Later Cloth. 8vo. [194] pages. 23 cm. First edition. In German. 'Asaf Judaeus, the oldest medical writer in the Hebrew language'. A landmark study on the Sefer Asaf, the earliest known Hebrew work on medicine, extant in 16 manuscripts, some complete; it constitutes a source of information on ancient customs and Jewish medical ethics as well as of ancient Jewish remedies and Hebrew, Aramaic, Persian, Latin, and Greek medical terminology. Excerpts from Greek medical books, some of which have been lost and are not known from any other sources, appear in Hebrew in this book. The most complete manuscripts are in Munich, Oxford, Brit. Museum London, Florence, and Paris. The book was not written by Asaph himself, but by his disciples. They mention, as teachers, R. Johanan b. Zavda and R. Judah ha-Yarhoni, as well as Asaph. Some sections of the book are very old, though others were written or translated from other languages as late as the seventh until the tenth century. The antiquity of the work is apparent from its style, similar to that of the older Midrashim, from its use of Persian (rather than Arabic) synonyms, and from the mention of weights current in Palestine during the talmudic period. - EJ 2008. Collection of the three parts of Asaf Judaeus published in the periodical: Jahresbericht der Franz-Josef-Landes-Rabbinerschule in Budapest; this collection spans the issues 38-40. Other material from the Jahresbericht is contained in the collection (namely, the annual report of the Franz Josef Landes-Rabbinerschule in Budapest for the years 1915-17) ; however, this bound collection of the Jahresbericht is specifically of Asaf Judaeus. Written by Lajos Venetianer (18671922) , Hungarian rabbi and historian
He edited the publications of the first Jewish medical writers in linguistic and medical-historical respects: Asaf Judaeus (13, 191517) , a work of pioneering importance despite the sharp criticism that Immanuel Loew leveled against it. - EJ 2008. An edition was also published in Strassburg, 1916-1917. Subjects: Jews - Medicine. Asaph ben Berechiah. Later cloth loose; title page of issue 38 loose and edges brittle; later blank endpages are loose and brittle; internal paper with text is clean and fresh. Good - condition. (GER-43-25A)
