Me'or Einayim and the quarrel over Jewish chronology
Azariah dei Rossi showed from Greek and Roman sources that the received chronology of the Second Temple is a century and a half short and that the era from creation is a post-talmudic construction. The book was not burned: it was forbidden to readers under twenty-five.
The book appeared at Mantua; the title-page reads 1573, the printing was finished in 1574, some copies are dated 1575, and the author corrected it while it was being set. Three parts: an eyewitness account of the Ferrara earthquake of 17 November 1570, the first Hebrew version of the Letter of Aristeas, and the sixty chapters of Imrei Binah.
Three things gave offence, in descending order. The chronology: in the fourth part of Imrei Binah he showed from external sources that the Seder Olam count for the Second Temple period is short by some hundred and sixty-six years, and that the era from creation is not a historical datum. This struck at practice, not at theory: legal instruments were dated by that era and calculations of the End rested on it. Hence the halakhic flavour of the quarrel. Next, the non-literal reading of aggadah, with the exemplary case of the gnat in Titus's head. And last, the method itself: Philo, Josephus, the Church Fathers, the Letter of Aristeas, Greek and Latin historians and Christian Hebraists as witnesses.
What was actually done to the book. R. Joseph Karo in Safed instructed R. Elisha Gallico to draw up a decree, to be circulated to all Jewry, ordering every copy burned — and died on 13 Nisan 1575 without signing it; the decree was never issued. The rabbis of Mantua took the one measure that came into force: the book might be read only by written permission of the local rabbinic authority, and not at all under the age of twenty-five. Venice and other Italian rabbinates imposed similar restrictions. R. Moses and R. David Provençal of Mantua and R. Isaac Finzi of Pesaro defended the author.
The most substantial answer came from outside and late: the Maharal of Prague took the book apart in the sixth *be'er* of Be'er ha-Golah — but in 1598, twenty-four years after publication and twenty after the author's death.
Two corrections. "The book was burned" — it was not. "Karo excommunicated Azariah" — he intended to, commissioned the decree and died without signing it; an intention must not be retold as an event.
How we know
Sources
Acharonim and later rabbinic literature
- Me'or Einayim, Mantua 1573–75 — the first edition; surviving copies differ from one another
Documents of the period
- The decree of the rabbis of Mantua (communal records, ed. S. Simonsohn) — the reading-licence and the age bar — the only measure in force
Scholarship
- J. Weinberg, Azariah de' Rossi: The Light of the Eyes, Yale — Karo's decree was left unsigned; the book was never burned
Basis: documents and evidence.
People and places
Azariah dei Rossi · Me'or Einayim · Mantua · Ferrara · Rabbi Yosef Karo · Maharal of Prague · Rabbi Judah Aryeh of Modena — Leone Modena · Venice · Ari Nohem