Yechiel of Paris | |
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| Personal life | |
| Born | end of the 12th century[1] |
| Died | c. 1268 |
| Children | Moses ben Yechiel |
| Religious life | |
| Religion | Judaism |
Yechiel ben Joseph of Paris orJehiel of Paris, calledSire Vives in French (Judeo-French:שיר ויויש) andVivus Meldensis ("Vives ofMeaux") inLatin,[2] was a majorTalmudic scholar andTosafist from northern France, father-in-law ofIsaac ben Joseph of Corbeil. He was a disciple of RabbiJudah Messer Leon, and succeeded him in 1225 ashead of theYeshiva ofParis,[1] which then boasted some 300 students; his best known student wasMeir of Rothenburg. He is the author of manyTosafot.
| Rabbinical eras |
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Yechiel of Paris is best known as the main defender of Judaism in the 1240Disputation of Paris held at the court ofLouis IX, where he argued against the convertNicholas Donin. This was the first formalChristian–Jewish disputation held in medieval Christendom. In defence of accusations of slanderous quotes in theTalmud against the founder of Christianity, Yechiel argued that the references toYeshu in fact refer to different individuals. Yechiel delineates them asJesus himself another "Yeshu haNotzri", also fromNazareth (Sanhedrin 107b), and a third "Yeshu" of theboiling excrement inGittin 47a.[3] Berger (1998) wrote: "Whatever one thinks of the sincerity of the multiple Jesus theory, R. Yehiel found a way to neutralize some dangerous rabbinic statements, and yet the essential Ashkenazic evaluation of Jesus remains even in the text of this disputation." Yechiel's argument was followed byNachmanides at theDisputation of Barcelona in 1263,[citation needed] but not byProfiat Duran at theDisputation of Tortosa in 1413–1414.[4]
Although the disputants were believed by at least some to have successfully defended Judaism, a decree was passed for the publicburning of all available manuscripts of the Talmud—and on Friday, June 17, 1244, 24 carriage loads of written works were set alight.
The arguments and the contents of the debate were published inThorn in 1873 under the titleVikuaḥ Rabenu Yeḥiel mi Paris[5] (Hebrew:ויכוח רבינו יחיאל מפריס).[6]
According to some sources, Yechiel arrived inOutremer around 1258 and settled inAcre, then ruled by theCrusader state of theKingdom of Jerusalem, along with his son, Messire Delicieux (מישירא דילשיש) and a large group of followers.[7][8] He soon re-established theGreat Academy of Paris (Midrash haGadol d'Paris)[9] and is believed to have died there between 1265 and 1268.[10] He was buried near Haifa, atMount Carmel.[11][clarification needed][better source needed]
According toSimha Emanuel [he] however, he never emigrated and died in France,[12] where a fragment of a funeral stone has been found bearing the inscription,
מורנו
י)יחיאל)
לגן עד
(translated: Our master Yehiel to the Paradise), which could be from Rabbi Yechiel.[citation needed]
He was atosafist. His tosafot are quoted as authoritative byPeretz ben Elijah,[13] in "Kol Bo",[14] and in "Mordechai".[15] He is frequently quoted also in the edited tosafot.
One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Solomon Schechter andIsaac Broydé (1901–1906)."Jehiel ben Joseph of Paris". InSinger, Isidore; et al. (eds.).The Jewish Encyclopedia. New York: Funk & Wagnalls.
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