Bidspirit auction | Tumat Yesharim, Four Early Works

Tumat Yesharim, Four Early Works Edited by Rabbi Benjamin Motal. First Edition, Venice 1622 - Fine Handwritten Title Page. - Sefer Tumat Yesharim is a rare and important anthology containing four early rabbinic works together with several shorter pamphlets, edited and published by Rabbi Benjamin Motal, one of the leading sages of Constantinople in the early seventeenth century. Only Edition. Venice, 1622. The volume bears the symbolic collective title Tumat Yesharim (“The Integrity of the Upright”) and contains the following works: Ohalei Tam — responsa by Rabbi Tam ibn Yahya, among the early Sephardic sages, containing concise halachic discussions on Shabbos, ritual law, monetary law, and related topics. Derech Tamim — glosses and annotations on the Rif by Rabbi Yosef Shalom, including novellae and analytical discussions on the rulings of the Rif. Tamim De'im — rulings and critical glosses of the Abraham ben David of Posquières on the Rif, accompanied by explanations and references supplied by the editor. Klalei Shmuel — methodological principles in Talmud study by Rabbi Shmuel ibn Sirilyo (Ibn Sid), among the early scholars of Talmudic methodology, dealing with the structure of the Mishnah, the organization of sugyos, and principles of analogy and language. Additionally included are several smaller treatises, homiletical passages, and glosses added by the editor. Rabbi Benjamin Motal, the editor of the anthology, was among the distinguished sages of Constantinople, a great grammarian, scholar, and bibliophile who devoted himself to editing and publishing early rabbinic manuscripts. He was also renowned among the printers and proofreaders of his time for his precision and is regarded as a key figure in the transition of Hebrew printing from the Ottoman-Turkish centers to Venice. In both structure and content, the volume presents a broad cross-section of early rabbinic and scholarly literature, spanning from the Geonic period and the early Sephardic authorities through the era of the later early authorities. Its great rarity stems from the fact that it was never reprinted, and the surviving copies today are found mostly in a small number of libraries in Europe and Israel. A large diagram appears on folio 109. Present are: 8; 78; 116 leaves (folio 116 mistakenly numbered 98); 9–120; 66 leaves, from an original total of 104; 120; 94; 66 leaves. 30 Cm. Although all the works in this volume appear here in first editions, the various authors lived in very different periods. The author of Ohalei Tam, Rabbeinu Tam ibn Yahya (not to be confused with Rabbeinu Tam of the Tosafists), was among the foremost disciples of Elijah Mizrachi and lived in the sixteenth century. He was the son of David ibn Yahya and a contemporary of Bezalel Ashkenazi and the Isaac Luria. Abraham ben David of Posquières, author of the famous glosses on the Rambam, lived in the twelfth century. This collection includes responsa and other writings by him under the title Tamim De'im. His annotations on the Rif, printed here for the first time, were later incorporated into the standard editions of the Rif. Rabbi Shmuel ibn Sirilyo, son-in-law of Yitzchak Aboab, was expelled from Spain in 1492 and settled in Egypt. He is cited extensively in the responsa of Moshe Alashkar, Yaakov Berav, and in Midrash Shmuel on Pirkei Avos.