Abstract:
Sefer H. asidim is one of those texts that has continued to challenge its readers—medieval, early modern, and modern—since its inception. Consisting of thousands of distinct passages, these disparate (and not always consistent) parts come together to provide a complex and nuanced glimpse into the thoughts and mindset of its author(s) that is far richer than almost any other surviving text from medieval Ashkenaz. Attributed to three authors— R. Samuel b. Kalonymous, his son R. Judah b. Samuel, both of whom are often known as he-H. asid (the pious),1 and Judah’s disciple R. Eleazar b. Judah of Worms—the text that has reached us is far from uniform and eludes all attempts at easy definitions, containing an array of genres including exegesis, mystical traditions, halakhic rulings, stories, and moral advice. The existence of so many different versions2 and numerous manuscripts may be due to the fact that, according to his son R. Moshe Zaltman, the work was incomplete when Judah he-H. asid passed away in Adar of 1217.
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