ITALIAN JEWISH POETRY
Immanuel and Dante.--The Machberoth.--Judah
Romano.--Kalonymos.--The Eben Bochan.--Moses Rieti.--Messer
Leon.
The course of Jewish literature in Italy ran along the same lines as in
Spain. The Italian group of authors was less brilliant, but the
difference was one of degree, not of kind. The Italian aristocracy, like
the Moorish caliphs and viziers, patronized learning, and encouraged the
Jews in their literary ambitions.
Yet the fact that the inspiration in Spain came from Islam and in Italy
from Christianity produced some consequences. In Spain the Jews followed
Arab models of style. In Italy the influence of classical models was
felt at the time of the Renaissance. Most noteworthy of all was the
indebtedness of the Hebrew poets of Italy to Dante.
It is not improbable that Dante was a personal friend of the most noted
of these Jewish poets, Immanuel, the son of Solomon of Rome. Like the
other Jews of Rome, Immanuel stood in the most friendly relations with
Christians, for nowhere was medieval intolerance less felt than in the
very seat of the Pope, the head of the Church. Thus, on the one hand
Immanuel was a leading member of the synagogue, and, on the other, he
carried on a literary correspondence with learned Christians, with
poets, and men of science. He was himself a physician, and his poems
breathe a scientific spirit. As happened earlier in Spain, the circle of
Immanuel regarded verse-making as part of the culture of a scholar.
Witty verses, in the form of riddles and epigrams, were exchanged at the
meetings of the circle. With these poets, among whom Kalonymos was
included, the penning of verses was a fashion. On the other hand, music
was not so much cultivated by the Italian Hebrews as by the Spanish.
Hence, both Immanuel and Kalonymos lack the lightness and melody of the
best writers of Hebrew verse in Spain. The Italians atoned for this loss
by their subject-matter. They are joyous poets, full of the gladness of
life. They are secular, not religious poets; the best of the
Spanish-Hebrew poetry was devotional, and the best of the Italian so
secular that it was condemned by pietists as too frivolous and too much
"disfigured by ill-timed levity."
Immanuel was born in Rome in about 1270. He rarely mentions his father,
but often names his mother Justa as a woman of pious and noble
character. As a youth, he had a strong fancy for scientific study, and
was nourished on the "Guide" of Maimonides, on the works of the Greeks
and Arabs, and on the writings of the Christian school-men, which he
read in Hebrew translations. Besides philosophy, mathematics, astronomy,
and medicine, Immanuel studied the Bible and the Talmud, and became an
accomplished scholar. He was not born a poet, but he read deeply the
poetical literature of Jews and Christians, and took lessons in
rhyme-making. He was wealthy, and his house was a rendezvous of wits and
scientists. His own position in the Jewish community was remarkable. It
has already been said that he took an active part in the management of
communal affairs, but he did more than this. He preached in the
synagogue on the Day of Atonement, and delivered eulogistic orations
over the remains of departed worthies. Towards the end of his life he
suffered losses both in fortune and in friends, but he finally found a
new home in Fermo, where he was cordially welcomed in 1328. The date of
his death is uncertain, but he died in about 1330.
His works were versatile rather than profound. He wrote grammatical
treatises and commentaries, which display learning more than
originality. But his poetical writings are of great interest in the
history of Jewish literature. He lived in the dawn-flush of the
Renaissance in Italy. The Italian language was just evolving itself,
under the genius of Dante, from a mere jumble of dialects into a
literary language. Dante did for Italy what Chaucer was soon after to do
for England. On the one side influenced by the Renaissance and the birth
of the new Italian language, on the other by the Jewish revival of
letters in Spain and Provence, the Italian Jews alone combined the
Jewish spirit with the spirit of the classical Renaissance. Immanuel was
the incarnation of this complex soul.
