The Book and Its Author

The ʾAgur is best classified as a code of Jewish law that encompasses a wide range of Jewish legal opinions and decisions.Footnote ² Although Landau is not responsible for originating this genre of rabbinic literature (indeed, its two most prominent examples are the Mishneh Torah and the ʾArba‘ah turim), Landau worked within the models established by his predecessors, while also departing from them in purpose and style. Landau's ʾAgur was explicitly intended as a daily reference guide for both the learned and unlearned, and therefore encompassed both a larger range of opinions and also a shortened form.

Throughout his writings Jacob Landau frequently referred to himself as “Ha-Ashkenazi.”Footnote ³ Though he did not live much of his life in German lands—according to Israel Yuval, Jacob and his father, Judah Loew, settled in Italy when Jacob was still a young childFootnote ⁴—Landau evidently considered himself to be of Ashkenazic origin and tradition, so understanding the cultural history of late medieval Ashkenaz is vital to understanding Landau and his book.

The thirteenth through fifteenth centuries marked a period of increased geographic mobility for Jews in the Holy Roman Empire. In the aftermath of the Black Plague, multiple tragedies, persecutions, and expulsions befell Jews in German lands, displacing many communities and disrupting the long-established local character of religious practice. New regional and supraregional customs were established to help ensure uniform practice in new areas of residence.Footnote ⁵ At the same time, Christian society began to rely less on oral authority and more on words written on paper; in turn, Jewish culture, too, became increasingly textualized.Footnote ⁶ As a result of these demographic and cultural changes, Ashkenazic Jews invested unprecedented efforts in compiling, recording, and evaluating minhagim of various communities.Footnote ⁷ Two important examples of custom books from this period are the Sefer Maharil, a record of the teachings of Jacob Moelin compiled posthumously by his students, and the Leket yosher of Joseph b. Moses, which contains descriptions of the life, customs, and rulings of Israel Isserlein. Though custom always featured in the determination of Jewish law, the extent to which it exerted authority significantly increased in Rhineland and France of the High Middle Ages.Footnote ⁸ In the thirteenth century, Meir of Rothenberg, for example, appealed to custom as a determining factor only in cases of disagreement between two legal authorities; by the fifteenth century, halakhists relied on common practice even when it was not attributable to a known legal source.Footnote ⁹

Jacob Landau, born at the end of this generation, in early fifteenth-century German lands, imbibed the culture of his birthplace—especially the centrality of minhag, to which he would accord preferential weight throughout his work. And yet Landau did not write a standard minhag book. Though the ʾAgur shares elements of that genre, it is not framed around the teachings of one rabbi primarily, as are the Sefer Maharil and Leket yosher, for example.Footnote ¹⁰ Instead, the ʾAgur encompasses a breadth of opinions, which made it more like a code, a genre dominated by Sephardic authors.Footnote ¹¹ Landau's decision to produce such a text, despite his Ashkenazic heritage, reflects the influence of the multicultural Italian context where the majority of his intellectual development took place.

Landau left his Ashkenazic birthplace for Italy sometime in his youth, and by the middle of the fifteenth century had settled in the northern Italian city of Pavia.Footnote ¹² Northern Italy in this period witnessed large migrations of Jews from German lands, French territories, and the Iberian Peninsula, with their respective expulsions. The influx of Jews from these various places transformed the character of Italian Jewry, turning major cities into heterogeneous centers of merging cultures.Footnote ¹³ Rabbinic émigrés continued to teach and serve as halakhic authorities in various urban areas in Italy, and in many cases, surpassed their Italian Jewish contemporaries in learning and stature. One such individual was Joseph Colon (the Maharik). Colon emigrated from France to Italy in the early fifteenth century and spent time in various cities in northern Italy, where he encountered prominent Ashkenazic authorities and their pupils, and subsequently came to be influenced by Ashkenazic halakhic trends.Footnote ¹⁴ As one of the foremost rabbinic authorities of his generation, the Maharik transformed each yeshiva at which he taught into a center of talmudic learning.Footnote ¹⁵ During his tenure in Pavia, he met and studied with Jacob Landau; Colon's influence is seen in Landau's frequent citation of the Maharik's opinions.Footnote ¹⁶

