Between Two Worlds: The tractate "Light of the Nations" of the Last Jewish Scholastic Philosopher 'Ovadyah Sforno (1475 ca.-1550) in its Hebrew and Latin Version
Final Report Abstract
The project explored the philosophical work of the Italian-Jewish exegete and philosopher Obadiah Sforno (ca. 1475–1550). The project produced a new edition of the treatise Light of the Nations (Hebrew: Or ʿAmmim, Bologna, 1537/38; Latin: Lumen Gentium, Bologna, 1548), which will be published along with two English translations. An analysis of the work revealed its complex genesis: the linear model previously prevalent in secondary literature, which assumed the Hebrew text to be the original while its Latin translation was only an “offshoot” of Sforno’s activities, which were primarily aimed at a Jewish public, has proven to be outdated. The tractate needs to be understood as the result of the reciprocal influence of Christian-Latin and Jewish-Hebrew philosophical traditions. Through its complementary character as a Scholastic summa and a philosophical Bible commentary, the author addressed both a Jewish and a Christian audience. Sforno’s contacts with Christian theologians, Humanists, and religious reformers may even have been crucial for the creation of the work. The project published a volume of proceedings, containing twelve contributions from two conferences (2017, 2018), which presents the first comprehensive and in-depth examination of Sforno’s literary production standing between philosophy and exegesis. According to these new findings, Sforno emerges as an idiosyncratic interpreter of Averroes, drawing from both the latter’s independent works and his commentaries on Aristotle. Sforno did not aim at a fundamental refutation of Aristotelian philosophy, but rather sought to offer a religious-philosophical synthesis in the tradition of Moses Maimonides. Additionally, through research on the author of a manuscript containing a Hebrew commentary on Or ʿAmmim, the project succeeded in identifying Sforno’s disciple Elia di Nola (ca. 1510–1580), who was not only the author of that commentary (under his alias “Elia di Butrio”), but also the anonymous author of an extensive commentary on the Psalms preserved in manuscript. Thereby, the oeuvre of Sforno’s most important disciple became an object of study for the first time. As part of the ongoing PhD projects of Florian Dunklau (Or ʿAmmim commentary) and R. Moshe Kravetz (Psalms), both manuscripts will be edited as separate projects, thus providing a new scholarly approach to Sforno’s circle of students and readers.
Publications
-
The Literary and Philosophical Canon of Obadiah Sforno.
Veltri, Giuseppe; Coppola, Giada & Dunklau, Florian
-
Obadiah Sforno: Light of the Nations.
Veltri, Giuseppe; Coppola, Giada & Dunklau, Florian
