Moses Kimhi

Moses Kimhi (c. 1127 – c. 1190), also known as the ReMaK, was a medieval Jewish biblical commentator and grammarian.

Birth and early life

Kimhi was born around 1127, the eldest son of Joseph Kimhi^[1] and the brother of David Kimhi,^[2] known as the RaDaK.^[3] He was born and lived in Hachmei Provence in Occitania, an area that was heavily under the influence of the Sephardic community of that time. Little else is known of his early life.

Adulthood

He apparently raised his younger brother David following the death of their father, and was a major influence in his commentaries.^[4]

Career as a commentator

Like his father, he wrote a number of commentaries on the Bible, basing himself on the literal meaning of the text. His surviving works include commentaries on the books of Proverbs, Job,^[5] Ezra, and Nehemiah.^[6]

He also wrote a book of essays on Hebrew grammar,^[7][8] known, after the first three words, as Mahalak Shebile Ha-daat, or briefly as Mahalak. In it he described the underlying principles of his commentaries, combined with tangential discussions of medieval philosophy. This handbook was of great historical importance as in the first half of the 16th century it became the favourite manual for the study of Hebrew among non-Judaic scholars.^[9]

References

1. Terry, Michael (1999). Reader's guide to Judaism. London: Fitzroy Dearborn. p. 344. ISBN 978-1-135-94157-4. OCLC 1100458504.
2. Rooden, Peter T. van (1989). Theology, biblical scholarship, and rabbinical studies in the seventeenth century: Constantijn L'Empereur (1591-1648), professor of Hebrew and theology at Leiden. Leiden, the Netherlands; New York: E.J. Brill. p. 187. ISBN 978-90-04-09035-4. OCLC 1000849816.
3. Steinschneider, Moritz; Manekin, Charles Harry; Langermann, Y. Tzvi; Biesterfeldt, Hinrich (2013). Moritz Steinschneider: the Hebrew translations of the Middle Ages and the Jews as transmitters. Dordrecht: Springer. p. 216. ISBN 978-94-007-7313-4. OCLC 1048079803.
4. Grunhaus, Naomi (2013-01-31). The Challenge of Received Tradition: Dilemmas of Interpretation in Radak's Biblical Commentaries. Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press. p. 5. ISBN 978-0-19-985840-8.
5. Berry, Donald K (1999). Introduction to Wisdom and Poetry of the Old Testament. Maitland: B & H Publishing Group. ISBN 978-1-4336-7070-1. OCLC 1058483315.
6. Kalman, Jason (2021). The Book of Job in Jewish life and thought : Critical essays. Cincinnati, Ohio: Hebrew Union College Press. ISBN 978-0-87820-195-2. OCLC 1264724271.
7. Campi, Emidio (2008). Scholarly knowledge: textbooks in early modern Europe. Genève: Librairie Droz. p. 170. ISBN 978-2-600-01186-0. OCLC 1000911548.
8. Price, David (2011-01-13). Johannes Reuchlin and the Campaign to Destroy Jewish Books. Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press. p. 68. ISBN 978-0-19-539421-4.
9.  One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Bacher, William (1911). "Ḳimḥi s.v. Moses Ḳimḥi". In Chisholm, Hugh (ed.). Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 15 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 800.