Mordecai Samuel ben Benzion Aryeh Ghirondi (; October 1799 – January 4, 1852) was an Italian Jewish author and
Chief Rabbi
Chief Rabbi ( he, רב ראשי ''Rav Rashi'') is a title given in several countries to the recognized religious leader of that country's Jewish community, or to a rabbinic leader appointed by the local secular authorities. Since 1911, through a ...
of
Padua.
Biography
Mordecai Samuel Ghirondi was born into a rabbinic family in
Padua. He studied at the
rabbinical college
Rabbinic Judaism ( he, יהדות רבנית, Yahadut Rabanit), also called Rabbinism, Rabbinicism, or Judaism espoused by the Rabbanites, has been the mainstream form of Judaism since the 6th century CE, after the codification of the Babyloni ...
of Padua, where he was later appointed professor of theology (1824). In 1829 he was appointed assistant rabbi of Padua; two years later he became chief rabbi. He was a recognized authority in rabbinics, and was consulted by rabbis of several communities.
Ghirondi was an avid
bibliophile, and parts of his book collection are now in the Montefiore Library in
Jews' College in London and the
Jewish Theological Seminary in New York.
Among his publications were ''Tokho ratzuf ahavah'', a work on ethics produced when he was only sixteen years old (Pisa, 1818), and ''Ma'amar keriyyat ha-borot'', a treatise on artesian
wells, showing references to them in the
Talmud (printed in
I. S. Reggio's ''Iggerot yosher'', Vienna, 1834). His most important work, ''Toledot gedole Yisrael'', is a biographical and bibliographical dictionary of Italian rabbis and secular scholars.
Ghirondi had in his possession
Graziadio Nepi's biographical work entitled ''Zekher tzaddikim''; to this he added 831 numbers of his own, two-thirds of which are not found in any earlier biographical dictionary. The combined work was published by
Ephraim Raphael Ghirondi
Ephraim (; he, ''ʾEp̄rayīm'', in pausa: ''ʾEp̄rāyīm'') was, according to the Book of Genesis, the second son of Joseph ben Jacob and Asenath. Asenath was an Ancient Egyptian woman whom Pharaoh gave to Joseph as wife, and the daughte ...
, the author's son: Nepi's and Ghirondi's were printed on opposite pages (Trieste, 1853).
The latter also wrote ''Kevutzat kesef'', responsa, in two parts, and ''Likkute shoshannim'',