Ibn-Latif or Allatif, Isaac BEN-ABRAHAjr, a Jew- ish philosopher, was born in Southern Siiain about 1270. But little is kno\ra of his personal history. He devoted much of his time to the study of the Cabala, and be- came one of its most celebrated exponents in .Spain. "With greater correctness than Cabalists who preceded him, he advocated tlie doctrine that the worlds of «pirit and of matter are closely allied, and likewise God and
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his creation. The divine is in everything, and every- thing in the divine. He also beheved in the power of prayer, but that man, in order to be accepted of God, must approach at least perfection ; hence the most per- fect of men, the prophets, interceded by prayer for the people. The development of the self-revelation of the divinity in the world, of the spirits, spheres, and bod- ies, Ibii-Latif explains by mathematical formulas. He died about 1290. Of his works, which are quite numer- ous, the following have been printed : Iggereth hat-To- shtibah, replies to the questions of Judah ben-Naason (Prague, 1839, 8vo) :— a Heb. Commentary on Ecclesi- astes (Constantinople, s. a. 8vo). See Griitz, Geschichte d. Juden, vii, 220 ; Fiirst, Biblioth. Judaica, ii, 224 ; Car- moly, Revue Orientale, i, 61 sq.
Iba-Librat. See Dunash.
Ibn-Saktar. See Itzchaki.
Ibn-Sargado, Aaron, also called Aaron Ha- CoHEX liEN-JosEPH, a Jewisli scholar, flourished in Bag- dad towards the middle of the 10th century. He was a wealthy merchant, but very fond of study, and, taking ground against Saadia (q. v.), for whose deposition from the " Gaonate" he expended large sums of money, short- ly after Saadia's decease he was elected Gaon (spiritual head) of the academy at Pumbadita (943), and by his zeal for learning and his great wealth greatly furthered the interests of this academy at the expense of the Su- ran school, over which Saadia had presided. Ibn-Sar- gado, during the eighteen years of his presidency, de- voted himself not only to the exposition of the O.-Test. Scriptures, but also quite extensively to the study of philosophy (comp. Miuik, Guide des egares, i, 4G2). He wrote a philosophical work and a Commentary on the Pentateuch, but they are not as yet known to us. From the fragments of the latter preserved by Aben-Ezra (Gen. xviii, 28; xxxiv, 30; xlix, 6, 7; Exod. x, 12 ; Lev. xviii, 6), we see that, though abiding by the traditional explanation of the Hebrew Scriptures. Ilm-Sargado was by no means a slavish follower of aiicinit (jpinious. See Griitz, Gesch. der Juden, v, 335 sq. : iUttd, ( '//'-lop. Bib. Lit. ii, 357; Fiirst, Biblioth. Jud. iii, 24tj; Geiger, Jii- dische Zeitschrift Jllr Wissenschaft und Leben (1862), p. 297 ; Zunz, in Geiger's Zeitschrift, vol. iv (Stuttg. 1839), p. 389, etc.
Ibn-Saruk. See Menachem.
Ibn-Shoeib, Joel, a Jewish commentator, flour- ished at Tudela in the latter half of the 15th century. But little, is known of his personal history. His works show him to have been a man of considerable culture and great liberality of mind. He wrote commentaries on the Pentateuch, entitled The Holocaust of Sabbath (Ven. 1577) ; on the Psalms, entitled Fearful in Praises (Salonaica, 1568-69) ; on the. Song of Songs, entitled A b?-ief Exposition (Sabionetta, 1558); and an Exposition of Lamnitaiions (A'enice, 1589). In his commentary on the Psalins he maintained that pious Gentiles would ha\e a share in the world to come, which, when we con- sider the severe persecutions they inflicted at this time on the Jews, is by no means a small concession on the part of Ibn-Shoeib. — Kitto, Cyclop, of Bib. Lit. ii, 358; Zunz, Zur Gesch. u. Literutur (Berl. 1845), p. 384. (J. H.W.)
Ibn-Sitta (N::''T "3), a distinguished Jew, flour- ished at Irak towards the close of the 9th century. He wrote a commentary on the Scriptures, of which frag- ments only are left. Such we flnd in Aben-Ezra (on Exod. xxi, 24, 35; xxii, 28). Saadia Gaon thought Ibn-Sitta of suflicient importance to refute his interpre- tations, while Al)cu-Kzni exercises his withering sarcasm
upi)u liini. — l\i LikbiU Ka,l,H..
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Pinsker.
uih ( Vi<'nn;i, iMiO ), ],. 13 ; Fiirst, Gesch. d. Karcierthums (Lpz. 18G2), p. 100, 173.
Ibn-Thofeil, an Arabian philoso]iher Avho flour- ished in the 12th century, wrote a worlc in ^vl.ich the existence of God is proved m so able a manner that the
arguments remain unrefuted to this day. It was trans- lated into Persian, Hebrew, and Latin. The last-named, by Ed. Pococke, was entitled Philosophus autodidactus, sice epistola Abi Jaafor Ebn-Tophail de Ilai Ebn-Yol- dham (Oxf. 1671 and 1700, 4to; and also in English by S. Ockley, Lond. 1708, 1731, 8vo, and other modem lan- guages).— Hoefer, Nouc. Bioy. Gen. xxv, 752.
Ibn-Tibbon, Jehudah ben-Saiil, a .Tcwish scholar of Spanish descent, was born at Limel, France, about 1120. He Avas educated a physician, but his ardent love for the study of Hebrew led" him to abandon the practice of his profession, and he devoted himself main- ly to the translation into Hebrew of some of the most valuable works of able Jews written in Arabic. He died about 1190. His translations are The Duties of the Heart of Joseph b.-Bechai, the Ethics of Ibn-Ge- birol, the Kusuri of Judah Ha-Levi, the Afoird Phi- losophy of Saadia Gaon, and the grammatical and lexi- cographical work of Ibn-Ganach (q. v.). All his trans- lations bear his o\vn pedantic character : they are literal, and therefore clumsy, and we can hardly see Avhy he should have gained the surname oi prince of translators, unless it was for the service which he rendered by pre- senting the Jews translations of works not otherwise ac- cessible to them. He is also said to have written a work on the purity of the Hebrew language (P.in^J "IID "•(■Hr^tl), which is lost. See Kitto, Cyclop. Bibl. Lit. ii, 358 ; Steinschneider, Catalogus Libr. Hebr. in EiUiotheca Bodleiana (col. 1374-76) ; Griitz, Gesch. d. Juden, xi, 241 ; Fiirst, Biblioth. Jud. iii, 401 sq.