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Biography of NahmanidesName: NahmanidesBirth Date: 1194 Death Date: 1270 Place of Birth: Gerona, Spain Nationality: Spanish Gender: Male Occupations: scholar Nahmanides The Spanish-born Jewish scholar Nahmanides (1194-1270), also called Moses ben Nahman, was the first outstanding rabbi to declare that resettlement in the land of Israel was a biblical precept binding upon all Jews.Nahmanides was born in Gerona and educated in Spanish rabbinic schools. He became the leader of Spanish Jewry, which was centered at Gerona. His studies and his natural frame of mind inclined him toward a mystical interpretation of the Bible and toward the philosophic doctrines of the Cabalists.Nahmanides's chief achievements lay in two directions. First, he reorganized and revivified the study of the Talmud in Spain. He produced a series of short works, each of which consisted of a selected passage from the Talmud that he analyzed and commented upon. In fact, Nahmanides inaugurated this form of rabbinic literature. Second, Nahmanides profoundly influenced Jewish biblical theology through his exegetical work. It was in this area that his …showed first 150 words…
…showed last 150 words…or "soul" or "inner life," of the hidden transcendent God. On this basis Nahmanides formed his mystical theory of history and thus became a forerunner of the mystical historical doctrines of the 18th and 19th centuries.Nahmanides was the outstanding Jewish protagonist in the famous Barcelona Disputation of 1263, in which his adversary was the anti-Jewish agitator Pablo Christiani. The Christian hierarchies commonly organized disputations of this sort as a form of public entertainment in the Middle Ages. Generally, they involved a converted Jew who challenged one of his former coreligionists. In the Barcelona Disputation, Nahmanides won the victory and received as a reward a purse of money from King James I of Aragon, in whose presence the disputation had taken place. In 1267 Nahmanides moved to Palestine. He died in Acre 3 years later. Further Reading Information on Nahmanides is in Gershom G. Scholom, Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism (1946; 3d rev. ed. 1954). |