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Ben Sira

THE JEWISH ENCYCLOPEDIA

ond Alphabet

is really nothing more than a collection of legends and fables common among the Jews of the Middle Ages. It is to be expected that such

a book should be full of absurdities and it is not just in Reifmann, Epstein, and Neubauer to stigmatize it as an intentional " mockery of Jewish literature. " Oriental popular books and the second part of Ben Sira came from Arabia or Persia contain much that is vapid together with good specimens of popular wit and charming fables.

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Bibliography

Editions, Manuscripts, and Translations First ed., Salonica, 1514, not known to the bibliographers, but of which one copy is in possession of Elkan N. Adler, and another of L. Schwager in Husiatyn ; second ed., Constantinople, 1519 ; only one complete copy known; that in the Brit ish Museum ; the Bodleian copy is defective ; third ed., Venice, 1544, very rare ; most later editions are based on this one, but are, however, badly mutilated. Steinschneider published a reprint of this edition with a comparison of the MS. with a MS. at Leyden, under the title Alphabetieum Syracidis, Berlin, 1854. The Bodleian Library has several MSS. with some variations from the printed text. The proverbs have been translated into Latin, French, and German ; in Cowley

and Neubauer, The Original Hebrew of a Portion of EecleIntroduction, pp. 28, 39, the First Alphabet has and the whole book has been , translated several times into Judaeo-German, and once into Judseo-Spanish. Compare Steinschneider, Cat. Bool. cols. 203, 206 ; Van Straalen. Catalogue, p. 24. Literature : Epstein, Mi-gadmonifiot ha-Yehudim. pp. 119-124 ; Reifmann, in Ha-Karmel (monthly), ii. 124-138 (in this work there are many errors along with some good observations); idem, in Keneset Yisrael, ii. 135, 136 ; Dukes, Rabbinisehe Blumenlese, pp. 31, 32, 67-84 ; Zunz, O. V., 2d ed., p. 11 ; Schorr, in He-Haluz, viii. 169-173; Jellinek, in Monatsschrlft, ii. 430; idem, in his Introduction to B. H. vi. 11-13.

siasticus.

been translated into English

L. G.

BEN TEMALION A demon mentioned in the

When

the Jewish sages, with Simon b. went to Rome to obtain the revocation of certain edicts hostile to the Jews, the demon Ben Temalion appeared before them and ofered his services. He proposed to enter into the body of a princess of the imperial house, and not to leave her until Simon b. Yohai was asked to cure her for in her madness she would call for him. On Simon b.Yohai's whispering the name "Ben Temalion" into the ear of the princess, he would leave her, and as a sign of his departure all the glass in the palace would break. At first the sages did not wish to make use of his services but as they could think of no other means of obtaining favor for their re-

Talmud. Yohai at

their head,





quest, they could not dispense with his help. Everything then took place as Ben Temalion had predicted. As a reward for the princess' cure, Simon

Yohai received permission to take whatever he wished from the imperial treasure-house. He found

b.

the anti-Jewish edicts there, and, taking them, tore them up (Me'ilah 176). In the Talmud this legend occurs only in shortened form but a more elaborate version is given in the "Halakot Gedolot," ed. Hildesheimer, pp. 603, 604; in the apocalyptic Midrash,

" Teflliat

R. Simon

b.

Yohai

"



in Jellinek,

"B. H."

MS. printed in io. vi. 128, 129. Rashi also, in his commentary on the passage in Me'ilah, cites a Haggadah which gives the legend in a form essentially varying from the one in the Talmud. R. Gershon, in his commentary on the pasiv. 117, 118;

and

in a

and the so-called Rashi, in Habib's " 'En Ya'awhich kob on the passage, give an Aramaic version, form of the legend. is probably the older In more than one respect this legend is of great sage,

"

as it interest for comparative folk-lore, occurring, the saints and does, also in the Christian legends of

Ben-Ze'eb

in Buddhist tradition.

It is related of the apostle

Bartholomew that he went

to India and there freed the daughter of the king from a devil which possessed her. Instead of accepting a reward, he caused a devil to enter an idol and then bade it leave the statue. Thereupon this statue and all others in the

temple were broken (Pabricius, "Codex Apocryphus N. T." i. 674 et seq. Tischendorf, "Acta Apostol. Apocrypha, " 246 et seq. Migne, " Dictionnaire des Apocryphes,"ii. 153-157). The kinship of this with the Jewish legend can not be denied. Yet it is highly improbable that the names of the demon Ben Temalion and Bartholomew are the same, the saint in the one story



becoming the demon in the

other. Such a metamorphosis, indeed, is not impossible; but, in this event,

the demon would be expected to be hostile and not friendly to the Jews and the fact that other etymologies suggested for the name " Ben Temalion " are hardly acceptable, provides no argument in favor of its identity with " Bartholomew. " The Buddhist legend, which is probably the source of the Jewish and Christian legends, is as follows demon, desiring to please a man, promises to enter into a princess and not to leave her until bidden to do so by certain words spoken by the man. This happens the man obtains the princess as his wife and receives one-half of the king's realm ("Panchatantra," ed. Benfey, i. 520; ed. Lancereau, p. 20). The French Jews considered Ben Temalion a kind of " lutin " (goblin or brownie), who in French folk-lore is friendly and helpful to man, but teases him. The Tosafists (on Me'ilah I.e.) remark that Ben Temalion has the appearance of a child and is wont to have his sport with women. Whether this was the original representation of Ben Temalion is very questionable.



A



Bibliography Grilnbaum, in Z. D. M. O. xxxi.332; Halevy, in Revue Etudes Juives, x. 60-65 Israel Le'vi, ib. viii. 200202, x. 60-73 Lebrecht, in Geiger's JUd. Zeit. xi. 273-278 (he holds that Ben Temalion was originally the name of a Senator





friendly to the Jews) ; Schorr, in j.

He-Haluz,

viii. 123.

L. G.

SB.

BEN-TIGLA.

BEN

See Ben-La'anah.

TJZZIEL.

See

Hirsch,

BEN YASUS.

See

Isaac

Samson

Ra-

phael. tbn

Jasos

ebn"

Sartar.

BEN ZAKKAI. See Johanan b. Zakkai. BEN-ZE'EB, JUDAH LbB: First Jewish grammarian and lexicographer of modern times; born near Cracow 1764; died at Vienna March 12, received the religious education common He married at of Poland in those days. a very early age and settled in Cracow in the home of his wife's parents, where he spent his days in studying Talmud, and his nights in clandestinely acquiring the knowledge of Hebrew philology and 1811.

He

to the

Jews

The financial embarrassment of secular subjects. of his family compelled him to seek Admitted his fortune in another land, and he naturally gravitated toward Berlin, to the Haskalah which was then the center of the " Haskalah"; i.e., the movement to spread enlightenment among the Jews by means of Neo-HeBen-Ze'eb was soon adbraic and German studies. .