Another significant halakhic authority Jacob Landau encountered during that time was Judah Minz.Footnote ¹⁷ Minz was born in Ashkenaz early in the fifteenth century and died in Padua in 1509. He was a relative of Joseph b. Moses, the author of the Leket yosher, and possibly also the brother of Moses b. Eliezer ha-Levi Minz, one of the prominent students of Israel Isserlein.Footnote ¹⁸ Judah Minz was considered an influential authority in his own right, and one of the great Ashkenazic rabbis of northern Italy. Among his intellectual coterie was Judah Loew Landau, Jacob Landau's father, who was an elder statesman of the German Jewish community in Treviso. Judah Landau and Judah Minz frequently spoke to one another, seeking each other's advice on the resolution of communal disputes and legal conundrums. Jacob Landau also developed ties with his father's colleague, having spent time studying with Minz.Footnote ¹⁹

Jacob Landau's immigration from Ashkenaz to northern Italy marks an important moment of cultural transition. He considered himself to be of Ashkenazic tradition, and relied heavily on the scholars of late medieval Ashkenaz, but he was also schooled by French and Italian rabbis in Italy. Indeed, like the other peripatetic scholars of his period, Landau encountered a relatively wide range of rabbinic personalities, as well as ideas—including science, metaphysics, and Kabbalah.Footnote ²⁰ But while the first generation of Ashkenazic émigrés in Italy seemed to have adhered primarily to the Ashkenazic tradition, by the mid-fifteenth century, the subsequent generation (children of the original émigrés), as well as a new wave of immigrants, began to embrace this multicultural learning environment. For example, the Maharik, whose traditions were rooted in the French model, was heavily influenced by Ashkenazic halakhists throughout his travels in Italy. Such influence is evident in his favoring—both in his responsa and yeshiva curriculum—of the authority of the ʾArba‘ah turim.Footnote ²¹ Judah Messer Leon, a native Italian Jew, similarly argued for the importance of the Tur; he even advocated for its acceptance as the authoritative code for all Jews in Italy.Footnote ²²

In this transitional period, when a new Jewish society composed of Jews of various origins and cultural traditions—German lands, the Iberian and Italian peninsulas, and French territories—was beginning to form, perhaps there was a sense that a new type of halakhic text needed to be written, one that would accommodate various traditions. Conceivably, Landau's ʾAgur was meant to achieve that goal. It is manifestly clear that increased intellectual exchange among Ashkenazic, Italian, and French Jewish scholars influenced the book's content; indeed, the ʾAgur represents an unprecedented effort to combine these various traditions in a single volume. But while Landau referenced authorities from each Jewish community among which he lived, he still gave preferential weight to Ashkenazic laws and customs, especially those of his father and Jacob Moelin. Landau also did not emphasize that his work was meant to supersede geographically specific traditions, though, as this study will later discuss, the text implies and signals such intention.

Landau's Textual Innovations

Jacob Landau's book is printed in quarto form on chancery paper.Footnote ²³ The title page is a decorative woodcut pattern surrounding three cherubs and a peacock. The border frames the beginning of the introduction, which is then followed by the text itself, organized in 1440 sections arranged according to the first two of Jacob b. Asher's ʾArbaʿah turim, Oraḥ ḥayim and Yoreh de‘ah. The table of contents, for the reader's reference, is printed at the end of the work.Footnote ²⁴

Jacob Landau's introduction to the ʾAgur is particularly revealing of the intent and nature of the book.Footnote ²⁵ Here, Landau clearly expresses his methodology and objectives in a three-fold fashion. Regarding methodology, first, he asserts that his work contains a collection of all the opinions and discussions of the great rabbinic authorities, including specifically Rif, Mishneh Torah, Mordekhai, Semag, ʿAmudei golah, ʾOr zaru‘ah, Turim, Shibulei ha-leket, Rashba, and Rokeaḥ. Second, it relates the customs of the great rabbis of Ashkenaz and France. Third, it cites the rabbis of his generation, and any authorities after the Tur whose opinions are not found in the above-mentioned works.Footnote ²⁶

Regarding the purpose of the text, Landau initially states that his work was intended for a particular student, a physician whose work prohibited him from intensively studying Halakhah as he desired. Though Landau employs the common rhetorical strategy of addressing a text to one specific individual, it is significant that his target was not the scholar, but rather an individual without sufficient time to study Halakhah.Footnote ²⁷ As the language of the text (Hebrew) would have prevented the general public or those with no rabbinic education from reading the work, the likely intended audience was the Jewish educated layman, someone with knowledge of the rabbinic tradition but not an advanced Talmud scholar.Footnote ²⁸ Landau also discussed three additional purposes for which his text could be used: as a guidebook for all halakhic opinions on a matter, as a source for a practical answer to a specific question, and as a reference work for a range of rabbinic opinions not cited in other materials.Footnote ²⁹ Thus, it becomes clear from Landau's introduction that the ʾAgur did not need to be intensively studied; it could be used periodically for reference purposes to suit the reader's need.Footnote ³⁰

