1. The major writing on Modena, with extensive bibliographical coverage, is Howard Adelman, ”Success and Failure in the Seventeenth-Century Ghetto of Venice: The Life and Thought of Leon Modena” (Ph.D. diss., Brandeis University, 1985). For Modena “reevaluated,” see idem, “New Light on the Life and Writings of Leon Modena,” in Approaches to the Study of Medieval Judaism, vol. 2, ed. David Blumenthal (Chico, Calif.: Scholars Press, 1985), pp. 109–122. I am grateful to Professors Adelman and Benjamin Ravid for complying with my request to read and comment on the present study, thereby allowing me to benefit from their wise counsel on numerous points of style and content. For a shorter version, with, as its first section, a review of Jewish musical activities in Renaissance VeniceM, see ”Jewish Musical Culture in Early Modern Venice,” in The Jews of Venice: A Unique Renaissance Community, ed. Robert C. Davis and Benjamin Ravid (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, forthcoming). An even shorter version, preliminary to each of the above, was read at the annual meeting of the Renaissance Society of America (Bloomington, Ind.; April 1996).Google Scholar

2. Rather than summarize the literature here, I shall refer to it, where relevant, in the sections below.

3. Sefer hayyei Yehuda [“Book of Judah's Life”], ed. Daniel Carpi (Tel-Aviv: Tel-Aviv University Press, 1985), pp. 104 105, resp. hazzanut and musiqa. (All translations here, and elsewhere, were made from the Hebrew; for an English version, see The Autobiography of a Seventeenth-Century Venetian Rabbi: Leon Modena's “Life of Judah”, trans. Cohen, Mark R. [Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1988].) Modena's list comprises such other activities, with ties to music, as writing comedies (to which were appended, as customary, musical interludes; see below), pronouncing rabbinical decisions (including two on music, to be discussed), and proofreading printed copy (especially, for our purposes, Rossi's “Songs of Solomon,” again to be discussed).Google Scholar

4. For Modena in Ferrara, then in Florence, see Adelman, “Success and Failure,” resp. pp. 351–392,411–20.Google Scholar

5. For Abraham ben Mordekhai Farissol, who, from his initial appointment in 1475, held the post of cantor in Ferrara for at least fifty years, see Ruderman, David, The World of a Renaissance Jew: The Life and Thought of Abraham ben Mordekhai Farissol (Cincinnati:Hebrew Union College Press, 1981), esp. pp. 18–20.Google Scholar

6. Modena, Leon, Historia de' riti hebraici (1637; repr, after 1678 edition, Bologna: Arnaldo Fomi, 1979), p. 18 (“… che canta phi forte degl'altri le Orationi, detto Cazan”; I.x.7). As with the Hebrew, all translations, unless otherwise indicated, are the author's.Google Scholar

7. Babylonian Talmud (B.T.), Ta'anit (“Fast”) 16a (). On the duties of the cantor, see Landman, Leo, “The Office of the Medieval Hazzan” Jewish Quarterly Review, n.s. 62 (1972): 156–187, 244–276.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

8. , (Sefer hayyei Yehuda, p. 41). On the musical training of others in his family, see below.

9. Modena's foreword to Salamone Rossi's “Songs of Solomon” (Venice: Pietro and Lorenzo Bragadini, 1622–23, from prefatory matter on fols. l–6v): . The author draws on the Song of Songs 1:17 (), Esther 3:8 (), and Isa. 2:6 (), playing on the double-meaning of (events/beams), (runnings/rafters), and (sufficed/were content).Google Scholar

10. Cf. Liber usualis(with introduction and rubrics in English; Tournai: Desclee, 1952), pp. 98–124.

11. For “the science of music,” see references in index to Hebrew Writings Concerning Music in Manuscripts and Printed Books from Geonic limes up to 1800,ed. Israel Adler (RISM BIX²; Munich: G. Henle Verlag, 1975), p. 360 (also references there s.v. hokhmat ham-musiqa).On musiqain the sense of “art music,”Google Scholar cf. Alloni, Nehemya, “Ham-munah ‘musiqa’ be-sifrutenu bi-y'mei hab-beinayim” [“The Term ‘musiqa’in Medieval Hebrew Literature”], in Yuval: Studies of the Jewish Music Research Center1, ed. Israel Adler (Jerusalem: Magnes Press of Hebrew University, 1968), pp. 11–38 (Hebrew sec).Google Scholar

12. Cf. Historia de' riti hebraici, p. 22 (“Nel canto, i Tedeschi piu di tutti cantano, Levantini, e Spagnuoli a certo modo, che ha del Turchesco, gl'italiani piu schietto, e riposatamente”; I.xi.6). Modena's pupil Samuel Nahmias, or after conversion Giulio Morosini, writes that in Venice, in the early seventeenth century, there were synagogues of “all kinds of national [origin, where] Spaniards, Turks, Portuguese, Germans, Greeks, Italians, and others congregated, and they all sing after their own practice” (“nelle Sinagoghe…intervenendovi di ogni sorte di natione, Spagnuoli, Levantini, Portoghesi, Tedeschi, Greci, Italiani, et altri, e cantano ogni uno ad usanza propria”; , Morosini, Via dellafede mostrata agli ebrei [Rome: Sacra Cong, de Prop. Fide, 1683], pp. 789–790). (On Nahmias alias Morosini, see further below.)Google Scholar

13. For details, see quaestio portion of a rabbinical responsum published by , Modena in 1605 (London, British Library, MS Add. 27148, fol. 9a); cf.Google ScholarPubMed She'elot u-t'shuvot: Ziqnei Yehuda [“Responsa of the Elders of Judah”], ed. Shlomo Simonsohn (Jerusalem: Rabbi Kuk Foundation, 1956), pp. 15–20 (also included, seventeen years later, in the prefatory matter to Salamone Rossi's “Songs”). Further information is contained in a letter that , Modena wrote, in the same year, to Judah Saltaro da Fano: cf. Igrot rabbi Yehuda Arie mim-Modena [“Letters of Rabbi Leon Modena”], ed. Yacob Boksenboim (Tel-Aviv: Tel-Aviv University Press, 1984), pp. 110–111.Google Scholar

14. (from letter to Judah Saltaro).

