, Montaigne cit., 20.   Robert Bellarmine, Disputationes de controversiis christianae fidei adversus huius temporis haereticos, 3 vols (Ingolstadt, 1586-93), 1:5: ‘De Potestate Pontificis temporali’. The reason for putting the Disputationes on the Index in 1590 was mainly political, in that the secular powers of the Pope were questioned. See Franz H. Reusch, Der Index der verbotenen Bücher: Ein Beitrag zur Kirchen- und Literaturgeschichte, 2 vols (Bonn, 1883-85), 2:503. See Godman, The Saint as Censor cit., 134-9; Fausto Parente, ‘The Index, the Holy Office, the Condemnation of the Talmud and Publication of Clement VIII’s Index’, in Church, Censorship and Culture in Early Modern Italy, ed. Gigliola Fragnito (Cambridge, 2001), 163-93 at 181. 5   See Stephanus Arator, ‘Censura P. Stephani Aratoris in primum tomum Controversiarum, et responsio Bellarmini’, in Auctarium Bellarminianum: supplément aux oeuvres du Cardinal Bellarmin, ed. Xavier-Marie Le Bachelet (Paris, 1913), 403-23: “saepe confundit censor unum cum alio” (407), “nulla est in verbis meis contradictio” (408), “falso imponitur mihi” (410), “non intellexit censor” (414). 6   “Sicche V. R. non se piglia fastidio alcuno, che al piu che si possa venire, potra essere che desiderino nella seguente editione si muttino alcune parolette, come dire, dove dice V.R. che sono errori, o sentenze d’alcuni, etc., et cosi moderarle”, Xavier-Marie Le Bachelet, Bellarmin avant son cardinalat 1542–1598: correspondance et documents (Paris, 1911), 262. See also Stefania Tutino, Empire of Souls: Robert Bellarmine and the Christian Commonwealth (Oxford, 2010), 68, n. 70. 3 4

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Chapter 1 – Church Policy towards the Jews

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disputable opinions ‘errors’7. Like Montaigne, Bellarmine declared himself willing to amend some controversial passages, which, in a letter to his confrere Antonio Possevino of 13 July 1598 – a year before he received the cardinal’s hat – he admitted were of minor importance and innocuous for the reader8. The account of Montaigne’s amiable encounter with the Master of the Sacred Palace, and more persuasively Claudio Aquaviva’s intervention on behalf of the figurehead of Counter Reformation theology, combined with Bellarmine’s willingness to amend ‘the errors’ in his Opus Magnum seem to suggest that censorship of works written by members of the Roman Church was carried out in interaction and discussion – not always without animosity – between censors and authors with the express desire of keeping them within the fold and solving political conflicts within the Church9. Only when it came to the books of those who had placed themselves outside the Church – the heretics – did censorship become rigid and of a different nature, as the various editions of the Index of forbidden books, which served as a fence around the catholic doctrine, demonstrate. The rapid spread of the Reformation initiated by Martin Luther was counteracted by the Church with decisive action. On 15 June 1520, Pope Leo X ordered the burning of Luther’s writings, and on 3 January, 1521 he issued the bull Decet Romanum Pontificem, which excommunicated Luther from the Catholic Church. When the first Roman Index of forbidden books was composed in 1559, it counted more than 1,000 condemnations of authors and their works. All their works were forbidden, including those that did not challenge or contradict the Catholic faith and even those that did not refer to religion at all10. That it sometimes was difficult to distinguish be  See Le Bachelet, Bellarmin avant son cardinalat cit., 265.   Le Bachelet, Bellarmin avant son cardinalat cit., 411. See further Tutino, Empire of Souls cit., 66–71. Bellarmine’s position vis-à-vis the papal ‘potestas temporalis’ remained a bone of contention. See Vitus Erbermannus, Variorum operum Roberti Bellarmini […] ad fidei controversias spectantium collectio, in qua exhibentur Recognitio ejusdem Bellarmini omnium librorum suorum, Tractatus de potestate Summi Pontificis […] Responsio ad librum, cui titulus est, Triplici nodo triplex cuneus, cum Apologia pro eadem Responsione, & Epitome vitæ ejusdem auctoris. Adjiciuntur etiam Vindiciæ Bellarminianæ R.P. Opus ad quatuor Controversiarum tomos sequens velut tomus quintus (Venice, 1721), 303-8; Jacopo Fuligatti, Vita del Cardinale Roberto Bellarmino della Compagnia di Giesù (Milan, 1624), 93-101. 9   Godman, The Saint as Censor cit., 138. Bellarmine’s own experience may explain his plea not to include Catholics in the revised Index of Sixtus V, but to impose upon them a private, that is internal expurgation, such as had happened in the case of the works of Cajetan. See Claus Arnold, Die römische Zensur der Werke Cajetans und Contarinis (1558-1601): Grenzen der theologischen Konfessionalisierung (Paderborn, 2008), 162-3. For the careful way Arias Montano, considering himself as an absolutely faithful Catholic, prepared the edition of the Antwerp Polyglot in close contact with the censors, see Anthony Grafton, The Culture of Correction in Renaissance Europe (London, 2011), 175-8. 10   See Jesus Martinez de Bujanda, Index de Rome 1557, 1559, 1564: les premiers index 7 8

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Chapter 1 – Church Policy towards the Jews

tween errors and heresy becomes clear in the discussions of the works of Erasmus within the Congregation of the Index on 28 April 1587, shortly after Bellarmine had joined the Congregation as consultor. He opposed a great number of members of the Congregation by arguing that, despite the many errors in his works, Erasmus was not a heretic, since he had not intended to challenge ecclesiastical authority. Being a loyal son of the Church, Erasmus should not have his works put on the Index, but should have them submitted to expurgation11. A third category of works that needed the attention of the Church were those written by unbelievers, first and foremost the Jews. Their books were hardly ever put on the Index of forbidden books, the Talmud being the exception, in the first Index promulgated in 1559 by Pope Paul IV, who earlier, as Head of the Inquisition, had given orders to burn this centrepiece of Jewish tradition12. The main concern of the Church authorities was eradicating blasphemies, insults against Christians and Jewish messianic expectations through censorship prior to publication or expurgation of printed books. From the erasures in a great number of Hebrew books, it appears that expurgation was usually a virtually mechanical activity, often executed by Jewish converts, who certainly had some knowledge of Hebrew, but were not in any way key figures in the upper echelons of the Church. After Pope Julius III formally initiated ecclesiastical censorship and expurgation of Hebrew books, in his bull Cum sicut nuper (29 May 1554), various private attempts were made to compose an Index expurgatorius, to facilitate expurgation13. The template of such Indices was the listing of the inadmissible words with reference to the line or passage in which they occurred, without any suggestions of replacement of vocabulary or reconstruction of the sentence, which illustrates not only the romains et l’index du concile de Trente, Index des livres interdit, vol. 8 (Sherbrooke, 1990), 12, 38; Jesús Martínez de Bujanda, ‘Sguardo panoramico sugli Indici dei libri proibiti del XVI secolo’, in La censura libraria nell’Europa del secolo XVI: Convegno internazionale di studi, Cividale del Friuli 9-10 novembre 1995, ed. Ugo Rozzo (Udine, 1997), 1-14. In the preparation of the Sixtine Index it was suggested that books by heretics that did not deal with religious matters could be expurgated. See Parente, ‘The Index’ cit., 176. 11   See Vittorio Frajese, Nascita dell’ Indice: la censura ecclesiastica dal Rinascimento alla Controriforma (Brescia, 2006), 112-15; Godman, The Saint as Censor cit., 108-14, 237. For the vicissitudes of Erasmus’ works prior to the discussions within the Congregation of the Index on 28 April 1587 see Silvana Seidel Menchi, ‘Sette modi di censurare Erasmo’, in La censura libraria nell’Europa del secolo XVI, 177-206. 12   For the fate of the Talmud – its inclusion in the Index promulgated by Paul IV (Thalmud Iudaeorum cum glossis, annotationibus et expositionibus), its possible expurgation offered by Pius IV being revoked by Pius V but reinstated by Sixtus V, and its final condemnation by Clement VIII, see Parente, ‘The Index’ cit., 163-93. 13   See Chapter 6, 131-3.

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mechanical way expurgation was carried out, but also its objective14. In a notable contribution to the subject, Gustavo Sacerdote suggested that an Index expurgatorius was composed between 1578 and 1583, during the pontificate of Gregory XIII (1572-1585), the result of which – he claimed – was preserved in MS Neofiti 39, now held in the Vatican Library as MS Vat. lat. 1462815. The manuscript consists of large extracts, mainly from Jewish biblical commentaries, with marginal comments to these passages. Key figures in the undertaking were Robert Bellarmine, who according to Sacerdote had to approve the Index, and the Master of the Sacred Palace, who arbitrated in case of doubt. The involvement of these heavyweight theologians, however, makes it highly unlikely that this undertaking was carried out in order to create a manual for expurgation. With its lengthy extracts from Hebrew books not matching in any way the template of an Index expurgatorius, the manuscript must have served a different purpose, and this will be discussed in full later in this study. A first indication of its rationale, however, is the way Robert Bellarmine got involved in the project. It should be noted that his participation followed an earlier task his Superior had assigned to him when he called this very gifted member of the Society back from Louvain. According to Bellarmine’s first biographer, Jacopo Fuligatti, the Superior General of the Society of Jesus, Everard Mercurian, acting on the advice of Bellarmine’s physician, had called Bellarmine back to Rome due to the unhealthy weather conditions in Louvain, which, after a stay of seven years, had seriously affected his health16. But while assuring a healthier environment for their suffering confrere, the Jesuits’ Superiors realized that they could offer the Roman Church a preacher, both notorious and celebrated. This extraordinary talent of Bellarmine’s had already been recognized in 1569, when the then Superior General Francesco Borgia sent him to Louvain to complete his theological studies, which he had begun in Padua; the sole reason for this move was the need of a preacher in Louvain who would be a match for the advancing Reformation17. An anonymous biographer claims that when Bellar14   For some examples of this procedure see Piet van Boxel, ‘Hebrew Books and Censorship in Sixteenth-Century Italy’, in Jewish Books and their Readers: Aspects of the Intellectual Life of Christians and Jews in Early Modern Europe, ed. Scott Mandelbrote and Joanna Weinberg (Leiden, 2016), 75-99 at 83-4. See further Chapter 6, 134-5, 137. 15   Gustavo Sacerdote, ‘Deux index expurgatoires de livres hébreux’, in Revue des études juives 30 (1895), 257-83. 16   Fuligatti, Vita del Cardinale Roberto Bellarmino cit., 70. 17   A prime example of Bellarmine’s success as preacher in Louvain is the letter by the Provincial of Belgium, Francis Coster, to the Superior General of the Order, Francis Borgia (9 December 1570): “P. Robertus Bellarminus concionatur latine hoc Adventu Lovanii singulis dominicis diebus, major in auditorio quam usquam, templum capacissimum dicitur refertum esse, et aliquot millia confluere; non desunt qui ad Societatem ipsius concionibus

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Chapter 1 – Church Policy towards the Jews

mine preached in Louvain’s St Michael church the city was empty18. It was this reputation that preceded him to the Eternal City and had prompted his Superior to assign to him the task of delivering conversionary sermons to the Jews of Rome, a year before papal decree (issued on 1 September 1577) obliged them to attend such sermons on a weekly basis19. Following the instructions of Francesco Borgia, written before 1572, it was in the spirit of the Jesuit Order to entrust the task of preaching only to the most eminent orators, and delivering sermons to the Jews apparently required the same high standards as confronting the Reformation20. However, once in Rome, in addition to being appointed professor of controversial theology at the Collegio Romano, Bellarmine was made advisor to the Master of the Sacred Palace, in a project of examining Hebrew books, as attested in Vat. lat. 14628. Reporting on his apostolate among the Jews, Antonio Possevino mentioned that in 1576 he had taken Bellarmine’s place as a preacher to the Jews21. Possevino gives no reason for his Superiors’ change of mind, but it stands to reason that the professor of the Collegio Romano would not be given the task of supervising an Index expurgatorius. It may be assumed that his Superiors were of the opinion that this talented confrere could be best used as advisor to the Master of the Sacred Palace working on a project intimately related to the task they originally had envisaged for him, namely preaching to the Jews. His impressive knowledge of Hebrew, which – so he claims – he had taught himself whilst teaching biblical exegesis in Louvain, combined with his unparalleled theological expertise, seems to epitomize the working method of the participants in selecting theologically disputable Hebrew texts, an approach far removed from the usual censorial activity22. In this study it will be argued that the permoveantur”. See Le Bachelet, Bellarmin avant son cardinalat cit., 75. See further the impressionistic and hagiographic descriptions in Fuligatti, Vita del Cardinale Roberto Bellarmino cit., 53-4 and James Brodrick, The Life and Work of Blessed Robert Francis Cardinal Bellarmine, S. J., 2 vols (London, 1928), 1:57, 65-7. 18   “E quindi se bene parlasse egli latino: idioma non inteso da tutti in quel Paese; pur tutta via ogni qualvolta si risapeva dovere egli predicare, spopolavasi la Città”, Vita del Venerabile Cardinale Roberto Bellarmino Arcivescovo di Capua, e Religioso della Compagnia Di Gesu, descritta da un Divoto del medesimo Ven. Cardinale (Roma, 1743), 76-7. 19   See Jean Dorigny, La vie du père Antoine Possevin de la Compagnie de Jesus (Paris, 1712), 165-6. 20   See Frederick J. McGinness, Right Thinking and Sacred Oratory in Counter-Reformation Rome (Princeton, 1995), 38-9. 21   Possevino gives an account of his apostolate with the Jews in Archivum Romanum Societatis Jesu (ARSI) Opp NN 313 fol. 18r and Opp NN 336 fols 89r-90v. The sermons he delivered are lost. 22   For Bellarmine’s acquaintance with the Hebrew language and Jewish tradition see Chapter 3, pp. 63-6 and Piet van Boxel, ‘Robert Bellarmine, Christian Hebraist and Censor’, in History of Scholarship: A Selection of Papers from the Seminar on the History of Scholarship Held Annually at the Warburg Institute, ed. Christopher R. Ligota and Jean-Louis Quantin (Oxford, 2006), 251-75.

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aim of the examination of Hebrew books, of which the results are preserved in Vat. lat. 14628, was to create a manual of Christian interpretation of Scripture in confrontation with Jewish biblical exegesis. Equipped with such a manual, preachers could guide the Jews into a correct understanding of the Old Testament. In supervising this project, Bellarmine was given a pivotal role in the missionary policy towards the Roman Jews, a policy in which the sermons figured prominently. The Preachers One of the eyewitnesses of these sermons was Michel de Montaigne who, in his diary, does not hide his fascination about the performances by “that renegade rabbi, who preaches to the Jews Saturday afternoon in the oratory of the Trinità23. There are always sixty Jews forced to attend. He was one of their wisest scholars and now he combats their faith with their own arguments, the words of their rabbis and the text of the Bible”24. Much more elaborate and slightly different from Montaigne’s account is Gregory Martin’s version of that weekly event. From late 1576 until the summer of 1578 Martin lived in Rome, where he assisted Cardinal William Allen in the foundation of the English College. During his stay in the Eternal City he acquired thorough familiarity with the religious life and the charities of Rome, which he documented in his Roma Sancta of 1581. In the chapter Concerning the “Devotion” of the City of Rome, Martin provides us with a detailed report of the sermons; the Jews, he says, “were bound under a penaltie to be present in the churche of the Company of the B. Trinitie, there to heare what may be said for christianitie agaynst their Judaisme”25. The account opens with a description of the special seating instructions, which should guarantee seats for the Jews around the pulpit and which requested Christian spectators to offer their place to them if needed. The vivid picture of this welcoming arrangement is followed by a list of Christian participants starting with the one presiding over the event: “The cheefe of the Christians in this Audience is alwayes a Cardinal, as it were by office deputed to be president of this exercise, as for other causes, so especially to keepe the Jewes in awe, and to rebuke them for absence 23   This was the Oratorio della Confraternita della Trinità dei Pellegrini near Ponte Sisto, see Roger le Déaut, ‘Jalons pour une histoire d’un manuscript du Targum palestinien (Neofiti 1)’, in Biblica 48 (1967), 509-33 at 518. 24   Michel de Montaigne, Journal du voyage de Michel de Montaigne en Italie, par la Suisse & l’Allemagne, en 1580 & 1581; Avec des notes par Meusnier de Querlon (Rome, 1774), 159. See also Michel de Montaigne, Journal de voyage de Michel de Montaigne, ed. François Rigolot (Paris, 1992), 120; Anna Foa, The Jews of Europe after the Black Death (Berkeley, 2000), 45. 25   Gregory Martin, Roma Sancta (1581) now first edited from the manuscript, ed. George Bruner Parks (Rome, 1969), 77.

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or slacknesse, and to make reporte to His Holinesse of al thinges”26. The president is accompanied by Christian dignitaries and experts such as cardinals, bishops, prelates, doctors of divinity and notables attending the sermon. As a special category “the Catechumeni and Neophyti, that is to say, the late converted and the late Baptized Jews, have theyr place among the Christians, in theyr liveries, they of white and these of blacke, to be talked of more hereafter”27. Having set the scene Martin then depicts in detail the actual procedure and the occasional result of the exercise: The audience being thus assembled every Satterday about two a clocke after dinner, there come up into the pulpit two excellent men, one after an other, for the space of two hours. The one and the first, a Jesuite or some other of greate skil and good spirit, to move: the other, a great Rabbine sometime of their owne, but now these manie yeares a zelous and learned Christian, named maister Andreas, of the which Christian Rabbines (by the way) there are in Rome fower very famous, one a Dominican fryer, an other a Jesuite, the third Reader of the Hebrew in Sapientia, that is the universitie: and the fourth, this M. Andreas. Whose Zeale for his brethren the Hebrewes (for so they are and would be called) not unlike to S. Paules in the like case, his maner of utterance to teache and convince and confound, his knowledge and readiness in the Hebrew Bible and al the Hebrewe commentaries and Chaldee Paraphrases and the Syriake and Arabike tong, who can conceave that hath not heard him: and who can expresse that hath heard him? Well, this man is chosen of purpose to confute them out of their owne bookes and doctors, and to confound them by their owne peevish opinions and absurde Imaginations and folish practices, which he knoweth as well as the best of their Rabbins, and can disclose al their ridiculous mysteries, him self having been sometime one of them, and knowing the greatest poyntes that then blinded himself, and marveyling now that he could be so sotted and bewitched28. […] The other that preacheth before him immediatly and in the first place, useth al other kinde of Reasons and proofes out of the old Scriptures and the fathers that have written of purpose agaynst the Jewes. And especially the zele and compassion that they declare toward the saving of theyr soules doeth much move and persuade, God principally working withal in their hartes. Father Possivino the Jesuite occupied the place til he was sent to convert Suetia [Sweden]. After him Lupus a Capuchine [Alfonso Lupo], and after him Francisco Maria [Tarugi], al famous men and ful of Zele and charitie. So by this meanes it cometh to passe, that now one, and now an other, and sometime a whole household, sometime of the Rabbines them selves, feele compunction and remorse, and saye as it were with theyr forefathers in the actes of the Apostles upon the preaching of Peter, Quid faciemus   Martin, Roma Sancta cit., 77.   Ibid., 77-8. The ‘talking of more hereafter’ refers to the next chapter, The catechizing and baptizing of the Jewes converted, 82-3. 28   Ibid., 78. 26 27

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viri fratres? What shal we doe brethern? And so signifying theyr minde, they are receaved, and baptized as followeth29.

As both Montaigne and Martin attest, an essential role was assigned to the preachers converted from Judaism. Their familiarity with Jewish tradition and knowledge of Hebrew were an indispensable instrument for ‘teaching, convincing and confounding’ their former coreligionists. Gregory Martin reports that four converts took part, of whom two can easily be identified. The preacher who taught Hebrew at the Sapienza, the University of Rome, from 1576 until his death at the beginning of the seventeenth century was Giovanni Paolo Eustachio30. He converted under the pontificate of Pius V around 1568 and, because of his excellent knowledge of Hebrew and his familiarity with transcribing Hebrew manuscripts, became scriptor of Hebrew books in the Vatican library, a position he held until 159931. Montaigne’s ‘renegade rabbi’, whom Martin calls Maestro Andreas, was Andrea de Monte (c. 1510–1587), Maestro di Casa [sotto-maestro] of the Collegio dei Neofiti, whose pupils attended the sermons32. De Monte was appointed preacher to the Jews by Pope Gregory XIII in 1576. He stepped down from this position in 1582, when encountering open hostility from the Roman Jews, who conveyed their discontent to one of the two protectors of the Casa dei Neofiti, Cardinal Guglielmo Sirleto33. The Dominican friar mentioned by Martin may well have been Alessandro Franceschi, whose father of the same name converted in 154234. The son, educated by Ignatius of Loyola, became a Dominican and devoted missionary among his former coreligionists35.   Ibid., 81-2. A caveat to the accuracy of Martin’s account can be found in Frederick J. McGinness, ‘Preaching Ideals and Practice in Counter-Reformation Rome’, in The Sixteenth Century Journal 11/2 (1980), 108-28 at 108-10. 30   For a biography see Barbara Leber, A Jewish convert in Counter-Reformation Rome: Giovanni Paulo Eustachio (PhD diss., University of Maryland, College Park, 2000). 31   See Giulio Bartolocci, Bibliotheca magna rabbinica de scriptoribus et scriptis hebraicis, ordine alphabetico Hebraice et Latine digestis, 4 vols (Rome, 1675-94), 4:33-5. Hermann Vogelstein and Paul Rieger, Geschichte der Juden in Rom, 2 vols (Berlin, 1896), 2:283-4; Karl Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit des ersten päpstlichen Missionsinstituts, Missionswissenschaftliche Abhandlungen und Texte 4 (Münster in Westfalen, 1923), 207-8. 32   See Bartolocci, Bibliotheca magna rabbinica cit., 3:759-60; Maurice Liber, ‘Montaigne à Rome’, in Revue des études juives 55 (1908), 109-18 at 113-16; Le Déaut, ‘Jalons pour une histoire’ cit., 518, n. 5; Renata Segre, ‘La Controriforma: espulsioni, conversioni, isolamento’, in Gli ebrei in Italia, vol. 1: Dall’alto Medioevo all’ età dei ghetti, ed. Corrado Vivanti, Storia d’Italia: Annali 11 (Turin, 1996), 709-78 at 754-5. On this institution for the training of neophytes as missionaries among their former co-religionists see below. 33   See Bartolocci, Bibliotheca magna rabbinica cit., 3:819. See further Fausto Parente, ‘Andrea de Monte’, in Dizionario biografico degli Italiani (Rome, 1990), 38:663-7. 34   See Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 7-8. 35   See Alberto Zucchi, Roma Domenicana: note storiche, 4 vols (Florence, 1938-43), 1:105; Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 29, 214. 29

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The other preachers were, like Robert Bellarmine, held in high esteem. The unnamed Jesuit in Montaigne’s account was identified by Martin as the Jesuit [Antonio] Possevino (1533-1611). In great demand as a preacher, he delivered sermons in the Oratorio della Confraternita della Trinità dei Pellegrini on Fridays during Lent36. In 1577, at the urging of Cardinal Giulio Antonio Santoro, he preached to the Jews for six months in the Confraternity of the Holy Trinity, and he claimed to have converted 14 Jews during that period. Concern about the aftercare of these converts may well have prompted him to advise Cardinals Guglielmo Sirleto and Giulio Antonio Santoro, and through them Pope Gregory XIII, to found a College for the neophytes, who were of an impressionable age. Possevino stressed the need to educate these young converts and to train them as preachers among their former coreligionists. It is not surprising that it took little time for this recommendation to be implemented – after all, Possevino, secretary of the Society of Jesus, was held in great esteem by Gregory XIII37. Furthermore, he suggested that in order to approach the Jews effectively a perfect knowledge of the Old Testament in both the Hebrew and Septuagint versions and the mastery of Patristic authors was needed38. In his bibliographical encyclopaedia Bibliotheca selecta Possevino provides more precious information about the initiatives taken by Gregory XIII to stimulate the conversion of the Jews and to win them over to the faith. He points explicitly to the weekly sermons, with an outline of the strategy to be followed in those sermons, and at the reorganization of the Casa dei Catecumeni, so that fitting missionaries to the Jews and other infidels would come out of it39. He then mentions the scheduled meetings of cardinals and some other learned theologians where, as he puts it, “blasphemous books of the Jews are either expurgated, or completely removed; to know these blasphemies is useful to those who have discussions   See Martin, Roma Sancta cit., 71.   See Emanuele Colombo, ‘The Watershed of Conversion: Antonio Possevino, New Christians, and Jews’, in “The Tragic Couple”: Encounters Between Jews and Jesuits, ed. James Bernauer and Robert A. Maryks (Leiden, 2013), 25-42 at 39; John P. Donnelly, ‘Antonio Possevino: From Secretary to Papal Legate’, in The Mercurian Project: Forming Jesuit Culture, 1573-1580, ed. Thomas M. McCoog (St Louis, 2004), 323-49 at 326-7. 38   Colombo, ‘The Watershed of Conversion’ cit., 38. Possevino’s acquaintance with these fields of biblical exegesis is demonstrated in his later published Apparatus Sacer ad Scriptores Veteris et Novi Testamenti: eorum interpretes, Synodos et Patres Latinos ac Graecos: horum versiones: theologos scholasticos quique contra hereticos egerunt: chronographos et historiographos ecclesiasticos […] Postrema hac editione quae nunc primum in Germania prodiit ab ipso auctore recognitus […] (Cologne, 1608). See also Irena Backus, Historical Method and Confessional Identity in the Era of the Reformation (1378-1615) (Leiden, 2003), 227-32. 39   Antonio Possevino, Bibliotheca selecta de ratione studiorum ad Disciplinas, et ad Salutem omnium gentium procurandam, 2 vols (Venice, 1603), 1:437-9. 36 37

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with the rabbis”40. The rather enigmatic description of such gatherings, hitherto unattested, seems to refer to two conflicting practices. Censorship and expurgation of Hebrew books in sixteenth-century Italy was a unilateral activity, which did not suppose or entail discussions with the rabbis. At the sermons, however, discussions with the rabbis were not only to be expected, but even provoked, as Gregory Martin apparently states and may have experienced: And he earnestly and sincerely provoketh them, if they can, to controwle presently any thing that he sayeth or alleageth, and to prove him a Lyer before the audience. And bycause they wil not lightlty so doe (although in deed it were his desire and would be his greater victorie) if theyr Rabbines talke with him privately in any such poynt, he answereth them presently to satisfie them: and in the next sermon openlie without naming the partie, he concealeth not the thing, but uttereth it as great advantage for theyr cause as them selves could make of it, and then confuteth it, to the profit of others lesse obstinate, although he have litle hope of the master Rabbine him self that objected it41.

Possevino, who himself must have encountered such confrontations, could not have known the blasphemies had they actually been censored or expurgated. The blasphemies may well be imagined on a wish list of censors, but in the missionary context depicted by Possevino they were to be discussed in the audience and therefore written out and preferably with appropriate comments. The other preachers were equally renowned orators. Gregory Martin mentions the Spanish Capuchin Alfonso Lubo, known as Lupo in Italy, and Francesco Maria Tarugi, to whom Michel de Montaigne adds the Jesuit Francisco de Toledo42. Francisco de Toledo (1532-1596), whose father was of Jewish descent, studied philosophy in Valencia and theology in Salamanca. In 1558 he entered the Society of Jesus. From 1559 to 1569 he taught at the Collegio Romano. In 1569 he was appointed apostolic preacher, theologian of the Santa Penitenzieria and consultor of the Roman Inquisition. In 1593 he was created cardinal43. Alfonso Lupo and 40   “Praeterea Cardinalium, ac quorundam aliorum eruditorum congregatio certis diebus est habita, in qua libri Iudaeorum blasphemi, aut purgarentur, aut tollerentur omnino: blasphemias vero illas nosse expedit iis, qui cum Rabbinis disceptant. In templo autem Catechumenorum, Neophyti conveniunt, ac Christianam doctrinam & reliqua huiusmodi pro captu cuiusque docentur, ne nutantes in fide redeant ad vomitum, neque peccatis gratiam Spiritus sancti amittant”, Possevino, Bibliotheca selecta, 1:440. 41   Martin, Roma Sancta cit., 79-80. 42   Alfonso Lupo played an important role in training his younger confreres as future preachers. See Arsenio D’Ascoli, La predicazione dei Cappuccini nel cinquecento in Italia, in Studio teologico laurentano dei frati minori Cappuccini 11 (Loreto, 1956), 180-82. On Francisco de Toledo see Liber, Montaigne à Rome cit., 113. 43   See Enciclopedia Cattolica (Florence, 1954), 12: 196-7. See also Klaus Reinhardt, ‘Tole-

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Chapter 1 – Church Policy towards the Jews

Francisco de Toledo, together with the Franciscan Francesco Panigarola, were among the most celebrated preachers of the time, all of them implementing the threefold objective of a sermon: to teach, to please and to move44. Francesco Maria Tarugi, from a noble family in Montepulciano and well trained in the art of rhetoric, was a member of the Oratory of San Filippo Neri45. He was called a prince of the word (‘dux verbi’) by fellow Oratorian Cardinal Cesare Baronio46. In his general chapter on sermons Martin calls them all highly respected preachers excelling in their metier47. His admiration for Francesco Tarugi, almost in the form of a eulogy, says it all: ‘O father Francisco Maria, how often and with what fruite (God knoweth) have I heard thee in those places handling the matters of Heaven and Hel? How vehemently for Zeale, fluently for Wordes, sweetely and familiarly for gesture and countenance, effectually for persuasion, and withal how humbly?’48 Cardinal Santoro The most prominent figure present at the weekly sermons was “the Cheefe of the Christians in this Audience and as it were by office deputed to be president of this exercise”. Martin does not disclose his name, but when he describes the Congregations of the Roman Church, in his Roma Sancta, he refers to Giulio Santoro Cardinale di Santa Severina. In addido, Francisco de’, in Biographisch-bibliographisches Kirchenlexicon, ed. Wilhelm Bautz (Nordhausen, 1975–), 12 (1997), cols 288-91, and McGinness, Right Thinking cit., 75-6. 44   “Toletus docet, Panicarola delectat et Lupus movet”, see Ludwig von Pastor, The History of the Popes: From the Close of the Middle Ages. Drawn from the Secret Archives of the Vatican and Other Original Sources, ed. Ralf F. Kerr (London, 1952), 19:210. The variant “Hebraeus docet, Panicarola delectat et Lupus movet”, explicitly links the saying with the sermons to the Jews, see Melchior A. de Pobladura, Historia generalis Ordinis Fratrum Minorum Capuccinorum, 3 vols (Rome, 1947-51), 1:259. Guillaume Cotin, the librarian at the abbey of St. Victor (Paris), when discussing famous preachers both abroad and in France, mentioned a preacher called l’Hébreu, and on 12 December 1585 noted in his diary his conversation with Giordano Bruno, who considered the Jew the most outstanding preacher while despising Francisco de Toledo: “Il prise entre les prédicateurs le seul Hébreu pour son éloquence et plus pour son sçavoir […] Il meprise fort Toletus”. Liber, who reports this conversation, identifies the unknown Jew with Andrea de Monte, see Liber, Montaigne à Rome cit., 114-16. Zucchi may well be right when identifying the Hebraeus with the converted Jew Alessandro Franceschi, see Zucchi, Roma Domenicana cit., 1:108, 111-12. For the rhetorical style of sermons, according to Martin’s description, see McGinness, “Preaching Ideals” cit., 108–28. 45   The formal affiliation between Filippo Neri and the Capuchin Order, and the high esteem in which Neri held Alfonso Lupo, may well have resulted in some cooperation, as suggested by Gregory Martin’s listing the Capuchin Lupo and the Oratorian Tarugi jointly. See de Pobladura, Historia generalis cit., 1:357. 46   See Von Pastor, The History of the Popes cit., 19:172. 47   Martin, Roma Sancta cit., 71. 48   Ibid., 74.

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tion to designating him Head of the Roman Inquisition, he describes Santoro in one other presidential role: “Also Cardinal Severinae is President in an other particular Congregation about Hebrew bookes, the Rabbines commentaries, the Talmud, the preaching to the Jewes and to take order of their conversion where he is ordinarily present and president”49. That Santoro’s role as President of the Congregation of Hebrew books was officially part of his responsibilities as Head of the Roman Inquisition (unus e Praepositis Sancti Officii), as Giovanni Mingarelli seems to suggest, is unlikely50. At the beginning of Gregory XIII’s pontificate, in 1572, the task of overseeing publications and the expurgation of books was formally assigned to the Congregation of the Index. However, the creation of the Congregation of the Index was not accompanied by a redefinition and limitation of the powers of the Roman Inquisition, which caused confusion and rivalry right from the start. Having compiled the first general Index of prohibited books in 1559, the Congregation of the Inquisition claimed authority over censorship and expurgation in equal measure51. As a result of Santoro’s claim the rules of the Index of 1596 were adjusted, and the Index was finally promulgated on 17 May 159652. However, Santoro’s scru49   Martin, Roma Sancta cit., 258: “and to take order of their conversion” is crossed out in the manuscript. 50   Marci Marini Brixiani canonici regularis congregationis Rhenanæ Sanctissimi Salvatoris Annotationes literales in Psalmos: nova versione ab ipsomet illustratos / nunc primum editae opera et studio D. Joannis Aloysii Mingarelli […] qui etiam auctoris vitam, Scriptorumque de ipso testimonia, & Hebraeorum Canticorum explicationem addidit, 2 vols (Bonn, 1748), 1:XVII. Berliner and recently Godman also claim that Cardinal Santoro, head of the Inquisition, was in charge of the expurgation of Hebrew books during the pontificate of Gregory XIII. See Abraham Berliner, Censur und Confiscation hebräischer Bücher im Kirchenstaate (Frankfurt am Main, 1891), 6; Godman, The Saint as Censor cit., 59. 51   For the rivalry between the two Congregations see Gigliola Fragnito, La Bibbia al rogo: La censura ecclesiastica e i volgarizzamenti della Scrittura (1471-1605) (Bologna, 1997), 122-5 and Fragnito, ‘La censura libraria tra Congregazione dell’Indice, Congregazione dell’Inquisizione e Maestro del Sacro Palazzo’, in La censura libraria nell’Europa del secolo XVI, 163-75 at 165-8. See also Godman, The Saint as Censor cit., 28-9. For the history of the Index see Fausto Parente, ‘La Chiesa e il “Talmud”: L’atteggiamento della Chiesa e del mondo cristiano nei confronti del Talmud e degli altri scritti rabbinici, con particolare riguardo all’Italia tra XV e XVI secolo’, in Gli ebrei in Italia, 1: Dall’alto Medioevo all’ età dei ghetti cit., 521-643 at 598-600; Francesco Zaccaria, Storia polemica della proibizione de’ libri (Rome, 1777); Reusch, Der Index der verbotener Bücher cit.; Joseph Hilgers, “Indices verbotener Bücher aus dem 16. Jahrhundert”, in Zentralblatt für Bibliothekwesen 20 (1903), 444-56; Antonio Rotondò, ‘Nuovi documenti per la storia dell’Indice dei libri proibiti’ (1572-1638), in Rinascimento, second series, 3 (1963), 145-211; Fragnito, La Bibbia al rogo, 112; Vittorio Frajese, ‘La politica dell’ Indice dal Tridentino al Clementino (1571-1596)’, in Archivio italiano per la storia della pietà, 11 (1998), 269-356. 52   Fragnito, ‘La censura’ cit., 171-2. However, in a letter to the inquisitor of Turin Santoro acknowledged the role of the Congregation of the Index in matters of expurgation. See Fragnito, La Bibbia al rogo cit., 124 n. 32. According to Fragnito, it was not until 1606 that the ultimate authority of the Congregation of the Index in matters of censorship was established, see ibid., 122-5.

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Chapter 1 – Church Policy towards the Jews

tiny of Hebrew books referred to by Gregory Martin is not necessarily an illustration of this rivalry. Since the title “President in an other particular Congregation” attributed to Santoro is directly connected with “preaching to the Jews where he is ordinarily present and president”, it seems justified to conclude that the examination of Hebrew books entrusted to this ‘Congregation’ was supposed to serve this undertaking, on which Santoro reported to the Pope53. In this context it is most likely that the meetings of cardinals and other learned theologians where blasphemous books of the Jews were ‘expurgated’, as reported by Antonio Possevino, were presided over by ‘the President of this Congregation’, Giulio Antonio Santoro. The Sermons In his outline of the issues presented and discussed in the sermons by Andrea de Monte, Gregory Martin reports that “the principal quaestion is [that] of their Messias, whom they looke for yet, to come in his royal and temporal state, more mighty and glorious then al the princes of the world, and so to deliver them from this Captivitie, and to bring them home to Jerusalem in Jewrie, and to make them al joly felowes, by advauncing theyr kingdom above Salomon’s glorye: whereas (I say) they dreame of al temporalities, their land of promis, their city, their temple, their earthly king: and we believe that both our messias and theirs, that is our Christ and theirs, is come already, in humilitie and poverty and affliction unto the very death of the Crosse […]”54. With reference to the Law and the Prophets as read in the liturgy of the day and to the ancient rabbis, “as it were the Catholike and sincere Rabbins” as opposed to those of later years, “as it were the Arche-haeretikes of Judaisme and Jewish religion”, Andrea de Monte sought to convince his audience of their misconception of the Messiah. Martin then gives us a taste of de Monte’s reasoning, as demonstrated in his explanation of messianic prophecies such as Daniel 9:24-27, Genesis 49:10, Psalm 21:17 and Isaiah 53:4 55. But these texts, understood by Andrea de Monte as messianic prophecies about Christ, are a drop in the ocean when compared with the arsenal of proof texts, which, in his Iggeret Shalom, he drew with great sophistication from the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament56. In order to situate the fulfilment of Old Testa53   Fausto Parente considers it not entirely unfounded to call Santoro President of the Congregation of Hebrew books in that it may concern a project mooted by Santoro that never came to pass. See Parente, ‘The Index’ cit., 172 n. 28. 54   Martin, Roma Sancta cit., 78-9. 55   Ibid., 80-81. 56   Iggeret Shalom: Neofiti 37, fol. 1: “Della verità della venuta del’ Messia alli Hebrei. Trattato de Andrea de Monte gia Rabbino et Predicatore Hebreo in Roma, intitulato Lettera di Pace”. On the manuscript, see Benjamin Richler, ed., Hebrew Manuscripts in the Vatican Li-

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ment prophecies in the time of Jesus, he linked them to historical events such as the end of the Davidic dynasty and the destruction of the Temple. Following an old Christian tradition, the Davidic dynasty came to an end when the Idumean Herod became king of the Jews at the time of the birth of Jesus, at which point in history “the sceptre had departed from Judah and he to whom it belongs had come” (Genesis 49:10)57. With the destruction of the Temple the sacrifices ceased, an event that brought about Hosea’s prophecy: “For the children of Israel shall dwell many days without king or prince, without sacrifice or pillar, without ephod or household gods” (3:4). The fulfilment of these prophecies made space for the New Covenant, predicted by Jeremiah: “Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah” (Jer. 31:31)58. More challenging than a Christian interpretation of the Old Testament prophecies were the proofs drawn from the Jewish masters, such as the sages of the Talmud and the Bible commentator Solomon ben Isaac (1040–1105) from Troyes, better known by his acronym Rashi. The text under discussion is Isaiah 2:2, “And it shall be at the end of the days, that the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be firmly established at the top of the mountains, and it shall be raised above the hills, and all the nations shall stream to it”. One Jewish tradition understood the text as the prediction of the miracle that “in the future the Holy One, blessed be He, will elevate Sinai, Tabor and Carmel and build the Temple on their tops”59. In order to claim a Christian fulfilment of the prophecy, the elevation of the mountain of the Lord’s House had to be understood metaphorically, an interpretation for which Andrea de Monte thankfully refers to Rashi, who comments on the verse as follows: “at the top of the mountains: On a mountain that is the head of all the mountains in the hierarchy of the mountains. And it shall be raised above the hills: the miracle performed on it, will be greater than the miracles of Sinai, Carmel, and Tabor”. Added brary: Catalogue compiled by the Staff of the Institute of Microfilmed Hebrew Manuscripts, Jewish National and University Library, Jerusalem. Palaeographical and Codicological Descriptions Malachi Beit-Arié in collaboration with Nurit Pasternak (Vatican City, 2008), 554-5. 57   The tradition is extensively dealt with in the Pugio Fidei, Caput Quartum: “probatio, quod Messias jam venit, continuatur per Prophetiam Jacobi”, Ramón Martí, Raymundi Martini Ordinis Praedicatorum Pugio Fidei adversus Mauros et Judaeos cum observationibus Josephi de Voisin et introductione Jo. Benedicti Carpzovi, qui simul appendicis loco Hermanni Judaei opusculum De sua Conversione ex Mscto […] (Leipzig, 1687), fols 312-30. 58   “per il computo del tempo, et per li effetti che doverrano riuscire in tal tempo della cessatione delli sacrificii, et altri successi che sono dichiarati, e manifesto essere venuto il Messia, cioe Christo benedetto”, Neofiti 37 (Iggeret Shalom), fol. 24. 59   Yalkut Shimoni on Isaiah 2:2. Also Abraham ibn Ezra on Micha 4, who says that the mountain of the Messiah will be elevated above the other mountains, that is to say above the holy patriarchs, as described in Yalkut on Isaiah 52:1.

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Chapter 1 – Church Policy towards the Jews

to all these witnesses drawn from Scripture and Jewish tradition are the Sibylline oracles and clear reasoning, which, in de Monte’s view, made the claim that Christ was the Messiah inevitable60. Dedicated to one of the protectors of the Casa dei Neofiti, Cardinal Guglielmo Sirleto, this Letter of Peace was a 124-folio long diatribe against the Jews, who in their blindness and stubbornness kept to their foolish beliefs. That this was the usual content and way of arguing in sermons to the Jews finds confirmation in 20 sermons held in Naples in 1585 by the Conventional Franciscan Faustino Tasso61. Fitting closely with de Monte’s arguments about the coming of the Messiah, the heading of the first sermon reads as follows: “The first reasoning, in which clearly is demonstrated that the Jews do not any longer possess the Law of God, nor the Hebrew language, nor the true priesthood, nor a Temple in which they can pray, nor absolute power to rule, nor a proper land, from where it can be concluded that they are completely abandoned by God”62. (Tasso’s sermons, however, do not take their starting point in the weekly readings of the Hebrew Bible.) As to the other preachers, who apparently could not draw upon the Jewish sources in order to bring the Messianic message home, in the words of Martin they ‘useth al other kinde of Reasons and proofes out of the old Scriptures and the fathers that have written of purpose agaynst the Jewes’, thus focusing on Christian understanding of the Old Testament and the exposition of Scripture by the Church Fathers63. Preaching Practices and Papal Bulls Both Michel de Montaigne and Gregory Martin locate the sermons in the Oratory of the Trinità (opposite the Chiesa della Santissima Trinità dei Pellegrini) near Ponte Sisto. Gregory Martin explicitly claims to have heard Andrea de Monte preaching there, and this is confirmed by Andrea de Monte himself in his Hebrew autograph summary of sermons64.   Neofiti 37, fol. 120.   Faustino Tasso, Venti Ragionamenti familiari Sopra la Venuta del Messia del R.P. Faustino Tasso, Minore Osservante. Fatti in Napoli ad alcuni Hebrei […] l’anno MDLXXV. Ne’quali con l’autoritadi de’ Teologi Christ. e de’ Rabbini Hebr. si dichiarano i più importanti Misterii della santiss. Trinità, & i più secreti Sacramenti della venuta del Messia (Venice, 1585). 62  “Ragionamento primo: Nel quale si mostra chiaramente, che gli Hebrei non hanno più nè legge di Dio, nè lingua Hebrea, nè Sacerdotio vero, nè Tempio da orare, nè imperio da commandare, nè paese proprio; onde sono del tutto abbandonati da Dio”, Tasso, Venti Raggionamenti familiari cit., 1. 63   Martin, Roma Sancta cit., 81. 64   Sermons by Andrea de Monte are preserved in Neofiti 35. See, among others for the year 1576: fols 46v, 47v and 50r; for the year 1577: fols 52v (shabbat lechodesh 5 January), 54r (shabbat 12 January in Chiesa Nuova) and 51v (shabbat 27 November); for the year 1580: fol. 56r; for the year 1581: fol. 65v (13 May 1581 erev chag ruach kodesh [= pentecost]). 60 61

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But this same autograph provides more information that has escaped the attention of scholars. The text mentions the names of four more churches, all relatively close to the ghetto, where such sermons were held, not necessarily with Jews present, but also in order to instruct Christians: the Gesù, the Santi Apostoli, Santa Maria in Vallicella also called Chiesa Nuova and Santa Maria sopra Minerva65. Sermons were held in the Gesù already before its completion in 1574 – for this church was the headquarters of the Jesuits, who, as already mentioned, were deeply involved in the conversionary sermons to the Jews66. In addition to Antonio Possevino and Francisco de Toledo, referred to by Gregory Martin and Michel de Montaigne respectively, Andrea de Monte mentions father Benedettino, to be identified as the Jesuit Benedictus who preached in the holy church of jesu hamevorah, that is the blessed Gesù, and of whose sermon Andrea made notes67. Together with Panigarola he stood head and shoulder above all other preachers in Rome, a popularity that explains the fact that according to Gregory Martin 14 cardinals at the time came to listen to their (his?) sermons on various occasions68. Formerly used by the Colonna family, in 1474 the church of the Santi Apostoli became a parish church in the care of the Franciscan Conventuals, who were likewise involved in preaching. Not mentioned by Gregory Martin, but included in Andrea de Monte’s overview of preachers, is the Conventional Franciscan Franceschino [Visdomini]. Shaped by a centuries long tradition of his Order, Franceschino was one of the most admired preachers of the time. His colleague Cornelio Musso, who himself was a most esteemed preacher of the mid sixteenth century, called him ‘the delight of the pulpit and the oratorical lyre of our times’. On the Feast of the Circumcision of Jesus in 1572 Father Franceschino gave a sermon about circumcision providing the answers Jews (who were probably not present) would give to the question69. The Chiesa Nuova was the home of Filippo Neri’s community of secular priests, called the Congregation of the Oratory. In a bull dated 15 July 1575 Neri received papal approval for his Oratory and took pos65   Gregory XIII had stipulated that sermons should take place in a prearranged place, where religious services were not usually held (“in locum praestituum, non tamen sacrum, nec ubi sacra confici solent”). But since there were few such places near the Roman ghetto that could take many people, sermons were held in the Oratorio of the Confraternita della Trinità dei Pellegrini and in other churches, see Zucchi, Roma Domenicana cit., 1:90. Zucchi mentions S Lorenzo in Damaso, Santa Maria del Pianto and S. Angelo in Pescheria. 66   See e.g. Neofiti 35, fols 37v, 40v. 67   Neofiti 35, fol. 38r (5 January 1574). 68   See Martin, Roma sancta cit., 71; McGinness, Right Thinking cit., 16-7. 69   See e.g. Neofiti 35, fol. 23v. For other sermons by Franceschino see Neofiti 35, fols 21r and 28r. On Franceschino Visdomini, see further Emily Michelson, Pulpit and the Press in Reformation Italy (Cambridge, MA, 2013), 56–8 and passim.

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session of the church. The Oratorian Francesco Maria Tarugi was one of the preachers70. Finally, it is not surprising that the church Santa Maria sopra Minerva, home to the Dominican Order and residence of the Master of the Sacred Palace and of the Master of the Order, was another location where sermons were held71. Preaching to the Jews had been a long-standing tradition of the Dominicans. Already at the beginning of the century the Jewish convert and Dominican Johannes Baptista Gratia Dei delivered sermons to the Jews here72. Sisto Fabri, who was Master of the Order from 1583 until 1589, and who as Master of the Sacred Palace from 1580 until 1583 had been involved in the project of examining Hebrew books, was a fervent supporter of the mission among the infidels and must have supported this activity in the church. With a view to the training of preachers to the Jews, Fabri founded a school for the teaching of Hebrew at his own headquarters73. Giulio Bartolocci reports that in his days a theologian and expert in Hebrew from the Dominican Order used to preach to the Jews74. One of Fabri’s predecessors as Master of the Dominicans, Vincenzo Giustiniani (1558-1570), must have shown similar interest in the conversion of the Jews. After his death the heirs, certainly in accordance with the wish of the deceased, supported the Casa dei Neofiti with a lavish donation of 2000 golden scudi75. The information provided by Andrea de Monte challenges the way the whole undertaking of conversionary sermons forced upon the Jews in the second half of the sixteenth century has been depicted thus far. The involvement of the Jesuits, Franciscans, Oratorians and Dominicans, who opened their churches for this particular missionary activity and to which they even more importantly contributed by providing their most prominent preachers, illustrates how much importance was assigned to it. By   See e.g. Neofiti 35, fol. 34r.   See e.g. Neofiti 35, fol. 40r (7 August 1575). 72   Liber de confutatione hebrayce secte (Rome, 1500). 73   See Jacques Quetif and Jacques Echard, Scriptores Ordinis Praedicatorum recensiti, notisque historicis et criticis illustrati, 2 vols (Paris, 1719-21), 2:266. Touron reports that in his Monumenta Dominicana Vincenzo Fontana claims that in 1584 Pope Gregory XIII appointed the convert Sirleto Dominicano as a fixed preacher to the Jews. See Antoine Touron, Histoire des hommes illustres de l’ordre de Saint Dominique; […] depuis la mort du fondateur, jusqu’au pontificat de Benoît XIII, 6 vols (Paris, 1743-49), 4:724; Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 211-12. Zucchi argues that such an appointment never took place. No converted Jews entered the Dominican order under the name of Sirleto in those days, see Zucchi, Roma Domenicana cit., 1:100-1. For the inclusion of Hebrew in the curriculum prescribed by Sisto Fabri see Angelus Walz, Compendium Historiae Ordinis Praedicatorum (Rome, 1930), 430. 74   See Bartolocci, Bibliotheca magna rabbinica cit., 3:749. 75   See Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 191; Walz, Compendium cit., 494. 70 71

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doing so they revived a practice that was initiated in medieval times.76 Congruent with the general strategy of preaching the Catholic doctrine, the passionate devotion to the cause of converting the Jews was triggered by Pope Pius V, who in 1568 reinstated the custom of forcing them to attend sermons on all Jewish Festivals77. With the bull Vices ejus nos of 1 September 1577 Pope Gregory XIII legislated that such sermons were to be held every Sabbath, an ordinance that was made into an obligation for all the Jews in the bull Sancta Mater Ecclesia of 1 September 158478. According to this bull, once the parashah and haftarah (the portions from the Pentateuch and the Prophets) had been read, a magister in theology or some other suitable person – preferably an expert in the Hebrew language – should confront the Jews with their misunderstanding and corruption of Scripture and present a Christian reading of the text according to the interpretations of the Church fathers and the true understanding of the Catholic Church, in order to bring them to the Christian faith79. The magister was to act prudently with true arguments deduced from the Holy Scriptures. Without any defamation or anger, he should lead them to the light of the truth with great love and modesty80. The Pope’s dictate that sermons were to be held every Sabbath (Vices ejus nos) and detailed instructions as to how they were to be structured and performed (Sancta Mater Ecclesia) were already in place when Gregory Martin attended one or more sermons at the Chiesa della Santissima Trinità dei Pellegrini in 1576. Andrea de Monte confirms this state of affairs and offers even more detailed pictures of the sermons held during the pontificates of Pius V and Gregory XIII. In his collection of sermons and summaries, he records a sermon held on one of the Jewish festivals, as ordered by Pius V. The sermon took place on Hanukkah, the eight-day Jewish festival commemorating the rededication of the Temple in Jerusalem at the time of the Maccabean Revolt against the Seleucid Empire of the second century BCE. The date given by Andrea is highly suggestive 76   In his breve Vineam Soreth (25 November 1277) Pope Nicholas III charged the Order of the Dominicans with the task of preaching Jesus to the Jews. See W. Faber, ‘Ein Breve des Papstes Nicolaus III’, in Saat auf Hoffnung, 24 (1887), 206-11. 77   See Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 201 n. 1. For the sermons to the Jews at the end of the sixteenth and the beginning of the seventeenth century see ibid., 198222; Fausto Parente, ‘Il confronto ideologico tra L’Ebraismo e la Chiesa in Italia’, in Italia judaica: atti del I Convegno internazionale, Bari 18-22 maggio 1981 (Rome, 1983), 303-81 at 32340; Renata Segre ‘La Controriforma’ cit., 753-6. For the role of preaching in sixteenth-century Italy, see Martin, Roma Sancta cit., 70-4 and Michelson, Pulpit and the Press cit., 15-53. 78   For the forced sermons, see further Segre, ‘La Controriforma’ cit., 754-6. 79   For the full text of the bull see Bullarum diplomatum et privilegiorum sanctorum Romanorum pontificum Taurinensis editio, ed. Aloysius Tomassetti (Turin, 1857-72), 8:487-9. For Gregory Martin’s description see Martin, Roma Sancta cit., 79. 80   Bullarum cit., 8:487-8.

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and programmatic: “Thursday three days after the birth of our redeemer [1571]”, a most appropriate day for a sermon about the coming of the Messiah. It is therefore not surprising that the core text of the sermon is Genesis 49:10, “The sceptre will not depart from Judah, nor the ruler’s staff from between his feet, until he comes to whom it belongs and the obedience of the nations is his”, followed by reference to King Herod81. But sermons were preached on the Sabbath already before Gregory XIII issued his bull Vices ejus nos. Andrea de Monte preached at the Chiesa della Santissima Trinità dei Pellegrini on the Sabbath of 23 April 1577 “in the presence of Cardinal Savella (sic) and Cardinal Sirleto and Cardinal Santo Severino [Santoro] and many Jews and Christian scholars (chachamim) on the parashah Emor el ha kohanim vegomer”82. The presence of the two cardinal protectors of the Casa dei Catecumeni as well as Cardinal Savelli, one of the five cardinals of the Inquisition undoubtedly lent gravitas to the occasion of the sermon of the convert. Gregory Martin’s description of cardinals attending the sermons, which were accompanied by interpretation of specific topics related to the weekly readings from the Law and the Prophets in the synagogue, are confirmed by Andrea de Monte’s records, affording us an invaluable insight into an established practice, which was not initiated but only confirmed by papal bulls83. Two Sides of the Same Coin The sermons that Gregory XIII forced the Jews of Rome to attend were not an isolated conversionary activity. They constitute a component of a wide-ranging strategy of the Church to combat dissidents and to make up for the loss of believers, who were joining the Reformation in large numbers. Staving off the heresy and rebuilding the Church were two sides of the same coin, as Emily Michelson argues, quoting the Franciscan Pietro Ridolfi, whose collected sermons appeared in 1584: “With one hand we must grip the sword against the evil heretics, more insolent than ever, and with the other, build up as much as possible the disheveled and ruined walls of this mystical Jerusalem”84. The sword against evil that was supposed to eradicate everything that could undermine Catholic doctrine was composed of the pyre and the Index of prohibited books. They were   Neofiti 35, fol. 23r; cfr. Iggeret Shalom, Neof. 37, fol. 4r.   Neofiti 35, fol. 56r. The liturgical reading of the day was Leviticus 21:1: “[The Lord said to Moses] Speak to the priests”. 83   Preaching to Jews was strongly supported by Cardinal Santoro who wrote in his diary on 19 January 1581: “Del predicare per gli Hebrei: che non si lasci e se facci seguitare da qualche frate. Di far vedere a sua Santita alcune bolle sopra la predica da farsi agli Giudei per tutto e farsi una bolla che dovunque sono si predichi; si consenta”. 84   Michelson, Pulpit and the Press cit., 168; see further ibid. 15-6, 145 and 174. 81 82

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primarily meant to liquidate the heresies of Luther and following reformers. The other side of the coin – the restoration, reviving and rebuilding of the Church – was to be achieved through the pulpit. Proclaiming and divulging the Catholic doctrine and values in sermons was strongly recommended by the Council of Trent and highly valued and admired in Counter-Reformation Rome.85 Both Michel de Montaigne and Gregory Martin provide rich descriptions of popular preaching in Rome, where preachers used every possible opportunity to contribute to the moral reform and spiritual renewal of the city and to promote the Catholic faith86. In order to achieve these goals the believers were confronted with the heresies they should shun, thus insuring that they would stay within the fold. But in order to seek reinforcement of the Church, the preachers also went beyond the borders of the Christian community, combining the efforts to prevent the faithful from leaving the Church with a passionate attempt to convert infidels to the Catholic faith87. The Jews of Rome underwent a similar fate. By censoring their books on the one hand, and subjecting them to attendance at a weekly sermon where they were confronted with their errors and simultaneously encouraged to convert on the other, the Church treated the Jews both as adversaries to be combated and as potential members to be welcomed into the fold. Thus, representing both sides of the same coin, the Jews of Rome were exposed to the unpredictable policies of the Church hierarchy, which might impose harsh and isolating measures upon them or try with reasoning and accommodating conditions to win their souls to Christ. The impetus to the Church’s conversionary efforts among the Jews was driven by the founder of the Order of the Jesuits Ignatius of Loyola88. After his plans to preach the Gospel in Palestine had failed, he became the foremost spokesman for the conversion of Jews resident in Rome. It was Ignatius who spearheaded the founding of a house for Jewish catechumens. At first, he used the premises of the Jesuits near Torre del Melangolo and   For the decree of the Council see McGinness, ‘Preaching Ideals’ cit., 111-2.   Ibid., 83-6. 87   For the worldwide missionary activities of the Church as a reaction to the Reformation, which led to the establishment of the Congregation De Propaganda Fide see Erwin Iserloh, Reformation, Katholische Reform und Gegenreformation, Handbuch der Kirchengeschichte, 4 (Freiburg, 1967), 482. For the problematic use of the term Counter Reformation see the bibliography in Amnon Raz-Krakotzkin, ‘Censorship, Editing and the Reshaping of Jewish Identity: The Catholic Church and Hebrew Literature in the Sixteenth Century’, in Hebraica Veritas?: Christian Hebraists and the Study of Judaism in Early Modern Europe, ed. Allison P. Coudert and Jeffrey. S. Shoulson (Philadelphia, 2004), 125-55 at 128 n. 11. 88   For other conversionary undertakings, to which the Jesuits in particular committed themselves, see Andrew C. Ross, A Vision Betrayed: The Jesuits in Japan and China, 1542-1742 (Maryknoll, NY, 1994). 85 86

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subsequently on Piazza Altieri where, from 1538 onwards, accommodation was offered to Jews who expressed interest in the Catholic faith. Here they were given religious instruction in preparation for their baptism. The restricted space available and the difficulties the Order had in meeting the expenses involved forced Ignatius to seek alternative arrangements in order to carry on the missionary activity among the Jews. New premises, located on Piazza d’Aracoeli, in the church of Giovanni di Mercato, were provided by the priest Giovanni di Torano who took over full responsibility for the undertaking. The initiative was highly appreciated by the Church authorities. On 19 February 1543 the arrangements were given official approval. Pope Paul III (1534-1549) authorized “the founding of a convent for Jewish women and girls who had been baptized or wished to be baptized, and also the establishment of a hospice for the same categories of Jewish males”89. The institution, now called Casa dei Catecumeni, was granted a cardinal protector and thus acquired the status of a papal missionary institution90. From the relatively high numbers of converts – 20 to 30 in any given year – it appears that the undertaking was in no small measure successful91. The seemingly welcoming approach of the Casa dei Catecumeni was counteracted by the Roman Inquisition, led by Cardinal Gian Pietro Carafa (later Pope Paul IV)92. Only two years after Marco Antonio Giustiniani had completed his Talmud edition, the Holy Office condemned this centrepiece of Jewish tradition to the pyre, because of its alleged blasphemies and insults of the Catholic faith. By decree of the Inquisition, all copies were confiscated from the houses of the Jews in Rome and on 9 September 1553 were publicly burnt on the Campo de’ Fiori93. The motive underlying this rigorous step of the Inquisition is explained in a missive addressed to all Christian rulers, bishops and inquisitors, in which they were urged to follow the example of Rome94. The letter forbids Christians to read or   Bullarum cit., 6:355; see further Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 1-11.   Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 12-5. On the various edicts concerning the Casa, see Kenneth Stow, Catholic Thought and Papal Jewry Policy 1555-1593 (New York, 1977), 51-4. 91   See Shlomo Simonsohn, ‘Some Well-Known Jewish Converts during the Renaissance’, in Revue des Études Juives 148 (1989), 17-52 at 19. 92   The Holy Office of the Roman Inquisition was erected by Pope Paul III in 1542. For the establishment of the Roman Inquisition see Christopher. F. Black, The Italian Inquisition (New Haven, 2009), 1-18. 93   See Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 48-50; Kenneth Stow, ‘The Burning of the Talmud in 1553 in the Light of Sixteenth Century Catholic Attitudes towards the Talmud’, in Bibliothèque d’Humanisme et Renaissance 34 (1972), 435-59 (repr. in Essential Papers on Judaism and Christianity in Conflict: From Late Antiquity to the Reformation, ed. Jeremy Cohen, New York, 1991, 401-28). 94   See Moritz Stern, Urkundliche Beiträge über die Stellung der Päpste zu den Juden: Mit 89 90

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to possess copies of the Talmud, suggesting that by taking measures to suppress the Talmud the Church would protect the Christian faith95. At the same time, the burning of the Talmud was considered a radical way of removing the major obstacle to the conversion of the Jews. The missive states that the inquisitors were of the opinion that they could best contribute to the illumination of the Jews by freeing them from the nefarious influence of their godless and worthless teachings, which were as a veil enshrouding their hearts. If this veil were to be lifted, the Jews would be able truly to understand the Holy Scripture and to perceive therein the hidden treasure of their salvation96. The removal of the veil for the sake of understanding the Holy Scripture is an unmistakeable allusion to St. Paul’s second Letter to the Corinthians. The appeal to the apostle in order to legitimize the action is, however, an (intentional?) misreading of 2 Cor. 3:12-16. According to St. Paul the veil is removed by conversion, thus enabling the newborn Christian to understand the real meaning of Scripture. The inquisitors, however, viewed conversion not as a condition, but as the result of the correct reading of the Bible. The veil that impeded its right understanding was the Talmud, which contained blasphemies, superstitions, hatred of Christ and maledictions of Christians97. The action by the Roman Inquisition constitutes a turning point in the Church’s attitude towards the Jews, in that it broke with the longstanding policy based upon the bull Sicut Judaeis issued by Pope Gregory the Great in 598, which, as a Constitutio pro Judaeis, was promulgated by Pope Callixtus II around 112098. As a charter of papal protection repeated many times during the Middle Ages, the bull warranted security for the Jews, despite their obstinacy and unwillingness to embrace the Catholic Benutzung des päpstlichen Geheimarchivs zu Rom, 2 vols (Kiel, 1893-95), 1:98-102. For the correct dating of the document see 98-9; William Popper, The Censorship of Hebrew Books, with an introduction by Moshe Carmilly-Weinberger, 2nd ed. (New York, 1969 [1899]), 33. 95   “Universis demum Christi fidelibus in virtute Spiritus sancti et sanctae obedientiae et sub excommunicationis latae sententiae poena praecipiendo mandamus, ne praedictos codices Thalmud, utpote damnatos ab ecclesia, legere aut penes se retinere praesumant […]”, Stern, Urkundliche Beiträge cit., 1:101-2. 96   “[…] nil eorum illuminationi conducibilius fore arbitrati sumus, quam si ipsos ab impiis et inanibus doctrinis avertentes, ad sacras (quas se colere falso iactant) litteras scrutandas deducere possemus, ubi suae salutis absconditum thesaurum, remoto ab eorum cordibus velamine, nobiscum Deo donante invenire et agnoscere valerent”, Stern, Urkundliche Beiträge cit., 99. In similar terms the Avignon Pope Benedict XIII had ordered the burning of the Talmud in 1415. See Stow, ‘The Burning of the Talmud’ cit., 436. 97   “[Thalmud] […] ubi pro pietate in Deum ipsum blasphemare, pro candido et sincero Deitatis cultu fabulas et inanes superstitiones, pro desiderio Redemptoris et Messiae exitiale odium in Christum et maledicta in Christianos perdiscunt”, Stern, Urkundliche Beiträge cit., 1:100. 98   Adriano Prosperi, ‘Incontri rituali: il papa e gli ebrei’, in Gli ebrei in Italia, vol. 1: Dall’alto Medioevo all’ età dei ghetti cit., 497-520 at 512-3.

