Yalkut haMachiri (
Hebrew
Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and ...
: ילקוט המכירי) is a work of
midrash
''Midrash'' (;["midrash"]
. ''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''. ; or ''midrashot' ...
. Its author was Machir ben Abba Mari, but his country and the period in which he lived are not definitively known.
Moritz Steinschneider
Moritz Steinschneider (; 30 March 1816 – 24 January 1907) was a Moravian bibliographer and Orientalist, and an important figure in Jewish studies and Jewish history. He is credited as having invented the term ''antisemitism.''
Education
Mo ...
says that Machir lived in
Provence
Provence is a geographical region and historical province of southeastern France, which stretches from the left bank of the lower Rhône to the west to the France–Italy border, Italian border to the east; it is bordered by the Mediterrane ...
; but his date remains a subject of discussion among modern scholars. say that the work was most probably composed in the late 13th or 14th century.
Contents
Yalkut haMachiri is similar in its contents to ''
Yalkut Shimoni
The ''Yalkut Shimoni'' (), or simply ''Yalkut'', is an aggadic compilation on the books of the Hebrew Bible. It is a compilation of older interpretations and explanations of Biblical passages, arranged according to the sequence of those portions ...
'', with the difference that while the latter covers the whole
Bible
The Bible is a collection of religious texts that are central to Christianity and Judaism, and esteemed in other Abrahamic religions such as Islam. The Bible is an anthology (a compilation of texts of a variety of forms) originally writt ...
, haMachiri covers only the books of
Isaiah
Isaiah ( or ; , ''Yəšaʿyāhū'', "Yahweh is salvation"; also known as Isaias or Esaias from ) was the 8th-century BC Israelite prophet after whom the Book of Isaiah is named.
The text of the Book of Isaiah refers to Isaiah as "the prophet" ...
,
Jeremiah
Jeremiah ( – ), also called Jeremias, was one of the major prophets of the Hebrew Bible. According to Jewish tradition, Jeremiah authored the Book of Jeremiah, book that bears his name, the Books of Kings, and the Book of Lamentations, with t ...
,
Ezekiel
Ezekiel, also spelled Ezechiel (; ; ), was an Israelite priest. The Book of Ezekiel, relating his visions and acts, is named after him.
The Abrahamic religions acknowledge Ezekiel as a prophet. According to the narrative, Ezekiel prophesied ...
, the
twelve Minor Prophets
The Twelve Minor Prophets (, ''Shneim Asar''; , ''Trei Asar'', "Twelve"; , "the Twelve Prophets"; , "the Twelve Prophets"), or the Book of the Twelve, is a collection of twelve prophetic works traditionally attributed to individual prophets, like ...
,
Psalms
The Book of Psalms ( , ; ; ; ; , in Islam also called Zabur, ), also known as the Psalter, is the first book of the third section of the Tanakh (Hebrew Bible) called ('Writings'), and a book of the Old Testament.
The book is an anthology of B ...
,
Proverbs
A proverb (from ) or an adage is a simple, traditional saying that expresses a perceived truth based on common sense or experience. Proverbs are often metaphorical and are an example of formulaic language. A proverbial phrase or a proverbial ...
, and
Job
Work, labor (labour in Commonwealth English), occupation or job is the intentional activity people perform to support the needs and desires of themselves, other people, or organizations. In the context of economics, work can be seen as the huma ...
.
In the introductions to these books Machir said he composed the work to gather the scattered aggadic teachings into one group.
Sources
Machir used the following sources in his compilation: the two
Talmuds
The Talmud (; ) is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law (''halakha'') and Jewish theology. Until the advent of modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the centerpiece of Jewi ...
, the
Tosefta
The Tosefta ( "supplement, addition") is a compilation of Jewish Oral Law from the late second century, the period of the Mishnah and the Jewish sages known as the '' Tannaim''.
Background
Jewish teachings of the Tannaitic period were cha ...
, the
minor treatises, the
Sifra
Sifra () is the Midrash halakha to the Book of Leviticus. It is frequently quoted in the Talmud and the study of it followed that of the Mishnah. Like Leviticus itself, the midrash is occasionally called Torat Kohanim, and in two passages ''Sifr ...
, the
Sifre
Sifre (; ''siphrēy'', ''Sifre, Sifrei'', also, ''Sifre debe Rab'' or ''Sifre Rabbah'') refers to either of two works of '' Midrash halakha'', or classical Jewish legal biblical exegesis, based on the biblical books of Numbers and Deuteronomy.
...
,
Pesikta Rabbati
''Pesikta Rabbati'' (Aramaic: פסיקתא רבתי ''P'siqta Rabbati'', "The Larger P'siqta") is a collection of aggadic midrash (homilies) on the Pentateuchal and prophetic readings, the special Sabbaths, and so on. It was composed around 8 ...