15. Such a possibility was also suggested by Adelman, “Success and Failure,” p. 379.

16. (from quaestw that Modena addressed in his responsum). Ein keloheinu (“There is none like our God”): hymn of praise and thanks to God (as, moreover, Lord, king, and savior) in his uniqueness, recited (in the Italian rite, to which we limit this and the following identifications) at close of Additional Service on Sabbath and Festivals; ’Aleinu leshabbeah (“It is our duty to praise the Lord of all things”): concluding prayer, proclaiming divine sovereignty over Israel and the world, for all daily and Sabbath services; Yigdal (“Magnified and glorified be the living God”): hymn (possibly by Daniel ben Yehuda, ca. 1300), based on Maimonides’ Thirteen Articles of Faith, for close of both Evening and Additional Services on Sabbath and festivals; Adon ’olam (“Lord of the universe”): hymn extolling unity, timelessness, and providence of God, for close of Evening Service on Sabbath.

17. (from letter to Judah Saltaro).

18. July 30, 1605 (the Special Sabbath known as Nahamu, following the Ninth of Av, which commemorates the destruction of the Temple).

19. (the quotation is, again, from the quaestio, portion; cf. She'elot u-t'shuvot, p. 15).

20. Cf. Igrot rabbi Yehuda Arie mim-Modena,p. 110.

21. Exod. 8:22 (“And Moses said: it is not right to do this”): the passage was purposely chosen because it concerns Moses, the name of the adversary.

22. On zemer as “song” (Italian canto), see , Modena, Novo dittionario hebraico, e italiano, doe, dichiaratione di tutte le voci Hebraiche piu difficili delle scritture Hebree nella volgar lingua italiana (Venice: Giocomo Sarzina, 1612), fol. [110]v.Google Scholar

23. Refers to Hag. 1:4().

24. Quotation from Hos. 9:1.

25. For the expression “scholars of Torah” (tofsei hat-tora), see Jer. 2:8.Google Scholar

26. See Marx, Alexander, “Rav Yosef ish Arli be-tor more we-rosh yeshiva be-Si'ena” [“Rabbi Joseph of Arli as Teacher and Head of a Yeshiva in Siena”], in Sefer hay-yovel li-kh 'vod Levi Ginzberg [”Louis Ginzberg Jubilee Volume”] (New York: American Academy for Jewish Research, 1946), pp. 279–282.Google Scholar

27. (Sefer hayyei Yehuda,p. 57).

28. As clear from two letters that Modena's son Mordekhai wrote, in 1604, to his uncle Moses Simha (cf. Igrot rabbi Yehuda Arie mim-Modena,pp. 94–95). At the end of the second, Mordekhai jested: “Then Moses sang in an intermedioF(the first part after Exod. 15:1: ). On Renaissance intermedi,i.e., musico-dramatic portions inserted for entertainment between the acts of plays, there is a rich literature, including, among others, Osthoffs, WolfgangTheatergesang und darstellende Musik in der italienischen Renaissance(Tutzing: Hans Schneider,1969)Google Scholar and Pirrotta's, NinoLi due Orfei: da Poliziano a Monteverdi (Turin:Einaudi, 1969).Google Scholar

29. From Sefer hayyei Yehuda,p. 57

30. According to Roth, Cecil, secular studies and courtly arts (music, dance) were imparted to Jewish boys, in Northern Italy, within the traditional curriculum (The Jews in the Renaissance [Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1959], pp. 271–304)Google Scholar. See also, for similar opinions, Shulvass, Moses Avigdor,The Jews in the World of the Renaissance, trans. Kose, Elvin I.(Leiden: Brill, 1973), pp.168–172;Google Scholar and most recently,Bonfil, Robert, Jewish Life in Renaissance Italy, trans. Oldcorn, Anthony (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1994), esp. pp. 134–135.Google Scholar

31. (Sefer hayyei Yehuda,p. 82).

32. (Ibid p. 62).

33. (Ibid p. 70).

34. (Ibid p. 72).

35. (Modena's foreword to the collection). On the topos of fathers grieving over sons, cf.McClure, George W., Sorrow and Consolation in Italian Humanism (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991), esp. p. 444, n. 3, for reference to earlier precedents (in writings of Cicero, Quintilian, Petrarch, Salutati, Ficino, etc.). The problem, for Modena, was how to circumvent the rabbinical proscription against engaging in “festive” activities the “Songs” were festive in their content and functions (see below) during the period of mourning (a full year).Google Scholar

36. Cf. Job 30:31 ().

37. Jer. 8:23 “my eye is a fountain of tears”: Modena plays on the word “my eye” (‘eini), which he exchanges for “I” (ani).

38. Cf. Ps. 109:22 (‘).

39. Cf. 2 Sam. 23:1 ().

40. Song of Songs 2:14 ().

41. Reason there was, as Modena himself well knew: Zebulun got into a quarrel over a whore (Sefer hayyei Yehuda), p. 73; cf. Adelman, “Success and Failure,” p. 513Google Scholar

42. Cf. 1 Sam. 25:31 () and Ps. 79:3 ().

43. Ps. 109:13 ().

44. Ps. 77:3 ().

45. 2 Sam. 19:36 ()

46. For Modena's money problems in the years 1620–22, for example, see Sefer hayyei Yehuda,pp. 67, 69–70

47. From foreword to “Songs”: (cf. Esther 8:16: ).

48. On the differentiation between non-rhythmicized chants for prayers and biblical cantillation and rhythmicized ones for piyyutim, seeIdelsohn, Abraham Zvi, Jewish Music in Its Historical Development (New York: Holt, Rinehart, Winston, 1929), chaps. 3–4, 7.Google Scholar

49. The poem, on which more below, is printed in , Modena'sDivan, ed. Bernstein, Simon (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1932), p.156 (no. 141).Google ScholarPubMed

50. 2 Sam. 23:1 (see above).

51. B.T., Ta'anit 16a (see above).

52. Midrash Tanhuma, Leviticus, the portion Re'e, par. 12 . Cf. Pesiqta rabbati, chap. 25 ().

53. (first of three poems in collection; for its ascription to Modena, see below).

54. (from responsum).

55. Ibid cf. Deut. 26:7:

56. (responsum). In emphasizing decorum, Modena tried to improve the image of the Jews in the eyes of their neighbors. In the madrigal comedies (e.g., Orazio Vecchi's Amfiparnaso [1597] and Adriano Banchieri's Barca di Venezia [1605]), the Jews were parodied for their sloppy singing. The French humanist Francois Tissard, who attended a prayer service in Ferrara at the beginning of the sixteenth century, reported that “one might hear one man howling, another braying, and another bellowing, such a cacophony of discordant sounds do they make!” (Grammatica hebraica et graeca [Paris: Égide Gourmont, 1508], fol. 17v; after Ruderman, World of a Renaissance Jew, pp. 19, 101). Thomas Coryat, an Englishman visiting Venice in 1608, voices his own animadversions (see his Coryat's Crudities [London: W. Stansby, 1611], p. 232; or in its later edition [Glasgow: J. MacLehose, 1905], p. 371).

57. Thus his grandson Isaac Halevi reported in his introduction to Modena's Magen wa-herev [“Shield and Sword”] (Milan: Biblioteca Ambrosiana, MS Q139 Sup, fols. 2–3), quoted by Geiger, Abraham in his Leon de Modena, seine Stellung zum Talmud, zur Kabbala undzum Christentum (Breslau: Sulzbach, 1856), fols. 11–12, esp. 11 ()Google Scholar

58. : from Beit Yehuda (Venice: Vendramin, 1635), fol. 44v (quoted after Nehemiah Libowitz, S., Leon Modena [New York: Harry Hirsch, 1901], p. 95; see also Shulvass, Jews in the World of the Renaissance, p. 241).Google Scholar

59. See, at length, Harran, Don, In Search of Harmony: Hebrew and Humanist Elements in Sixteenth-Century Musical Thought, Musicological Studies and Documents 42 (Neuhausen: Hanssler-Verlag for the American Institute of Musicology, 1988);Google Scholar and Moshe Idel, “Hap-perush ham-magi we-hat-te'urgi shel ham-musiqa be-teqstim yehudiyyim mi-t'qufat ha-renesans we-'ad ha-hasidut” (“The Magical and Theurgic Interpretation of Music in Jewish Texts from the Renaissance until Hassidism”), in Yuval, : Studies of the Jewish Music Research Center 4, ed. Israel, Adler, Bathja Bayer, and Lea Shalem (Jerusalem: Magnes Press of Hebrew University, 1982), pp. 33–63 (Hebrew sec).Google Scholar

60. Moscato was the leading rabbi in Mantua at the end of the sixteenth century. His sermon on music (Higgayon be-khinnor [“Contemplations on a Lyre”]) was published as the first in his collection Nefutsot Yehuda [“Judah's Dispersions”] (Venice: di Gara, 1588–89); for an extended study, cf. Shmueli, Herzl, “Higgayon bekhinnor”: Betrachtungen zum Leierspiel des Jehuda Moscato (Tel-Aviv: Neografika, 1953). For messianic echoes in Leon Modena's treatment of art music, see belowGoogle Scholar

61. “Non possono toccar, né maneggiar cosa di peso, ne instrumenti d'arti… “: Historia de' riti hebraici (III.i.7), p. 57

62. “Pero tutta questa cerimonia si chiama Habdalà, che vuol dir distintione. AI fin del che gettano del vino per terra, per segno d'allegrezza, et alcuni usano dir qualche canto, o verso augurandosi pur felicita, e buona sorte quella settimana … “ (Ibid [III.i.25], p. 63).

63. “Si fanno molte allegrezze, feste, e conviti, come in Ester nell'ultimo capitolo dice, Essentque dies isti…” (Ibid [III.x.4], pp. 85–86).

64. See, for example, Schirmann, Jefim, “Hat-te'atron we-ham-musiqa bi-sh'khunot hayyehudim be-'Italya” [“Theater and Music in Jewish Communities in Italy”], Zion 29 (1964): 61–111 (reprinted in the author's collected writings, Mehqarim u-massot [“Studies in the History of Hebrew Poetry and Drama”], 2 vols. [Jerusalem: Bialik Institute, 1979], 2:44–94).Google Scholar

65. “All'hora poi, che si vuole; si riducono li sposi in una sala, o camera sotto un baldachino con suoni, et alcuni usano con certi fanciulli appresso con torcie accese in mano, che cantano…. Li Rabini del loco, o il cantarino della Scuola, o '1 piu stretto parente, preso una tazza, o caraffa di vino in mano, dice una benedittione a Dio…. E poi con un'altro vaso di vino cantano sei altre benedittioni, in tutto sette…. La sera si fa un convito ad amici, e parenti…. Poi si cantano quelle sette benedittioni, che si dissero nello sposare doppo l'ordinaria benedittion della mensa, e si levano le tavole” (Historia de' riti hebraici [IV.iii.4–5], pp. 91–92).

66. Superscript breath marks are set at the point of caesura (and virgules at the end of lines):(cf. Divan, p. 131 [no. 87]; the last line here, like the whole poem, is incomplete).

67. (plus six more lines, to complete an ottava rima; Ibid, p. 120 [no. 74]). Line 6 concludes with the rhyme word simha (see end rhyme ha of line 2), referring to the head of the yeshiva, Simha Luzzatto. The final couplet has the end rhyme tin, to accord with the last word gittin (B.T., Gittin [“The Laws of Divorce”]; ).

68. Divan, p. 156 (no. 141), marked “for the conclusion of the tractate Ketubbot [“Marriage Contracts”] in the yeshiva of the Great Synagogue”

69. . Divan, pp. 119–120 (no. 73).

70. Talmud Torah schools, run as confraternities, provided advanced study for adults

71. (for poem, see below).

72. Bernstein, following the autobiography, identifies the poem as the one sung by Zebulun (Divan, p. 120 n.), as does Carpi (Sefer hayyei Yehuda, p. 70). Adelman, following the superscription to the poem, believes it was sung by Modena (“Success and Failure,” p. 512).

73. (Sefer hayyei Yehuda, p. 70).

74. (etc).

75. Cf. Job 5:11 ().

76. Cf. Song of Songs 3:8 ().

77. Refers to B.T., Kiddushin [“Marriage”] 30a, where the study of Torah is conceived as a battle between father and son, i.e., teacher and pupil, ending in peace or, as here, love: (the last portion, suggesting that be read not as “storm” but as “end,” is a quotation from the lost biblical Book of the Wars of the Lord, referring to the site Wahev; cf. Num. 21:14: ).

78. For the combination “wisdom” and “science,” see 2 Chron. 1:10–12 (); and for the combination “wisdom” and “understanding,” with its sefirotic implications, see Dan. 1:20 ()

79. Cf. 1 Kings 5:11 (sons of Mahol, though their wisdom was exceeded by Solomon's: ). The simile applies, of course, to the wise Simha Luzzatto (see above)

80. , (from fourth stanza). Cf. Zeph. 3:14 ().

81. On the siyyum,or completion of readings, see Howard Adelman, “Another More nevukhim:The Italian Background and the Educational Program of Modena's, LeonMore nevukhim biktivah bilshonenu hakadosh,” in From Ancient Israel to Modern Judaism: Intellect in Quest of Understanding (Essays in Honor of Marvin Fox), vol. 3, ed. Jacob Neusner, Ernest S. Frerichs, and Nahum M. Sama (Atlanta:Scholars Press, 1989), pp. 89–107, esp. 94–95.Google Scholar

82. From the same introduction to Modena's Magen wa-herevmentioned above (), fol. 11.

83. Divan,p. 118 (no. 72), a poem consisting often distichs, with each line ten syllables long, as follows: .

84. Cf. Ps. 68:4 ()

85. It is uncertain whether is to be read as (“their…troubles”) or (“their…expectations”).

86. Cf. Exod. 29:27 ().

87. These poems are to be distinguished from others intended to be sung upon opening the Holy Ark. Cf. Massimo Acanfora Torrefranca, “ ‘Quando si apre l'arca al Signore’: Su di un manoscritto ebraico italiano del XVIII secolo, e sul ‘Cantar di forte all‘arca,’” Italia: studi e ricerche sulla storia, la cultura e la letteratura degli ebrei d'ltalia10 (1993): 59–72.Google Scholar

88. Cf. Igrot rabbi Yehuda Arie mim-Modena,pp. 52 55, for three letters, though devoid of musical references.

89. (cf. Divan, 131 [no. 96]). Or are the words to be read as a reference to Clerli's being a musician (“because he is involved in music”)?

90. (Ibid).

91. , (Divan, pp. 133–134 [no. 90]).

92. (line 3).

93. The one with a firm attribution to Modena figures in his Divan, pp. 82 83 (no. 37). It constitutes the third poem in the music collection, separated from the first two by Modena's foreword. That the first two are by Modena may be presumed on stylistic and contextual grounds. Stylistically, the three poems are cast in similar language. Contextually, at least three points bear mention: the author of the first poem identifies himself as “a confidant [of the composer]… one of his great admirers, his friend” (); he must have written the second one as well, for it bears the caption “He then went on to say” (); since Modena introduced the third poem with the related caption “Therefore I will go on reciting wonders” (,; after Isa. 29:14: ), he appears to have connected it, in content and presentation, with the first two (the key word is “go on”). The one loophole in this argument is that ”Therefore I will go on reciting wonders” may refer not to the “wonders” already recited in the first two poems, but to those recited in the intervening foreword.

94. First quatrain: . For a quotation of the second quatrain, see above.

95. Cf. Gen. 4:21: ; 1 Sam. 10:5: ; 2 Sam. 6:5 (also 1 Chron. 13:8): ; Isa. 5:12: .

96. Ps. 81:3: .

97. Ps. 33:3: ; also 1 Sam. 4:6: , and Ezra 3:12:

98. Jer. 6:17: .

99. Ps. 16:6: .

100. First four lines: ; and, from the end of line 6 to the conclusion: “ … in chorus / Sing in the Temple and in the study hall / To the lofty abode of the Cause of all Causes” ().

101. Wordplay on nn'bt (“songs”) (“vines,” as implied by ‘«n», “the roots o f ) and on V (“divine,” i.e., “God's songs”) / “w (”above”); cf. Ezek. 8:17: .

102. Cf. Josh. 11:13 ().

103. Ps. 68:26: . In the original (see above) the poet plays on the double-reading trafa ”i (“prince of players”) and D*M vra (“we sang: ‘Gardens…’ ” ).

104. Cf. Job 8:19 ().

105.

106. Cf. Ps. 68:30 ().

107. 2 Sam. 23:1: .

108. Cf. Isa. 40:26 (,).

109. Cf. Job 34:19 ().

110. For the word in the context of song, see Ps. 68:32–33:

111. Cf. Isa. 35:2: (an4 similarly, 49:13 and 52:8–9).

112. Cf. B.T., Sukka 5,4: ; and Sanhedrin 94a: .

113. Cf. Ps. 150:4: .

114. Discussed in Harran, ”From Music to Matrimony: The Wedding Odes of Rabbi Leon Modena (1571–1648),” in Proceedings of the Twelfth World Congress of Jewish Studies, Jerusalem, 1977 in preparation

115. From the letter to Judah Saltaro da Fano (1605): (Igrot rabbi Yehuda Arie mim-Modena,p. 110).

116. (Modena's responsum).

117. , (Ibid).

118. Ibid

119. : the reference is to Karo's compendium Shulhan ‘arukh, orah hayyim[”The Prepared Table: Mode of Life“] 560:3, as commented by Moses Isserles

120. (responsum).

121.

122. (from Rossi's dedication to his collection).

123. : poems 1:14 and 3:9 (the latter with ).

124. Ps. 67:5 () and 92:5 ()

125. (from responsum

126. (Ibid; after Isaac Alfasi, Hilkhot rav Alfas [“Laws of Rabbi Alfasi”], ed. Nisan Zakash, 2 vols. [Jerusalem: Rabbi Kuk Foundation, 1969], 1:25).

127. (Rossi's dedication).

128. (dedication).

129. (Ibid).

130. (Ibid).

131. For the Hebrew text, see Modena, She'elot u-fshuvot,pp. 176–178 (no. 131).

132. For details, see Adler, Israel, ”The Rise of Art Music in the Italian Ghetto,“ in Jewish Medieval and Renaissance Studies, ed. Alexander Altmann (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1967), pp. 321–364, esp. 350–353.Google Scholar

133. It is discussed, along with the others, by Adler in his La pratique musicale savante dans quelques communautes juives en Europe aux XVIIe-XVIIIe siecles, 2vols. (Paris and The Hague: Mouton, 1966), lxhap. 5 (for their quotation, see 1:257–262 [nos. 22–26], and for Modena's text in particular, p. 262 [no. 26]).Google Scholar

134. (She‘elot u-t’shuvot, p. 176).

135. “Crown,” from the Qedusha (“keter yitenu lakh”); in the kabbalistic doctrine of the sefirot, it refers to God in His most hidden essence.

136. “These are the festivals of the Lord” (Lev. 23:4).

137. The first from Shema‘ Yisra'el (“Hear, O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is One,” the Jewish confession of faith, read in the morning and evening prayer services), the second from the prayer Modim anahnu lakh (“We thank You, for You are the Lord our God,” etc., the eighteenth benediction of the prayer ’Amida [“Standing,”so named because it is recited in a standing position]). On the talmudic prohibition of repetition, cf. B.T., Berakhot [“Blessings”] 5, 33b: “Anyone who says ‘Modim, modim’ is silenced, as if he who says ‘Modim, modim’ were to say ‘Shema’, shema”” (). The repetition of “keter and the holy name” is reprehensible for its implication of two gods.

138. (from beginning of responsum; She ‘elot u-t’shuvot,p. 176

139. (Ibid, p. 177). On Modena and Kabbalah, see Howard Adelman, “Rabbi Leon Modena and the Christian Kabbalists,” in Renaissance Rereadings: Intertext and Context, ed. Maryanne Cline Horowitz, Anne J. Cruz, and Wendy A. Furman (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1988), pp. 271–286, esp. 273–276; and at length, Moshe Idel, “Differing Conceptions of Kabbalah in the Early Seventeenth Century,” in Jewish Thought in the Seventeenth Century, ed. Isadore Twersky and Bernard Septimus (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1987), pp. 137–200.

140. The two were connected; indeed, after turning to Kabbalah, Hamits (d. ca. 1676), Modena's erstwhile pupil, published along with Zaccuto (d. 1697) an expanded edition of the Zohar hadash,with glosses on the Zohar(entitled Derekh emet,1658). On Modena's controversy with Hamits over the relation between Kabbalah and philosophy, see Idel, “Differing Conceptions of Kabbalah,” p. 155

141. (She ‘elot u-t’shuvot, x pp. 177–178).

142. (Modena's first responsum, on art music).

143. (after Adler, “Art Music,” p. 357). On Trabotto and other members of his family, see Joseph Green, “Mishpahat Terabot [”The Trabot Family“], Sinai 79 (1976): 147–163.

144. “Songs of Solomon,” no. 7, mm. 17: the word is extended in the four voices by elaborate melismas (the melisma is a succession of three or more notes sung to a single syllable). There are enough notes in the melismas to accommodate a twofold statement of keterin each of the voices, but Rossi specifically notated a single one

145. “Songs of Solomon,” no. 6, mm. 3–4: there is no possibility of a repetition, for in all voices the three syllables of adonaiare each assigned to a single note

146. Cf. “Songs of Solomon,” no. 20 (Psalm 128), mm. 54–56. In another example, the word adonaiis repeated within the repeat of a longer portion: no. 24 (Psalm 29), mm. 49–61 (in the tenor: “Break did He, the Lord, the cedars of Lebanon; [repeat] the Lord, the cedars of Lebanon”). Trabotto knew his Rossi well, for he caught the passage, though justified it, as Modena would have too, on musical grounds: “If, in the psalm ‘Havu ladonai benei elim,’ they repeat one verse twice or three times, there is no reason for alarm, for they sing the same verse two or three times for the sake of improving the melody, as is customary in art music” (; Trabotto's responsum, loc. cit.).

