Albo, Joseph

Albo, Joseph, a learned Spanish rabbi of Soria, in Old Castile, was born about 1380, and died. about 1444. He is known as one of the Jewish disputants in the conference with Jerome de Santa Fe, which took place at Tortosa, between Feb. 7, 1413, and Nov. 12, 1414, under the presidency of Pedro de Luna (afterwards pope Benedict XIII). Albo, who in the Branch -of David (צמח דויד) is styled "the divine philosopher," published in 1425 his ס8 עקרים The Book of Principles (of Jewish faith), a philosophical view of the theology of Judaism, divided into three parts. The first speaks of the existence of God, the second of revelation, and the third of reward and punishment. According to Albo, "the belief in the resurrection of the dead is an article of faith incumbent on the Jews and accepted according to the national tradition, although its denial was not held by him as a rejection of the law of Moses." The Sepher Ikkarim is written in difficult Rabbinical Hebrew, and has been carefully explained by annotations in the Ohel Jacob (אהל יעקב) of Jacob ben-Samuel (Freiburg, 1584; Cracow, 1594); also in the Ets Shathul (עוֹ שתול) of Gedalja Lupschiitz, with the text (Venice, 1618; Lemberg, 1861), and in Historische Einleitung zu Albo's kkarim, by L. Schlesinger (Frankfort, 1844). A Latin translation was made by Genebrard (Paris, 1566), wherein he answers Albo's attacks upon Christianity. See Fiirst, Bibl. Jud. i, 32; De' Rossi, Dizionario Storico (Germ. transl.), p. 34; id. Biblioth. Antichristiana, p. 14; Lindo, History of the Jews in Spain, p. 194; Finn, Sephardim, p. 390 sq.; Etheridge, Introduction to Hebr. Literature, p. 264; Basnage, History of the Jews, p. 689; Gratz, Gesch. d. Juden, viii, 115 sq., 157-167; Jost, Gesch. d. Judenth. u. . Sekten, iii, 99, 102; Herzog, Real-Encyklop. s.v.; and especially Back, Joseph Albo's Bedeutung in der Gesch. derjud. Religions philosophie (Breslau, 1859). (B. P.)