To more fully understand the significance of Landau's intentions, it is useful to compare the ʾAgur's introduction with that of Maimonides's Mishneh Torah, the most significant halakhic code of the medieval period.Footnote ³¹ Landau certainly read Mishneh Torah, as he frequently cites it throughout the ʾAgur, and thus it is likely that he consciously compared his work to Maimonides's magnum opus. One major point of contrast between these texts is that unlike the ʾAgur, Maimonides's introduction contains philosophical musings, theoretical discussions, and enumeration of commandments, in addition to a pragmatic expression of his purpose in writing the book. Such breadth indicates that Maimonides sought to accomplish more than compile laws to be followed. As Isadore Twersky has argued, Maimonides's philosophy was in fact integrally intertwined with his halakhic works.Footnote ³² Another critical difference lies in Maimonides's and Landau's intended purposes for their texts. Maimonides's articulated intent was to create a work so comprehensive in its scope of Jewish law that it could replace all other sources of its kind. In fact, Maimonides explicitly claimed that he organized his work in an easy-to-memorize form, so that individuals could read and remember his book in place of studying the Oral Law.Footnote ³³ According to the radical interpretation, Maimonides did not intend to merely supplement the Talmud and subsequent Jewish legal discussions, he meant to supplant them.Footnote ³⁴ Like Landau, Maimonides stated that he hoped his text would increase Torah learning among all Jews, and the Mishneh Torah was, in its time, a more accessible halakhic work; Landau, however, sought to make his work even more readily available to different reading audiences.Footnote ³⁵

Jacob ben Asher's Turim, the other most significant code of the medieval period that Landau read, and upon which he based his ʾAgur in part, provides an additional point of comparison on the continuum of halakhic literature.Footnote ³⁶ The Turim was explicitly intended for a different purpose than the Mishneh Torah: it was meant to organize the laws, not to replace them.Footnote ³⁷ In addition to stating his purpose, Jacob also outlined his method of organization in the introduction, which speaks to his main goal of elucidating, and not deciding, the law.Footnote ³⁸ However, the most distinct point of divergence from the Mishneh Torah was that the Turim cited and elucidated sources, while Maimonides eliminated the lengthy discourse and conflicting opinions that led him to his conclusions. Also, in contrast to Maimonides, Jacob b. Asher claimed that he did not base his legal decisions on his own logic, but rather on the opinion of his father, Asher ben Yeḥiel. The Tur, like the Mishneh Torah, appealed to broader audiences; nonetheless, it was still not intended to be a quick-reference guide, a simple and straightforward text, nor would it have feasibly been used as such during the time of its composition.Footnote ³⁹ In the medieval period, Hebrew manuscripts were personal documents copied by scholars for individual use.Footnote ⁴⁰ Manuscripts had some finding aids, such as rubrication and sometimes tables of contents, but these features were not prominent aspects of the works because scholars familiar with the material could already, without much effort, find subjects under question.Footnote ⁴¹ In printed texts, however, where the readership might not have encountered the text before and prior familiarity could not be assumed, such features became selling points advertised on title pages—printers and publishers boasted that the tools in their printed works allowed broader audiences to access classical and traditional manuscripts.Footnote ⁴² Landau understood the new cultural circumstances of his time and took the initiative not only to reformat existing authoritative works but to create a new one that would condense the law, therefore making it more accessible to nonscholars and suitable for the new realities brought about by print.

The introductions to the ʾAgur, Mishneh Torah, and Turim thus make clear the ʾAgur's innovative purposes: to be used in new ways by an expanded audience. Landau meant for the ʾAgur to be studied by those with advanced rabbinical education and those without, to be used as a reference manual or a comprehensive guide, and to be disseminated in a variety of Jewish communities, goals that could realistically be achieved in his lifetime, due to the new method with which Landau chose to produce his text.

Analysis of the structure and methodology of these three texts shows that Landau crafted the style and presentation of his text in accordance with, and to help accomplish, these goals. The ʾAgur's length and scope are considerably shorter than those of the Mishneh Torah and the Tur. Maimonides covered all aspects of Oral Law in his code, even laws no longer relevant in his period, including the laws of Temple service and animal sacrifices. Jacob b. Asher excluded these no-longer-applicable laws and accordingly limited his discussions to his ʾArba‘ah turim (literally “four columns”): ʾOraḥ ḥayim, Yoreh de‘ah, ʾEven ha-‘ezer, and Ḥoshen mishpat. These four sections organized the practical laws into two categories concerning ritual matters (ʾOraḥ ḥayim and Yoreh de‘ah) and two concerning laws of business, marriage, and divorce (ʾEven ha-‘ezer and Ḥoshen mishpat).Footnote ⁴³ But Landau's guide is even further condensed; it is limited to only the first two of Jacob b. Asher's four columns. Such reduced form meant that the ʾAgur only included practical everyday laws, such as those covering prayers, blessings, Sabbath, holidays, kashrut, and ritual purity. Excluded are laws decided by rabbinic courts, not lay individuals themselves, such as those regarding business, marriage, and divorce. Landau expanded the accessibility of his work by keeping the ʾAgur relatively short and focused. This increased its readability and appeal to nonscholarly individuals, especially those looking for brief answers to halakhic matters of daily relevance.Footnote ⁴⁴