,
Midrash Rabbah on the
Pentateuch
The Torah ( , "Instruction", "Teaching" or "Law") is the compilation of the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, namely the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. The Torah is also known as the Pentateuch () o ...
,
Midrash Ḳohelet,
Midrash Tehillim
Midrash Tehillim (Hebrew: מדרש תהלים), also known as Midrash Psalms or Midrash Shocher Tov, is an aggadic midrash to the Psalms.
Midrash Tehillim can be divided into two parts: the first covering Psalms 1–118, the second covering 119� ...
,
Midrash Mishle,
Midrash Iyyob
Midrash Iyyob (Hebrew: מדרש איוב) or Midrash to Job is an aggadic midrash that is no longer extant.
Contents
Explicit reference to the source Midrash Iyyob are found in relation to Job 1:14, to Job 1:6, to Job 1:1 and 4:12, to Job 7:9, ...
,
Midrash Tanhuma
Midrash Tanhuma (), also known as Yelammedenu, is the name given to a homiletic midrash on the entire Torah, and it is known in several different versions or collections. Tanhuma bar Abba is not the author of the text but instead is a figure to w ...
, a Midrash quoted as דשחנו"ע,
Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer,
Seder Olam Rabbah
''Seder Olam Rabbah'' (, "The Great Order of the World") is a 2nd-century CE Hebrew language chronology detailing the dates of biblical events from creation to Alexander the Great's conquest of Persia. It adds no stories beyond what is in the bi ...
, and
Haggadat Shir ha-Shirim, frequently quoting the last-named Midrash in the part on
Book of Isaiah
The Book of Isaiah ( ) is the first of the Latter Prophets in the Hebrew Bible and the first of the Major Prophets in the Christian Old Testament. It is identified by a superscription as the words of the 8th-century BC prophet Isaiah ben Amo ...
. Machir had another version of
Deuteronomy Rabbah, of which only the part on the section "Devarim" exists now. It is difficult to ascertain whether Machir knew of
Midrash Yelammedenu; he quotes only
Midrash Tanhuma
Midrash Tanhuma (), also known as Yelammedenu, is the name given to a homiletic midrash on the entire Torah, and it is known in several different versions or collections. Tanhuma bar Abba is not the author of the text but instead is a figure to w ...
, but the passages which he cites are not found in the present text of that work, so that it is possible that he took these passages from the Yelammedenu.
Only the following parts of the ''Yalḳuṭ ha-Makiri'' are extant: Isaiah, published by I. Spira from a Leyden manuscript; Psalms, published by
S. Buber
Salomon (or Solomon) Buber (2 February 1827 – 28 December 1906) was a Jewish Galicia (Central Europe), Galician scholar and editor of Hebrew literature, Hebrew works. He is especially remembered for his editions of Midrash and other medieval Je ...
(Berdychev, 1899) from two manuscripts (one, previously in the possession of Joseph b. Solomon of Vyazhin, was used by David Luria, and its introduction was published by
M. Straschun in
Fuenn's ''Ḳiryah Ne'emanah,'' p. 304; the other is MS. No. 167 in the
Bodleian Library
The Bodleian Library () is the main research library of the University of Oxford. Founded in 1602 by Sir Thomas Bodley, it is one of the oldest libraries in Europe. With over 13 million printed items, it is the second-largest library in ...
); the twelve Minor Prophets; Proverbs, extant in a manuscript which is in the possession of Grünhut, and which was seen by
Azulai, published by Grünhut in Jerusalem in 5662 (= 1902).
Significance
Moses Gaster
Moses Gaster (17 September 1856 – 5 March 1939) was a Romanian, later British scholar, the ''Hakham'' of the Spanish and Portuguese Jewish congregation, London, and a Hebrew and Romanian linguist. Moses Gaster was an active Zionist in Rom ...
attached great importance to Yalkut haMachiri, thinking that it was older than Yalkut Shimoni, the second part of which at least Gaster concluded was a bad adaptation from Yalkut haMachiri. Gaster's conclusions, however, were contested by A. Epstein, who declares that Yalkut haMachiri is both inferior to and later than "Yalkut Shimoni." Buber conclusively proved
[In the introduction to his edition of "Yalkut haMachiri"] that the two works are independent of each other, that Machir lived later than the author of the "Yalkut Shimoni," and that he had not seen Yalkut Shimoni.
Samuel Poznanski thinks that Machir lived in the fourteenth century.
References
*
* The ''JE'' cites Poznanski, in R. E. J. xl. 282 et seq., and the sources mentioned above.
* .
{{Authority control
Aggadic Midrashim
Jewish medieval literature
Sifrei Kodesh
Hebrew-language literature