A Textual and Contextual Analysis of the Hebrew Gospels translated from Catalan

Abstract

The first extant translation of the four Gospels into Hebrew is to be found in a late fifteenth-century manuscript kept in the Vatican Library (Vat. ebr. 100). The study of this manuscript has to date been rather haphazard and very little has been written about it. Delcor argued in 1981 that it was probably translated from Catalan and suggested that the translator was a Jew, probably writing at the end of the fifteenth-century or the start of the sixteenth-century. In this article we attempt to demonstrate that the manuscript is a copy of the original fourteenth or fifteenth century translation. It was indeed based on a Catalan translation of the Gospels, specifically, the so-called “Bíblia del segle XIV,” which is to be published in the Corpus Biblicum Catalanicum. There are small but significant hints that the translator was a Jew writing for a Jewish audience, in order to provide them with knowledge of these core Christian texts (possibly to help them to undermine Christian polemicists). However, the possibility also exists that this translation was carried out by a converso for others who, in the aftermath of 1391 and the Tortosa disputation, had converted or were considering conversion, in order to inform them about their new faith. 1. The manuscript of the Vatican Library Vat. ebr. 100 The first complete translation of the four Gospels into Hebrew is to be found in a late fifteenth-century manuscript written in a Byzantine hand, now in the Vatican Library (Vat. ebr. 100). This manuscript is a copy of the original translation though, sadly, there is nothing in the manuscript by means of which we can identify the copyist or the translator. Earlier translations of Matthew into Hebrew and other verses from the Gospels scattered in Jewish anti-Christian polemical works were translated from the Latin, generally from the Vulgate. However, in this case, the translator chose to make the translation based on a vernacular translation of the Gospels into Catalan. The study of this manuscript has been rather haphazard. In 1936, Josep Maria Millàs i Vallicrosa published a short article in which he looked at Hebrew manuscripts in the Vatican library that were translated from Catalan. At the start of the article, he stated that it is by no means a full list of the possible manuscripts that might have been translated from Catalan into Hebrew. His article was written before Cassutto’s catalogue of 115 of the Hebrew manuscripts in the Vatican Library appeared in 1956,1 and he used the very old * Harvey J. Hames: Department of History and Director of the Center for the Study of Conversion and InterReligious Encounters, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev. Email: hames@bgu.ac.il Pere Casanellas: Director of the Corpus Biblicum Catalanicum, Associació Bíblica de Catalunya, and president of the Societat Catalana d’Estudis Hebraics, Institut d’Estudis Catalans, Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain. Email: pere.casanellas@b-j.cat. This research was supported by the I-CORE Program of the Planning and Budgeting Committee and The Israel Science Foundation (596/12). 1 Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Codices Vaticani Hebraici: Codices 1-115, ed. Umberto Cassuto, Bybliothecae Apostolicae Vaticanae codices manu scripti recensiti (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1956). THE HEBREW GOSPELS TRANSLATED FROM CATALAN (CASANELLAS AND HAMES) 69 Catalogue of Stefano Evodio Assemani and Giuseppe Simone Assemani, which appeared in Rome in 1756.2 His short study does not mention the manuscript containing the Hebrew translation of the four Gospels and it is impossible to ascertain whether he saw it.3 Cassuto described the manuscript in his Catalogue noting that it could be a translation from Catalan without adding any explanations.4 Beyond this, very little has been written about this manuscript aside from commenting on its existence. A two page discussion by D. V. Proverbio in a Vatican publication suggests that the manuscript itself was compiled in Crete but is inconclusive about the possibility of its Catalan origins.5 The catalogue of the Institute of Microfilmed Hebrew Manuscripts in the National Library in Jerusalem describes the manuscript as being from the fifteenth century in a Byzantine hand and adds Cassuto’s comment about the possibility of it being a translation from Catalan. The same information appears in the new catalogue of the Hebrew Manuscripts in the Vatican Library compiled by the staff of the Institute of Microfilmed Hebrew Manuscripts.6 According to this catalogue, the translation is different from the specimens of four other translations collected by A. Marx in “The Polemical Manuscripts in the Library of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America.”7 It refers also to the brief aforementioned text by D.V. Proverbio. However, in 1981, Maties Delcor carefully examined chapter 10 of Matthew in the Vatican manuscript and based on grammatical formulations and the