Eliezer ben Isaac ha-Gadol

Eliezer ben Isaac ha-Gadol was a German rabbi of the eleventh century. He was a pupil of his cousin R. Simon ha-Gadol of Mainz and of R. Gershom Me'or ha-Golah. David Conforte, relying on the statement in the tosefta to Shab. 54b, says that Eliezer ha-Gadol was the teacher of Rashi; but Rashi himself, in citing Eliezer, does not say so. In Rashi's quotation he is sometimes called Eliezer ha-Gadol and sometimes Eliezer Gaon, which induced Azulai to consider them as two separate persons.

According to a provenance of a sacred tradition—sometimes presumed to describe the transmission of early medieval Kabbalah from Babylon to Western Europe—with the provenance itself attributed to Eleazar of Worms (13th century), this ‘Eliezer the Great’ or Eliezer Ben Isaac ha-Gadol, of the early 11th century generation of Ashkenazi Hasidim, was an ancestral member of this lineage of teachers ,and a member of the Kalonymids: the Ba’al Shems or Masters of the Name in medieval Germany.

Works

Footnotes

  1. ↑ David Conforte, Ḳore ha-Dorot, p. 8a
  2. ↑ Pesachim 76b
  3. ↑ Chaim Azulai, Shem ha-Gedolim, p. 12a
  4. ↑ For example by Gershom Scholem in his chapter on the ‘Hasidim in Germany’ in Major Trends in Jewish Mysticism (1941) and throughout his Origins of the Kabbalah (1961).
  5. 1 2 Re: article “Kalonymus” in 21st century edition of Encyclopedia Judaica. v. 12, Kat-Kz. Two extant copies of the provenance, transcribed by Maharshal (as a relatively brief annotation) and by Jose Delmedigo (as a lengthy, descriptive and presumably complete copy of the list) reflect a common source. This and various other corroborating elements tend to authenticate the document.
  6. ↑ Menahem di Lonsano, Shete Yadot, p. 122a
  7. ↑ Michael, Heimann Joseph, (1891) Or ha-Ḥayyim, Frankfort-on-the-Main (in Hebrew), pp. 205-207

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Richard Gottheil and M. Seligsohn (1901–1906). "Eliezer ben Isaac ha-Gadol". In Singer, Isidore; et al. (eds.). The Jewish Encyclopedia. New York: Funk & Wagnalls. Its bibliography: