Letters: Edition, Translation and Introduction

212 Pages·2007·4.607 MB·Portuguese, English, Hebrew

by  Isaac Abravanel, Cedric Cohen Skalli (editor)

CEDRIC COHEN SKALLI
ISAAC ABRAVANEL: LETTERS
w
DE
G
STUDIA JUDAICA
FORSCHUNGEN ZUR WISSENSCHAFT
DES JUDENTUMS
HERAUSGEGEBEN VON
E. L. EHRLICH UND G. STEMBERGER
BAND XL
WALTER DE GRUYTER · BERLIN · NEW YORK
ISAAC ABRAVANEL: LETTERS
EDITION, TRANSLATION AND INTRODUCTION
BY
CEDRIC COHEN S KAI J J
WALTER DE GRUYTER · BERLIN · NEW YORK
® Printed on acid-free paper which falls within the guidelines of the ANSI
to ensure permanence and durability.
ISBN 978-3-11-019492-0
ISSN 0585-5306
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Λ CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.
Bibliographie information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek
The Dcutschc Nationalbibliothck lists this publication in the Dcutschc Nationalbibliografic;
detailed bibliographic data arc available in the Internet at http://dnb.d-nb.de.
© Copyright 2007 by Walter de Gruytcr GmbH & Co. KG, D-10785 Berlin
All rights reserved, including those of translation into foreign languages. No part of this book
may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
including photocopy, recording or any information storage and retrieval system, without permis-
sion in writing from the publisher.
Printed in Germany
Cover Design: Christopher Schneider
To my beloved grand-father Oscar Ewenczyk >ι,
who first embodied for me the difficult synthesis of
Humanism and Judaism to which this book is devoted

Foreword
Almost five hundred years after his death, Don Isaac Abravanel (1437-
1508) remains a legendary figure of Sephardic history and, above all, a
legendary figure of the Expulsion of 1492. His life story has been told
again and again over the centuries, from Don Isaac's own autobio-
graphical writings through the monographic studies of the past ninety
years. Most of his literary work was preserved and has been continu-
ously in print from the time of its writing to the present day. And yet
Don Isaac Abravanel remains a mysterious figure for the reader and
observer of today. Was he a remarkably successful Jewish financier and
merchant or was he a great leader of Portuguese and Spanish Jewry
and, after the Expulsion, of the Sephardic Diaspora? Was he one of the
first Jewish humanists or was he a conservative thinker who marked
the end of the history of Jewish medieval philosophy? Pre-modern and
modern scholars have painted many "portraits" of him, and still we
hesitate and cannot discern which is the true picture. Such hesitation is
common, reflecting a variety of perspectives on a historical figure with
such a rich personality. However, it seems that these many faces con-
ceal a difficulty in understanding his role and the role of other Jewish
laypeople in Renaissance history. The many faces of Abravanel are, in
some way, a faithful picture reminding us of our own incertitude about
Renaissance Judaism.
The four letters of Abravanel presented here for the first time in a
critical and scholarly edition might in some measure dispel this incerti-
tude. They form a remarkable—although limited—collection of Jewish
epistolary writings, which can be compared to the humanistic episto-
lary genre revived by Petrarch and his followers. The epistolary genre
became in the Renaissance the major mode of the expression and diffu-
sion of humanism throughout Europe. The humanistic epistle in its dif-
ferent national forms has long been the subject of scholarly examina-
tion, and its characteristics can be used as a methodological framework
for the study of Abravanel's four letters. The introductory study of the
letters following this foreword will attempt, by such comparative
methodology, to determine their place in the humanistic epistolary
genre. For instance, it is possible to see in Don Isaac's Portuguese and
Hebrew letters an important reflection of how the Jewish elite assimi-
VIII Foreword
lated humanistic trends and inserted them into the traditional modes of
expression that were at their disposal. More than Abravanel's literary
works, his personal letters open a window on a complex cultural proc-
ess of assimilation and dissimulation of humanism among the fifteenth-
century Jewish elite. The clear humanistic flavour of the Portuguese
letter seems to vanish upon the reading of the Hebrew epistles, as if
Don Isaac were holding a dual discourse, showing his humanistic cul-
ture to his Christian patrons while concealing it from his Jewish ad-
dressees. Thus, the ambivalence of modern scholars as to the "true"
Abravanel may be considered a distant echo of the complexity of Don
Isaac's attitude to humanism and to Renaissance culture and history in
general.
Don Isaac Abravanel, born in Lisbon in 1437, grew up in a wealthy
Jewish Spanish family, which had found refuge in Portugal after the
ruin of Sevillan Jewry in 1391. His education and subsequent career
were those of a Jewish merchant and financier in the service of Portu-
guese nobility. His ascension up until the year 1481 in the court of the
noble Braganga family and that of King Afonso V was spectacular, ren-
dering him an important figure in late fifteenth-century Portuguese
trade, finance, and politics. Although particularly successful, Don Isaac
was in fact following the path of his father and of his Sevillan ancestors.
What was more unique was his literary activity as a writer in both He-
brew and Portuguese. Although we have some indication of his fam-
ily's advanced Jewish education and of their support of Jewish scholar-
ship, Don Isaac was the first Abravanel to contribute to the family's
traditional economic livelihood with his impressive literary works and
teaching. Trade, finance, politics, teaching, and writing were surely
very different commitments, and at times conflicting ones, but they all
conflated to nurture a personality informed by the new historical and
cultural conditions of the fifteenth-century Renaissance. Don Isaac was
a man of his time. He took part in the major trends of the Iberian Ren-
aissance: international trade with Flanders, Tuscany, and North Africa;
cultural exchanges with Italy; Iberian humanistic discussions; Portu-
guese expansionistic policy; and, Spanish reconquista. Don Isaac's Por-
tuguese and Hebrew correspondence has to be seen as a direct conse-
quence of his historical involvement. Indeed, commerce, finance, and
politics implied constant letter writing and reading. But beyond the
practical uses of correspondence, the exchange of letters was for Abra-
vanel —as for many of his contemporaries— a way to give a cultural
shape and a general meaning to his many commitments.
During the fifteenth century, Portuguese and Spanish nobles sig-
nificantly expanded the practice of epistolary writing, making it one of
Foreword IX
the central expressions of their cultural ideal. Drawing more and more
upon classical sources and upon Italian humanistic models, the Iberian
elite transformed letter exchange into a laboratory of their new self-
definition as nobles and as servants of the monarchy. In this way, liter-
ary representation and rhetorical ability became important and neces-
sary components of leadership. The reading of the only Portuguese let-
ter of Don Isaac to reach us makes it clear that Abravanel assimilated
the new humanistic epistolary trend. His letter is very similar in its
sources and its rhetoric to those written by fifteenth-century Iberian
humanists. As far as I know, this letter is the first humanistic vernacu-
lar epistle written by a Jew. While modern scholars have diminished its
historical and cultural importance, the story of its conservation and
transmission tells much about its appreciation by late fifteenth-and six-
teenth-century Portuguese literati. This dismissive attitude of scholars
is, of course, related to their ambivalent appreciation of Don Isaac's life
and work. The present edition is an attempt to give the fullest scope to
this rare, if not unique, literary document. Breaking with the unfortu-
nate scholarly division between Sephardic studies and Spanish and
Portuguese literary studies, this edition intends to restore this epistle to
its original historical background—that is, humanistic epistolary writ-
ing among the Iberian elite. Such an endeavour, which relies on the
contextualizing of this letter in a range of literary, historical, and eco-
nomic documents, will hopefully elucidate Abravanel's knowledge of
Iberian humanistic literature, his friendship with leading Portuguese
humanists, and his participation in the economic, diplomatic, and cul-
tural relationships between Portugal and Italy. Thus this fragment of
Abravanel's vernacular correspondence will stand as an exemplary
piece through which we may view the intricate world of a Jewish hu-
manist as well as the conditions that gave rise to such a new figure.
It is important here to remind the reader that the second major ex-
ample of a vernacular humanistic text written by a Jew is that of the
Dialoghi d'Amore, which was written by the elder son of Don Isaac, Ye-
huda, in the first years of the sixteenth century. This work is surely one
of the most significant of these texts. It crowns the remarkable evolu-
tion of the Abravanel family throughout the fifteenth century and con-
firms that Don Isaac's epistle is not an interesting peculiarity but a piece
of a whole cultural transformation. Indeed, a similar evolution can be
found in Don Isaac's biography. After his successful career in the court
of the Duke of Braganga, Don Isaac had to flee Portugal in 1483 because
of Braganga's plot against the new king, Joäo II, Afonso V's son. He
found refuge in Castile and was soon commencing another successful
career, this one in the house of the Mendoza. The Mendozas, like the
χ Foreword
Bragangas, were not only the most influential noble family of the king-
dom, but also the leading patrons of humanism and Renaissance cul-
ture in Castile. Don Isaac's financial services for Cardinal Don Pedro
Gonzalez, son of the great humanist El Marques de Santillana and, he
himself an accomplished humanist, were surely mixed with intellectual
exchanges although we have no record of it.
After the Expulsion of 1492, Don Isaac and his family found shelter
in Naples where King Ferrante, also a great patron of humanists, used
his services. We have some sense of a strong relationship between the
two men. Was such a relationship only based on economic interests?
More likely, given Don Isaac's humanistic background, Ferrante saw
him as more than merely a financier. Indeed, we know that Abravanel
left Naples with Ferrante's son, Ferrandino, for Sicily on the eve of the
French invasion in 1495. Such knowledge points to a cultural proximity
between Abravanel and the Neapolitan kings and nobles. Don Isaac
finally settled in Venice in 1503, where he lived until his death. His
subsequent participation in the negotiations of the Doges with the Por-
tuguese Kingdom concerning the new sea route to India is further evi-
dence of Don Isaac's integration in the Italian Renaissance elite. Venice
was at that time barred to long-term Jewish residents, and yet Abra-
vanel was accepted and even employed as a diplomatic agent. Here
again, such a success cannot be explained without considering cultural
and humanistic factors.
Clearly, Abravanel moved from the periphery to the very heart of
Renaissance culture and humanism with the same constant success. It
seems that, parallel to his economic and political endeavours, he con-
stantly learned and assimilated the humanistic culture of his surround-
ings. Thus, Don Isaac's Portuguese humanistic letter enables us to view
his economic and political curriculum from a cultural perspective, re-
vealing the abilities and skills essential for being a successful courtier in
fifteenth-century Portuguese, Spanish, and Italian courts. The only ver-
nacular epistle that has reached us from Abravanel stands, from this
cultural point of view, for the many other letters that Don Isaac wrote
throughout his career, in which he had to display his literary skills as
well as his financial and political talent.
The question of the impact of the Abravanel family's humanistic
vernacular tendencies on Renaissance Judaism can be partially eluci-
dated by the study of the three Hebrew private letters written by Don
Isaac that have reached us. Scholars quickly noticed the dissimilarities
between the Portuguese letter and the Hebrew ones. The major sign of
humanism in the Portuguese epistle, its many references to classical
literature, is entirely absent from the Hebrew epistles. This difference—