This may be seen from the form of Immanuel's _Machberoth_, or
"Collection." The latter portion of it, named separately "Hell and
Eden," was imitated from the Christian Dante; the poem as a whole was
planned on Charizi's _Tachkemoni_, a Hebrew development of the Arabic
Divan. The poet is not the hero of his own song, but like the Arabic
poets of the divan, conceives a personage who fills the centre of the
canvas--a personage really identical with the author, yet in a sense
other than he. Much quaintness of effect is produced by this double part
played by the poet, who, as it were, satirizes his own doings. In
Immanuel's _Machberoth_ there is much variety of romantic incident. But
it is in satire that he reaches his highest level. Love and wine are the
frequent burdens of his song, as they are in the Provençal and Italian
poetry of his day. Immanuel was something of a Voltaire in his jocose
treatment of sacred things, and pietists like Joseph Karo inhibited the
study of the _Machberoth_. Others, too, described his songs as sensuous
and his satires as blasphemous. But the devout and earnest piety of
some of Immanuel's prayers,--some of them to be found in the
_Machberoth_ themselves--proves that Immanuel's licentiousness and
levity were due, not to lack of reverence, but to the attempt to
reconcile the ideals of Italian society of the period of the Renaissance
with the ideals of Judaism.
Immanuel owed his rhymed prose to Charizi, but again he shows his
devotion to two masters by writing Hebrew sonnets. The sonnet was new
then to Italian verse, and Immanuel's Hebrew specimens thus belong to
the earliest sonnets written in any literature. It is, indeed,
impossible to convey a just sense of the variety of subject and form in
the _Machberoth_. "Serious and frivolous topics trip each other by the
heels; all metrical forms, prayers, elegies, passages in unmetrical
rhymes, all are mingled together." The last chapter is, however, of a
different character, and it has often been printed as a separate work.
It is the "Hell and Eden" to which allusion has already been made.
The link between Immanuel and his Provençal contemporary Kalonymos was
supplied by Judah Romano, the Jewish school-man. All three were in the
service of the king of Naples. Kalonymos was the equal of Romano as a
philosopher and not much below Immanuel as a satirist. He was a more
fertile poet than Immanuel, for, while Immanuel remained the sole
representative of his manner, Kalonymos gave birth to a whole school of
imitators. Kalonymos wrote many translations, of Galen, Averroes,
Aristotle, al-Farabi, Ptolemy, and Archimedes. But it was his keen wit
more than his learning that made him popular in Rome, and impelled the
Jews of that city, headed by Immanuel, to persuade Kalonymos to settle
permanently in Italy. Kalonymos' two satirical poems were called "The
Touchstone" (_Eben Bochan_) and "The Purim Tractate." These satirize
the customs and social habits of the Jews of his day in a bright and
powerful style. In his Purim Tractate, Kalonymos parodies the style,
logic, and phraseology of the Talmud, and his work was the forerunner of
a host of similar parodies.
There were many Italian writers of _Piyutim_, i.e. Synagogue hymns, but
these were mediocre in merit. The elegies written in lament for the
burning of the Law and the martyrdoms endured in various parts of Italy
were the only meritorious devotional poems composed in Hebrew in that
country. Italy remained famous in Hebrew poetry for secular, not for
religious compositions. In the fifteenth century Moses Rieti (born 1389,
died later than 1452) imitated Dante once more in his "Lesser Sanctuary"
(_Mikdash Meät_). Here again may be noticed a feature peculiar to
Italian Hebrew poetry. Rieti uses regular stanzas, Italian forms of
verse, in this matter following the example of Immanuel. Messer Leon, a
physician of Mantua, wrote a treatise on Biblical rhetoric (1480).
Again, the only important writer of dramas in Hebrew was, as we shall
see, an Italian Jew, who copied Italian models. Though, therefore, the
Hebrew poetry of Italy scarcely reaches the front rank, it is
historically of first-rate importance. It represents the only effects of
the Renaissance on Jewish literature. In other countries, the condition
of the Jews was such that they were shut off from external influences.
Their literature suffered as their lives did from imprisonment within
the Ghettos, which were erected both by the Jews themselves and by the
governments of Europe.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
S. Morals.--_Italian Jewish Literature_ (_Publications of the
Gratz College_, Vol. 1).
IMMANUEL AND KALONYMOS.
Graetz.--IV, p. 61 [66].
J. Chotzner.--_Immanuel di Romi_, _J.Q.R._, IV, p. 64.
G. Sacerdote.--_Emanuele da Roma's Ninth Mehabbereth_,
_J.Q.R._, VII, p. 711.
JUDAH (LEONE) ROMANO.
Graetz.--IV, p. 68 [73].
MOSES RIETI.
Graetz.--IV, p. 230 [249].
MESSER LEON.
Graetz.--IV, p. 289 [311].