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faith. The protection was prompted not by conversionary intentions, but by ‘the mildness of Christian piety’. Jews were only to be baptized of their own free will99. Christian piety did not rule out attempts to win over the Jews as, for example, through conversionary sermons, a method promoted by various popes100. But the higher authorities of the Church did not embark on an active policy of conversion101. The new strategy initiated by the burning of the Talmud was formalized by the same Gian Pietro Carafa, who, as Pope Paul IV (1555-1559) issued the bull Cum nimis absurdum on 14 July 1555. The bull prohibited the Jews from owning real estate and limited their commercial activities, excluded them from practising medicine, forced them to wear a distinctive badge and forbade in general all social relations with Christians, regulations that culminated in the institution of the Roman ghetto as an effective means, but certainly also as a symbol, of separation between Jews and Christians102. The humiliating living conditions imposed upon the Roman Jews were justified as follows: “Considering that the Roman Church tolerates the Jews in testimony of the true Christian faith and to the end that they [convert], and that it is therefore appropriate that as long as they persist in their errors they should recognize through experience that they have been made slaves, while Christians have been made free through Jesus Christ, our God and Lord, and likewise recognize that it is iniquitous that the children of the free woman should serve the children of the maid-servant, […] we sanction […] that ghettoes be established” etc.103. As the head of the Inquisition, Carafa had taken the most rigorous possible action against the Talmud, which he considered a danger for the Catholic faith. Not surprisingly, therefore, in his battle against all forms of heresy that he (now Pope) put “the Talmud and all its glosses, comments, interpretations and explanations” on the first Roman Index librorum prohibitorum, published in 1559104. With the bull Cum nimis absurdum and the Talmud on the Index, Paul IV is commonly considered the trendsetter of Church policy vis-à99   “Statuimus enim, ut nullus Christianus invitos vel nolentes eos ad baptismum venire compellat, sed, si eorum quilibet ad Christianos fidei causa confugerit, postquam voluntas ejus fuerit patefacta, Christianus absque calumnia efficiatur”, Stern, Urkundliche Beiträge cit., 2:2. 100   See Peter Browe, Die Judenmission im Mittelalter und die Päpste (Rome, 1942), 13-54. 101   See Stow, Catholic Thought cit., XX-XXIV. 102   Vogelstein and Rieger, Geschichte der Juden in Rom cit., 2:152-4. 103   Bullarum cit., 6:498-9. I follow the translation proposed by David Berger. See David Berger, ‘Cum Nimis Absurdum and the Conversion of the Jews’, in Jewish Quarterly Review 70 (1979), 41-9 at 45. This reading, however, supports fully Kenneth Stow’s claim, denied by Berger, that “conversion was the core to which all Jewry policy including ghettoisation and a variety of other regulations was united”, see Stow, Catholic Thought cit., 3-13. For Stow’s answer to Berger, see Kenneth Stow, ‘The proper meaning of “Cum nimis Absurdum”’, in Jewish Quarterly Review 71 (1981), 251-2. See further Segre, ‘La Controriforma’ cit., 715-7. 104   See Reusch, Der Index der verbotenen Bücher cit., 2:48, 258-99.

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vis the Jews. The enduring existence of the ghetto has led many scholars to regard Cum nimis absurdum as a definitive charter of Roman legislation concerning the Jews, and consecutive bulls are often considered to be confirmation of this policy. The treatment of the Jews by subsequent Pontiffs, however, shows an alternating strategy, which materialized in either oppressive or welcoming and more attractive regulations. Paul IV’s successor Pius IV (1559-1565) abandoned his predecessor’s harsh policy – quite possibly motivated by a different conversion strategy. Presenting the Church in a more welcoming guise, he made certain commercial and economic concessions, such as allowing Jews to have shops outside the ghetto, to do business with Christians, to travel without the yellow hat and to acquire property105. He even relaxed the ban on the Talmud, on condition that it did not contain any contemptuous references to the Christian faith106. Pius V (1566-1572), however, adopted the same uncompromising policy towards the Jews as Paul IV. In the bull Romanus Pontifex (19 April 1566) he renewed all the regulations established in the bull Cum nimis absurdum and instead of considering the Jews potential members of the Church he expelled them from all towns in the Pontifical State apart from Ancona, Rome and Avignon107. Pope Gregory XIII and Conversion Policy On his ascension to the papal throne, Gregory XIII relinquished the policies of Pius V and resumed those of Pius IV’s. In addition, Gregory XIII alleviated the financial burden on the community through tax relief and lifted the prohibition on taking interest108. The Pope’s moderate policy towards the Jews did not itself bring about conversion. What the alleviation of the financial situation in the ghetto may have achieved was the creation of a more positive image of the Church, like that created earlier by Pius IV, which could break down barriers when embarking on an intensified conversionary policy. A number of decisions and papal decrees 105   “Quare nos, considerantes quod sancta mater Ecclesia hebraeis, quos in memoriam Passionis dominicae tolerat, multa plerumque concedit ut, christiana benignitate allecti, errorem suum recognoscant, et ad verum, quod est Christus, lumen tandem convertantur […]”, Bullarum, 7:167. See further Vogelstein and Rieger, Geschichte der Juden in Rom, 2:160-63; Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 127; Stow, Catholic Thought cit., 13-16. Stow calls these minor mitigations “that effected no radical change in the restrictions which Cum nimis had imposed on the Jews” (15). 106   “si tamen prodierint sine nomine Thalmud et sine injuriis et calumniis in religionem christianam, tolerabuntur”, Franz H. Reusch, Die indices librorum prohibitorum des sechzehnten Jahrhunderts (Tübingen, 1886), 279. See further Parente, ‘The Index’ cit., 165-9. 107   For the bull see Bullarum cit., 7:438-40. See further Vogelstein and Rieger, Geschichte der Juden in Rom cit., 2:163-9; Stow, Catholic Thought cit., 17-8. 108   See Vogelstein and Rieger, Geschichte der Juden in Rom cit., 2:169-72.

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indicate that the conversion of the Jews was high on the Pope’s agenda. The most obvious and effective way of stepping up the missionary activity was supporting the work of the Casa dei Catecumeni. The institution that in its early days, during the pontificate of Pope Paul III (1534-1549), had depended on voluntary contributions, from his successor onwards had been the recipient of papal support. Julius III (1550-1555) allocated the Casa a regular source of income by introducing a synagogue tax. In the bull Pastoris aeterni vices of 31 August 1554 he stipulated that all synagogues in Rome were henceforth subject to an annual tax amounting to 10 gold ducats. The Casa was to receive the proceeds of this tax, so that the Jewish community was forced to finance missionary activities among its own members. A petition was submitted to the Pope requesting revocation of the tax in view of the distressed circumstances of the community. As a result of the protest Julius withdrew the decree and, instead of the revenue that would have accrued from the synagogue tax, the Casa was granted an annual sum of 200 gold ducats from the usual taxes paid by the Roman Jews109. After the brief pontificate of Pope Marcellus (1555), his successor Paul IV devised additional, far-reaching means for financing the Casa. In Cum nimis absurdum he stipulated that in each Jewish residential area only one synagogue was permitted and, where necessary to conform to this restriction, synagogues were to be demolished110. During the pontificate of Julius III there were nine synagogues in Rome, which Paul IV reduced to three. In a further bull, issued on 28 March 1556, he reintroduced the provisions of the bull Pastoris aeterni vices, issued by Julius III, with the additional stipulation that the tax was also to be levied on closed and demolished synagogues111. This policy more or less lapsed during the pontificate of Pius IV. From the archives of the Casa dei Catecumeni it appears that, for the most part, the synagogue tax was not paid during this period, and that no measures were taken to ensure its collection. However, as the records show, his successor Pius V enforced the collection of four years’ worth of arrears112. Passionately committed to the conversionary cause, Gregory XIII took a personal interest in the Casa dei Catecumeni. The substantial financial support the Pope gave to this institution is documented in Marc’Antonio Ciappi’s Compendio delle heroiche et gloriose attioni, e santa vita di Papa Gregorio XIII. It was one of the many institutions that enjoyed the Pope’s magnanimous munificence and, according to Ciappi, it received   Vogelstein and Rieger, Geschichte der Juden in Rom cit., 2:61-3.   Ibid., 2:153. 111   See Archivio Storico del Vicariato di Roma (ASVR), Libro delle memorie della Chiesa, 30. See further Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 63-4; Vogelstein and Rieger, Geschichte der Juden in Rom cit., 2:155. 112   ASVR, Atti notarili 1565-1587, 303. 109

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thousands of scudi from the Pontiff113. Exaggerated as this report may be, Gregory’s generosity finds confirmation in his successor’s complaint about the financially desperate condition in which his predecessor had left the Church, and his reluctance therefore to support ‘the affairs of the East’114. The potential converts’ concern about life without family support must have been assuaged by the promise of accommodation in the Casa dei Catecumeni, and financial support if needed. As Co-Protector of the Casa dei Catecumeni Cardinal Santoro took personal note of the care for the neophytes. In his Catechismus Generalis he insists on appointing inspectors, who should visit and help sick and poor neophytes. Santoro leaves no room for ambiguity about his motivation: indigent neophytes should be supported so that extreme poverty should never force them to turn to [fellow] unbelievers115. A particular, meticulously designed tool of the missionary strategy was the dowry offered to Jewish converts. From the archives of the Casa dei Catecumeni it appears that the institution invariably offered a dowry of 50 scudi116. Such an amount was in sharp contrast to dowries given by Opere Pie, ecclesiastical institutions, which usually provided orphans and girls in poor circumstances with an average amount of 25 to 30 scudi117. By offering Jewish converts a dowry of 50 scudi the Church authorities – while never explicitly referring to Jewish practice – seem to have attempted to adhere to Jewish regulations for dowries for Jewish brides without means118. Given the poor conditions in the ghetto, the number of Jewish girls who needed this bridal support must have been considerable, and there is good reason to believe that the community was not able to deal with all the requests. Those who were denied a dowry 113   Marc’Antonio Ciappi, Compendio delle heroiche et gloriose attioni, e santa vita di Papa Gregorio XIII. Distinto in Tredeci Capi, in memoria delli XIII. anni, che egli visse nel suo Felice Pontificato: raccolto da Marc’Antonio Ciappi, Senese (Rome, 1596), 55. See also Possevino, Bibliotheca selecta cit., 1:440. 114   See Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 223. 115   “Si quis eorum infirmatur, statim per designatos visitatores visitetur, et subsidio spirituali et corporali, si opus fuerit, adiuvetur. Similiter et aliorum pauperum, et indigentium Neophytorum cura habeatur, ne propter nimiam inopiam aliquando ad suos infideles confugere cogantur”, Thomas à Jesu, De procuranda salute omnium gentium schismaticorum, haereticorum, Iudaeorum, Sarracenorum, caetertumque Infidelium, Book XII: Catechismus Generalis pro omnium sectarum catechumenis utilissimus, ab Illustrissimo Cardinale à Sancta Severina compositus, hactenus tamen nunquam editus, et a nobis in compendium redactus (Antwerp, 1613), 866-926 at 922. 116   See Piet van Boxel, ‘Dowry and the Conversion of the Jews in Rome: Competition between the Church and the Jewish Community’, in Marriage in Italy 1300-1650, ed. Trevor Dean and K.J.P. Lowe (Cambridge, 1998), 116-27 at 121-3. 117   Ibid., 123-5. 118   Ibid., 119-20. In his Catechismus Generalis Cardinal Santoro states in general terms that marriageable girls should financially be supported so that they can marry decently. See Thomas à Jesu, De procuranda cit., 910.

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from Jewish charity must have been tempted by the halakhic minimum amount that the Church offered to Jewish converts through the Casa dei Catecumeni. During the greater part of his pontificate Gregory XIII followed the standard policy of the Casa, and like his predecessors he provided individuals with a dowry of 50 scudi on more than one occasion119. But by the end of his pontificate, papal dowries had risen to 100 scudi or even more120. The Jewish community was obviously not in a position to compete with such generous offers, as may be concluded from the fact that in 1618 the administrators eventually decided to limit the number of dowries for poor girls to 12 per year and to fix the amount of the dowry at 50 scudi, so that the halakhic minimum became the maximum amount the community was prepared to pay121. It would appear, then, that by the end of Gregory’s pontificate the dowry had developed into a missionary tool, and that Christian marriage became a most attractive option for Jewish spouses without means. Although no numbers are known, it seems a reasonable assumption that many were not able to stand firm, and consequently converted. This highly competitive policy was pursued alongside official papal decrees directly focusing on the conversion of the Jews. In three papal bulls – Vices ejus nos, Antiqua judaeorum improbitas and Sancta Mater Ecclesia – Gregory XIII demonstrated a rather different attitude towards the Jews than that of his predecessors. As mentioned above, the first bull, Vices ejus nos (1 Sept 1577), forced the Jews ‘in alma Urbe’ to attend conversionary sermons and announced the founding of the Casa dei Neofiti, which was brought about by a reorganization of the male section of the Casa dei Catecumeni122. Over the years the Casa had continually expanded, with the result that on more than one occasion it was unable to offer sufficient accommodation for its pupils123. The difficulty arose partly because converted Jews remained in the Casa following their baptism until there   Van Boxel, ‘Dowry’ cit., 125.   Ibid., 126. 121   Ibid., 120. 122   For the full text of the bull see Bullarum cit., 8:188-91. 123   For female converts the accommodation was much as in a convent, and they were able to remain until they had found a suitable Christian marriage partner. Those who did not marry became nuns, and continued to live in the part reserved for female converts. In 1558 the female section was transferred from San Giovanni di Mercato to the Piazza Margana, a transfer that was officially approved by Pope Pius IV in a breve issued in 1560, see ASVR, Libro delle memorie della Chiesa cit., 12; Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 83-4. In 1568 the female branch of the Casa, in the meantime given papal recognition as a convent, was moved to the Preceptoria of the Knights of St John and was henceforth known as SS. Annunziata in San Basilio, see ASVR, Libro delle memorie della Chiesa cit., 26-8; Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 84-8. 119 120

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was some certainty of their being able to integrate themselves socially and religiously in the outside world. Consequently, the Casa dei Catecumeni was no longer simply a house for catechumens, but also a resident school for young neophytes, a function that was formalized in the bull Vices ejus nos, in which the Pope explicitly expressed his intention to convert unbelievers, in particular the Jews. He considered the Casa dei Neofiti an appropriate means to achieve this goal124. The new institution, officially called Collegium Ecclesiasticum Adolescentium Neophitorum, offered an extensive and thorough education for young men converted from the Jewish or Islamic faith. Students accepted for theological training enrolled at the Collegio Romano, the university founded by the Pope. Classes in music, Arabic, Hebrew and Syriac, and an advanced course in philosophy, were given at the Casa dei Neofiti125. In taking this initiative, the Pope hoped that some of these highly trained students would be imbued with the desire to undertake missionary activity in the communities from which they had come. Arrangements for the housing of the new institution were made by the Camera Apostolica, which on 22 March 1578 negotiated the acquisition of several buildings in the Rione San Eustachio opposite the Chiesa di Santa Chiara for this purpose. The transaction was approved, and funds were made available on 6 April of the same year126. Furthermore, the Pope insisted on the collection of the synagogue tax in the Papal State and even asked the Duke of Ferrara to impose a similar tax in his domain127. Little is known about the early achievements of this missionary institution, the only measure of its success being the numbers of students who entered the College128. Of the 11 students who enrolled in October 1577, eight were of Jewish origin. This ratio accorded with the assigned places for students, of which two-thirds were to be Jewish converts and one-third from the Islamic community, a proportion based on the number of converts at the time from the two faith groups resident in and around Rome. Some or all of the 11 students in the early days of the Collegio dei Neofiti attended Maestro di Casa Andrea de Monte’s weekly sermons to the Jews as part of their vocational training. During the pontificate of Gregory XIII, 88 students, 42 of them converted Jews, were admitted to the Casa dei Neofiti129. 124  “[…] sed eorum etiam, qui, in infidelitatis tenebris ambulantes, misere pereunt, praesertim iudaeorum, conversionem veramque salutem exoptare, ac totis viribus quaerere non cessemus”, Bullarum cit., 8:188. 125   See Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 182-6. 126   Ibid., 183. 127   ASVR, Atti notarili 1556-1587 cit., 958. 128   Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 189-90. 129   ASVR, Busta 8, pos. 11.

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Chapter 1 – Church Policy towards the Jews

The second bull, Antiqua judaeorum improbitas, was issued on 1 July 1581130. More than Vices ejus nos, it proclaims a radically different approach towards Jews and their writings from that of Gregory’s predecessors, who had focused on the blasphemies and contemptuous references to the Christian faith in Hebrew books. It is noteworthy that Antiqua judaeorum improbitas does not begin with a list of blasphemies, errors or indecencies, against which the inquisitors should take action, but rather with what Christians, Jews and other ‘infidels’ (meaning Muslims) have in common, a shared tradition which should neither publicly nor privately be denied: “We decide and declare that the inquisitors of heretical irregularity can freely proceed at all occasions and in cases that follow: if a Jew or an infidel has declared, proclaimed or privately suggested that what we have in common with them in terms of faith, such as the one God and the eternal, omnipotent creator of all that is visible and similar issues is not existing”131. This focus on what Christians, Jews and Muslims share provides us with a hermeneutical key with which to interpret the rest of the bull. It is first and foremost to be understood as a prohibition of actions and attitudes that undermine the common ground of Christians and Jews, either contradicting Christian doctrine or aiding Christians to practice heresy. Antiqua judaeorum improbitas expresses the Pope’s intention to create a shared religious space and dictionary. Such a goal could never have been achieved through the straightforward censorship introduced by his predecessor Julius III in his bull Cum sicut nuper, let alone by burning the Talmud or putting it on an Index132. Heretical books or Talmudic and other Jewish books, are only mentioned in second place, and only insofar as they contained heretical doctrines133. The bull Sancta Mater Ecclesia, issued on 1 September 1584, constitutes the sequel to Antiqua judaeorum improbitas by stipulating that in the sermons to the Jews – now universally imposed – a Christian interpretation of the portions of the Bible read in the Synagogue service, should confront the Jews with their misunderstanding and corruption of Scripture134. With this stipulation the bull formally confirmed a practice documented in An  For the full text of the bull see Bullarum cit., 8:378-80.   “… statuimus ac etiam declaramus inquisitores hereticae pravitatis libere procedere posse in omnibus causis et casibus, qui sequuntur. Si quis iudaeus aut infidelis, in iis quae circa fidem cum illis nobis sunt communia, veluti Deum unum et aeternum, omnipotentem, creatorem omnium visibilium, et invisibilium et similia, non esse asseruerit, praedicaverit vel privatim alicui insinuaverit”, Bullarum cit., 8:378. 132   For the beginnings of ecclesiastical censorship see Chapter 6, pp. 131-3. 133   “Si libros haereticos vel thalmudicos aut alios iudaicos quomodolibet damnatos aut alias prohibitos tenuerit, custodierit vel divulgaverit, vel in quaecumque loca detulerit, aut ad eam rem operam suam accomodaverit”, Bullarum cit., 8:379. 134   For the full text of the bull see Bullarum cit., 8:487-9. 130 131

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drea de Monte’s sermons preserved in MS Neofiti 35 and in the account that Gregory Martin has left us: “For every Sabbath they read one lesson of Moyses Law, and another on the prophetes answering to that [i.e. all the points that he has against them] as we read the Gospel and the Epistle. And therfore of purpose he taketh those lessons every day for his text”135.

135

  Martin, Roma Sancta cit., 79.

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CHAPTER 2

THE PREACHERS’ MANUALS

From the eyewitnesses’ accounts of the weekly sermons to the Jews in Rome, and from papal instructions, it appears that confronting the Jews with the Christian interpretation of Scripture and their misunderstanding and corruption of the Hebrew Bible was a well thought-out conversion strategy during the Pontificate of Gregory XIII. The most eminent preachers, both converted Jews and cradle Christians, took part in the undertaking. It therefore stands to reason that, in order to make a convincing case, preachers would have been provided with sufficient tools to identify alleged Jewish corruptions of the Hebrew Bible and to present a unanimously accepted Christian interpretation of Scripture. As already mentioned, in his Bibliotheca Selecta Antonio Possevino confessed it to be useful for those who had discussions with the rabbis to know these blasphemies. Gregory Martin alludes to such guidelines when reporting, “And al this, [namely the contradictions among them selves, the impossibilities that they imagine, and absurd folies that they invent, and shamful corruptions that they make as wel in the very text as in the interpretation thereof] he sheweth them to the eye, and readeth it before them out of the booke (for he hath al such bookes necessarie lying round about)”1. In Chapter 1 it was suggested that Cardinal Santoro’s presidency of the Congregation of Hebrew books should be understood specifically in terms of the way his scrutiny of Hebrew books served the project of preaching to the Jews. It may well be that the books Gregory Martin saw ‘lying around’ the preacher were the result of such examination. With the proviso that a leading role can be attributed to Santoro in composing MS Vat. lat. 14628, and the likelihood that it would cater for the specific undertaking of discussing the weekly reading from Torah and haftarah, the manuscript will prove to be a suitable candidate for such a manual. Thus far it has been considered to be an Index expurgatorius despite the fact that its format – large extracts mainly from Jewish biblical commentaries with marginal comments to the texts – does not bear any resemblance to the template of 1

  Martin, Roma Sancta cit., 79.

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such an Index2. In order to solve this incongruity Sacerdote, who launched the idea, considered Vat. lat. 14628 to be a preparatory phase of a final version of the Index3. William Popper joined him, arguing that “it was the intention to collect finally and index in one great work all the passages judged offensive, and to place a copy in the hands of the regularly appointed expurgator; his whole duty would consist then in the merely mechanical expurgation of such passages in any work brought before him as were contained in the authorized Index Expurgatorius”4. The manuscript’s extremely well organized layout and the fact that for the most part it was copied by scriptores already put into question the assumption that the manuscript represented a preparatory stage of a larger project. A conclusive rejection of Sacerdote’s claim is supported by the evidence of two other manuscripts: Vat. lat. 14629 and Vat. lat. 146305. From the description of these manuscripts it will emerge that their contents are partly identical to the material preserved in Vat. lat. 14628. A close comparison between the two will enable us to reconstruct the procedure the composers followed in selecting passages from the Hebrew books under discussion and to present a full picture of the undertaking and its participants. From the various stages of the project that will come to the fore in this reconstruction Vat. lat. 14630 and 14629 (in this order) will appear to be earlier drafts of Vat. lat. 14628, which is to be considered the final version of the undertaking6. This sequential order is confirmed by the final dates of composition provided in the three manuscripts7. The joint history and provenance of the three manuscripts, which are further proof of their interrelationship, will be discussed later in this chapter. 2   See Sacerdote, ‘Deux index’ cit., 262; Popper, Censorship cit., 62-4; Nathan Porges, ‘Der hebräische Index expurgatorius ‫’ספר הזיקוק‬, in Festschrift zum 70. Geburtstage A. Berliner’s, ed. Aron Freimann and Meier Hildesheimer (Frankfurt am Main, 1903), 273-95 at 278; Hoff�mann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 137; Stow, ‘The Burning of the Talmud’ cit., 458; Parente, ‘La Chiesa e il “Talmud”’ cit., 606; Parente, ‘The Index’ cit., 174; Godman, The Saint as Censor cit., 59; Saverio Ricci, Il sommo inquisitore: Giulio Antonio Santori tra autobiografia e storia (1532-1602) (Rome, 2002), 345-6. 3   Sacerdote, ‘Deux index’ cit., 270-1. 4   Popper, Censorship cit., 63. 5   Sacerdote’s oversight has been noted by Roger Le Déaut without appreciating the intimate relationship between the manuscripts. See Le Déaut, ‘Jalons pour une histoire’, 527 n. 3. When Sacerdote and Le Déaut discussed the manuscripts they were classmarked in the Vatican library as Neofiti 39 (= Vat. lat. 14628), Neofiti 49 (= Vat. lat. 14629) and Neofiti 50 (= Vat. lat. 14630). 6   See Chapter 4. 7   That this sequential order of the three manuscripts, namely Vat. lat. 14630, 14629 and 14628, is not followed in Fondo Vaticano latino is due to the fact that their relationship had not been established when they were transferred from the Fondo Neofiti to the Fondo Vaticano latino in 1977 (see below).

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Vaticano latino 14628 The manuscript is a codex of 460 paper sheets (28 cm x 21 cm), written on both sides, containing collections of passages from Jewish writings. The stamped foliation – recto and verso – was added after the various fascicles of the manuscript were bound. Many of the collections, in impeccable Latin, were written by copyists. Other parts, in Latin or in Italian, clearly were drafted by compilers, and they occasionally bear the compiler’s signature. The earliest date given is 1577; the last is 3 February 15838. The passages are usually accompanied by marginal notes, called censurae. In some collections the censurae are lacking, omissions that occasionally have been corrected9. These so-called revisions, both of the collected passages and of censurae, are unique to Vat. lat. 1462810. These corrections and adjustments are for the most part on separate sheets, often not bound together with the collections to which they refer, but dispersed throughout the manuscript. Biblical commentaries The collections preserved in Vat. lat. 14628 contain extracts from 17 commentaries, by a great variety of Jewish biblical commentators, including Rashi (1040-1105), Abraham ibn Ezra (1089-1164), David Kimhi (1160?-1235?), Moses ben Nahman (1194-1270), Levi ben Gershon (12881344), David ibn Yahya ben Solomon (1455-1528) and Abraham Farissol (c. 1451-c. 1525). One wonders how the composers of the collections came to their selection of commentaries, which at first glance seem to have been chosen at random and without any coherence. One rather enigmatic heading to a small collection in the manuscript, however, offers us the key for the rationale of a substantial part of the manuscript. The heading reads as follows: “censurae to the introduction to the Pentateuch [Torah] by a certain rabbi, who was in charge of the corrections when this Bible was printed in the year […] from the creation of the world”11. Although, no year is given, from the content of the collection it appears that the censurae concern the introduction to the rabbinic Bible, printed in Venice in 154748 by Daniel Bomberg. This Flemish entrepreneur from Antwerp, who in 1515 had started a printing press in Venice, published the first rabbinic Bible in 1516-17, with the Jewish convert Felice da Prato as editor; the   See App. I, 25 and 5a respectively.   See App. I, 6 n. 13 and 14 n.17. 10   See App. I, 1, 4, 7, 8, 12, 15, 16, 17, 21, 26. 11   See App. I, 11. The introduction was published by Christian David Ginsburg, Jacob Ben Chajim’s Introduction to the Rabbinic Bible. Hebrew and English: with Explanatory Notes (London, 1865). 8 9

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Hebrew text, along with an Aramaic translation – the Targum – was accompanied by a selection of rabbinic commentaries12. In 1524-25 Bomberg published his second rabbinic Bible, this time with the Jew Jacob ben Hayyim ibn Adonijah as the editor. The edition differs considerably from the first rabbinic Bible in that it includes more commentaries and, as emphasized by the editor in his preface, provides an improved biblical text13. Apparently due to high demand, a third edition, virtually a reprint of the second edition, followed in 1547-48. The editor was again Jacob ben Hayyim ibn Adonijah, whose name had been left out in the introduction for obvious reasons – by then he had converted to Christianity. The collected passages are headed simply as ‘censurae’ in the preface to the Pentateuch of a certain rabbi14. From a comparison of Vat. lat. 14628 with the various editions of Bomberg’s rabbinic Bible, it appears that the manuscript contains extracts from virtually all the commentaries from the first and the third editions. Most of the space in the first rabbinic Bible is taken up by two highly respected and popular biblical exegetes, Rashi and the famous grammarian and exegete of Narbonne David Kimhi, also known by his acronym Radak15. Certainly due to their immense popularity, their commentaries were republished in the second and third editions16. Vat. lat. 14628 contains collections of disputable passages from Rashi’s commentaries on the Pen12   For Daniel Bomberg see Bruce Nielsen, ‘Daniel van Bombergen, a Bookman of two worlds’, in The Hebrew Book in Early Modern Italy, ed. Joseph R. Hacker and Adam Shear (Philadelphia, 2011), 56-75. See further Joshua Bloch, ‘Venetian Printers of Hebrew books’, in Bulletin of the New York Public Library 36 (1932), 71-92 (Repr. in Hebrew Printing and Bibliography, ed. Charles Berlin, New York, 1976, 63-88). For a full description of the edition see Christian David Ginsburg, Introduction to the Massoretico-Critical Edition of the Hebrew Bible (London, 1897), 925-48. See further Thomas H. Darlow and Horace F. Moule, Historical Catalogue of the Printed Editions of Holy Scripture in the Library of the British and Foreign Bible Society, 2 vols (London, 1903-11), 2:703, For Bomberg’s entrepreneurial considerations in editing the edition see van Boxel, ‘Hebrew Books and Censorship’ cit., 76-9. 13   See Ginsburg, Introduction cit., 3436-84; Stephen G. Burnett, ‘The Strange Career of the Biblia Rabbinica among Christian Hebraists, 1517-1620’, in Shaping the Bible in the Reformation, ed. Bruce Gordon and Matthew McLean (Leiden, 2012), 63-84 at 68-9. According to Ginsburg, the editor of the first rabbinic Bible, Felice da Prato, had already claimed unjustifiably to have improved the biblical texts thus far “containing as many errors as words”, see Ginsburg, Introduction cit., 945-8. 14   See App. I, 11. Many Christian scholars possessed a copy of one or more editions. See Burnett, ‘The Strange Career of the Biblia Rabbinica’ cit., 67-8, 70 and 78-9. 15   For the use of Rashi by Radak, see Naomi Grunhaus, ‘The Dependence of Rabbi David Kimhi (Radak) on Rashi in his Quotations of Misdrashic Traditions’, in Jewish Quarterly Review 93 (2003), 415-30. 16   Rashi’s commentary on Torah was printed as early as 1480, and Kimhi’s commentaries on the former and on the latter Prophets in 1485, followed by many editions of individual Prophets; see further Grunhaus, ‘The Dependence of Rabbi David Kimhi (Radak)’ cit., 416 n. 5.

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tateuch, the Five Scrolls, Ezra, Nehemiah and Chronicles17. Some of these collections are extant in two versions18. Questionable interpretations were also collected from Kimhi’s commentaries19. Whether the first or the third rabbinic Bible was used for collecting passages from Rashi’s commentaries cannot be established. For the scrutiny of Kimhi’s commentaries the compilers seem to have used the third edition20. Also under scrutiny was the commentary on Proverbs by the Portuguese rabbi, grammarian and scholar David ibn Yahya ben Solomon. We also find extracts from commentaries on the Book of Job: that of the Italian Bible commentator, geographer and polemicist Abraham Farissol, and that of the Spanish physician, kabbalist and exegete Moses ben Nahman, commonly called Nahmanides or by his acronym Ramban. Vat. lat. 14628 furthermore preserves a collection of excerpts from the commentary on the Book of Daniel by the mathematician, astronomer, philosopher and Bible commentator Levi ben Gershon, usually called Gersonides, also known by his acronym Ralbag. The commentaries on Ezra, Nehemiah and Chronicles attributed to Simeon ha-Darshan were also subjected to close inspection21. Likewise, collections are found in Vat. lat. 14628 from all the commentaries in the third edition that had not been included in the first rabbinic Bible. Compilations were made from the commentaries on Torah by the Spanish polymath Abraham ibn Ezra and Jacob ben Asher (c. 1270c. 1340), the author of the halakhic work Arba’ah Turim, (The Four Rows)22. Vat. lat. 14628 also preserves collections from Levi ben Gershon’s commentaries on Joshua, Judges, 1 and 2 Samuel, 1 and 2 Kings, Job and Proverbs, as it does from the commentaries on Joshua, Judges, 1 and 2 Samuel and 1 and 2 Kings by the Italian Talmudist and biblical exegete 17   See App. I, 1. The Five Scrolls (in Hebrew called Megillot) are the Song of Songs, the Book of Ruth, the Book of Lamentations, Ecclesiastes and the Book of Esther, The collection from Genesis is missing, but is extant in Vat. lat. 14630 and 14629, see App. II, 3 and App. III, 4. 18   See App. I, 1. 19   Joshua, Judges, Samuel and Kings (in the manuscripts 1-4 Kings), and Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, see App. I, 12a, 12b, 12c. 20   In an earlier stage of collecting passages from Kimhi’s commentaries the collector noted that he had no access to his commentary on Psalms, from which it may be concluded that he worked with the third rabbinic Bible, in which this commentary included in the first rabbinic Bible was omitted, see App. III, 5. 21   For David ibn Yahya ben Solomon (the author of Kav ve-naki) see App. I, 16. For Moses ben Nahman and Farissol see App. I, 17 and 18. For Levi ben Gershon see App. I, 8c. For Simeon Ha-Darshan see App. I, 9. Levi ben Gershon’s commentary on the Megillot is missing. 22   See App. I, 2 and App. I, 7. The title The Four Rows alludes to the jewels on the High Priest’s breastplate according to Exodus 28:15-19. Asher was known, in reference to this title, as Ba’al ha-Turim.

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Isaiah ben Elijah di Trani [the younger] (13th/14th cent.)23 The collections from Ibn Ezra’s commentaries on Psalms, the Five Scrolls, Job, Proverbs, Ezra, Nehemiah and Daniel are extant only in an earlier draft, which is preserved in Vat. lat. 1462924. This also applies to the selection of excerpts from the commentary on the Book of Daniel by Saadiah Gaon (882-942), the important leader of Babylonian Jewry in the Geonic period25. By using the rabbinic Bibles as their main provider of information, the collectors did not work at random, but composed a coherent and comprehensive overview of Jewish exegesis from the eleventh to the sixteenth century, which combined Ashkenazi (Northern France and Western Germany) tradition, of which Rashi had become the most authoritative representative, with Sephardi (Spanish) or Provençal commentators such as Ibn Ezra, Kimhi and Levi ben Gershon26. An additional reason for paying attention to the third rabbinic Bible was Jacob ben Hayyim’s claim that, like the 1524-25 rabbinic Bible, this edition included the entire system of Massoretic annotations, a critical apparatus traditionally regarded as indispensable for the understanding of the biblical text27. Added to this summary of Jewish biblical interpretation were excerpts from very popular and the most recent commentaries that were not included in one of the rabbinic Bibles. One such work was Zeror hamor (A Bundle of Myrrh), a commentary on Torah by the Spanish exegete, preacher, and kabbalist Abraham ben Jacob Saba (middle of the 15th cent.-c. 1508)28. The title is derived from Song of Songs 1:13: “My beloved is to me a bundle of myrrh that lies between my breasts”. Saba wrote his commentary at the time of the expulsion of the Jews from Portugal, in 1497, and this experience is sometimes expressed in his commentary by way of emotive outbursts against the nations29. The reason it was submitted for examination may therefore well have been both its suspect contents and its popularity, of which the many editions provide evidence. It was first   See App. I, 8 and 10.   The collections are extant in Vat. lat. 14629, see App. III, 6. 25   The collection is extant in Vat. lat. 14629, see App. III, 7. 26   See David Stern, ‘The Rabbinic Bible in Its Sixteenth-Century Context’, in The Hebrew Book in Early Modern Italy cit., 76-108 at 99-101. 27   For a detailed description of the first and the second editions of Bomberg’s rabbinic Bible see Jordan S. Penkower, ‘Rabbinic Bible’, in Dictionary of Biblical Interpretation, 2 vols (Nashville, 1999), 1:361-4. See also Ginsburg, Introduction cit., 287-468. 28   See App. I, 4. The Esecutori in Venice had ordered, apparently not very effectively, all the copies of the edition to be burned in Piazza San Marco. See Paul Grendler, ‘The Destruction of Hebrew Books in Venice, 1568’, in Proceedings of the American Academy for Jewish Research 45 (1978), 103-30 at 113. For the clandestine ways Jews and their publishers found to print and distribute Hebrew books see ibid., 120-30. 29   See Bartolocci, Bibliotheca magna rabbinica cit., 1:48 and Abraham Gross, Iberian Jewry from Twilight to Dawn: The World of Rabbi Abraham Saba (Leiden, 1995). 23 24

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published in Constantinople in 1514, followed by three Venetian editions printed respectively by Daniel Bomberg (Venice, 1523), Marco Antonio Giustiniani (Venice, 1546) and Giorgio Cavalli (Venice, 1566)30. In Vat. lat. 14628 only the revision remarks have been preserved31. Equally popular was the Perush al ha-Torah, a commentary on Torah by the Italian rabbi and kabbalist Menahem ben Benjamin Recanati (late 13th-early 14th cent.) It was published twice in Venice in the first half of the sixteenth century, by Bomberg in 1523 and by Giustiniani in 154532. Hot off the press was a biblical commentary by the Jewish philosopher and statesman Isaac Abravanel (1437–1508). According to Julius Fürst, it was already censored when it came to print in Venice in 157933. Another relatively recently published work was the commentary on Torah, Song of Songs and Ecclesiastes in one volume by the Italian physician and philosopher – and Hebrew teacher of Johann Reuchlin – Obadiah ben Jacob Sforno (c. 1470-c. 1550)34. The work was published in Venice by Giovanni Griffio in 156735. In the same year Griffio published the first volume of Or ha-sekhel (The Light of the Intellect) entitled Ma’adanei melekh (Royal Dainties), a commentary on Bereshit Rabbah, the midrash on the Book of Genesis, by Abraham ben Gedaliah ibn Asher (Aba) (sixteenth century)36. It was examined together with another (the first) edition of Midrash Rabbah, printed   See Johann Ch. Wolf, Bibliotheca Hebraea, sive, Notitia tum auctorum Hebr. cuiuscunque aetatis, tum scriptorum, quae vel Hebraice primum exarata vel ab aliis conversa sunt, ad nostram aetatem deducta, 4 vols (Hamburg, 1715-33), 1:93. 31   For the censorship of the various editions see Federica Francesconi, “This Passage can also be Read Differently […]: How Jews and Christians Censored Hebrew Texts in Early Modern Modena”, in Jewish History 26 (2012), 139-160, at 144. 32   See App. I, 15. 33   See App. I, 5a. For the censorship of the work, see Julius Fürst, Bibliotheca Judaica: bibliographisches Handbuch der gesammten jüdischen Literatur mit Einschluss der Schriften über Juden und Judenthum und einer Geschichte der jüdischen Bibliographie, 3 vols (Leipzig, 1849–63), 1:11. 34   See App. I, 6. 35   In the manuscript indicated as ‘ex impressione Veneta’ (fol. 210). Other biblical commentaries by Obadiah ben Jacob Sforno were published later: Job: Venice 1590; Psalms: Venice 1586; Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Ruth were included in the Amsterdam rabbinic Bible Kehilat Moshe, 1724. 36   The collection is missing, see App. I, 26. To the lemma ‘Rabbi Abba’ Bartolocci wrote: “Scripsit Pirusc, id est Commentarium super primos duos libros Rabbòth, id est Super Genesim & Exodum. Extat msc. Romae in Biblioth. Collegii Neophyt. in 4. Papyr.”, Bartolocci, Bibliotheca magna rabbinica cit., 1:1. He does not mention having seen a collection of excerpts from this commentary in the Casa dei Neofiti. The examination of Or ha-sekhel shows an attitude different from that of the Venetian authorities, who immediately after its publication ordered the 1,000 copies seized to be burned. See Grendler, ‘The Destruction of Hebrew Books’ cit., 114. On Aba see Benjamin Williams, ‘The Ingathering of Midrash Rabbah: A Moment of Creation and Innovation’, in Midrash Unbound: Transformations and Innovations, ed. Michael Fishbane and Joanna Weinberg (Oxford, 2013), 347-70, at 361-70. 30

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in Constantinople in 151237. The only manuscript scrutinized (liber manuscriptus) was the commentary on Psalms by the Provençal scholar and Talmud commentator Menachem ha-Me’iri (1249-1316)38. Theological works The comprehensive survey of Jewish exegetical literature contained in Vat. lat. 14628 must surely make it a serious candidate for use as a manual for the weekly sermons to the Jews. The small number of non-exegetical tracts included in the manuscript does not overturn this hypothesis. For the topics dealt with in these tractates, such as punishment, repentance and atonement, resurrection and the Messiah, were obviously of fundamental importance to both Jews and Christians and would have been integral to the exegetical discussions. Among the works discussed was Abravanel’s Rosh Amanah (Principles of Faith), a defence of Maimonides’ formulation of the so-called Thirteen Principles of Faith39. It was published together with Nahalat Avot (Heritage of the Fathers) and Zevah Pesah (Passover Sacrifice) in Constantinople 1505 and 1519; later editions were published in Venice in 1545 by Giustiniani and in Cremona in 1557 by Vincenzo Conti. Which edition the compilers used cannot be established. Jewish rites, feasts and fasts, the Messiah and the resurrection of the deaths are the subjects of Zeidah la-Derekh (Provision for the Way) by the Spanish rabbi and codifier Menahem ben Zerah (early 14th cent.-1385)40. It was printed in Ferrara in 155441. Reward, punishment, repentance and the hereafter feature in Sefer Hasidim (Book of the Pious) by Judah ben Samuel he-Hasid (c. 1150-1217)42. The work was printed in Bologna in 1538 by Abraham Moses ha-Kohen. Since the collection was approved in 1580, the compilers could not have used the second edition, which was printed in Basel in 1581 by Ambrosius Froben43. Atonement and repentance are equally the central subject in Sha’arei Teshuvah (Gates of Repentance) by the Spanish rabbi and Talmudist Jonah Gerondi   See App. I, 14.   See App. I, 19. The manuscript is held by the Vatican Library (Vat. ebr. 527). The owner’s stamp is Bibl. S. Puden[tiane] de Urbe. It was published for the first time in 1936 in Jerusalem by Joseph Cohn: [Menachem ha-Meiri], Commentarius libri psalmorum quem composuit R. Menachem ha-Meiri (Jerusalem, 1936). 39   See App. I, 5b. For a full discussion of the Thirteen Principles, see Arthur Hyman, ‘Maimonides’ “Thirteen Principles”’ in Jewish Medieval and Renaissance Studies, ed. Alexander Altmann (Cambridge, MA, 1967), 119-44. 40   See App. I, 13. The title is derived from Genesis 42:25, cfr. Joshua 9:11 41   See Wolf, Bibliotheca Hebraea cit., I:764. 42   See App. I, 20. 43   See further Encyclopedia Judaica cit., 11:490. 37 38

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(c. 1200-1263)44. The work was printed three times in the sixteenth century: in Fano by Gerson Soncino in 1505, in Constantinople by David Nachmias in 1511 and in Venice [publisher unidentified] in 1544. The compilers may have used the Venice edition45. Seder Olam Rabbah (The Great Order of the World) is a second-century midrashic chronology of biblical events from the Creation to the conquest of Persia by Alexander the Great46. The Hebrew work was first published in Mantua in 1513, and a popular edition with the Latin translation of the French Benedictine professor of Hebrew at the Collège royal de France Gilbert Génébrard (1535-1597) was printed in Paris in 1577 and in Basel in 158047. It is not surprising that Robert Bellarmine took it upon himself to examine the highly sensitive subject of chronology, although as supervisor of the project, he usually took no part in the compiling of the excerpts48. Bellarmine himself did not publish his short chronology from the creation of the world until the year 1621, in his De scriptoribus ecclesiasticis49. Liturgy The Torah readings are an integral part of the synagogue service. It is therefore all too obvious that the prayer book used by the Roman Jews, the Mahzor Romi, would have also been subjected to meticulous examination. Only the beginning of a collection from the prayer book is extant in Vat. lat. 1462850. The special section on mourning, in Latin translation by Génébrard, was separately dealt with by Robert Bellarmine51. Though   See App. I, 21.   See App. I, 21. 46   See Günter Stemberger, Introduction to the Talmud and Midrash, trans. and ed. Markus Bockmuehl, 2nd ed. (Edinburgh, 1991), 354-5. 47   Calendarium Hebraeorum ad intelligendam scripturam et synagoge ritus utilissimum (Paris, 1577). 48   See App. I, 25. A shortened Latin version of Seder olam rabbah by Génébrard with his commentary was published as the first volume in Chronographia in duos libros distincta. Prior est de Rebus veteris Populi: Posterior recentes historias, praesertimque Ecclesiasticas complectitur (Paris, 1567). On the importance of the Jewish calendar for the chronology of early Christianity see Anthony Grafton and Joanna Weinberg, ‘I have always loved the Holy tongue’: Isaac Casaubon, the Jews, and a Forgotten Chapter in Renaissance Scholarship (Cambridge, MA, 2011), 217-30. 49   Robertus Bellarminus, De Scriptoribus Ecclesiasticis Liber Unus cum Adiunctis Indicibus undecim et brevi Chronologia ab Orbe condito usque ad annum M.DC.XXXI (Cologne, 1631). (The date of publication does not comply with the date mentioned at the beginning – 1613 – or at the end of the end – 1621 – of the chronology). 50   See App. I, 24. The largest part of the collection is preserved in MS Borgiano latino 149, also held in the Vatican Library. The different provenance of the manuscript will be discussed in Chapter 3. 51   Symbolum fidei Iudaeorum e R. Mose Aegyptio; praecationes eorumdem pro defunctis, 44 45

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no explicit regulations had been issued about the Jewish prayer book, the scrutiny of this Latin translation seems to reflect a concern, which was officially formulated in the Index of forbidden books promulgated by Pope Clement VIII in 1596. In the Index it is stated that no translation whatsoever of the Mahzor is permitted52. Pertinent to liturgical practices is a loose leaf encased in this manuscript. It comprises a fascinating note about the discussion of Rabbi Jonah Gerondi, one of the commentators of Alfasi’s Sefer ha-Halakhot, on the legal question of whether a Jew may respond Amen to a blessing made by a Cuthean, namely a pagan or gentile53. Vaticano latino 14630 The earliest phase of the examination of Hebrew books is preserved in Vat. lat. 14630, a codex of 289 paper sheets (21 cm x 14 cm) written on both sides. It contains mainly collections of passages from rabbinic commentaries on the Bible in a mixture of Latin and Italian in the same hand. The earliest date given is 1 February 1577, the last date is 7 February 157854. Originally, each folio was separately numbered; in a later phase a stamped foliation, recto and verso, was added to both sides55. There is no explicit indication of who composed the collections. The manuscript begins with a bibliography of works by Jewish authors on halakhah (legal matters) and Jewish hermeneutics, followed by a list of Christian polemical works against the Jews56. The larger part of the manuscript consists of excerpts from all of Rashi’s biblical commentaries except for those on Song of Songs, Ruth and Ezra57. To some collections additional passages were appended, which were marked as suppleta58. e lib. Mahzor; aliae, in quibus commemorationem suorum diuorum faciunt; aliae pro his, qui despondentur et coniuga[n]tur, e breuiario Hebraeorum; sexcenta tredecim Legis praecepta, e More Nebuchim. Interprete G. Genebrardo theologo Parisiensi (Paris, 1569), see App. I, 22. 52   See Reusch, Die Indices librorum prohibitorum cit., 537. For a detailed discussion of the polemics between Catholics and Protestants about the question as to whether Jews prayed for the dead see Grafton and Weinberg, ‘I have always loved the Holy tongue’ cit., 48-9. 53   See App. I, 3.The passage relates to Mishnah Berakhot 8:8 as taken up by the medieval commentators. The passage is discussed in Chapter 6, 148-9. 54   See App. II, 4 n. 19 and 6 n. 24. 55   Since the original numbering is not consistent and often missing, the stamped pagination is followed here when referring to a particular folio in the manuscript. 56   See App. II, 1. The function of these bibliographies will be discussed in Chapter 6. 57   See App. II, 3. Though traditionally attributed to him, the commentaries on Job from 40:25 onwards, Ezra, Nehemiah and Chronicles are different in style and method of exegesis and are not considered authentic. On Rashi see Avraham Grossman, Rashi translated [from the Hebrew] by Joel Linsider (Oxford, 2012). From his commentary on Job, only two passages have been selected, combined with a few passages from the commentaries on Job by Ibn Ezra and Levi ben Gershon, see App. II, 7. 58   See App. II, 3 and 4.

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Extracts were made of Abraham ibn Ezra’s commentaries on Jeremiah, Proverbs, and Job59. The manuscript furthermore contains combined collections of passages from Rashi’s and Ibn Ezra’s commentaries on Isaiah, Psalms and Ecclesiastes, with suppleta to the collection from Psalms60. From Rashi’s and Ibn Ezra’s commentaries on the Book of Psalms one combined collection of excerpts was made, a procedure followed more than once by the composer. This seemingly unorganized working method is actually a clear indication that they were working from the rabbinic Bibles. In this case the collection was apparently made from the third rabbinic Bible, in which Rashi’s and Ibn Ezra’s commentaries on the Book of Psalms figure together. (The first and second rabbinic Bibles did not include Ibn Ezra’s commentary on the Book of Psalms)61. The collection also contained extracts from Levi ben Gershon’s commentary on Proverbs and from his introduction to the Book of Job62. The composer commented on the Massorah63, and remarkably extracted Nahmanides’ citations of the apocryphal Book of Wisdom in his introduction to his commentary64. A number of genealogical trees of biblical figures are scattered throughout the manuscript65. Vaticano latino 14629 The manuscript is a codex of 352 paper sheets (28 cm x 21 cm) written on both sides. The stamped foliation – using recto and verso for the page – was added after the manuscript was bound. Like Vat. lat. 14630, Vat. lat. 14629 comprises collections of passages mainly from rabbinic biblical commentaries, for the most part in Latin translation and in various hands. Some collections are like those in Vat. lat. 14630, written in a mixture of Latin and Italian. The earliest date given is 22 October 1577; the last is 12 April 157966. In contrast to Vat. lat. 14630, the selected passages are provided with comments, the so-called censurae, at the end of each   See App. II, 5.   See App. II, 4. 61   See App. II, 4. This also applies to the combined collection of excerpts from the commentaries on Job by Rashi, Ibn Ezra and Levi ben Gershon, see App. II, 7. Further confirmation that the second rabbinic Bible was not examined is found in the fact that no collection is extant in any of the three manuscripts from Ibn Ezra’s commentaries on the Minor Prophets included in the 1524 edition and left out in 1547 edition. From his commentary on Isaiah only one note, concerning Chapter 66, is found in Vat. lat. 14630, see App. II, 4. 62   See App. II, 6. 63   See App. II, 8. The extracts from the Massorah in Vat. lat. 14630 are probably taken from the third edition. 64   See App. II, 9. 65   See App. II, 2. 66   See App. III, 4 and 6. 59 60

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passage. Underlined and thus easily recognizable, they are either merely brief classificatory references to the nature of the texts or more elaborate assessments with a clear polemical edge. In the last 40 pages comments have been added to the passages only occasionally. The first 40 pages of the manuscript contain an Index of alleged errors in Rashi’s biblical commentaries and in the commentary on the Pentateuch by the biblical commentator and kabbalist Bahya ben Asher ben Hlava (mid thirteenth century-1340)67. This highly popular commentary on Torah, in which Bahya provides the four levels of interpretation: the plain (peshat), the non-literal (derash), philosophical or rational (derekh sekhel) and a kabbalistic (sod) interpretation, was printed in Naples as early as 149268. Once again, the extraordinary popularity of Bahya’s commentary, combined with the many anti-Christian passages that it contains, made the work an inevitable target for examination. The Index refers to the excerpts from Rashi’s and Bahya’s commentaries in the manuscript69. A third list of errors refers to the Mahzor70. The collection itself of the disputable passages from the prayer book is not found in this manuscript71. In addition to the collections from Bahya’s commentary on Torah and all of Rashi’s commentaries on the Hebrew Bible, the manuscript preserves compilations: from David Kimhi (Samuel and Kings, the Prophets and Chronicles), Ibn Ezra (Genesis, Exodus, Proverbs, Ruth, Psalms, Song of Songs and Daniel), Saadiah Gaon (Daniel) and Immanuel ben Solomon of Rome (Proverbs)72. As in Vat. lat. 14630, we find suppleta to collections, here related to the collections from Rashi’s and Kimhi’s commentaries73. The last 20 pages of the manuscript contain Latin translations of the Aramaic paraphrases (Targumim) of Ecclesiastes, the Songs of Hannah and David and the Book of Esther74. From a comparison, it emerges that excerpts from Rashi’s commentaries are found in all three manuscripts, with the exception of Genesis, which is not extant in Vat. lat. 14628, and Job, Song of Songs, Ruth, Chron  See App. III, 1.   It was followed by editions printed by members of the Soncino family in Pesaro (1507, 1514, 1517), Constantinople (1517) and Rimini (1524). The Venice editions were produced by Cornelius Adelkind in 1544, Daniel Bomberg in 1546, and Giorgio di Cavalli in 1566. 69   For the collections from Rashi’s commentaries see App. III, 4; for the collection from Bahya’s commentary see App. III, 3. The collection from Bahya’s commentary is preceded by the Arbor Sephiroth, the tree representing the 10 Sefirot or divine emanations. 70   See App. III, 2. 71   The collection is preserved in the Vatican Library as MS Borgiano latino 149, see App. I, 24 n. 20 and App. III, 2 n. 3. 72   For Kimhi see App. III, 5; for Abraham Ibn Ezra see App. III, 6; for Saadiah Gaon see App. III, 7; for Immanuel ben Solomon of Rome see App. III, 8. 73   See App. III, 4 and 5. 74   See App. III, 9, 10, 11 and 12. 67 68

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icles, Ezra and Nehemiah, which are lacking in Vat. lat. 1463075. Collections from Kimhi’s commentaries on Joshua, Judges, the Books of Samuel and Kings, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Chronicles are found in Vat. lat. 14629 and Vat. lat. 1462876. Both Vat. lat. 14630 and Vat. lat. 14629 contain a collection from Ibn Ezra’s commentary on Psalms77. These parallels bring the intimate relationship between the manuscripts clearly to the fore. The intricacies of this relationship will be laid out in a detailed reconstruction of the project78. Provenance of the Manuscripts The three manuscripts under discussion have shared the Vatican Library as their home only since 1891, when they were added to the holdings of the library classified as Neofiti 39, Neofiti 49 and Neofiti 50. Their arrival was the result of the relocation of 42 manuscripts in total, belonging to the library of the Casa dei Catecumeni e Neofiti79. On 1 April 1891 the rector of the Casa, Monsignor Ludovico Schüller, arranged for the 42 manuscripts to be temporarily transferred to the Vatican library80. In the list compiled for the transfer, manuscript 38 was noted as ‘Censure sui libri ebraici’81. The title undoubtedly refers to the manuscript that was subsequently recorded in the catalogue of the Vatican library as Neofiti 39 (now Vat. lat. 14628) bearing on the spine the misleading title “Bellarmino Roberti censurae super commentarios Rabbinorum”. In 1893 the entire library of the Casa dei Catecumeni e Neofiti was sold to a dealer, except for a small number of books and manuscripts. These manuscripts were then sold to the Vatican Library in 1896 together with those that already had been   See App. I, 1; App. II, 3; App. III, 4.   See App. I, 12; App. III, 5. 77   See App. II, 4; App. III, 6. 78   See Chapter 4. 79   The two libraries merged when, following the authorization by Pope Urban VIII (16231644), the two institutions were jointly located on the premises near the church of the Madonna dei Monti. A close link developed between the Casa dei Catecumeni e Neofiti and the church, as the students actively participated in the services. See Le Déaut, ‘Jalons pour une histoire’ cit., 516; Rome, ASVR, Libro delle memorie della Chiesa cit., 35-6 and 122; Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 192-8. The Casa dei Catechumeni e Neofiti continued its activities in the new premises until 1962. In that year the missionary was officially disbanded and the records were moved to the Archivio Storico del Vicariato di Roma. 80   ASVR, Busta 23, pos. 75; see Le Déaut, ‘Jalons pour une histoire’ cit., 526. Ludovico Schüller (1852-1924), born in Rome, was appointed rector of the Casa dei Catecumeni e Neofiti in 1886. For a biography see ASVR, Busta 46, pos. 14: “In memoria del sacerdote romano Monsignor Ludovico Schueller canonico liberiano rettore della pia casa dei Catecumeni e Neofiti con prefazione di Mons. Vincenzo Bianchi-Cagliesi protonotario apostolico partecipante”. 81   See Le Déaut, ‘Jalons pour une histoire’ cit., 526-7. 75 76

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transferred in 189182. Since the contents of Neofiti 39, Neofiti 49 and Neofiti 50 are mainly in Latin, the Prefetto of the library in 1977 decided to add them to the Fondo Vaticano latino as Vat. lat. 14628, Vat. lat. 14629 and Vat. lat. 14630 respectively. In an inventory of the library of the Casa dated 1869 the three manuscripts are listed as Censurae super commentarios Rabbinorum (Neofiti 39 = Vat. lat. 14628), Miscellanae Biblicae (Neofiti 49 = Vat. lat. 14629) and Libro Genesis (Neofiti 50 = Vat. lat. 14630)83. In earlier inventories there is no further mention of Neofiti 50, but it may be presumed that the inscription ‘Collegij Neophytorum’ at the end of the manuscript reveals its provenance. Having been recognized as a sixteenth century hand, the dating of the inscription is sufficiently consistent with the last date mentioned in the manuscript (7 February 1578) to consider the library of the Casa dei Neofiti as its original home84. A legal document dated 16 June 1824 and kept in the archives of the Casa sheds further light on the common history of Neofiti 39 and Neofiti 49. It refers to “two manuscripts which are said to be compiled by Cardinal Bellarmine and scholars with an excellent knowledge of the Hebrew language”, a description that suits Bellarmine’s authoritative role in the assessment of the compilations in Neofiti 39 (Vat. lat. 14628)85. His role in the compilation of Neofiti 49 (Vat. lat. 14629), where his name is mentioned only once, seems less obvious. Since, however, the latter covers in no small measure the same material as Neofiti 39, there is no reason not to consider Neofiti 49 to be the other manuscript mentioned in the document86. The earliest reference to Neofiti 39 is found in an inventory of the library of the Casa dei Catecumeni e Neofiti dated 1713, which includes the title Censurae super commentarios Rabbinorum in the section Scrittura Sacra87. No reason is given as to why the inventory was drawn up, but it may reflect some reorganization of the   Le Déaut, ‘Jalons pour une histoire’ cit., 527.   See ASVR, Busta 294, pos. 4: “Çatalogo Della Biblioteca de L.L.P.P. De Catecumeni di Roma Fatto Nell’Anno 1869 da G.L. Loreti, il quale memore de benefici ricevuti in detta Pia Casa nel tempo che vi fece dimora volle con questo dare a suoi Benefattori un picolo attestato dáffetto e di gratitudine”. 84   Vat. lat. 14630, fol. 288v. The same inscription is found in other manuscripts, which in 1662 were transferred from the Casa dei Neofiti to the Vatican. See Le Déaut, ‘Jalons pour une histoire’ cit., 515. 85   “Due Tomi manoscritti indicati in esso, opera pregievole e singolare composta dal Cardinale Bellarmino e dai piu grand’uomini del suo secolo intelligenti della lingua ebraica”: ASVR, Busta 11, pos. 62. 86   See above. 87 .   ASVR, Instrumenti 1709-1713. The title Censurae super commentarios Rabbinorum, mentioned on p. 71, clearly refers only to Neofiti 39 and does not include, as Le Déaut claims, Neofiti 49 and 50, which bear a different title on the spine, see Le Déaut, ‘Jalons pour une histoire’ cit., 524. 82 83

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library, which included the binding of fascicles that now make up Vat. lat. 14628. Prior to 1713 we find references only to parts of this manuscript. Giulio Bartolocci in his Bibliotheca magna rabbinica, published between 1675 and 1693, mentions the Censurae to Ibn Ezra’s commentary on the Pentateuch collected by Diego Lopez in the College of the Neophytes88. Carlo Imbonati in his Biblioteca Latino-Hebraica, published in 1694, lists collections from the following biblical commentaries and treatises: Abraham ibn Ezra’s and Jacob ben Asher’s commentaries on the Pentateuch and Levi ben Gershon’s commentary on Proverbs by Diego Lopez89; Midrash on the death of Moses and Abravanel’s Rosh Amana by Marco Marini da Brescia90; Menahem Recanati’s commentary on the Pentateuch by Mattia Aquario91; Abraham ben Jacob Saba’s commentary on Torah, Zeror hamor and Judah ben Samuel he-Hasid’s Sefer Hasidim by Diego de Ahumada92; David Kimhi’s commentary on Joshua, Judges, the Books of Samuel and Kings and Levi ben Gershon’s commentary on Proverbs by Adamanzio da Firenze93. Under Robert Bellarmine’s name figure the censurae to Ibn Ezra’s Pentateuch commentary, Abraham ben Jacob Saba’s commentary on Torah, Zeror hamor, Kimhi’s commentary on Joshua, Judges, the Books of Samuel and Kings and to the Mahzor, the prayer book for the Jewish festivals94. 88   “Censuras super commentarios Rabii Aben Ezra in Pentateuchum collegit Didacus Lopez anno Domini 1578 et habentur manuscripti in Collegio Neophytorum Urbis”, Bartolocci, Bibliotheca magna rabbinica cit., 1:41, see App. I, 2. 89   “Didacus Lopez de Messa natione Hispanus, patria Zafrensis, Societatis Jesu, collegit Errores et censuras in Commentarios R. Abraham Aben Ezrae super Pentateuchum, an. 1378 [sic]. Extant msc. in Collegio Neophytorum Romae. Item in R. Iacob Baal Turim super Pentateuchum, et in R. Levi Gerson super Proverbia Salomonis. Extant msc. ibidem”, Carlo Imbonati, Biblioteca Latino-Hebraica, sive, De scriptoribus Latinis, qui ex diversis nationibus contra Iudaeos, vel de re Hebraica utcumque scripsere (Rome, 1694), 35, see App. I, 2, 7 and 8b. 90   “Marcus Marinus Brixianus, Canonicus Regularis D. Salvatoris, Censuram super Rabboth. Extat msc. in Collegio Neophytorum Romae; Censuras super librum Rosh emunah [in Hebrew letters] R. Isaaci Abravanelis. Reperitur ibid. De fabulosa Morte Mosis. Ibid.”, Imbonati, Biblioteca Latino-Hebraica cit., 156, see App. I, 14 and 5b. 91   “Matthias Aquarius collegit Errores R. Menachem Recanati super Pentateuchum. Extat liber hic msc. in Collegio Neophytorum Romae”, Imbonati, Biblioteca Latino-Hebraica cit., 160, see App. I, 15. 92   “Didacus Humadas confecit Censuras super librum, qui appellatur Fasciculus myrrhae R. Abraham Sabag. Extat msc. in Collegio Neophytorum Romae an. 1580. Item in librum Nachasidin [Hasidim] R. Iudae Chasid. Extat msc. ibidem”, Imbonati, Biblioteca Latino-Hebraica cit., 34, see App. I, 4 and 20. 93   “Adamantius Eremitanus collegit Censuras in commentarios R. David Kimchi et R. Levi Gerson. Extant msc. in Bibl. Collegii Neophyt. Romae”, Imbonati, Biblioteca Latino-Hebraica cit., p. 1. For Kimhi see App. I, 12. The collection (or revision) from Levi ben Gershon’s commentary is not extant, see App. I, 8b. 94   “Robertus Bellarminus censuras in commentarios R. Abrahami Aben Ezrae super Pentateuchum, recognovit an. 1578. Extant msc. in Collegio Neophytorum Romae. Item super Fasciculum myrrhae R. Abraham Sabag in Pentateuchum, et R. David Kimchi. Edidit etiam

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From a comparison of Imbonati’s inventory with Vat. lat. 14628 it appears that a number of collections preserved in Vat. lat. 14628 are not listed in the Biblioteca Latino-Hebraica95. The incompleteness might have been caused by an oversight on the part of Imbonati. Since the collections as found in Vat. lat. 14629 and 14628 were bound more than 100 years after they were composed, there is a good possibility that in the course of time (parts of) these collections were mislaid96. The assumption that collections went astray without leaving any trace at all in Vat. lat. 14628 finds an unexpected confirmation in MS 2456 of the Biblioteca Universitaria di Bologna (BUB), which contains six collections from rabbinic writings in an autograph of Marco Marini da Brescia, one of the participants in the undertaking under discussion. They appear to have been included under Marini’s name in Vat. lat. 1462897. The Bologna manuscript preserves a set of excerpts from the midrashic commentary on Torah and the Five Scrolls printed in Constantinople in 1512 that is identical to the excerpts included in Vat. Lat. 14628 under the name Censura in Rabbot, super fabulosa morte Moysi ex impressione Costantinopolitana98. We find the same passages from the commentary on Psalms by Menachem ha-Meiri in Vat. lat. 14628 and BUB 245699. The collection in Vat. lat. 14628 from Menahem ben Zerah’s treatise on Jewish rites, Zeidah la-Derekh, was copied from the autograph in the Bologna manuscript100. A selection from Obadiah Sforno’s commentary on Torah, Song of Songs and Ecclesiastes as found in Vat. lat. 14628 is copied word for word from Marco Marini’s collection preserved in the Bologna manuscript101. Abravanel’s Rosh Amanah in Vat. lat. 14628 is a faithful rendition of the slightly corrected second copy of this work in the Bologna manuscript102. Exact parallels of the collections Censuram in lugentium officium, ex libro precationum Hebraicarum, qui inscribitur Machazor Synagogae Romanae, Genebrardo Interprete. Extat msc. in supradicto Collegio”, Imbonati, Biblioteca Latino-Hebraica cit., 217, see App. I, 2, 4, 12 and 22. 95   See App. I, 1, 5a, 6, 9, 10, 13, 16, 17, 18, 19, 21 and 25. 96   From Imbonati, Biblioteca Latino-Hebraica cit., it appears that in 1695 they still circulated as separate fascicles, see notes 89-94. 97   I am most grateful to Michela Andreatta for having drawn my attention to the manuscript and for having allowed me to integrate her finding into my research. 98   App. I, 14 and BUB MS 2456, Censura Raboth ex impressione Costantinopolitana, fols 21r-30r. Only the collection from Deuteronomy is significantly bigger in Vat. lat. 14628. Marini used the Constantinople, 1512 edition. 99   See BUB 2456, In expositionem psalmorum rabi Menahem censura. Liber manuscriptus, fol. 31v and App. I, 19. 100   See App. I, 13 and BUB 2456, Censura libri Zedah ladarech; Rabi Menahem de praeceptis legis ex impressione cremonesi, fols 42r-43r (final copy fols 46r-47r). 101   See App. I, 6 and BUB 2456, Censura commentariorum Abdia Sphorni in pentateuchum, fols 44r-45r (final copy fols 48r-49r) and Censura eiusdem sphorni in Cantica Canticorum et Ecclesiastem, fol. 45v (final copy fol. 49v). Marini used the Venice 1567 editions. 102   See App. I, 5b and BUB 2456, Censura libri Ros amana barbanela, fols 54r-55r (earlier version fol. 52r-v). (fol. 50r-v: Nonnulli errores reperti in libro qui dicitur Amona Abarbanil).