orthography of the proper names of the Apostles concluded that it was translated from Catalan. He also suggested that corrections in the margin indicate that the manuscript was read and corrected by an Italian, and he was of the opinion that it was a Jew, probably at the end of the fifteenth century or the start of the sixteenth century, who was the translator. Delcor’s comments are interesting but inconclusive, and he admitted that both Provençal and Castilian were also possible sources for the Hebrew translation. He also added that even if the translation was from Catalan, it was difficult to know what version of the Gospels was used.8 The manuscript itself is a compendium containing three works. The first and largest is the translation of the four gospels, written in a different hand from the last two parts, with which there is no evident connection. It seems likely that this manuscript is a compendium compiled in Crete in the late fifteenth century for a Jewish erudite, perhaps someone like Elia Capsali (ca. 1485-1550), a Rabbi who also composed histories of Venice and 2 Stefano Evodio Assemani and Giuseppe Simone Assemani, Bibliothecae Apostolicae Vaticanae codicum manuscriptorum catalogus in tres partes distributus: in quarum prima orientales in altera Graeci in tertia Latini Italici aliorumque Europaeorum idiomatum codices, 3 vols. (Rome, 1756; rpt. Paris, 1926), 1, part. 1:1-408. 3 See J. M. Millàs i Vallicrosa, “Manuscrits Hebraics d’Origen Català a la Biblioteca Vaticana,” in Homenatge a Antoni Rubió i Lluch: Miscel·lània d’Estudis Literaris Històrics i Lingüístics (Barcelona, 1936), vol. 1, 97-109. 4 Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Codices Vaticani Hebraici, 144-145. 5 Delio Vania Proverbio, “Vangeli. Ebraico,” in I Vangeli dei Popoli. La Parola e l’immagine del Cristo nelle culture e nella storia, eds. F. D’Aiuto, G. Morello, and A.M. Piazonni (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 2000), 372374. 6 Hebrew Manuscripts in the Vatican Library: Catalogue, compiled by the staff of the Institute of Microfilmed Hebrew Manuscripts in the Jewish National and University Library, Jerusalem, edited by Benjamin Richler, palaeographical and codicological descriptions by Malachi Beit-Arié in collaboration with Nurit Pasternak, Studi e Testi, 438 (Vatican City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 2008), 67. 7 A. Marx, “The Polemical Manuscripts in the Library of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America,” in Studies in Jewish Bibliography and Related Studies in Memory of A. S. Freidus (New York, 1929), 270-273. 8 M. Delcor, “Un manuscrit hébraïque inédit des quatre évangiles conservé a la Bibliothèque Vaticane (Hebr. 100),” Anuario de Filología 7 (1981): 201-219. He compares the translation to other known translations of the Gospels, such as Shem Tob ibn Shaprut’s translation of Matthew and points out, correctly, that the translation is not very good. MELILAH MANCHESTER JOURNAL OF JEWISH STUDIES 11 (2014) 70 Constantinople, who might have been interested in having a Hebrew translation of the Gospels.9 The manuscript later became the property of the banker and bibliophile Ulrich Fugger (1526-1584) from where it made its way into the Vatican collection in 1623.10 2. Catalan as the language of the original and the Italianization of proper names introduced by copyists It is relatively easy to show that the translation is based on a Catalan version of the Gospels. 2.1. Proper names, especially names of persons, are in general clearly transcribed from Catalan. However, as Maties Delcor rightly suggested, a copyist has often corrected these names by means of marginal corrections. Sometimes proper names appear corrupted in the text itself or have been changed into an Italian form. Finally, names usually appear in their Italian form in the headings of chapters, which must have been added by the copyist who Italianized the translation. The list of the Apostles in Matthew 10:1-4 (f. 14r) is a good example of this state of affairs. Most names appear in the text clearly transcribed from Catalan: ןומיש Simon (which appears twice in the list), יריפ Pere, בירדנא Andreu, ימקיג Jacme (appears twice in the list, but on its first occurrence, probably a result of a copyist error, it appears as מקיג ו ), בידאבאז Zebedeu, ןאוז Joan, שאמוט Tomàs, ביננאק Cananeu, שדוי Judes. In three cases it seems that there are copyist errors: ימוטרב instead of ימוטרב ב Bartomeu, ביפבא instead of ביפלא Alfeu, בידטאט instead of בידאט Tadeu. It has to be taken into account that the ending בי־ is the normal transcription in Hebrew of the mediaeval Catalan final diphthong -eu. Some of these Hebrew forms could also be transcriptions of names written in other Romance languages, especially some Occitan dialects, but as a whole they can hardly be transcriptions from any language other than Catalan. It also has to be borne in mind that inicial Jof Catalan can be transcribed by ־ז (as in ןאוז Joan), ־י׳ג, ־ג (ימקיג or ימקי׳ג Jacme, האידוג Judea) or ־י (שדוי Judes, שואשי Jesús). The transcription by ־י can be explai