MOSES DE LEON (BEN SHEM-OB)

By: Kaufmann Kohler, Meyer Kayserling

Cabalistic writer; author, or redactor, of the Zohar; born at Leon, Spain,
about 1250; lived in Guadalajara, Valladolid, and Avila; died at Arevalo in
1305, while returning to his home. He was familiar with the philosophers
of the Middle Ages and with the whole literature of mysticism, and knew
and used the writings of Solomon ibn Gabirol, Judah ha-Levi,
Maimonides, etc. He knew how to charm with brilliant and striking
phrases without expressing any well-defined thought. He was a ready
writer and wrote several mystical and cabalistic works in quick
succession. In the comprehensive "Sefer ha-Rimmon," written in 1287
and still extant in manuscript, he treated from a mystical standpoint the
objects and reasons for the ritual laws, dedicating the book to Levi ben
Todros Abulafia. In 1290 he wrote "Ha-Nefesh ha-akamah," or "HaMish al" (Basel, 1608, and frequently found in manuscript), which shows
even greater cabalistic tendencies. In this work he attacks the
philosophers of religion and deals with the human soul as "a likeness of
its heavenly prototype," with its state after death, with its resurrection,
and with the transmigration of souls. "She el ha-odesh" (written in
1292), another book of the same kind, is dedicated to Todros ha-Levi
Abulafia. In the "Mishkan ha-'Edut," or "Sefer ha-Sodot," finished in 1293,
he treats of heaven and hell, after the apocryphal Book of Enoch; also of
atonement. He wrote as well a cabalistic explanation of the first chapter
of Ezekiel.

Toward the end of the thirteenth century Moses de Leon wrote or

compiled a cabalistic midrash to the Pentateuch full of strange mystic
allegories, and ascribed it to Simeon ben Yo ai, the great saint of the
Tannaim. The work, written in peculiar Aramaic, is entitled "Midrash de R.
Shimeon ben Yo ai," better known as the Zohar. The book aroused due
suspicion at the outset. The story runs that after the death of Moses de
Leon a rich man from Avila offered the widow, who had been left without
means, a large sum of money for the original from which her husband
had made the copy, and that she then confessed that her husband
himself was the author of the work. She had asked him several times,
she said, why he had put his teachings into the mouth of another, but he
had always answered that doctrines put into the mouth of the miracle-

working Simeon ben Yo ai would be a rich source of profit. Others

believed that Moses de Leon wrote the book by the magic power of the
Holy Name. At any rate the contents of the book have been accepted
and approved by all cabalists, and can by no means be regarded as
mere inventions and forgeries of Moses de Leon.

Bibliography:
Ahimaaz Chronicle, ed. London, pp. 95 et seq.;
Jellinek, Moses b. Schem-Tob de Leon und Seine Verhltniss zum Sohar, Leipsic,
1851;
Grtz, Gesch. vii. 231 et seq.;
Geiger, Das Judenthum und Seine Geschichte, iii. 75 et seq., Breslau, 1871;
De Rossi-Hamberger, Hist. Wrterb. p. 177;
Steinschneider, Cat. Bodl. cols. 1852 et seq.;
idem, Hebr. Bibl. x. 156 et seq.

http://pluto.huji.ac.il/~liebes/zohar/zohar.html
http://www.ashlagbaroch.org/Zohar/
http://israel613.com/HA-ZOHAR/ZOHAR_CHADASH_BERESHIT_1.htm
http://www.sup.org/zohar/?d=Aramaic%20Texts&f=index
http://www.hebrewbooks.org/21828
http://www.hebrewbooks.org/44307
http://www.linguee.es/ingles-espanol/traduccion/have+hope.html
http://www.linguee.es/espanol-ingles/traduccion/me+afano+en.html
http://www.linguee.es/espanol-ingles/search?source=auto&query=hearing
http://www.linguee.es/espanolingles/traduccion/existen+diferentes+opiniones.html
https://archive.org/details/B20442464

https://archive.org/details/cantosdelamonta00calluoft