Moses ibn Ezra משה אבן עזרא
“HaSallach” — the man whose penitential poems are read before Yom Kippur
Moses ibn Ezra was born in Granada about 1055 into a distinguished family. While Granada stood he lived the life of a court poet: banquets, friendship with the young Judah Halevi, whom he introduced, poems of wine and spring.
Then came the Almoravids. The Granada community was ruined, the family scattered, and he fled to the Christian north. He never returned — and that is not a figure of speech: all the sources agree that he remained in exile to the end and longed for Andalusia.
The second half of his life is selichot. There are so many of them, and they entered use so thoroughly, that he was nicknamed HaSallach, the maker of penitential poems. In Sephardi and Ashkenazi machzorim alike his verses stand in the days before Yom Kippur.
He also wrote a book unique of its kind — Kitab al-Muhadara, a study of Hebrew poetry: where it comes from, how it differs from Arabic, how metre and rhyme work, and which poets are worth what. It is the first Jewish book of literary theory.
On the timeline
Sources
Rishonim
- The selichot of Moshe ibn Ezra — poems that entered the machzorim before Yom Kippur
- Kitab al-Muhadara — the first Jewish book on poetics
Basis: documents and evidence.