Isaac Abravanel

See also: Abravanel (homonymy)

Dom Itshak Ben Yehouda Abravanel (1437, Lisbon (Portugal) - 1508, Venice (Italy)), member of famous family Abravanel (with the celebrity of which it largely contributed), was a statesman, philosopher, biblical, and financial commentator Juif.

One often refers to him by his only family name, whose pronunciation becomes according to whether one refers to the opinion of scholars or well-read men, Abravanel, Abrabanel, or, in the books of Jewish study, Abarbanel.

The family Abravanel, famous being of ic ascent David, one of oldest and is distinguished, at the same time among the Juif S and the Large ones of Spain. They were established there before the arrival of the Sépharade S, and the catholic Kings used of all the stratagems to try to prevent gift Isaac from following his/her brothers out of Spain in 1492, going until fomenting the removal of its grandson. The presence of Gift Judah Abravanel is attested with Seville, although one speaks already about large Wise Abravanel under Alphonse X says the Wise one.

It is buried with Padoue.

Biography

Abravanel was the pupil of Joseph Hayim Ben Shem Tov, rabbi of Lisbon, and studied in Yeshiva of Rav Isaac Aboab. Poured so much in the rabbinical Literature than in profane sciences of its time, it devoted its youths to the study of Jewish philosophy. At 20 years, he wrote various treaties on the original shape of the paramount elements (fire, air, etc), the religion, prophecy, etc Mentionnons particularly his affinity for Isaïe, also of davidic line. He entered as a treasurer and a collector taxes to the service of the house of Bragance, the first among the large ones of Portugal, whose assets covered one the third of the grounds, and confidants of King Alphonse V

For as much, the Community person in charge was not erased in front of the financier. In a letter addressed to his friend Yehiel of Pisa, Italian banker, it tells how, at the time of the catch of the town of Azrilla, with the Morocco, when the Jews living were reduced there in slavery, it employed most of his fortune to make them release and rehouse these Jews exclusively Arabic-speaking people in Portugal.

The things were spoiled with the making of the capacity. The son of Afonso V, Joao II of Portugal, showed Abravanel of complicity and high treason with the Duke of Bragance. Abravanel, informed in time, flees precipitately in Castille (1483). Its fortune was confiscated by royal decree, and he was condemned to death in absentia. He managed nevertheless to make transfer his family.

With Tolède, where he had elected residence, interpreting its disgrace like a divine reprimand, he harnessed himself being studied biblical, and produces in six months an important comment on the Livre of Josué, the Livre of the Judges, and Samuel. Nevertheless, Bragance exiled at the court of Castille having praised its merits, it entered quickly to the service of the catholic Kings. The Spanish army was ruined in a war exhausting against the kingdom buckwheat of Grenade. Abravanel undertook quickly, with his/her friend Don Abraham Senior, of the incomes of tenant farming, and to supply the Spanish army.

However, Ferdinand II of Aragon, which was used as model with the Prince of Machiavel, and the Queen Isabelle, hardly enacted the expulsion of the Jews of Spain 3 months after the fall of Grenade. By three times, Abravanel tried to make cancel the edict, offering considerable sums which were used to finance the forwarding of Christophe Colomb. It is told that it reached that point almost, but that the Enquiry, i.e. Torquemada was interfered.

The prestige of Abravanel was so large that Kings Catholiques used of all their stratagems to retain it in Spain. They offered to him to remain, as Juif, like 9 men, in order to be able to join together a Minyan (quorum of prayer). They tried to remove its grandson, but this one had already been sent to Portugal.

Finally, he preferred the exile, while Abraham Senior and its Melamed son-in-law were constrained with a baptism in large pump, and sponsored by the catholic Kings. The exile of Abravanel is told in its introduction to the book of Josué. One allotted to him a answer to the decree of Alhambra, which would have been perceived like a Jewish curse against Spain, and would have caused to prohibit with the Juif S was this to press the Spanish ground, until Franco abolishes the decree of Alhambra in 1967. However, Abravanel does not make any mention in its own relation of the facts (introduction to the First Prophets), and it acts more than probably of a literary fiction written in its style.
Il goes without saying that the money having course even in the courses of law, Abravanel could make it possible some Jews to remain in Spain, realizing species sounding, stumbling and important.

Abravanel arrived at Naples, only ground of exile to accept the Jews. It entered quickly to the service of the king and knew a short period of calm, but Italy being a ground of war and covetousness, Naples was invaded soon by the army of France. Abravanel accompanied its Master in Messine, before setting sail towards Corfou in 1495, in Monopoli in 1496, before being fixed at Venice in 1503, where it negotiated a treaty between the Venetian republic and Portugal. The treaty was not concluded, without that harming of anything its prestige, the Portuguese having refused.

Being Jewish, Abravanel could not be buried in Venice, and rests in Padoue.

A hospital in Israel bears its name.