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in Vat. lat. 14628, these six compilations provide sufficient evidence that other collections preserved in BUB 2456 and composed by Marco Marini must have been part of the project under discussion, but did not leave any trace in Vat. lat. 14628. These Marini-Bologna collections contain a variety of works that belong to the wider canon of Jewish literature. They include the Sefer ha- ’Ikkarim (Book of Principles), completed in 1425 by the Jewish philosopher Joseph Albo (c. 1380–1444); Kad HaKemach (Receptacle of the Flour) by Bahya ben Asher ben Hlava, an encyclopaedic collection of 60 homilies on fundamental Jewish concepts, as well as ritual practices103; the Tannaitic midrashim, the Mekhilta on Exodus; Sifra on Leviticus, and Sifre on Numbers and Deuteronomy104; and the little Talmud, or Sefer ha-Halakhot, of Isaac ben Jacob Alfasi (1013-1103), who was known as the Rif105. To sum up, it would appear that Vat. lat. 14628 does not represent the totality of the collections. Some are only partly preserved or even completely missing, as can be concluded from the explicit references to these texts made by the revisers of the collections. Its incompleteness is further attested by Marco Marini’s autograph collections from Jewish writings preserved in the library of the University of Bologna, which partially coincide with collections in Vat. lat. 14628 and also provide additional material. But Marini’s collections so recently discovered also bear witness to the project’s focus on Jewish biblical interpretation and theological issues relevant to both Jews and Christians, whilst Vat. lat. 14628 constitutes the major representative of this monumental enterprise.

  BUB 2456, Censura libri Cad lachemah, idest Cadi farina ex impressione Veneta, fols 31r-35v. Marini used the Venice 1545-46 edition. On Bahya ben Asher’s Kad HaKemach see further Marvin J. Heller, The Sixteenth Century Hebrew Book: An Abridged Thesaurus, 2 vols (Leiden, 2004), I:67. 104   BUB 2456, Censura libri Mechilta ex impressione Veneta Danielis Bombergi, fols 37r-39v. Marini used the 1545 Venice editions. On the editions see Heller, The Sixteenth Century Hebrew Book cit., I:285. 105   BUB 2456, Censura Alfesi, fols 40r-41v and fols 55v-68v. Marini used the Venice 152021 edition. Vat. lat. 14628 contains one halakhic question from Sefer ha-Halakhot, collected by the convert Marco Fabiano Fioghi di Monte San Savino, see App. I, 3. For Sefer ha-Halakhot see further Heller, The Sixteenth Century Hebrew Book cit., I:31. 103

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CHAPTER 3

THE COMPOSERS OF THE COLLECTIONS

Of particular importance for the reconstruction of the project are the prefatory headings to many collections in Vat. lat. 14628, which provide us not only with the dates of their completion, but also with the names of the compilers and of those who revised, corrected and approved the sets of excerpts. Identifying the participants and establishing their expertise and position within the Church will shed light upon the exclusive nature of the enterprise and help us to understand the scope of the undertaking. Those responsible for selecting the passages were Diego Lopez (Didacus Lopez), Marco Fabiano Fioghi di Monte San Savino, Giovanni Paolo Eustachio, Diego de Ahumada (Didacus Humada), Marco Marino da Brescia, Adamanzio da Firenze (Adamantius eremitanus) and Mattia Aquario. In his description of Vat. lat. 14628 Sacerdote claims that almost all seven were “anonymous Jewish converts who owed their appointment to their fanaticism rather than to their knowledge of Hebrew”1. Popper refers to five of the seven in similar terms and, apart from Marco Marino da Brescia, known for his involvement in the publication of a censored Talmud edition, and Giovanni Paolo Eustachio, who after his conversion became a teacher at the Casa dei Neofiti, labels the five others as obscure converts2. Porges calls all seven neophytes3. Without identifying any of the compilers, Hoffmann thinks that not all of the seven were converts as some of them did not know Hebrew4. Parente presupposes, as do Godman, Ricci and Frajese, that the majority of the censors were converted Jews5. None of these authors ascribe any theological knowledge to the participants in the project. A closer look at who the compilers actually were contradicts the unsubstantiated assumption that most of them were fanatical neophytes.   Sacerdote, ‘Deux index’ cit., 263.   Popper, Censorship cit., 63. 3   Porges, ‘Der hebräische Index expurgatorius’ cit., 278. 4   Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 137. 5   Parente, ‘La Chiesa e il “Talmud”’ cit., 606; Godman, The Saint as Censor cit., 59; Ricci, Il sommo inquisitore cit., 345; Frajese, Nascita dell’ Indice cit., 129. 1 2

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Only two of the seven were converts. One of them was Elia ben Menahem ha-Rofé di Nola, who, after his baptism around 1568, adopted the name Giovanni Paolo Eustachio6. From 1576 he taught Hebrew at the Sapienza, the University of Rome. He died at the beginning of the seventeenth century7. The second convert was Marco Fabiano Fioghi di Monte San Savino. Following a theological dispute with the Capuchin Paolo da Norcia, he embraced Christianity in 1559. With his Dialogo fra il Cathecumino et il Padre Catechizante, printed in Rome in 1582, he played a prominent role in the conversion of his former coreligionists8. Apparently very skilled in Hebrew, he became the first Hebrew lecturer at the Collegio dei Neofiti9. The other compilers were highly qualified theologians and all cradle Christians. Diego de Ahumada from Cordova had studied theology for 12 years in Salamanca and Sigüenza. After completing his doctorate he became member of the Congregation of the Index10. The Dominican Mattia Aquario studied in Bologna and in 1569 became Magister in Theologia. Between 1571 and 1575 he taught metaphysics in Naples. From 1575 onwards he was regularly in Rome, where in 1580 he was appointed maestro di teologia at the Sapienza and personal theologian of the Head of the Inquisition, Cardinal Santoro. In 1587 he returned to Naples, where he died in 159111. The Augustinian monk Adamanzio da Firenze was an orientalist versed in Greek, Arabic, Hebrew and Aramaic. He furthermore studied philosophy, theology, geography and mathematics. He received his Laurea in theology from the University of Florence. At the Council of Trent he was the advisor of the papal delegate Cardinal Madruccio. After the Council, Pope Gregory XIII called him to Rome as ‘a reviser and corrector of   Leber, A Jewish convert in Counter-Reformation Rome: Giovanni Paolo Eustachio, cit.   See Chapter 1, pp. 14-5. 8   For his Hebrew translations of Christian prayers as a means to converting Jews see Kenneth Stow, ‘Conversion, Christian Hebraism, and Hebrew Prayer in the Sixteenth Century’, in Hebrew Union College Annual 47 (1976), 217-36 at 220-4. 9   Bartolocci, Bibliotheca magna rabbinica cit., 4:337; Wolf, Bibliotheca Hebraea cit., 1:961; Vogelstein and Rieger, Geschichte der Juden cit., 2:285; Le Déaut, ‘Jalons pour une histoire’ cit., 516; Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani (Rome, 1960–), 48:90-2. 10   MS Ott. lat. 2452 of the Vatican Library preserves the following letter addressed to Cardinal Sirleto, head of the Congregation of the Index, in which he is asked to admit Diego de Ahumada as a member of the Congregation: “Illustrissime et Reverendissime domine. Doctor Didacus de Ahumada cordubensis, qui per duodecim annos in sacrae Theologiae studio Salmantice et postea Segunti versatus, abhinc tribus annis licentiae et doctoratus honorem in dicta Academya recepit, summo studio desiderat in librorum Indicis examine publicae utilitati inservire. Ideoque ab Illustrissima et Reverendissima Dominatione Vestra humillissime petit ut ad id ministerium dignetur illum admittere, qui in suis sacrificiis Deum optimum maximum pro salute Illustrissimae ac Reverendissimae Dominationis Vestrae continuo deprecabitur”, Ott. lat. 2452, fol. 3r. No name of the sender or date is given. 11   See Dizionario biografico cit., 3:654-6. 6 7

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the Talmud’12. He died in 1581 or 1582. Diego Lopez was a member of the Congregation of the Index13. He was recommended to the cardinals of the Congregation of the Index by Cardinal Francesco Alciati and the Spanish Jesuit (and later Cardinal) Francisco de Toledo14. At the end of one of the collections, which he compiled, Diego Lopez calls himself ‘Doctor theologus’15. Well-equipped for the examination of rabbinic writings was Marco Marino da Brescia, who had learned his Hebrew from the convert Paolo Veneto and who had supervised the censored Talmud edition, published in Basel between 1578 and 1580 by Ambrosius Froben16. Marco Marino was called to Rome by Pope Gregory XIII “to correct the impieties of the rabbis regarding Christ and the Christians”17. This identification of all seven compilers sheds a rather different light on their motivation and expertise than thus far assumed. The two converts, one being a lecturer at the Sapienza and the other at the Casa dei Neofiti, were in no way obscure converts “who owed their appointment to their fanaticism rather than to their knowledge of Hebrew”, but highly qualified experts in Hebrew and well-versed in Jewish tradition and rabbinic literature. Mattia Aquario and Diego de Ahumada needed the help of the specialist in Hebrew Giovanni Paolo Eustachio, who selected the excerpts from the rabbinic texts, which he then translated into a mixture of Italian and Latin. Mattia Aquario and Diego de Ahumada, then translated his renderings into correct Latin and added the censurae18. This division of work is confirmed by Eustachio’s collection of excerpts from Abravanel’s commentary on the Pentateuch, which is in Italian without censurae19. In addition to being highly qualified theologians, the other three censors 12   See Giulio Negri, Istoria degli scrittori Fiorentini (Ferrara, 1722), 2. One of Adamanzio’s manuscripts listed by Negri is “Glossae et Interpretationes in Talmud Hebraeorum”. See further Christian Gottlieb Jöcher, Allgemeines Gelehrten-Lexicon, darinne die Gelehrten aller Stände […] in alphabetischer Ordnung beschrieben werden, 4 vols (Leipzig, 1750), 1:79. 13   See Vat. lat. 6207, fol. 93. Imbonati erroneously identifies him with the Jesuit Didacus Lopez de Mesa, see Imbonati, Bibliotheca Latino-Hebraica cit., 35. Didacus Lopez de Mesa left in 1572 for Mexico where he died on 31 October 1615, as the records of the Mexican Province of the Jesuits confirm, see Félix Zubillaga, Monumenta mexicana, vol. 1 (1570-80). Monumenta missionum Societatis Jesu (Rome, 1956), 537; Augustin De Backer and Aloys De Backer, Bibliothèque de la Compagnie de Jésus; première partie: Bibliographie, 12 vols, Nouvelle édition par Carlos Sommervogel (Paris, 1960), 4:1960-1. 14   See Vat. lat. 6416, fol. 32v and 31r. Francesco Alciati studied law in Bologna and Pavia and was called to Rome in 1560. As cardinal he held important positions in the Curia, see Dizionario Biografico cit., 2:65-7. 15   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 175v. See also the heading of App. I, 8b. 16   See Parente, ‘La Chiesa e il “Talmud”’ cit., 604-5. 17   Marci Marini Brixiani … Annotationes literales cit., 1:XV. 18   See App. I, 4; the same distribution of work may be presupposed in App. I, 15, 20 and 21. 19   See App. I, 5a. No conclusion can be drawn from a comparison of handwriting with regard to Eustachio as the possible author of Vat. lat. 14630.

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were themselves sufficiently versed in Hebrew and able to compile collections without any support from converts20. Marco Marino da Brescia was responsible for the extracts from Abravanel’s Rosh Amanah, Sforno’s commentaries on the Pentateuch, Song of Songs and Ecclesiastes, the midrash on The Death of Moses and Menachem ha-Meiri’s commentary on Psalms21. Adamanzio provided the excerpts from David Kimhi’s commentaries22. Likewise, Diego Lopez assembled the collections from the commentaries of Ibn Ezra, Jacob ben Asher and Levi ben Gershon without any assistance23. The Congregation of the Index and the Magister Sacri Palatii Many prefatory headings in Vat. lat. 14628 attest that the collections were presented to and approved of in the ‘Congregation’24. The fact that Diego Lopez and Diego de Ahumada were members of the Congregation of the Index seems to suggest that the project was executed under the auspices of this Congregation, which officially was responsible for censorship and expurgation of books. On the basis of the prefatory headings, and in line with his assumption that it was planned to be an Index expurgatorius, Sacerdote presumes that the Congregation of the Index, together with Robert Bellarmine and the Magister Sacri Palatii, were responsible for the composition of Vat. lat. 1462825. William Popper follows Sacerdote and holds the view that the actual expurgation was carried out by the Congregation of the Index26. The involvement of the Magister Sacri Palatii seems to confirm this assumption27. According to the headings, the collections   The legal document, dated 16 June 1824 and kept in the archives of the Casa dei Neofiti, rightly speaks of the composers as “piu grand’uomini del suo secolo intelligenti della lingua ebraica”, see Chapter 2, 52 n. 85. 21   See App. I, 5b, 6, 14, 19. For the collections made by Marco Marini, which are in the library of the University of Bologna see Chapter 2, 54-5. 22   See App. I, 12. 23   See App. I, 2, 7, 8. 24   See phrases such as “in congregatione lecti” (App. I, 5), “lecta prius in congregatione […] et […] exhibita” (App. I, 6) “cum interventu Neophytorum deputatorum in congregatione mensibus praeteritis” (App. I, 12), “lecta prius in Congregatione […] deinde exhibita” (App. I, 13), “lecta et approbata in congregatione” (App. I, 14), “lecta et exhibita […] in Congregatione” (App. I, 19), “exhibiti” (App. I, 20 and 21). For the work methods of the Congregation see Godman, The Saint as Censor cit., 33-48. 25   Sacerdote, ‘Deux Index’ cit., 259-60. 26   Popper, Censorship cit., 62-3, and more recently Parente, ‘La Chiesa e il Talmud”’ cit., 606; Ricci, Il sommo inquisitore cit., 345. 27   Some headings do not refer to the Congregation and only mention the revision by Bellarmine and the Magister Sacri Palatii, see App. I, 2, 4, 7 and 8. This, however, does not mean that the Congregation did not play the role as indicated above in these cases. That the headings are to be understood as private and incomplete notes only roughly indicating the procedure of the undertaking will be discussed later in this chapter. 20

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usually underwent a revision, for which the Master of the Sacred Palace himself seemed to be solely responsible28. This role of the Magister as autonomous and final assessor seems to accord with the modus operandi of the Congregation of the Index as described by the protocols kept in the archives of the Holy Office. A striking example of this working method is the expurgation of Theatrum vitae humanae by Conrad Lycosthenes and Theodor Zwinger29. The greater part of this work was carried out under supervision of the Congregation of the Index30. Some of the 19 volumes, however, were directly entrusted to the Magister Sacri Palatii for expurgation. The Magister did not report back to the full assembly, but only conveyed his decisions to the Cardinal members of the Congregation or their consultants31. With regard to the first volume it was agreed that the Magister could delete or change censurae, which had been made according to his own judgement32. In order to make an informed decision he sometimes turned to outsiders, when specific expertise was required. When Michel de Montaigne’s Essais (1580) were scrutinized, the Magister Sacri Palatii Sisto Fabri sought advice outside the Congregation because of the incompetence of its members33. But as far as the project under discussion is con28   The Magister’s involvement in the assessment of Hebrew books had only recently been added to his responsibilities. Originally, lector or Magister theologiae of the Studium Curiae Romanae, the school of the papal palace erected by Pope Innocent IV in 1244, from the fourteenth century onwards the Magister became the personal advisor to the Pope. At the beginning of sixteenth century the school of the papal palace was closed down, and the Magister Sacri Palatii became the papal scrutinor of the Christian doctrine. At the tenth session of the fifth Lateran Council (1512-1517) Pope Leo X in his Motu Proprio ‘Inter solocitudines’ of 4 May 1515 declared that the Magister Sacri Palatii from then on was responsible for books published in Rome, each of which had to have his ‘imprimatur’. Pius V in a Motu Proprio on 19 November 1570 extended the Magister’s responsibilities by assigning to him the task of overseeing the expurgation of books printed at the Vatican press; see Raymond Creytens, ‘Le “Studium Romanae Curiae” et le Maître du Sacré Palais’, in Archivum Fratrum Praedicatorum, 12 (1942), 5-83; Zucchi, Roma Domenicana cit., 3:80; Fragnito, La Bibbia al rogo cit., 114, 117. 29   Conrad Lycosthenes and Theodor Zwinger, Theatrum vitae humanae (Basel, 1565). See further Paolo Simoncelli, ‘Documenti interni alla Congregazione dell’ Indice, 1571-1590: Logica e ideologia dell’ intervento censorio’, in Annuario dell’Istituto storico italiano per l’età moderna e contemporanea 35-36 (1983-84), 187-215 at 192. 30   See ACDF ASU Prot. C, fols 219-21. 31   “Decretum ex lectis censuris in aliquot theatri libros quod Magister sacri palatii incumberet in eandem censuram ut perficeretur cuius in posterum nil in plene congregatione referendum sed vel ad aures Illustrissimorum Cardinalium vel deputatorum ab ipsis”, ACDF ASU, Ind. I,1 fol. 13, dated 2 September 1583. 32   “Decretum quod Magister sacri palatii suo iudicio deleret et immutaret quae sibi videbuntur in censura facta ad primum volumen theatri vitae humanae”, ACDF ASU Ind. I,1 fol. 12v. Such a decisive role of the Magister exceeds his formal position as consultor of the Congregation, see Fragnito, La Bibbia al rogo cit., 125-8. 33   Ibid., 45-6.

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cerned, it could not have been lack of skills of the members of the Congregation that motivated the Magister to call upon the expertise of outsiders. Diego Lopez was sufficiently proficient in Hebrew and Diego de Ahumada was a competent theologian. They were the perfect duo, who together with the Magister theologiae Mattia Aquario as a consultor of the Congregation, were sufficiently erudite to carry out the project of selecting passages from Hebrew books and adding theological comments to them34. It is noteworthy that the two most prominent Hebrew experts and two other highly qualified theologians, intimately linked with the Roman hierarchy joined the members of the Congregation, for this does not seem to reflect normal procedures. Apart from speeding up the process of collecting passages, the reason for including these heavyweights in Hebrew tradition and theology in the team was to create a generally respected and representative platform to discuss them ‘in congregatione’. The meticulous way this was carried out, which will be discussed in Chapter 4, extends the undertaking far beyond the remit of the Congregation of the Index. It is therefore not surprising that the undertaking left no trace in the archives of the Holy Office, where the records of the Congregation of the Index are stored35. The fact that detailed documentation of the activities of the Congregation have been preserved systematically only from 1591 onwards could explain the absence of records regarding our project. But since Vat. lat. 14628 exceeds the working methods of the Congregation of the Index not only in content, but also in the calibre of the participants and their mode of operation, it seems more likely that it was not even considered to belong to the records of the Congregation. The very fact that the collections were deposited in the library of the Casa dei Neofiti is further proof that they had a different raison d’être, which most likely served the objective of the College, namely the training of Jewish converts for missionary activities among their former coreligionists. The Masters mentioned in Vat. lat. 14628 are Paolo Constabile and Sisto Fabri. Paolo Constabile (1520-1583) who came from Ferrara, was a Dominican and the Inquisitor of Milan before being appointed Magister Sacri Palatii in 1573. In 1580 he was elected General of the Dominican order36. Constabile’s successor was Sisto Fabri (1540-1594). Born in Villa Basilica

34   Sisto Fabri had some knowledge of Hebrew. See Touron, Histoire des hommes illustres cit., 4:721. But on the whole the Masters of the Sacred Palace were dependent on the experts in Hebrew. 35   Fragnito, La Bibbia al rogo cit. , 119 n. 19. 36   See Dizionario biografico cit., 28:60-1.

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near Lucca, he entered the Dominican order in 155637. Like his predecessor, Fabri taught theology at the Sapienza from 1576 to 1580. After the death of Paolo Constabile in 1583 he became General of the Dominicans38. Robert Bellarmine From the headings that accompanied the collections it furthermore appears that Robert Bellarmine, though at the time not a member of the Congregation of the Index, played a major role in revising most of them before they were ratified by the Magister39. His reputation as theologian at the Collegio Romano made him an uncontested and most reliable candidate for the assessment of the passages selected by his colleagues40. In his comments Bellarmine also demonstrated a surprisingly good knowledge of Hebrew and Jewish tradition, and Paolo Constabile and Sisto Fabri, confident of his expertise, usually followed his advice. For the key role he would play in the assessment of Jewish exegetical works, Bellarmine had prepared himself quite late in life. It was only in Louvain that he devoted himself to the study of Hebrew and Jewish exegesis. On his arrival in 1569 he found as his teacher for biblical exegesis at the Jesuit school, Johan Willemzs of Haarlem (1538-1578), who had formerly taught at the highly respected Collegium Trilingue41. It is implausible that Willemzs did not include Hebrew in his teaching of biblical exegesis42. He must have taught Bellarmine more than the alphabet and some basic grammatical rules, despite Bellarmine’s assertion to the contrary. In his autobiography, the 71-year-old cardinal writes about his days at the Jesuit school: In those days N [i.e. Bellarmine] considered the Hebrew language very useful for the understanding of the Holy Scriptures and decided to study it. After having been taught the alphabet and some basic grammatical rules by somebody who knew the language, he himself wrote a Hebrew grammar according to a   See ibid. cit., 43:759-62.   For Paulo Constabile and Sisto Fabri see further Daniel A. Mortier, Histoire des Maîtres Généraux de l’Ordre des Frères Prêcheurs, 8 vols (Paris, 1903–20), 5:509-610; Fragnito, La Bibbia al rogo cit., 117 n. 14. 39   Bellarmine became a member of the Congregation of the Index only in 1587, see ACDF, Prot. B, fols 21 and 188. 40   See Godman, The Saint As Censor cit., 56-8. 41   See Paul Begheyn, ‘Jesuits in the Netherlands, 1573–1580’, in The Mercurian Project cit., 115-44 at 124; Lucien Ceyssens, ‘Bellarmin et Louvain’, in L’Augustinisme à l’ancienne faculté de théologie de Louvain, ed. Mathijs Lamberigts (Louvain, 1994), 179-205 at 186-8. In 1566 Willemzs (Harlemius) entered the Society of Jesus, but taught at the Trilingue until 1569 as the successor of Andreas van Gennip, and was one of the collaborators of Arias Montanus for the Biblia Regia (Antwerp 1569-72). 42   See Henry de Vocht, History of the Foundation and the Rise of the Collegium Trilingue Lovaniense 1517-1550, 4 vols (Louvain, 1951-55), 4:156-7. 37

38

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simpler method than that used by the rabbis and in a short time he learned the Hebrew language as far as it seemed sufficient for a theologian43.

It is difficult to ascertain whether Bellarmine devoted much time to Hebrew during his student days. But what becomes clear from his exegetical homework is that once he had become the only professor at the Jesuit school, he was expected to teach the Bible, and must have fulfilled this task in the spirit of his teacher Johan Willemsz44. His Notae in Genesim, an octavo of 120 pages containing his notes on Genesis for his classes of biblical exegesis, is held in the archives of the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome45. A fire in the university library of Louvain in 1914 destroyed Bellarmine’s copy of the Nuremberg edition of the Vulgate (1529) with his annotations to the book of Genesis. The Gregorian manuscript is therefore a precious witness to Bellarmine’s proficiency in Hebrew and to his exegetical methods46. Apart from Alberto Vaccari’s preliminary study, no proper analysis of the manuscript has been undertaken47. A certain number of notes in the manuscript relate to rather elementary grammatical and semantic matters of the Hebrew language and reveal Bellarmine’s use of Kimhi’s Sefer ha-Shorashim, the lexicon of the Hebrew language used by many Christian Hebraists. The more exegetical part shows a good understanding of the rabbinic commentaries on the Hebrew Bible. The references to three main Jewish commentators, Rashi, Ibn Ezra and Jacob ben Asher, seem to indicate that Bellarmine used Bomberg’s rabbinic Bible of 1524 or 1547, since these were the only editions of the rabbinic Bible in which all three commentaries on Genesis appeared on the same page. It appears that for Bellarmine Jewish exegesis had a role to play in establishing the meaning of the text. But he does not desist from making the stereotypical denigrating remarks about rabbinic interpretations. Comments like fabulantur, nugae and fabula are scattered throughout the work48.   Johann von Döllinger and Franz H. Reusch, Die Selbstbiographie des Cardinals Bellarmin: lateinisch und deutsch mit geschichtlichen Erläuterungen (Bonn, 1887), 80. Le Bachelet takes Bellarmine’s account at face value and does not consider Willemzs his real teacher, see Le Bachelet, Bellarmin avant son cardinalat cit., 68 n. 3. According to Frison, Willemsz taught him the basic principles, see Nicolas Frizon, La vie du cardinal Bellarmin, de la Compagnie de Jesus (Nancy, 1708), 78. 44   See Le Bachelet, Bellarmin avant son cardinalat cit., 75, 86-7. 45   Pontificia Università Gregoriana MS 385b. 46   See Le Bachelet, Bellarmin avant son cardinalat cit., 94 n. 1. 47   Alberto Vaccari, ‘Note del Ven. Bellarmino al Genesi’, in Gregorianum 2 (1921), 57988. Thomas Dietrich in his recent contribution to Bellarmine’s approach to Scripture does not mention these seminal exegetical notes. See Thomas Dietrich, ‘Schriftverständnis und Schriftauslegung bei Robert Bellarmin (1542-1621)’, in Hebraistik – Hermeneutik – Homiletik: Die ‘Philologia Sacra’ im frühneuzeitlichen Bibelstudium, ed. Christoph Bultman and Lutz Danneberg, Historia Hermeneutica 10 (Berlin, 2011), 341-56. 48   See Van Boxel, ‘Robert Bellarmine, Christian Hebraist’ cit., 272-3. 43

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His proficiency in the Hebrew language came clearly to the fore when, towards the end of his stay in Louvain (probably between 1574 and 1576, the year he returned to Rome), he wrote his Exercitatio grammatica in Psalmum XXXIII, a word for word exegesis of the Hebrew text of the Psalm49. For the grammatical explanations, Bellarmine referred, in this early work, to Jean Cinqarbres’ Institutiones in Linguam Hebraicam, published in Paris in 1559. In the meantime, he prepared his own Hebrew grammar, which was published in Rome in 1578 together with the Exercitatio grammatica. In this combined edition the references in the grammatical exercise no longer relate to Cinquarbres’ grammar, but to his own Institutiones Linguae Hebraicae50. The user-friendly grammar for Christian Hebraists was apparently a success, judged by the number of times it was reprinted51. In 1616 his confrere and student Georg Mayr published a revised edition52. Bellarmine’s acquaintance with Jewish tradition is notably evident in a manuscript held at the Biblioteca Fabroniana in Pistoia. The library owes its name to the legacy of Cardinal Carlo Augusto Fabroni who bequeathed his books to his native town. Various unpublished autographs of Bellarmine came into Fabroni’s possession while he was involved in the process of Bellarmine’s beatification. The manuscript that interests us here is entitled Errores R. Salomonis in quinque libros Mosis (Errors of Rabbi Salomon in the five books of Moses) with the subtitle for the Book of Genesis: Loca quae in commentariis R. Salomonis in Genesim emendanda videntur (Places in Rabbi Salomon’s commentary on Genesis which appear to need emendation)53. The manuscript consists of a selection in Latin from Rashi’s commentary on the Pentateuch, each passage being preceded by the biblical verse quoted from the Vulgate and occasionally accompanied by a remark or short comment. Sometimes Bellarmine translates the text, occasionally also providing a summary of Rashi’s explanation. Although sometimes revealing a weakness in his proficiency of the language, the translation is on the whole an impressive illustration of Bellarmine’s handling of Jewish tradition54. There is no date to the manuscript, but the title and content point unmistakably to his work as supervisor of the project. This collection of passages from Rashi’s commentary on the Pentateuch   Exercitatio grammatica in Psalmum XXXIII [s.i.: s.n., s.d.].   Institutiones linguae Hebraicae Ejusdem exercitatio in Psalmum XXXIV [XXXIII] (s.l.). 51   Rome 1578, 1580, 1585; Cologne 1580, 1596, 1616; Leiden 1595; Lyon 1596, 1615; Antwerp 1596, 1606, 1615, 1616; Venice 1606; Geneva 1609, 1615, 1616. See also Imbonati, Bibliotheca Latino-Hebraica cit., 216. 52   Georg Mayr, Institutiones linguae hebraicae in sex partes distributae, quibus accessit exercitatio gramatica in Ionam prophetam (Augsburg, 1616). 53   Fabroniana MS 15, fols 1r-36v. 54   See Van Boxel, ‘Robert Bellarmine, Christian Hebraist’ cit., 274. 49 50

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could well be considered part of his homework for this task55. His knowledge of Hebrew and, more important, his acquaintance with Jewish Bible interpretation combined with his theological erudition, meant that he was the qualified person for the role of reviser in the project56. The Role of Cardinal Giulio Santoro It is surprising that Cardinal Sirleto, a reputed Hebraist and head of the Congregation of the Index, appears not to have been in charge of the project – his name never appears in the manuscripts57. It is his colleague and rival Cardinal Santoro who assumed control of the undertaking. Our knowledge that Santoro had the last word in the whole process of composing the collections comes from an unexpected quarter, MS Borg. lat. 149. Currently held at the Vatican Library, this manuscript was never part of the Fondo Neofiti. However, the manuscript, consisting of 97 sheets (28 cm x 21 cm) written on both sides, is related in more than one respect to the three manuscripts thus far discussed. The most obvious connection is provided by a set of excerpts from the 1540 Bologna edition of the Roman Mahzor. Consisting of Latin extracts with censurae in the margin, this collection clearly belongs to the same undertaking as Vat. lat. 14628, which contains only two pages of challenged passages and a provisional heading58. The complete set of passages from the Mahzor is preserved in Borg. lat. 149 with a heading similar to those in Vat. lat. 14628: “Censurae on the Mahzor, that is the book of prayers, seasons, rites and ceremonies, made by the reverend father Magister Adamantius Florentinus and presented on 9 November1580. Revised by the reverend father Robert Bellarmine of the Society of Jesus and returned on 22 December of the same year 1580”59. Other material that links the two manuscripts are collections of extracts in Vat. lat. 14628 from commentaries by David ibn Yahya ben Solomon (Kav ve-naki) on Proverbs and Moses ben Nahman on Job, to which Borg. lat. 149 provides revision remarks by Robert Bellarmine and the Master of the Sacred Palace60. Collections of which no reference is found in Vat. lat. 14628 are extracts from the Zohar, the classic work of Jewish mysticism, traditionally   See Chapter 5, 88-90.   The only exception being the highly respected theologian and orientalist Adamanzio, who revised the collection from Levi ben Gershon’s commentary on Proverbs, see App. I, 8. 57   See Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 104-5. Godman, The Saint as Censor cit., 32-3. 58   “Censurae in the book of prayers, rites and ceremonies, which by the Jews is called Mahzor, that is Cycle, and in the commentaries on it”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 455r, see App. I, 24. 59   See App. IV, 3. The collection apparently is not the one Bellarmine is referring to in his remarks in Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 454r, where he refers to the fact that Fagius and Münster are quoted. It therefore must relate to Génébrard’s translation, see Chapter 2, n. 51. 60   See App. I, 16 and App. IV, 5. 55 56

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ascribed to the second-century sage Simeon bar Yochai, followed by extracts from Sha’arei Orah (Gates of Light) and Sha’arei Tsedek (Gates of Righteousness) by the Spanish kabbalist Joseph ben Abraham Gikatilla (1248–c. 1325)61. These popular works of Kabbalah enjoyed a wide circulation among Christians as well as Jews62. The heading to these collections provide the evidence of Cardinal Santoro’s role in the scrutiny of Hebrew books, over which, according to Gregory Martin, he presided. The heading to this first fascicle of the manuscript reads as follows: Errors from the book called Zohar on the Pentateuch and from the books entitled Portae Lucis et Portae Iustitiae collected by the Reverend Father Marcus Marinus Canonicus regularis of the congregation of the Holy Saviour, who signed them on 8 June 1580. [From here onwards in a different, i.e. Santoro’s hand], Father Bellarmine saw them and returned them on 5 October 1580 and [the collection] was signed by the Reverend Father the Magister Sacri Palatii on the same day. He, however, had it checked once more by Magister Mattia Aquario, our theologian, and he returned it to me on 1 December 158063.

These collections from the book of the Zohar were certainly part and parcel of the project under discussion. The heading in Vat. lat. 14628 introducing the excerpts from Levi ben Gershon’s biblical commentaries makes this perfectly clear: Censurae of the commentaries of Rabbi Levi ben Gershon on the Books of Joshua, Judges, Kings and Job. [From here onwards in Santoro’s hand] In April and May 1579 revised by the reverend father Bellarmine and frater Paolo [Constabile]64.

The heading in Vat. lat. 14628 and the one in Borg. lat. 149 match one another in that they both stipulate the role Robert Bellarmine and the Master of the Sacred Palace played as revisers of the collections. From the heading to the excerpts from the Zohar, however, it appears that Santoro, with the help of his personal theologian Mattia Aquario, had the final say in the assessment of this collection65. Since virtually all the headings to the collections preserved in Vat. lat. 14628 with exact indication of the revision dates are at least partly in Santoro’s hand it is more than likely   See App. IV, 1 and 2.   The collections differ from the usual pattern in Vat. lat. 14628 in that they only summarize the challenged passages and do not give an exact translation. This procedure of summarizing passages occasionally occurs in Vat. lat. 14628, see e.g. the extracts from Moses ben Nahman’s commentary on Job, see App. I, 17. 63   App. IV, 1. 64   See App. I, 8a. 65   By portraying Mattia Aquario as a censor in the usual meaning of the word, and making Roberto Bellarmino his opponent, Godman misinterprets the manuscripts he is quoting. See Godman, The Saint as Censor cit., 59-60. 61 62

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that as in the case of the Zohar, all collections ended up on the cardinal’s desk66. After they had passed his watchful eye, they were deposited in the library of the Casa dei Neofiti. It may well have been an oversight of Santoro that he did not deposit the collections from the Zohar in the library of the Casa. This must have also been the case with the revisions made by Bellarmine and the Master of the Sacred Palace about the collections from the commentaries by David ibn Yahya ben Solomon on Proverbs and Moses ben Nahman. Years after the scrutiny of Hebrew books had been completed in 1583 they were bound together with an Index expurgatorius of the same Mahzor examined in our project and a summary of the regulations concerning the expurgation of Hebrew books, which were issued by Pope Clement VIII in 1593 and 1596. Incorporated in the library of the Congregatio de Propaganda Fide, over which Santoro also presided, the manuscript – like many other Latin documents belonging to personalities related to the Congregation – became part of the Fondo Borgiano, which was incorporated in the Vatican Library in 190267.

66   See the (parts of) headings in cursive in App. I. That Santoro actually interfered, though infrequently, and had the casting vote in the discussion about whether or not a passage should be included in the collection, will be discussed in Chapters 4 and 6. 67   See Paola Orsatti, Il Fondo Borgia della Biblioteca Vaticana e gli studi orientali a Roma tra sette e ottocento, in Studi e Testi 376 (Vatican City, 1996), 91-4; Jeanne Bignami Odier, La bibliothèque vaticane de Sixte IV à Pie XI; recherches sur l’histoire des collections de manuscrits, with the collaboration of José Ruysschaert (Vatican City, 1973), 242 n. 133 and 255 n. 313. The Congregatio De Propaganda Fide was instituted by Gregory XIII as a cardinalitial Commission and in 1622 was made into a pontifical ministry by Gregory XV, see ‘Propagation of the Faith, Congregation for the’, in The New Catholic Encyclopedia, 11:749-52.

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CHAPTER 4

PROCEDURE OF THE COMPILATIONS

When reconstructing the procedure followed in composing the collections of excerpts from rabbinic Bible commentaries as preserved in Vat. lat. 14628, Gustavo Sacerdote used as a safe guide the headings that adorn those collections. He suggested that each of the seven – in his view – censors was allotted a number of Hebrew texts to be examined for passages containing concepts contrary to the Christian faith or offensive expressions concerning the Church. After selection, the excerpts were translated into Italian or Latin. Critical comments were added explaining why the passages in question were unacceptable to the censor responsible for the selection. The collections and the comments were then submitted for approval to Robert Bellarmine, and finally to the Master of the Sacred Palace1. When taking into account that Vat. lat. 14630 and Vat. lat. 14629 are integral parts of the undertaking and constitute preliminary phases in the process of composing the collections, it becomes clear that the selection and translation of the excerpts, the addition of accompanying comments (censurae), and the revision – in which experts in Hebrew, theologians, the Congregation of the Index, external revisers, the Magister Sacri Palatii and Cardinal Santoro all played roles – was an exceptionally complex procedure. Relationship between the manuscripts Vat. lat. 14630, 14629 and 14628 contain a number of collections from the same biblical commentaries2. A close comparison of the corresponding material in Vat. lat. 14629 and Vat. lat. 14628 brings to light that, apart from a small number of passages absent in Vat. lat. 14628, the collections from Rashi’s and Kimhi’s commentaries are identical in the two manuscripts. These missing passages are the point of departure for the recon1   Sacerdote, ‘Deux Index’ cit., 262. Sacerdote’s description has been generally followed; see Popper, Censorship cit., 62-4; Porges, ‘Der hebräische Index expurgatorius’ cit., 278; Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 137; Parente, ‘La Chiesa e il “Talmud”’ cit., 606. 2   See Chapter 2, 50-1.

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struction of the procedure. A note in Vat. lat. 14628 informs us that the collections in Vat. lat. 14629, after a second selection of passages, constitute the final version, which, referred to as exemplarius archetypus, are preserved in Vat. lat. 146283. A comment accompanying the collection from Bahya’s commentary on the Pentateuch, in Vat. lat. 14629, sheds further light on the procedure: “where this sign † appears, what is written should be omitted”4. Since Vat. lat. 14628 does not contain any collection from Bahya’s commentary, the implementation of this modus operandi cannot be verified. Collections from Rashi’s and Kimhi’s commentaries, however, are extant both in Vat. lat. 14629 and 14628, and it appears that indeed none of the passages marked with a dagger in Vat. lat. 14629 is included in Vat. lat. 146285. From Vat. lat. 14629 it further emerges that, before being authorized as exemplarius archetypus, collections underwent corrections and were expanded with additional passages – the so-called suppleta6. A particularly illustrative example of corrections and supplementary passages is the collection from Rashi’s commentary on the Book of Daniel. In addition to the collection from the entire commentary, Vat. lat. 14629 contains a second set of passages from Daniel 7-12, bearing the heading Iterum correctiora in Danielem, which in several respects differs from the first collection7. New passages are included and censurae changed, and the passages, which are copied from the first collection, are phrased differently. This additional set of passages, together with the initial selection of the excerpts from Rashi’s commentary on Daniel 1-6, constitutes the final version in Vat. lat. 146288. In some cases more than one collection was planned from the same commentary, as was the case with Kimhi’s commentary on Psalms. Adamanzio, who was given the task of composing collections from Kimhi’s commentaries9, noted that without Kimhi’s commentary on Psalms at his disposal he could only present some annotations based upon excerpts made by others10. Of Kimhi’s commentaries on Ezekiel and Chronicles,   See Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 305r.   “Ubi apparet hoc signum † ommitendum est quod scribitur”, Vat. lat. 14629, 49v. The use of this sign is consistent with the way printers indicated words in a manuscript to be omitted. 5   In some collections a dagger was used to indicate that a passage was to be retained: “Quae sunt notata † censurenda, reliqua dimittenda”. These collections belong to the first step of the procedure. See Ibn Ezra’s commentary on Song of Songs, Vat. lat. 14629, fols 329r-332r, and Saadiah’s commentary on Daniel, Vat. lat. 14629, fols 332v-336v. 6   See App. III, 4 and 5. 7   Vat. lat. 14629, fols 245r-248r. 8   Vat. lat. 14628, fols 147r-151v. 9   See App. I, 12. 10   “Desunt psalmorum censurae. Nam etsi Kimchi scripsit super psalmos eius tamen commentarii mihi non fuerunt exhibiti. Hic tamen etiam quaedam annotabuntur ab aliis 3 4

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Vat. lat. 14629 includes two drafts, one of which was made the exemplarius archetypus11 and included in Vat. lat. 14628.12 Of the second draft no subsequent use was made13. A comparison of Vat. lat. 14629 with Vat. lat. 14630 confirms the circulation of more than one collection from rabbinic commentaries, which only partially were used for the exemplarius archetypus. That the two manuscripts are intimately related becomes clear in a note in Vat. lat. 14629 to a passage selected from Ibn Ezra’s commentary on Psalm 39. In his remark, the compiler refers to page 405, which as a matter of fact is the page in the original pagination of Vat. lat. 14630 from which he had taken the material to compose his draft of unacceptable passages in Ibn Ezra’s commentary on Psalms14. One case that illustrates the composition of more than one collection are the three sets from Rashi’s commentary on Genesis in Vat. lat. 14629. The first collection is a selection from the compilation preserved in Vat. lat. 1463015. According to the heading of a second set of passages, of which there are no traces in Vat. lat. 14630, the first collection was considered inadequate16. From the two compilations a third collection was composed17. This procedure shows that Vat. lat. 14630 could not serve as an undisputed and formally approved basis for subsequent versions of the various collections. Other examples of compilations that clearly have not provided the material for the collections that resulted in an exemplarius archetypus are the sets of excerpts from Levi ben Gershon’s commentaries on Proverbs and Job18. That Vat. lat. 14630 does not contain excerpts from Kimhi’s commentaries is possibly because these collections were made by the orientalist Adamanzio da Firenze19. Well-versed in Hebrew, he produced excerpts in ‘proper’ Latin translation, which constitute excerpta”, Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 301v. From this remark it appears that Adamanzio worked from the third rabbinic Bible, which contains Kimhi’s commentary on Chronicles but not his commentary on Psalms, included only in the first rabbinic Bible. 11   Vat. lat. 14629, fols 303r-306v (for Ezekiel) and fols 307r-308r (for Chronicles). 12   See App. I, 12c under Ezekiel and 1 and 2 Chronicles (Paralipomenon). 13   Vat. lat. 14629, fols 309r-311v (for Ezekiel) and fols 312r-314v (for Chronicles). 14   Ibid., fol. 325v. 15   Ibid., fols 150r-158v and Vat. lat. 14630, fols 8r-28v respectively. Contrary to Vat. lat. 14629, it the passages marked with a dagger are not those to be omitted but those to be retained in a collection. 16   “Visum est et quaedam alia ex genesi digna annotare, si forte emendationis et censurae nota subire iudicentur”, Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 159r. 17   Vat. lat. 14629, fols 132r-149v. Since no collection from Rashi’s commentary on Genesis is preserved in Vat. lat. 14628, it is not possible to establish whether this collection indeed was the final version. 18   See App. II, 6 and 7. 19   See App. I, 12a.

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the first stage of the procedure20. It should furthermore be noted that, in the case of many collections, either no preliminary stage or final version has been preserved21. The censurae, which were examined with equal care, shed more light on the complexity of the procedure and the thorough examination of the collections. More than once a passage without censura was marked with a dagger, thus indicating that the extract should not be included in the exemplarius archetypus. But in many cases a censura was added to a passage that in a later stage was left out in the final version of the collection. An illustration of this meticulous modus operandi is the set of excerpts from Kimhi’s commentaries, of which in a number of cases the censurae appeared to be missing, omissions that consequently were corrected in an appendix under the heading censurae omissae22. From Kimhi’s comment on Isaiah 40:2 it appears that these additional censurae were appended before a definitive selection of passages from Kimhi’s commentaries was made, since the passage with the added censura was ultimately excluded from the final collection as preserved in Vat. lat. 1462823. The importance attached to these censorial remarks becomes more evident in the corrections and different phrasing of censurae in the process of establishing the final version24. Reconstruction of the Procedure The correspondence between the three manuscripts enables us to reconstruct the various steps involved in the selection of passages from Jewish writings. The earliest phase of the compilation of extracts is preserved in Vat. lat. 14630. Written in a mixture of Latin and Italian the manuscript contains the collections from Rashi’s commentary on the whole of the   See App. III, 5.   Thus in Vat. lat. 14630, the collections from Rashi’s commentaries on Job, Song of Songs, Ruth, Chronicles, Ezra and Nehemiah, which are extant in Vat. lat. 14629 and 14628, are missing. In Vat. lat. 14628, the collections from Rashi’s commentaries on Genesis and Psalms and Ibn Ezra’s commentary on Psalms, extant in Vat. lat. 14630 and 14629, are missing. The collection from Abravanel’s commentary on the Pentateuch in Vat. lat. 14628, being in Italian without censurae, constitutes the very first stage of the procedure and belongs actually to the compilations, which are preserved in Vat. lat. 14630. See App. I, 5a. For other incomplete or missing collections, see App. I, 4, 12c (Jeremiah) and 26. 22   See App. III, 5. 23   See Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 289v. Sometimes passages from Vat. lat. 14629 are incorporated in Vat. lat. 14628 without the related censurae, which as censurae omissae were added at the end of the collection in Vat. lat. 14629. These lacunae are probably due to an oversight on the part of the copyist. 24   See e.g. the comments to Rashi’s commentary on Hosea 5:10; 6:13; 13:14; Obadiah 20; Habakkuk 2:15. For the corrections made to Hosea 1 is referred to fol. 102, which in the revised pagination corresponds to fol. 253. 20 21

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Hebrew Bible and Ibn Ezra’s commentary on the Psalms25. From material in Vat. lat. 14630, passages were selected, then rendered into correct Latin and accompanied by censurae to serve as a text for further examination and discussion. The prefatory heading of the set of excerpts from Abraham Saba’s commentary on the Pentateuch illustrates this point. It states that the errors were collected by Giovanni Paolo Eustachio, and were translated into Latin, marked (with a dagger indicating which passages were to be included in the collection) and provided with censurae by Diego de Ahumada26. The collection itself is extant in neither Italian nor Latin. Two other works – Sefer Hasidim by Judah ben Samuel he-Hasid and Sha’arei Teshuvah by Jonah Gerondi – were extracted by Paulo Eustachio. Of both collections, only the final Latin version is preserved27. Of Abravanel’s commentary on the Pentateuch, Vat. lat. 14628 contains a collection of excerpts in Italian without censurae, which was made by Eustachio28. Vat. lat. 14629 contains the Latin renderings of the Italian drafts from Rashi’s commentaries as well as the collections made by the theologians in correct Latin, and with censurae, done without the help of converts. The next step was to scrtunize all the sets of excerpts ‘in congregatione’29. Missing censurae were added, passages taken from other collections were inserted, and a final selection of passages was carried through, resulting in exemplarii archetypi which then were copied by a scriptor. It is in this form that they are preserved in Vat. lat. 1462830. The congregation, however, did not have the final say. As already mentioned, after the collections had been discussed in plenum, the Master of the Sacred Palace called in the help of a reviser, in most cases Robert Bellarmine31. His comments vary from remarks concerning mistakes made by a copyist in the final version of a collection, to disapproval (often cautiously introduced by expressions such as ‘omitterem’, ‘putarem’, or ‘posset fortasse’) of the selection of a particular passage or the phrasing of a cen25   See App. II, 4. Two sets of excerpts from Ibn Ezra’s commentary on Genesis in Vat. lat. 14629 phrased in a mixture of Latin and Italian and not accompanied by censorial remarks belong to the earliest phase of the compilation of extracts as preserved in Vat. lat. 14630. See Vat. lat. 14629, fols 315r-318r and 319r-v. 26   Errores ex libro Fasciculo Myrrhae appellato super Penthateuco Rabbi Abraham Sabag, collecti per Jo. Paulum Eustachium, et Latine versi et notati, adiectis in eos censuris per Doctorem Dicacum Humadam, qui eosdem consignavit die primo mensis Martii MDLXXX, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 195r, see App. I, 4. 27   See App. I, 20 and 21. 28   See App. I, 5a. 29   See Chapter 3, 60-2. 30   No conclusion based upon the writing of these copied collections can therefore be drawn about the composers, as does Sacerdote with regard to the excerpts from Rashi and Kimhi. See Sacerdote, ‘Deux index’ cit., 264 n. 2. 31   See Chapter 3, 63.

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sura32. His observations were usually followed by the Magister sacri palatii. Remarks such as ‘optima annotatio’, or – in cases when Bellarmine’s correction was questioned by the compiler responsible for the collection under discussion – ‘magis placet annotatio patris Roberti’, illustrate Bellarmine’s influential position. It also demonstrates the Magister’s authority; for it is his voice that usually brings the discussion to an end33. A striking example of this procedure is the discussion about Rashi’s interpretation of Judges 2:1 “Now the angel of the Lord went up from Gilgal to Bochim and said, ‘I brought you up from Egypt’”, identifying the angel with Phinehas, the grandson of Aaron and High Priest of Israel in the wilderness34. The composer of the collection considers this identification an ‘expositio praepostera et falsa’. Bellarmine, however, opposes this judgement, asserting that Rashi’s interpretation was neither preposterous nor false. He even suggests that the passage in its entirety could be omitted on the grounds that Rashi’s explanation, though most likely wrong, did not contain an obvious error35. In a reaction to Bellarmine’s comment, the compiler insists that the phrase ‘eduxi vos ex Aegypto’ refers to an angel speaking ‘in persona Dei’. But the Magister takes Bellarmine’s side and considers Rashi’s comment a ‘res levis’36. As a consequence, the harsh censura ‘expositio praepostera et falsa’ was changed to ‘expositio falsa’. And yet, the intervention of the Master of the Sacred Palace, assisted by a reviser like Robert Bellarmine, did not always produce the final text. It has already been mentioned that in Vat. lat. 14628 most of the headings are in Cardinal Giulio Santoro’s handwriting, and that Santoro’s personal theologian Mattia Aquario checked the collection from the Zohar after it had been checked by Bellarmine and approved by the Magister37. Occasionally Santoro himself interfered in the discussions. This is exemplified by the discussion of Jonah Gerondi’s statement in Sha’arei Teshuvah that all sins one has committed in life will be forgiven when one feels ashamed of one of them. The reviser of the collection – either 32   Revision remarks in Vat. lat. 14628 are twice signed by Robert Bellarmine, see fol. 350r and fol. 447r. Sometimes they were first copied by a scriptor and in this form presented to the Magister, who then wrote his final verdict on this copy, see e.g. the revision remarks that refer to the collection from Rashi’s commentary on Judges to 4 Kings, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 263r-v. A similar procedure in found in Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 111r-v and fol. 121r-v. 33   See e.g. Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 48r ad Num. 22:23; fol. 109r ad Isa. 66:7. For discussions between compiler, reviser and Magister see App. V: 10, 14, 15, 20, 21, 25, 26, 29, 33, 34. 34   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 55r. The tradition is found in Numbers Rabbah, XVI:1. 35   “Non vocarem praeposteram expositionem illam de Phinees. Vere enim Phinees erat sacerdos summus. Fortasse etiam expediret omittere totam hanc censuram de Phinees. et si enim verisimile est falsam esse hanc sententiam R. Salomonis, tamen non continet exploratum errorem”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 263r. 36   “sed certe res levis est et omittenda”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 263r. 37   See Chapter 3, 67-8.

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Aquario or Bellarmine – accepted Gerondi’s statement as meaning that shame comes with remorse not only for one sin but for all sins committed in one’s entire life38. The remark, here copied by a scriptor, was apparently passed on to the cardinal, who rejected the possibility that the author could have meant it this way and insisted in keeping the passage in the collection39. On the unusually long censurae to the selected passages from Levi ben Gershon’s commentary on Job, the cardinal commented: “this kind of censurae should be shorter, so as not to be irksome or grievous to the readers”40. Furthermore, since Bellarmine’s revisions are found in Borg. lat. 149 they must have been assessed by Santoro41. The approval of Bellarmine’s rejection of the censura to Kimhi’s comment on Isa. 26:7, clearly in Santoro’s hand, followed by the removal of the passage from the collection, confirms this assumption42. Thus Santoro had the casting vote on whether or not a passage should be included in the collection and how censurae should be phrased. Stylistic Corrections A final observation concerns the definitive version of the collections from some of Rashi’s commentaries. Of the collections made from his commentaries on Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy and 1-4 Kings, two copies are found in Vat. lat. 1462843. The duplicates do not substantially differ from each other. Clearly it was the intention of the copyist to produce a clean copy, since corrections made by the revisers, which in the first copy were put in the margin, are integrated into the text in the second version44. Stylistic and grammatical changes were sometimes made in the course of the copying. A synoptic reading of the collections from Rashi’s commentary on Deuteronomy 10-11 and from Kimhi’s on Isaiah 30-33, as preserved in the three manuscripts, will serve as illustration of the procedure.

38   “Si postquam aliquis peccavit ipse sumendo verecundiam de peccato omnia peccata ei condonantur, quae ab eo sunt commissa per totum spatium suae vitae; quae propositio sic intellecta est falsa, si autem intelligeretur quod iste qui peccavit per verecundiam quam sumit de peccato cum vera contritione ne dum unius peccati, sed omnium peccatorum, quae commisit in tota vita sua, ei condonantur peccata, poterit stare”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 447r. 39   “De hoc auctor non intelligit, ideo maneat censura”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 447r. 40   “Mihi etiam videretur ut huiusmodi censurae breviores essent ne legentibus sint onerosae vel molestae”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 240r. 41   See App. IV, 5. 42   “Non video hinc ullum errorem”, “Nec ego”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 304r. 43   See App. I,1. 44   See e.g. 1 Kings 3:2; 2 Kings 5:22; 4 Kings 23:18.

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Rashi on Deuteronomy 10-11 From Rashi’s commentary we find a first collection in Vat. lat. 14630, from which subsequently a selection of passages – indicated with † – was made. In Vat. lat. 14629 we find the selected passages often expanded, with the Latin improved where necessary, censurae inserted and supplemented by the addition of other passages not found in the first collection in Vat. lat. 14630. This revised collection served as the exemplarius archetypus. The text in Vat. lat. 14628 is identical with the one in Vat. lat. 14629 and is therefore not reproduced in the synopsis.

