Elijah ha-Kohen ha-Itmari
An influential preacher sensitive to social injustice and prolific rabbinic author with strong kabbalistic leanings, Elijah was scion of a rabbinic family in Izmir (Smyrna), in western Anatolia. His Hebrew ethical work Shevet musar (Staff of Teaching) appeared in more than fifty editions and was translated into Ladino and Yiddish. In its advice regarding marital relations, as in other areas, the book both reveals realia of everyday Jewish life in a late seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century Ottoman city and reflects the gender sensibilities of its time.
Content by Elijah ha-Kohen ha-Itmari
Primary Source
Ve-lo ‘od ela’ (Moreover): On the Earthquake in Smyrna
Primary Source
Me‘il tsedakah (Robe of Righteousness)
Primary Source
Shevet musar (Rod of Correction): Instructions for a Wife
Primary Source
Yado ba-kol (His Hand Against Every Man)
Primary Source
Shevet musar (Rod of Correction): On Contemplating Death
Related Guide
Birth of an Idea: Defining the Early Modern Period
The emergence of the early modern period (1500–1750) in Jewish history is relatively recent and complex.
Related Guide
Jews on the Move: Early Modern Jewish Migration
The geography of Jewish settlement shifted dramatically in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.
Related Guide
Community, Congregation, and Self-Government
The early modern period witnessed flourishing Jewish self-governance across the diaspora, as economic utility to host nations enabled unprecedented communal autonomy.
Related Guide
Early Modern Rabbis and Intellectuals on the Move
Carrying books and knowledge, itinerant rabbis and scholars traveled between communities, facilitating cultural exchange.
Related Guide
Early Modern Religious Practices
Early modern Jews both preserved tradition and innovated. Documents and legal texts reveal rich details about synagogue life, marriage, family relations, and death rituals.