147. A possible scenario is mapped out in Harran, Don, “Salamone Rossi, Jewish Musician in Renaissance Italy”, Acta musicologica 59 (1987): 46–64, esp. 61–62. For the “Songs” in Rossi's repertoire at large, see idem,Salamone Rossi, Jewish Musician in Late Renaissance Mantua (Oxford University Press, shortly forthcoming), esp. chap. 7.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

148. He was in Mantua, for example, in 1620 (Sefer hayyei Yehuda,p. 68), as he was, further, in 1623 (Ibid, pp. 78–79).

149. Book 1 of madrigals a 5,1600; the fourth book of instrumental works, 1622; and the Madrigaletti,Rossi's last collection, 1628. The remaining collections, eight in all (excluding reprints), are signed Mantua, which is inconclusive. It means either that Rossi was not in Venice at the time or, if he was, that the dedication was prepared after his return to Mantua.

150. L'Ester (Venice: Giacomo Sarzina, 1619), pp. 3–7, where the author praises his patroness for her frank yet delightful conversation, her singular manners, and her sundry virtues and talents, among them her skills in, and understanding of, Italian poetry. “Avendomi Vostra Signoria fatto degno dell'onesta e gentil sua conversazione, la quale per le sue rare maniere, et molte vertu e scienze … é bramata da qual si sia piu ingegnosa persona, come quella che della poesia italiana in particolar modo si diletta, intende e vi si adopra,”Google Scholar etc. On Sara Copio, see various writings by Boccato, Carla, particularly “Lettere di Ansaldo Cebà, genovese, a Sara Copio Sullam, poetessa del Ghetto di Venezia”, La rassegna mensile di Israel 40 (1974): 169–191Google Scholar; and “Sara Copio Sullam, la poetessa del ghetto di Venezia: episodi della sua vita in un manoscritto del secolo XVII,” Italia: studi e ricerche sulla storia, la cultura e la letteratura degli ebrei d'italia 6 (1987): 104–218. For her musical preoccupations, see Don Harrán, “Doubly Tainted, Doubly Talented: The Jewish PoetCopio, Sara (d. 1641) as a Heroic Singer,” in Musica Franca: Essays in Honor of Frank A. D'Accone, ed. Irene Almet al. (Stuyvesant, N.Y.: Pendragon Press, 1996), pp. 367–422.Google Scholar

151. (first poem, lines 9–11).

152. (from Modena's foreword to Rossi's collection).

153. Portaleone, Shiltei hag-gibborim [“Shields of Heroes”] (Mantua: n.p., 1612); the portions that deal with music may be consulted in Hebrew Writings Concerning Music, ed. Israel Adler, pp. 243–285. For Portaleone in a broader context, see Harran, Don, “Cultural Fusions in Jewish Musical Thought of the Later Renaissance,” in In Cantu et in Sermone: For Nino Pirrotta on His Eightieth Birthday, ed. Fabrizio della Seta and Franco Piperno (Florence:Leo S. Ols chki, 1989), pp. 141–154.Google Scholar

154. Cf. Adelman, “Success and Failure,” esp. p. 213, where Archivolti is said to have “shape[;d] Modena's activities for the rest of his life.”

155. For musical passages in 'Arugat hab-bosem [;“Bed of Spices”], including the one in question, cf. Hebrew Writings Concerning Music, pp. 96–102, esp. 98 and for Modena's parallel comment, the quotation in n. 9 above.

156. Profiat Duran, Ma'ase Efod [;“Work of Ephod','] (1403), from introduction; cf. Hebrew Writings Concerning Music, pp. 126—130, esp. 128: “… and so it was, in all its perfection, in the Temple, with its singers and instruments; and they achieved great learning in i t, … but this learning is absent from us today” Immanuel ha-Romi (“the Roman”), in the fourteenth century, wrote that “the art of music is a wondrous science, yet today it has disappeared from our dwellings” , from his unpublished commentary on Gen. 4:21; cf. Amnon Shiloah, “A Passage by Immanuel ha-Romi on the Science of Music,” Italia: studi e ricerche sulla storia. la cultura e la letteratura degli ebrei d'ltalia 10 (1993): 9–18, esp. 14.

157. From the beginning of his foreword to Rossi's (“The lip of truth shall be established forever, or to refer to the poet who wrote in his notebooks [;as follows]: 'What does the science of music say to others? “Indeed, I was stolen out of the land of the Hebrews” [;after Gen. 40:15]'”; Mahbarot 'Immanu'el ha-Romi [;“Immanuel ha-Romi's Notebooks”], ed. Dov Yarden (Jerusalem: Bialik Institute, 1957), p. 120 (notebook 6, line 341; there the wording was not “to others,” but “to the Christians ,” which, in Modena's time, came under the censor's knife).

158. (from foreword).

159. (from Modena's foreword to Rossi's “Songs”). For the dichotomy “profane”/“sacred,” cf. Lev. 10:10, Ezek. 22:26, 44:23 and, in the Havdala service, “Blessed are You, O Lord, who distinguish between sacred and profane” and for adding from the one to the other, B.T., Rosh Hashana 9a:

160. Then what is Hebrew in his “Songs”? See Don Hárran, “Salamone Rossi as a Composer of 'Hebrew' Music,” in a Festschrift for Israel Adler (forthcoming).

161. (from Modena's third poem, distichs 12–13).

162. a (Ibid, distichs 5–6).

163. Assuming Rossi needed such help: on the relatively low level of Hebrew learning among Italian Jews, and Modena's program for reform, see Adelman, “Another A/ore nevukhim.”

164. As is the case in certain prayers in the collection (nos. 1 and 16, Qaddish; 3, Barekhu; 7, Qedusha)

165. From the composer's dedication (see above for quotation).

166. (from Modena's foreword).

167. (Rossi's dedication).

168. (from Modena's foreword).