An examination of a cross section of laws treated in the Mishneh Torah, Tur, and ʾAgur further demonstrates Landau's originality. In this instance the laws of Hanukah, as a somewhat short and self-contained chapter in Jewish law, provide a useful point of contrast.

In his section on the laws of Hanukah, Maimonides does not simply enumerate the laws; rather, he introduces the ordinances with a discussion of the historical and philosophical underpinnings of the holiday. Only after having framed the laws in such fashion does he proceed to address practical halakhic concerns: who is obligated to light candles, how many candles should be lit, and where exactly one should light. These discussions reflect on and summarize the talmudic discourse concerning the holiday, and give a practical bottom line to be followed in each case. Maimonides, however, neither cites his sources nor explains the methodology whereby he arrived at his conclusions. A closer examination of his opinions concerning the requisite time frame for lighting candles illustrates this point. In this portion of his text, Maimonides plainly states the ideal time as sunset, and the final time as the point in the evening when people finish conducting their business in the marketplace.Footnote ⁴⁵ He does not include in this discussion alternative opinions or an explanation for his conclusions. Thus, Maimonides's methodology can be summarized as follows: he places the holiday in its context, offers his philosophical understanding of it, and then states its legal practicalities.

Jacob b. Asher, on the other hand, eschews philosophical introduction and instead begins his discussion of Hanukah with an explanation of legal matters. The nature of his presentation of the law becomes clear upon examination of his opinion about the ideal time for lighting candles. Jacob states what he believed the law to be: the obligation to light begins at the end of sunset and continues until a half hour into the night. However, if one forgets to light during that period, the commandment can still be fulfilled until the morning. At the same time, Jacob cites Maimonides and juxtaposes his opinion to his own, and explains the logic by which he, Jacob, reached his conclusion. This kind of discussion cannot be found in the Mishneh Torah. In this specific case, he explains, a decision was rendered according to the opinion of Isaac b. Judah and Tosafot.Footnote ⁴⁶ Here we see the fundamental differences between Maimonides's treatment of these laws and Jacob's: unlike the Mishneh Torah, the Tur explicitly provides citations, conflicting opinions, and logical reasoning for the conclusion drawn.Footnote ⁴⁷

The ʾAgur's analysis of the same set of laws is similar in content and style to the Tur, but shorter and more clearly presented. Like the Tur, the ʾAgur does not mention the historical context of Hanukah; rather, the text begins with legal matters of practical relevance. In discussing the ideal time to light the candles, Landau first cites the ultimate conclusion: if necessary, the candles can be lit until the morning. In the same fashion as the Tur, Landau then contrasts his opinion with that of Maimonides, quoting the same portion of the Mishneh Torah mentioned in the Tur. Landau additionally cites the Tosafot that led him to his conclusion. It is possible that Landau copied this entire section straight from the Tur, as it reads almost like a condensed version, and Landau explains in his introduction that he did not always specify his citations of the Tur because he relied so heavily on it.Footnote ⁴⁸ But in accordance with Landau's intention to cite as many authorities as possible, he also adds to the Tur's discussion by quoting the Sefer ha-miẓvot and Asher b. Yeḥiel, the Rosh.Footnote ⁴⁹ This specific example demonstrates Landau's terseness combined with an increased (albeit relatively so in this case) breadth of opinions cited.Footnote ⁵⁰

The comparison of the treatment of the laws of Hanukah illustrates the characteristics distinguishing the ʾAgur from its predecessors: it is condensed, with clearer explanations and more rabbinic opinions. Maimonides purposely did not cite any of his sources; Jacob b. Asher cited some of his sources, but they are relatively limited in scope; Landau, by contrast, cited and incorporated a larger number of opinions but in briefer and more easily understood forms. Landau thus not only specifically intended that his text reach nonscholarly audiences, he made his text more meaningful and intelligible to these new readers through textual innovations.

