the Fourth Week of Advent
Click here to join the effort!
Bible Encyclopedias
Eleazar ben Ziṭa Abu al-Sari
The 1901 Jewish Encyclopedia
or Karaite Bible exegete; lived probably in Egypt in the tenth century. He supported the rigid, ascetic, and Sadducean doctrines advocated by Anan and other Karaites, though at times he opposed Anan's teaching.
It is not at all certain that he ever wrote any work, or that Saadia compiled any reply to his views. His disputes with Saadia seem to have been oral. All that is known of Ben Ziṭa comes from Abraham ibn Ezra, who probably derived the information from Saadia's commentary to the Pentateuch. Ibn Ezra mentions Ben Ziṭa several times in his commentary to Exodus.
Ibn Ezra also mentions Ben Ziṭa in his "Sefer ha-'Ibbur" (7a), in regard to the question whether the method of determining the months and the festivals is to be found in the Bible. Ben Ziṭa was the first to cite Genesis 1:14; Numbers 28:14; and Psalms 104:19 as such proof. A marginal note to a Bodleian manuscript (No. 316) of Ḳimḥi's commentary to Ezekiel, published by Neubauer in "Jour. Asiatique," 1861, p. 230, also contains a reference to Ben Ziṭa's refutation of Anan's quaint interpretations of Ezekiel 18:6; but Israelsohn has shown that the passage is quoted not from Ibn Janaḥ, but from Judah ibn Balaam's commentary to Ezekiel. The name "Abu al-Ari," found in the Bodleian manuscript and accepted by Neubauer, Fürst, and Geiger, is a mistake for "Abu al-Sari."
- Geiger, in Jüd. Zeit. 2:151;
- Pinsker, Liḳḳuṭe Ḳadmoniyyot, p. 43;
- Fürst, Gesch. des Karäert. 1:100,173; 2:33;
- Israelsohn, in Rev. Etudes Juives, 23:132;
- Poznanski, in Monatsschrift, 41:203.
These files are public domain.
Singer, Isidore, Ph.D, Projector and Managing Editor. Entry for 'Eleazar ben Ziṭa Abu al-Sari'. 1901 The Jewish Encyclopedia. https://www.studylight.org/encyclopedias/eng/tje/e/eleazar-ben-zia1a-abu-al-sari.html. 1901.