Caput 10 (Vat. lat. 14630, fol. 94r)

Caput 10 (Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 179v)

† (v.1) Notat R. Salomon quod fuerunt duae arcae una quam fecit Moses ubi reposuit tabulas legis et haec in bello deducebatur. Alteram fecit Beseleel et haec non adducebatur in bello nisi tempore Ophni et Phineas.

v.1 In tempore illo. Post 40 dies placatus est mihi, et dixit mihi dola tibi. Deinde et facies arcam. Ast ego feci primum arcam. Nam quando venissem et habuissem mecum tabulas ubi nam locare potuissem illas? Neque haec est illa arca, quam fecit Beseleel quia ecce non laboratum est in tabernaculo nisi post dies Chippurim, quoniam cum descendit de monte dedit illi praeceptum de extruendo tabernaculo. Et Beseleel primo construxit tabernaculum deinde arcam et vasa etc. Et haec est arca illa, cum qua in prelium exibat, at illa quam fecit Beseleel non exibat in prelium nisi quando exiit diebus Eli sacerdotis. De duabus arcis res inaudita.

† (v.12) Nisi ut timeas Dominum. Magistri nostri hinc elicuerunt, omnia in manu coeli id est Dei praeter timorem coeli id est Dei.

v.12 Nisi ut timeas Deum. Magistri nostri hinc elicuerunt sententiam illam, omnia de manu Dei sunt praeter timorem Dei. Dogma falsissimum.

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Caput 11

Caput 11

† v.6 In medio omnis Israel. Omnis locus quo aliquis ex his fugiebat terra aperiebatur sub eo et deglutiebat eum. Ista sunt verba R. Juda. Dixit ei R. Nehemias: sed none iam dictum fuit, et aperuit terra os suum, et non ora sua. Dixit ei: et quomodo potero saturare in medio omnis Israel. Dixit ei quod facta est terra ‫ מדרון כמשפך‬declivis quasi clepsidra, et ubicumque fuit unus de omnibus volvebatur et veniebat ad locum rupturae.

v.6 In medio omnis Israel. Quocunque quispiam confugisset, terra sub illo aperiebatur et illum deglutiebat. Sed huic opponit R. Nehemias, quod scriptura dicit quod terra aperiebat os suum [Num 16:32], et non ora sua. Respondit illi: et quomodo tueri potero hoc quod scriptura asserit in medio omnis Israel. Solvit R Nehemias, quod terra instar clepsydrae vel infundibili facta est declivis, ita ut sicubi fuisset unus ex illis volvebatur per declive usque ad voraginis illius hiatum. Fabulae.

v.9 (=11) Terra montium et vallium. Mons longe maius colendus quam planities quia planitiae in loco cor tu seminas cor, sed montis loco cor de eo quinque corim, quattuor in declivi, et unum in capite suo. v.10 (=12) Quam Dominus Deus tuus semper invisit. Deus non requirit nisi terram Israel, et eius unius gratia invisit et requirit caeteras terras cum ea. Puerilia. v.11 (=12) A principio anni usque ad finem. A principio enim anni iudicatur et statuitur a Deo quid toto anno usque ad finem eius agendum sit. Erroneum dogma. † (v.14) A tempore suo. In nocte sab- v.12 (=14) Dabo pluviam vestram tembatorum quando omnes inveniuntur in pore suo: Tempore suo nocte scilicet ne vobis interdiu molestia sit, vel temeorum domibus. pore suo id est noctibus sabbathorum, quando omnes se domi suae continent. Ridendum.

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Vat. lat. 14630, fol. 94r.

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Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 179v.

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Kimhi on Isaiah 30-33 The synopsis of the collection of passages taken from Kimhi’s commentary shows the text in Vat. lat. 14629 copied from Vat. lat. 14630 and the last stage of the procedure as preserved in Vat. lat. 14628. In Vat. lat. 14629 two passages are marked with a dagger, indicating that they should be excluded from the exemplarius archetypus, a decision reflected in Vat. lat. 14628. In both cases a censura is missing. The fact that they are not added in an appendix of censurae ommissae45 shows that the two passages in the second selection were removed from the collection before the final selection was made. The final text in Vat. lat. 14628 shows how the reviser (Robert Bellarmine in this case) and the Master of the Sacred Palace worked on the collections. When making the final revisions Bellarmine noticed an incomprehensible censura to Isaiah 33:1: “Woe to you, destroyer, who yourself has not been destroyed”46. Kimhi had identified ‘the destroyer’ with the fourth kingdom in Daniel’s vision, that is Rome, which was to be destroyed in the days of the Messiah. Interpreting Kimhi’s reference to the fourth kingdom as a veiled reference to the Church, the compiler dismissed Kimhi’s comment as a false prediction of its destruction. In his censura he states: “this is erroneous because the reign of the Roman Church began after the coming of the Messiah”. Copying from Vat. lat. 14629 the copyist had misread the abbreviation qỉ and wrote in full quod instead of quia, thus producing the censura: “it is erroneous that the reign of the Roman Church began after the coming of the Messiah”. In his revision of the collection Bellarmine reinstated the correct reading of the censura. The censura clearly needed corroboration; for the Magister proffered another piece of evidence to prove that the Church would never be destroyed. The Gospel of Matthew 16:18, supplied the indisputable proof: Jesus’ promise to Peter that the powers of death would not prevail against the Church.

   

  Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 289v.   “Nescio quid sibi velit censura ad marginem, cum ait, falsum esse quod regnum romanae ecclesiae post messiae adventum coepit”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 304r. 45 46

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Caput 30 (Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 276v)

Caput 30 (Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 302v-303r)

v.1 Veh filiis declinantibus etc. adaptat temporibus Achaz. Sed potius prophetia est contra Hebraeos qui noluerunt recipere evangelium

Sed potius prophetia est v.1 Veh filiis declinanticontra Hebraeos qui no- bus etc. adaptat temporiluerunt recipere evange- bus Achaz. lium

† v.28 Canticum erit vobis etc. quando assyrius cecidit, nox erat paschatis

† Caput 31 v.1 Veh qui descendunt in Egyptum. Exponit hoc capitulum de strage Asssyriorum etc. et consolatione Hezechiae Caput 32 (v.1) Ecce ad iustitiam faciendam etc. iste est rex Hezechias qui regnavit ad faciendam iustitiam

Caput 32 Multi ex nostris huic expositioni consentiunt, nihilominus grandes promissiones Messiam innuunt.

(v.1) Ecce ad iustitiam faciendam etc. iste est rex Hezechias qui regnavit ad faciendam iustitiam

Multi ex nostris exponant de rege Hezechia. nihilominus grandes promissiones messiam innuunt.

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Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 276v.

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Caput 33 v.1 Veh praedanti et tu non praedam passus. Si consolatio est, quemadmodum scripsimus fuit in diebus Ezechiae. Et dicitur Veh qui praedaris de Senacherib. Et si intelligitur de diebus Messiae, dicitur contra illum qui regnabit illius saeculo, et est regnum quartum in visione Danielis etc. cui dicitur, Et si adhuc non fuerit passus praedam, cito audiet quod regnum eius ad finem perducendum est. Falsum qî regnum ecclesiae Romanae post Messiae adventum coepit

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Caput 33 Falsum quod quia regnum ecclesiae Romanae post Messiae adventum coepit

v.1 Veh praedanti et tu non praedam passus. Si consolatio est, quemadmodum scripsimus fuit in diebus Ezechiae. Nec portae inferi prae- Et dicitur Veh qui praevalebunt adversum eam daris de Senacherib. Et si intelligitur de diebus Messiae, dicitur contra illum qui regnabit illius saeculo, et est regnum quartum in visione Danielis etc. cui dicitur, Et si adhuc non fuerit passus praedam, cito audiet quod regnum eius ad finem perducendum est.

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Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 302v.

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Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 303r.

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CHAPTER 5

THE EXEGETICAL CRITERIA

When browsing through the final version of the collections from Hebrew biblical commentaries in Vat. lat. 14628, one cannot fail to notice the variety of marginal notes indicating the reasons specific explanations of Scripture were considered inadmissible. This medley of censurae finds a more systematic presentation in a subject index of extracts from Rashi’s and Bahya’s Bible commentaries preserved in Vat. lat. 14629. Under the heading Errors, false dogmas, insults, absurdities, perversion of Scripture, the Index provides a comprehensive outline of the compilers’ motives for including certain abstracts in their collections1. Their objections resulted is an unprecedented catalogue of alleged blasphemies against God and the divine attributes2, errors in the supernatural and natural sphere3, insults and imprecations of holy men and women4, unacceptable Jewish dogmas and beliefs5, invented miracles, lies, obscenities and sheer ignorance6. 1   Errores, falsa dogmata, blasphemiae, contumeliae, deliramenta, perversiones scripturae, Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 4r, see App. III, 1. 2   “Blasphemias in deum: In dei omnipotentiam, in dei sapientiam et immutabilitatem, in dei beatitudinem, in dei iustitiam, de ira dei, in dei bonitatem, in dei aeternitatem, in dei simplicitatem et veritatem, de divina maiestate, in dei incircumscriptionem, in dei impeccabilitatem”. 3   “De angelis errores, de coelis et stellis, de elementis, de arboribus et herbis, de animalibus, bestiis et iumentis, de Adam et homine”. 4   “Convitia et maledicta in viros sanctos: Adam, Hevam, Enos, Mathusalem Melchisedech, Noe, Abraham, Saram, Eliezer, Jacob, Isaac, Iob, Mose, Chaleb, Oseam, Annam, Iethro, Ninivitas, Hezechielem, Naboth, Esaiam, Eliam, Ezechiam, Ieremiam, Levi, Aharon, David, Laban, Josias, Esther, Joseph, Josue, Deborah, Phinees, Sem, Samuelem, Salomon, Saulem, matrem Salomonis, Sunamitem Elisaei, contra auctorem libri Paralipomenon, in Jephteh, Ruth, Habacuch, Elimelech, Nephtali, Judah”. 5   “Dogmata Ebraeorum: De messia, de creatione, de altare Ebraeorum, de arca dei, de prophetia et revelationibus, de cabala et traditionibus et scripturis rabbinorum, de circumcisione, de thephilim, de sacrificiis, de peccatis in genere, peccatum originale, de cultu idolatriae, de peccati remissione, de paupertate, de infanticidio, de coniungio, de primo et secundo templo, de tertio aedificando templo, de redemptione a presente captivitate et redemptione in genere, de resurrectione mortuorum, de lege”. 6   “Miracula apocrypha, superstitiones, fabulae, mendacia, obscena, expositiones absurdae, de [artibus] artium liberarium, imperitia historiarum, imperitia geographiae, imperitia medicinae”.

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The list shows a striking similarity with the objections against Jewish Bible exegesis that Robert Bellarmine formulated in the Fabroniana manuscript 15, which contains his extracts from Rashi’s commentary on the Pentateuch7. Bellarmine classified his criticism under the following five categories: 1. blasphemies against God and the saints; 2. insults against the Christians; 3. obstacles to conversion; 4. errors against reason and the law of nature; 5. corruption of the Holy Scriptures or their profanation8. Bellarmine provides examples of all these errors from the Jewish festival prayer book – the Mahzor – and specific rabbinic Bible commentaries, which also appear in Vat. lat. 14630, 14629 and 146289. Blasphemies against God and the saints are specified as blasphemies against God, Jesus, the holy angels, the holy fathers [i.e. biblical figures] and the sacraments, including other holy objects of the Church. A well-known example referred to by Bellarmine is Rashi’s comment on Numbers 28:15: “And there shall be one male goat for a sin-offering to the Lord”, explained by Rashi as an atonement for God for having diminished the moon. According to Bellarmine, this idea is unacceptable because in his view it suggests that God was frightened of being excommunicated10. The same text with the censura: “this is a most shameful blasphemy against God” is included in the collection from Rashi’s commentary on Numbers as preserved in Vat. lat. 1462811. Rashi’s comment on Exodus 32:7, “The Lord said to Moses, ‘Go down at once! [Your people, whom you brought up out of the land of Egypt, have acted perversely]”, which suggests the idea that Moses was excommunicated by the celestial council, is rejected by Bellarmine as a blasphemy against the saints12. In Vat. lat. 14628 the passage is also included with the note that it is a false and disgraceful statement13. As   See Chapter 3, 65-6.  “Quae corrigenda in libris iudaeorum esse videntur, ad quinque capita revocari possunt”, Pistoia, Biblioteca Fabroniana MS 15, fols 480r-483v. For the whole text see Le Bachelet, Auctarium Bellarminianum cit., 658-60. 9   Rashi on Torah, Joshua, 3 Kings, Isaiah, Song of Songs, Job and Proverbs, see App. I, 1; Bahya on Genesis, see App. III, 3; Kimhi on 1 Kings, 3 Kings, Isaiah, Ezechiel, Amos and Psalms, see App. III, 5; Ibn Ezra on Psalms, see App. II, 4; Levi ben Gershon on 4 Kings, see App. I, 8a; Baal Turim on Leviticus, see App. I, 7; Moses ben Nahman on Job, see App. I, 17; Mahzor, see App. III, 2. 10   “Blasphemiae in Deum et sanctos. 1. In Deum: ut quod Deus peccaverit; quod pro peccato suo sacrificium instituerit; quod excommunicationem timuerit”, Le Bachelet, Auctarium Bellarminianum cit., 658. 11   “Hircum caprarum. In Talmud tract. shebuoth et in Midras: Holocaustum offerte propitiationem pro me qui diminui lunam. Censura: indignissima blasphemia contra Deum”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 20v at Numeri 28:15. 12   “Blasphemiae in sanctos patres: Moses excommunicatus fuit a Deo. R. Salo. Exo. 32”, Le Bachelet, Auctarium Bellarminianum cit., 658. 13   “Vade et descende: descende de tua dignitate: non insignivi te dignitate nisi eorum causa, ipsamet hora Moses de sententia superni Collegii excommunicatus fuit. Censura: falsa et temeraria assertio”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 12v at Exodus 32:7. 7 8

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an example of the insults against Christians, including bishops, priests, monks and neophytes, Bellarmine points to Rashi’s comment to Proverbs 2:12: “It (prudence) will save you from the way of evil, from those who speak perversely”14. According to Rashi those who speak perversities are the minim (heretics), who lead Israel to idolatry. The compiler of Rashi’s commentary in Vat. lat. 14628 states that such an explanation is an affront to the Christians15. A barrier to the conversion of the Jews is their denial of eternal punishment, as illustrated by Rashi’s comment on Isaiah 63:7: “I will recount the gracious deeds of the Lord, […] that he has shown them according to his mercy, according to the abundance of his steadfast love”16. From God’s assurance that Israel is His people, Rashi concludes that they do not sin despite their rebellion against God. The text is included in Vat. lat. 1462817. The errors against reason and the law of nature are their beliefs in the mortality of the soul, the transmigration of souls from one body to another and the physical sensation of dead bodies. According to Bellarmine this idea is exemplified in Rashi’s comment on Job 14:22 that the dead suffer from the bite of the snake18. In Vat. lat. 14628 the compiler makes the remark that the dead have no capacity to feel [any pain]19. The corruption of Scripture is subdivided into lies and abuse of Scripture. The Jews recount legendary and shameless stories indiscriminately mingled with the interpretation of Scripture. Bellarmine exemplifies this kind of corruption by quoting Nahmanides’ interpretation of Job 19:27, “My reins are consumed in my lap”, which states that Job with his stool emptied his kidneys20. The composer of the collection refers to the Vulgate rendering (“this my hope 14  “‘Contumeliae in christianos’. 2. In neophitos: ut quod eos appellant destructos, et omnino damnandos affirmant, et similia. Item minim, id est, haereticos vocat R. Salo., Proverb. c. 2, 6, 7”, Le Bachelet, Auctarium Bellarminianum cit., 659. 15   “a viro loquente perversitates: sunt minim qui faciunt declinare Israelem ad idolatrium”. censura: contra christianos’, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 94r at Prov. 2:12. 16   “Impedimenta, ne Judaei convertantur. 4. Quod affirment, reclamantibus Scripturis, nullum Israelitam damnari posse ad aeternas poenas [Israelis Deus peccata dissimulat, ac si non essent, R. Salo., Isaiae 63]”, Le Bachelet, Auctarium Bellarminianum cit., 659. 17   “et dixit vere populus meus sunt: filii qui non mentientur, quamvis compertissimum mihi sit quod fuerint mihi rebelles, nihilominus populus meus sunt: sunt mihi perinde ac filii qui non peccaverint. Censura: Hebraei videntur hac haeresi laborare, ut remissionem culpae non imputationem arbitrentur”, Vat. lat. 14628, fols. 108v-109r at Isaiah 63:7. 18   “Errores contra rationem et legem naturae. 3. de sensu corporum mortuorum, quae ita dolent, ac si acrem vim caro sentiret, propter morsum serpentis. Sic R. Salo. in Job 14”, Le Bachelet, Auctarium Bellarminianum cit., 659. 19   “Verumtamen caro eius in eo dolebit etc. Gravis est vermis mortuo sicut acus in carne viventis. Censura: non est sensus mortuo”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 77v at Job 14:23 (=22). 20   “Corruptelae divinarum literarum, vel earumdem prophanatio. 2. Job emisit renes cum stercore, nam scriptum in Job 19: defecerunt renes mei in sinu meo. Gerundensis, in Job”, Le Bachelet, Auctarium Bellarminianum, 660.

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is laid up in my bosom”) and calls Nahmanides’ interpretation absurd and obscene21. The correspondence between Vat. lat. 14628 and the examples of unacceptable Jewish exegesis presented by Bellarmine can hardly be incidental. It stands to reason that the list preserved in manuscript Fabroniana 15 is based upon the collections, which as already has been pointed out were clearly at Bellarmine’s disposal22. Together with the Index in Vat. lat. 14629, Bellarmine’s list of errors therefore provides a fairly accurate insight into the criteria used for the compilation of the collections. The scrutiny of Jewish biblical commentaries according to criteria documented in Vat. lat. 14629 required a profound knowledge of Christian theology and exegesis according to the standards of a Church devoted to a longstanding tradition of Christological and ecclesiological interpretation of Scripture, deeply rooted in patristic biblical exegesis and by then firmly shaped by Thomistic theology. The expurgation of Hebrew books, however, was limited to the implementation of some basic guidelines. Acquaintance with the Hebrew language was to be expected of a censor, usually a converted Jew. But one may well ask whether such a person had sufficient theological knowledge that would enable him to use a more sophisticated arsenal of criteria. In contrast, those who composed the collections were for the most part highly qualified theologians, who were perfectly capable of applying Bellarmine’s theological and exegetical criteria to rabbinic biblical commentaries – for the first time in Church history these writings formed the main object of a thorough theological examination23. From the procedure followed in the project, as discussed in Chapter 4, it appeared that such an implementation was not always straightforward even for highly qualified theologians. The selection of passages was carried out in various stages: drafts of excerpts and censurae were discussed, changed and partially or even entirely rejected24. In other words, the theologians   “reposita est haec spes mea in sinu meo. Verba haebrea habent defecerunt renes mei in sinu meo. Opinio Magistrorum, inquit, est quod effusi sunt renes Iobis, et forsitan emissit eos in stercore eius. Censura: absurda et obscaena expositio: verba enim hebraea significant quod quamvis prae afflictione defecerint intestina omnia, remanet tamen desiderium et spes resurgendi et ita noster interpres sensum traduxit”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 417v at Job 19:27. For the problematic text history of the verse see J.I. Mombert, ‘On Job XIX, 25-27’, in Journal of the Society of Biblical Literature and Exegesis 2/1 (June 1882), 27-39. 22   The close relationship between MS Fabroniana 15 and the Vatican manuscripts under discussion makes Le Bachelet’s suggestion that Bellarmine’s directives for censorship could relate to the revision of Hebrew books under Sixtus V unlikely, see Le Bachelet, Auctarium Bellarminianum cit., 659 n. 1. 23   Biblical commentaries and Bible translations had already been the subject of inquisitorial investigation, exclusively focusing, however, on heretical positions within or close to the Reformation, see Reusch, Der Index der verbotenen Bücher cit., 2:126-8, 199-204, 266, 331-2. 24   See Chapter 4, 70-2. 21

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frequently disagreed about what should be considered the established exegetical and theological tradition of the Church, with which rabbinic biblical commentaries were to be confronted. Thus, the assessment of Jewish exegesis often led to internal discussions, with decisive roles ascribed to Robert Bellarmine and the Master of the Sacred Palace. The Talmud An indisputable criterion for including a particular explanation of Scripture in the collection of unacceptable passages was the use of or reference to the Talmud. It was not for the first time that this centrepiece of Jewish tradition was looked upon unfavourably in Christian circles. Charges against the Talmud date back to 1238, when the Jewish convert Nicholas Donin of La Rochelle composed a list of accusations, alleging that the Talmud was full of anthropomorphisms, obscenities and blasphemies and that it taught the superiority of the Oral Law over the Written Law of Moses. These charges led to the Disputation of Paris in 1240, which culminated in the burning of 24 cartloads of Talmudic works in 124225. Similar accusations resulted in confiscation and destruction of copies of the Talmud on several other occasions26. The burning of the Talmud on 9 September 1553 on the Campo de’ Fiori in Rome by order of the Roman Inquisition represented the culmination in the age-long troubled relationship between Church and Synagogue. Meant to eradicate this epitome of Jewish beliefs, the pyre in Rome prompted a polemic within the Church about Hebrew books other than the Talmud, in particular biblical commentaries. Three days after the burning of the Talmud, Gian Pietro Carafa, Head of the Roman Inquisition, expressed his sadness that the Jews had almost entirely 25   An important witness of the accusations against the Talmud brought forward by Donin is MS lat. 16 558 in the Bibliothèque nationale in France, see Isidore Loeb, ‘La controverse de 1240 sur le talmud’, in Revue des études juives 1-3 (1881), 1: 247-61; 2:248-70; 3:39-57. See further, Solomon Grayzel, The Church and the Jews in the XIIIth Century (Philadelphia, 1933), 339-43; Judah M. Rosenthal, ‘The Talmud on Trial: The Disputation at Paris in the Year 1240’, in Jewish Quarterly Review 47 (1956-57), 1:58-76, 2:145-69; Robert Chazan, ed., Church, State, and the Jew in the Middle Ages (New York, 1980), 221-38; Hyam Maccoby, Judaism on Trial: Jewish-Christian Disputations in the Middle Ages (Rutherford, 1982). 26   The first burning of the Talmud in Paris in 1242 was followed by a number of pyres in France in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. In 1263 Pope Clement IV demanded the expurgation of the Talmud in Spain. In 1321 Pope John XXII ordered the confiscation of the Talmud in Italy. For an overview of the vicissitudes of the Talmud see Reusch, Der Index der verbotenen Bücher cit., 1:45-53; Popper, Censorship cit., 6-20; Willehad Eckert, ‘Hochund Spätmittelalter: katholischer Humanismus’, in Kirche und Synagoge: Handbuch zur Geschichte von Christen und Juden, Darstellung mit Quellen, ed. Karl H. Rengstorf and Siegfried von Kortzfleisch (Stuttgart, 1968, 1970), 1 (1968), 210-306 at 227-35; Stow, ‘The Burning of the Talmud’ cit., 435-59; Parente, ‘La Chiesa e il Talmud’ cit., 548-66; Parente, ‘The Index’ cit., 163-93.

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closed and sealed the Sacred Scriptures and only studied the Talmud27. He summoned local authorities to follow the Roman initiative and burn all available copies28. The first reaction to this summons came from Venice, where on 21 October 1553 the Council of Ten, one of the governing bodies of the Republic, burnt Giustiniani’s edition of the Talmud, printed only two years earlier. Furthermore – as advised by Christian theologians – the Council decided that all abstracts and summaries from the Talmud such as Alfasi’s anthology of legal decisions Sefer ha-Halakhot, compilations of all the aggadic material in the Talmud like Ein Yaacov and works that derived their authority from the Talmud were to be considered part of the Talmud and should therefore also be burnt29. From the town of Pesaro the inquisitor Girolamo Muzio reported to the Roman Inquisition that on 16 December 1553 the burning of the Talmud and other books selected by an expert sent from Rome, a certain Raffaele Aquilino, had taken place on the marketplace. The inquisitor furthermore informed the Roman Inquisition about the disagreement between Raffaele and the Jews concerning certain books. According to the Roman delegate, these books contained large portions of the Talmud, and were therefore also eligible for burning. Raffaele was moreover of the opinion that many biblical commentaries contained despicable comments. Jewish biblical commentaries were endangered further by the position of the Duke of Urbino, who had even gone so far as to suggest that Jews should be allowed only the Bible30. Carafa’s complaint about Jews’ preoccupation with the Talmud, the decision made by the Venetian authorities to broaden the definition of Talmud, and the discussions in Pesaro and Urbino as to whether biblical commentaries should also be burnt, clearly illustrate a trend in the Church to intensify the de27   “Quare cum ad nostram notitiam non sine ingenti animi dolore pervenisset, male sui studiosam ac obstinatam hanc Hebraeorum gentem iam paene clausis et obsignatis sacrorum Bibliorum libris solis codicibus quibusdam, quos Thalmud appellant, studere ac eos, ut aiunt, diurna nocturnaque manu versare suosque filios a teneris unguiculis hac virulenta doctrina praecipue imbuere […]”, Stern, Urkundliche Beiträge cit., 1:99-100. 28   “[…] omnes et singulos principes Christianos et rerum publicarum rectores nec non ordinarios locorum et haereticae pravitatis inquisitores hortamur et monemus […] omnes huiusmodi libros Thalmud per domos et synagogas Hebraeorum in eorum civitatibus et terris habitantium diligenter perquiri et inventos publice comburi faciant”, Stern, Urkundliche Beiträge cit., 1:101. 29   See the report by Canonicus Don Leonardo, Frater Thommaso and the theologian Juan Baptista di Fresci Olivi about the Talmud and the question which Talmudic books according to the order of the council of Ten in Venice on 21 October 1553 were to be burnt, Stern, Urkundliche Beiträge cit., 1:106-8; Paul Grendler, The Roman Inquisition and the Venetian Press, 1540-1605 (Princeton, 1977), 90-3. First published in Constantinople in 1509, Alfasi’s Sefer ha-Halkhhot was printed in Venice in 1521 and 1552. Ein Yaacov was first published in Salonica in 1516 and printed in Venice in 1546. Giustiniani’s Talmud edition was printed in Venice between 1546 and 1551. 30   See Stern, Urkundliche Beiträge cit., 1:113.

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structive policy of the Inquisition31. The animosity against Hebrew books was counteracted on 29 May 1554, when, eight months after the burning of the Talmud in Rome, Pope Julius III (1550-55) issued the Bull Cum sicut nuper, which imposed on the Jews the compulsory inspection of all their Hebrew books within four months. Those who possessed books in which the name of Jesus was mentioned in a blasphemous or contemptuous way, were to be punished32. Books that did not contain such blasphemies were to be returned to their owners without bothering them any further. By initiating censorship and expurgation, the Pope prevented Hebrew books from being burnt indiscriminately33. By creating limited space for Hebrew books within the doctrinal parameters of the Church, the Pope, representing those who opposed the radical and oppressive policies of the Roman Inquisition, came nolens volens to the rescue of Hebrew books34. The Biblical Commentaries The promulgation of the bull Cum sicut nuper did not put an end to the discussion about whether Hebrew books related to the Talmud – biblical 31   On the burning of the Talmud in other Italian cities see Parente, ‘La Chiesa e il Talmud’ cit., 583-98 and bibliography mentioned there. 32   “in quibus nomen Iesu, Salvatoris nostri, quod Iesevi Hanozri dicitur, cum blasphemia, aut alias ignominiose nominatur”, Parente, ‘La Chiesa e il Talmud’ cit., 593. See also Berliner, Censur und Confiscation cit., 4. 33   For the beginning of censorship carried out in the preparation of new editions see Isaiah Sonne, ‘Expurgation of Hebrew books – The work of Jewish scholars’, in Bulletin of the New York Public Library 46 (1942), 975-1015 at 976. See also Shlomo Simonsohn, History of the Jews in the Duchy of Mantova (Jerusalem, 1977), 685-6. Earlier attempts to implement censorship were made by the Nuncio in Venice Giovanni della Casa in 1548, who had orders from Rome to arrange for the censorship of Hebrew books in the Republic. In 1550 Cardinal Verallo complained to the Venetian ambassador in Rome about Hebrew books printed in Venice, which were pernicious to Christianity. His protest, however, did not prevent Giustiniani from completing his Talmud edition in 1551. Only after its publication did the Venetian Collegio order the Esecutori contro la bestemmia to examine the Talmud and to arrange for Christian experts to record blasphemies and other offensive passages. The results of this examination certainly contributed to the decision of the Roman Inquisition in 1553 to burn the Talmud. See Grendler, ‘The Destruction of Hebrew Books’ cit., 105-6. 34   See Amnon Raz-Krakotzkin, ‘The Censor as a Mediator: Printing, Censorship and the Shaping of Hebrew Literature’, in The Roman Inquisition, the Index and the Jews, ed. Stephen Wendehorst (Leiden, 2004), 35-58 at 40. Stow differs, considering Cum sicut nuper “not more than a reinforcement of the inquisitional order by a higher authority”, see Stow, Catholic Thought cit., 56-8. On the other hand, Stow does notice the Pope’s compromise in that he reaffirmed the ban, but approved the use of other rabbinic works. See Stow, ‘The Burning of the Talmud’ cit., 438-9, 443. On the adamant position against the Talmud within the Congregation of the Inquisition and the indecisiveness of Julius III see Grendler, The Roman Inquisition cit., 96. On the Pope’s mild attitude towards heresies, see further Ludwig von Pastor, Geschichte der Päpste seit dem Ausgang des Mittelalters. Sechster Band: Geschichte der Päpste im Zeitalter der katholischen Reformation und Restauration: Julius III., Marcellus II. und Paul IV. (1550-1559) (Freiburg im Breisgau, 1957), 160-1.

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commentaries in particular – also warranted destruction. Protagonist in the discussion was the Jesuit Francisco Torres, who immediately after the burning of the Talmud submitted a memorandum to the Holy Office, in which he recommended that Jewish Bible commentaries be subjected to the same treatment and burnt35. In reaction to this request two anonymous memoranda were presented to the Holy Office, in which opponents of Torres pleaded that biblical commentaries be expurgated instead of destroyed, so that they could be used in the discussions with the Jews36. In January1555, almost a year after Julius III issued Cum sicut nuper, Torres published his pamphlet De sola lectione legis, in which quoting the arguments of his opponents often verbatim, he rejected their view that Jewish Bible commentaries could be a resource for demonstrating to the Jews their mistaken interpretations of Scripture. He argued that since these commentaries did not announce the coming of Christ, they constituted not an aid but an obstacle to the Jews’ conversion37. Thomas Aquinas’s question, in his Summa Theologica, whether the rites of the unbelievers ought to be tolerated was at the centre of their discussion. Stating that those rites that appear to be useful for the (Christian) believers or bear some truth should be condoned, Thomas had concluded, “since the rites of the Jews foreshadow the truth of our faith and in them our faith is represented figuratively, so to speak, they should be tolerated”38. Relying on the letter to the Hebrews, Torres interprets Thomas’ proposition as a reference to the sacrifices in the Temple as described in the Old Testament, but not to the Synagogue service39. However, Thomas had stated that it had been recognized practice, authorized by Pope Gregory, the Great (590–604) that “they should be allowed to observe all their feasts, just as hitherto they and their fathers have for ages observed them”. Torres, therefore, could not afford to plead for the abolition of the Jewish ceremonies and only called for the suppression of the biblical commentaries, despite the fact that Scripture and its interpretation constituted an   See Stow, ‘The Burning of the Talmud’ cit., 440-1.   See Fausto Parente, ‘Contrasti tra Curia e Sant’Uffizio all’indomani del rogo di Campo de’ Fiori del 1553: Il De sola lectione di Francisco Torres e la Novella legis 146 di Giustiniano’, in Italia Judaica: Gli ebrei nello Stato Pontificio fino al Ghetto (1555). Atti del VI Convegno internazionale Tel Aviv, 18-22 giugno 1995 (Rome, 1998), 158-86 at 158-62. 37   See Charles Dejob, Documents tirés des papiers du cardinal Sirleto et de quelques autres manuscrits de la Vaticane sur les Juifs des états pontificaux (Versailles, 1884), 88-90; Parente, ‘Contrasti’ cit., 165. For Torres see also Stow, Catholic Thought cit., 212-7. 38   “Utrum infidelium ritus sint tolerandi”, IIa IIae, Quaestio 10, Art. II. For the Jewish plea with reference to Thomas Aquinas to save their commentaries see Dejob, Documents cit., 89-90. 39   See Hebr. 10:11-18. 35 36

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integral part of the synagogue service40. His reading of the passage in the Summa Theologica, to which his opponents in their anonymous memoranda refer, is actually a reaction to a comment by the Dominican and theologian Thomas Cajetan on the same question41. According to Cajetan, books that defend the Jewish faith were to be regarded as an integral part of the cult, and therefore had to be tolerated. Biblical commentaries belonged to this category: “Some books are wholly appropriate for the Jews, such as the books of the Old Testament and their explanations, which undoubtedly should be left to them. Other books edited in order to foster their faithlessness against the divinity of Jesus Christ so that the Jews would not convert to the faith of Jesus Christ, but obstinately persist in their faithlessness, should be burnt by the Church, if it has the opportunity to do so”42. Since he himself claimed to rely on Jewish exegesis for his literal interpretation of the biblical text, Cajetan’s defence of rabbinic commentaries is not surprising43. From a register of decisions made by the Holy Office it appears that the Inquisition received Torres’ request, but because of the opposition in the Curia no action was taken44. An observation by Sisto da Siena seems to confirm this state of affairs. Sisto was sent to Cremona in 1559 by Pope Pius to implement the instruction of the Inquisition to destroy the Talmud. In the course of this undertaking, he examined all the Jewish libraries and printing houses in the city45. Sisto did not consider the biblical commentaries to be derived from the Talmud. Rather than issuing an order for them to be burnt, he gave them prominence. At the beginning of   See Parente, ‘Contrasti’ cit., 166-7.   (Thommaso de Vio) Cajetan (1469-1534) wrote an extensive commentary on Thomas Aquinas’ Summa theologica. Pars secunda secundae of the Summa theologica, where Thomas discusses the question whether the rites of the unbelievers ought to be tolerated, was published with Cajetan’s commentary in Lyon in 1540: Secunda secundae Sancti Thomæ, cum comment. Car. Caietani: sanctissimi theologorum monarchæ, divi Thomæ Aquinætis secunda secundæ, luculentissimi reverend. domini Thomæ de Vio, Caietani […] commentationibus adornata (Lyon, 1540). 42   “Quidam competentes Iudaeis absolute, ut sunt libri Testamenti Veteris et expositiones eorum: et hi procul dubio relinquendi sunt Iudaeis. Quidam editi ad confovendam suam perfidiam contra Iesu Christi divinitatem ne convertantur Iudaei ad Iesu Christi fidem sed persistant in sua perfidia obstinati: et hi libri, si facultas adsit, sint per Ecclesiam comburendi”. Quoted in Parente, ‘Contrasti’ cit., 172. 43   See Jared Wicks, ed. and trans., Cajetan Responds: A Reader in Reformation Controversy (Washington, 1978), 34-8. 44   See Parente, ‘Contrasti’ cit., 163. Parente rejects Hoffmann’s reading of Ott. lat. 2532, see Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 59. Stow follows Hoffmann, see Stow, ‘The Burning of the Talmud’ cit., 440-1. 45   The common view that Sisto was a Jewish convert has been questioned by Fausto Parente. See Fausto Parente, ‘Alcune osservazioni preliminari per una biografia di Sisto Senese: Fu realmente Sisto un Ebreo convertito?’, in Italia Judaica: Gli ebrei in Italia tra Rinascimento ed Età barocca (Rome, 1986), 211-31. 40 41

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his catalogue of Christian expositors of the Holy Scriptures in his Bibliotheca sancta he gives a list of those Jewish commentaries that he had seen mentioned by Christian exegetes46. The Composers and the Talmud The composers of our collections shared the views of Torres’ opponents and, following in the footsteps of Cajetan, had no intention of banning Jewish biblical commentaries. Their stance is noteworthy, since in effect they were opposing Cardinal Sirleto, who supported Torres’ claim. Despite his position as head of the Congregation of the Index, Sirleto played no decisive role in our project47. However, these compilers of the collections were not unaffected by Torres’ vicious attack and by the Church’s opposition to the Talmud and related works. The Vatican manuscripts show that they scrupulously collected all the passages in which the Talmud provided an unacceptable interpretation of Scripture, annotating them with the reason they should be included in a collection. One example may suffice. Exodus 32:1 reads: “When the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain [where he had gone to receive the two tablets of the covenant, tablets of stone, written with the finger of God], the people gathered around Aaron and said to him, ‘Come, make gods for us, who shall go before us; as for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him’”. At the beginning of the verse: “[And when the people saw] that Moses delayed” Rashi commented as follows: “On the sixteenth day Satan came and disturbed the world and brought it into disorder, thus creating the impression of a thick darkness and gloom, so that they said: ‘Moses is really dead; that is why this darkness came into the world.’ He said to them: ‘Moses has died, because six hours have already passed and he has not come back etc.’ [see tractate Shabbat]”. The six hours that had passed after the time Moses was expected to come down from Mount Sinai – Satan’s reason for declaring him dead – are nowhere attested in Scripture, but are based on a word play found in tractate Shabbat of the Babylonian Talmud: “Rabbi Joshua ben Levi 46   Sixtus Senensis, Bibliotheca Sancta a F. Sixto Senensi, ordinis praedicatorum, ex praecipuis catholicae ecclesiae authoribus collecta, et in octo libros digesta; quorum inscriptiones sequens pagina indicabit (Venice, 1566), 485-7. Many authors or works listed in the Bibliotheca Sancta are also found in the collections under discussion: Ibn Ezra (App. I, 2), Abraham ben Jacob Saba (App. I, 4), Abraham Farissol (App. I, 18), Bahya (App. III, 3), Midrash Rabbah (App. I, 14), Kav ve-naki (App. I, 16), David Kimhi (App. I, 12), Levi ben Gershon (App. I, 8), Menahem Recanati (App. I, 15), Rashi (App. I, 1). 47   See Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 105; see further Chapter 3, p. 66.

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said: Why is it written: ‘And when the people saw that Moses delayed [boshesh]’? Read not ‘boshesh’ (delayed) but ‘ba’u shesh’: the sixth [hour] has come)”48. ‘Ridiculous and incredible’ is the judgement of the compilers on this reference to Talmud in Rashi’s commentary49. But this process entailed going beyond selecting passages from the Talmud that contained unacceptable exegesis of Scripture. The compilers were apparently aware of Torres’ accusation that the commentaries were inspired by Satan and derived from the Talmud, “a sewer from which all conceivable iniquities descend”50. They therefore distanced themselves completely from the Talmud as such, and included passages in their collections not because of their blasphemous, offensive or implausible character, but for no other reason than that they referred to the Talmud as their source. Thus in Exodus 12:6 it is said of the Passover sacrifice that “the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening”. Rashi (whose comment is not even quoted in the extract) had followed a Talmudic interpretation of the expression ‘the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel’: “The paschal-lambs of the congregation are to be slaughtered in three groups [the whole assembly, the congregation and Israel], one after the other. The first group entered and the doors of the court were closed etc. as is to be found in Pesahim”51. The purpose of the Talmudic explanation is to provide a scriptural justification for the once existing practice of slaughtering in three groups by using the midrashic idea that there is a purpose to every word in Scripture52. However, it is not this rabbinic reading of Scripture that is questioned by the compiler. Rather, it is clear that what is unacceptable is the reference to the Talmud. For the extract simply contains the biblical lemma and the censura: “‘To the whole assembly of Israel’: quoted from the Talmud”53. Rashi’s inclusion of a reference to Talmud in his commentary on Deuteronomy 27:12 is once again the reason for the attention given to the passage. In vv. 12-14 it says: “Moses charged the people as follows: When you have crossed over the Jordan, these shall stand on Mount Gerizim for the blessing of the people: Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Joseph, and Benjamin. And these shall stand on Mount Ebal for the curse: Reuben, Gad, Asher, Zebulun, Dan, and Naphtali. Then the Levites shall declare in a loud voice to all the Israelites” and then follows a whole catalogue of curs  B.T. Shabbat 89a.   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 12r, see App. V, 1. 50   See Parente, ‘Contrasti’ cit., 165. 51   B.T. Pesahim 64a. 52   See Moses Mielziner, Introduction to the Talmud: With a new bibliography, 1925-1967, ed. Alexander Guttmann (New York, 1968), 120-7. 53   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 7v, see App. V, 2. 48 49

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es and of blessings that will come upon the people of Israel depending on their disobedience or obedience of the Law. Rashi describes the scene as follows: “Six tribes ascended to the top of Mount Gerizim and six tribes ascended to the top of Mount Ebal, and the priests and the Levites with the ark stood below between the two mountains. The Levites turned towards Mount Gerizim and spoke saying ‘Blessed be he who makes no molten or graven images’ etc. and both parties answered ‘Amen’. Then they turned towards Mount Ebal and spoke saying: ‘Cursed be he who makes a graven image’ etc. and all the following lines and concluding with ‘Cursed be he who observes not the words of the Law’”. Taken from tractate Sotah, Rashi’s comment is no more than a tapestry of Scriptural passages. According to Deuteronomy 27:12-13 six tribes should stand on Mount Gerizim and six on Mount Ebal. The detail about the priest and the Levites with the ark is taken from Joshua 8:33 and the curses are quotations from Deuteronomy 27:15 and 27:26. The only reason for selecting this comment, which is entirely compatible with the biblical narrative, must have been the reference to tractate Sotah. The passage is recorded as follows: “Rashi on Deuteronomy 26 [=27:12]54: ‘To bless the people’. [Censura: Tractatus Sotah]”55. It is not the Talmudic content in Rashi’s commentaries that is deemed objectionable, but, in every case, it is simply the word Talmud that raises alarm56. No theological debate was intended, and listing Talmudic references in such an unspecified manner was nothing but a way of alerting the user that he would come across a reference to the Talmud in the chapter with which he was dealing. This modus operandi appears to be in startling conformity with the way Robert Bellarmine prepared his task as reviser of the collections by examining Rashi’s commentary on the Pentateuch. Without referring to a particular verse in a chapter where the Talmud is quoted, Bellarmine jotted down ‘citatur de Talmud’ more than 50 times in his Errors of Rabbi Salomon in the Five books of Moses without any further indication of the nature of the citation57. Thus, extracting from Rashi’s commentary on Leviticus, he simply noted, without referring to specific chapters, that in the course of chapters 13 to 20 the Talmud is quoted about 10 times58.   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 38v.   The reference is missing in Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 38v, but is recorded in Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 180v. See App. V, 3. The text to which Rashi refers is the Mishnah in B.T. Sotah 32a. 56   See e.g. Vat. lat. 14628, 15 ad Num. 5 (=5:2): “Citatur tractatus Ghittin et Pesachim”; Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 20v ad Num. 26 (=26:54): “Citatur ex Thalmud Baba Kama” (actually Baba Batra); Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 39r ad Deut. 31 (=31:11 and 26): “Citatur tractatus Sota et Baba Batra”. 57   See Fabroniana MS 15. 58   “A capite 13 usque ad 20 citat decies aut circiter Talmud”, Fabroniana 15, fol. 13v. 54 55

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Talmudic traditions are treated in a similar way. Without passing theological judgement, the censurae often consist only of remarks such as ‘Talmudic’, ‘from the Talmud’, ‘from Talmudic traditions’, ‘drawn from the unresponsive questions of the Talmudists’, or ‘taken from Talmudic disputations’59. Since it requires thorough familiarity with the Talmud to identify such traditions, one is inclined to attribute the collections from Rashi’s commentary, in which most of these observations are recorded, to one of the two converts who participated in the project, Giovanni Paulo Eustachio or Marco Fabiano Fioghi60. Such a conclusion, however, should not be drawn too rapidly, since remarks of this type also occur occasionally in collections composed by one of the Christian-born compilers, which testify to their impressive knowledge of Hebrew literature61. “I think this is a Talmudic tradition”. Such a cautious remark about Rashi’s commentary on 3 Kings 22:7, may well have come from a Christian compiler62. The following excerpts illustrate the composers’ concern about Talmudic traces in the biblical commentaries. In Exodus 12:46 it is said about the Passover lamb that “it shall be eaten in one house; you shall not take any of the animal outside the house, and you shall not break a bone of it”. Rashi explains the expression: “You should not break a bone of it”, as signifying something which is suitable to eat. “For instance, if there is an olive’s amount of meat on a bone, the breaking of the bone is a transgression for you. If there is less meat than the size of an olive, there is no sin in breaking it”. Rashi’s explanation, which is certainly derived from the Talmud, though not explicitly, is composed of two separate statements: no bone of the paschal lamb should be broken, as long as it contains something suitable to eat, is a clarification of the biblical commandment derived from tractate Pesahim, where it states: “If it contains the standard of eating, it is subject to the [prohibition of] breaking a bone”63. In the discussion about the amount of meat, Rashi follows Rabbi who in tractate Yoma declares that all legal measurements 59   thalmudicum, see Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 21r (Rashi on Num. 32:20), fol. 27v (Rashi on Deut. 12), fol. 56r (Rashi on Judges 5:23), fol. 64r (Rashi on 2 Kings 22:8); ex Thalmud, see Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 56r (Rashi on Judges 6:19), fol. 58v (1 Kings 9:24); de traditionibus thalmudicis, see Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 30v (Rashi on Lev 10:1); ex frigidis Thalmudistarum quaestionibus haustum, see Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 60r (Rashi on 1 Kings 17:53); sumptum ex disputationibus Thalmudicis, see Vat. lat. 1468, fol. 65v (Rashi on 3 Kings 4:16). 60   The collections are lacking the usual heading. Parente does not refer to any sources for his claim that the collections from Rashi’s commentary were made by Didacus Lopez, see Parente, ‘La Chiesa e il Talmud’ cit., 606, n. 179. 61   See e.g. Kimhi’s commentary on Judg. 6:25 selected by Adamantius with the remark ‘Thalmudica omnia’, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 259v and his commentary on Isaiah 58:13 selected by Adamantius with the censura ‘observationes thalmudicae’, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 317v. 62   traditio, credo, thalmudica, see Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 185r. 63   B.T. Pesahim 84b.

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[for food] are the size of an olive64. Correctly qualified as derived from the Talmud, Rashi’s clarification of the biblical text is included in the collection with the following censura: “Talmudic measurements”65. For a similar reason Rashi’s comment on Leviticus 10:1-2, where the death of Aaron’s sons is reported, is included in the collection of passages. The biblical text reads as follows: “Now Aaron’s sons, Nadab and Abihu, each took his censer, put fire in it, and laid incense on it; and they offered unholy fire before the Lord, such as he had not commanded them. And fire came out from the presence of the Lord and consumed them, and they died before the Lord”. Asking about the reason the fire was unholy, and thus caused the death of Nadab and Abihu, Rashi provides two possible answers: “Rabbi Eliezer said, the sons of Aaron did not die for any other reason than for having taught a Talmudic ruling before the master, Moses. Rabbi Simeon states that they went into the sanctuary after having drunk wine; know that He after their death warned future generations that those who had drunk wine should not enter [into the sanctuary]”. As in his comment on Exodus 12:46, Rashi does not refer to the Talmud and yet draws his twofold answer to the question from tractate Eruvin of the Talmud. According to the Talmudic passage, Rabbi Eliezer suggested that the Talmudic prohibition that a disciple is not allowed to give a halakhic (legal) ruling in a district that falls under his master’s jurisdiction was the cause of the death of Aaron’s sons. By taking matters into their own hands the sons had put unholy fire on the altar (Lev. 10:1) in defiance of the ruling that fire had to descend from heaven to consume the sacrifice (in Lev. 9:24: “fire came out from the Lord and consumed the burnt-offering and the fat on the altar”)66. Rabbi Simeon’s explanation was based upon Lev 10:9: “Drink no wine nor strong drink, you nor your sons with you, when you go into the tent of meeting, lest you die”67. The compiler does not comment on Rashi’s explanations of the deaths of Nadab and Abihu, but irrespective of the content considers the association with the Talmud as such a criterion for including the passage in the collection with the censura: “from Talmudic traditions”68. The strategic decision on the part of the compilers to make a clear distinction between biblical commentaries and the Talmud ensured the pres  B.T. Yoma 80a; cf B.T. Pesahim 84b-85a.   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 7v, see App. V, 4. 66   See B.T. Eruvin, 62b-63a. 67   According to Rashi it is Rabbi Ishmael. For this cause of the death of Aaron’s sons, see also Leviticus Rabbah 5:1, 12:1, 20:9. The prohibition to enter the sanctuary after having drunk wine is often mentioned in the Talmud, see e.g. B.T. Ta’anit 17b; Baba Mezia 90b; Sanhedrin 22b, 83b; Shevuot 36b; Keritot 13b. 68   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 30v, see App. V, 5. 64 65

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ervation of rabbinic commentaries69. The fact that years after the pyres of 1553 such a threat still hovered over rabbinic commentaries is clearly alluded to by the composer of passages from the commentary on the book of Ezra attributed to Simeon ha-Darshan, who stated that almost everything in these commentaries was literally derived from the Talmud and should therefore be condemned rather than censured in any other way. The reason the collector nonetheless paid attention to what was discovered ‘in this booklet’ was “to allow for a more correct judgment about it”70. The precision with which the compilers searched for traces of Talmudic tradition in the biblical commentaries may well have been prompted by the protagonist of the undertaking, Cardinal Santoro. In preparation of a revision of the Tridentine Index, brought out by the Congregation of Cardinals for the Index in 1596, Santoro successfully advocated the complete and definitive condemnation of the Talmud against more lenient appraisals within the ecclesiastical hierarchy71. But the effort to erase all traces of the Talmud from biblical commentaries was not motivated purely by strategic reasons. From the comments to specific passages in the collections, it appears that the composers also had a theological motive for detaching biblical exegesis from the Talmud. Accepting a Talmudic explanation of a biblical verse would assign authority to the Talmud and would possibly give it the last exegetical word. Oral Torah The rejection of the Talmud as an exegetical authority comes clearly to the fore in the denunciation of its founding principle, the belief that the Oral Torah (Oral Law), which interprets and complements the Written Torah, is divinely revealed. According to Jewish tradition, the Oral Torah, a constitutive element of Judaism as far as observance is concerned, takes precedence over the Written Torah72. It is this claim that the Church had 69

  For the importance Bellarmine ascribed to rabbinic Bible commentaries see Chapter

3, 64 70   “Fere omnia quae in his commentariis continentur desumpta sunt ad verbum ex Thalmud, ideo potius damnatione quam alia censura digna sunt. Nihilominus quae in hoc parvo libello deprehensa fuerunt observavimus ut rectius iudicium de illo ferri possit”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 369v. For different reasons, namely reprehensible content, Levi ben Gershon’s commentary on Job should, according to the Master of the Sacred Palace Paulo Constabile, be burnt: “Haec in Job expositio R[abbi] Levi prorsus abiicienda mihi videtur et igni tradenda”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 246v. He passed the same judgement on Bahya’s commentary on the Pentateuch: “Becceaiaj commentaria in pentateucum fabulis ineptiis et erroribus plena penitus abolenda et igne absumenda censeo”, Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 123v. 71   See Parente, ‘The Index’ cit., 186-93. 72   For the Oral Torah see Ephraim E. Urbach, The Sages: their Concepts and Beliefs, 2 vols (Jerusalem, 1975), 1:286-314.

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rejected from its early days and which was one of the reasons for the condemnation of the Talmud in Paris in 124073. That no authority should be ascribed to the Oral Torah over Scripture is attested in our manuscripts, most prominently in the collection of extracts from the introduction to the third rabbinic Bible, where it is explicitly stated that there is no difference between the Oral and the Written Law74. In rabbinic exegesis, various passages in Scripture are understood as biblical endorsement of the divine provenance of the Oral Torah. Thus in Genesis 26 God promises Isaac to make his offspring as numerous as the stars of heaven, “because Abraham obeyed my voice and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws”. Passing over the most obvious meaning of ‘my laws’ as a collection of laws, Rashi, with a well-known and frequently used hermeneutical device, exploits the plural of ‘my laws’ (Torotai) in order to claim that Genesis 26:5 speaks of two Torahs, a written and an oral one. After the lemma “And my laws” he continues: “in order to comprise the Written Law and the one which was transmitted orally”. The compiler could have pointed at the Talmudic tradition as a reason for including the passage in his collection75. In this case, however, the issue was not the Talmud as such, but the content. His censura reads: “The orally transmitted Law, which they call kabbalah, has no foundation whatsoever in Holy Scripture”76. Occasionally the compiler offers his reason for divesting the Talmud of any authority. On one occasion, for example, he summarizes Ibn Ezra’s introduction to the Book of Genesis, and writes: “And shortly after [that is after Ibn Ezra’s exposition about the five different ways of exegesis], when dealing with the Written Law of Moses and that which was orally transmitted, he [Ibn Ezra] says: ‘This should be a sign for us that Moses leaned upon the Oral Law, which is a joy for the heart and a remedy for the bones: for there is no difference between the two Laws; we have received both from our fathers’”. The censura to the passage leaves no doubt as to its objection to this statement: “Since the traditions of the rabbis or the Talmud are full of errors and fables, it seems heretical to ascribe as much authority to them as to the Written Law”77. 73   In the preamble to his Novella 146 (8 February 553) Emperor Justinian already rejects the authority of the Mishnah and therefore of the Talmud, which is “the handwork of man, speaking only of earthly things, and having nothing of the divine in it”. See James Parkes, The Conflict of the Church and the Synagogue: A Study in the Origins of Antisemitism (Philadelphia, 1961), 392-3. 74   “Praeterea pudendi non verentur tantam authoritatem impiissimo Thalmud tribuere quantam divinae Scripturae”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 373v. 75   See B.T. Yoma 28b. 76   Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 142v, see App. V, 6. In the manuscripts the word kabbalah does not refer to the mystical system developed in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, but means tradition or traditional Law as used in early rabbinic literature, see e.g. B.T. Rosh ha-Shanah 7a. 77   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 162r, see App. V, 7.

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The authority of the Talmud is also at stake in the critique on Ibn Ezra’s comment on Exodus 21:24: “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth”. According to rabbinic tradition this law of retaliation was not supposed to be taken literally: “A Tanna of the school of Hezekiah taught: Eye for eye [implies] but not an eye” – in other words, monetary compensation for the loss of an eye78. In relation to this passage, Ibn Ezra states that rabbinic interpretation, which produces the Oral Law, is indispensable for the understanding of Scripture. The compiler summarizes his comment as follows: “Here he draws the conclusion, that the precepts of the Law as such cannot be explained completely unless they are supported by the words of our sages: because like the [written] Law we have received the Oral Law from our fathers, and between the two there is no difference”. In strong terms, the compiler contrasts the human and the divine: “Since the traditions of the rabbis are full of errors, fables, blasphemies and incorrect explanations of Holy Scripture, as can be seen in the Talmud, to which they attribute more authority [than Scripture], it is an intolerable error to lend them much credibility as Holy Scripture, whose author is the Holy Spirit”79. The claim that the Oral Law is a Sinaitic revelation is, according to the composers of the collections, indisputably undermined by the many errors and blasphemies, which make it unfit as an authoritative tool for biblical exegesis80. Scripture The Oral Torah could not be used as a guideline for understanding the Written Torah. According to the composers, Jews had to base all their interpretations on Scripture. They insisted that biblical exegesis should remain within the parameters of the Old Testament, which usually meant conforming to the so-called literal meaning of the text81. Vat. lat. 14628 contains many examples that follow this reasoning. Illustrative is Rashi’s comment on the story of Achan, “who took from the spoil devoted to the Lord. And the anger of the Lord burned against the people of Israel” (Josh. 7:1). According to the biblical story the inhabitants of Ai killed about 36   B.T. Ketubot 38a.   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 171v, see App. V, 8. Surprisingly the compiler does not refer to Matt. 5:38-40 and 1 Pet. 3:9. 80   It should be noted that the contemporary censored edition of the Talmud (Basel 1578–80), contains all the passages deemed objectionable according to these scholars, thus demonstrating that those attempting to control Jewish literature were not uniformly driven by the same agenda. 81   Throughout the analysis of the criteria for selection, the word literal and the Jewish equivalent peshat are used as synonyms for the plain meaning of the text, excluding interpretations that are extraneous to the text. See David Weiss Halivni, Peshat and Derash: Plain and Applied Meaning in Rabbinic Exegesis (New York, 1991), 19. 78

79

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Israelites, and the Lord warned Joshua that because of their sins the Israelites were doomed to destruction. When questioned by Joshua, Achan answered: “It is true; I am the one who sinned against the Lord God of Israel. This is what I did: when I saw among the spoil a beautiful mantle from Shinar, and two hundred shekels of silver, and a bar of gold weighing fifty shekels, then I coveted them and took them. They now lie hidden in the ground inside my tent, with the silver underneath” (Josh. 7:20-21). According to Rashi, however, Achan on his own accord and therefore to his credit confesses his transgression with the following altruistic motivation: “He saw the sons of Judah already congregated and ready to fight; he said: ‘It is better that only I die rather than that so many thousands Israelites be killed’”. The altruism ascribed to him by Rashi is rejected by the composer of the collection on the prosaic grounds that “this does not appear from the letter [of the text]”82. Given the divine character of the Hebrew Bible, both Jewish and Christians exegetes had to face the task of reconciling discrepancies in the text. Driven by their desire to castigate the Jewish exegetes, the composers occasionally overlooked their primary task. Internal discussion and disagreement ensued as the following text illustrates. The passage concerns king Jeconiah of Judah. In Jer. 22:30 it is said about him, when imprisoned in Babylon: “Thus says the Lord: Write this man down as childless, a man who shall not succeed in his days; for none of his offspring shall succeed in sitting on the throne of David and ruling again in Judah”. This proclamation seemed to be contradicted by 1 Chr. 3:17, where it states: “and the sons of Jeconiah, Assir [the captive], Shealtiel his son”. In his commentary on Chronicles Kimhi had solved the contradiction by claiming that Jeconiah’s captivity had procured atonement, which made God change his decree. Drawing on Talmudic tradition he argued as follows: “‘And the sons of Jeconiah, Assir, Shealtiel his son’: R. Johanan said: captivity procures atonement, for it was written: ‘Write this man childless’ (Jer. 22:30). But after he had gone into exile, it is written about him: ‘his sons Assir Shealtiel’. He is called Assir [prisoner], because his mother conceived him in prison. Shealtiel, because he planted him (shatal in Hebrew is to plant) not in the way that others are planted, because a woman does not conceive standing upright; he is also called Shealtiel, because God was asked (shaal = asked) about or exempted [by the heavenly court] from the oath that he had made”83. The discrepancy between the Book of Jeremiah and Chronicles does not seem to have caused alarm. Rather, the compiler uses conventional language and dismisses Kimhi’s text as “absurd and ob-

82 83

  Vat. lat. 14628, 52v, see App. V, 9.   B.T. Sanhedrin 37b-38a; see also Pesikta Rabbati, piska 47 and Numbers Rabbah 20:20.