Two additional aspects of the ʾAgur distinguish this text in important ways from the works of Maimonides and Jacob b. Asher: the ʾAgur incorporated opinions from a variety of Jewish communities and relied more often on minhag as a basis for legal determination. Indeed, the ʾAgur was not limited to the Halakhah of one geographically specific tradition, but rather it included a range of Ashkenazic, Italian, and French legal opinions. An example of the ʾAgur's scope is the discussion of hoẓa'at Shabbat, the laws of carrying on the Sabbath. Here Landau quotes and contrasts the Ashkenazic custom of not wearing sandals tied a certain way on Shabbat with the more lenient Italian practice. Landau then renders a decision according to the ruling of Joseph Colon (the Maharik): it is forbidden to wear these shoes on the Sabbath.Footnote ⁵¹ In this one instance, Landau juxtaposes minhag Ashkenaz with minhag Italiah, and ultimately decides the law according to the Maharik, whose opinion was aligned with the Ashkenazic custom. The Mishneh Torah and the Tur do not include such a geographical range of sources, nor Landau's extensive reliance on minhag.Footnote ⁵² Thus, the ʾAgur's mixing of cultural opinions and its greater reliance on minhag further distinguishes it from other halakhic codes. What remains to be determined is whether Landau's modes of creation were specifically adapted to the new ramifications of print.

Meant for Print?

Perhaps the most significant cultural shift of Landau's lifetime was Gutenberg's invention of the printing press and the emergence of movable type in Europe in the middle of the fifteenth century. Landau was aware of these new ways to put words on paper,Footnote ⁵³ and, more significantly, took the opportunity to exploit them to reach new reading audiences and provide them with a Jewish legal resource that was shorter in length and easier to read and understand than the existing halakhic codes. But are these connections mere coincidences? Did Landau in fact write the ʾAgur with the intention to have it printed?

In 1470 the first Hebrew press opened in Rome. Shortly thereafter, Hebrew printing spread throughout Italy to Reggio di Calabria, Piove di Sacco, Mantua, Ferrara, Bologna, and Soncino. The first works produced by these presses were primarily classical works of the Bible, biblical commentaries, liturgy, and classic halakhic texts and commentaries.Footnote ⁵⁴ Jews embraced the practical value of this new technology: it allowed production of multiple copies of the same book at once in a less expensive form. Although the vast majority of printed works consisted of classical texts that had previously circulated in manuscript form, almost immediately after the beginning of Hebrew print contemporary authors recognized the potential of the presses for distributing their own works. Jacob Landau was among the first of such individuals; the ʾAgur was printed in the last decade of the fifteenth century.

Indeed, Landau was eminently familiar with the business of print. In 1487, he and Joseph Gunzenhauser together entered into an agreement with two bankersFootnote ⁵⁵ to establish the first Hebrew printshop in Naples.Footnote ⁵⁶ Naples was then particularly hospitable toward Hebrew printing, as its king, Ferrante I, had issued policies that allowed for a fair degree of economic freedom and Jewish toleration. Ferrante I even exempted the book trade from taxes.Footnote ⁵⁷ Such favorable circumstances allowed for the establishment and success of the Gunzenhauser printshop.Footnote ⁵⁸

Between 1487 and 1492, the Gunzenhauser press produced fourteen texts, including an edition of the Psalms, books of the Bible, biblical commentaries, and Landau's ʾAgur. Landau worked as a proofreader in the print house and thus saw firsthand the profound ramifications of the press and movable type. He even remarked on the newness of the technology in his colophon to Gunzenhauser's book of Psalms:

In this colophon, Landau offers two reasons for mistakes made in typesetting: the newness of print and scarcity of manuscript sources. Such grasp of the difficulties of gaining expertise in an art so recently established shows Landau's familiarity not only with the technical aspects of print but also with its cultural potential. Though not explicitly stated, Landau's emphasis on finding the right manuscript copies implies recognition that print could provide a means to aid in halakhic standardization, a concept not fathomed by Landau's father's generation. Of course, there were many mechanisms of textual standardization before print—Torah scrolls, for example, are highly standardized manuscripts—but the technology of print made textual standardization easier and cheaper. Unlike the vagaries that could occur from one manuscript to subsequent copies, a printed work would, in theory at least, be identical no matter how many copies were produced.Footnote ⁶⁰ Print was a means through which the variety of halakhic discourse could be consolidated and preserved.Footnote ⁶¹

That Landau himself printed his ʾAgur, sometime between 1490 and 1492, most forcefully demonstrates that he knew how to use this new technology and that he was aware of the capacity of print to change how knowledge was disseminated.Footnote ⁶² Landau not only created a text that was adapted to the needs of new audiences through its simplified legal discourse and inclusion of a variety of geographically specific traditions, he produced that text with the technological means most suited to his goals, which would allow for wide distribution through increased production volume. Though it cannot be conclusively established that Landau designed and wrote the ʾAgur with the express purpose of accessing the benefits of the printing press, the argument for such a finding is further supported through an analysis of certain elements of the book, specifically the inclusion of rabbinic approbations, its reduced size, and its table of contents.

