Tseror ha-mor (Bundle of Myrrh) and Eshkol ha-kofer (Cluster of Henna)

Bundle of Myrrh

When I was in Castile in the city of Zamora, tranquil and secure in my abode, I set my mind to inquire and explore matters of Torah and began to compose a book yielding lovely utterances on the five books of the Torah. On this scriptural portion I produced insights that were worthy in my estimation. I completed the first volume of the work, through the end of Genesis. Then the Lord’s anger was kindled against His people, and He uprooted them from their land. King Ferdinand expelled all the Jews in his kingdom. Some went to Navarre; some left by boat; some moved to the kingdom of Portugal; some died of plague and starvation. Wherever they went, they were a burden on the land. I was among the exiles who stayed in the city of Guimarães in Portugal, where I settled and completed the commentary on the Torah that I had begun in Castile. I built it out with all kinds of embellishments, to be available to any inquirer; I crowned it with radiant pearls in every section, adorning it with homilies and tales, and coloring it with stripes and hues drawn from the Jerusalem Talmud, the Mekhilta, and the Yalkut [Shimoni]. I was able to do so because I had all the tools of my trade at my disposal to light my way—books beyond counting, such as you wouldn’t believe, volumes of the Zohar and the [Menorat] ha-ma’or [Menorah of Light, by Isaac Aboab (early fourteenth century)], in more editions than I could count, giving new insights on Midrash and the Sefirot. Who can recount their mighty wonders! From all these works I built and completed my own [commentaries] including earthshaking insights of the Zohar. To this I added a commentary on the Five Scrolls, set out and crowned with adornments, with double and triple meanings, and borrowings from R. Jonathan ben Uziel. I also composed a commentary on Tractate Avot, for which my eyes and heart sigh, replete with embellishments, expounding on juxtapositions in all six chapters, jewels elegantly arranged, with the names of the senior and junior masters, with fragrance and charms intertwined, written in innocence and enlightenment.

God continued to wax furious against His people. King Manuel expelled all the Jews in the kingdom of Portugal. He commanded that their books be taken from all their dwelling places. He declared that he wished for boats to be provided for them to travel by sea, and that all the Jews should leave on a day designated for everyone, young and old, to depart for Lisbon. This was after he had taken all the infants and children, male and female, to convert them by force. I then left my house, possessions, and everything I loved, including my books, in the province of Porto, and set my feet on the road to go to the capital city together with my married children and my wife. I risked my life in order to take along the books I had composed, handwritten by pen, proceeding slowly till my strength was exhausted, arriving at the outskirts of Lisbon, where I sat down. The announcement had gone out in the whole province and its environs that all books and tefillin should be brought to the great synagogue in Lisbon, on pain of death. They had already taken one Jew guarding his one beloved book and flogged him mercilessly with whips. I stood trembling upon hearing this, and I went in fear and haste and dug out a hole within a large olive tree that had struck large roots into the earth, and there I hid the three books that I had written, the commentaries on the Torah, the Five Scrolls, and Tractate Avot, as well as the book Tseror ha-kesef [Bundle of Silver] that I had written in my youth. For this I mourn and wail, weeping day and night, for the fire of God has ravaged my palaces and the books of my tent. Woe to me that my enemy has consumed what I nurtured and raised; my eye trickles without ceasing. I have written bitter leaves; olive leaves bitter as gall and wormwood were my food. And yet, leaves of the olive were food in my mouth, “verdant olive tree of lovely shape” I called it, with a great roaring sound. I put my hand in my mouth and justified God’s decree chirpingly, and it was sweeter in my mouth than honey and the drippings of the honeycomb.

Afterwards, they led about ten thousand Jews into a courtyard, forcing and enticing them to change their religion. Within four days, not forty were left of the men and women. To make it short, they stripped me of my skin, of my sons and daughters and all that I possessed, leaving only my body. I was imprisoned and bound with iron chains along with the others, to persuade us to convert. After six months, when the king saw that he had not succeeded, he ordered that a single broken ship be given to us to take us to Arzilla, and from there we proceeded to the sons of Ishmael [i.e., Islamic Morocco]. I stayed there in the city Ksar el-Kebir. The great holy congregation there clothed my nakedness and provided for all my needs; may the Omnipresent see to it that they are treated compassionately by their overlords! For a long time, I was ill there, suffering from my head and my eyes, weeping for my children and for my books that I had left behind, especially the books that I had written. Out of my concerns, I reflected on earlier times and brought to mind all my work, communing with what I had written. I set my heart on remembering some of what I had written on this section, dealing with the birth of the heads of the tribes, and I called it “The Glory of the Children,” for it was better to me than sons and daughters, and because it was based on the glory of the tribes of Israel. I trust in God that He will grant me life and heal me, privileging me to begin and complete my commentary on the entire Torah. May He put a new song in my mouth, a prayer to our God, to remember the deeds of the Lord, that which I wrote originally and the second time around, especially this section on the topic of the birth of the tribes, connected with the blessing of Jacob and that of Moses of blessed memory.