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scene”84. Unlike the composer, Bellarmine offers a way out of the alleged inconsistency, by reading the second half of Jer. 22:30 as a specification of God’s decree – Jeconiah would not have a child who would sit upon the throne of David. Contrary to Kimhi, who had recourse to a non-biblical notion that captivity as such procures atonement, Bellarmine’s reading of Jer. 22:30 solved the problem within the parameters of Scripture: “I would add to the censura that it is false [to say] that God was exempted from the oath, through which he had threatened Jeconiah with sterility. For when God ordered that it should be recorded that Jeconiah would be sterile, he did not deprive him from offspring altogether, but from royal offspring as Jeremiah himself explains in chapter 22: ‘Write ye this man childless, for there shall be no man of his seed who will sit upon the throne of David’”85. Bellarmine’s authority was not to be overlooked. The following final censura reads: “It is false [to say] that God would not keep his word. For he announced that he would be without royal offspring that would sit on the throne of David, and this was indeed fulfilled”86. In some cases, where actions or events described in the Hebrew Bible imply transgression of Old Testament law, Bellarmine did not offer an alternative reading and simply agreed with the compiler’s censura, in which the Jewish commentator is criticized for finding an extra-biblical, that is rabbinic, justification for the alleged transgression. One such case is Rizpah, the daughter of Aiah, the concubine of Saul, who kept the dead bodies of the seven descendants of Saul unburied. They had been hanged by the Gibeonites as retaliation for Saul’s transgression of having put Gibeonites to death despite the fact that the people of Israel had sworn to spare them (2 Sam. 21:2). While remaining unburied “from the beginning of harvest until water dropped upon them out of heaven”, their dead bodies became a testimony that justice had been done to the Gibeonites87. The act itself, however, was an infringement of the Written Law that stipulates, “When someone is convicted of a crime punishable by death and is executed, and you hang him on a tree, his corpse must not remain all night upon the tree; you shall bury him that same day”88. Rashi, however, exculpated Rizpah by applying the rabbinic concept of Kiddush ha-Shem (Sanctification of God’s name): “But is it not written, ‘his corpse shall not pass the night’?89 But they said it is preferable to eradicate the letter of the   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 181v, see App. V, 10.   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 348. Bellarmine’s reading accords with Matt. 1:11-2. 86   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 181v, see App. V, 10. 87   See 2 Samuel 21:10. 88   Deuteronomy 21:22-3. 89   No lemma for the biblical text is quoted. 84 85

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Law, if the name of God can be sanctified in public90. For when these dead bodies were kept on gibbets people passed and said, ‘what was the rank of those who were killed?’ And they answered them, ‘they were sons of kings’. ‘What shameful act did they commit?’ ‘They stretched their hands out to the troops of strangers [sic]’91. Then they said, ‘With this nation more than with any other nation one should enter into friendship’”92. In a most remarkable comment the composer expostulates that the Jew should keep to the Old Testament commandments: “this is a false dogma that it is allowed to transgress the Law of God for the sake of His [God’s] good name”93. Yet, in several cases, rabbinic use of biblical text to resolve discrepancies is equally regarded as incorrect. 1 Kings 8:65 describes the end of the celebration of the dedication of the temple built by king Solomon: “And at that time Solomon held a feast, and all Israel with him, a great assembly, people from Lebo-Hamath to the wadi of Egypt, before the Lord our God, seven days and seven days, even fourteen days”. Following the Targum, Rashi separates the two weeks into seven days for the dedication of the temple from the 8th to the 15th of the month Ethanim (or Tishri), and seven days for the Feast of Tabernacles, from the 15th to the 21st94. As a consequence, the Day of Atonement, which is celebrated five days before the first day of Tabernacles, would have fallen in the middle of the first week of celebration. Rashi cannot but conclude that Israel on that occasion ate and drank on Yom Kippur: “‘Seven days for the festival’: namely of the dedication and seven days for the festival, namely Tabernacles. From this it follows that they ate and drank on the Day of Atonement”. That no punishment followed the transgression is according to rabbinic tradition implied in the immediate continuation of the biblical text, “On the eighth day he sent the people away: and they blessed the king. And they went unto their tents joyful and glad of heart for all the goodness that the Lord had done for David his servant, and for Israel his people” (1 Kings 8:66). The goodness, which God had shown to Israel, consisted in Him granting them pardon for transgressing the Day of Atonement95. But   For the sanctification of God’s name see Urbach, The Sages cit., 1:356-60.   By reading gerim gedudim instead of gerim gerurim the translator made the ‘unattached strangers’ [i.e. proselytes who have not been admitted yet into the congregation] into ‘troops of strangers’. The mistake is easily made because of the similarity of resh and daleth in combination with the expression ‘stretch your hand out as a troop’ as found in B.T. Sanhedrin, 16a. 92   The interpretation is derived from B.T. Yevamot, 79a. 93   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 63v, see App. V, 11. 94   Targum Jonathan renders as follows: “And Solomon held a feast … seven days for the dedication of the house and seven days of feasting, fourteen days”. See also 2 Chr. 7:9-10. 95   B.T. Mo’ed Katan 9a. The Septuagint (Codex B) solves the problem by leaving out seven days, fourteen days, thus restricting the festivities to only one week, the festival of Tabernacles. The Vulgate follows the Hebrew text. 90 91

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in his censura the compiler of the collection considers the reference to 1 Kings 8:66 an unsatisfactory solution for the discrepancy between the festivities accompanying the solemn dedication of the temple and the laws of the day of Atonement: “It is not possible to explain [it] in this way, for the transgression of this precept meant destruction”96. The Vulgate Since all exegesis had to comply with Scripture, the compilers inevitably had to address the question whether the Hebrew Bible or the Vulgate represented this canon. From the Middle Ages onwards St Jerome’s Latin translation of the Bible had been generally accepted as the text of the Church97. At the Council of Trent it had been given a unique position in “that this old and common (vulgata) edition, which has been approved by the long use of so many centuries in the Church should be considered authentic in public reading, disputations, sermons and explanations”98. Whether the declaration was meant to make the Vulgate the authentic text of the Bible in the sense that not a single word was corrupt and that therefore any other text, be it Hebrew or Greek, was of secondary importance or that the Vulgate’s authority was limited to matters of faith and morals, became a bone of contention among theologians99. The Congregation of the Council tried to bring the controversy to an end by declaring on 17 January 1576 that the change of a sentence, a word, a syllable, an iota of the Vulgate alone would suffice to impose the punishment as established in the Council’s decree100. Not long after this decision our composers dealt with the issue of the authority of the biblical text101. Following the declaration of the Congregation of the Council in 1576, the compilers of the collections from Rashi’s and Kimhi’s commentaries asserted that the Vulgate should be the stand96   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 66r, see App. V, 12. That eating and drinking was forbidden on the Day of Atonement is a rabbinic interpretation of the biblical instruction to afflict your souls (Lev. 23, 27 and 32). See Mishnah Yoma 8:1. 97   Bruce M. Metzger, The Early Versions of the New Testament: Their Origin, Transmission and Limitations (Oxford, 1977), 330-62; Alberto Vaccari, Institutiones Biblicae scholis accomodatae, Vol. 1: De S. Scriptura in universum (Rome, 1951), 326-7. 98   Session IV (8 April 1546), see Heinrich Denzinger, Enchiridion symbolorum definitionum et declarationum de rebus fidei et morum, ed. Karl Rahner (Fribourg, 1957), 280. 99   See Van Boxel, ‘Robert Bellarmine, Christian Hebraist’ cit., 258-9. 100   Le Bachelet, Bellarmin et la Bible Sixto-Clémentine (Paris, 1911), 8. Guy Bedouelle and Bernard Roussel, eds, Le temps des Réformes et la Bible (Paris, 1989), 266-8; Hildebrand Höpfl, Beiträge zur Geschichte der Sixto-Klementinischen Vulgata (Freiburg im Breisgau, 1913), 35-6. 101   The earliest date mentioned in our manuscripts is 1 February 1577. A revised edition of the Vulgate as had been stipulated by the Council was not produced until 1592.

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ard text for biblical interpretation. Jewish exegesis should therefore take its starting point from this Latin rendering102. An illustration of the authority of the Vulgate over the Hebrew text is the rejection of Kimhi’s literal understanding of Ezekiel 11:18[=16], used in Jewish tradition as a proof text for the origins of the synagogue, and therefore not without political repercussions. The falsity of the Jewish rendering is emphasized by the compiler’s citation of Pagninus’ highly controversial translation, which closely adhered to the Hebrew text: “And I will be (was) to them as a little sanctuary in the countries where they have come”103. Kimhi had written: “Although I ensured that they were removed to the nations, I nevertheless did not abandon them, but I was to them as a little sanctuary and asylum in the lands to which they came. It is as though He says, ‘Although they are far from the sanctuary of the Lord, which is the major sanctuary, here in its land I will be to them as a little sanctuary’. It is as if He was saying, ‘in their synagogues in which they gather to pray I will be with them, I will hear them and liberate them from the hand of their enemies, lest they destroy them completely’. Thus also Targum Jonathan, ‘And I will give them the houses of the synagogues, which take second place after my sanctuary’”. Despite Pagninus’ correct Latin rendering of the Hebrew and the corroborative evidence of the Septuagint, which translates ‘sanctuary’ (άγιασμα), the compiler rejected Kimhi’s interpretation, thus confirming the authority of the Vulgate: ‘But these are fantasies. For ‫[מקדש‬mikdash] in this place does not mean sanctuary, but sanctification, as is the meaning according to Jerome ‘I will be to them moderate sanctification, i.e. short in the lands to which [they shall come]’ which was fulfilled in Babylon in the time that Daniel lived and Ananias etc.”104. The compilers’ zealous promotion of the Vulgate went even further. Not only did they collect rabbinic explanations that contradicted the Latin rendering, but they also included passages that suggested corruptions in the Hebrew Bible. They apparently were of the opinion that a corrupted Hebrew text would undermine its authority to the advantage of the Vulgate, a view not unanimously shared among Christian exegetes as the discussion about Kimhi’s introduction to the book of Joshua illustrates. Kimhi writes: 102   Consequently, the composers, instead of referring to 1-2 Samuel and 1-2 Kings, call the Books of Samuel and the two Books of Kings in accordance with the Vulgate 1-4 Kings. 103   fui tamen eis ut sanctuarium parvum. Based upon the Hebrew text and rejecting the Vulgate as the infallible text of Scripture, Pagninus’ Latin translation, published in Lyon in 1528, was a bone of contention within the Church. 104   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 178r, see App. V, 13. The reference to the time in Babylon is derived from the Glossa ordinaria et interlinearis. For the role which this commentary played in the undertaking see below 125-30.

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Furthermore, at the end I will explain why in the Bible text some [words] are written in the same way as they are read; other [words] are written (ketiv) and not read (kere) [in the same way] and again other [words] are read (kere) and not written (ketiv) [in the same way], and to the best of my ability I will try to give the reason in the appropriate places105. In my opinion these words were found in this form in the codices. For in the first captivity the books got lost and the sages who were experts in the Law, who had been scattered in different directions, had died. Later, the men of the Great Synagogue, who restored the Law to its former state, preserved many of these kinds of variants that they found in the holy books. Those which they did not really understand, they copied as they found [them] in the text, but did not vocalize [them], and wrote them with other vowels in the margin without reproducing [them] in the text. Thus they wrote something different in the text from what they wrote in the margin.

The censura is unequivocal on this point, accusing the Jews of having corrupted the Hebrew Bible: “Here we have noted this testimony of Kimhi against the Jews, who believe that the Bible is not corrupt and can only be read in their way; and they condemn the text of the 70 interpreters because of this, their false opinion”106. As a reviser, however, Bellarmine took a different stance. Already in Louvain, when teaching biblical exegesis, he had advocated a limited authority of the Vulgate. In his notes on Genesis in preparation for his classes, he stressed the reliability of the Hebrew text, which he was not prepared to change according to the Latin rendering107. In his Disputationes, written while participating in our project and published in 1586, Bellarmine kept to this position – despite the declaration of the Congregation of the Council in 1576 – and asserted that the Council of Trent had never excluded the Hebrew text as the primary source, which except for corruptions due to scribal errors he considered to be largely reliable108. It is this difference of opinion that comes to the fore in his   For the question of ketiv and kere see Ginsburg, Introduction cit., 183-6.   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 254r, see App. V, 14. 107   See Van Boxel, ‘Robert Bellarmine, Christian Hebraist’ cit., 258-61. 108   In the first Controversia ‘De Verbo Dei’ of his Disputationes Bellarmine devotes a chapter to the question of whether the Hebrew text of the Bible is corrupt. At the end of this chapter, he states that the Hebrew Scriptures are neither completely corrupt nor totally reliable and faultless, and that the errors in the text, due to negligence or ignorance, partly arise from the similarity of Hebrew letters, which are beth and kaf (‫ ;)כ & ב‬daleth and resh (‫& ד‬ ‫ ;)ר‬heh, heth and taf (‫ה‬, ‫ח‬, & ‫ ;)ת‬vav and zayin (‫)ז & ו‬, and partly stem from the ignorance of the rabbis who added [vowel] points. These errors, however, do not affect matters of faith or morality. See Bellarminus, Disputationes, 1: De verbo Dei, lib. 2, cap 2. Bellarmine’s view on the authority of the Vulgate comes also to the fore in his activity as a censor at the time. In connection with the censorship of Carlo Sigonio’s De Republica Iudaeorum (Bologna, 1582) he stresses that the Council of Trent had declared the Vulgata the authentic text of the Bible as opposed to other Latin translations, but not against the Hebrew and Greek editions: “Falso asserit censor, prohibitas esse alias editiones praeter vulgatam. Concilium enim non opponit 105 106

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revision of the censura: “I would omit the first censura, which is the one on the introduction of R. David for two reasons: firstly, things that have been said correctly do not need to be included in the list of errors, even if they seem to be against the Jews, and secondly this opinion of R. David is perhaps not against the Jews; for although almost all the Jews and most Christians assert that the Bible has not been deliberately corrupted by the rabbis, nobody, neither Christian nor Jew, denies that through negligence of copyists and the damage of time some errors have crept into the holy books and that it is therefore now necessary that some [words] are read differently than the way they are written”109. Even though the Master of the Sacred Palace usually insisted on the implementation of Bellarmine’s revisions of censurae, in this case, apparently subscribing to the Congregation of the Council’s declaration, he ignored Bellarmine’s revision. This issue of the reliability of the Hebrew Bible and the authority of the Vulgate divided the Church into two camps. In defending the authority of the text of the Hebrew Bible, Bellarmine did not restrict himself to technical considerations explaining the occurrence of errors through negligence of copyists and the damage of time, an argument that could hardly compete with the authority of the Congregation of the Council. More challenging were his quotations from the writings of the Church Fathers, rejecting the possibility that corruptions of the Hebrew Bible could be traced back to Jewish antichristian sentiments, and his claim that the reliability of the Vulgate depended entirely on an undamaged Hebrew original. The debate on this issue arose in relation to the attribution of cities to the sons of Merari according to their families. According to Joshua 21:7 the sons of Merari, one of the sons of the priestly tribe of Levi, received 12 cities. Kimhi had commented on this passage: “In this verse he says that there were 12 cities for the sons of Merari from the tribe of Ruben, the tribe of Gad and the tribe of Zebulon and later in the enumeration of the cities [Josh. 21:34-40] he mentions only eight cities, four from the tribe of Zebulon and four from the tribe of Gad, and of the tribe of Ruben he did not write anything. But I have seen books, which were corrected, where the four cities of the tribe of Ruben were enumerated [Josh. 21:36-37], but I have not seen these two verses in any ancient correct codex apart from some that had been amended”. The compiler’s vulgatam latinam hebraicis, et graecis editionibus, sed solum aliis latinis, etc.”. Fabroniana 15, fol. 486. Bellarmine’s position contrasts sharply with the firmly held belief in the status of the Vulgate as the infallible text of Scripture. 109   By Bellarmine in his own handwriting, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 342r, see App. V, 14. Bellarmine’s view is not shared by Jacob ben Hayyim ibn Adonijah, the editor of the second and third rabbinic Bibles, who in his preface to both editions rejects Kimhi’s explanation of the textual problems in Scripture. See Ginsburg, Jacob Ben Chajim’s Introduction cit., 43-4.

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reaction is predictable: “It appears that Hebrew books are not without lies”110. But Bellarmine’s response, in which he combines political awareness with the authority of the Church Fathers and an insight into textual transmission, is a straightforward rejection of the compiler’s accusation: About this censura I think the same as about the first one, and I really do not see what advantage it is to us to emphasize the corruption of the Bible so much111. For by harming the Jews, we involuntarily help the Anabaptists to profit. For what else do they proclaim than that nothing certain can be elicited from the Bible, because it is corrupt in many places and distorted112. In times past the Manicheans reproached the Catholics in a similar way and then Saint Augustine passionately proclaimed that the Holy Bible was not falsified. His voice we also hear in book 15 of De Civitate Dei in Ch.13: “Far be it that any intelligent person would think that the Jews, no matter how great their depravity and spite, could have caused all this in so many and so widely scattered codices”. Previously, Saint Jerome had made the same observation and in his commentary to chapter 6 of Isaiah, using the testimony of Origen together with his own arguments, had taught and proven that it is inconceivable that the Jews would have corrupted the Holy Books on account of their hatred of the Christians113. Moreover, one cannot claim that this sacrilege was committed after the time of Saint Jerome and Saint Augustine. After all, all these passages, which R. David and others mention as corrupt and changed by scribes, Saint Jerome translated, and we now read them in the Vulgate edition in the form that they claim has been corrupted or changed114.

The New Testament As discussed above, the compilers often rejected passages in which the Old Testament was called upon to support rabbinic traditions. When the authority of the New Testament was at stake, the likelihood of rejec  Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 257r, see App. V, 15.   Kimhi’s commentary on Joshua (introduction); see the preceding passage. 112   With his concern that admitting corruption of the Bible would favour the Anabaptists, Bellarmine is probably referring to radical reformers such as the very influential Sebastian Franck, who, given the uncertainty of the text tradition, rejected the letter of the Bible as the highest authority and a means of salvation. See Alfred Hegler, Geist und Schrift bei Sebastian Franck: eine Studie zur Geschichte des Spiritualismus in der Reformationszeit (Freiburg, 1892), 63-83 at 78. 113   “Quod si aliquis dixerit, Hebraeos libros postea a judaeis esse falsatos, audiat Origenem quid in octavo volumine Explanationum Esaiae huic respondeat quaestiunculae, quod numquam Dominus et apostoli, qui cetera crimina arguunt in scribis et pharisaeis, de hoc crimine, quod erat maximum, reticuissent. Sin autem dixerint post adventum Domini Salvatoris et praedicationem apostolorum libros Hebraeos fuisse falsatos, cachinnum tenere non potero, ut Salvator et evangelistae et apostoli ita testimonia protulerint, ut Judaei postea falsaturi erant”, Commentariorum in Esaiam libri I-XI, (Turnhout, 1963) 92. 114   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 342v, see App. V, 15. The passage was not taken out. 110 111

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tion was even greater. The biblical justifications for the rabbinic tradition of the minyan, the halakhic minimum of 10 men for communal prayer, may illustrate the role that the New Testament played in the procedure of composing the collections115. Traditionally, the biblical support for a minimum of 10 men for communal prayer is Genesis 18:32, where Abraham pleads with God not to punish Sodom with destruction: “Suppose 10 are found there. He answered, For the sake of 10 I will not destroy it”. According to Ibn Ezra: “Our sages blessed be their memory transmitted that no prayer can take place in a congregation where fewer than 10 [men] have gathered. And this verse confirms our faith”. The compiler does not react to Ibn Ezra’s use of a biblical verse to justify a rabbinic tradition, but calls it an “erroneous tradition of the rabbis and contrary to the words of Christ [our] Lord, because he says in Matthew 18:19, ‘that if two of you shall agree on earth about anything that they shall ask etc. For when two or three etc’. [Matt. 18:20]”116. The same passage is invoked as a reason for rejecting Jacob ben Asher’s use of Exodus 20:24 as a biblical justification of the minyan: “in every place where I cause my name to be remembered I will come to you and bless you”. By applying the device of gematria (a hermeneutical device that plays on the numerical value of the letters of the Hebrew alphabet) the word ‘I will come’ counts for 10, indicating that if 10 men are found in the synagogue “I will come to you and bless you etc.”117 Diego Lopez, responsible for collecting passages from both Ibn Ezra’s and Jacob ben Asher’s commentary on the Pentateuch, not surprisingly passes the same judgment: “He alludes to the error of the rabbis who contend that prayers cannot be held and will not be heard when fewer than 10 men are gathered and it is proven by the authority of Christ, ‘If two of you agree on earth about anything’ and again, ‘for where two or three etc.’” (Matt. 18:19)118. Jacob ben Asher applies a different hermeneutical device to support the same tradition. He comments on Genesis 28:16: “And when Jacob awoke from his sleep, he said”: By taking the first and/or the last letter of consecutive words, a method called notarikon, he composes the word congregation [‫“ ]ציבור‬in order to indicate that the prayer of a man is not heard unless it is said in a congregation, or assembly”119. In this case, 115   See Mishnah Megillah IV:3. See further Ismar Elbogen, Der jüdische Gottesdienst in seiner geschichtlichen Entwicklung (Berlin, 1905), 493-4. 116   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 165r, see App. V, 16. 117   The numerical value of the letters ‫( אבוא‬I will come) being 1+2+6+1 is 10. For gematria see Encyclopedia Judaica, 7:370-74. 118   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 219r, see App. V, 17. 119   For notarikon, see Encyclopedia Judaica, 12:1231-2. Diego Lopez, the compiler of extracts from Jacob ben Asher’s commentary on the Pentateuch, explicitly states at the beginning of his collection that the use of gematria and notarikon is inadmissible for biblical exegesis: “autor iste ut cabalisticus est sacram scripturam exponit nunc ex primis nunc ex

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Diego Lopez rejects the rabbinic tradition of the minyan as “a wicked and pernicious heresy”, which, according to Saint James [5:17], is palpably contradicted by the example of Elijah who brought about a drought of three years by his prayers120. Having removed Scripture from rabbinic tradition, the composers were furthermore faced with a direct confrontation between the Old and the New Testament. They collected extracts in which the Jews were promised an end to their exile. In Hosea 2:1, the prophet had called his son ‘Lo-ammi’ (not my people). “Yet the number of the people of Israel shall be like the sand of the sea, which can be neither measured nor numbered; and in the place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people’, it shall be said to them, ‘Children of the living God’. The people of Judah and the people of Israel shall be gathered together, and they shall appoint for themselves one head; and they shall take possession of the land, for great shall be the day of Jezreel”. According to Rashi this passage indicated that: Punishment and consolation are interrelated. The ancients [said]: Hosea felt that he had sinned, because he had said, “exchange those [Israel] for another people”. He stood and prayed for Israel121; as Rav said: these two verses, namely ‘you are not my people’ and ‘the number of the sons of Israel shall be like the sand of the sea’ are interconnected, but distant from each other more than east from the west122. But what is the meaning of what is said? An example: A king was angry with his wife. He called for a clerk so that he could write a letter of divorce. In the meantime, before the clerk had arrived, the king became reconciled with his wife. The king said, “Will this clerk go away from me with doubts in his heart, and in surprise will say, Why did he call for me?” When he came, he said to him, “Come and write: I double my wife’s dowry”. But these two verses according to their plain meaning are reconciled thus: Because you are not my people and I am not yours, I will manifest myself to you as a stranger and as if I am not yours, because you will be driven into exile among the nations, and nevertheless there you will grow and flourish, and it is there that you will convert to me.

The compiler dismisses the consolation that Rashi reads into Hosea’s prophecy and insists on the permanent rejection of Israel, while claiming ultimis cuiusqumque dictionis literis voces et clausulas componens in quibus interpretatio saepentissime ab ipsa scriptura diversa continetur. Aliquando etiam ex literis quibus ipsae dictiones constant alias dictiones format. Praeterea per numerum quem ipsae literae significant alia verba et clausulas componit. Hunc modum geometricum appellat quem aritmathicum potius nuncupari deberet. Et ut huius autoris melius iuditium fieri possit maiorem partem huius primi capitis ad verbum traductam proponere libuit cuius ea quae damnanda sunt in margine censurabuntur”. Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 229r. 120   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 215v, see App. V, 18. 121   The beginning of this comment paraphrases a discussion between the Holy One and Hosea. See B.T. Pesahim 87b. 122   Sifre Numbers Balak par. 131.

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that according to St Paul the gentiles are called ‘my people’: “They make this up so that they cannot be forced to acknowledge their rejected condition, and the ‘calling of the nations’, which in this place the prophet most appropriately predicts as St. Paul attests in Romans 9 [:24-26]”123. Using the New Testament as the exegetical benchmark for reading the Old Testament required theological skills that the compilers certainly could claim. That sometimes an excerpt sparked off an animated discussion between all parties – compiler, reviser and Magister – shows how seriously the matter of fulfilment of an Old Testament prophecy was taken. The censura to the excerpt from Rashi’s comment on Jeremiah 1:5 set off such a discussion. Rashi interprets the task God assigned to Jeremiah of being a prophet to the nations: “that is to Israel that used the customs of the gentiles. Thus it is explained in Sifre: a prophet out of your midst […] He will bring forth for you, not for the nations. For why should I put forth a prophet for the nations? But I have appointed you a prophet for Israel that in its customs in no way differs from the gentiles”. The reaction of the compiler is predictable: “they do not want to acknowledge any promise done by God to the gentiles, although the opposite is clearly the case”124. By a careful reading of Paul’s Letter to the Romans, however, Bellarmine supports Rashi’s interpretation, while at the same time including the gentiles in the redemptive history: the statement ‘I made you a prophet to the nations’, that is to Israel, is true. Contrary to the marginal annotation, I would assert as true that God did not make a promise to the gentiles. For although the prophets made many predictions about the conversion of the nations, God did not make them any promises as He did to the Jews, and the prophets were not sent to the nations, but to the Jews alone. This is what we read in Romans 15 [:8-9]: “I tell you that Jesus Christ became a servant of the circumcision because of God’s truthfulness, in order to confirm the promises to the fathers: and in order that the nations might glorify God for his mercy”. This explanation by Rabbi Salomon could therefore perhaps be tolerated, unless it can be proven that he concludes in this place that the Messiah and the Holy Scriptures in no way belong to the nations125.

The sensitivity of the question is attested in a reaction from another participant in the project, who wrote in the margin to Bellarmine’s anno-

123   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 131v, see App. V, 19. There is, however, some rabbinic tradition on exile that gives a place to the gentiles in Hosea’s prophecy: “Rabbi Eleazar also said: The Holy One, blessed be He, did not exile Israel among the nations save in order that proselytes might join them, for it is said: ‘And I will sow her unto Me in the land’ (Hos. 1:6): surely a man sows a se’ah in order to harvest many kor. While Rabbi Johanan deduced it from this: ‘And I will have compassion upon her that has not obtained compassion’ (ibid.)”.See B.T. Pesahim 87b. 124   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 115r, see App. V, 20. 125   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 111v, see App. V, 20. The remarks on this page in Bellarmine’s handwriting are copied by a scribe on fol. 345v.

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tation: “although the promises of salvation have been given by nature only to the people of Israel, it does not follow (as Rabbi Salomon derives) that the prophet, i.e. the Messiah, was erected for Israel but not for the nations. For it is said about the Messiah, ‘and he will be the expectation of the nations’ (Gen. 49:10), ‘him shall the nations deprecate’ (Is. 11:10). Was not also Jonah sent to the Ninevites? Therefore Rabbi Salomon wants to exclude the nations from the fruits of the promise”. In conformity to convention, the Master of the Sacred Palace had the final say in the discussion. Not surprisingly, the Master took the side of Bellarmine, and argued that the passage should be removed: “I think that the censura has to be deleted because of what it says in Romans 15”126. The passage was consequently crossed out. Christian Exegetes The composers of our collections attached great importance to the plain meaning of the biblical text. The derogatory comments ‘ridiculum’, ‘falsum et fictum’, ‘somnia’, ‘fabula’, ‘commentum apocryphum’, ‘absurdissimum commentum’, ‘expositio inepta’, occur regularly whenever rabbinic exegesis deviated from the sensus literalis. Stressing the plain meaning meant forcing the Jews to distance themselves from ‘ridiculous, false, fictitious, absurd comments and inept explanations’ of Scripture. Yet, Christians had a rich history of allegorical and mystical interpretation upon which biblical theology was built. Keeping to the plain meaning of an Old Testament text could jeopardize or even undermine the doctrine of the Church. Finding the balance between the sensus literalis and an allegorical interpretation had therefore been an ongoing exercise of Christian exegetes, a task undertaken by the compilers of our collections. On more than one occasion this led to internal discussions about the validity of certain Christian interpretations of the biblical text127. It is here that the theological expertise and authority of Bellarmine and the Master of the Sacred Palace most evidently come to the fore. They frequently questioned the alleged discrepancy between Jewish exegesis and Christian tradition, by referring to Christian allegorical explanations with which a specific rabbinic interpretation agreed. In this manner, they disallowed any denunciation of Christian tradition. Jerome Given the authority attributed to the Vulgate it is not surprising that Jerome figures prominently in these discussions. Compilers and revisers   Vat. lat. 14628, 112r, see App. V, 20.   See Peter Harrison, ‘Hermeneutics and Natural Knowledge in the Reformers’, in Nature and Scripture in the Abrahamic Religions: Up to 1700, ed. Jitse M. van der Meer and Scott Mandelbrote, 2 vols (Leiden, 2008), 1:341-62 at 349-51. 126 127

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often turned to Jerome when the literal interpretation of a text was under discussion. Such is the case with the interpretation of Isaiah 4:1: “And seven women shall take hold of one man in that day, saying, ‘We will eat our own bread and wear our own clothes, only let us be called by your name; take away our reproach’”. Rashi comments: “This came about because many widowed women sought husbands for themselves. In the midrash it is said: with an edict Nebuchadnezzar took care that nobody would approach the wife of a man, lest they would be punished. Therefore those who were widows asked men to adopt at least the name of a man in order not to suffer from the violence and the ignominies of the soldiers”128. The compiler rejects Rashi’s literal interpretation and without any further specification legitimizes his decision by referring to the ‘usual mystical interpretation’ of the text: “this is an invention and it is usually explained by our [Fathers] mystically”129. An early witness of this tradition is Jerome, who had identified the seven women with the seven gifts of the Holy Spirit resting upon Jesus as predicted in Isaiah 11:2: “And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord”130. The reviser, however, retained a literal understanding of the text, also provided by Jerome, who, in addition to a mystical interpretation, defends the plain meaning of the text, finding biblical support in Exod. 23:26: “there shall not be one fruitless nor barren in your land” and Deut. 7:14 “no one shall be barren among you”131. Rashi’s literal interpretation, including the   See Echa Rabbati 5:11.   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 98r, see App. V, 21. 130   “Ceterum in adventu Domini Salvatoris, septem mulieres, id est, septem gratiae Spiritus sancti, de quibus in consequentibus idem propheta dicturus est: ‘Exiet virga de radice Iesse et flos de radice conscendet; et requiescet super eum spiritus Domini, spiritus sapientiae et intellectus, spiritus consilii et fortitudinis, spiritus scientiae et pietatis, et implebit eum spiritus timoris Domini’; apprehendent Iesum, quem multo tempore desideraverant, quia nullum alium potuerant invenire, in quo aeterna statione requiescerent”, S. Hieronymi Presbyteri Opera. Pars I Opera exegetica. 2 Commentariorum Esaiam libri I-XI (Turnhout, 1963), 60. The tradition is also found in the Glossa ordinaria a.l. A mystical interpretation of Isa. 4:1 is also given by Eusebius of Caesarea and Origin of Alexandria, see Robert Wilkin, ed. and trans., Isaiah: Interpreted by Early Christian and Medieval Commentators (Grand Rapids, MI, 2007), 43-6. 131   “Cum pulcherrimi urbis Hierusalem gladio ceciderint et fortes perierint in proelio; et maeruerint luxerintque portae eius; et ipsa fuerit desolata ob nimiam hominum raritatem, interfectis bellatoribus, septem mulieres apprehendent unum virum, cupientes habere semen in Sion et domesticos in Hierusalem. Cibum et vestimentum se habere dicentes; tantum ne absque marito esse videantur et subiacere illi maledicto, quod scriptum est: ‘maledicta sterilis et quae non facit semen in Israel’ [see the combination of Exod. 23:26 and Deut 7:14]. Zacharias quoque huic congruit sensui: ‘In diebus illis apprehendent decem homines ex omnibus linguis gentium fimbriam viri Iudaei dicentes: Ibimus vobiscum, audivimus enim quoniam Deus vobiscum est’. [Zech. 8:23]”, S. Hieronymi Presbyteri Opera. Pars I Opera exegetica. 2 Commentariorum Esaiam libri I-XI (Turnhout, 1964), 59. 128 129

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midrashic embellishment, was therefore judged to be admissible, and the reviser advised the passage to be omitted: “The first part of the commentary by R. Salomon, that because few men were available seven women sought themselves husbands and all wanted the same man at the same time, is also [the interpretation] of Saint Jerome, and it seems impossible to interpret [the text] according to its literal meaning in any other way. The second part does indeed seem to be invented, but not erroneous, and I therefore would think that it can be omitted”. The Master of the Sacred Palace agreed with this judgment: “It certainly can be omitted”132. As a result, the passage was crossed out. The censura to the passage, the revision and the final decision of the Master of the Sacred Palace are again an illustration of the careful assessment of Rashi’s comment. Given the great importance attached to the plain meaning of the biblical text, it is not surprising that the Master of the Palace preferred Jerome’s literal explanation to the mystical interpretation of Isaiah 4:1. Different, however, is the judgment on Kimhi’s explanation of Ezekiel 16:53: “I will turn their captivity, both the captivity of Sodom and her daughters, and the captivity of Samaria and her daughters, and I will turn your own captivity in the midst of them”. According to Kimhi, the fact that Sodom is still in ruins implies that the turning of captivity – that is the time of consolation and restoration for Israel from exile – is still to come. His comment has a clear antichristian sting when he states, “And this is an answer to or refutation of those who say that the [the time of] consolations has already passed. But Sodom still remains destroyed in its destruction, as it once was, and is still not inhabited”. For dogmatic reasons the compiler makes reference to Jerome, who had claimed that the text is to be understood metaphorically. He therefore rejects such a literal understanding: “An error of the Jews, since they are not able to understand that the rehabilitation of Sodom is the conversion of the soul that was turned away from God. See Saint Jerome ad locum”133.

  Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 111r, see App. V, 21.   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 178v, see App. V, 22. “Sodoma revertitur in antiquum statum, quando naturae suae reddita gentilis prius, et impia anima intelligit Creatorem”, S. Hieronymi Presbyteri Opera. Pars I Opera exegetica. 4 Commentariorum in Hiezehielem libri XIV (Turnhout, 1964), 211. 132 133

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Nicholas of Lyra One of the most renowned medieval exegetes, and a strong advocate of the literal meaning of the biblical text, was Nicholas of Lyra (c. 12701349). Born in Lyre (Normandy), he entered the Franciscan Order at the beginning of the fourteenth century. For most of his life, he lived in Paris, where he taught theology at the Sorbonne134. In the introduction to his magnum opus, the Postilla literalis super Bibliam (1322-31), Nicholas emphasizes the sensus literalis as an indispensable basis for scriptural exegesis: “all [mystical meanings of the text] presume the literal sense as a kind of foundation. So, just as a building which begins to separate from its foundations is inclined to collapse, so a mystical exposition which deviates from the literal sense must be considered unseemly and inappropriate, or at any rate less seemly and less appropriate than other interpretations”135. In his efforts to establish the plain meaning of a biblical verse, Nicholas takes the Hebrew text as his starting point, and turns for its interpretation not only to Christian scholars, but also to the Jews, and in particular, to Rashi whose name occurs frequently throughout the Postilla. In Nicholas’ own words: “[…] my intention is to cite the statements not only of Catholic but also of Jewish teachers, and especially Rabbi Salomon, who among all the Jewish exegetes has put forward the most reasonable arguments, in order to illuminate the literal meaning of the text”136. The immense popularity of the Postilla literalis over the centuries is attested by the hundreds of extant manuscript copies and the many printed editions from as early as 1471137. In their preoccupation to preserve the plain meaning of a biblical text, the compilers frequently turned to this trustworthy representative of Christian Bible interpretation, from whom they often derived their reasons for selecting a particular passage from a rabbinic commentary. By doing so, however, they entered into a complex interaction between Jewish and Christian exegesis, for Nicholas’ switching between literal and allegorical/mystical interpretation frequently appears to follow Rashi’s non-literal explanation of selected texts. The discussions between com  For a full biography see Henri Labrosse, ‘Biographie de Nicolas de Lyre’, in Études Franciscaines 17 (1907), 489-505, 593-608. See further Philip Krey and Lesley Smith, eds, Nicholas of Lyra: The Senses of Scripture (Leiden, 2000), 1-6; Deeana Copeland Klepper, The Insight of Unbelievers: Nicholas of Lyra and Christian Reading of Jewish Text in the Later Middle Ages (Philadelphia, 2007), 6-10. 135   Alastair J. Minnis and Alexander B. Scott, eds, Medieval Literary Theory and Criticism c. 1100-c. 1375: The Commentary Tradition, rev. ed. (Oxford, 1991), 268. 136   Minnis and Scott, eds, Medieval Literary Theory and Criticism cit., 270. 137   See Edward A. Gosselin, ‘A listing of the printed editions of Nicholas de Lyra’, in Traditio 26 (1970), 399-426; Krey and Smith, eds, Nicholas of Lyra cit., 8-12; Copeland Klepper, The Insight of Unbelievers cit., 117 and 129-31. 134

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pilers, revisers and the Master of the Sacred Palace illustrate the predicament in which they found themselves when this figurehead of Christian exegesis, of whose authority they gratefully made use, sided with Rashi against other Christian interpretations. Many censurae to selected passages from Jewish commentaries show the unreserved trust of the compilers in Nicholas’ exegetical skills. One example is Rashi’s comment on 1 Samuel 13:9 [1 Kings]: “[Saul said,] ‘Bring the burnt-offering here to me, [and the offerings of well-being’. And he offered the burnt-offering.]” In 1 Samuel, however, the prophet Samuel, having anointed him as king, had given Saul strict instructions: “And you shall go down to Gilgal ahead of me; then I will come down to you to present burnt-offerings and offer sacrifices of well-being. For seven days you shall wait, until I come to you and show you what you shall do” (1 Sam 10:8). When, after seven days, Samuel had not come to Gilgal, Saul offered the burnt-offerings. Samuel’s castigation of Saul would seem to have arisen because he had usurped priestly prerogatives. Following a tradition of presenting the first king of Israel in a favourable light, it is to this insinuation that Rashi reacts: “He was allowed to sacrifice on an elevated place”138. Guided by Nicholas of Lyra, the compiler focuses on Samuel’s rebuke: “But Lyranus rightly says that Saul sinned, because he illegally took possession of the (priestly) function”139. According to Nicholas of Lyra, Saul’s conduct was wrong on three counts. He had ignored Samuel’s instructions to wait seven days until the prophet would come to offer burnt and peace offerings, for between the hour that he asked a sacrifice to be offered and the hour of the continual burnt offering in the evening other sacrifices could have been offered140. He furthermore transgressed by bringing a burnt-offering, as did King Uzziah, who went into the temple to burn incense upon the altar and was rebuked by the priests who were consecrated to burn incense, as described in 2 Chr. 26:18141. And he sinned by arguing with Samuel instead of humbly acknowledging his transgression. It should be noted that none of Nicholas’ arguments for stating that Saul had sinned on this occasion are spelled out by the com  Rashi’s comment finds support in 1 Kings 3:2:“The people were sacrificing at the high places, however, because no house had yet been built for the name of the Lord”. According to the Babylonian Talmud Saul transgressed only once, when he was told by God to “smite Amalek and spare them not” (1 Sam. 15:3), but he spared Agag, the king of the Amalekites and all that was good (1 Sam. 15:9), see Yoma 22b. In Leviticus Rabbah, however, Saul is said to have committed five sins, one being the instance of disobedience cited: “Seven days you wait (1 Sam. 10:8) and he did not do this”, 36:7. 139   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 59r, see App. V, 23. 140   See 1 Sam. 10:8. 141   The earthquake mentioned in Zech. 14:5 is considered by Nicholas a sign of God’s anger over Uzziah’s sin. 138

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piler, who apparently presupposes that the users of the collection, Robert Bellarmine and the Master of the Sacred Palace, had access to Nicholas’s Postilla and would have been able to appreciate the compiler’s censura. Nicholas of Lyra’s authority as exegete is also central in interpretations that employ extra-biblical rather than biblical arguments to counter Jewish explanations. Such was the case with the contradiction between Ezekiel 1:10 and 10:14 where, in the vision of the chariot, the face of an ox becomes the face of a cherub. Kimhi comments on Ezekiel 10:14, “The first face was the face of a cherub”: Above he had said the face of an ox [Ezek. 1:10]. It is known that the elders said: “Ezekiel prayed to the Lord and the faces of the ox were changed into those of a cherub. He said before God: King of the world, shall an accuser ever become an advocate? And cherub is the same as ‫[ כרביא‬kerabia] which means ‘as a child’, for in Babylonia a child is called ‫[רביא‬rabia]. But, they ask, are the face of a cherub [i.e a child] and the face of a man not the same? But they harmonized [the texts by saying] that they are the bigger faces and the smaller faces142. And this we have explained in a veiled way”.

According to the Talmud, the reason for the change was the fact that the ox as a plaintiff reminds Israel of its sin with the golden calf, while the faces on the Chariot are meant to intercede for them143. Referring to Nicholas of Lyra’s explanation of the change of faces, the compiler called Kimhi to account: “It is incredible that by means of the prophet’s prayer somebody’s face was changed. But according to Lyranus it means that the Macedonian kingdom represented by an ox that is irrational, turned into mildness and kindness, which according to the compiler was realized in Alexander the Great, who in a hostile spirit marching to Jerusalem afterwards paid homage to the Hebrew [High] Priest, who came to meet him”144. Nicholas of Lyra’s own explanation, which was not mentioned any further, and was apparently presupposed, cleverly combines Rashi’s literal meaning of cherub/child with Greek concepts of wisdom. According to Nicholas, the faces were changed: because the face of an ox signifies the petulance of the ordinary people in Greece. But then wisdom flourished under the philosophers of Greece; therefore in order to point this out the face of the ox, which is an irrational animal, was changed into the face of a man, which is a rational animal, and into the face of a child, because wisdom does not grow old, but rather revives also in old men who after their passions have calmed down see wisdom more clearly, as it says in book 7 of [Aristotle’s] Physics: by sitting and resting the soul becomes   See B.T. Hagigah 13b.   See B.T. Rosh ha-Shanah 26a. 144   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 178r, see App. V, 24. For the meeting between Alexander and the High Priest see Josephus, Ant. XI, 8 §§ 4-6 and B.T. Yoma 69a. 142 143

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wise and prudent. That is why it says in the Book of Wisdom 6[:12]: “Radiant is wisdom, which never withers”.

However, the use of Nicholas of Lyra as a canon for collecting inadmissible passages from rabbinic commentaries sometimes disclosed similarities and agreements between Jewish and Christian interpretation that went beyond the establishing of the meaning of a single Aramaic word. Failing to notice such similarities could result in an (unintentional) undermining of Nicholas’ reputation as a Christian exegete. The Master of the Sacred Palace would therefore every now and then order extracts to be removed from a collection. This occurred in the treatment of Rashi on Isaiah 6:4: “The pivots on the thresholds shook at the voice of him who called, [and the house filled with smoke]”. The text is part of the vision of the prophet Isaiah when he saw the Lord sitting on a throne in the year that King Uzziah died. Rashi had commented: “this happened in the days of Uzziah as it is read in Zechariah 14:5: ‘And you shall flee like as you fled from before the earthquake in the days of Uzziah the king of Judah’. And they say that it was a sign of divine indignation against the boldness of Uzziah, who dared to place incense in the Temple of the Lord”145. The compiler included the passage in his collection. In his view, only very explicit and unequivocal biblical support would have permitted such an interpretation: “Perhaps this motion was different from that one [in Zech. 14:5] and was [meant] as instruction and awe for the divine majesty that was revealed to Isaiah; for Scripture would not have remained silent if it had happened for the sake of Uzziah”. Again relying on Nicholas of Lyra, the Magister accepted the proposed connection between Isaiah 6:4 and Zechariah 14:5 without biblical proof-texts being proffered: “The first part of the censura [i.e. this censura] can be omitted, because Lyranus also explains it in this way, and this explanation is not at all absurd”146. By order of the Magister the passage was removed from the collection. Rashi’s comment to 2 Kings 25:27 [4 Kings 25:26] was also included in a collection of inadmissible passages because of its lack of biblical support. In 2 Kings it is said that King Evil-merodach of Babylon began to reign in the thirty-seventh year of the exile of King Jehoiachin of Judah, in the twelfth month, on the twenty-seventh day of the month. According to Jeremiah 52:31, however, Evil-merodach began to reign two days earlier, on the twenty-fifth day of the twelfth month. Rashi comments as follows: “For after Nebuchadnezzar had died, Evil-merodach reigned in his place on the twenty-seventh of the month. And in the Book of Jeremiah 145 146

  See 2 Chr. 26:16-18.   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 99r, see App. V, 25.

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it is said the twenty-fifth147. But on the twenty-fifth, Nebuchadnezzar died, and he was buried on the twenty-sixth. On the twenty-seventh, however, he [Evil-merodach] pulled him out of his grave and destroyed him in order to make his decrees void through which the saying of Isaiah became fulfilled: ‘But thou are cast out of thy grave like an ill-smelling flower’” 148. The censura to the passage is particularly noteworthy, for the compiler only implicitly gives his reason for selecting the passage. From the wording of the censura – “But Lyranus in Isaiah chap. 14 accepts this fable as in consonance with the prophecy and approves of it” – it may be concluded that, unlike Nicholas, the compiler did consider this fulfilment of the prophecy a fable. But simply by mentioning that Nicholas saw Isaiah’s prophecy fulfilled in 2 Kings 25:27 he expressed reservation about having the passage included in his collection149. That his doubts were justified is demonstrated by the reaction the censura evoked from Robert Bellarmine who, as reviser of the collection, cautiously pointed out that it was unnecessary to include the last annotation (that is the last excerpt from Rashi’s commentary on 2 [4] Kings). The Master of the Sacred Palace took Bellarmine’s suggestion on board and decided that the passage should be cancelled; he noted, however, that an explanation of the story in the Holy Scripture was needed150. As a result of the internal discussion, the passage was marked with a dagger (†) according to the procedure used in Vat. lat. 14629. The excerpt was removed from the collection in deference to Nicholas’ approval of Rashi’s exegesis – even though, as noted in an additional censura reflecting the Magister’s remark – ‘[the story] was not appropriately explained in the Holy Scripture’151. Furthermore, Nicholas’ authoritative role may be detected from an even wider exegetical perspective. In 1 Samuel [1 Kings] 22:4 David asks the king of Moab to host his father and mother, who then stay with the king all the time that David is in the stronghold. But, according to Midrash Tanhuma, the king kills David’s whole family with the exception of one of his brothers, who is saved by Nahash, the king of Ammon. Though Nahash is portrayed in the Bible as rather hostile towards Israel, the kindness attributed to him in the midrash was clearly intended to explain David’s puzzling statement in 2 Samuel 10:2: “I will deal loyally with Hanun the   See Jer. 52:31.   Vat. lat. 14628, 70v, see App. V, 26. 149   Nicholas of Lyra refers to Isa. 14:19. 150   From a comparison of the handwriting with a note in Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 36, the Magister appears to be Paulo Constabile. Since he was elected General of the Dominican Order in 1580, this year gives us a terminus ad quem for the undated collections from Rashi’s commentary. 151   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 70v, see App. V, 26. 147 148

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son of Nahash, as his father dealt loyally with me”152. Nicholas of Lyra follows Rashi’s interpretation of ‘[The days] that David was in the fortress’: “‘and when David went back from there to the forest of Hareth the king of Moab killed David’s father and mother and his brothers except one of them, whom Nahash the Ammonite rescued from death and this is the mercy, which David remembered, ‘when his father had mercy with me’ (2 Sam. 10:2). Thus Midrash Tanhuma”. The compiler justifies his decision to include the passage in his collection by calling it “an apocryphal story, although Lyranus considers it not improbable”153. A similar judgment was reserved for Rashi’s interpretation of 2 Chronicles 21:12: “And there came a writing to him from Elijah”. Rashi states that “after he had been carried away into heaven this prophetic writing came to him”. The letter, which king Jehoram received from the prophet Elijah informed the king of an illness that would afflict him as punishment for murdering his brothers. Nicholas of Lyra gives compelling proof that the letter was sent after Elijah had gone to heaven. Jehoram killed his brothers after his father Jehoshaphat had died (2 Chr. 21:1-4). But Elijah was taken to heaven when Jehoshaphat was still king of Judah during the lifetime of Elijah’s successor Elisha154. Despite this compelling dating of the letter, of which the compiler is well aware, he rejects the inescapable conclusion that the letter must have been sent from heaven: “It seems to me not very likely; neither does one read anything similar about a deceased saint in the whole of the Old Testament. But Lyranus approves of R. Salomon’s opinion”155. The reviser and the Master of the Sacred Palace accepted the compiler’s assessment; Rashi’s explanations that were not founded on the biblical text were judged to be too fictitious, a judgment that Nicholas was unable to avert. But the fact remained that Nicholas of Lyra’s support for Rashi is not expunged from the discussion of the interpretation of these verses, and this seems to suggest that the reviser and the Magister did not feel confident enough to expunge all reference to Nicholas’ clear preference for Rashi. Their esteem for Nicholas even holds, though predictably in vain, when his interpretation is pitted against that of St. Jerome regarding Isa. 66:7: “Before she was in labour she gave birth”. Rashi comments on the text: “Before Zion was seized by the birth pangs, she brought forth her sons, as if it says, her sons will be assembled in the womb of her who was deprived of them; and now behold, in a certain way she brought them forth without   For Nahash’s hostility towards Israel see 1 Samuel 11:1 and 12:12.   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 60r, see App. V, 27. 154   See 2 Kings 23:14-18. 155   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 155v, see App. V, 28. 152 153

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pain, because all the nations bring her children into her”. Despite the fact that the prophecy ad litteram concerns Jerusalem, which will rejoice over the (re)birth of a nation, the compiler decided to include Rashi’s comment in his collection, since “the meaning of this [verse] cannot fittingly be adjusted to the literal [meaning], but it is a prophecy about the virgin giving birth, who brought forth her son without pain”156. But Robert Bellarmine, in his revision of the collection, opts for Jerome’s explanation and agrees with Rashi: “‘Before she was in labour she gave birth’ is explained literally by Saint Jerome and by others usually as the birth of the Church, which unexpectedly brought forth the nations for God157. And the words of Rabbi Salomon do not appear to be wrong, unless one could prove his bad intention. I therefore would only note in this chapter that the things which are said about the Church and the conversion of the nations are wrongly turned towards the synagogue of the Jews”158. In an additional comment to Bellarmine’s reaction, the compiler promotes Nicholas of Lyra’s Christological explanation: “Lyranus explains it according to the literal [meaning] as the virgin giving birth. But if it is explained as the birth of the Church, the explanation will be right, but not in the fictitious way that Rabbi Salomon fantasizes about with his congregation of the Synagogue”159. The Magister takes Bellarmine’s side, apparently because of Jerome’s contribution to the topic: “I prefer Robert Bellarmine’s annotation”160. Consequently the censura – that Isa. 66:7 is a prophecy about the virgin giving birth – was crossed out and replaced by Bellarmine’s comment: “What is said about the conversion of the gentiles is falsely distorted into the Synagogue of the Jews”161. Nicholas is brought to bear on another verse, though in a rather critical and dismissive way. Rashi had said that it was impossible to understand Ezekiel 1:27: “And I saw as the colour of hashmal”. The compiler included this short remark in his collection with the following censura: “And earlier R. Salomon had said about this word hashmal, which is [the colour of] amber, that we do not know what it is. But Saint Jerome translates most   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 109r, see App. V, 29.   “Clamore resonante de Hierusalem et templo eius, quando obsessa atque subversa est, et inimicis Christi, qui Deum regem suscipere noluerunt, recipientibus pro impietate sua atque blasphemiis aeterna supplicia, Ecclesia in nomine Domini congregata, de qua in psalmo dicitur: ‘Homo natus in ea; et ipse fundavit eam altissimus’ [Ps. 86:3]”, S. Hieronymi Presbyteri Opera. Pars I Opera exegetica. 2A Commentariorum in Esaiam libri XII-XVIII in Esaia Parvula Adbreviatio (Turnhout, 1963), 775-6. 158   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 111r, see App. V, 29. 159   Lyra in his Postillae gives both interpretations: first the birth of Christ and second the birth of the faithful, i.e. the Church. 160   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 109r, see App. V, 29. 161   Ibid. 156 157

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appropriately ‘amber’, and I wonder why Lyranus does not approve of this interpretation, and prefers R. Salomon to Saint Jerome”162. The earlier comment by Rabbi Salomon, to which the compiler refers, is his comment on Ezekiel 1:4163. There, Rashi provides various meanings of the Hebrew hashmal, which according to the Talmud is to be understood as an angel or as an acronym based on hajot esh memalelot (living creatures speaking fire)164. Rashi himself does not pronounce on the meaning, and Nicholas follows him and rejects Jerome’s translation: “Here R. Salomon says that he himself does not really know what hashmal means, and I therefore do not know why Jerome translated amber (electrum). And it seems very unlikely that he would have known Hebrew better than this doctor”165. The compiler, however, reverses the argument, claiming that neither Christian nor Jewish exegetes should question Jerome’s Latin rendering of the Hebrew Bible. The Glossa ordinaria In their efforts to assess Jewish interpretation of Scripture according to an exegesis generally accepted by the Church, the compilers and revisers assigned a prominent place to Nicholas of Lyra in the most authoritative synopsis of biblical exegesis: the Vulgata edition of the Bible with the Glossa ordinaria et interlinearis, the commentary that included both the Greek and Latin Church fathers166. The edition was first printed in 1495 in Venice by Paganino Paganini167. The significance of this edition is summed up in the words of Karlfried Froehlich: “The presentation of Vulgate, Glossa ordinaria, and Lyra on the same page provided the preacher   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 123v, see App. V, 30.   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 123r, see App. V, 31. 164   See B.T. Hagigah 13a. 165   “Dicit hic R. Salomon quod ipse nescit proprie quid significet hassemal. Et ideo nescio quare Hieronymus transtulit elecrum. Non enim multum videtur probabile quod melius intellexerit hebraicum quam doctor ille”, Postillae ad Ezek. 1:4. 166   See Beryl Smalley, The Study of the Bible in the Middle Ages (Oxford, 1952), 56. No different functions should be ascribed to the Glossa ordinaria and the Glossa interlinearis. Only for reasons of convenience was the longer one put in the margin (ordinaria), whereas the shorter gloss was put between the lines (interlinearis), ibid., 56. For the development of the Glossa ordinaria see Beryl Smalley, ‘Les commentaires bibliques de l’époque romane: glose ordinaire et gloses périmées’, in Cahiers de civilisation médiévale Xe – XII e Siècles 4 (1961), 15-22. The editio princeps was published by Adolph Rusch of Ingweiler in Alsace (1480), see Karlfried Froehlich, ‘An Extraordinary Achievement: the Glossa ordinaria in Print’ in Biblical Interpretation from the Church Fathers to the Reformation (Farnham, 2010), V:18-20. 167   Liber uite Biblia cum glosis ordinarijs, et interlinearibus, excerptis ex omnib[us] ferme ecclesie sancte doctorib[us]: simulq[ue] cum expositiōe Nicolai de lyra: et cum concordantijs ī margine (Venice, 1495). For a detailed description of the edition see Froehlich, ‘The Printed Gloss’, in Biblical Interpretation cit., VI:11-14. 162 163

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with an ‘all-you-need’ tool, a dream library for all practical purposes”168. And yet, Nicholas of Lyra’s authority did not go unquestioned. This is clear from the second edition, printed in Basel in 1498169. It now included the critique, or Additiones, of Lyra’s main opponent, Pablo de Santa Maria, better known as Paul of Burgos (c. 1351-1435). The Jewish convert, born Solomon ha-Levi, was a member of a distinguished Jewish family of Burgos where he was appointed bishop in 1415. He had accused Nicholas of Lyra of not adhering consistently to the dicta sanctorum et doctorum170. Clearly meant as a counterbalance to Paul of Burgos’ critique, and in defence of Nicholas his confrere, the German historian and theologian Matthias Döring (c. 1390-1469) wrote his Replicae, which were also included in this and the following editions171. It was much in demand by preachers in the late fifteenth and early sixteenth century. In the second half of the sixteenth century, however, the number of Protestant customers eager to go back ‘ad fontes’ diminished drastically, while Catholic preachers used it as a tool for fighting heresy, making it an equally suitable device for the assessment of Jewish Bible interpretation172. The discussions between compilers, Robert Bellarmine and the Master of the Sacred Palace clearly indicate that the participants in our project must have had this major exegetical vademecum at their disposal. An example of explicit use of these editions is the assessment of Rashi’s comment on Leviticus 10:12: “Moses spoke to Aaron and to his sons who were left”. The sons who were left were Eleazar and Ithamar after the two other sons Nadab and Abihu had been consumed by heavenly fire as a punishment for offering unauthorized fire before the Lord. Rashi comments on the last part of the verse ‘his sons who were left’: “namely from being killed. It teaches that they had been sentenced to death because of the sin of the [golden] calf. This is what is said, ‘and with Aaron the Lord was very angry to destroy him’ [Deut. 9:20]. And ‘destruction’ simply means the consuming and annihilation of the 168   Froehlich, ‘The Fate of the Glossa ordinaria in the Sixteenth Century’, in Biblical Interpretation cit., VII:23. 169   For a detailed description of the edition, see Froehlich, ‘The Printed Gloss’ in Biblical Interpretation cit., VI, 14-18. 170   See Henri de Lubac, Exégèse médiévale: les quatre sens de l’Écriture, 2 vols (Paris, 1959-64), 2:355. For Pablo de Santa Maria see Yosef Kaplan, ‘Pablo de Santa Maria’, in Encyclopedia Judaica, 13:3-4. 171   Textus biblie, Cum Glosa ordinaria, Nicolai de lyra postilla, Moralitatibus eiusdem, Pauli Burgensis additionibus, Matthie Thoring Replicis (Basel, 1498). For the critique of Nicholas of Lyra by Paul of Burgos and Matthias Döring’s response, see De Lubac, Exégèse médiévale cit., 2:355-9. The many subsequent editions show the high esteem in which this synopsis of biblical exegesis was held, see Froehlich, ‘The printed Gloss’ in Biblical Interpretation cit., VI:18-36. 172   See Froehlich, ‘Makers and Takers: the Shaping of the Biblical Glossa ordinaria’ in Biblical Interpretation cit., III:3-5.

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sons, because it says, ‘And I will destroy its fruit above’ [Amos 2:9]. And the prayer of Moses interceded, because it says, ‘Moses prayed for Aaron at that time’ [Deut. 9:20]”. The reason given by the compiler for including the passage in the collection was that Rashi’s explanation was “both apocryphal and an arbitrary remark”173. The censura, however, was the result of a discussion that is preserved in Vat. lat. 14629 where we find an additional censura: “note that Lyranus considers this sentence passed by God against the sons of Aaron. But Burgensis rejects [it], and it is therefore to be seen if ‫[ שמד‬to destroy] everywhere in the Law means the slaying of all future generations, in particular in Deuteronomy where this word almost all the time is repeated”174. The additional remark was apparently taken up and since the verb does not necessarily imply the destruction of all posterity, the controversy between Nicholas of Lyra and Burgos was left out in the final text175. A discussion that involved Jerome, the Glossa ordinaria and Nicholas of Lyra, is Rashi’s comment on the Book of Judges 18:30. The story concerns the tribe of Dan, their conquest of Laish and the sanctuary that was subsequently created there. About the arrangements in the sanctuary it says: “Jonathan son of Gershom, son of Moses, and his sons were priests to the tribe of the Danites”. Problematic is the length of the duration of the sanctuary: “until the day of the captivity of the land”. According to Rashi it ceased to exist ‘in the first captivity by Sennacherib’, that is when the northern kingdom of Israel was taken into captivity (2 Kings 17)176. The compiler considered Rashi’s comment an undermining of Samuel’s authorship of the Book of Judges: “If this explanation of Salomon were true, the present Book of Judges could not have been written by Samuel, as is the consensus of almost all [theologians], but many centuries later”177. Bellarmine, however, in the company of the venerable Bede, whose commentary on the Book of Ezra is included in the Glossa ordinaria and whom Bellarmine quotes verbatim, emphatically sides with Rashi: “Also in this place I do not see any error of R. Salomon. For although the Book of Judges is believed to be written by Samuel, it is not at all certain, and furthermore it is well known that several additions have been made by Ezra, who collected all the books and put them together, as Bede clearly   Vat. lat. 14628, fols 30v-31r, see App. V, 32.   Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 173r, see App. V, 32. 175   See e.g. Deut. 9:3, 9:8, 9:14, 9:19, 9:20, 9:25. 176   For the rabbinic tradition that hold Sennacherib responsible for capturing Israel see Rivka Ulmer, ‘Sennacherib in Midrashic and Related Literature: Inscribing History in Midrash’, in Sennacherib at the Gates of Jerusalem: Story, History and Historiography, ed. Isaac Kalimi and Seth Richardson (Leiden, 2014), 347-87 at 378-9. 177   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 56v, see App. V, 33. Sennacherib was king of Assyria and Babylonia from 705 until 681 BCE. 173 174

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demonstrates in the seventh chapter of the first Book of Ezra. The last words of Deuteronomy for instance ‘And there arose not a prophet since in Israel like Moses’ can only be the words of somebody who lived a long time after Moses. Also in 1 Kings 9 (=1 Sam. 9:9) ‘He that is now called a prophet was beforetime called a seer’ cannot have been said by Samuel, who is believed to be the author of the first Book of Kings, but by a later author178”. Though backed by Bede, Bellarmine’s support of Rashi did not convince the Master of the Sacred Palace, who introduced two opponents to Bellarmine’s exegesis. First, he referred to Jerome’s translation of Judges 18:30: “But R. Salomon overlooked the more suitable explanation of Saint Jerome who renders [the text as] ‘the day of its captivity’, i.e. of the ark by the Philistines”. He then advised Bellarmine to have a look at what Nicholas of Lyra had said about this enigmatic text: Lyranus should be consulted about this for he proves this more convincingly [i.e. that the text does not refer to the exile of the Northern tribes]. And I do not consider it probable that this book was written so much later or that somebody later inserted an addition into this holy history179. Nicholas of Lyra considered Judges 18:30 to be “a prophecy about the antichrist to be thrown down by Christ” as it says in 2 Thess. 2:8: “And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will destroy with the breath of his mouth, annihilating him by the manifestation of his coming”.

By referring to Jerome and Nicholas of Lyra the Master of the Sacred Palace demonstrated that the literal and allegorical, that is Christological, interpretation of one and the same verse are not mutually exclusive. Thus with a two-pronged argument he rejected, Rashi’s interpretation of Judges 18:30180. Against Bellarmine’s advice, the passage was not removed from the collection. Most convincing is the use and authority of the Vulgata with the Glossa ordinaria/interlinearis and Nicholas’ Postillae when all three could be 178   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 263r, see App. V, 33. Bede in the Glossa ordinarius to Ezra 7:1: “‘Now Ezra, who is called a scribe skilled in the law of Moses for having restored the Law that had been destroyed, rewrote not only the Law but also, as the common tradition of our forebears holds, the whole sequence of sacred Scripture that had likewise been destroyed by fire, in accordance with the way that seemed to him to meet the needs of readers. In this undertaking they say that he added certain words that he considered useful, such as the saying, ‘And no prophet that the Lord knew face to face like Moses has risen in Israel’ (Deut. 34:10), and so on, which could be said only by one who lived a long time after Moses; and in the Book of Samuel, ‘Formerly in Israel, if a man went to inquire of God, he would say, “Come, let us go to the one who sees,” because he who is called today a prophet used to be called one who sees 1 Sam. 9:9’”. See Scott Degregorio, Bede: On Ezra and Nehemiah, trans. with an introduction and notes (Liverpool, 2006), 109-10. 179   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 263r, see App. V, 33. 180   On the combined literal and spiritual/allegorical meaning of Scripture in Catholic tradition, see Richard J. Blackwell, Galileo, Bellarmine, and the Bible (Notre Dame, 1991), 33-4.