Paratextual Analysis

The rabbinic approbations (haskamot) Landau included in the ʾAgur fundamentally distinguish the book from many other compilations of Jewish law. Indeed, the ʾAgur is the first Hebrew book to contain these endorsements, which were later commonly used and even required in certain Jewish communities before a book would be accepted. Despite the ubiquity of rabbinic approbations in later centuries, the circumstances prompting their origin remain obscure. The first of two theories argues that competition between the Gunzenhauser and Soncino printshops in Naples prompted Gunzenhauser to seek advertisement for the quality of his printed texts. Gunzenhauser hoped the inclusion of approbations from notable rabbis would increase his sales.Footnote ⁶³ The second theory suggests a connection between the Christian practice of including Latin approbations and the origins of the Jewish practice.Footnote ⁶⁴ Although both theories are plausible, neither of them has been sufficiently substantiated, nor do they address the question of why approbations first appear specifically in the ʾAgur.

Perhaps a new theory can be advanced: Landau purposefully included the approbations to gain the ʾAgur—a code that departed from the models established by its predecessors—acceptance in Jewish communities. Landau wanted to sell and establish the authority of his code in a variety of Jewish communities, but its innovations in substance and design could prove obstacles to this goal. Landau needed to garner authoritative praise, advertisement, and support for his text. Additionally, as one of the first books printed while its author was still alive, some justification was necessary for its very existence.Footnote ⁶⁵ The approbations additionally served that purpose.Footnote ⁶⁶

The rabbis gathered by Landau and probably also by the printer/publisher GunzenhauserFootnote ⁶⁷ represent an elite and learned coterie of individuals from a variety of Jewish centers.Footnote ⁶⁸ The well-known Messer Leons—Judah and his son DavidFootnote ⁶⁹—and Jacob ben David ProvenẓaliFootnote ⁷⁰ wrote approbations for the text, as did Ben Ẓion ben Rafael, Isaac ben Samuel Ḥayim ha-Sefardi, Moses ben Shem Tov of the Ibn Ḥabib family,Footnote ⁷¹ Solomon Ḥayim ben Yeḥiel ha-Cohen, and Netanel ben Levi of Jerusalem.Footnote ⁷² The imprimaturs of this spectrum of rabbinic authorities from Italy, Spain, and Provence confirmed Landau as a halakhic authority and the clarity, accuracy, and usefulness of his text. Interestingly, in light of Landau's background, none of the approbations came from scholars of Ashkenazic origin, though Italians David and Judah Messer Leon followed Ashkenazic Halakhah.Footnote ⁷³ The combination of Italian and Sephardic approbations for this Ashkenazic-centric text speaks to Landau's adaptation to the composite nature of his community and to his desire to gain recognition from each of these elements, as an analysis of the approbations suggests.

A common theme in many of the approbations is praise of Landau's ability to determine Halakhah: his breadth of knowledge and his respect for the system. The haskamah written by Netanel ben Levi, for example, commends Landau along these lines: “Regarding most of them [the decisions] he [Jacob Landau] was inclined toward being strict, and he did not exaggerate regarding the laws of the holidays and festivals.”Footnote ⁷⁴ Netanel ben Levi forewarns, lest anyone worry, that Landau did not write the book to argue for a more lenient approach to Halakhah; rather, it was appropriately stringent. Netanel additionally stresses that the book should be purchased because its owners and their children would benefit from owning such a text. The explicit encouragement for people to buy the book supports interpretation of the haskamot as advertisement for Landau's project: not only is Landau a valid authority, his text will have longevity and will be a valuable addition to a family's library. With similar perspective, Judah Messer Leon's haskamah states: “It [the ʾAgur] is a composition which presents the pleasing sayings of the customs and halakhic determination—halakhot that are correctly stringent. And therefore I have placed my signature on this honeycomb, these words of pleasantness.”Footnote ⁷⁵

Jacob Provenẓali offers a different sort of praise, highlighting the importance of Landau's project: “[A text] such as this has not been written in many years: a collection of desirable things and decisions testifying to much talmudic discourse.”Footnote ⁷⁶ Though Provenẓali does not note the role of print in the creation of Landau's work or recognize the originality of its intended purpose, it is still significant that Provenẓali notes that such a comprehensive text—indeed a legal code—had not been produced in many years. Provenẓali thus recognized that Landau's project was unique in its time.