Let no one blame me if I mention some sayings of the rabbis without attributing their authorship, for I presently have no access to the books of the Talmud, the Midrash, and the Zohar, but only to the five books of the Torah and to what I recall from previous times, by the counsel of God gracing my tent. I will trust in the Lord my God, that he may help me to bring the concealed to light, by shining His light over my head, that I may walk in the darkness by His light, so that His word shall be a lamp for my foot and a light for my path. I embark on this project with the help of Him who brings counsel from afar. [ . . . ]

Cluster of Henna

I am the poorest of the thousands, the most junior of the students, Abraham, son of my sire, the pious R. Jacob Saba, of blessed memory. It occurred to me to comment on the Five Scrolls as my good God would allow, and the Holy Blessed One privileged me to complete them. But then the wrath of the Lord was kindled against His people, and all the Jews of Portugal were expelled by the decree of Manuel, may his name and memory be erased. As if that were not enough, he commanded the confiscation of all the books in his kingdom, having already commanded to seize the sons and daughters and the synagogues. I left all my books in the city of Porto at the king’s decree, but I put myself in danger by bringing to Lisbon the commentary on the Torah that I had composed, together with the commentaries on Tractate Avot and on the Five Scrolls, as well as Tseror ha-kesef that I had composed in my youth on legal matters.

When I arrived at Lisbon (may it be rebuilt and established!), the Jews came to me, telling me that word had been spread in the province that any Jew found with a book or tefillin should be put to death. Immediately before I entered the lodging outside the city, I carried those books that I had with me, and two Jews accompanied me and dug a hole under a certain olive tree, and they buried them there. Even though this fulfilled the verse verdant olive tree, fair, with choice fruit (Jeremiah 11:16) on account of the words of Torah that it now harbored, I called it Alon bakhut [Tree of Weeping; see Genesis 35:8], for there I buried the apple of my eye, namely, my commentaries on the Torah and the commandments, that are dearer than gold and fine metal. For with them I had comforted myself over my two sons who were taken by force to be converted. And I said, this is the inheritance of the servants of the Lord, better than sons and daughters. I was thus left naked of all, and I did not see them, for they immediately threw me into prison, into the place where the king’s prisoners are confined, and I remained there, trembling, close to six months.

After God privileged me, by the merit of my fathers, to depart from there, and I came to the kingdom of Fez, it occurred to me to restore the crown to its former glory, and to remember some of what had been written there, and I succeeded in composing commentaries on the Torah and on Tractate Avot. I now wish to write a commentary on the Five Scrolls, with God’s help, according to what I remember. I request assistance and verbal facility from God to begin and complete this commentary on the Scrolls in installments, based in some places on the commentary of Jonathan ben Uziel [author of the Aramaic Targum Jonathan], as it is the best among the commentaries.

In the early days, I called this work Eshkol ha-kofer [Cluster of Henna], for the first books were the bundles of my silver and gold. I called my first work, dealing with legal matters, Tseror ha-kesef [Bundle of Silver], and I called my commentary on the Torah Tseror ha-mor [Bundle of Myrrh], and the commentary on Tractate Avot Tseror ha-ḥayim [Bundle of Life]. As I had run out of [biblically allusive] titles using bundle and could not find another one, I called this work Eshkol ha-kofer [Song of Songs 1:14]. [ . . . ]

A Colophon to Deuteronomy from Bundle of Myrrh, Requoted in Cluster of Henna

Here is completed the commentary on the entire Torah, awesome as the exalted ones and illuminating as the stars, fair as the moon and pure as the sun. And blessed is the Lord Who has helped me and bestowed many favors on me. To Him I give thousandfold and ten-thousandfold thanks. He confers favors on the unworthy; he has healed me and kept me alive and brought me to this occasion, to begin and complete all five books of the Holy One’s sacred Torah. [ . . . ]

If anyone find an error in this book, he should know that it comes on my account, and let him judge me leniently, for love covers all faults. For I wandered to and fro in the land, twice exiled by force, without a book or a friend. By my sins, all my books remained in Portugal, together with this work that I composed there. Out of my concern, I searched my memory to recall the days of old and to compose this book, a memory of what had been in my original work. For by my sins, on account of the many troubles and tribulations that came upon me, on land and on sea, I forgot the specifics of what was written there and retained only the chapter headings, which I have written here. Let it be God’s will that it be a memorial before the Lord continually.

Other works by Saba: Tseror ha-kesef (late 15th century); Perush ‘eser sefirot (ca. 1500); Tseror ha-ḥayim (ca. 1500).