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called upon for ratifying a rabbinic interpretation of Scripture. Such is the case with Hosea 14:3, where the prophet exhorts Israel to say to God: “Take away all guilt; accept that which is good, and we will offer the fruit of our lips”. Rashi comments on the text: “‘And accept that which is good’: take in your hand the little there is of our good works and judge us only according to those, as David said: ‘Let your eyes see the right’”181. According to the compiler of the collection, Rashi undermines God’s justice in his interpretation of this verse: “This is a misconception of the divine justice, and explaining [the verse] in this way gives rein and license to sin”182. Bellarmine, however, expresses the greatest appreciation for Rashi’s interpretation of Hosea 14:3: “With R. Salomon agree Saint Jerome, Lyranus and the Glossa interlinearis”183. This was the last word on the matter – the passage was removed from the collection. The compilers of the collections discussed in this chapter scrutinized Jewish exegesis in order to arrive at a definitive interpretation of Scripture. Most revealing are the discussions between the various participants in the project, who, contrary to Sacerdote’s suggestion, were anything but “anonymous Jewish converts who owed their appointment to their fanaticism rather than to their knowledge of Hebrew”184. In a complex use of biblical hermeneutics based on the most celebrated exegetical traditions, Hebrew experts and distinguished theologians had set themselves the task of establishing the authoritative interpretation of Scripture. This confrontation between Christian and Jewish exegesis was represented by the flagships of the two traditions: the 1548 rabbinic Bible, which includes the most prominent and popular medieval Jewish commentaries, and the Christian exegetical tradition, shaped over the centuries and brought together in an authoritative synopsis of patristic and medieval Bible interpretation in Textus biblie, Cum Glosa ordinaria, Nicolai de lyra postilla, Moralitatibus eiusdem, Pauli Burgensis additionibus, Matthie Thoring Replicis.

  Psalm 16:2. (Vulgate).   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 136r, see App. V, 34. 183   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 138r, see App. V, 34. Jerome ad Hosea 14:3: “‘et accipe’, inquit, ‘bonum’. Nisi enim tuleris mala nostra, bonum tibi quod offeramus, habere non possumus, iuxta illud quod alibi scriptum est: ‘Declina a malo, et fac bonum; et reddemus, ait, vitulos labiorum nostrorum’”, S. Hieronymi prebyteri opera. Pars I Opera exegetica 6. Commentarii in Prophetas minores (Turnhout, 1969), 154. For Bellarmine’s treatment and use of the Fathers see Backus, Historical Method and Confessional Identity cit., 227-32. 184   Sacerdote, ‘Deux index’ cit., 263. 181 182

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CHAPTER 6

SCOPE OF THE UNDERTAKING

From an analysis of both extracts and their censurae it appears that the compilers of excerpts from Jewish Bible commentaries searched for passages that did not conform with Christian biblical exegesis. Once again, we need to ask what purpose these collections of passages were meant to serve. In his description of Vat. lat.14628, Sacerdote presumed that the compilers had set out to produce an Index expurgatorius; and this assumption has been widely accepted and until recently repeated1. Sacerdote cited the deaths of Pope Gregory XIII and Cardinal Sirleto, and the absence from Rome of Robert Bellarmine during the years 1589-1590, as reasons for the collections never having been promulgated as the official Index expurgatorius2. It should be noted, however, that the collections had been given final approval by the Master of the Sacred Palace and Cardinal Santoro by 1583. If the Church authorities had any intention to bring out an Index expurgatorius, our collections easily could have been declared the official guidelines for censorship and expurgation before Gregory XIII and Sirleto died in 15853. But composing a vade mecum for censorship had been private initiatives from the very beginning. In 1555, immediately after Pope Julius III had issued his bull Cum sicut nuper, imposing censorship and expurgation of Hebrew books, Abraham Provençal of Mantua took the initiative of creating such a manual. Contrary to Sacerdote, whose view was followed by Popper and Berliner, Sonne adopted Porges’ claim that Provençal was not directly charged with his work by the Pope. He suggested that: in all likelihood the Jews, anxious to conform to this edict, charged Provençal with the expurgation of their Hebrew books, in order to secure their return

  See Sacerdote ‘Deux Index’ cit., 269 and Chapter 2, n. 2.   Ibid., 270. Bellarmine was spiritual director at the Collegio Romano from 1588 to 1592. He temporarily discontinued this function in 1589-90, in order to accompany Cardinal Cajetan as papal legate to France. See Ludwig Koch, Jesuiten-Lexikon: Die Gesellschaft Jesu einst und jetzt, 2 vols (Paderborn, 1934), 1:185. 3   The last date is 3 February 1583. See App. I, 5a and 19. 1 2

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according to the terms of the papal edict. In the execution of this task entrusted to him by the Jews, Provençal felt the need of an index as an instrument to speed up his own work of expurgation, and perhaps also to supply a guide to any assistants whom he may have employed’.4

According to Sonne, there is no reason to assume that Provençal suspended his work after the death of Julius III. He even may have become the assistant of the first ecclesiastical censor of Hebrew books, Giacomo Geraldino, who, around 1555, was in charge of the whole of the Pontifical State5. He was given the virtually impossible task “to correct Hebrew manuscripts and expurgate from all printed Hebrew books not only the blasphemies concerning the name of Jesus but anything contrary to the Catholic faith and to good principles and morals”6. He may well have used Provençal’s guidelines, which would explain the popularity of his Index among ecclesiastical censors. Forty years later Hippolite of Ferrara used it as a basis for his own Index7. After completion, Hippolite submitted it to the Church authorities, clearly for no other reason than to assure himself of the Church’s approval of his own censorial activities8. The most renowned Index was the Sefer ha-Zikuk composed by Domenico Gerosolimitano. It has survived in four manuscript copies, one of which is entirely in Domenico’s hand and was completed in 15969. Though soon considered an appropriate tool for expurgation, it was never given official approval   Sonne, ‘Expurgation of Hebrew books’ cit., 8.   See Porges, ‘Der hebräische Index expurgatorius’ cit., 274, n. 2 and Simonsohn, ‘Some Well-Known Jewish Converts’ cit., 36. Following the common practice, I am using the words censor and censorship in the broad sense, including the expurgator and expurgation of Hebrew books. For the distinction between censor and expurgator/reviser see Porges, ‘Der hebräische Index expurgatorius’ cit., 275. 6   See Stern, Urkundliche Beiträge cit., 168 (n. 160). It is not surprising that charges of inconsistency and lack of thoroughness in his censorial activities were made against him. See Popper, Censorship cit., 41. 7   Popper, Censorship, 8; Sacerdote ‘Deux Index’ cit., 260-1. Another private initiative was the Index expurgatorius by Laurenzio Franguello, who worked as a censor of Hebrew books from 1571 until 1595, see Popper, Censorship cit., 56, 77-80. According to Sacerdote, who gives a full description of the Index, the manuscript is catalogued as MS 45 in the Biblioteca Vallicelliana in Rome, see Sacerdote, ‘Deux index’ cit., 271-6. See also Popper, Censorship cit., 81. The manuscript, however, cannot be traced in the Biblioteca Vallicelliana. 8   “pedibus Sanctae Romanae Ecclesiae Catholicae humiliter submissa”, Biblioteca comunale Ariostea in Ferrara, MS 290 Classe prima, 1. 9   See Berliner, Censur und Confiscation cit., 58-60 and Porges, ‘Der hebräische Index expurgatorius’ cit., 279. According to Popper the list contains 336 works, see Popper, Censorship, 84. The manuscript that sketches the development of the Sefer ha-Zikuk until 1612 lists 420 works, see Porges ‘Der hebräische Index expurgatorius’ cit., 288. The Sefer ha-Zikuk is preceded by a manual for expurgation of works that were not specifically dealt with in the Index, see Popper, Censorship cit., 82-5 and Porges, ‘Der hebräische Index expurgatorius’ cit., 286-92. Recently a new edition has been published by Gila Prebor, ‘Sepher Ha-Ziquq by Domenico Yerushalmi’ (Hebrew), in Italia 18 (2008), 7-296. 4 5

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by the Church. In an undated letter, an anonymous censor reported that Domenico’s corrections of Hebrew books served as a blueprint for other censors10. He himself, however, had never been able to trace the original («il codice della spurga autentico») and had therefore made use of other examples of expurgation11. Given all these private initiatives, it seems unlikely that the Church had ever regarded the collections in Vat. lat. 14628 as the official manual for censorship. This assumption is confirmed by an examination of the expurgation of the rabbinic Bibles12. In a copy of the fourth rabbinic Bible, published by Giovanni de Gara in Venice in 1568, we find the signatures of five censors, covering the Church’s assessment of rabbinic biblical commentaries over a period of almost half a century13. The first censor was Laurenzio Franguello who signed as early as 1579, and who probably used his own Index. In 1599 the copy was examined again, this time by Luigi da Bologna, who had succeeded Franguello in the censorship commission in 159714. The Church authorities must have considered Luigi da Bologna’s work unsatisfactory, as they appointed Domenico Vistorini to fulfil the same task in 161015. During a new period of censorial activity, Camillo Jagel subjected this copy to a fourth revision in 162116. The last censor who examined the volumes, in 1626, was Renato da Modena, who used Gerosolimitano’s Sefer ha-Zikuk17. None of these officially appointed censors, who altogether expurgated surprisingly few words and passages, made use of the elaborate collections of Vat. lat. 1462818. A similar state of affairs pertains to a copy of Bomberg’s third rabbinic Bible (1547-48), currently held at the Marriott Library of the University of Utah. A fourfold expurgation appears to have resulted in the erasure 10   It is known that several censors used the Sefer ha-Zikuk. Renato da Modena used it in his capacity as censor in 1626, adding to Domenico’s Index further offensive passages in Hebrew books. See Popper, Censorship cit., 82 and Porges, ‘Der hebräische Index expurgatorius’ cit., 280. Pietro de Trevio, having received a copy from the Magister Sacri Palatii, when he was appointed as censor in Rome, used the Index in 1623, see Porges, ‘Der hebräische Index expurgatorius’ cit., 281. Joseph Cronti made use of it at least until 1641, see Berliner, Censur und Confiscation cit., 21. According to Porges, however, with the exception of Renato da Modena and Pietro de Trevio, Domenico’s Index was used neither by his contemporaries nor by his successors. 11   Borg. lat. 149, fol. 97r. 12   See Chapter 2, 42-6, 48-51. 13   A not uncommon procedure, see Popper, Censorship cit., 144. The copy of the fourth rabbinic bible of 1568 is held in the Jewish Theological Seminary, New York. 14   Popper, Censorship cit., 78 and 93. 15   Ibid,, 99. 16   Ibid., 100. 17   Ibid., 103. 18   The copy of the fourth rabbinic Bible in the British Library was expurgated in 1589 and 1593.

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of only 20 passages19. Almost negligible is the expurgation of a copy of the 1517 rabbinic Bible in the Vatican Library carried out by Hippolite in 1594 showing hardly any erasures, except for a number of passages in the commentaries on Isaiah. A salient detail of Hippolite’s rather moderate intervention in the text is its discrepancy with his own Index expurgatorius published on 24 May 1594. In its introduction, Hippolite stated that Hebrew books: contained many dangerous passages which are worthy of being noted, examined and censored. Among them are many expositions of Sacred Scripture, such as are advanced by those who make use of certain ancient rabbis’ Talmudic expressions, and of their false opinions and statements, through which they have attempted to spread with impious lips many blasphemies against the Most high God, and have made certain false statements in regard to the angels, the creation of the world, the Kingdom of the Romans and its princes, the Church, the Pope, bishops, elders, some of its ministers, – in short, against all those faithful to Christ20.

A comparison between Sefer ha-Zikuk and Vat. lat. 14628 is further confirmation of the generally moderate way of expurgating Hebrew biblical commentaries. Fourteen passages culled from Levi ben Gershon’s commentary on the Book of Job feature in Vat. lat. 14628. The Master of the Sacred Palace, Paulo Constabile, to whom all collections were to be submitted for approval, noted at the end of this collection that it would be better to burn this commentary on Job. Such an unequivocal decision is virtually unique as far as Church appraisal of Jewish commentaries is concerned – only Bahya’s commentary on Torah was threatened with the same fate by the Magister21. And yet, in Gerosolimitano’s Sefer ha-Zikuk it is explicitly stated that there is nothing to be included from Levi ben Gershon’s commentary on Job22. When discussing the purpose of our collections, attention should also be paid to the unmistakable difference in format and layout between an 19   The copy was expurgated by four censors – Luigi da Bologna, Camillo Jagel, Renato da Modena and Girolamo da Durallano – over a period of almost half a century. See Michael T. Walton and Phyllis J. Walton, ‘In Defense of the Church Militant: The Censorship of the Rashi Commentary in the Magna Biblia Rabbinica’, in The Sixteenth Century Journal 21 (1990), 385-400. The erased passages are the following: Genesis 1:21, 26; 2:23; 6:6; 15:10, 14, 17; 24:16; Exodus 21:1; 22:30; 23:13; Numbers 23:10; 24:3, 19; 28:15; Deuteronomy 12:3; 21:13; 28:64; 32:21, 27, 28. 20   Biblioteca comunale Ariostea, MS 290, fol. 1; Translated in Popper, Censorship cit., 64-5. 21   “Haec in Job expositio R. Levi prorsus abiicienda mihi videtur et igni tradenda”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 246v. 22   Vatican Library, MS Vat. ebr. 273, fol. 69v. Interestingly, the same ambivalence to Levi ben Gershon is found among Jews. See Robert Bonfil, Introduction (in Hebrew) to Judah Messer Leon, Nofet Zufim: On Hebrew Rhetoric, facsimile edition of the 1475 printing (Jerusalem, 1981), 16-8.

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Index expurgatorius, such as Sefer ha-Zikuk, and Vat. lat. 1462823. The discrepancy is shown clearly in the two collections of passages from the Mahzor, preserved in MS Borg. lat. 14924. As discussed earlier, the first collection, consisting of Latin extracts with censurae in the margin, belongs to the same undertaking as Vat. lat. 1462825. The other collection, which merely records the usual inadmissible vocabulary with the first word of the line where an unacceptable expression occurs and a reference to the page of the edition (Bologna, 1540), follows the pattern of an Index expurgatorius26. Since no date is provided for its creation or use, it remains uncertain whether this second collection from the Mahzor was part of the project executed under Gregory XIII. However, a similar composite of collections, from Kimhi’s commentary on Isaiah, confirms that censorship had its own separate niche in the project, which did not coincide with the main purpose of the collections. Like all the other collections in Vat. lat. 14628, one collection from Kimhi’s commentary consists of translations of extracts with marginal comments, occasionally with extensive discussions between censor and reviser about the admissibility of certain passages27. Its heading reads as follows: “Censurae to the commentary of Rabbi David Kimhi on Isaiah, revised by the Reverend Father Frater Sisto, Master of the Sacred Palace with the intervention of the deputies of the Neophytes, and the Jews having been given a hearing in 1581, with a short censura of what has not yet been corrected”. The corrections, which the Magister had expected to be carried out, refer to a list of 17 passages with the heading: “Censura of what needs to be corrected in the commentary of David Kimhi on Isaiah by the Reverend Father frater Sisto Fabri, Master of the Sacred Palace who wrote it down in the Congregation during the past months in the presence of the Jews with the intervention of the deputies of the Neophytes and returned it on 7 September 1581”28. The requested corrections relate to the standard vocabulary – such as Edom, Rome, gentiles, idolatry – and to alleged attacks on Christianity that had to be removed from Jewish biblical commentaries29. With the instruction that the corrections 23   For the characteristics of an Index expurgatorius see Popper, Censorship cit., 81-9. Sacerdote also notes the difference between our manuscripts and an Index expurgatorius, see ‘Deux index’ cit., 269. 24   Borg. lat. 149, fols 46r-86v and 87r-94v, see App. IV. 25   See Chapter 3, 66-8. 26   Borg. lat. 149, fols 93v-94r. For the layout of Domenico Gerosolimitano’s Sefer ha-Zikuk see Prebor, ‘Sepher Ha-Ziquq’ cit. For a more detailed discussion of Borg. lat. 149, fols 93v-94r see van Boxel, ‘Hebrew Books and Censorship’ cit., 83-4. 27   See App. I, 12b. 28   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 250, see App. I, 12c. 29   For the list, see App. VI. For measures to this effect taken by Gregory XIII, see Popper, Censorship cit., 66.

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Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 250r.

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had to be implemented according to the newly printed editions, the Magister undoubtedly referred to the latest rabbinic Bible, published in Venice by Giovanni di Gara in 1568, which contained the most recent edition of Kimhi’s commentary on Isaiah30. The Venetian authorities had banned the edition almost immediately after its publication, under the pretence that the publishers had violated the instructions for expurgation drafted by Jacopo Giraldino, which they had established in 1559, and that it contained ‘molte pravità’31. The real motives were political, however, and the action against Hebrew books in 1568 was retaliation for alleged Jewish hostilities against the Republic32. Although a copy signed by Laurenzio Franguello in 1579 proves that the 1568 edition had not escaped expurgation, the fact that the 1568 edition of the rabbinic Bible was used as a model for censorship and expurgation by the highest authorities of the Church confirms the political motivation of the Venetian authorities33. As to the corrections themselves, it should be noted that the list of 17 passages differs in its layout from the usual Index expurgatorius. There is no precise indication of what exactly is to be expurgated from the commentaries on Isaiah. This unusual way of listing passages to be expurgated seems to point at a particular group of ‘censors’, namely the Jews, who as both headings reveal were present when the Magister composed his list. This state of affairs is confirmed by notes in the diary of Cardinal Santoro. In preparation for one of his weekly audiences with the Pope, Santoro recorded a memorandum from Sirleto on 27 July 1581, asking him to discuss with the Pope various issues concerning the Jews, including their behaviour in the meetings of the Congregation with the Master of the Sacred Palace, their attempted subordination, their unwillingness to report to the Congregation and their lies34. Santoro’s accompanying note to this memo refers to the directive of the Pope that, at meetings where the revision of Hebrew books was discussed, a Jew should be present, and that the minutes made at such meetings should be reported to the Congregation35. Although the 30   See references to Kimhi’s comments on Isaiah 34:1, 2; 49:6; 51:6; 52:13; 54:1; 66:17 listed in App. VI. 31   Hebrew books could be printed under condition that the texts had been censored according to a papal Index expurgatorius, prepared by Jacopo Giraldino, see Grendler, ‘The Destruction of Hebrew Books’ cit., 108. 32   Ibid., 111-3. 33   The copy signed by Franguello is held at the library of the Jewish Theological Seminary, New York. 34   “della congregazione avanti il Magistro Sacro Palazzo, con gli Giudei; delle subornationi tentate; della relatione non fatta e delle bugie da loro esposte; del tempo della congregazione; de’ libri Hebrei, e spese fatteci e fatighe tenute”, Archivio Segreto Vaticano, Arm. LXX, t. 18, fol. 87. 35   “N.S. ordinò che con li primi riveditori de’ libri Hebrei, vi intervenisse alcun Giudeo; e quel che poi sarà notato, si riferisca in congregazione, Archivio Segreto Vaticano”, Archivio Segreto Vaticano, Arm. LXX, t. 18, fol. 87.

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heading of the collection from Kimhi’s commentary on Isaiah does not allude to the unwillingness of Jews to collaborate, it is quite likely that they did not co-operate wholeheartedly. An indication of this reluctance may be suggested by the fact that they had not yet implemented the corrections required by the Magister, which was recorded on 7 September 1581 just over a month after Santoro’s note36. In all likelihood, the Master of the Palace wanted to expurgate Kimhi’s commentary published in the uncensored 1547-48 edition of the rabbinic Bible, which was one of the main targets of the project37. Discussions with the Jews Close examination of the passages and censurae in Vat. lat. 14628 provide a first indication of the aim the composers of the collections had set themselves. Their exact and clear rendering of the excerpts indicates that these passages were not meant to be simple tools for locating places to be erased, but rather provided reasoned arguments regarding the passages under dispute. An example of this concern is the correction of the Latin rendering of Rashi’s comment on Hosea 13:3(=2). The text reads as follows: “And now they keep on sinning and make a cast image for themselves, idols of silver made according to their understanding, all of them the work of artisans. ‘Sacrifice to these’, they say. People are kissing calves!”38 Rashi had interpreted this description of people kissing calves according to Raba’s explanation recorded in the Babylonian Talmud: “If one sacrificed his son to the idol, the priest said to him: You have offered a most precious gift to it; come and kiss it”39. Rather than vitulos obsculentur (let them kiss the calves) the Latin rendering of Rashi’s comment, in Vat. lat. 14628, reads an incomprehensible viribus obsculentur40. The reviser rightly notes that in this place the words of Rabbi Salomon seem to have been translated obscurely41. Subsequently, the distorted text, which had resulted from an incorrect copying of the draft text in Vat. lat. 14629, was corrected42. Similar attention was paid to the censurae, which in cases of omission (censurae omissae) from the early version of a collection were   Archivio Segreto Vaticano, Arm. LXX, t. 18, fol. 87.   For a discussion of the (un)censored passages in the various rabbinic Bibles, see Van Boxel, ‘Hebrew Books and Censorship’, cit., 89-92. 38   For the various interpretations of this biblical verse, see Andrew A. Macintosh, A Critical and Exegetical Commentary on Hosea (Edinburgh, 1997), 523. 39   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 135. 40   Ibid. 41   “Videntur obscura versa hoc loco verba R. Salomonis”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 138r. 42   Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 253v. 36 37

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added in an appendix43. But most revealing is the way these censurae were discussed, and on numerous occasions revised, by Robert Bellarmine and the Master of the Sacred Palace, thus assuring that these critical remarks to rabbinic comments always represented the official Catholic Bible interpretation and Church doctrine44. These correct renderings of passages and precise phrasing of censurae were also meant to be tools for discussions with the Jews. This becomes clear in the internal discussion about the censura of Kimhi’s introduction to the Books of Chronicles. On the basis of 1 Sam. 13:1, Kimhi concluded that Saul ruled only for two years. The censor comments with a firm rejection of this conclusion: “This is wrong, for he ruled for 20 years on his own, but 40 years with Samuel as it says in Acts 13 (v. 21: ‘Then they asked for a king; and God gave them Saul son of Kish, a man of the tribe of Benjamin, who reigned for forty years’). However, what is said in the first Book of Kings 13:1 [1 Sam. 13:1] ‘he ruled for two years over Israel’ is understood as the period before David was anointed. For from that time onwards he did not rule legally”45. The reviser’s critique of the censura is twofold. First, he rejects the censor’s interpretation of 1 Sam. 13:1, since it contradicted 2 Sam. 2:5 (“David sent messengers to the people of Jabesh-gilead, and said to them, ‘May you be blessed by the Lord, because you showed this loyalty to Saul your lord, and buried him!”) and David’s behaviour towards Saul: I would delete those last words of the censura “for from that time onwards he did not rule legally”, since Saul never was removed from his throne while he lived, but was only deprived of the hope of succession; neither did the first anointment of David make him king, but it pointed out the future, otherwise he would not have been anointed again after Saul’s death as stated in 2 Kings 2:5 [= 2 Sam. 2:7]. Finally, David always revered Saul as the real king and his lord.

The reviser’s second observation reveals the rationale for the whole undertaking: “In order to convince the Jews I would, however, add a proof based on David’s age. For, if David was a little boy when Saul already had reigned for some time, as we have it in 1 Kings 16 (1 Sam. 16:11), and David began to reign when he was already 30 years old, as we have it in 2 Kings 5 [2 Sam. 5:4], Saul must have reigned as many years as there are between the childhood of David and his adult age, which are certainly more than two”46. The reviser’s critique resulted in a partial rewording of the original censura, where the concluding line “for from that time onwards he did not   See Chapter 4, 72-4.   See Chapter 5, 115-29. 45   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 181v. The 40-year reign of Saul is not attested in the Hebrew Bible, but see Josephus Ant. X, 7 § 4 where the period of Saul’s reign is given as 20 years and Ant. VI, 14 § 9 where it is given as 40 years, a duration corresponding to that in Acts 13:21. 46   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 348r. 43 44

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rule legally” was elided and replaced by the interpretation as found in one of the authoritative Christian Bible commentaries, the Glossa ordinaria: “He ruled two years over Israel: that is to say justly and gently, but after that he was more a tyrant than a king”. Further proof that the undertaking was meant to persuade the Jews of their distorted interpretation of Scripture, is an additional comment made by the reviser concerning Rashi’s interpretation of Numbers 13:26: “And they returned from searching of the land after forty days”. Rashi answers the question as to how the spies sent out by Moses were able to inspect the whole of the Promised Land within 40 days as follows: “but did the promised land not extend 400 miles both in longitude and in latitude, whilst an ordinary man cannot travel much more than10 miles a day? It was a distance of 40 days from east to west, and yet they travelled its length and its width. But since God had known what he had to decree against them ‘a day for a year’ (Numbers 14:31 (=34)), He therefore contracted the land and made it smaller before them”47. While the censor labels the interpretation as ‘absurd prodigies’, the reviser provides us with the following comment: “In order to convince the Jews one could add the testimony of Jerome, who lived in Palestine for a long time. For in his letter to Dardanus he declares that the length of the whole of the Promised Land was hardly more than 160,000 passi [147 miles] and its width hardly more than 46,000 [42 miles], distances that could be travelled within 20 days”48. The Church authorities wanted these arguments to be phrased in such a way that the Jews would not feel offended. Thus, concerning Rabbi Jonah’s De poenitentia, the reviser first noted one possible change in the collection and then concluded his revision with the remark: “For the rest nothing in my opinion is to be added or left out, although the phrasing could be more elegant and clearer”49. Passing judgement on the collections from Levi ben Gershon’s writings, Cardinal Santoro apparently reacted to an earlier observation by a reviser, and gave as his opinion that “this kind of censurae should be shorter, so as not to be irksome or grievous to the readers”50. In a determined effort not to cause offence to the Jews, the composers finely tuned their arguments about the correct interpretation of Scripture. Such a diplomatic procedure must surely indicate their desire to provide the best context in which to bring about conversion.

  Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 16v.   Patrologia latina, Vol. 22, Epistula CXXIX ad Dardanum, de terra promissionis. 49   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 447r. 50   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 240r. 47 48

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The Manuscripts and the Sermons In the bull Sancta Mater Ecclesia (1584) Pope Gregory XIII outlined the strategy to be followed in the Church’s efforts to convert the Jews: the obligatory attendance at sermons in churches. In the bull, the Pope stated that a Magister in theology or another relevant person, if possible an expert in the Hebrew language, should follow the reading of the parashah (weekly reading from the Pentateuch) and haftarah (weekly reading from the Prophets), and confront the Jews with their misunderstanding and corruption of Scripture. In order to bring them to the Christian faith he should present a Christian reading of the text, according to the interpretations of the Church fathers and the true understanding of the Catholic Church, as opposed to the fables, lies and deceits of rabbinic explanations. Such a Magister, however, was to act prudently, using true arguments derived from the Holy Scripture, and, without any defamation or anger, try to open to them the light of the truth with great love and modesty51. The collections contained in Vat. lat. 14628 are the perfect blueprint for an undertaking as envisaged in Sancta Mater Ecclesia. Issued on 1 September 1584, and reflecting down to the last detail the procedure followed by the composers of the collections, the bull may well be considered the Pope’s endorsement of this undertaking, of which 3 February 1583 was the last recorded date52. It is difficult not to detect the hand of the Jesuit Antonio Possevino in the procedures followed in the project, who at the urging of Cardinal Giulio Antonio Santoro preached to the Jews in the Confraternity of the Holy Trinity. Possevino had advised that the most effective way of approaching the Jews was to confront them equipped with a perfect knowledge of the Hebrew and Greek Old Testament, as well as the writings of the Fathers53. Succinct censurae such as ‘blasphemous’, ‘obscene’, ‘fabulous’ and ‘against the Christians’, was the usual response of Christian theologians to large swathes of Jewish exegesis that were not in conformity with Christian doctrine. Only occasionally did a censura go far beyond the standard phraseology and provided the user with lengthy expositions about matters with which he might not be familiar. The philosophical presuppositions that underlie Levi ben Gershon’s comment on Job 1:6-7 generated such a reaction: “Now there was a day that the sons of God came to present themselves before the Lord, and Satan also came amongst them. The Lord said to Satan, ‘Whence have you come?’ Satan answered the Lord, ‘From   Bullarum cit., 8:487-8.   See Segre, ‘La Controriforma’ cit., 756. 53   See Chapter 1, 16. 51 52

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going to and fro on the earth and from walking up and down on it”. Levi ben Gershon’s interpretation is rendered as follows: But after this God is introduced as if He were addressing the source from whom all evil that happens in this world originates, namely from something that is outside God and by resemblance is called Satan, since it causes [men] to deviate from the way intended by God. And in order to demonstrate that this Satan has no purpose in himself it says “among them Satan was present” as if he had come without [any] purpose. It also says that he walked only on earth, because the evil he causes is found in these lower parts, but not in the higher parts. In fact the sons of God are those forces that on divine command rule the universe [the lower world]54.

In a lengthy comment the compiler explains that Levi ben Gershon’s cosmology necessarily leads to the denial of Satan’s existence: In order to understand the error that here and in many following places occurs, one needs to add the position of this rabbi concerning the activity of the angels55. For he assumes 50 separate intellects, of which he affirms that the first one is God, the second one the universal agent intellect, the third one the potential intellect. The others are the souls of the heavens [celestial spheres] that always assist their motion. This doctrine does in no way allow for [the existence of] demons, and this point is frequently made by Gersonides [in the commentary] to the Pentateuch, especially in relation to Exodus chapter 3 and to Deuteronomy 32:17: they sacrificed to the demons etc.56.

A Bibliography of Judaism Clearly, discussions with rabbis and Jewish scholars were not simply a purely exegetical exercise. Jewish converts such as Andrea de Monte, who according to Martin was keen on private discussions with the rabbis (“in 54   For Levi ben Gershon’s denial of the existence of demons, see Alexander Altmann, ‘Gersonides’ Commentary on Averroes’ Epitome of Parva Naturalia, II.3: Annotated Critical Edition’, in Proceedings of the American Academy for Jewish Research: Jubilee Volume (192829 / 1978-79), ed. Salo Baron and Isaac Barzilay (Jerusalem, 1980), 1, 1-31 at 10. See further the introduction to Gersonides’ commentary on Job in Abraham Lassen, The Commentary on Levi ben Gersom (Gersonides) on the Book of Job translated from the Hebrew with introduction and notes (New York, 1946), XI-XXI and Gersonides’ introduction to his commentary on Job in Leon D. Stitskin, ‘From the Pages of Tradition: Ralbag’s Introduction to the book of Job’, in Tradition: A Journal of Orthodox Jewish Thought 6 (1963), 81-5. 55   At the beginning of his collection the censor already records Levi ben Gershon’s introduction to his commentary on Job outlining the philosophical assumptions, on which his biblical exegesis is based, see Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 238. Equally, at the beginning of the collection from his commentary on Proverbs, observations are made in order to explain the selection of passages: “Pro explicatione eorum quae censurantur hic permittere aliqua opportet ex eis quae alibi circa istius rabbini commentaria observata sunt”, Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 354r. His commentary on the Pentateuch was first published in Mantua before 1480. 56   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 238v.

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deed it were his desire and would be his greater victorie if theyr Rabbines talke with him privately in any such poynt”)57, certainly had the knowledge required to hold debates about Jewish beliefs, which may have taken place both in liturgical settings and outside the synagogue58. The two converts who participated in our project produced conversionary tracts during that period. Giovanni Paolo Eustachio wrote his Sacro Settenario in 1579 and Salutari Discorsi in 1582. In these works, he calls on his former coreligionists to convert, based on what he argues to be the correct understanding of Scripture59. In his Dialogo fra il cathecumeno et il padre cathechizante, published in 1582, Marco Fabiano Fioghi points at the lack of scriptural basis for Jewish practice and belief60. But the composers of our collections were well aware that familiarity with the Jewish faith in all its aspects was not part of most Christians’ cultural heritage, a shortcoming they themselves may have experienced. Only highly acclaimed Hebraists like the Basler professor of Hebrew Johann Buxtorf (1564-1629) could pride themselves of mastering Jewish beliefs, tradition and customs in all their facets and guises61. In order to overcome this inadequacy, a bibliography of Jewish writings was compiled (preserved in Vat. lat. 14630), which contained all the requisite information62. Since the works were all in Hebrew, the bibliography was apparently in the first place meant to serve those, like the participants in the project, who were well versed in the Hebrew language. Yalkut Shimoni, the most comprehensive midrashic anthology of more than 50 rabbinic works on the Bible, was referred to as a book “most helpful for the understanding of the opinions of the Jews”63. Jesh  Martin, Roma Sancta cit., 79-80. See Chapter 1, 17.   That discussions with the Jews were not confined to ‘liturgical’ encounters appears from the headings to the collections from Kimhi’s commentary on Isaiah, discussed above. These collections, it is stated, were revised by the Master of the Sacred Palace “with intervention of the deputies of the Neophytes, the Jews having been given a hearing”. 59   See Sacro settenario raccolto dalle Sante scritture, per Giouan Paolo Eustachio Nolano, già hebreo, hor christiano, professor della lingua santa, & studioso delle sacre lettere. Aggiontaui vna ispositione delle cerimonie sacre, vsate ne’ aprir della Porta Santa, ne l’anno del Santissimo Giubileo (Naples, 1579) [copy in the Vatican Library]; Salutari discorsi composti da M. Giovan Paolo Eustachio Nolano, già hebbreo, hor christiano (Naples, 1582). Hoffmann thinks it possible that Eustachio actually used his writings as sermons. See Hoffmann, Ursprung und Anfangstätigkeit cit., 208. 60   See Fausto Parente, ‘Il confronto ideologico’ cit.; see further Segre, ‘La Controriforma’ cit., 755, 761. 61   See Anthony Grafton and Joanna Weinberg, ‘Johann Buxtorf Makes a Notebook’, Canonical Texts and Scholarly Practices: a Global Comparative Approach, ed. Anthony Grafton and Glenn Most (Cambridge University Press, forthcoming). 62   Vat. lat 14630, fols 1v-2v, “Libri ebraeorum quos citatos vidi”. 63   Yalkut Shimoni was probably compiled in the thirteenth century and attributed to Simeon ha-Darshan, see Encyclopedia Judaica cit., 16:707-9 and Heller, The Sixteenth Century Hebrew Book cit., II:81. It is most likely that the composer referred to the 1566 Venice edition. 57

58

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ua ben Joseph ha-Levi’s Halikhot Olam (The Ways of Eternity), a popular work on Talmudic methodology, was considered useful for its explanation of numerous Talmudic terms. First printed in Leiria, Portugal (c. 1490), it was reprinted in Constantinople (1510), Venice (1544) and Sabbioneta (1567)64. The anonymous halakhic work Kol Bo (All is in it), written at the end of the thirteenth or the beginning of the fourteenth century, is included as a key for understanding all aspects of Jewish life, such as customs, prayers, festivals and dietary laws. The first edition was printed before 1500, and was followed by five editions in the sixteenth century65. Maimonides’ commentary on the Mishnah, referred to as Rabbi Moshe’s Al haMishnah was accompanied by the note “it would be appropriate to see”. It is most probably a reference to Maimonides’ introduction to his commentary on the Mishnah, which would indeed be useful for those wishing to understand its nature and structure. Isaac ben Solomon ibn Sahula’s Meshal ha-Kadmoni (The Fable of the Ancients), written at the end of the thirteenth century, in which animals are presented as scholars learned in Talmud and Bible interpretation, is bizarrely recommended as an aid for the understanding of the use of Scripture by the Jews. It was first printed in Brescia (c. 1497). Easily accessible were the Venice editions of c. 1547 and 1567. Mention is also made of Seder Olam, the oldest extant Jewish chronology, which, according to Jewish tradition, was compiled in the second century CE by Yose ben Halafta. This is offered as an example of chronology, despite the fact that “it contains infinitive errors”. The work itself was examined by Robert Bellarmine66. Sefer ha-Emunot we-ha-De’ot (The Book of Beliefs and Opinions), a philosophical justification of rabbinic dogmas, was originally written in Arabic, by Saadiah Gaon (933), and was translated in 1186 by Judah ibn Tibbon. It was included as a means for understanding rabbinic reasoning. This selection from Jewish writings was accompanied by a second bibliography that listed the works of established Christian polemicists, who, familiar as they were with Jewish tradition, offered instructive material for future discussions with the Jews. Written in Latin, they were accessible for those preachers and discussion partners not versed in Hebrew. One such work was De arcanis catholicae veritatis (Orthone, 1518; Basel, 1561), by the polemicist Galatinus, otherwise known as Pietro Colonna (c. 1460/65soon after 1539)67. It figures together with other polemical treatises such   Heller, The Sixteenth Century Hebrew Book cit., I:273.   Ibid., I:331 66   See Chapter 2, 47 and App. I, 25. 67   Opus toti christianae reipublicae maxime utile, de arcanis catholicae veritatis contra obstinatissimam iudaeorum nostrae tempestatis perfidiam: ex Talmud aliisque hebraicis libris nuper excerptum et quadruplici linguarum genere eleganter congestum (Orthonae maris, 64 65

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as Victor Porchetto de Salvatici’s Victoria adversus impios Hebraeos (Paris, 1520)68. Both Galatinus and Victor Porchetto were heavily dependent on the Pugio fidei by the Spanish Dominican Ramón Martí (1220-1285), one of the participants in the famous Barcelona disputation in 1263, whose work is also included in the bibliography69. Mention is also made of Adrianus Finus’ In Iudaeos flagellum ex sacris scripturis excerptum (Venice, 1538). In his Apparatus Sacer Antonio Possevino called it a valuable work, which preachers could profitably use in order to confute Jewish perfidy and to establish and elevate the Christian faith. He further recommended the introduction, in which the author lays out the reasons he wrote the work and summarizes its nine books70. Given this recommendation it may well be assumed that Possevino, who over a period of six months in 1577 took part in the weekly sermons to the Jews and who himself was not a Hebraist, used Adrianus Finus’ In Iudaeos flagellum as a personal manual. Additional material was provided by the Epistula ad Iudaeos, written by the convert Ludovico Carreto. The Hebrew text was published with a Latin translation by Angelo Canini, in Paris in 155471. The reference to Baptista medicus undoubtedly regards the Roman doctor Johannes Baptista Gratia Dei, author of the polemic work Liber de confutatione hebrayce secte72. Jacobus Perez de Valentia’s commentary on the Psalms was included for equally polemical reasons73. Some understanding of kabbalah could be ob1518); Vat. lat. 14630, 2. See Browe, Die Judenmission cit., 108. An accompanying note to Sefer ha-Emunot we-ha-De’ot stating that it is quoted in Galatinus’ work in Liber undecimus Q. shows the relationship between the two lists. 68   Victoria adversus impios Hebraeos, in qua tum ex sacris litteris tum ex dictis Talmud ac cabbilistarum et aliorum omnium authorum quos Hebraei recipiunt monstratur Veritas catholicae fidei (Paris, 1520). See Browe, Die Judenmission cit., 104. 69   Pugio fidei adversus Mauros et Iudaeos (Basel, 1540). See Browe, Die Judenmission cit., 103. For Galatinus’ dependence on the Pugio Fidei see the observations by Ioseph de Voisin in Ramón Martí, Raymundi Martini Ordinis Praedicatorum Pugio Fidei. 70   See Possevino, Apparatus Sacer cit., 1:569. 71   Epistula Ludovici Carreti ad Iudaeos, quae incribitur Liber visorum divinorum, qua eos ad resipiscentiam invitat, validissimisque rationibus christianam asserit Veritatem, una cum latina interpretatione (Paris, 1554), see Possevino, Apparatus Sacer cit., II:38. See further Joanna Weinberg, ‘A Sixteenth-Century Hebraic Approach to the New Testament’, in History of Scholarship: A Selection of Papers from the Seminar on the History of Scholarship Held Annually at the Warburg Institute, ed. Christopher R. Ligota and Jean-Louis Quantin (Oxford, 2006), 231-50 at 240-1. 72   Rome, 1500. See Browe, Die Judenmission cit., p. 107 and François Secret, ‘Les Dominicains et la kabbale chrétienne à la Renaissance’, in Archivum Fratrum Praedicatorum 27 (1957), 36-48 and 319-36, at 325. 73   Centum et quinquaginta Psalmi cum diligentissima etiam titulorum omnium expositione (Valencia, 1484). The author’s intention is clearly expressed in the preface: “[…] sed solum intendo ex doctrina sacrorum doctorum antiquorum secundum gratiam mihi desuper datam veritatem et thesaurum evangelicum in hoc sacro agro libri psalmorum absconsum et laten-

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tained through the Christian interpretation by the Franciscan philosopher and theologian Arcangelo da Borgonovo (d. 1569), in his Dechiaratione sopra il nome di Giesu secondo gli Ebrei cabalisti, greci, caldei, persi & latini74. Although no specific reasons are given for the composition of this second bibliography, there seems little doubt that these polemical works were meant to provide models of disputations and helpful conversionary material. An important source of information for discussions about liturgical context was the collection of excerpts from the Mahzor. The collection preserved many useful bits of information that could assist those who were not familiar with Jewish liturgy. A category in its own right are the passages from the prayer book that originally contained alleged offences against Christianity and had been expurgated by a Christian censor or omitted through Jewish self-censorship. According to the censurae of these abstracts, the compiler wanted to inform the Christian reader about the original text of these prayers. By doing so, he provided an insight in the Jewish mind and the alleged originally antichristian features of the Jewish prayer book. Since such a procedure required an intimate familiarity with Jewish liturgy, it is most likely that that the Christian Adamanzio, who was responsible for the collection, was assisted by of one of the converts who knew the liturgical text by heart75. Included in the collection are two prayers: the Birkat ha-Minim, one of the blessings in the Amida or Shemoneh Esrei, the daily prayer of the 18 [19] benedictions, and the last prayer in the daily liturgy, called Aleinu. The Birkat ha-Minim copied in the manuscript from the censored Bologna edition reads as follows: Blessed are you, o Lord, King who loves righteousness and justice. And for the informers may there be no hope and may […] perish in a moment and all your enemies be speedily cut off and […] do thou uproot and crush speedily in our days76.

tem in lucem fidelibus detegere et reserare et tandem caecicati et obstinationi modernorum Judaeorum obstare et eorum maledictis et vanis argumentis respondere et satisfacere”, xxvi. See further Bellarmine, De scriptoribus ecclesiasticis cit., 331. 74   The work was printed in Ferrara in 1557. For a discussion of the Dechiaratione, see Paolo E. Fornaciari, ‘Un testo di Qabbalah in volgare: “La Dechiaratione sopra il nome di Giesù” di Arcangelo da Borgonovo’, in Rinascimento 33 (1993), 279-301. 75   Comments such as “vana observatio, sed dimitarem” (fol. 50v) and “haec solutio licet inanis et nullius momenti sed tamen nihil falsi continet” (fol. 51), which criticize the selected passages, confirm this presumption. 76   “Benedictus tu Domine rex qui diligis iustitiam et iudicium. Et detractoribus non sit spes et omnes […] universi momento pereat et omnes hostes nostri velociter succidantur […] celeriter succidas et frangas et humilies eos celeriter in diebus nostris”, Borg. lat. 149, fol. 52r.

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The uncensored last line reads: And for the informers may there be no hope and may the wicked perish in a moment and all your enemies be speedily cut off and the evil ones swiftly do thou uproot and crush speedily in our days.

Adamanzio found it appropriate to draw attention to the expurgated passage with the censura “this is without any doubt an imprecation against the Christians”77. The censored version of the Aleinu, served the same purpose. Aware of Christian sensitivity, the Jewish publishers of the Bologna Mahzor had omitted the terms which the Church undoubtedly would consider as directed against Christians, leaving blank spaces in the prayer clearly in order to give the purchaser the opportunity to restore the original text. Realizing that changing the text through self-censorship did not mean a change of mind, Adamanzio included the prayer as follows: It is our duty to praise the Lord of all things, to ascribe greatness to the Creator from the beginning that He has not made us like the nations of the earth and has not placed us like other families of the earth among whom he has not placed our portion and our share, like the other multitudes who worship […] and pray […], but we bow our knees and worship before the King of kings78.

The uncensored last line reads: “like the other multitudes who worship vanity and pray emptiness”. In his censura, Adamanzio gives a similar reason for the inclusion of the passage in the collection: namely that the open spaces refer to the Christians79. The most salient example of the sort occurs in connection with the notorious blessing in the Morning Prayer: “Blessed be you, o Lord who did not make me a gentile”. In the Mahzor edition of 1540 the wording was changed to “Blessed be you, o Lord who made me an Israelite”80. Despite the fact that the revised text had not left any trace of correction, the passage was included in the collection with the following censura: “once it read ‘that you did not make me a gentile’, but they recently corrected it in this way”; the reader is encouraged to think about what the Jews really   “Sine dubio haec est imprecatio contra christianos”, Borg. lat. 149, 52r.   “Ad nos spectat laudare dominum universorum dare magnificentiam creatori a principio quod non fecerit nos sicut gentes terrae et non posuit nos instar familiarum regionum in quibus non posuit partem nostram et sortem nostram, sicut reliquae turbae quae adorant […] et orant […] et nos flectimus genua et adoramus coram rege regum”, Borg. lat. 149, fol. 53r. 79   Censura: “Intendunt in his locis quae reliquunt vacua christianos”, Borg. lat. 149, fol. 53r. 80   The correction was not implemented in the commentary of the Bologna edition that still reads “that he did not make me a goy”. 77 78

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pray when saying their Morning Prayers81. Even more striking in this censura is Adamanzio’s reference to Paul’s statement “In Christ there is neither male nor female”82. This must certainly be an implicit reaction to the next two blessings in the same prayer, which respectively thank God “for not having made me a slave or woman”. The Jewish prayer seems to have generated all manner of reactions, which seem to transcend the limited constraints of religious polemic. However, the word ‘goy’, here seemingly unequivocal in its meaning, was far from an undisputed expression in Jewish tradition. Insiders like the convert Marco Fabiano Fioghi were well aware of the various ways gentiles figured especially in halakhic discussions. This is eloquently exemplified in two leaves of Vat. lat. 14628. Here we hear the voice of a composer, Marco Fabiano Fioghi, who is contesting the Christian Marco Marini’s favourable assessment of a gloss of the thirteenth-century Spanish Rabbi Jonah Gerondi83. According to Fioghi the statement was blasphemous. But he did not leave the matter there. Rather, he provided his superior with an Italian translation of the Hebrew text which he also transcribed, and proposed four reasons for controverting Marini’s evaluation84. The controversial passage occurred in the commentary attributed to Jonah Gerondi on Isaac Alfasi’s Sefer ha-Halakhot. The underlying text already in the Mishnah (Berakhot 8:8) stated: “One does not respond Amen to a Samaritan unless he completes the entire blessing”. In his gloss on the text Jonah discussed the implications of this legal point, and in particular, how such a ruling pertained to a gentile (goi) who makes a blessing. He wrote that since Samaritans were now regarded as gentiles it was generally accepted that Amen is not to be said in response to the gentile’s blessing, completed or not. But Jonah then overturned this position on the grounds of his teacher’s ruling: But my teacher thought that one should respond Amen even after a gentile [...] for he intends to make the blessing in the name of God since we hear that he is making the blessing in the name of God. Even though he does not know who God is – for he thinks that the idol is the creator – nevertheless, since his intention is directed towards God, when we hear the blessing from his mouth one should respond with Amen. In these times, the Cuthean [Samaritan] is regarded as a gentile and one responds with Amen when one has heard the entire blessing from his mouth […]   “olim legebatur quod non fecisti me gentilem sed correxerunt hoc modo neoterici”, Borg. lat. 149, fol. 46v. 82   See Gal. 3:28. 83   See BUB, fol. 56r where Marini gives a brief reference to the text and gloss of Jonah Gerondi. 84   He refers to 43[a], and thus to Sefer Rav Alfas (Riva di Trento, 1558). 81

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Rabbi Jonah’s discussion reflects an inner-Jewish debate. The safeguarding of the divine name had to take precedence over attitudes towards gentiles – and these were clearly not particularly complimentary. Fioghi realized that this ‘very modern’ Jew used the word ‘gentile’ when he meant Christian. For Fioghi, the most incriminating words of the Rabbi – and these he underlines – are the reference to the gentile’s object of worship as an idol. Since gentile was a less than circuitous way of referring to the Christian, Jonah was, according to Fioghi, most certainly expressing “a blasphemy against Jesus Christ and against all Christians”.

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CHAPTER 7

A JEWISH ENCYCLOPAEDIA AND DICTIONARY FOR CHRISTIANS

In the foregoing chapters we have demonstrated the various ways that theologians used extracts from rabbinic Bible commentaries and the Mahzor together with bibliographical recommendations, mainly in Hebrew, in order to confront Jews with their misconceptions of Scripture. These extracts encompassed only a small part of the vast array of literature that Jews had created over the centuries. The participants in the project were clearly aware that innumerable topics relating to religious, social and individual Jewish life and beliefs were amassed in Jewish writings and, in particular, in what became known as ‘the sea of the Talmud’. To assist Christian surfing of the Jewish net they invented an ingenious tool, a comprehensive subject index of Jewish thought and tradition. A first attempt at such an Index is preserved in Vat. lat. 14629. The manuscript opens with an alphabetical index of blasphemies, insults, lies, obscenities and proofs of ignorance, with short summaries of inadmissible passages from the Mahzor, and from Rashi’s and Bahya’s Bible commentaries1. This compendium of Jewish errors formed the basis of what may justifiably be called a Jewish encyclopaedia for Christians, of which two manuscripts of the Fondo ebraico of the Vatican Library in Rome constitute the final version. These manuscripts, Vaticano ebraico 513 and 514, have been entirely disregarded. Intimately related with Vat. lat. 14629 and 14628, they offer us a comprehensive encyclopaedic dictionary of Jewish thought and beliefs extracted from a wide range of Hebrew sources. A third manuscript in the Fondo ebraico, Vat. ebr. 512, contains an extensive selection of passages from the Babylonian Talmud2. As will be shown here, all three manuscripts were intended to serve Christians as reference tools in preparation for their debates with Jews about their mistaken beliefs and false expectations.

  See Chapter 5, 87.   I would like to thank Dr Benjamin Richler for drawing my attention to these manuscripts. Since the two volumes of Vat. ebr. 513 and Vat. ebr. 514 constitute one work, we will refer to them as Vat. ebr. 513–514 unless we are dealing with a particular passage. 1 2

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Vat. ebr. 513-514 and Vat. lat. 14629 Vat. ebr. 513-514 share a great number of passages – often identical both in the Latin rendering of the Hebrew extracts and in the censurae – with Vat. lat. 146293. Occasionally it can even be established that the passages in Vat. ebr. 513-514 correspond to the last phase of the selection process through which the collections as preserved in Vat. lat. 14629 went4. It may therefore be concluded that the composer of Vat. ebr. 513-514 worked from these revised and approved collections. However, the material in Vat. ebr. 513-514 is not organized according to authors and their works, but is strictly alphabetical. Vat. ebr. 513 (28 cm x 21 cm), in two volumes, contains 577 leaves written on both sides, of which the first volume ends with folio 3225. The alphabetical index in volume I begins with ‘Abacuch’ and ends with ‘David’. Volume II continues with ‘Deborah’ and ends with ‘Iustificatio et condemnatio apud deum’. Vat. ebr. 514 (28 cm x 21 cm), a single volume of 483 leaves also written on both sides, is a continuation of the Index covering the rest of the alphabet from ‘Laban’ to ‘ziz’6. A comparison between the manuscripts also brings to light that numerous extracts in Vat. ebr. 513-514 differ considerably from Vat. lat. 14629 in 3   Also included here are passages from Vat. lat. 14628 when a collection is missing in Vat. lat. 14629. See e.g. Ibn Ezra on Gen. 17:2 in Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 164v and Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 330r; on Psalm 99:3 in Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 327r and Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 330r; Baal haTurim on Lev. 25:1 in Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 222v and Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 330r; on Exod. 2:16 in Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 217r and Vat. ebr. fol. 513, 498r; Rashi on Gen. 47:20 in Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 159v and Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 64r; on Josh. 2:11 in Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 183r and Vat. ebr. 514, fol. 331; on Jer. 1:4 in Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 207r and Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 55r; on Jer. 37:6 in Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 209r and Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 64r; Levi ben Gershon on Daniel 9:21 in Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 366r and Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 96r; on 3 Kings (=1 Kings) 18:42 in Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 236v and Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 505r; Kimhi on Jer. 2:6 in Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 296r and Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 55r; Kimhi’s introduction to the Book of Joshua in Vat. lat. 14629, fol.257r is almost verbally identical with the text in Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 202r, the only real difference being an addition to the censura. 4   Rashi’s comment on Psalm 78:9 is found in both Vat. lat. 14629 and Vat. ebr. 513 in identical Latin rendering. In Vat. lat. 14629 the passage was included in the collection only after discussion, added as a suppletum, see Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 255v and Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 65v. Rashi’s comment on 3 Kings (= 1 Kings) 21:15 was also appended only after discussion to the collection of excerpts in Vat. lat.14629 and, though with a different censura, it is in identical phrasing to that found in Vat. ebr. 513; see Vat. lat. 14629, fol.195v and Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 39v. The excerpt from Rashi’s explanation of Job 38:26 in Vat. lat. 14629 was on further consideration expanded. Only this later addition to the excerpt was copied by the composer of the encyclopaedia in Vat. ebr. 513. See Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 239r and Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 69v. 5   There are traces of original pagination of the various fascicles of the manuscript. See e.g vol. I, fols 1r-21v and 22r-26v. The page numbering in pencil was added after the parts were bound together. 6   Among other meanings the word ziz refers to a special name of a bird; see Genesis Rabbah 19:4.

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translation or censura, or cannot be traced back to that manuscript at all7. Whole entries are missing in the provisional Index of Vat. lat. 14629, such as the entry for ‘Esau’, a somewhat sensitive topic. Vat. ebr. 513 provides us with no less than 10 passages from Rashi’s commentary on Genesis only8. The same state of affairs applies to extracts from the Mahzor, in that Borg. lat. 149 reflects only in part the collection in Vat. ebr. 513-5149. The very partial and provisional character of the Index in Vat. lat. 14629, however, is mainly due to its use of biblical commentaries. The composers of Vat. ebr. 513-514 drew on a vast array of sources – major midrash collections like Genesis Rabbah, Tanhuma and Yalkut and other major works of Jewish tradition such as Maimonides’ Mishneh Torah. In its present form the work preserved in Vat. ebr. 513-514 has clearly not reached its final stage. Though on the whole following the same pattern as the collections in Vat. lat. 14629 and 14628 – translation into Latin with censura – some passages, like the collections in Vat. lat. 14630, are still in a mixture of Latin and Italian or completely in Italian and often without censurae10. Furthermore, the extracts are written in various hands, clearly indicating that the Index had not yet undergone a final redaction11. Selection Criteria From the extensive use of Vat. lat. 14629 it may be concluded that the compilers of Vat. ebr. 513-514 followed the same criteria when selecting passages from rabbinic literature that have been discussed earlier12. Many midrashic explanations of Scripture found their way into the Index because of their incompatibility with Christian Bible interpretation. But, in addition, Jewish tradition was subjected to a critique based on its con-

7   See, for example, the following, which are not found in Vat. lat. 14629 or Vat. lat. 14628: Rashi on Exod. 32:27 (Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 71r), Kimhi on Josh. 24:7 (Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 64v), Kimhi on Isa. 2:15 (Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 400r). For differences, see e.g. Rashi on Job 28:7 (Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 80r and Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 78v); Rashi on Job 29:18 (Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 80r and Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 79r). Under the entry Debora, Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 323r refers to Rashi’s comment on Judges 4:4 and 4:12, whereas in Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 19r one finds a reference to his comment on Judges 5:18. 8   See Vat. ebr. 513, fols 385r-393v. 9   For corresponding passages, see e.g. Borg. lat. 149, fol. 49v and Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 256v (in Mahzor 18); Borg. lat. 149, fol. 51v and Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 257r (in Mahzor 23); Borg. lat. 149, fol. 53r and Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 257r (in Mahzor 29). Since Vat. ebr. 513-514 uses the same Bologna edition of the Mahzor with page reference for each selected passage as Borg. lat. 149 it easily can be established that many passages from the Mahzor in Vat. ebr. 513-14 were not taken from this collection. 10   See e.g. Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 459r. 11   Often only the word censura is written, while the remark itself has not (yet) been filled in. 12   See Chapter 5.

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formity with Christian systematic theology. More than once the compilers of Vat. ebr. 513-514, when scrutinizing the many theological and moral excursions in aggadic midrashim, justify the inclusion of passages in the Index by referring to major theologians such as Augustine and Bonaventure. The final word in doctrinal matters was left to the Doctor Angelicus, Thomas Aquinas. At the Council of Trent, Aquinas’ Summa Theologica had become a de facto manual of Catholic doctrine, with which Jewish tradition – along with all others – had to comply. The ceremony of Havdalah (Separation) that marks the end of the Sabbath and symbolizes the separation of the holy from the profane is an example of such theological discrepancy. The spice box used in the ritual is explained in the Mahzor as a means of consoling the Jew at the departure of the Sabbath. According to the tradition, a person gains an extra special soul during the Sabbath; when it departs at the end of the Sabbath it leaves him enfeebled reliant on his ordinary soul13. The human inner self therefore needs to be comforted with the smell of spices14. With reference to the Summa Theologica the censor rejects the idea of literally possessing more than one soul15. Thomistic theology came to play when discussing rabbinic ideas of God’s justice and mercy. A rabbinic answer to the apparent incompatibility of justice and mercy is found in the parable of the king who mixes hot and cold water in order not to break the crystal glasses when pouring the water into them: The Lord God made earth and heaven. This may be compared to a king who had some empty glasses. Said the king: “If I pour hot water into them, they will burst; if cold, they will contract”. What then did the king do? He mixed hot and cold water and poured it into them, and so they remained intact. “Even so”, said the Holy One, blessed be He: “If I create the world on the basis of mercy alone, its sins will be great; on the basis of judgment alone, the world cannot exist. Hence I will create it on the basis of judgment and of mercy, and it will then be able to stand”16.

The claim that justice plays a part in God’s creation of the world is rejected with the following remark: “If they had said this about the government of men it would have been right, but it is not the case with the creation of the world, where only God’s goodness and not his justice shines”. The censura clearly reflects the position of Thomas Aquinas, who argues that the material world was created because of God’s goodness17.   See B.T., Betza 16a.   See Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 446r; cf. Borg. lat. 149, fol. 68v. 15   See Summa Theologica, Ia, Qaestio 76, Art. 3. 16   Genesis Rabbah 12:15. 17   Summa Theologica, Ia, Qaestio 65, Art. 2: “Equality of justice has its place in retribution, since equal rewards or punishments are due to equal merit or demerit. But this does 13 14

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The tradition that Adam sacrificed an ox to the Lord is based upon Rashi’s interpretation of Psalm 68(=69):31 “This will please the Lord more than an ox or a bull with horns and hoofs”. According to Rashi the ox mentioned in the Psalm is the ox that Adam offered18. The interpretation is based upon a midrash on Genesis 4:8: “Cain said to his brother Abel, ‘Let us go out to the field’. And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him”. The midrash comments as follows: “Cain had closely observed where his father slew the bullock [which he sacrificed, as it is written] ‘And it shall please the Lord better than a bullock’, and there he killed him [Abel]: by the throat and its organs”19. The compiler qualifies this interpretation as apocryphal and quotes extensively from the Summa Theologica, where Thomas discusses the question whether offering a sacrifice to God belongs to the law of nature. After having given the arguments pro and contra, Thomas concludes that, although it is nowhere said that Adam or Isaac offered a sacrifice, offering sacrifices does belong to the law of nature. Since Adam represented original sin it followed that he could not have offered a sacrifice. For totally different reasons Isaac did not offer a sacrifice; he signified Christ who himself was offered as a sacrifice20. A Jewish Dictionary A striking characteristic of Vat. ebr. 513-514 is the explicit intention of the composer to inform the reader about Jewish beliefs and customs. The conditions of the wicked and the righteous, the daily benedictions, festivals such as Hanukah and the divine name Adonai are described in great detail21. The many passages that they extracted from the medieval not apply to things as at first instituted. For just as an architect, without injustice, places stones of the same kind in different parts of a building, not on account of any antecedent difference in the stones, but with a view to securing that perfection of the entire building, which could not be obtained except by the different positions of the stones; even so, God from the beginning, to secure perfection in the universe, has set therein creatures of various and unequal natures, according to His wisdom, and without injustice, since no diversity of merit is presupposed”. 18   See Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 47r. 19   Genesis Rabbah 22:8. See also 34:9. 20   Summa Theologica, IIa IIae, Qaestio 85, Art. 1. 21   For the fate of the wicked and the righteous, see Vat. ebr. 513, fols 325r-326v: Defunctiorum conditiones in altero saeculo tam malorum quam iustorum. For the daily benedictions, see Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 186r: Benedictiones quotidianae. For a description of the festivals, see Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 324r-v: Dedicationis festum Ebraeorum. Concerning the name Adonai, see Vat. ebr. 513, fols 332r-349v (partly in Italian): De nomine Adonai. Ex libro portae lucis [Sha’arei Orah]. This very large extract has no parallel in Borg. lat. 149, where one only finds short summaries with references to folio and column of both Portae lucis and Portae iustitiae, see App. IV, 2.