Another recurring motif in the haskamot is the value of the ʾAgur's clarity and breadth. Ben Ẓion ben Rafael addresses this point:

Here Ben Ẓion ben Rafael notes that the ʾAgur would help increase knowledge among the Jewish people because it is a comprehensive work that could reach individuals lacking in halakhic knowledge. Another maskim notes the value of this book's collection of opinions, and its possible role as a text that would supersede others: “The master, Rabbi Jacob Landau, has written and brought for us a book on the decisions on the daily service and of the festivals and decisions regarding prohibitions and permissions. He gathers and collects all the opinions of most of the writers and adds to it jewels of his mouth, extended to be stringent and not to be lenient. And from now on I rely upon it to teach the children of Israel.”Footnote ⁷⁸ Interestingly, the author of this haskamah was a Sephardic Jew. His acceptance of the authority of Landau's text, and his reliance on it as an educational manual, represents a merging of geographically specific traditions, which accords with Landau's intention for the text to be considered authoritative by Ashkenazic, Italian, and Sephardic Jews.Footnote ⁷⁹ A second Sephardic scholar, the renowned poet and grammarian Moshe ben Shem Tov ibn Ḥabib, makes the same point, and even brings it one step further by praising Landau's role in the establishment of a standardized Halakhah:

This haskamah is significant because Ibn Ḥabib equates a fixed Halakhah, and specifically the ʾAgur, with the coming of redemption. Thus, according to Ibn Ḥabib, Landau's text did not just clarify halakhic discussions; Landau was uniquely blessed with clarity of insight necessary to establish a set of uniform practices. Though not explicitly mentioned in Ibn Ḥabib's haskamah, print—the new art with which Landau was familiar through his work as proofreader at Gunzenhauser's print shop—is an important factor in this equation.Footnote ⁸¹ Realistically, a standardized Halakhah could be realized only through print—the inherently limited number of manuscripts that could be produced by scribal hand prevented the establishment of textual uniformity that could extend beyond a tiny, insular community. Though printed texts were not free from error, the same version of a single text could be widely disseminated in many Jewish centers. Print enabled the production of cheaper and smaller books that could easily be transported. One text could be established as the text from which practice should be based. Ibn Ḥabib's haskamah is testimony that both Landau and his reader understood that due to its content and the means of its production the ʾAgur could become the standard Jewish legal resource.Footnote ⁸²

In addition to the haskamot, and aside from its substantive content, other aspects of the ʾAgur attest to Landau's awareness of the possibilities and advantages of the new printing technology for the production of books. The ʾAgur's size—the first edition of the book is small and easy to carry around—compared to previous codes reflects Landau's intent to reach new audiences who had neither the resources nor time to study large tomes that necessarily had to remain in one place.Footnote ⁸³ Manuscript materials and practices were laborious and expensive, and consequently few individuals amassed libraries of any sort. Such works were instead read and studied primarily in yeshivot. The small size of Landau's book meant that individuals without requisite time to study Jewish law could read this text outside of such contexts, in fact whenever and wherever they pleased. Moreover, the ʾAgur contains a detailed table of contents, a remarkable (for the time) feature that in today's vernacular made the ʾAgur user-friendly. One did not need to read the book intensively from cover to cover. Rather, it could be used as Landau intended, as a ready reference source to be consulted to answer specific questions as they arose or read in part and out of order.Footnote ⁸⁴ It was a tool for those without the time or knowledge to devote themselves entirely to rabbinic study, not a treatise accessible only to the scholarly elite.Footnote ⁸⁵

Additionally, the first edition of the ʾAgur was printed together with Landau's Sefer ḥazon, a small stand-alone text of mystical legal conundrums.Footnote ⁸⁶ These riddles were intended for entertainment, so the inclusion of this text gave the ʾAgur as initially published a dual purpose: to be read for study and pleasure. Landau also cited kabbalistic works, specifically the Zohar, at points in the ʾAgur, which further distinguishes his work from his predecessors’ codes and speaks to its adaptation to the heterogeneity of his cultural environment.Footnote ⁸⁷ Finally, the errata list printed by Landau at the end of the ʾAgur additionally shows his preoccupation with perfection and fixity of texts.Footnote ⁸⁸ As seen from his colophon to Gunzenhauser's book of Psalms, Landau well understood the work of printers and the importance of producing a text in its most precise form. And if the ʾAgur was to establish a standardized Halakhah, as the approbations suggest, the errata were of absolute importance to this project.