Abravanel philosophizes

It can to appear paradoxical that man, presented like last Jew aristotélicien, whose comment on the Guide of Stray the is so famous that certain editions of the Guide do not hesitate to present Abravanel and Maïmonide side by side, was one of the largest adversaries of philosophy.

However, it did not miss sour words for its predecessors, philosophical eminent Juifs, like Isaac Albalag, ibn Caspi, Shem Tov Ben Falaquera, Gersonide, Moïse Narboni, etc Their opinions, which he considered rationalizing by too and leaving a too great freedom of interpretation as for delicate points religious philosophico, mislaid according to him many Jews, whose piles authentically faithful, and sometimes involved them at worst the inaccuracies or corruptions of their beliefs.

As for Abraham ibn Ezra, the Neo-Platonist par excellence, Abravanel was of agreement with him only on one point: with the foot of the Sinai, the Jews heard and included/understood the Ten Commands. For the remainder, it did not miss invectives in its connection, treating its comments of “futile”, “contrary with the elementary principles of Tora”, obscure without anything bringing to the student. Abravanel does not hesitate, in order to affirm the inanity of an opinion, that Rav Abraham ibn Ezra itself finds it criticizable.

Its attitude towards Maïmonide is definitely more moderate. After having exposed the theses of the Master, he often says: " this is the thought of our Master Brace, not Moïse our Master "

Contrary to the Master and his school of thought, the design of Abravanel on the Judaïsme, very near to that of Juda Halevi, is based on the conviction that God appeared in the history, and turned into to Jews His people of election. Abravanel frankly tackles the rationalist designs of the Master on the prophetic visions, this one relegating them to the row of creations of their imagination. For Abravanel, even it “kol beats” (echo of voice, literally girl of voice) whose one finds many examples in the Talmud, is a true voice, made audible by God, a phenomenon in miraculous truth (comment on the Genèse, chap. 16). In the same way, Abravanel exceeded all its predecessors when it is a question of criticizing the theories of Maïmonide on the “Celestial Tank” of the book of Ezéchiel (comment of the Guide of Stray the, IIIe left: 71-74.)

On the other hand, if it strongly moderates the position of Maïmonide, it often validates it in its biblical Comment.
Ainsi, on the debate as for knowing if Maïmonide adhered or not to the idea eternity of the world, after having disputed, by requesting it to excuse it, the explanation which Rambam of the word Bereshit gives (Guide from stray II, chap 30), Abravanel adds: " And to explain the first word of the first verse in the direction of a temporal anteriority necessarily does not result in posing that creation took place in time, nor does not call into question the principle of creation ex nihilo, as Rambam fears it, because it is not impossible to say that the beginning of which it is question in this verse been part itself of time that he inaugurates and that the creation of the sky and the ground does not come to fall under a former time, but which it is the moment founder of time him-même."
Abravanel thus presents Maïmonide impotent to triumph over the reasoning aristotelician without calling into question the bases of its own system of belief, but convinced for itself of the revealed lesson.

In fact, the arguments of Abravanel itself, for right that they are, are not evidence and generally address only to that which reads its comment, therefore a believer.
As regards the scientific community, this dogma of the eternity of the world will be seriously called into question only to the twentieth century, with the theories of Georges Gamow. Source: Isaac Abravanel, Comment of the account of creation, Genesis 1: 1 to 6: 8, translated by Yehouda Schiffers, collection the Ten Words, Verdier editions.

In addition, its " Rosh Amanah " (Principles of the Faith) is a committed defense of the thirteen articles maïmonidiens of the faith against the attacks of Hasdaï Crescas and Joseph Albo, which discusses the number and the validity of these principles. Abravanel concludes by explaining why Maïmonide, by compiling these articles, forever made only reproduce the habits of the nations to state axioms, i.e. basic principles of their sciences. Nevertheless, the Judaism in common does not have anything with the social science, the lesson of Tora is divine revelations, and not the fruit of human speculations, and is thus all equivalent. None them can thus be regarded as principle or corollary of a principle.

Apologetic writings: the Messianic trilogy

Well after the destruction of the two Temples, well before the Night of crystal, the Jewish community sépharade is expelled, 9Av 5252 (August 2nd 1492, of the ground where the majority were established since the Exile. Spain, where one still calls the day located between Friday and Sunday of the name of Sabbado , will never recover from this damage. As for the Jewish community, only the Second world war will create a major traumatism.

Abravanel embarks in Valence with its in July 1492 family, but this time, it is not any more one fugitive insulated, a whole community is torn off with its ground at the same time.

Abravanel, chief of the Jewish community, and its eternal defender, all that did was in its capacity to cancel the Décret of Alhambra. To its personal failure, its suffering of individual (although it was relatively more fortunate in its destiny), is added the perception of the suffering of all his/her brothers, suddenly stripped of all and without shelter. Many will die during their Exil, deprived of any splendor. As for the survivors, even more the scholars will be detached from the holy things to be worried but immediate and material contingencies more.