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midrashic anthology Yalkut Shimoni are certainly included because “they are so suitable for understanding Jewish thought”22. The use of gematria in biblical exegesis is such a case. As recorded in Vat. lat. 14628 Jacob ben Asher discovered a biblical proof in Exodus 20:24 for the tradition of the minyan (the halakhic minimum of 10 men required for public prayers)23. The censor described this device as the composition of words and sentences by using the numerical value of the [Hebrew] letters24. In Vat. ebr. 513 the composer, not expecting the reader to know about the numerical value of the Hebrew alphabet, explained gematria with an example taken from Yalkut Shimoni: “Initially God made Abram king over 243 limbs, in the end he made him king over 248, that is to say, He added five limbs namely the two eyes, the two ears and the glans of the penis”25. The composer added the following explanation to the text: “the letter ‘He’ which is added to the name Abraham signifies five. By this they want to indicate that because the number of limbs of a human being is 248 and [the letters of] Abram add up only to 243 which would not be perfect, God therefore said: ‘walk before me and be perfect’ [Gen. 17:1], and gave him five namely [he added to his name the letter] ‘he’ that stands for the five other limbs. But I wonder why two ears, two eyes etc.”26 The passage from the Amida prayer is recorded in Vat. ebr. 513 in a similarly didactic manner. Though slightly differently phrased, the passage in its Latin rendering does not substantially diverge from the one in Borg. lat. 149. Noticeable, however, are the clarifying notes (here underlined) that are added to the text27. The passage reads as follows: In the Mahzor p. 26 a prayer is read, which they say against us three times a day: “Blessed are you, o Lord, king who loves righteousness and justice. And for the ‫( מלשינין‬that is the detractors or informers, some understand it as inquisitors) may there be no hope and may all […] (was deleted but it read minim that is converts to the Christian faith or heretics who fell off from the Jewish faith) perish in a moment and all your enemies be speedily cut off and […] do thou uproot and crush speedily in our days28.

The censura also differs in that the simple remark in Borg. lat. 149 “this is without any doubt an imprecation against the Christians” is replaced by   See Chapter 6, 143.   See Chapter 5, 112. 24   Vat. lat. 14628, fol. 229r. 25   Yalkut 22.2a in fine. From the page number it appears that the Venice edition 1566 was used. 26   Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 14r. 27   It is not clear whether the compiler of Vat. ebr. 513 wanted to improve the Latin of Borg. lat. 149, or whether he was working from a different source. 28   Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 262r, see App. VII, 1. 22 23

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the extensive note: “It is said that the Jews added this prayer and inserted it in the 18 prayers, which they recite daily in order to extinguish the sect of the Christians, which they saw growing. Certainly minim does not sound different from apostates and those who reject Judaism”29. Sometimes the underlying Christological meaning of the Old Testament appears to be the reason for the inclusion of a particular reading. An example is Gen. 22:3, “He clave the wood for the burnt offering”, in the dictionary. The tradition found in Yalkut Shimoni is summarized as follows: “The Jews say that there were only two pieces of wood. Hence it says in this place: because of the two pieces, which our father Abraham clave, Abraham merited that the Red Sea was divided into two parts before his sons”30. The censura discloses the reason for the passage’s inclusion in the dictionary: “it is to be checked more carefully whence this tradition among the Jews – that Abraham took only two pieces of wood for the burnt offering of his son – originated, which, if it is correct and trustworthy, supports very well the mystery of the cross”31. Encyclopaedic arrangements Another distinctive characteristic of Vat. ebr. 513-514 is the way it gives cross references connecting names and traditions under specific entries. A few examples may suffice to illustrate the precision with which the handbook was composed. In Vat. lat. 14629 we find five passages concerning king Hezekiah of Judah: two from Rashi’s commentary on 4 Kings, two from his commentary on Isaiah and one passage from Kimhi’s commentary on Isaiah32. These comments, with exactly the same Latin rendering, are found in Vat. ebr. 513; but, as is to be expected in an encyclopaedia, they are brought together under one subject heading ‘Ezechias Rex Judah’33. One text under this entry – Rashi’s explanation of 4 Kings 20:14 – deserves further attention, in that it sheds even more light on the encyclopaedic structure of Vat. ebr. 513-514. The biblical text reads as follows: “Then Isaiah the prophet came to king Hezekiah, and said to him, ‘What did these men say? And whence did they come to you?’ And Hezekiah said, ‘They have come from a far country, from Babylon’”. In his com29   Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 262r, see App VII, 1. For the Latin rendering in Borg. lat.149, fol. 52r see Chapter 6, 146 n. 76. 30   Yalkut Shimoni, remez 98. 31   Yalkut 28, 2a initio, Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 20v. In the Hebrew ‘wood’ is in the plural, from which it is deduced that he cut up two logs. The tradition is also found in Genesis Rabbah 55:8. See App. VII, 2. 32   Rashi on 4 Kings (= 2 Kings) 20:1 and 20:12-14 in Vat. lat. 14629, 194v, on Isa. 38:9 and 38:16 in Vat. lat. 14629, 203v and Kimhi on Isa. 28:16 in Vat. lat. 14629, 276r. 33   Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 396r-v.

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ment, Rashi points at the similarity between Cain, Balaam and Hezekiah, in that all three gave the wrong answer when addressed by God. Cain was asked “Where is Abel” and he said, “I do not know. Am I my brother’s keeper?” (Gen. 4:9). He should have answered, “King of the World, is not all that is hidden exposed to you?” And God came to Balaam and said, “Who are these men with you?” And Balaam said to God, “Balak the son of Zippor, king of Moab, has sent to me, saying, […]”. (Num. 22:10). But he should have answered, like Ezekiel when God asked him, “Son of man, can these bones live?”, “O Lord God, you know” (Ezek. 37:3). When Isaiah the prophet came to King Hezekiah, and said to him, “What did these men say? And whence did they come to you?”, Hezekiah said, “They have come from a far country, from Babylon” (4 Kings [2 Kings] 20:14). However, he should have said, “You are God’s prophet and you are asking me?” Rashi’s comment, as one piece included in Vat. lat. 14629, was broken up by the composer of Vat. ebr. 513. The exemplary compiler, transferred the story about Cain to the entry ‘Cain’ with a cross reference to its new location under ‘Ezechias Rex Judah’34. The use of the cross-reference as a means of expanding the reader’s familiarity with a particular subject is a common feature in Vat. ebr. 513514. Thus under the heading ‘angelus mortis’ (the angel of death) we find Rashi’s comments on Jer. 21:4, Hab. 3:5 and Prov. 13:23 followed by three cross-references35. First the compiler recommends the user to look at the entry ‘Daemon et Satan’, where he will find much information about the angel of death. He then refers to the entry ‘Israel’, where the story is told that when Moses was in heaven in order to receive the Torah various angels disclosed their secrets to him, and that the angel of death had conveyed to him the revelation that pestilence can be controlled by incense36. Finally he mentions the entry ‘de utilitate legis’ (usefulness of the Law), where it is stated that the angel of death is not able to kill one who is reciting the Torah37. All the particular features of Vat. ebr. 513-514 – extensive excerpts from a wide range of Jewish writings meant to provide information about Jewish beliefs and practice, carefully arranged under specific headings and combined with cross references – make these two manuscripts, unlike the preliminary phase of the Index preserved in Vat. lat. 14629, a unique encyclopaedic reference for Christians38.   “De Cain lege suo loco”.   Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 105r. 36   See B.T. Shabbat 89a. 37   See Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 105. Another example is the heading ‘Seraphim’, where the various traditions about Seraphim are recorded (Rashi, Tanchuma, Ibn Ezra and Kimhi) with further reference to the heading ‘angeli’. See Vat. ebr. 514, fol. 398r. 38   A good example of the difference between the Index in Vat. lat. 14629 and Vat. ebr. 513-514 is the heading ‘[H]abacuch’. In Vat. ebr. 513-514 Rashi’s comments on Hab. 2:1, Hab. 34 35

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Provenance of Vat. ebr. 513–514 and Vat. ebr. 512. Despite their intimate relationship with Vat. lat. 14629, the stamp Bibl. S. Pudentianae on Vat. ebr. 513-514 would seem to indicate that these manuscripts had at one time belonged to the library of the Roman church, Santa Pudenziana39. Given its interior decorations, the church, which was run by the Cistercians, could well have been a location in its own right for missionary activity among the Jews of Rome40. The mosaic in the apse of the church shows us two female figures, one behind the apostle Peter, the other behind the apostle Paul, both holding a laurel wreath. These two figures behind St Paul and St Peter may well represent the Ecclesia ex gentibus and the Ecclesia ex circumcisione as is the case with the slightly later mosaic in the church, Santa Sabina41. It is more than likely that the fourth-century mosaic of S. Pudenziana provided an appropriate mise-enscène for missionary activity. The church of S. Pudenziana was not, however, the first home of Vat. ebr. 513-514. The original provenance of the manuscripts was indeed the Casa dei Neofiti; only at a later stage were they transferred to the church of S. Pudenziana. The person responsible for the move was the author of the Bibliotheca magna rabbinica, Giulio Bartolocci, a Cistercian who was appointed professor for Hebrew and Rabbinics at the Casa dei Neofiti and Hebrew scriptor at the Vatican Library in 1651. For his monumental bibliography of Hebrew literature, Bartolocci had examined the holdings of several libraries, including the Casa dei Neofiti. There he discovered the set of excerpts from Ibn Ezra’s commentary on the Pentateuch and, copying the exact heading as found in Vat. lat. 14628, he included it in his magnum opus42. After his death, Bartolocci’s personal library was bequeathed to the church of S. Pudenziana43. The Cistercian connection may be one reason for the bequest, but a more personal motive for leaving his 3:1, Isa. 21:6 and Isa. 45:9 are quoted almost verbatim from the Vat. lat. 14629 collection, see Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 1. In the index of Vat. lat. 14629. however, only Hab. 2:1 is quoted; Hab. 3:1 is summarized and the two Isaiah texts are only referred to, see Vat. lat. 14629, fol. 20v. 39   See Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 577v and Vat. ebr. 514, fol. 482v. 40   In 1587, in the Bull Superna dispositione, Pope Sixtus V entrusted the church to the Congregation of St Bernard of the Order of the Cistercians, see Archivio di Stato di Roma, Pergamene 18, cassetta/cartella 35/5. 41   See Marie-Louise Therel¸ Les symbols de l’‘Ecclesia’ dans la creation iconographique de l’art Chrétien du IIIe au VI e siècle (Rome, 1973), 106-8. 42   “Censuras super commentarios Rabii Aben Ezra in Pentateuchum collegit Didacus Lopez anno Domini 1578 et habentur manuscripti in Collegio Neophytorum Urbis”. See Chapter 2, n. 88 and App. I, 2. 43   An inventory of 1662 of the deceased rector of the College, in which mention is made of 26 nice quarto books on various subjects, with no further detail, seems to illustrate the possible loss of library books. See Le Déaut, ‘Jalons pour une histoire’ cit., 524.

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books to S. Pudenziana was his cordial relationship with the abbot of the monastery, the Jewish convert Joannes Baptista Borgia, one of his former students at the Collegio dei Neofiti. In a long list of Christian Hebraists, Bartolocci refers to Borgia as a proficient Hebraist who preached to the Jews44. It is not unlikely that Vat. ebr. 513-514 had ended up in Bartolocci’s private library and thus became part of his bequest. This assumption finds confirmation in a third, closely related manuscript, Vat. ebr. 51245. Also bearing the stamp Bibl. S. Pudentianae, Vat. ebr. 512 was used extensively by Bartolocci when compiling his Bibliotheca magna rabbinica46. In it he included a great number of passages from the Babylonian Talmud, which were partly copied from Vat. ebr. 512. Though technically belonging to the Neofiti, these manuscripts became de facto part of Bartolocci’s working library; the transfer to S. Pudenziana of the manuscripts may have been caused by an oversight due to the apparently unsystematic way the various collections were kept in the library, which actually provided the church and its abbot with useful resources for conversionary sermons. Vat. ebr. 512: a Dictionary of the Babylonian Talmud When discussing the criteria Jewish exegesis had to meet in order to enjoy the blessing of the Church, we noticed the rejection of the Talmud as a hermeneutical key for biblical interpretation47. Quotations from or even allusions to the Talmud were sufficient reasons for texts being included in the collections of Vat. lat. 14629 and the final versions in Vat. lat. 1462848. While drawing on a rich spectrum of Jewish resources, the composers of Vat. ebr. 513-514 sporadically touched upon this most authoritative storehouse of Jewish tradition. Only occasionally, and far from systematically, we find in Vat. ebr. 513-514 short extracts from the Talmud. At first sight one is inclined to ascribe both the rejection of the Talmud as a hermeneutical key for biblical interpretation and the absence of the Talmud from a Jewish encyclopaedia to decades of censorial suppression of this pièce de resistance of Judaism. But such suppositions are completely negated by Vat. ebr. 512 (28 cm x 21 cm), with its 401 leaves written on both sides. It contains extensive collections of passages from all the tractates of the Babylonian Talmud in Latin translation. The extracts are accompanied by 44   See Bartolocci, Bibliotheca magna rabbinica cit., 3:754. For biographical notes on Borgia see Carolus Morotius, Cistercii Reflorescentis seu Cong. Cistercio-Monasticarum B. Mariae Fuliensis in Gallia et Reformatorum S. Bernardi in Italia chronologica Historia etc. (Turin, 1690), 131-2. 45   See Richler, ed., Hebrew Manuscripts in the Vatican Library cit., 438. 46   For the stamp Bibli. S. Pudentianae de Urbe, see Vat. ebr. 512, fol. 1r. 47   See Chapter 5, 101. 48   See Chapter 5, 96-101.

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passages from Maimonides’ commentary on the Mishnah, Rashi’s commentary on the Talmud, Asher ben Jehiel’s Piske Halakhot (abstracts from Talmudic legal portions) and comments from the Tosafists (German and French glossators on the Talmud). The manuscript begins with a list of all the Talmud tractates followed by an alphabetical subject index in which each entry refers to all relevant extracts from the various tractates. Such an arrangement was unmistakably meant to help the Christian user to find his way in ‘the sea of the Talmud’49. The last part of the manuscript consists of additions to and clarifications of the collected passages50. The selection and translation of passages were probably started in April 1580 – the first date given is 13 May 1580, when tractate Hagigah was finished51. The manuscript was completed on 25 July of the same year52. Two different hands can clearly be distinguished, which seem to indicate that the text had not gone through a final redaction53. The unrestricted access to the Talmud created by the composers of this Talmudic encyclopaedia runs counter to the oppressive policy initiated by the burning of the Talmud in 1553 and its subsequent place on the Index of forbidden books. Like the other manuscripts discussed in this study, the extracts from the Talmud, accompanied by critical and dismissive notes, served an encounter in which informed Christians made every effort to convince the Jews of their mistaken beliefs. The transfer to S. Pudenziana did not change the purpose for which Vat. ebr. 512 had been composed, but an address to the Christian user inserted at the beginning of the manuscript discloses a change in tone vis-à-vis the Jews. In it the reader is beseeched “to reject all the impertinent and satanic assertions of the Jews annotated in this volume, since they are like any other Hebrew book full of blasphemies, incantations, soothsaying, superstition, sensual filth and other abominable sayings, with which this nation rages against the truth. He should only make use of these annotations in order to confront the Jews with the disarray of their doctrine and to make them return from their evil life”54. On the last page of the manuscript the reader is given an antidote to ‘this book’ and encouraged to heed a verse from the Apocalypse of St John: “the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burns with fire and brimstone: which is the second death” (Rev. 21:8). 49   Between the index (fols 2r-66v) and the beginning of the Talmud extracts, on fol. 75r, there are a few pages with extracts from Berakhot perek Haroeh (69r-70r) (71-74r are empty), and on 74v a few notes from Petrus Galatinus, Opus de arcanis catholicae veritatis (Basel, 1561). 50   Fols 391v-401v. We follow the later inserted pagination in pencil. 51   Vat. ebr. 512, fol. 205r. 52   “Finis totius Thalmud die 25 Julii hora 14 Romae 1580”, Vat. ebr. 512, fol. 391r. 53   See e.g. a different hand on fols 233r-234v, where the text is partly in Italian. 54   Signed by a certain Joannes Richeus, Vat. ebr. fol. 512, 1v.

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Vat. ebr. 512 and the Basel Talmud The act of compiling passages from the entire Babylonian Talmud accompanied by often elaborate censurae on the matters under discussion contrasts sharply with the censored Talmud edition printed by Ambrosius Froben in Basel between1578 and 1580. Unlike the Basel Talmud edition, from which alleged offensive vocabulary was systematically taken out, the composer of Vat. ebr. 512 clearly wished to inform the reader about the ‘nefarious’ contents of the Talmud55. The passage about the wicked (Roman) government in tractate Sanhedrin can be used to illustrate this phenomenon: “Once the wicked government decreed a persecution over Israel that whoever performed an ordination (semicha) should be put to death”56. In the censored Basel edition, predictable corrections have been made: the government is not called ‘wicked’, and ‘persecution’ has been changed into ‘decree’, thus producing the unobjectionable introduction: “once the government decreed a decree over Israel etc.” Had Vat. ebr. 512 been designed as an Index expurgatorius, it would have sufficed to list the words ‘wicked’ and ‘persecution’. But it is not the offensive vocabulary that drew the attention of the composer. With the introduction, “It happened that the wicked government decreed a persecution over Israel”, the whole story about what happened to R. Judah ben Baba is told without alteration. When he ordained five elders against the orders of the Roman rulers, “he was killed with 300 iron spear-heads that were driven into his body, making it like a sieve”. The Talmud story is then followed by a note explaining the inclusion of the passage in the collection: “Note that semicha (ordination) requires one to be worthy and authorized to pass judgment and [capable of dealing with] many other things. This semicha, he says, is only valid in the land of Israel and this is the subject of the discussion”57. The statement about rabbinic ordination that can only be conferred in the land of Israel is actually made by Rabbi Jehoshua ben Levi further on in the text. The compiler wanted to convey this notion to the reader, thus questioning the legitimacy of rabbinic authority in the diaspora of his days. With a few minor omissions, the story as recorded in Vat. ebr. 512 is included virtually verbatim in Bartolocci’s Bibliotheca magna rabbinica58. The difference between suppression and informative critique is particularly conspicuous in the treatment of the tractate on idolatry, Avodah

  On the censored Basel edition, see Joseph Prijs, Die Basler hebräischen Drücke (14921866) (Olten, 1964), 175-91. 56   B.T. Sanhedrin 14a. 57   Vat. ebr. 512, fol. 355r. 58   See Bartolocci, Bibliotheca magna rabbinica cit., 3:276-7. The explanatory note in Vat. ebr. 512 is taken up by Bartolocci, Bibliotheca magna rabbinica cit., 3:570. 55

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zarah. In the Basel edition, it was left out in its entirety because of the alleged identification of Christians with idolaters. Vat. ebr. 512, however, contains a large collection of extracts, which seems to indicate that the compiler had no intention of shying away from this confrontational issue. On the contrary, as with the accompanying comments to the Amida in Vat. ebr. 513 he wanted to inform the non-Jew about the Jewish attitude towards gentiles – that is, Christians. Thus in Avoda zarah 26a it says that an Israelite woman is forbidden to act as midwife to gentiles, because she would deliver a child to idolatry, or to use a gentile midwife, because gentiles are suspected of committing murder. For the same reasons the prohibition applies to giving suck to a baby. The following pages in the Talmud deal with regulations related to idolaters and shepherds: “they need not be brought up [from a pit], though they must not be cast in; informers and apostates may be cast in and need not be brought up”. All these regulations are faithfully translated into Latin and included in Vat. ebr. 51259. The question about the definition of a min (heretic) or apostate is most remarkably left out in the extract. Since a conventional Christian tradition interpreted all references to minim in Jewish texts as a disparaging term for Christians, the composer apparently considered a discussion about their identification irrelevant. Having disregarded the passage, the translator continues with the question of whether a gentile is allowed to circumcise a Jew. The dilemma as to whether one should prefer a Samaritan or an idolater to circumcise the Jewish baby when no Jew is available again is omitted, thus focusing entirely on the gentiles. In this way the text is transformed into a straightforward polemic against Christians. Other Talmudic passages served polemical purposes. Thus, for example Gen. 49:10, “The sceptre shall not depart from Judah”, a prophecy made void by Talmudic historical interpretation60. Bartolocci included the passage in virtually identical phrasing in his Bibliotheca magna rabbinica61. Confrontation between Jews and Christians is also implied in the question raised in tractate Shabbat 11a, as to whom an Israelite would prefer to serve. Vat ebr. 512 renders the text as follows: “Rava said [that] Rav said: ‘[Let one be] under an Ishmaelite and not under a gentile. Rabbi Salomon explains: [prefer] to serve Ishmael more than the gentiles of the Idumaeans, since the Idumaeans are the most wicked and the worst”. The compiler comments as follows: “Among the Jews there is a common opinion that Christians are far worse than the Turks”62. With the addition of two   Vat. ebr. 512, fol. 387v.   See B. T. Sanhedrin 5a in Vat. ebr. 512, fol. 355r. 61   See Bartolocci, Bibliotheca magna rabbinica cit., 3:568. 62   “Pro Ismael et non pro gentili. Et exponit R. Salomon: pro Ismaele, ad serviendum et non pro gentilibus edumeorum, quia Idumei sunt pessimi et deterrimi. Censura: Apud 59 60

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explanatory notes, Bartolocci copies the compilers’ comment verbatim: “Among the Jews there is a common opinion that Christians, whom they randomly call gentiles and Idumeans, are far worse than the Turks, who are designated Ishmaelites”63. Understanding the Talmud As a Talmudic encyclopaedia, Vat. ebr. 512 introduced the Christian reader to Talmudic thinking and tradition. Aware of the often intricate and succinct way this tradition was conveyed, the composer did his utmost to provide comprehensible translations. The passage taken from the very beginning of the first tractate of the Talmud Berakhot, about reciting the Shema, provides us with an eloquent illustration of the informative and interpretative function of the manuscript and the use Bartolocci made of this anthology of the Talmud. The Mishnah reads as follows: “From what time may one recite the Shema in the evening? From the time that the priests enter [the temple] in order to eat their terumah (the heave offering) until the end of the first watch”. The compiler is apparently not interested in the actual instructions concerning the time the Shema should be recited, and he starts his extract with the Talmudic comment on the last part of the Mishnah, which reports Rabbi Eliezer’s claim that both on earth and in heaven the night is divided into three watches. For the uninformed reader, the rather faithful translation into Latin is larded with explanatory notes (underlined in the translation). [He holds that the night has three watches] therefore it is evident to us that there are vigils or watches (which is called in Hebrew masmeroth) in heaven as well as on earth. For the saying of Rabbi Eliezer is reported: “The night has three watches, and at each watch God sits and roars like a lion. For it is written: ‘The Lord does roar from on high, and raise his voice from his holy habitation; roaring He does roar because of his fold’ [Jer. 25:30]. And the sign of the thing is: in the first watch, the ass brays more; in the second, the dogs bark; in the third the child sucks from the breast of his mother and the woman chats with or cuddles her husband”. What does R. Eliezer understand by the word watch? What follows are scrupulous Talmudic arguments that are of no use whatsoever and therefore omitted64. Rabbi Isaac ben Samuel says in the name of Rav:

Iudaeos communis sententia omnium est, Christianos esse longe deteriores Turcis”, Vat. ebr. 512, 107v. 63   “Apud Iudaeos communis sententia omnium est, Christianos [quos Gentiles et Idumaeos passim vocant] esse longe deteriores Turcis”, Bartolocci, Bibliotheca magna rabbinica cit., 3:376. Other examples of Bartolocci’s use of Vat. ebr. 512 are “God putting on tefillin” (Berakhot 6a): Vat. ebr. 512, fol. 78v. and Bibliotheca magna rabbinica cit., 1:564-5; “God praying as the rabbis do” (Berakhot 7a): Vat. ebr. 512, fol. 79v and Bibliotheca magna rabbinica cit., 1:574-6. 64   It is here that the text is interrupted. Like in the passage on the minim the translator

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“The night has three watches, and at each watch the Holy One, blessed be He, sits and roars like a lion and says: Woe to me for I have destroyed my house and burnt my temple and exiled my children among the nations of the world”. One reads that Rabbi Jose said: “I was once travelling on the road, and I entered into one of the ruins of the city of Jerusalem in order to pray. Elijah came (may the outcome be lucky and propitious) and waited for me at the door and awaited until I finished my prayer. After I finished my prayer he said to me: peace be with you, rabbi. I said to him: peace be also with you, rabbi and master. He said to me, my son, why did you go into these ruins? I said to him: to pray. He said to me: it was also allowed to pray on the road. I said: I feared lest travellers would interrupt me. In that hour I learned three things from him. Firstly, one must not go into ruins or desolate places. Secondly, that it is allowed to pray on the road and on a journey. Thirdly, that who prays on a journey has to use a very short prayer. He further said to me: My son, what sound did you hear in this ruin? I replied: I heard the daughter of a voice or an echo, cooing like a dove, and saying: Woe to me for I have destroyed my house and burnt my temple and exiled my children among the nations of the world65. And he said to me: By your life and by your head! Not in this moment alone does it exclaim thus. And more than that, whenever the Israelites go into the synagogues and schoolhouses and respond ‘May his great name be blessed’ the Holy One, blessed be He, shakes his head and says: Happy is the king who is thus praised in this house. Woe to the father, who had to banish his children, and woe to the children who had to be banished from the table of their father”66.

The index at the beginning of Vat. ebr. 512 refers to this passage of the Babylonian Talmud, under the lemma ‘Deus’, by quoting two phrases. The first is taken from Rabbi Isaac ben Samuel’s saying: “During three watches God groans and roars like a lion and says: Woe to me for I have destroyed my house”. It is in a similar vein that the words from the prophet Elijah are quoted: “He daily groans like a dove and says: Woe to me for I also have burnt my temple and lead my children into captivity”67. The two quotations undoubtedly form the core of the compiler’s critique. But skips some halakhic arguments. A similar lack of interest in purely internal halakhic matters is evident in the way a final decision was made about fixing the Sabbath day in uncertain circumstances. An extract was made from tractate Shabbat 69b: “R. Huna said: ‘If one is travelling on a road or in the wilderness and does not know when it is Sabbath, he must count six days and observe one’. Hiyya b. Rav said: ‘He must observe one and count six’. Wherein do they differ? One Master holds that it is as the world’s creation; the other Master holds that it is like the case of Adam”. The inclusion of this passage in the collection is rejected with the following remark: “This passage does not contain any of the errors which we are looking for”, Vat. ebr. 512, 115r. 65   ‘Filia vocis’ is the literal Latin translation of the Hebrew bat kol meaning an oracular voice. 66   Berakhot 3a, Vat. ebr. 512, fol. 75r. 67   “Deus per ternas noctis excubias gemit et rugit ut leo, dicitque Veh mihi quia destruxi domum meam char. 1. Item quotidie gemit ut columba dicens veh mihi quia etiam incendi templum et adegi in captivitatem filios meos, ibidem’, Vat. ebr. 512, fol. 11r.

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it should be noticed that the whole passage is translated in such a way that optimal understanding of the Talmudic text and the Hebrew is guaranteed. Thus when translating that at the third watch “the woman chats with her husband” the translator renders the Hebrew ‫(מספרת‬mesaperet) with two Latin verbs “(mulieris) blandientis seu colloquentis” “the woman chats with or cuddles her husband”. These comments are intended to proffer information: the ‘watches’ are called mishmaroth in Hebrew, and filia vocis, the Latin translation of bat kol, is an echo and Elijah’s appearance constitutes a happy and fortunate event (felix et faustum). In other words, with the exception of the legal (halakhic) section the extracts inform and advise about potentially heretical texts. In other words, the description of the destruction of the temple and the exile of the Jews as a source of regret or grief on the part of God are to be read in context, an objective which is virtually the opposite of censorship. In the third volume of his Bibliotheca magna rabbinica Bartolocci gives a short summary of the passage, and refers to the first volume for the full text under discussion68. That he copied the passage from Vat. ebr. 512 becomes abundantly clear when comparing the two extracts in the Latin translation69. Partly due to the use of the Zohar as an additional source and to minor corrections of the Latin in comparison with the Hebrew that accompanies his Latin rendering, Bartolocci’s translation of the passage in Berakhot differs occasionally from the text in Vat. ebr. 512. But the similarity between the two translations provides irrefutable evidence that Vat. ebr. 512 was on Bartolocci’s desk when preparing his Bibliotheca magna rabbinica. This claim finds further confirmation in other texts such as the discussion in tractate Pesahim of the puzzling statement in Zechariah 14:9, “And the Lord will become king over all the earth; on that day the Lord will be one and his name one”. Rabbi Aha ben Hanina attributes to God more than one name in this world, in that He is good and does good while at the same time being the judge over evil. But, in the world to come, his name will be one, in that He is only good and does nothing but good. Rabbi Nahman ben Isaac said: Not like this world is the future world. In this world his name is written with yod he and read as alef daleth; but in the future world it shall be one: it shall be written with yod he and read as yod he70.

  Bartolocci, Bibliotheca magna rabbinica cit., 3:360-61 and 1:553-6.   See App. VII, 3. 70   With yod he is meant YHWH, the letters of the Tetragrammaton. Alef daleth stands for Adonai, the name substituting the Tetragrammaton, which was considered too holy for utterance. 68 69

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Bartolocci does not render the passage as extensively as does the compiler of Vat. ebr. 512, but both focus on the enigmatic way the names of God are discussed at the end of the passage: “The Holy One, blessed be He, said: Not as I am written am I read. I am written with a yod he, while I am read as alef daleth”71. In his comment, the compiler of Vat. ebr. 512 explains the meaning of the phrase to the uninformed Christian reader, turning it into a possible proof text of the fulfilment in Christ of the Old Testament, in that “the Christians, who received the Messiah, have to pronounce the name Tetragrammaton with its letters, namely Iehova and not as Adonai like in past times, that is in the Old Testament”72. In his Bibliotheca magna rabbinica, Bartolocci copies the comment verbatim, as found in Vat. ebr. 51273. What we encounter here is not the conventional story about the fate of the Talmud in the sixteenth century, in which copies were either burnt or put on an Index. In a unique conversion strategy devised by Gregory XIII, Christians were given selected access to the Talmud in order to equip them in their discussions with the Jews. Or as the custodian of Vat. ebr. 512, put it, when it was deposited at the church of Santa Pudenziana: “[The user of this manuscript] should only make use of these annotations in order to confront the Jews with the disarray of their doctrine and to make them return from their evil life”74.

  Pesahim 50a “Et erit Dominus in regem super omnem terram […] Dixit Deus sanctus benedictus: non sicut ego scribor, sic legor. Scribor per Iod, He et legor per Aleph, Daleth”, Vat. ebr. 512, fol. 132r. 72   “Hinc constat etiam sensus sententiarum Ebraeorum Christianos, qui receperunt Messiam pronunciare debere nomen Tetragrammaton per suas literas scil. Iehova, et non per Adonai, ut in saeculo praeterito, id est Veteri Testamento”. 73   “Ex hoc loco Talmudis inferunt nonnulli: Christianos, qui receperunt Messiam pronunciare debere nomen Tetragrammaton per suas literas scil. yod he waw Iehova, et non per Adonai, ut in saeculo praeterito, id est Veteri Testamento”, Bartolocci, Bibliotheca magna rabbinica cit., 3: 404. 74   Vat. ebr. 512, fol. 1v. 71

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CONCLUSION

The relationship of the Church with Jews and their books has been as chequered as Joseph’s coat of many colours. Under pontifical rule Jews enjoyed protection set out in papal bulls such as Sicut Judaeis (around 1120), were confined to ghettos as ordered in the bull Cum nimis absurdum (1555) or expelled from the Papal States (1569). Their books were scrutinized and checked for offenses against Christians in polemical disputations such as those in Paris (1240), Barcelona (1263) and Tortosa (1413), and in the sixteenth century printed by Christians such as Daniel Bomberg for both Jewish and Christian clientele. The Babylonian Talmud, the foundation document of rabbinic Judaism, was printed by Bomberg with the blessing of Pope Leo X (1520), but condemned and burnt by order of the Head of the Roman Inquisition, the future Pope Paul IV (1553) or subjected to censorship by his successor Julius III in his bull Cum sicut nuper (1554). Within these ever changing and volatile circumstances faced by Jews over the centuries, the pontificate of Gregory XIII stands out as a unique phase in the relationship between Church and Synagogue. Unlike his predecessors Paul IV and Pius V, Gregory adopted an intense conversion policy. And the need to break down the barriers to conversion led him to strive to impress upon the Jews a positive image of the Church. To this end certain concessions were granted that made life in the ghetto less unbearable. The pope’s conversion policy was given concrete shape in the weekly sermons, which a representative number of the Roman Jewish community was forced to attend. The eyewitness accounts of these weekly sermons provided us with descriptions (rather too benign ones) of these events. Gregory Martin even provided a short summary of the content of these sermons. More information is preserved in MS Neofiti 35 of the Vatican library, which preserves autograph sermons that the convert Andrea de Monte delivered on various occasions to his former coreligionists1. In addition to de Monte our eyewitnesses also referred to several renowned Christian orators who took part in this undertaking. To perform their task, these Christian preachers needed to attain a certain degree of familiarity with Jewish interpretation of Scripture. As to the audience, Gregory Martin explicitly mentioned the catechumens and neophytes ‘so clearly distinguishable in the audience by their white and black liveries’. For these converts the sermons delivered by their Maestro di Casa, Andrea de

1

  See Chapter 1.

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Conclusion

Monte, were certainly more than the spectacle that attracted Christians of the likes of Montaigne and Gregory Martin2. Listening to the sermons would have helped them prepare for their future career as missionaries. Unlike the Christian preachers, they probably needed little training in the Jewish side of the argument, but they certainly required guidance in Christian assessment of Jewish exegesis. This study argues that a monumental investigation of both Jewish and Christian interpretation of Scripture is preserved in four manuscripts of the Vatican library: Vat. lat. 14630, Vat. lat. 14629, Vat. lat. 14628 and Borg. lat. 149. They reflect the immense labour-intensive efforts of a team of scholars whose expertise in either Jewish or Christian exegesis was meant to exemplify everything that a preacher might need in order to enable Jews to accept the ‘correct’ meaning of Scripture3. Though at first sight similar to other confrontational undertakings such as the medieval disputations, the aim and purposes of these manuals were of a rather different nature. As stipulated by Pope Gregory XIII in his bull Sancta Mater Ecclesia (1584), the preachers were “to act prudently, using true arguments derived from the Holy Scripture, and, without any defamation or anger, try to open to them the light of the truth with great love and modesty”4. Without evading the conventional derogatory adjectives such as ridiculous, false, fictitious and absurd, when commenting upon rabbinic explanations of Scripture, the participants in the project that was carried out between 1578 and 1583 adopted a surprisingly conciliatory tone5. It was apparently not on his own initiative that the Pope ordered that all preaching to the Jews should be carried out in a prudent manner. Rather, the bull Sancta Mater Ecclesia expressed the papal blessing of a policy that had already been put in place under the supervision of Cardinal Santoro, namely, the compilation and collection of dubious passages in Jewish commentaries and liturgy. In an unprecedentedly complex procedure, the works of all major Jewish commentators were perused, and passages were selected by applying a fixed set of hermeneutical devices of an unmistakable Catholic signature6. A major concern on the part of those who revised the collected passages (Robert Bellarmine, the Master of the Sacred Palace and Cardinal

  Martin, Roma sancta cit., 70.   Composing preachers’ handbooks and the scholarly apparatus that accompanied sermon collections was a widespread practice in sixteenth-century ecclesiastical circles. See Michelson, Pulpit and the Press cit., 151 and 157-8. 4   Bullarum cit., 8:487-8. 5   On the disputation at Paris, see Rosenthal, ‘The Talmud on Trial’. For the disputations in general, see Maccoby, ed., Judaism on Trial. 6   See Chapter 5. 2 3

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Santoro) was to avoid the inclusion of extracts which contained Jewish interpretations of Scripture that were actually parallel to Christian readings of the same text. It is this concern that underlies the many internal discussions between composers and revisers. On various occasions a Jewish interpretation of a particular a biblical verse that accorded with the view of one or more, but not all, Christian exegetes was formally approved. The compilers’ thorough investigation of Jewish biblical commentaries exposed the high degree of agreement between Jewish and Christian exegesis. This common ground could be exploited when attempting to convert the Jews, but equally it indicated that Jewish commentaries were not alien territory for Christians, but rather a genuine and often helpful resource for their interpretation of Scripture. This shared Bible could never have been achieved through straightforward censorship. The final version of the four manuscripts – Vat. lat. 14628 – constitutes a manual radically different from what Francisco Torres had in mind when he made his crusade against rabbinic biblical commentaries. Already in 1555 he had suggested that Inquisitors should feel morally obliged to arrange for such sermons to take place in the synagogue. “Either”, he wrote to the Roman Inquisitors, “you expel them from our cities or you force them to hear about Jesus from the Law and the prophets and to be instructed not by a rabbi, but by a learned Christian in all the synagogues”. Torres had no intention of giving any credit to Jewish biblical exegesis7. The exegetical confrontation between Christians and Jews as a central point in the conversionary tactics of the Church was not an isolated action reserved to theologians, but was embedded in a more general programme of informing Christians about Jewish tradition. The perusal of the whole gamut of aggadic – that is theological or more precisely non-legal – literature resulted in a remarkable alphabetical reference work on Jewish tradition in Latin, held in the Vatican library as Vat lat. 513 (I-II) and Vat. lat. 514. These texts illustrate the wide-ranging and meticulously composed format of conversion policy under Gregory XIII. The pinnacle of this unique initiative is the 401-page anthology from the Babylonian Talmud in Latin, complete with an alphabetical subject index – a reinstated Talmud, a virtual Jewish-Christian canon.

7   Francisco Torres, De sola lectione legis et prophetarum Iudaeis cum Mosaico ritu et cultu permittenda: et de Iesu in synagogis eorum ex lege, ac prophetis ostendendo et annunciando (Rome, 1555), 159-60.

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APPENDIX I1 Vat. lat. 14628





1. Censurae in commentaria R[abbi] Salomonis Jarchii2 Hebraei in Exodum: 4 Collection Revision Exodus 4v-12v.1r-2v Leviticus3 30r-32v / 14r-v.23r Lev.-Deut.4 Numeri 15r-21v / 23r-26r 36r-v.43r-v Deuteronomium 33r-35v.38r-40v / 26r-29v.49r Josue 51r-54v Judicum 55r-56v Judicum-4 Regum5 1 Regum 57r-61r / 71r-74r 263r-v 2 Regum 61v-64r / 74r-75r 3 Regum 64v-67v / 75r-v.184r-185r 4 Regum 67v-70v / 185r-187r Job 76r-81r 132r Canticum 82r-85v Ruth 86r Esther 87r Threni 90r-91r Ecclesiastes 92r-93v Proverbia 94r-96v Isaias 110r-v.98r-109r 345r-v/111r-v6   The appendix follows the order of the manuscript. Only where parts of a collection are dislocated due to incorrect binding, has the original order of a collection been restored. The parts of the headings in cursive indicate a different hand. 2   Solomon ben Isaac (Rashi), often referred to as Yarchi. 3   The two collections from the commentaries on Leviticus, Numeri, Deuteronomium and 1-4 Regum are not identical. 4   The revision of the collections from Leviticus – Deuteronomy corresponds with the remarks in Vat. Lat. 14629, fol. 196v. 5   The revision of the collections from Judicum – 4 Regum corresponds with the remarks in Vat. Lat. 14629, fol. 196v. 6   The original revision (fols. 345r-v) has been copied by a scriptor (fols. 111r-v). 1

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174

APPENDIX I

Jeremias 115r-119r 345v/111v-112r7 Ezechiel 123r-129r 121r Psalmi8 121v Duodecim Prophetae Minores Duod. Proph. Min. Osee 131r-v.134r-136r 137r-138v Joel 136r Amos 136r-v.139r Abdias 139r Jonas 139r-v Michaeas 140r-v Nahum 140v Habacuc 140v-141r Sophonias 141r Aggaeus 141r-v Zacharias 141v-144r Malachias 144v Daniel 147r-151v 159r-v 1 Paralipomenon 153r-155r 159r 2 Paralipomenon 155r-v 159r Esdras 157r 159r Nehemias 157r 2. Censurae in commentarios R[abbi] Abraham Abenezrae super Penthateucon: per doctorem Didacum Lopez revisae per R[everendos] Patres, Magistrum sacri palatii, et Robertum Bellarminum, 1578: 161r Collection Genesis 162r-167v Exodus 167v-173v Leviticus 173v Numeri 174r-v Deuteronomium 174v-175v 3. Del cutheo e gentile nell Alfesi se comprende i christiani. De M Fabiano di monte [...] a die 8 di Giugno 1581:188r-189r

7 8

  The original revision (fol. 345v) has been copied by a scriptor (fols. 111v-112r).   The collection is missing.

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APPENDIX I

175

4. Errores ex libro Fasciculo Myrrhae appellato super Penthateuco Rabbi Abraham Sabag, collecti per Jo. Paulum Eustachium, et Latine versi et notati, adiectis in eos censuris per Doctorem Didacum Humadam, qui eosdem consignavit die primo mensis Martii MDLXXX. Reviderunt R[everendi] patres Bellarminus et magister sacri palatii: 195r Collection9 Revision 198r-v.196r-197r 5a. Errores Rabbi Isaac Barbanellae in commentariis super Penthateucum. Collecti et in congregatione lecti a D[omino] Johanne Paulo Eustachio et redditi die XII Januarii MDLXXXIII et a R[everendo] P[atre] Roberto Bellarmino revisi et restituti die tertio Februarii 1583: 208r Collection10 Genesis 199r-200v Exodus 200v-202v Leviticus 202v-203v Numeri 203v-204r Deuteronomium 204r-207r 5b. Notata ex libro Ros Amana Barbanellae per D[ominum] Marcum canonicum Sti. Salvatoris, de Brixia, qui exhibuit die secundo augusti 1581. Revisa a R[everendis] P[atribus] Bellarmino, et magistro sacri palatii, qui die XXI februarii MDLXXXII restituit cum censuris11: 427r Collection 428r-429r 6. Censura in commentaria Abdiae Sphorni super Penthateucum12, et in Cantica Canticorum et Ecclesiastem. Lecta prius in congregatione per D[ominum] (Marcum) de Brixia canonicum S. Salvatoris et exhibita per eumdem die VI Decembris [...] P[ater] Bellarminus vidit, et restituit, die VII Martii 1582. R[everendus] fr[ater] Sixtus, magister sacri palatii vidit et cum suis qualificationibus propositionum reddidit die X Maii 158213: 209r Collection Penthateucon 210r-211v Cantica canticorum 211v Ecclesiastes 211v   The collection is missing.   The collection is in Italian without censurae. The heading possibly refers to a later stage of the collection, which has not been preserved. 11   The revision is missing. 12   ‘ex impressione Veneta’ [Venice: Giovanni Griffio, 1567], fol. 210r. 13   No censurae are added to this collection apart from some passages with the Magister’s comment, see fol. 191r. 9

10

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176

APPENDIX I

7. Censurae in Rabbi Jacob Thurim super Penthateucum per Doctorem Didacum Lopez collectae, et revisae a R[everendo] p[atre] magistro sacri palatii, et patre Bellarmino 1578: 214r (=213r) Collection Revision Genesis 229r-230v.214r-216v Gen.-Deut. Exodus 216v-221r 48 Leviticus 221v-223r Numeri 223r-226r Deuteronomium 226r-228r

8a. Censurae super commentarios R[abbi] Levi filii Gerson in libros Josue, Judicum, Regum, et Jobis. Aprili et Maio 1579 revisae per R[everendum] p[atrem] Bellarminum et f(ratrem) Paulum magistrum sacri palatii: 232r Collection Revision Josue 233r-234r 239r-240r14 Iudicum 234r-235r 1Regum 235r-v 2Regum 235v-236r 3Regum 236r-237r 4Regum 237r-v Job 238r.241r-246v 239r-240r

8b. Censurae in commentaria Rabbi Levi Gerson super Proverbia Salomonis, Junii 1579. Compilatae per R[verendum] d[ominum] Doctorem Lopez et revisae per R[everendos] p[atres] Magistrum Adamantium et per Magistrum sacri palatii: 353r Collection Proverbia 354r-360v 8c. Censurae super commentariis Rabbi Levi filii Gerson in librum Danielis. Item et in commentariis R[abbi] Simoni super libris Ezrae. Et eiusdem Simoni in paralipomena. Praeterea in commentariis R[abbi] Jesaiae, tetrani nuncupati, super libris Josue Judicum et Regum, item super praefationem in tota biblia cuiusdem Rabini qui fuit corrector dum praelo mandaretur haec biblia. Vidit f[rater] Paulus magister sacri palatii. Aprili 14

  Bound after fol. 246.

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APPENDIX I

177

et maio 1579 revisae per R[everendos] patres Bellarminum et magistrum sacri palatii: 363 Collection Revision Daniel 363r-364v.366r-369v 365v

9. Commentaria Rabbi Simhoni super Esram Nehemiam et Paralipomenon: Collection Esra 369v-370v Nehemia 370v 1 Paralipomenon 371r-373r 2 Paralipomenon 373r-v

10. Commentaria R[abbi] Jesahia Thetrani super libros Josue, Judicum, et Regum: Collection 1 & 2 Regum 373v 11. Censurae in Prohaemium super Penthateucon cuiusdam Rabini qui praeerat correctioni dum praelo mandaretur haec biblia anno [...] ab orbe condito (sic)15. Collection 373v-374r

12a. Censurae in commentarios Rabbi David Kimchi collectae per magistrum Adamantium eremitanum ac revisae a R[everendo] p[atre] Bellarmino et a patre magistro sacro palatii: 248r Collection Revision Josue 254r-257v Jos.-Jud. Judicum 259r-261r 342r-343v 1 Regum 266r-273v 2 Regum 275r-279r 3 Regum 280r-v.282r-284v 4 Regum 285r-287v

15

  The 1547-48 edition of the Rabbinic Bible printed in Venice by Daniel Bomberg.

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178

APPENDIX I

12b. Censurae in commentarios R[abbi] David Kimchi super Esaiam. Revisae a R[everendo] p[atre] f[ratre] Sixto magistro sacri palatii cum intervento Neophytorum deputatorum presentibus et auditis Judeis 1581 cum censura brevi eorum quae nondum correcta erant: 290 Collection Revision Isaias 291r-303v.306r-324r 304r-305r 12c. Censura eorum quae visa sunt correctione digna in commentariis R[abbi] David Kimchi in Esaiam. R[everendi] p[atris] f[ratris] Sixti Fabri magistri sacri palatii qui notavit presentibus Judeis cum interventu Neophytorum deputatorum in congregatione mensibus praeteritis et reddidit die 7 septembris 1581: 250r Collection Revision Jeremias 326r-335r Ezechiel 337r-v.341r-v.445r.178r-180v 340r-v.339r-v.181r 1 Paralipomenon 181v-182v 348r 2 Paralipomenon 183r-v.446 13 ‫[ צידה לדרך‬Zeidah la-Derekh]. Censura in librum Rabbi Menahem, de preceptis legis, lecta prius in congregatione per d[ominum] Marcum de Brixia canonicum S. Salvatoris, deinde exhibita per eumdam die […] decembris 1581. P[ater] Bellarminus vidit et restituit die VII Martii 1582. R[everendus] p[ater] fr[ater] Sixtus magister sacri palatii vidit et reddidit cum suis qualificationibus die X Maii 1582: 376r16 Collection 377r-378v 14. Censura in Rabbot, super fabulosa morte Moysi, facta per R[everendum] p[atrem] Marcum Marinum de Brixia et lecta et approbata in congregatione habita die XII Januarii feria III MDLXXXIII: 382r Collection17 383r-394v

16   No censurae are added to this collection apart from some passages with the Magister’s comment, see fol. 193r. 17   ‘ex impressione constantinopolitana’, fol. 383r. There are no censurae to the collection.

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APPENDIX I

179

15. Errores Rabi Menachem de Racenato in commentariis in Pentateuchum collecti per Jo. Paulum Eustachium, et per magistrum Matthiam Aquarium latine redditi, cum censuris in eosdem accepti die 18 Maii 1581. Revisi a R[everendo] p[atre] Roberto Bellarmino et consignati die 26 Junii 1581 et a R[everendo] p[atre] magistro sacri palatii, qui reddidit die VII Septembris 1581: 177r Collection Revision Genesis 190v.190r.396r-400r 249r Exodus 400v-403r Leviticus 403v-405r Numeri 405r-406r Deuteronomium 406r 249r 16. Censurae in commentariis Kav benaki super proverbia Salomonis et in commentariis Rabi Moyses Nachman in Job. Et in commentariis Rabbi Abraham Phaerezolo etiam in Job 1578. Revisae a r[everendis] p[atribus] Magistro sacri palatii 1578 et Roberto Bellarmino: 18 380r Collection Revision Kav benaki 412r-413v Borg. lat. 149, 95r 17. Censurae in commentarios Rabi Moses bar Nachman Gerundensis nuncupatus super Job: 413v Collection Revision 413v-419r Borg. lat. 149, 95r-96r 18. Rabbi Abraham Phaerezolo in Job: 407r Collection 407r-411r 19. Censura in Rabbi Menahem super psalmos, lecta et exhibita a D[omino] Marco de Brixia in congregatione habita die XXV novembris 1582 et data R[everendo] p[atri] Roberto Bellarmino qui restituit die II decembris sed et R[everendus] p[ater] magister sacri palatii revidit, et restituit die III februarii MDLXXXIII in congregatione: 420r Collection19 421r-v   Kav ve-Naki by David ibn Yahya.   The subheading of the collection reads “in expositionem psalmorum rabi Menahem censura. Liber manuscriptus”. 18

19

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180

APPENDIX I

Qui notantur errores Rabi Menahem super expositione psalmorum R[everendi] p[atris] magistri sacri palatii: 422r 20. Errores et censurae in librum Hachasedim Rabbi Judae Chasid per Joannem Paulum Eustachium, et doctorem Didacum Humadam collecti, et factae, exhibiti die XV novembris MDLXXX. Revisae per R[everendum] p[atrem] Robertum Bellarminum societatis Jesu et redditi die XV mensis decembris eiusdem anni MDLXXX: 431r Collection 432r-438r 21. Notae et censurae in Tractatum Rabbi Jona de poenitentia per Joannem Paulum Eustachium, et doctorem Didacum Humadam collectae, et factae, exhibitae die XV novembris MDLXXX. Revisae per magistrum Matthiam Aquarium, et per p[atrem] Bellarminum, qui restituit die primo februarii 1581: 443r Collection Revision 444r-v.449v 447v 22. Censura in supremum lugentium officium, ex libro precationum hebraicarum, qui inscribitur Mahzor sinagogae Romanae , interprete G[ilberto] Genebrardo Theologo Parisiense quod editum est in quarto Tomo Bibliothecae Sanctorum Patrum a pagina 103 et seq. Per R[everendum] p[atrem] Robertum Bellarminum societatis Jesu praelectorem die tertio februarii 1579: 451r Collection 455r 23. De arrogato sanctitatis nomine a Judaeis praesertim Romae degentibus: 452r Collection 453r 24. Censurae in Volumen precum, rituum, ceremoniarum, quod ab Ebraeis Machazor id est Cyclus appellatur. Et in illius etiam Commentarios: 455r Collection 455r20 20   Only the two first pages of the collection are extant. The whole collection is preserved in Borg. lat. 149. See App. IV, 3.

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APPENDIX I

181

25. Censura in Chronicum Hebreorum latine versum, interprete G[ilberto] Genebrardo Theologo Parisiense. Per R[everendum] p[atrem] Robertum Bellarminum societatis Jesu theologiae praelectorem 1577: 457r21 Collection 458r-460v 26. [Abraham ben Asher, Maadne melekh, perush aba al bereshit rabbah] Collection22 Revision 281r.350r.425r-426r

21 22

  Seder Olam Rabbah   The collection is missing.

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182

APPENDIX II1 Vat. Lat. 14630

[Table of Contents:] 1r 1. Libri ebraeorum quos citatos vidi: 1v-2v 2. Prosapia: Saul 5v, 140v Thare [Terah] 6r Levi (Gen. 36) 6v-7r Edom 7v Levi (Num. 3) 29v Judah 139v David 140r-v 3. In Genesi ex R[abbi] Salomone2 annotata pro erroribus: 8r Collections: Suppleta 3 Genesis 8r-28v.29r Exodus 29r4.33r-50v Ex.- Deut. Leviticus5 51r-77r, 78r-v6 30r-32v Numeri 81r-92r Deuteronomium7 92r-102v Josue 102v-105r Josue - Judicum Judicum8 105r-106r.108r-109v 106v-107v.109v-110v 1 Regum 113r-121r 1Regum – 4 Regum 2 Regum9 121v-127v.127v-130r 127v.139r 3 Regum 130r-133v 1  The appendix follows the order of the manuscript. Only where parts of a collection are dislocated due to incorrect binding has the original order of a collection been restored. 2   Solomon ben Isaac (Rashi). 3   Noted as dubia ex Genesi. 4   Noted as dubia ex Exodo. 5   Dated 31 May 1577 (fol. 77r). 6   ‘ad holocausta’ (Lev 1). 7   Dated 22 April 1577 (fol. 102v). 8   Dated 12 May 1577 (fol. 109v). 9   In 2m librum ex r. Salomone (Rashi) et Kimhi congesta.

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APPENDIX II

183

4 Regum10 134r-138v.112v Isaias11 141r-156v.157v-162v.185r-186v 220v Jeremias 157r-v.163r-164v.179v-180v Ezechiel 181r-184v.187v-188v Duodecim Proph. min. Duodecim Proph. min. Osee 165r-168r 173r.178v-179r Joel12 168v-169r Amos 169r-170r Abdias 170r Jonas 170v Michaeas 170v-171v Nahum 171v Habacuc 172r-173r Sophonias 173v Aggaeus 173v-174r Zacharias 174v-177v Malachias13 177v-178v Proverbia 259r-261v.279r 14 Ecclesiastes 262r-269v Esther15 269v-270v Threni 271r-272r Daniel16 275r-278 1.2 Paralipomenon17 202v. 4. [Rashi and Ibn Ezra on:] Collection Suppleta Isaias18 187r Psalmi19 189r-213v.215r-219v. 214r-v.226r-227v.228v.237r 221r-225r 239r.248r.251r-256v.257r20   Dated 22 June 1577 (fol. 138v).   Dated 2 July 1577 (fol. 141). The suppleta are dated 10 January 1578 (fol. 220 v). 12   Dated 20 August 1577 (fol. 168v). 13   Dated 1 September 1577 (fol. 178v). 14  Dated 7 October 1577 (fol. 262). The collection is combined with Ibn Ezra’s commentary, see n° 4. 15   Dated 8 October 1577 (fol. 269v). 16   Dated 24 October 1577 (fol. 278v). 17  The collection only concerns 1 Chr. 3:10, 2 Chr. 5 (de arca Dei) and 2 Chr. 31 (de ministerio Levitarum). 18   The collection only concerns chapter 66. 19   Dated 1 February 1577 (fol. 225r). The suppleta are dated 4 September 1577 (fol. 214r). 20   Fol. 257r gives an index relating to the excerpts from Ibn Ezra’s commentary. 10 11

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184

APPENDIX II

Ecclesiastes21 267v-268r

5. [Ibn Ezra on:] Isaias Jeremias22 Proverbia23 Prooemium Job On Rome

Collection 187r 225v.228 257v 274v 278v

6. [Levi ben Gershon on:] Proverbia24 Prooemium Job

Collection 279r.281r-285r 288v

7. [Rashi, Ibn Ezra and Levi ben Gershon on:] Collection Job25 43v.266v 8. Annotationes in Massoreth 237v-238r 9. Ex Gerundensi. Citat duo loca ex Sapientia Salomonis26 250r

  The collection only concerns chapter 12.   The collection only concerns Jer. 25:1. 23   The collection only concerns the introduction and chapter 20. 24   Dated 7 February 1578, fol. 279r. The collection only concerns chapters 10-16. 25   The collection only concerns Job 4:18 and 38:30. 26   Wisdom 7:5-8 and 7:17-21. 21 22

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185

APPENDIX III1 Vat. lat. 14629 [Table of contents:] 1r-v 1. Tabula de erroribus r[abbi] Salomonis2: 3r-v Errores, falsa dogmata, blasphemiae, contumeliae, deliramenta, perversiones scripturae reperta et annotata in commentariis R[abbi] Salomonis Jarchii Ebraei quae hic per capita digesta sunt: 4r-40v 2. Tabula Machazor3: 41r-44v 3. Censurae in commentaria Rabbi Bechaiai in quinque libros Moisis. Revisae a R[everendis] p[atribus] Magistro sacri palatii4 et p[atre] Roberto Bellarmino 15785: 45r Iudicium de hoc scriptore: 46r-v Collection Arbor Sephiroth: 49r Genesis 50r-77r Exodus6 78r-90v Leviticus 92r-103v Numeri 104r-112r Deuteronomium 112v-123r

1   The appendix follows the order of the manuscript. Only where parts of a collection are dislocated due to incorrect binding, has the original order been restored. 2  The Tabula is a summary of errors and blasphemies in the commentaries of Bahya and Rashi, followed by a list of exact references to the passages (in an original pagination different from the later stamped pagination) as found in the collections listed under n° 3 and 4. 3   The alphabetical index of errors and inadmissible beliefs refers to the collection Borg. lat. 149, 46r-86v. The collection in Borg. lat. is incomplete and goes only as far as page 500 of the Mahzor [Bologna 1540]. 4  The Magister Sacri Palatii was Paulo Constabile. 5   The heading mentions the revisors of the collection and the year in which the revision was completed. In Vat. lat. 14628 most of the collections are provided with such prefatory headings, see App. I. The part printed in cursive indicates a different hand. 6   Dated 19 December 1578 (fol. 90v).

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186

APPENDIX III

Tractatus de Abramo7: 124r-126v 4. Censurae in commentarios R[abbi] Salomonis Jarchii Ebraei super Genesim Collection Suppleta Genesis 132r-149v Genesis 150r-158v Visum est et quaedam alia ex genesi digna annotare si forte emendationis et censurae nota subire iudicentur: 159r-166v. Exodus 167r-172v Exodus-Deuteronomium Leviticus 173r-174r 196v.252r Numeri 174r-178r Deuteronomium 178r-182r Josue 183r-184v Josue-4 Regum Judicum 184v-185v 195v-196.251r.252v.254r 1 Regum 185v-188r 195v 2 Regum 188r-190r 195v 3 Regum 190v-193r 195v 4 Regum 193r-195r 195v Isaias8 197r-206v 254r Jeremias 207r-209v Ezechiel 210r-214r Psalmi9 215r-222v 230v.254r.255v Ecclesiastes 223r-224r Ruth 224r-v Esther 224v-225r Threni 225r-226r Canticum 226r-228v Proverbia 229r-230v Duodecim Prophetae Minores 253r-254r Osee 231r-232r Joel 232r-v Amos 232v-233r Abdias 233r Jonas 233r-233v Michaeas 233v-234r

  Genesis 12.   Dated 25 May 1578, see fol. 289r. 9  The Psalms are numbered according to the Vulgate. 7 8

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APPENDIX III

187

Nahum 234r Habacuc 234r-v Sophonias 234v Aggaeus 234v Zacharias 234v-236v Malachias 236v Job 237r-239v Daniel10 240r-243v.245r-248r Esdras 248r Nehemias 248r 1 Paralipomenon 248v-250r 2 Paralipomenon 250r-v 252r Discussa quaedam in Congregatione11 1578: 196r Numerus annorum a captivitate Joachim usque ad destructionem templi (ex Eusebio; ex Lyrano, expositio communis, Raimundus in libro Pugio): 244r 5. Censurae in commentarios R[abbi] David Kimchi qui respuitur, et primo in librum Josue: 257r Collection Suppleta Josue 257r-258v Judicum 259r-v 1 Regum 260r-263v 1 Regum-4 Regum 2 Regum 263v-265v 251r-v 3 Regum 265v-267r 4 Regum 267v-268v Isaias12 269r-289r13 Jeremias 296r-301v Ezechiel 303r-306v 309r-311v Osee 290r-291r Joel 291r Amos 291v

  Dated 22 October 1577. See fol. 240r.   On the name of God. 12   Dated 25 May 1578. See fol. 289r. 13   On fol. 289v ‘censurae omissae’ to Kimhi’s commentary of Isaiah. 10 11

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188

APPENDIX III

Abdias 292r Michaeas 292r-v Nahum 292v Habacuc 293r Sophonias 293r Aggaeus 293r Zacharias 293r-294r Malachias 294v 1 Paralipomenon 307r-v 313v-314v 2 Paralipomenon 307v-308r 312r-313v Desunt psalmorum censurae. Nam etsi Kimchi scripsit super psalmos eius tamen commentarii mihi non fuerunt exhibiti. Lege tamen charte [...] Hic tamen et quaedam annotabuntur ab aliis excerpta: 301v. 254v14 6. In Aben Ezra annotationes super Genesim atque etiam censurae15: 315r Collection Genesis 315r-319v Disgressio de nomine Dei ex Aben Ezra16 320r Exodus (1,4) 321r Proverbia 323r-v Ruth 323v Psalmi17 324r-328v Canticum18 329r-332r Daniel 337r-v 7. Ex R[abbi] Saadia super Daniel: 332v Daniel 332v-336v 8. Ex R[abbi] Immanuel super Proverbia: Proverbia19 338r-v 9. Thargum Ecclesiastes ut habetur in bibliis ebraicis Venetis de verbo ad verbum20: 339r-350v

  The collections are missing.   Dated 12 April 1579. Additional censurae were added on 8 July 1578. See fol. 319r. 16   Exodus 3. 17   “finis 2 aug 1578, recitatum 2 aug 1578”. See fol. 328v. 18   Dated 29 August 1578. See fol. 332r. 19   Dated 6 October 1578. See fol. 338r. 20   Dated 20 August 1578. See fol. 350r. 14 15

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189

APPENDIX III

10. Canticum Annae 1 Regum 2,1 [Targum]: 350v 11. Canticum David 2 Regum 23,2 [Targum]: 350v 12. Thargum Esther:

351r-v

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190

APPENDIX IV Borg. lat. 149 [Title page] IIr 1.  Errores ex libro Zohar appellato super Pentatheuco et ex libris inscriptis Portae lucis et Portae iustitiae collecti per r. p. dominum Marcum Marinum canonicum regularem congregationis sacri Salvatoris, qui eosdem consignavit die 8 mensis Junii 1580. Vidit pater Bellarminus, qui restituit die 6 octobris 1580 et fuit consignatus R. p. Magistro sacri palatii eodem die. Is autem hunc revideri fecit a magistro Matthia Aquario nostro theologo et mihi restituit die primo Decembris 1580.1 Censura libri Zohar impressionis Mantuanae2 Genesis 1r-15r Exodus 15r-26r Leviticus 26v-30v Numeri 30v-36r Deuteronomium 36v-37r 2. Censura librorum Sahare Orah et Sahare Zedec, id est portae lucis et portae iustitiae 37r-42v 3. Censurae in Machazor Hebraeorum id est Volumen precum, horarum, rituum et ceremoniarum per r. P. Magistrum Adamantium florentinum ordinis eremitarum Sancti Augustini factae, exhibitae die IX mensis Novembris MDLXXX. Revisae per R. p. Robertum Bellarminum societatis Jesu, et redditae die XXII Decembris eiusdem anni 1580: 43r Censurae in volumen precum, horarum, rituum, ceremoniarum quod ab Ebraeis Machazor id est cyclus appellatur et in illius etiam commentarium 45r-86v

1 2

  The part in cursive is in the hand of Giulio Santoro.   The Mantuan edition of the Zohar was published between1558-1560.