Reception and Legacy of the ʾAgur

The ʾAgur represents a first adaptation of halakhic literature to print production. Landau did not simply reformat an existing code, he wrote a new work that in both substance and design was created for the new cultural realities of print. The ʾAgur accommodated both scholarly and nonscholarly readers and aimed to appeal to a wider and more cosmopolitan Jewish audience. The approbations Landau solicited for his book speak to his desire to gain authoritative acceptance for this new type of halakhic text. By producing the ʾAgur on a printing press with movable type Landau's ambitions could be best realized. However, despite the ʾAgur's importance in the history of the Jewish book, Landau's efforts were not sufficient to attain his goals.

There are two primary reasons Landau's work did not become the standard Jewish legal resource. First, the ʾAgur has certain shortcomings that prohibit its ready use as a stand-alone guide to the law. The scope and size of the work made comprehensive summary of every law difficult, if not impossible. As a result, Landau does not spell out all practical details required for observance of every law. In the laws of ritual slaughter, for example, Landau does not list the details and processes required for properly salting meat. He instead discusses issues that arose in the period after the Tur and cites sources not fully discussed in the Tur. The ʾAgur thus sometimes functions best not on its own but as a companion book to the Tur.Footnote ⁸⁹ Second, Landau's work was superseded by a better-executed project of similar intent: Joseph Karo's Shulḥan ‘arukh, which is clear, concise, and systematic and thus more useful as a single practical guide to the law. Indeed, as such, the Shulḥan ‘arukh quickly established widespread authority. Though Karo's text appeared a century after the emergence of movable type, when the cultural realities of print had already been better established, and Karo aggressively sought to get his text printed, passed by the censors, and accepted by Jewish communities of various origins, his work was also, simply, a more useful halakhic compendium.Footnote ⁹⁰

Though the ʾAgur was never accepted as a universal code of Jewish law, it continued to be printed, so it must have still been read, even if only by a small audience. After its second printing in Rimini in 1526, the ʾAgur was printed for a third time in Venice in 1545. The text then made its way to eastern Europe and was printed in Offenbach in 1718, Zolkovo in 1798, Sudzilkow in 1834, and Piotrkow in 1884. It seems to have been printed in the twentieth century only in New York, in 1959, and in Jerusalem, in 1960.Footnote ⁹¹ Altogether, the print runs of the ʾAgur were very few, especially when contrasted with those of the Shulḥan ‘arukh. Within a century after its original printing, the ʾAgur was already considered a relatively insignificant text. Lists of the libraries of the Jews of Mantua in 1595 show that of the 430 families who owned at least one book, only 16 owned a copy of the ʾAgur, while 185 families owned a copy of the Mishneh Torah, and approximately 150 owned copies of the Tur and Shulḥan ‘arukh.Footnote ⁹² Today, the number of Jewish families and institutions that own copies of the ʾAgur is even smaller. It would be odd to find a major yeshiva today without multiple copies of the Mishneh Torah, Tur, and Shulḥan ‘arukh, while it would be surprising if a single copy of the ʾAgur graced the bookshelves of these same institutions. Many observant families today also own copies of the three standard codes of Jewish law, but few individuals are even aware of the ʾAgur and its significance, much less possess a copy.

Nevertheless, the ʾAgur has not entirely faded into obscurity. Indeed, Landau's contributions survive in the manifold footnotes of the Jewish legal corpus; he is cited authoritatively in nearly all of his successors’ major halakhic works. Karo himself cited Landau's ʾAgur approximately one hundred times in his commentary on the Tur, the Beit Yosef.Footnote ⁹³ Moses Isserles also very frequently used the ʾAgur as an authoritative source of Ashkenazic Halakhah. And none of the major commentaries on the Shulḥan ‘arukh and Isserles's Mapa—Taz, Shakh, and Magen ʾAvraham—failed to mention the ʾAgur and cite it authoritatively. The ʾAgur thus earned recognition from its successors, though perhaps not in the fashion Landau had desired.

As the fifteenth century drew to a close, Landau published his ʾAgur with a view to the cultural shifts made possible and accelerated by the development of movable type. Meant to reach nonscholarly audiences, appeal to a variety of geographically specific traditions, and ultimately establish itself as a standard halakhic guidebook, the ʾAgur represents an early textual adaptation to the culture of mechanical print. Though the text was not ultimately established as the authority Landau imagined, it may still be said that the ʾAgur helped uncouple textual access from education. Individuals without requisite knowledge or time for tackling the entire Jewish legal corpus—or even just the codes—had a written source they could readily and easily consult, a text that was specifically directed to them, and that was organized and produced so they could make use of it. As such, the ʾAgur was the first halakhic text truly of the printed age.