169. Cf. L'écrivain face à son public en France et en Italie à la Renaissance, ed. Charles, Fiorato and Jean-Claude, Margolin (Paris: Vrin, 1989), especially part 1, devoted to what is now commonly called the “paratext,” viz., the prefaces, dedications, introductions, and postscripts by means of which authors tried to influence readers and control their responses.Google Scholar

170. Cf. Lorenzo Bianconi. “II Cinquecento e il Seicento,” in Letteratura italiana, 7 vols. in 10, ed. Alberto Asor Rosa (Turin: Einaudi, 1986), 6:319–363, esp. 320, on composers and printers who commissioned men of letters to write or revise their dedications. In his autobiography, Modena provides a list of twenty-one Hebrew works, among them Salamone Rossi's “Songs of Solomon,” to which he added “poems and prefaces” note the plural form of both); cf. Sefer hayyei Yehuda, pp. 75—76. On guides to Hebrew writing, including Modena's unfinished project entitled “Guide to the Perplexed in Writing in Our Sacred Tongue” (More nevukhim bi-kh 'tiva bi-l'shonenu haq-qaddosK), see Adelman, “Another More nevukhim,” esp. pp. 104—106.

171. (the word lintot was printed with a double stroke to show its affinity to nota or notare; from Modena's foreword). That Rossi, and not Modena, decided on the typographical procedure for aligning music and text may be assumed from the expression “it appeared to the mehabber” In poem 3 (distich 18) and the statement of copyright, mehabber (“author/composer”) refers distinctly to the composer (see also the next quotation, where Modena speaks of Rossi's hibbur or “composition,” as well as the quotation in n. 175).

172. (Modena's foreword).

173. (Ibid).

174. On the accuracy of word-tone correspondences in Rossi's treatment of the texts, as distinct from accuracy in matters of orthography or typography, see Don Harran, “Salamone Rossi as a Composer of 'Hebrew' Music.” For a full discussion of textual and musical errors, in both the composition and the recension, see the introduction to volume 13 in Salamone Rossi, Complete Works, ed. Don Harran, Corpus Mensurabilis Musicae 100 (13 vols. in 5), vols. 1—12 (Neuhausen: Hanssler-Verlag, 1995), vol. 13 (forthcoming).

175. (from Modena's p foreword). On didactic models in Renaissance literature, see John David Lyons, Exemplum: The Rhetoric of Example in Early Modem France and Italy (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989).

176. Morosini was Modem's student before 1628 (the date that, in the present document, may be taken as a terminus ad quem); he apostatized in 1649. On Modena as his teacher, see Simonsen, David, “Giulio Morosinis Mitteilungen uber seinen Lehrer Leon da Modena und seine judischen Zeitgenossen,” in Festschrift zum siebzigsten Geburtstage A. Berliner's, ed. Aron Freimann and Meier Hildesheimer (Frankfurt: Kaufmann, 1903), pp. 337–344;Google Scholar and for his anti-Jewish stance, Ravid, Benjamin, “Contra Judaeos in Seventeenth-Century Italy: Two Responses to the Discorso of Simone Luzzatto by Melchiore Palontrotti and Giulio Morosini,” AJS Review IS (1983): 301–351, esp. 328–351.Google Scholar

177. Morosini, Via delta fede (see above); Modena, a letter preserved, in draft, in London, British Library, MS Or. 5395, fol. 23. The two documents have variously been discussed by Roth, Cecil, “L'accademia musicale del ghetto veneziano,” La rassegna mensile di Israel 3 (1927 –28): 152–162Google Scholar; Werner, Eric, “Manuscripts of Jewish Music in the Eduard Birnbaum Collection,” Hebrew Union College Annual 18(1944): 397–428Google Scholar; Israel Adler, “Art Music in the Italian Ghetto,” esp. pp. 344—349; and most recently, Howard Adelman, “Success and Failure,” pp. 635–636, 692–93, 771.

178. ” … in Venetia del 1628 in circa … si formo … nel Ghetto … un Accademia di musica … e '1 mio maestro Rabbi Leon da Modena era maestro di cappella” {Via dellafede,p. 793).

179. “… quando da Mantova per causa della guerra fuggiti gli Ebrei, se ne vennero in Venetia. E coll'occasione che fioriva la citta di Mantova in molti sorti di studii, anche gli Ebrei havevano applicato alia musica e agl'istromenti” (Ibid).

180. “… nella quale si cantava due volte per settimana di sera e vi si congregavano solamente alcuni principali e ricchi di quel Ghetto che la sostentavano, tra i quali io pure mi trovavo” (Ibid).

181. ” … fecero nella Scuola Spagnuola … fare due cori ad usanza nostra per li musici, e le due sere cioe neH'ottava della festa Scemini Nghatzeret e Allegrezza della Legge, si canto in musica figurata in lingua ebraica parte della Ngharbith [;= 'arvit, evening service] e diversi Salmi, e la Mincha [;= afternoon service], cioe il Vespero dell'ultimo giorno con musica solenne, che duro alcune hore della notte … “ (Ibid).

182. (Modena, responsum on art music, originally 1605).

183. “Tra gFistromenti fu portato in Sinagoga anche 'Organo, il qual pero non fu permesso dai Rabbini, che si sonasse per essere instromento che per ordinario si suona nelle nostre chiese” (Via della fede, p. 793). On rabbinical attitudes to the use of the organ in the synagogue, see Benayahu, Meir, “Da'at hakhmei Italya 'al han-negina be-'ugav bi-t'filla” (“The Opinions of Italian Sages on Organ Playing in Prayer Services”), Asufot, sefershana le-mada 'ei hay-yahadut[;“Collections, Yearbook for Jewish Studies”] 1 (1987): 265–318.Google Scholar

184. (from responsum).

185. (Modena, responsum).

186. Among them the Feast of Tabernacles, concluding with the two feast days just mentioned (Shemini 'Atseret, Simhat Torah).

