Elazar ben Moshe Azikri

Rabbi Elazar ben Moshe Azikri (Hebrew: אלעזר בן משה אזכרי‎) (1533–1600) was a Jewish kabbalist, poet and writer.

Elazar ben Moshe Azikri
Rabbi Elazar Azikri's grave in Safed
Personal
Born1533
Safed, Ottoman Empire
Died1600
Safed, Ottoman Empire
ReligionJudaism

Biography

Azikri was born in Safed to a Sephardic family who had settled in Ottoman Syria after the expulsion from Spain. He studied Torah under Rabbi Yosef Sagis, Rabbi Jacob Berab, and in the Yeshiva of Moshe Cordovero.

He is counted with the greatest Rabbis and intellectuals of his time: Shlomo Halevi Alkabetz, Yosef Karo, Moshe Cordovero, Isaac Luria, Israel Najara, etc. In fact, he was one of a handful of rabbis to receive the renewed rabbinic semichah initiated by Rabbi Berab.[1]

In 1588 Rabbi Elazar founded the "Sukat Shalom" movement who acted to arouse in Jews the devotion to religion. His Sefer Haredim - see below - blends a halachic enumeration of the Mitzvos (Torah "commandments") with Kabbalist ethics, and is one of the central works of it genre.[1]

Rabbi Elazar died in 1600 and was buried in Safed.

Works

Rabbi Elazar's best known Book, the Sefer Haredim (ספר חרדים), is a famous discussion of the 613 Mitzvot, and is considered as one of the main works of Jewish deontology. It was printed after his death in 1600. Its arrangement differs from other similar books: [2] First, the mitzvot are arranged according to the human body and / or the time on which they depend in their observance; Second, the work does not maintain a single count of the mitzvot, but rather lists these re the opinion of several Rishonim, authorities to c. 1600.

He also wrote a commentary on Tractates Bezah[3] and Berakhot[4] of the Jerusalem Talmud.

The Piyyut (liturgical poem) Yedid Nefesh (ידיד נפש) is commonly attributed to Rabbi Elazar, who first published it in his Sefer Haredim.

References
  1. Elazar ben Moshe Azikri, sefaria.org
  2. Sefer Chareidim by Rabeinu Elazar Azkari
  3. "Dr. Israel Francus". Archived from the original on April 13, 2004. Retrieved 2007-08-26.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link). The commentary is reprinted in the Oz Vehadar edition of the Yerushalmi.
  4. Printed in the Vilna Yerushalmi Brachot.
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