Pardes Mosheh (Collection of Letters, Poems, and Eulogies), Moses Zacuto, Amsterdam: 1742-1763

137 leaves (7 3/4 x 6 1/8 in.; 198 x 158 mm)[i], 1-127 + 1, 128-134, [i]=137 leaves

Johann Christoph Wolf’s Bibliothecae Hebraeae, vol. 4 (Hamburg, 1733), p. 1200; Yaakov Lattes, “The Printed Works of Rabbi Moses Zacuto,” Pe‘amim 96 (2003): 21-33 (in Hebrew); Moses Zacuto, I Raise My Heart: Poems, ed. Dvora Bregman (Jerusalem, 2009) (in Hebrew).

Rabbi Moses Zacuto (c. 1620-1697), halakhist, kabbalist, liturgist, and poet of considerable note, was one of the most prolific Italian Jewish authors of the seventeenth century. Born into a family of Portuguese conversos that had settled in Amsterdam, he took an interest in Kabbalah at a young age, moving to Posen and then Verona to immerse himself in its study. In 1645, he relocated again to Venice, where he served as a rabbi, preacher, and proofreader, and in 1673 became rabbi of Mantua, a position he held until his death.

The present lot comprises a unique collection of Zacuto’s correspondence with individuals and communities throughout Europe and the Land of Israel on halakhic and social issues; poems and riddles composed for all manner of special occasions, particularly weddings, as well as topical poems on various themes; letters of recommendation for charity collectors; elegies on the passing of a number of rabbinic colleagues (most prominently, Yom Tov Lipmann Heller [1654]); and epitaphs he had prepared for the tombstones of the departed, including his daughter Hannah and his wife Esther. Headed by an elegantly decorated title page, the over one hundred eighty documents in this volume were copied and assembled between the years 1742 and 1763, and to the end of the collection was appended a transcription of Zacuto’s epitaph copied from Johann Christoph Wolf’s Bibliothecae Hebraeae.

While some of Zacuto’s correspondence on kabbalistic and halakhic matters appeared in Sefer Iggerot ha-Remez (Livorno, 1780; corrected ed.: Jerusalem, 1998), and some of his poetry has been published in recent years, a great deal of material in the present manuscript has never before been printed.

Unpublished collection of letters, rulings, and poems by Rabbi Moses Zacuto. See Avivi report for full table of contents. Sold at auction by J. L. Joachimsthal, Amsterdam 1899 (lot 3499): Note on final folio, which contains the text of Zacuto’s epitaph, points you to Johannes Wolf’s Bibliothecae Hebraeae, vol. 4, p. 1200, as the source of the epitaph.