187. Num. 10:10.

188. The manuscript has been discussed by Werner, in “Manuscripts of Jewish Music” and, most recently, by Adler in his inventory of Hebrew Notated Manuscript Sources up to circa 1840 (RISM B IX1; 2 vols., Munich: G. Henle Verlag, 1989), 1:394–401.Google Scholar

189. As skimpy as it is, the standard source for Civita is still Birnbaum, Eduard, Judische Musiker am Hofe von Mantua von 1542—1628 (1893),Google Scholar in rev. Ital. trans, by Colorni, Vittore as “Musici ebrei alia corte di Mantova dal 1542 al 1628,” Civiltd mantovana 2 (1967): 185–216,Google Scholar esp. 192. On Porto, see variously in Harran, Don, “Allegro Porto, an Early Jewish Composer on the Verge of Christianity,” Italia: studi e ricerche sulla storia, la cultura e la letteratura degli ebrei d'ltalia 10 (1993): 19–57. Both composers have tenuous Venetian connections.Google Scholar

190. Cf. Hebrew NotatedManuscript Sources, p. 133. The reason for rejecting the attribution is not given, but may be assumed from Adler's “Art Music in the Italian Ghetto,” p. 347 (“we have found nothing to suggest that he had ever attempted musical composition”).

191. Immanuel (to whom Modena referred in his foreword to Rossi's “Songs”) relied on Ibn Falaquera, Reshit hokhma [;“Beginning of Wisdom”] (1240), pt. 2, chap. 5 (par. 5), itself based on Arabic sources (in particular, Al-Farabi). See, for Ibn Falaquera's exposition, Hebrew Writings Concerning Music, ed. Israel Adler, pp. 66–68

192. (after Shiloah, “A Passage by Immanuel ha-Romi on the Science of Music,” pp. 15–16).

193. Quoted in Hebrew Writings Concerning Music, pp. 284—285. For full edition, see Rieti, Miqdash me'at [;“The Lesser Temple”], ed. Jacob Goldenthal, in Il Dante ebreo, ossia il picciol santuario … dal Rabbi Mose, medico di Rieti… per la prima volta … pubblicato(Vienna: P. Zollinger, 1851).

194. Sefer htayyei Yehuda, pp. 77–78

195. Cf. Neri, Achille, “Gli intermezzi del Pastor Fido,” Giornale storico della letteratura italiana 11 (1888): 405–415Google Scholar; and Hartmann, Arnold Jr., “Battista Guarini and II Pastor Fido,” Musical Quarterly 39 (1953): 415–425.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

196. To Sara Copio on Purim, February 28, 1619.

197. For Sommi's play, see Ham-mahaze ha-'ivri ha-rishon … [;“The First Hebrew Play: 'The Comedy of Betrothal' by Judah Sommo”], ed. Yefim, Schirmann (Jerusalem: Sifrei Tarshish, 2nd ed. 1965), esp. pp. 98–104 (for musical indications). On other plays performed at Purim, cf. Schirmann, “Hat-te'atron we-ham-musiqa bi-sh'khunot hay-yehudim be-'Italya” (as above).Google Scholar

198. For a combined study of the two, cf. Harran, Don, “Jewish Dramatists and Musicians in the Renaissance: Separate Activities, Common Aspirations,” in “Musicologia humana”: Studies in Honor of Warren and Ursula Kirkendale, ed. Siegfried Gmeinwieser, David Hiley, and Jorg Riedlbauer (Florence:Leo S. Olschki Editore, 1994), pp. 291–304,Google Scholar and, further, in Leone de' Sommi and the Perfoming Arts, ed. Ahuva, Belkin (Tel-Aviv University Press, 1997), pp. 27–47.Google Scholar

199. Rabbi Samuel Aboab (1610–94) was adamant in his opposition to theatrical spectacles, writing a responsum later published, along with others, in his Devar Shemuel [;“Samuel's Word”] (Venice: Vendramin, 1701–2), fols. 1v–2.

200. “Tutto questo fu un fuoco di paglia, duro poco PAccademia” {Via dellafede, p. 793).

201. See above (n. 177) for source reference.

202. “Hebbe una volta il nostro Congresso musicale nome giustamente d'accademia perche v'erano alcuni non indegni d'esser connumerati tra musici e di voci e di mano… Ma aggiuntasi lo sciagura che l'anno della peste perdemmo i migliori suggetti che v'erano, nostra compagnia rimase si sola … allora per communi impedimenti rade volte siamo insieme e imperfettamente vien esercitata.” On the plague of 1630, see Boccato, Carla, “Testimonialize ebraiche sulla peste del 1630 a Venezia,” La rassegna mensile di Israel 41 (1975): 458–467Google Scholar; and in a broader context, Cipolla, Carlo, Fighting the Plague in Seventeenth-Century Italy (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1981).Google ScholarYet “the show” went on; for theatrical activity in 1630, see Boccato, , “'L'Amor possente, favola pastorale di Benedetto Luzzatto hebreo da Venezia,' composta durante la peste del 1630,” La rassegna mensile di Israel 43 (1977): 36–47.Google Scholar

203. “… et il nome era degli impediti tutto per alluder all'infelice stato della captivita nostra che n'impedisce ogni atto virtuoso la compitezza” (Modena's letter).

204. “… riservando il nome infatti, poiche non piu accademia” (Ibid).

205. “… godremo cosi volentieri l'effetto della sua cortesia se ne fara parte de' frutti maturi cbe saranno prodotti nella nova loro Academia che ne significa, poiche di qua non gli potemo offerir altro tanto non havendo pianta fertile di Compositori” (Ibid).

206. For the political idealization of biblical Israel, see Saul B. Robinsohn, Hinukh bein hemshekhiyyut li-f'tihut [;“Education between Continuity and Openness”] (Jerusalem: School of Education, Hebrew University, 1975), esp. pp. 13–69 (“The Biblical Hebrew State as an Example of Ideal Government in the Writings of Political Thinkers in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries” [;in Hebrew]).

207. Modena, from the foreword to Rossi's “Songs.”