However, since Ateret Zqenim, written in Lisbon, the Messianic question did not cease arising in Abravanel. It is thus natural that it is harnessed with what will be the third major aspect of its work, and which aims at reinforcing the faith in his/her brothers of exile. Don't these misfortunes announce the pains of the childbirth of the Messiah?

It is in this context that he writes the Migdol Yeshu' ot :

  • My' aynei haYeshua (Sources of the Hello) is completed on December 6th, 1496
  • Yeshou' ot Meshi' Ho , the Saving Advertisements of Its Messiah, on December 20th, 1497
  • Mashmi' has Yeshou' ah , the Herald of the Hello on February 26th, 1498.

Abravanel starts by refuting the opinion of the Christian commentators, according to whom prophecies were carried out in the person of Jesus.
Dans Mashmi' has Yeshu' ah, it also attacks those of the Juifs commentators, among whom Juda ibn Balaam de Tolède, Moïse Giqatilla and Abraham ibn Ezra, which locates the realization of prophecy at the time of the second Temple: for Abravanel, the second Temple was only one substitute of the first, and did not fit in the redemption, but in the continuations of the exile begun at the time of the destruction of the first Temple.

The Sources of the Hello are a comment of the Livre of Daniel, contradicting all Christian interpretations of this book, particularly on the four empires of the universal history.
Néanmoins, it is of agreement with them on one and only one point: for Abravanel, Daniel must be counted indeed among the prophets, against the opinion of Wise of Talmud, since it is on him that Abravanel is based, and Nahmanide before him to calculate the arrival of the Messiah.
Pour the remainder, it points out that the Christian kingdom is not indestructible, and that the Moslems made them move back on several occasions.
Il sees in the fourth Rome animal, and its " small corne" (Daniel 7: 8) the papacy, which has " eyes of homme" and known as " things monstrueuses" , such as the doctrines of the Trinity or the Incarnation.

In the Saving Advertisements of Its Messiah , Abravanel defends the rabbinical sources of the messianism, among which the Aggada. Indeed, at the time of the argument of Barcelona, Nahmanide compared Aggada with the sermons of the bishops, reducing involuntarily by there its importance, leading to a handing-over in question of Talmud even.
Abravanel comments on in the first part chapter 28 of Pirke of Rabbi Eliezer, having milked with the four empires of the dream of Daniel, and in his second the passages of the treated Sanhédrin, dealing with the Messiah, for example:

  • the Messiah should already have come at the fifth century. Actually, the time of the exile having to be 400 years minimum, the Wise ones wanted to indicate that the Messiah could not come before the fifth century.
  • the Messiah, according to Rabbi Hillel (not to be confused with Hillel HaZaqen), would have come at time from Ézéchias. It is thus, explains Abravanel, which the Saver will not be strictly speaking oint (what " means; mashia' H " in Hebrew) but only a " prince". David it is not called " prince" by the prophet Ezéchiel (37: 25: " And My David servant will be their prince forever ") ?

The Héraut of the Hello makes in the same way with the biblical passages.

Works

  • “Tsurot haYessodot”, the shape of (four) the elements, philosophical work, which does not appear in the list of works that it established towards the end of its life.
  • “Ateret Zqenim”, the diadem of Old”, (according to Proverbs 17: 6)
  • “Mahzeh Shaddaï”, Vision of the Almighty (according to Numbers 24: 4), disappeared work, but which it often evoked in its writings.
  • “Rosh Amana”, Principles of the Faith (according to the Song of Songs 4:8) where it enumerates and defends the thirteen principles of Maïmonide.
  • “Zeba' H Weighed' H”, the Pascal Sacrifice, comment on Haggada of Passover
  • “Nahalat Avot”, the heritage of the Fathers, comment of the treated Avot.
  • “Migdol Yeshu' ot”, the fortress of the Hello (according to II Samuel 22:51), more generally indicated like the “Messianic trilogy”
“My' aynei haYeshua”, Sources of the Hello (according to Isaïe 12:3), which is a comment on the book of Daniel
  • “Yeshu' ot Meshi' Ho”, saving advertisements of Its Messiah (according to Psaumes 28:8), who is a comment on the passages of the rabbinical literature where it is question of the Messiah.
  • “Mashmi' has Yeshu' ah”, the Herald of the Hello (according to Isaïe 53:7), which comments on the whole of the Messianic passages disseminated in the Bible.

    • “Mif' alot Elohim”, Works of the Almighty (according to Psalms 66: 5), philosophical work on Creation

    • biblical Comments (3 volumes on Tora, one on the First Prophets, one on the Last Prophets, one on the Writings)
    • Responsa in Saül haCohen Ashkenazi, on 12 philosophical questions contiguous to Maïmonide. It is about its last work.

    See too

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