The
Sephardic Classic of Constantinople: Me'am Lo'ez
By
Shelomo Alfassa
Sephardic Image Magazine Vol. 12, No. 11. September 2002
The Me'am
Lo'ez is a classic Jewish work written in the language that the
Jews of Spain brought with them to the Ottoman Empire in the 15th
century. Written in Ladino, the book is essentially an encyclopedic
commentary on the Torah, written in an easy style for the laity to
comprehend. Technically, the Me'am Lo'ez, as we know it today, is
a 46-volume commentary on the entire Tanakh. It was developed via
the brilliancy of Haham Yakoub Huli of Constantinople. Born in 1689
CE, Huli immigrated to the Holy Land via Crete, settled in Jerusalem,
and lived his remaining days in Safed. He would become a principal
leader of world Jewry by his fourth decade of life.
Before the Me'am
Lo'ez was developed, Huli was given the great honor to edit and publish
Haham Yehuda Rosanes' commentary on the RaMBaM's Mishna Torah
known as the Mishneh LaMelekh. This was an enormous accomplishment
by itself, but not his finest work. History will remember Huli's paramount
contribution to Judaism as the Me'am Lo'ez, for it helped bring many
Jews back to Judaism. When Huli embarked on the Me'am Lo'ez, he was
doing it in response to the many Jews of the Turkish lands who had
strayed away from Judaism over several decades.
Haham Huli took
the "spiritually destitute" Jewish community of the Ottoman
Empire back from the blow which the "false messiah" Shabbetai
Sevi inflicted upon them. Sevi not only lured Jews away from their
faith, but subsequently toward Islam. In a preface to a volume of
the Me'am Lo'ez it is written, "Today there are many common folk
who neither know or understand the Hebrew language. Their eyes are
covered with clay
they do not know how to avoid the forbidden,
nor when things are permitted." Huli lamented about the disappointment
of Jews who became forgetful and ignorant of their own religion. Reacting
not only to the spiritual damage Sevi brought to the world of Ottoman
Jewry, but the general malaise of the Jewish people. Huli's declaration
from 1730 CE tells of the waning knowledge of Hebrew in the population:
They may
own many books inherited from their fathers, but, since they cannot
understand, they never make use of them. Any information is concealed
between the covers of the volumes. Whenever they hear a Haham's
sermon, they are amazed at even the simplest thoughts. Never having
read the Bible or the Shulhan Aruh [code of Jewish law], they know
nothing of the obligation of the Jew. They have no knowledge, either
of our history nor of the miracles that God has wrought for us.
As a result, heaven forbid, it is very possible that the Torah will
be forgotten by a majority of the Jewish people.
Huli set out
to develop a sefer that would revitalize them. Not a work in Hebrew
(which an increasing number could not read), but a work in the everyday
language of the people, Ladino. This Hispanic language had been the
primary language of the Balkan, Greek and Levantine Sephardim since
their expulsion from Spain. Printed in Rashi characters, the Ladino
language text made the material available to the broadest audience
and the vast majority of Sephardim from Croatia to Cairo and beyond.
A religious text specifically tailored in the day-to-day language
of the Jewish people was not only needed, but was received with open
arms. In Turkey printing of the work was done a few pligod (pages)
at a time, and then distributed prior to Shabbat. Afterward, the pligot
were bound, completing the various volumes.
The Me'am Lo'ez
was a religious book, but one which was neither sterile nor difficult
through complexity. Through the quill of this reputed Turkish sage,
flowed a work of great enormity and importance. A manuscript, which
transmitted the holy words, life lessons and heritage of the Jewish
people, specifically tailored towards those in the Ottoman Empire.
Professor Daniel J. Elazar said the Me'am Lo'ez "summed up the
general knowledge popularly expected to be known by everybody (including
women) in the eighteenth century." The Me'am Lo'ez was still
popular with the immigrants when they came to America from the former
Ottoman lands. Isaac Maimon of Seattle wrote in his memoirs:
Every morning
and evening Uncle Jack would be the first one in kahal
. He
occupied the same seat in the Sephardic Bikur Holim Midrash for
over 30 years. Rather than dwell on idle talk, he used to take a
Me'am Lo'ez, which was written in Ladino (the original language)
and read until the prayers were started. They tell us that he read
all the volumes of the Me'am Lo'ez twice, reading a page or two
every day. He was one of a handful of men left who could read the
original Ladino script....
As the number
of Ladino readers fell drastically after the Holocaust, the Me'am
Lo'ez would soon be translated for a new generation. In 1967 a Hebrew
translation known as the Yalkut Me'am Lo'ez was printed. This version
was a silent but fitting memorial to Huli who once feared the holy
language would be forgotten.
In 1964, two
Catholic scholars from the University of Granada made available a
modern Spanish printing of the Me'am Lo'ez in Latin characters. Apparently,
their lack of knowledge regarding both Turkish and Ladino resulted
in an edition filled with inaccuracies. This effort was criticized
by the New York City based Foundation for the Advancement of Sephardic
Studies and Culture. Eventually a professional translation would take
place by none other than the respected Haham Aryeh Kaplan. Working
in conjunction with the Judeo-Spanish leadership of Louis Levy and
David Barocas of the Foundation, the books were slowly translated
into English. Barocas helped Haham Kaplan considerably in understanding
many of the difficult and obscure Ladino words and phrases. Bob Bedford
the director of the Foundation recalls Kaplan mentioning whenever
he had a problem, a simple phone call to Barocas would usually solve
it:
Eventually
Kaplan asked Barocas to translate the 'Pirke Avoth,' which was very
difficult to understand. Barocas concluded that after the initial
work was printed in Constantinople, it was later reprinted in Livorno,
although much of the obscure Turkish words were retranslated by
the European editors, into modern Castilian. Thus, Barocas considered
the Livorno edition to be a 'Rosetta Stone', and an excellent source
to decipher the older work.
The translation
into English was a step of immense importance making the books available
to the broadest audience across the globe. The Me'am Lo'ez has now
been printed in several languages from Judeo-Arabic to Russian, and
is available in almost any Jewish bookstore today. In our modern day
when Torah education is still not at the level it could be, the Me'am
Lo'ez can serve as it was intended to do when it was written. Haham
Huli's statement from 300 hundred years ago is a statement which can
be still said to be true today: "[many people] do not understand
the holy tongue, and that even those who do know the words, do not
understand what they are saying, and from day to day, there are fewer
and fewer readers, and the law and the customs of Judaism are being
forgotten."
In our present
day the Me'am Lo'ez is studied across the world in Sephardic, Ashkenazi
and Hassidic congregations. The books making up the early Me'am Lo'ez
were first published between 1730 and 1777 CE. The Haham himself intended
to publish his commentary on all the books of the Bible, but he passed
away while writing his commentary on Beresheet (Exodus) in 1732 CE.
The work was soon continued by other Turkish Talmudists such as Haham
Magriso (who completed it up to Devarim [Deuteronomy]), and Haham
Agruiti (who wrote the commentary on Devarim and Yehoshua [Joshua]).
Haham Shmeul Yerushalmi completed many of the later books. The great
Sephardic sage of Constantinople and friend Haham Rafael Isak Yerushalmi
declared about Haham Huli:
Never before
has there been one whose soul yearned to teach all the children
of Israel the rules and laws
the man of Jerusalem was the one
who taught in a clear language
he worked so that the Torah
not be forgotten among Israel
. From the time the sun rose
until it set, words of Torah never left his mouth.