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APPENDIX IV

191

4. Machazor Bologna cum commentario Jochanan de Treves 87r-94v 5. [Revision remarks by Roberto Bellarmino and Cardinal Santoro on the collections from Kav ve-naki on Proverbs and Nahmanides’ commentary on Job.1] 95r-96r 6. [Summary of the regulations in 1593 and 1596 by Pope Clement IX concerning the expurgation of Hebrew books] 97r

1

  See App. I, 16 and 17.

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APPENDIX V

1. Rashi on Exodus 32:1 (Vat. lat. 14628, 12r) Quod tardabat Moses. Die XVI venit satan, et permiscuit, et obturbavit mundum, praebens speciem caliginis densae et tenebrarum, ita ut dicerent: Profecto Moses mortuus est, obidque venit obscuritas ipsa in mundum. Dixit eis: mortuus est Moses, quia iam venerunt sex horae, nec advenit etc. In tractatu Sabbath. Censura: Ludricum, et fabulosum. 2. Rashi on Exodus 12:3 (=6) (Vat. lat. 14628, 7v) Ad omne coetum Israel. Censura: citatur de Talmud. 3. Rashi on Deuteronomy 26 (=27:12) (Vat. lat. 14628, 38v) Ad benedicendum populum. [censura: Tractatus Sotah]. 4. Rashi on Exodus 12:46 (Vat. lat. 14628, 7v) Os non comminuetis, quod sit aptum comestioni, verbi gratia, si sit super os illud caro quanta est oliva, est tibi transgressio fractionis ossis. Non est in eo caro quanta est oliva, non peccatur in fractione. Censura: Thalmudicae limitationes. 5. Rashi on Leviticus 10:2 (Vat. lat. 14628, 30v) Et exiit ignis a facie Domini. R. Eliezer dixit, non mortui sunt filii Aaron ob aliam causam nisi quia docuerunt canonem quendam thalmudicum ante Mosem Magistrum. R. Simeon habet, potato vino ingressi sunt sanctuarium, scito quod post mortem eorum monuit posteros, ne ingrederentur qui bibissent vinum. Censura: De traditionibus thalmudicis. 6. Rashi on Genesis 26:5 (Vat. lat. 14629, 142v) Et leges meas, ut legem scriptam et ore traditam comprehendat. Censura: lex ore tradita, quam dicunt cabalam, nullum habet in divinis literis fundamentum. 7. Ibn Ezra’s introduction to Genesis (Vat. lat. 14628, 162r) Et paulo post tractans de lege Moisis scripta et ea quam tradidit ore, inquit, Hoc nobis signum sit quod Moises innixus fuit etiam super legem

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traditam ore, quae est laetitia cordi, et ossibus medicina: nulla enim differentia est inter duas leges; utranque a patribus nostris accepimus. Censura: Cum traditiones Rabinorum vel talmud erroribus et fabulis plenae sint, haereticum apparet tantam auctoritatem illis tribuere quantam legi scriptae. 8. Ibn Ezra on Exodus 21:24 (Vat. lat. 14628, 171v) Oculum pro oculo, dentem pro dente etc. Hoc loco statuit talem conclusionem, videlicet, quod praecepta legis per se non possunt perfecte exponi nisi innitendo super verba sapientum nostrorum: quia sicut recepimus legem a patribus nostris, ita et legem traditam ore, inter quas nulla est differentia. Censura: Cum Rabinorum traditiones erroribus, fabulis, blasphemiis et iniquis sacrae Scripturae expositionibus plenae sint, ut est videre in Talmud, cui maiorem auctoritatem isti tribuunt, error intolerabilis est tantam fidem illis adhibere sicut sacrae Scripturae cuius auctor est spiritus sanctus, de quo supra censura 2. 9. Rashi on Joshua 7:20 (Vat. lat. 14628, 52v) Et respondit Achan. Vidit filios Juda iam congregatos et paratos dimicare, dixit, melius est ut moriar ego solus et non occidantur tot millia Israelitarum, Censura: hoc non apparet ex littera. 10. Kimhi on 1 Chronicles 3:17 (Vat. lat. 14628, 181v) Filii autem Jeconiaeh Assir Scalthiel filius eius. Dixit R. Johanan, captivitas impetrat propitiationem, nam scriptum erat, scribite virum istum sterilem. Sed postquam abiit in captivitatem de eo scribitur, filii eius Assir Scalthiel. Dictus est Assir, quia concepit eum mater eius in vinculis. Scalthiel quia plantavit eum (nam sathal Hebraice est plantare) non secundum morem plantandi, quia mulier non concipit de stante; aliter dictus est Scalthiel, quia fuit rogatus seu dispensatus in iuramento suo quod scilicet Deus fecit. Censura: Absurda et obscena sunt. Revisio (Vat. lat. 14628, 348r): Adderem ad censuram, falsum esse, quod Deus dispensaverit in iuramento, quo minatus fuerat Jechoniae sterilitatem. Deus enim cum iussit scribi Jechoniam virum sterilem non privavit eum prole simpliciter, sed prole regia, ut Hieremias ipse explicat cap 22: scribe, inquit, virum istum sterilem, nec enim erit de semine eius vir qui sedeat super solium David. Censura (Vat. lat. 14628, 181v): Falsum Deum dispensasse in verbo suo. Nam praenuntiavit illum sterilem prolis regiae qui sederet super solium David, quod et fuit impletum.

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11. Rashi on 2 Kings (=2 Samuel) 21:9 (=10) (Vat. lat. 14628, 63v) Sed nonne scriptum est: non pernoctabit cadaver eius? Sed dixerunt, prestat extirpare literam de lege, si contingat nomen Dei in publico sanctificari. Nam quando cadavera illa servabantur in patibulis transibant homines, et dicebant, quaenam istorum interfectorum conditio fuit? Respondebantque eis, De filiis regum extiterunt. Quid ergo flagitii admiserunt? Extenderunt manus in exercitum. Tunc dicebant, Nullus populus est cum quo magis iungenda videatur esse amicitia, quam cum isto. Censura: Dogma falsum, quod boni nominis comparandi causa praevaricari liceat Dei legem. 12. Rashi on 3 Kings (=1 Kings) 8:65 (Vat. lat. 14628, 66r) Septem diebus festo scilicet dedicationis et septem diebus festo scilicet Tabernaculorum. Ex hoc consequitur, quod comederunt et biberunt in die Chippurim. Censura: Non fas est sic exponere, quia transgressio illius praecepti erat exterminium. Chippurim. 13. Kimhi on Ezekiel 11:18 (=16) (Vat. lat. 14628, 178r) Et ero eis in sanctuarium parvum in terris ad quas venerunt. Quod elongari feci eos in gentes, nihilominus non dereliqui illos, sed fui eis quasi parvum sanctuarium, et asylum in regionibus ad quas venerunt, quasi dicat, etsi longe sint a Sanctuario Domini, quod est sanctuarium maius, ibi in terra eius ego ero eis in sanctuarium parvum, quasi dicat, in eorum synagogis quo conveniunt ad orandum ero cum illis, exaudiam illos, et liberabo eos de manibus hostium suorum, ne illos penitus consumant. Sic etiam Thargum Jonathan, ‘et dabo eis domum synagogarum, quae post sanctuarium meum tenent secundum locum. Censura: Sed somnia sunt. Nam ‫ מקדש‬hoc loco non sanctuarium, sed sanctificationem significat, ut sit sensus secundum Hieronymum, ‘Ero eis in sanctificationem modicam id est brevem, in terris ad quas etc.’ quod fuit impletum in Babylone, tempore quo vixit Daniel Ananias etc. 14. Kimhi’s introduction to Joshua (Vat. lat. 14628, 254r) Circa finem scribam insuper, cur in textu bibliorum quaedam eodem modo scribantur et legantur, quaedam scribantur, et non legantur, et quaedam legantur, et non scribantur, conaborque pro viribus reddere rationem quam potero huius rei suis in locis. Existimo autem quod dictiones istae secundum hanc formam repertae fuerint in codicibus. Quia in prima captivitate perierunt codices et sapientes in Lege eruditi cum dispersi hinc inde essent, mortui fuerant. Proinde viri Synagogae maioris qui restituerunt legem suae vetustati cum invenissent in codicibus sacris

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eiuscemodi varietates, multas quidem pro eorum sententia retinuerunt, quas vero non exacte perceperunt, scripserunt utique ut iacebant in textu sed non punctarunt, punctis aliis scripserunt in margine, et non retulerunt in textum, atque ita aliter scripserunt in textu aliter extra textum. Censura: Annotatum est hoc Kimchi testimonium contra Hebraeos, qui biblia credunt esse incorrupta, nec legi posse nisi ut ipsi legunt; damnantque textum LXX interpretum ex hac falsa eorum sententia. Revisio (Vat. lat. 14628, 342r): Omitterem primam censuram, quae est ad prohoemium R. Davidis, tum quod non debeant in catalogum errorum referri ea, quae recte dicta sunt, etiamsi contra iudaeos esse videantur; tum etiam, quod fortasse non sit contra iudaeos haec sententia R. Davidis; quamvis enim hebraei fere omnes, et plerique christianorum contendant non esse biblia corrupta de industria a rabinis, nulli tamen sunt neque christiani, neque iudaei, qui negent, negligentia scriptorum, ac temporis iniuria irrepsisse aliqua vitia in sacros libros, eamque ob causam necesse nunc esse, ur quaedam aliter legantur quam scribantur. 15. Kimhi on Joshua 21:7 (Vat. lat. 14628, 257r) Filiis Merari per familias suas. In hoc versiculo dicit, quod duae et decem civitates fuerunt filiis Merari de tribu Ruben, et de tribu Gad, et de tribu Zabulon et infra in enumeratione civitatum non scripsit nisi octo civitates, de tribu Zabulon 4 et de tribu Gad 4 et de tribu Ruben non scripsit, sed vidi libros correctos ubi 4 civitates tribus Ruben recensentur, sed non vidi duos istos versiculos in ullo codice vetusto correcto adscriptos nisi in quibusdam emendatis. Censura: Fatetur hebraicos libros non carere mendaciis. Revisio (Vat. lat. 14628, 342v): Idem sentio de hac censura, quod de prima et sane non video quid nobis prosit tantum urgere bibliorum corruptionem. Dum enim iudaeis nocere volumus, Anabaptistis non volentes prosumus. Quid enim illi clamant aliud, quam nihil certe ex bibliis elici posse, quod multis in locis corrupta, ac depravata sint. Quod cum olim Manichei similiter catholicis obiicerent, D. Augustinus acerrime defendit sacra biblia non esse falsata, cuius etiam est illa vox in libro 15 de Civitate Dei cap 13 “Absit”, inquit, “ut prudens quispiam iudaeos cuiuslibet perversitatis, atque malitiae tantum potuisse credat in codicibus tam multis et tam longe, lateque dispersis quod idem antea senserat”, et docuerat D. Hieronymus in commentario ad cap 6 Isaiae, ubi et Origenis testimonio, et propriis argumentis demonstrat, incredibile esse, ut iudaei in odium christianorum sacros libros depravuerint. Neque responderi potest, post tempora D. Hieronymi, et D. Augustini sacrilegium hoc a iudaeis esse patratum. Siquidem loca illa omnia, quae R. David et caeteri proferunt

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tamquam corrupta et a scribis immutata, ita D. Hieronymus vertit, et nunc in vulgata editione nos legimus, ut ipsi corrupta, sive mutata fuisse dicunt. 16. Ibn Ezra on Genesis 18:32 (Vat. lat. 14628, 165r) Quid, si inventi fuerint ibi decem. (Inquit) sapientes nostri zal [zikhronam li-verakhah=of blessed memory] tradiderunt quod non est oratio vel non potest fieri in congregatione ubi minus quam decem convenerint. Et iste versus corroborat hanc nostram fidem. Censura: Erronea Rabinorum traditio et Christi Domini verbis contraria, quia inquit Mat 18,19 Quia si duo ex vobis consenserint super terram de omni re quacumque petierint etc. Ubi enim duo vel tres etc. 17. Ba’al ha-Turim on Exodus 20:24 (Vat. lat. 14628, 219v) Veniam ad te et benedicam tibi etc. Dictio ‘Veniam’ per geometriam decem importat ut significet, quod si inventi fuerint decem homines in Synagoga veniam ut benedicam etc. Censura: aludit (sic) ad Rabinorum errorem asserentium non debere fieri nec exaudiri orationem ad quam minus quam decem congregati fuerint, et convincitur authoritate Christi: Math. 18:19: si duo ex vobis consenserint etc. et iterum ubi enim sunt duo vel tres etc. 18. Ba’al ha-Turim on Genesis 28:16 (Vat. lat. 14628, 215v) Cumque vigilasset Jacob de somno etc. Finales literae constituunt dictionem (congregatio) ut significetur quod hominis oratio non exauditur nisi facta fuerit in congregatione, seu coetu. Censura: Impia et perniciosa haeresis, quam D. Jacobus cap 5:17 convincit postquam dixit “multum valet deprecatio iusti assidua” exemplo Eliae qui sua oratione obtinuit ut non plueret per tres annos (3 Reg. 17:1). 19. Rashi on Hosea 2:1 (Vat. lat. 14628, 131v) Et erit numerus filiorum Israel. Vindictae et consolationes simul iuguntur. Antiqui: sensit Oseas se pecasse, quia dixerat muta illos in populum alium, stetit et deprecatus est pro Israele; legitur quod Rab dixerit: duo sunt hi versiculi iuxta se coherentes sed distantes ab invicem, plusquam oriens et occidens, nempe hi, “vos non populus meus”, “et erit numerus filiorum Israel quasi arena maris”, sed quo sensu haec dicta sunt? Exemplum: Rex indignatus est uxori suae, accersivit scribam, ut scriberet illi repudium. Interim dum scriba venit rex reconciliatur uxori. Dixit rex: numquid scriba iste exibit a me corde ambiguo, ita ut admirabundus dicturus sit, quare accersivit me? Quandoque venit, dixit ei: “Veni et scribito: ego uxori meae augeo dotem in duplum. Sed hi duo versiculi secundum planum literae sensum sic conciliantur: quoniam vos non populus meus

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et ego non ero vester. Ostendam me vobis alienum et quasi non sim vester, quia agemini in exilium inter gentes, et nihilominus ibi crescetis et florebitis et ibidem convertimini ad me”. Censura: Fingunt ista ne cogantur fateri reprobationem in quam inciderunt, et vocationem gentium, quam hoc loco aptissime propheta vaticinatur teste D. Paulo ad Rom. 9. 20. Rashi on Jeremiah 1:4 (=5) (Vat. lat. 14628, 115r) Prophetam gentibus dedi te, id est Israeli, qui utuntur gentilium moribus. Sic exponitur in Siphri, “prophetam de medio tui …etc. suscitabit tibi, non gentibus. Nam quid ego proponerem prophetam gentibus? Sed posui te prophetam Israeli, qui moribus nihil a gentibus distant”. Censura: nolunt ullam promissionem factam a Deo gentilibus fateri, licet contrarium luce clarius appareat. Revisio (Vat. lat. 14628, 111v): Illud, prophetam gentibus dedi te, id est Israeli, verum est. Nec videtur mihi falsum, ut in margine annotatur, nullam promissionem factam a Deo gentilibus. Nam etsi multa praedixerunt prophetae de conversione gentium, tamen nihil eis Deus promisit sicut promisit Judaeis, nec prophetae ad gentes, sed ad solos Judaeos missi sunt. Et hoc est quod legimus Rom. 15: “Dico Christum Jesum ministrum fuisse circumcisionis propter veritatem Dei ad confirmandas promissiones patrum; gentes autem super misericordia honorare Deum”. Posset igitur fortasse tolerari haec expositio R. Salomonis, nisi probari possit eum hoc loco colligere messiam et sacras scripturas nihil ad gentes pertinere. In margine: Licet soli populo israelitico factae sint promissiones salutis nostrae, non tamen consequitur (ut deducit R. Salomon) quod propheta nempe Messias suscitatus sit Israeli tamen non gentibus. Nam legitur de Messia “ipse erit expectatio gentium”; “ipsum gentes deprecabuntur”. Item nonne etiam ad Ninivitas missus est Jonas? Iccirco vult R. Salomon excludere gentes a fructis promissionis. Magister Sacri Palatii (Vat. lat. 14628, 112r): Tollendam censeo censuram propter dictum Rom. 15: “Dico Christum Jesum ministrum fuisse circumcisionis propter veritatem Dei ad confirmandas promissiones patrum; gentes autem super misericordia”. 21. Rashi on Isaiah 4:1 (Vat. lat. 14628, 98r) Apprehendent septem mulieres virum unum secundum historiam, quia multae orbatae viris suis, ultro quaerebant sibi maritos. In midras dicitur: “Nebucdenesar edicto cavit ne quis uxorem viri accederet ne punirentur. Hinc quae erant viduae, ne paterentur militum vim et ignominias, petebant a viris ut saltem sibi nomen viri accomodarent”. Censura: commentum est et communiter a nostris mystice exponitur.

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Revisio (Vat. lat. 14628, 111r): Prima pars commentarii R. Salomonis, quod nimirum propter virorum raritatem septem mulieres ultro sibi maritos quaerent et saltem unum omnes simul habere cupient, est etiam D. Hieronymi, nec videtur ad literam hic locus posse aliter exponi. Altera pars videtur quidem commentitia, sed non erronea, itaque putarem posse omitti. Magister Sacri Palatii (Vat. lat. 14628, 111r): certe omitti potest. 22. Kimhi on Ezekiel 16:51 (=53) (Vat. lat. 14628, 178v) Et convertam captivitatem eorum, captivitatem Sedom. Et hic est responsio seu confutatio illorum qui dicunt quod consolationes iam praeterierunt. Et tamen adhuc Sodoma manet subversa in subversione sua, quemadmodum olim fuit, et adhuc non est inhabitata. Censura: Error Hebraeorum quia nesciunt intelligere reversionem Sodomae id est animae a Deo aversae conversionem. Vide hoc loco D. Hieronymum. 23. Rashi on 1Kings (=1Sam) 13:9 (Vat. lat. 14628, 59r) Afferte ad me holocaustum; licitum erat illi offerre in excelso. Censura: Sed Lyranus, et bene, dicit Saulem peccasse, quia illicitum sibi officium usurpavit. 24. Kimhi on Ezekiel 10:14 (Vat. lat. 14628, 178r) Facies primi, facies cherub. Supra dixerat facies bovis. Notum est quod dixerunt antiqui: Ezechiel deprecatus est Dominum, et versae sunt facies bovis in cherub. Dixit coram Deo: Rex mundi, nunquid accusator fiet unquam advocatus? Et cherub idem est kerabia id est quasi infans. Nam in Babylonia sic appellatur parvulum rabia. Sed instant facies cherub et facies hominis nonne sunt unum? Sed sic conciliant, quod facies maioris et facies minoris sint. Et nos tacite hoc declaravimus. Censura: Fabulosum quod ad deprecationem prophetae fuerit immutata alicuius facies. Sed Lyranus dicit significari, quod regnum macedonum figuratum per bovem qui est irrationalis, versus est in mansuetudinem et humanitatem quod fuit impletum in Alexandro Magno, qui infesto animo progrediens Jerosolymam, postmodum sacerdotem hebraeum, qui illi occurit, veneratus est. 25. Rashi on Isaiah 6:4 (Vat. lat. 14628, 99r) A voce clamantis mota sunt liminaria etc. Hoc accidit in diebus Oziae sicut legitur in Zach. 14:5: Et fugietis sicut fugistis a facie terraemotus in diebus Oziae. Et dicunt quod fuit divinae indignationis signum contra Oziae presumptionem qui ausus est ponere incensum in templo Domini.

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Censura: Fortasse commotio ista alia est ab illa et haec fuit ad instructionem et reverentiam divini numinis quod Esaiae apparuit; nam scriptura non tacuisset si pro Ozia evenisset. Magister Sacri Palatii (Vat. lat. 14628, 111r): Prima pars censurae omitti potest quia sic etiam Lyranus exponit et nil habet absurdi illa expositio. 26. Rashi on 4 Kings 25:26 (=27) (Vat. lat. 14628, 70v) Levavit Evilmerodach. Nam mortuo Nebucdenasar regnavit loco eius Evilmerodach vigesimo septimo mensis. Et libro Jeremiae dicitur 25º, sed 25º mortuus est Nabucdenasar et sepultus est 26. Sed (vigesimo) septimo mensis extraxit eum Evilmerodach de sepulcro et dispersit illum, ut irrita faceret decreta eius quo impleretur dictum Esaiae: “et tu proiiceris de tumulo tuo quasi flos faetens”. Censura: Sed hanc fabulam Lyranus in Esaiam c 14 tanquam consentientem prophetiae recipit et probat. Revisio (Vat. lat. 14628, 263v): Ultima annotatio non videtur necessaria Magister Sacri Palatii (Vat. lat. 14628, 263v): tolli potest, licet historiae explicatio in sacris literis desideretur. Additional censura: licet apte non explicetur in sacris literis. 27. Rashi on 1 Kings 22:4 (Vat. lat. 14628, 60r) Quibus fuit David in arce, et quando David inde recessit in sylvam Hareth occidit Rex Moab patrem et matrem David et fratres eius praeter unum ipsorum quem subduxit a morte Nahas Ammonites et haec est illa misericordia quam commemoravit David, ‘quando fecit pater eius misericordiam mecum’. Sic in midras Thanchuma. Censura: Historia apocrypha licet Lyranus non improbabilem putet. 28. Rashi on 2 Chronicles 21:12 (Vat. lat. 14628, 155v) Et venit ad eum scriptura ab Elia, postquam raptus fuerat in coelum, venit ad eum scriptura ista prophetica. Censura: Non mihi videtur verisimile; nec in toto vetere Testamento consimile quid legitur de aliquo sancto defuncto. Licet Lyranus sententiam R. Salomonis probet. 29. Rashi on Isaiah 66:7 (Vat. lat. 14628, 109r) Antequam parturiret peperit etc. Syon antequam corriperetur dolore partus, peperit filios suos, quasi dicat, Congregabuntur filii eius in visceribus eius quae erat illis orbata, et nunc ecce quodammodo ipsa eos parit sine dolore, quoniam omnes populi adducent filios eius intra eam. Censura: Sensus iste non potest ad literam accomodari ut hinc quadret, sed prophetia est de partu virginis quae filium sine dolore peperit.

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Revisio (Vat. lat. 14628, 111r): Illud antequam parturiret peperit ad literam exponitur a D. Hieronymo et ab aliis communiter de partu ecclesiae, quae quasi repente omnes gentes peperit Deo. Nec verba R. Salomonis viderentur mala, nisi constaret de prava eius intentione. Itaque solum notarem in hoc capite ea quae dicuntur de ecclesia et conversione gentium, perperam a R. Salomone detorqueri ad synagogam Iudaeorum. In margine: Lyranus ad literam de partu virginis exponit. Sed si exponatur de partu ecclesiae bona erit expositio, non autem quam fingit R.Salomon de sua fabulosa synagogae congregatione. Magister Sacri Palatii: Magis placet annotatio P. Roberti (Vat. lat. 14628, 109r). Final censura: quae dicuntur de ecclesia et conversione gentium, perperam detorquuntur ad synagogam Iudaeorum. 30. Rashi on Ezekiel 1:27 (Vat. lat. 14628, 123v) Et vidi tamquam colorem electri. Non data est facultas intelligendi versiculum istum. Censura: Et supra R. Salomon de hac voce Hasmal, id est electri, dixerat, nescimus quid sit. Sed D. Hieronymus aptissime electrum vertit, mirorque Lyranum non satis probare hanc interpretationem, et praeferre R. Salomonem Divo Hieronymo. 31. Rashi on Ezekiel 1:4 (Vat. lat. 14628, 123r) Quasi color electri de medio ignis, quod his appellatur electrum He‫  למשח‬angelus est, cui tale erat nomen et similitudinem quandam braice ‫חשמל‬ coloris eius vidit in medio ignis, Consimile quiddam narrant maiores nostri de quodam puero, qui cum legeret historiam hanc de divina quadriga, quam Hebrei marcheva appellant, et defixus intenderet in hoc electrum exiit ignis de electro, illumque consumpsit. Insuper dixerunt vocem hanc esse compositam ceu cum dicunt quid est electrum? Dixit Rabbi Juda, animalia ignis loquentia. In Misnach hoc traditur: Aliquando tacent, aliquando loquuntur. Quando verbum exit ab ore Dei tacent, quando verbum non exit ab ore Dei loquuntur, nempe quod commendant, et laudant Deum ps. 5. Similitudo hominis in eis. Mirum est hoc quod dicitur. 32. Rashi on Leviticus 10:12 (Vat. lat. 14628, 30v-31r) Filii eius, qui superstites fuerunt scilicet a caede. Docet quod etiam super illos decreta erat sententia mortis pro iniquitate vituli. hoc est quod dicitur, Et contra Aaron iratus est Dominus valde ut destrueret eum. Nec est destructio nisi consumptio et deletio filiorum, quia dicitur, Et perditur fructus eius desuper Amos 2:9. Et oratio Mosis medietatem substulit quoniam dicitur, Et oravit etiam pro Aaron in tempore illo.

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Censura: Apocryphum et arbitrarium dictum. Censura (Vat. lat. 14629, 173r): Nota quod hanc sententiam latam a Deo contra filios Aharon init Lyranus. Sed Burgensis improbat. Videndum esset an ‫ שמד‬significet interfectionem cum tota posteritate ubique in lege praesertim in Deuteronomio ubi talis vox fere semper repetitur. 33. Rashi on Judges 18:31 [=30] (Vat. lat. 14628, 56v) Usque ad diem captivitatis terrae, per Senacherib prima captivitate. Censura: Ergo praesens liber Judicum scriptus fuisset non a Samuele, ut consensus est pene omnium sed multis saeculis deinceps, si vera esset haec Salomonis expositio. Revisio (Vat. Lat. 14628, 263r): Neque hoc loco video ullum errorem R. Salomonis. Nam etsi liber Judicum credatur scriptus a Samuele, tamen non est omnino certum, et praeterea constat nonnulla addita ab Esdra, qui omnes libros collegit, et in unum corpus redegit, ut evidenter demonstrat Beda in septimo capite libri primi Esdrae. Illa enim Deuteronomii ultima “Et non surrexit ultra propheta in Israel sicut Moses” non possunt esse verba nisi alicuius qui diu post Mosem extiterit. Etiam primo Rege 9 “qui nunc propheta dicitur, olim vocabatur videns” non potest esse dictum a Samuele, qui creditur auctor primi libri Regum, sed ab aliquo posteriore. Magister Sacri Palatii (Vat. lat. 14628, 263r): Sed R. Salomon praetermittit veriorem expositionem quandam D. Hieronymi qui interpretatur diem captivitatis suae id est arcae per Philisteos. De quo videndus est Lyranus qui magis hoc probat. Nec arbitror probabile hunc librum tanto post tempore fuisse conscriptum vel fuisse ei ab aliquo posteriore additionem factam praesertim sacrae historiae. 34. Rashi on Hosea 14:3 (Vat. lat. 14628, 136r) Et accipe bonum. Paucum quod est de nostris bonis operibus cape in manu tua et iudica nos iuxta illa dumtaxat, sic etiam David dixit: “oculi tui videant aequitates”. Censura: Praeiudicium est divinae iustitiae et ita exponere est dare habenas ad peccandi licentiam. Revisio (Vat. lat. 14628, 138r): Cum R. Salomone consentiunt D. Hieronymus, Lyranus et glossa interlinearis.

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APPENDIX VI Vat. lat. 14628, 250r

Kimhi on Isaiah: 25:10 Nominat Edom de cuius genere credunt esse christianos. 26:14 Innuunt nos idolis servire. 34:1 Dum nominat Edom fatentur se de nobis loqui, quod et in novis impressionibus sublatum fuit. [34]:2 Pariter nomen Edom et Romae in novis codicibus noviter impressis deletum est. [40]:21 Loquuntur de idolatris quamvis ipsi afferant de eis suorum temporum. 45:20 Notat adorantes imagines et idolatras vocat. 49:6 Quae male sonabant, sunt prorsus sublata in novis. 51:6 Agunt de perditione populorum qui affligunt Israel, quod deleverunt in novis. [51]:7 Delendum est, quod in christianos evomunt. 52:1 Delendum est ubi christianos innuunt in Edom. Ita etiam versum 5. [52]:13 Delendum est, ubi conversos ad fidem tangit, et haereticos nominat quod factum est in novis. 54:1 Quia loquuntur contra Ecclesiam christianorum, et de Roma, tollenda sunt ut in novis nomen Romae abrasum est. 55[=56]:10 Tollendum contra gentes. 57:6 In correctione quam habebat Pater Guilielmus, repertum est aliquid notatu dignum.1 63:1 Nominant Edom pro Romano Imperio. 66:17 Signo crucis dicit, signatos impuros esse et pariter qui suillam comedunt quae omnia in novis sublata sunt et quod dicunt de Regno quarto tunc deleverunt.

1   The text was not included in the collection from Kimhi’s commentary on Isaiah and was apparently a personal contribution by a certain Guilielmus, who may have been one of the three neophytes, who in 1588 were entrusted with the revision of the Talmud, a project which never materialised, see ACDF, Prot. B f. 97.

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203

APPENDIX VII 1. Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 262r In Machazor 26 legitur imprecatio quam ter quotidie orant contra nos. Benedictus tu domine Rex, qui diligis iustitiam et iudicium et ipsis ‫מלשינין‬ (i. detractoribus vel delatoribus, quidam inquisitoribus interpretantur) numquam sit spes et omnes…. (obliteratum erat sed legebatur ‫( מנים‬i. conversi ad fidem christianam seu haeretici qui se desciverunt a fide iudaica) momento perdant et omnes gentes hostes populi tui Israel celeriter succidantur et regnum temerarium vel apte praevaricans celeriter eradicetur et frangas et deprimas illos velociter in diebus nostris. Benedictus tu domine qui frangis hostes et resistis superbis. Censura: dicunt ebraeos addidisse hanc orationem et interseruisse in decem et octo orationibus, quas quotidie recitant, ut christianorum sectam, quam multiplicari videbant, extinguerint. Certe minim non sonat aliud quam apostatas et abnegantes iudaismum. 2. Vat. ebr. 513, fol. 20v Et scidit ligna holocausti: dicunt Ebraei fuisse duo tantum ligna. Hinc legitur hoc loco propter duas scissiones, quas scidit pater noster Abraham, meruit Abraham quod divideretur in duas partes mare rubrum ante filios suos. Censura: videndum est diligentius, unde manavit apud Ebraeos haec traditio quod duo tantum ligna Abraham in holocaustum filii acceperit: quod si probatur et fidem obtineat favet admodum apte mysterio Crucis. 31. Vat. ebr. 512,75r – Bibl. Rab. 1, 553-56 Et ecce constat nobis quod sunt vigiliae seu excubiae (quod ebraice dicitur masmeroth) in caelo et in terra. Quia fertur dictum R. Eliezer: Tribus excubiis nox integratur /dividitur et in singulis illarum / in qualibet excubia sedet Deus et rugit instar leonis / ut leo, quia legitur, deus ab alto seu excelso rugiet et de habitatione sua dabit vocem suam rugiendo rugiet super habitaculum suum Jer. 25,28 [25,30]. Signum autem de re /huius rei primae vigiliae est asinus potius rudens / rudit; secundae canes latrantes / latrant; tertiae infantes suggentes / infans sugit ubera matris et uxoris blandientis seu colloquentis / uxor colloquitur cum marito suo. Sed quis sensus est / cogitat R. Eliezer? Si principium vigiliae etc [Si principium excubiarum quaerat; principium primae excubiae (quaerere superfluum est) et signum ad quid? Iam notum est. Si finem excubiarum investigat: finis ultimae 1   The text in cursive is identical in both versions. The parts in regular font are found only in Vat. ebr. 512. Differences are underlined in Vat. ebr. 512 followed by Bartolocci’s rendering in regular font. Bartolocci’s additions and comments are put between square brackets.

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APPENDIX VII

custodiae ad quid? Signum eius certum est: sed investigat finem primae excubiae, et principium ultimae, et medium mediae etc]2. Quod sequitur sunt scrupulosae argutiae thalmudicae ad nihilum utiles et proinde omissae. Deinde sic legitur: tribus excubiis nox constat et in singulis illis sedet deus et rugit quasi leo et dicit, Veh mihi quia destruxi domum meam et incendio absumpsi templum meum et in captivitatem abieci filios meos inter populos mundi3. Legitur [seu est traditio]: dixit R. Jose: forte / aliquando ibam prosequens iter meum / per viam et ingressus sum in ruinas quasdam civitatis Jerosolymae orandi causa / ad orandum. Venit Elias (quod felix et faustum sit) / beatae momoriae et praestolabatur me ad ostium et expectavit donec absolverem orationem meam. Postquam absolvi dixit mihi, Pax tibi Rabi. Dixi ei, Pax item et tibi Rabi et domine. Dixit mihi, fili mi: cuius gratia ingressus es has ruinas? Dixi ei, ut orarem. Dixit mihi, licebat etiam per viam orare. Dixi, timui ne me interpellarent viatores. Dixit mihi, poteras uti brevi et compendiosa oratione. In ista ora tria ab eo didici. Primum non ingrediendum esse in ruinas seu desolata loca. Secundum quod licet in via et itinere orare. Tertium quod qui orat in itinere uti debet perbrevi oratione. Deinde mihi dixit, Fili mi, quam vocem audivisti in ruinosis illis parietibus? Dixi, Audivi filiam vocis seu echo gementem instar columbae et dicentem: Veh mihi quia dirui domum meam et incendi templum meum et adegi in captivitatem filios meos inter populos / nationes mundi. Tunc dixit, ita vivas tu et caput tuum. Non hac tantum vice sic loquitur / dicit Deus, sed quotidie ter in die sic proclamat, neque hoc dumtaxat, sed eo tempore quo Israel ingreditur synagogas et scholas [academias] et respondet Amen, sit nomen eius magnum benedictum; deus [sanctus benedictus] movet caput suum et dicit, o beatum regem cui contigit habere eiusmodi laudatores in domo sua. Et veh patri qui pellit et extrudit filios suos in exilium [inter nationes]. Et veh filiis qui exulant a   Here Bartolocci summarises the Talmudic question: “What does R. Eliezer understand [by the word watch]? Does he mean the beginning of the watches? The beginning of the first watch needs no sign, it is the twilight! Does he mean the end of the watches? The end of the last watch needs no sign; it is the dawn of the day! He, therefore, must think of the end of the first watch, of the beginning of the last watch, and of the midst of the middle watch”. The continuation, which Bartolocci like the composer of Vat. ebr.512 considers “scrupulous Talmudic arguments that are of no use whatsoever and therefore omitted”, reads: “If you like I can say: He refers to the end of all the watches. And if you object that the last watch needs no sign, [I reply] that it may be of use for the recital of the Shema’, and for a man who sleeps in a dark room  and does not know when the time of the recital arrives. When the woman talks with her husband and the child sucks from the breast of the mother, let him rise and recite”. 3   Here Bartolocci inserts a passage from the Zohar, followed by a long exposé accusing the Jews of making God powerless, ignorant and most miserable, since He never gets any rest, whereas Jeremiah 25:30 refers to the force of God’s justice, through which he had decreed to take revenge against the Jewish people, to destroy Jerusalem, to burn down the temple and to lead the whole people into captivity in Babylon. 2

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APPENDIX VII

205

mensa parentum suorum. Haec in Thalmud4. [Vide quam infelix sit Deus Rabbinorum, qui non tantum ter in nocte, sed etiam ter in die, imo frequentius et quasi per totam diem, dum Iudaei Synagogam, aut scholas ingrediuntur , plorat, ululat, gemit et dolet, quia Iudaeos in captivitatem adigit. Cur autem ter in nocte Deum rugire dicatur5]. R. Salomon addit / assignat rationem cur deus ter in die rugit, quia in auctoritate illa Jeremiae citata ter dicitur rugiet, rugiendo, rugiet. [Digna certe tanto Rabbino speculatio6].

  Bartolocci gives the reference in full.   “See how unfortunate the God of the rabbis is, who not only three times in the night, but also three times during the day, and even more frequently, the whole day as it were, while the Jews enter the synagogue or the academies, weeps, wails, sighs and grieves, because He had driven the Jews into captivity. However, as to the question why it is said that God roars three times during the night [...]” 6   “Certainly an observation worthy of a rabbi of such stature” Bartolocci does not make a secret of his contempt for this kind of Jewish exegesis. 4 5

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207

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Manuscripts Paris, Bibliothèque nationale MS latin 16 558 Pistoia, Biblioteca Fabroniana MS 15 Rome, Archivio di Stato di Roma Pergamene 18, cassetta/cartella 35/5 Città del Vaticano, Archivio della Congregazione per la Dottrina della Fede, (ASU) Prot. C Rome, Archivio Storico del Vicariato di Roma (ASVR) Libro delle memorie della Chiesa Atti notarili 1556-1587 Instrumenti 1709-1713 Busta 8, pos.11 Busta 11, pos. 62 Busta 23, pos. 75 Busta 46, pos. 14 Busta 294 Città del Vaticano, Archivio Segreto Vaticano Arm. LXX Rome, Archivum Romanum Societatis Jesu (ARSI) Opp NN 313 Opp NN 336 Città del Vaticano, Biblioteca Vaticana MS Vat. ebr. 513-4 MS Vat. ebr. 512 MS Vat. ebr. 527 MS Vat. lat. 14628 MS Vat. lat. 14629

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Bibliography

MS Vat. lat. 14630 MS Vat. lat. 6207 MS Vat. lat. 6416 MS Borg. lat. 149 MS Neofiti 35 MS Neofiti 37 MS Ott. lat. 2452 Rome, Pontificia Università Gregoriana MS 385b

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INDEX OF SOURCES

Old Testament Genesis 1:21, 134 n. 19 1:26, 134 n. 19 2:23, 134 n. 19 6:6, 134 n. 19 9:24-27, 20 15:10, 134 n. 19 15:14, 134 n. 19 15:17, 134 n. 19 17:1, 156 22:3, 157 24:16, 134 n. 19 42:25, 46 n. 40 49:10, 20-1, 115, 163

Deuteronomy 7:14, 116 12:3, 134 n. 19 27:15, 98 27:26, 98 21:13, 134 n. 19 21:22-23, 105 n. 88 28:64, 134 n. 19 32:21, 134 n. 19 32:27, 134 n. 19 32:28, 134 n. 19 Joshua 7:1, 103 8:33, 98 9:11, 46 n. 40 21:34-40, 110

Exodus

Judges

21:1, 134 n. 19 22:30, 134 n. 19 23:13, 134 n. 19 23:26, 116

2:1, 74

Leviticus 9:24, 100 10:9, 100 21:1, 26 n. 82 23, 27 and 32, 107 n. 96 Numbers 23:10, 134 n. 19 24:3, 134 n. 19 24:19, 134 n. 19 28:15, 88, 134 n. 19

1 Samuel 9:9, 128 10:8, 119 11:1, 123 n. 152 12:12, 123 n. 152 15:3, 119 n. 138 15:9, 119 n. 138 16:11, 139 2 Samuel 2:5, 139 2:7, 139 5:4, 139 10:2, 122-3 21:10, 105 n. 87

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222

Index of sources

1 Kings

Jeremiah

3:2, 119 n. 138

22:30, 104 25:30, 164 31:31, 21 52:31, 121

2 Kings 23:14-18, 123 n. 154 1 Chronicles 3:17, 104 2 Chronicles 7:9-10, 106 n. 94 21:1-4, 123 26:16-8, 121 n. 145 26:18, 119 Job 1:6-7, 141-2 19:27, 89-90 Psalms 21:17, 20 Wisdom 6:12, 121 7:5-8, 184 (9) 7:17-21, 184 (9)

Ezekiel 11: 16, 108 16:53, 117 Daniel 1-6, 70 7-12, 70 9:24-7, 20 Hosea 1:6, 114 n. 123 3:4, 21 14:3, 129 Zechariah 8:23, 116 n.131 14:5, 119 n. 141 14:9, 166 New Testament Matthew 1:11-2, 105 n. 85 5:38-40, 103 n. 79 18:19 (=20), 112

Song of Songs

Acts of the Apostles

1:13, 44

13:21, 139

Isaiah

Romans

11:2, 116 11:10, 115 26:7, 75 33:1, 80 53:4, 20

9:24-6, 114 15:8-9, 115 2 Corinthians 3:12-6, 29

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Index of sources

Galatians

Eruvin,

3:28, 148 n. 82

62b-63a, 100 n.66

2 Thessalonians

Pesahim

2:8, 128

10:11-8, 94 n. 39

50a, 167 64a, 97 84b-85a, 99 87b, 113 n. 121 and 123

James

Yoma

5:17, 113

3:9, 103 n.79

22b, 119 n. 138 28b, 102 69a, 120 n. 144 80a, 99-100

Revelation

Betza

21:8, 161

16a, 154 n. 13

Josephus

Rosh ha-Shanah

Antiquitates

7a, 102 n. 76 26a, 120 n. 143

Hebrews

1 Peter

VI, 14 § 9, 139 n. 45 X, 7 § 4, 139 n. 45 XI, 8 §§ 4-6, 120 n.144 Rabbinic literature Mishnah Berakhot 8:8, 148 Yoma 8:1, 107 n. 96 Megillah IV:3, 111 n. 115

Ta’anit 17b, 100 n. 67 Mo’ed Katan 9a, 106 n. 95 Hagigah

Babylonian Talmud

13a, 125 n. 164 13b, 120 n. 142

Berakhot 3a, 164-6

Yevamot

Shabbat 11a, 163-4 89a, 96, 158 n. 36

223

79a, 106 n. 92 Ketubot 38a, 103 n. 78

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224

Index of sources

Sotah 32a, 98 n. 55 Baba Mezia 90b, 100 n. 67 Sanhedrin 5a, 163 14a, 162 n. 56 16a, 106 n. 91 22b, 100 n. 67 37b-38a, 104 n. 83 83b, 100 n. 67 Avodah zarah 26a, 163 Shevuot 36b, 100 n. 67 Keritot 13b, 100 n. 67 Mekhilta 55 Sifra

Genesis Rabbah 12:15, 154 n. 16 22:8, 155 n. 19 Leviticus Rabbah 5:1, 100 n. 67 12:1, 100 n. 67 20:9, 100 n. 67 36:7, 119 n. 138 Numbers Rabbah 20:20, 104 n. 83 Pesikta Rabbati piska 47, 104 n. 83 Echa Rabbati 5:11, 116 n. 128 Jerome Commentariorum Esaiam libri I-XI, 111 n. 113 Commentariorum in Hiezehielem libri XIV, 117 n. 133 Commentarii in Prophetas minores, 29 n. 183 Epistula CXXIX ad Dardanum, de terra promissionis, 140 n. 48

55

Augustine De Civitate Dei 15:13, 111

Sifre Numbers

Thomas Aquinas

Balak par. 131, 113 n. 122

Summa Theologica Ia, Quaestio 65 Art. 2, 154 n. 17 Summa Theologica Ia, Quaestio 76 Art. 3, 154 n. 15 Summa Theologica IIa IIae, Quaestio 10 Art. 11, 94 n. 38 Summa Theologica IIa IIae, Quaestio 85 Art. 1, 155 n. 20

Sifre on Numbers and Deuteronomy 55 Midrash Rabbah 45-6, 53-4, 178 (14)

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GENERAL INDEX

Aba, see Asher, Abraham ben Abravanel, Isaac 45, 46, 54, 175 (5a and 5b) Adamanzio da Firenze 53, 57-60, 66, 71, 146-8, 176 (8b), 190 (3) Albo, Joseph 55 Aleinu, see Prayers Alfasi, Isaac ben Jacob, 55, 148, 174 (3) Andreatta, Michela, 54 n. 97 Apparatus sacer, 145 Aquario, Mattia 53, 57-60, 67, 179 (15), 180 (21), 190 (1) Aquaviva, Claudio 8-9 Arcangelo da Borgonovo 146 Asher, Abraham ben 45, 181 (26) Asher ben Jehiel 161 Ba’al ha-Turim, see Jacob ben Asher Bahya ben Hlava ben Asher 50, 55, 134, 185 (3) Bartolocci, Giulio 15 n. 31-3, 24, 53, 159 Bede 127-8 Bellarmine, Robert 8, 11-3, 47, 523, 63-7, 73-4, 88-90, 98, 105, 10911, 114-5, 122, 124, 127-9, 174 (2), 175 (4, 5a-b, 6), 176 (7, 8a), 177 (8c), 179 (15, 16, 19), 180 (20, 21, 22), 181 (25), 185 (3), 190 (1, 3), 191 (5) Benedictus (Jesuit) 23 Bible Biblical commentaries, 41-6, 4851, 92-6, 100-1 Hebrew, 108-11 Oral Torah 101-3 Rabbinic Bible 41-4, 64, 133-4, 137-8

Vulgate 107-11 Written Torah 103-6 Birkat ha-Minim, see Prayers Bomberg, Daniel 5, 41-2 Borgia, Francesco 11-2 Borgia, Joannes Baptista 160 Bulls Antiqua judaeorum improbitas (Gregory XIII) 34, 36 Cum nimis absurdum (Paul IV) 30-1 Cum sicut nuper (Julius III) 10, 93 Decet Romanum Pontificem (Leo X) 9 Pastoris aeterni vices (Julius III) 32 Romanus Pontifex (Pius V) 31 Sancta Mater Ecclesia (Gregory XIII) 25, 34, 36, 141 Sicut Judaeis (Gregory the Great) 29 Vices ejus nos (Gregory XIII) 25, 34, 36 Vineam Soreth (Nicholas III) 25 n. 76 Cajetan, Thommaso De Vio 95 Callixtus II 29 Carafa, Gian Pietro 28-9 Carreto, Ludovico 145 Casa dei Catecumeni, see Rome Casa dei Neofiti, see Rome, Collegio dei Neofiti Censorship general 7-11, 61 Hebrew books 90, 131-8, 191 (6) Chiesa Nuova, see Rome, Santa Maria in Vallicella Ciappi, Marc’Antonio 32-3

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226

GENERAL INDEX

Clement IX, pope, 191 (6) Collegio dei Neofiti, see Rome Commentaries, biblical, see Bible Congregation of the Index, see Holy See Constabile, Paolo 62-3, 134, 176 (8a), 185 (3 n. 4) Council of Trent 27, 58, 107, 109, 154 De Ahumada, Diego 53, 57-60, 62, 175 (4), 180 (20-21) De arcanis catholicae veritatis 144 Dechiaratione sopra il nome di Giesu 146 De Monte, Andrea 15 n. 33, 20-6, 35-7 Döring, Matthias 126 Dowry 33-4 Elia ben Menahem ha-Rofé, see Eustachio Epistula ad Iudaeos 145 Erasmus 10 Eustachio, Giovanni Paolo 15, 5760, 143, 175 (4), 175 (5a), 179 (15), 180 (20) Evil-merodach 121-2 Expurgation, see censorship Fabri, Sisto 7-8, 24, 62-3, 135-8, 175 (6), 178 (12b, c) Farissol, Abraham 41, 43, 179 (18) Felice da Prato 41 Finus, Adrianus 145 Fioghi, Marco Fabiano 57-60, 143, 148-9, 174 (3) Fragnito, Gigliola 19 n. 51 and 52 Frajese, Vittorio 57 Franceschi, Alessandro 15 Francisco de Toledo 17-8, 59 Galatino, Pietro 144-5 Gematria 112, 156 Génébrard, Gilbert 47, 180 (22), 181 (25) Geraldino, Giacomo, 132

Gerondi, Jonah 47, 140, 148-9, 180 (21), 184 (9) Gerosolimitano, Domenico 132-3 Gersonides, see Levi ben Gershon Gesù, chiesa del, see Rome Ghetto, Roman, , see Rome Gikatilla, Joseph ben Abraham 67 Giustiniani, Marco Antonio 28 Giustiniani, Vincenzo 24 Glossa ordinaria et interlinearis 1259, 140 Godman, Peter 57 n. 5, 60 n. 24, 67 n. 65 Gratia Dei, Johannes Baptista 24, 145 Gregory the Great 29, 94 Gregory XIII 16, 19, 25, 31-7 Halikhot Olam 144 Havdalah 154 Herod the Great 21, 26 Hezekiah 157-8 Hippolite of Ferrara, 132, 134 Hoffmann, Karl 25 n. 77, 57 Holy Office, see Holy See, Inquisition, Roman Holy See Congregation of the Index 19, 60-2 Inquisition, Roman 19, 28-9, 94-5 Magister Sacri Palatii 60, 61 n. 28, 121-4 Ibn Ezra, Abraham 41, 43-4, 49-51, 53, 174 (2), 183 (4), 184 (5), 188 (6) introduction to Genesis, 102, 192 (7) on Genesis 18:32, 112, 196 (16) on Exodus 21:24, 102-3, 193 (8) Ibn Yahya, David ben Solomon 41, 43, 66 Iggeret Shalom 20-2 Imbonati, Carlo 53-4

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GENERAL INDEX

Immanuel ben Solomon of Rome 50, 188 (8) In Iudaeos flagellum 145 Index expurgatorius 10-11, 39, 68, 131-8, 162 Index librorum prohibitorum 8-10, 19, 26-7, 30, 36 Inquisition, Roman, see Holy See Isaiah ben Elijah di Trani 44, 177 (10) Jacob ben Asher 43, 53, 176 (7) on Genesis 28:16, 112-3, 196 (18) on Exodus 20:24, 112, 156, 196 (17) Jacob ben Hayyim ibn Adonijah 42, 177 (11) Jeconia, king of Judah 104 Jerome 115-7, 123-5, 127-8, 140 Jerusalem Temple 20-1 destruction of 21-2, 26 Jews Church policy 29-32 discussions with 138-48, 161, 167 Judah ben Samuel he-Hasid 46, 180 (20) Julius III 32, 93 Kad HaKemach 55 Kav ve-naki 43, 66, 179 (16), 191 (5) Kimhi, David 41, 43, 50-1, 53, 177-8 (12a, b, c), 187 (5) Kimhi on

Joshua introduction, 108-9, 194 (14) 21:7, 110, 195 (15)



Judges 6:25, 99 n. 61



1 Kings (=1 Samuel) 13:1, 139



1 Chronicles introduction, 139 3:17, 104, 193 (10)



Isaiah 25:10, 202 26:14, 202 28:16, 157 n. 32 30-33, 80-1, 83 34:1, 202 34:2, 202 40:21, 202 45:20, 202 49:6, 202 51:6, 202 51:7, 202 52:1, 202 52:13, 202 54:1, 202 56:10, 202 57:6, 202 58:13, 99 n. 61 63:1, 202 66:17, 202



Jeremiah 22:30, 104

227

Ezekiel 10:14, 120, 198 (24) 11:18 (=16), 107-8, 194 (13) 16:51 (=53), 117, 198 (22) Kol Bo 144 Le Bachelet, Xavier-Marie 8 n. 5-6 Levi ben Gershon 41, 43, 49, 53, 134, 176 (8a, b, c), 184 (6, 7) on Job 134 1:6-7, 141-2 Liber, Maurice 15 n. 32 Liber de confutatione hebrayce secte 145 Liturgy, Jewish 47-8, 146-9 Lopez, Diego 53, 57-60, 62, 99 n. 60, 174 (2), 176 (7), 176 (8b) Loyola, Ignatius of 27-8 Lupo, Alfonso 17-8 Luther, Martin 9

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228

GENERAL INDEX

Ma’adanei melekh 45, 181 (26) Magister Sacri Palatii, see Holy See Mahzor Romi 47-8, 50, 53, 66, 68, 135, 146-8, 180 (22, 24), 185 (2), 190 (3, 4) Maimonides commentary on the Mishnah 144, 161 Mishneh Torah 153 Marini da Brescia, Marco 53-5, 57, 60, 67, 148, 175 (5b), 175 (6), 178 (14), 179 (19), 190 (1) Martí, Ramón 145 Martin, Gregory 13-23, 26-7, 37 Massorah 44, 49, 184 (8) McGinness, Frederick J. 18, 23, 27 Mekhilta 55 Menachem ha-Me’iri, 46, 54, 180 (19) Menahem ben Zerah 46, 54, 178 (13) Mercurian, Everard 11 Meshal ha-Kadmoni 144 Messiah 20 Michel de Montaigne 7-8, 13, 15-7, 22-3, 27 Michelson, Emily 23 n. 69, 25 n. 77, 26 n. 84 Midrash 45, 153-4 Mingarelli, Giovanni 19 Minyan 112-3, 156 Moses ben Nahman, see Nahmanides Nahalat Avot 46 Nahmanides 41, 43, 66, 179 (17) on Job 19:27, 89-90, 191 (5) Neophytes, see Rome, Collegio dei Neofiti Neri, Filippo 23-4 New Testament, 111-5 Nicholas III 25 n. 76

Nicholas of Lyra 118-29 Notarikon 112 Or ha-sekhel see Ma’adanei melekh Oral Torah, see Bible Oratorio della Trinità, , see Rome Panigarola, Francesco 18 Parente, Fausto 10 n. 12, 19 n. 51, 20 n. 53, 57, 59 n. 16, 60 n. 26, 69 n.1 Paul III 28 Paul IV 30-1 Paul of Burgos 126-7 Perez de Valentia, Jacobus 145 Piske Halakot 161 Pius IV 31-2 Pius V 25, 31-2 Popper, William 40, 57, 131-5 Porchetto de Salvatici, Victor 145 Porges, Nathan 57, 131-3 Possevino, Antonio 9, 12, 16-7, 141, 145 Prayers, Jewish 148-9 Aleinu 147 Birkat ha-Minim 146-7, 156-7 Morning prayer 147-8 Prophecy 20-1, 124 Provençal, Abraham 131-2 Pugio fidei, 145 Rabbinic Bible, see Bible Rashi 41-3, 48-50, 173 (1), 182-4, 185 (1), 186 (4) Rashi on

Genesis 4:8, 155 4:9, 158 26:5, 102, 192 (6)



Exodus 12:3 (=6), 97, 192 (2) 12:46, 99, 192 (4) 32:1, 96, 192 (1) 32:7, 88

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Leviticus 10:1, 99 n. 59 10:1-2, 100, 192 (5) 10:12, 126-7, 200 (32)





Numbers 5:2, 98 n. 56 13:26, 140 14:31 (=34), 140 22:10, 158 26:54, 98 n. 56 28:15, 88 32:20, 99 n. 59



Psalms 68(=69):31, 155



Proverbs 2:12, 89



Deuteronomy 10-11, 76-7 12, 99 n. 59 26 (=27:12), 97-8, 192 (3) 31:11, 98 n. 56 31:26, 98 n. 56



Isaiah 2:2, 21 4:1, 111-6, 197 (21) 6:4, 121, 198 (25) 14:19, 122 38:9, 157 n. 32 38:16, 157 n. 32 63:7, 89 66:7, 123-4, 199 (29)



Jeremiah 1:5, 114-5, 197 (20) 52:31, 121-2



Ezekiel 1:4, 125, 200 (31) 1:10, 120 1:27, 124-5, 200 (30) 10:14, 120 37:3, 158



Hosea 2:1, 113, 196 (19) 5:10, 72 n. 24 6:13, 72 n. 24 13:3(=2), 138 13:14, 72 n. 24 14:3, 129, 201 (34)



Obadiah 20, 72 n. 24



Habakkuk 2:15, 72 n. 24



Zechariah 14:5, 121

Joshua 7:20-21, 103-4, 193 (9)

Judges 5:23, 99 n. 59 6:19, 99 n. 59 18:31 (=30), 127-8, 201 (33)



1 Kings (=1 Samuel) 9:24, 99 n. 59 13:9, 119, 198 (23) 17:53, 99 n. 59 22:4, 122-3, 199 (27)



2 Kings (=2 Samuel) 21:9 (=10), 105-6, 194 (11) 22:8, 99 n. 59



3 Kings (=1 Kings) 4:16, 99 n. 59 8:65-6, 106, 194 (12) 22:7, 99



4 Kings (=2 Kings) 20:1, 157 n. 32 20:14, 157-8 25:26 (=27), 121-2, 199 (26)

229

2 Chronicles 21:12, 123, 199 (28)

Job 14:22, 89

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230

GENERAL INDEX

Raz-Krakotzkin, Amnon 27 n. 87, 93 n. 34 Recanati, Menahem ben Benjamin 45, 53, 179 (15) Reusch, Franz H. 30 n. 104 Ricci, Saverio 57 Richler, Benjamin 20 n. 56, 151 n. 2 Ridolfi, Pietro 26 Rizpah 105-6 Rome Casa dei Catecumeni 28, 32-5, 51 Casa dei Neofiti, see Rome, Collegio dei Neofiti Chiesa Nuova, see Santa Maria in Vallicella Collegio dei Neofiti 16, 35-6, 52-3 Gesù, chiesa del 23 Ghetto, Roman 30-1 Neophytes, see Collegio dei Neofiti Oratorio della Trinità 13, 16, 22, 23 n. 65, 25-6 Santi Apostoli, basilica dei 23 Santa Maria in Vallicella, chiesa di 23-4 Santa Maria sopra Minerva, basilica di 23-4 Santa Pudenziana, basilica di 159-60 Synagogue 32, 108, 124 Rosh Amanah 46, 53-4 Saadiah Gaon 44, 50, 144, 188 (7) Saba, Abraham ben Jacob 44, 53, 175 (4) Sacerdote, Gustavo 11, 40, 57, 131 Santa Maria in Vallicella, chiesa di, see Rome Santa Maria sopra Minerva, basilica di, see Rome Santa Pudenziana, basilica di, see Rome Santi Apostoli, basilica dei, see Rome

Santoro, Giulio Antonio 16, 18-20, 58, 66-8, 74-5, 101, 137-8, 140-1, 190 n. 1 Saul, king of Judah 119 Savelli, Giacomo 26 Schüller, Ludovico 51 Seder Olam Rabbah 47, 144, 181 (25) Sefer ha-Emunot we-ha-De’ot, 144 Sefer ha-Halakhot 55, 92, 148, 174 (3) Sefer Hasidim 46, 53, 180 (20) Sefer ha-Ikkarim 55 Sefer ha-Zikuk, 132-5 Segre, Renata 25 n. 77-8, 30 n. 103 Sennacherib 127-8 Sermons general 11-12, 18 n. 44, 25 n. 77, 27 to the Jews 12-8, 20-7, 36-7, 141, 160, 170 Sforno, Obadiah ben Jacob 45, 54, 175 (6) Sha’arei Orah 67, 190 (2) Sha’arei Teshuvah 46-7, 74-5, 180 (21) Sha’arei Tsedek 67, 190 (2) Sifra 55 Sifrei 55 Simeon bar Yochai 67 Simeon ha-Darshan 43, 143, 177 (9) Sirleto, Guglielmo 16, 66, 96 Sisto da Siena 95-6 Sixtus V 8 Solomon, king 106 Solomon ben Isaac, see Rashi Stern, Moritz 29 n. 94-97, 30 n. 99 Stow, Kenneth 28 n. 90 and 93, 30 n. 103, 31 n. 105 Synagogue, see Rome Talmud 30-31, 36, 96-101, 160-67 burning of 10 n. 12, 28-9, 91-3 Basel Talmud 162

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General Index

Targum 50, 108, 188 (9), 189 (10-2) Tarugi, Francesco Maria 17-8, 24 Tasso, Faustino 22 Theatrum vitae humanae 61 Thomas Aquinas 94-5, 154-5 Torah she-be-`al peh, see Bible, Oral Torah Torah shebiktav, see Bible, Written Torah Torano, Giovanni di 28 Torres, Francisco 94-97, 171 Tosafists 161

231

Van Boxel, Piet 33-4 n.116-21, 42 n. 12, 64 n. 48, 65 n. 54, 107 n. 99, 109 n. 107, 135 n. 26, 138 n. 37 Victoria adversus impios Hebraeos, 145 Visdomini, Franceschino 23 Yalkut Shimoni 143, 156-7 Zeidah la-Derekh 46, 54, 178 (13) Zeror hamor 44-5, 53, 175 (4) Zevah Pesah 46 Zohar 66-7, 190 (1) Zucchi, Alberto 15 n. 35, 18 n .44, 23 n. 65

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