Rabbeinu Yonah of Gerona רבנו יונה

Jonah ben Abraham of Gerona was Nachmanides' cousin and his teacher in matters of ethics. His chief book, Shaarei Teshuvah, sets out repentance in stages: what regret is, how it differs from shame, how a spoken word is put right, how trust is restored. It is studied to this day, especially in the month of Elul.

In the controversy over Maimonides' legacy he stood with the opponents: he held that the philosophical works should not be put into everyone's hands. The dispute ended with the Dominicans burning Maimonides' books at Montpellier in 1232–1233.

What follows is tradition. Nine years later, in 1242, the Talmud itself was burned in Paris — twenty-four cartloads of manuscripts. It is told that Rabbeinu Yonah saw in this an answer to the earlier burning, repented publicly, and vowed to travel to Maimonides' grave to ask forgiveness.

This passage needs a caveat. Historians regard the account as thinly attested; it may have been composed by Maimonides' partisans afterwards. It is given here as tradition rather than fact — because that is the form in which it has come down.