original, on account of which lack of evidence on the part of Ma, the editor has been obliged to reconstruct the text. It has a number of errors such as misspelled words and minor repetitions, due to carelessness of the scribe, or to a faulty source. A few vocalized words and marginal readings, chiefly of a later hand, occur.
So = Maimonides' Commentary on Abot, Soncino (1484–85?). It is found in the libraries of Columbia University, of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, and elsewhere, and is an incunabulum. It is minutely described by De Rossi, in Annales Hebraeo Typographici, Parma, p. 131. It was probably copied from the Soncino edition of the Maḥzor.[1] Its chief value lies in its being in places corroboratory of Br or Ma. Only occasionally does it offer an independent reading of value.
Mi = Mishnah text with Commentary of Maimonides, Naples, 1492; printed by Joshua Soncino.[2] This is the first edition of the Mishnah. The copy used by the editor is found in the library of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America. It has marginal notes offering corrections, as well as some interlinear insertions. It agrees substantially with So, its source evidently being the same, both being Soncino editions. Variants from it are recorded in the notes only when differing from those of So.
As it has been the aim of the editor to restore the text as it came from the pen of Ibn Tibbon, it has very often become necessary for him to place in the notes readings whose Hebrew is superior to that of those retained in the text.[3] Ibn Tibbon, on the whole, translated literally, and consequently the literalism of a reading indicates conclusively that it originated with him. The more idiomatic renderings are due to copyists, who endeavored to improve the text, but who, it may be added,
- ↑ See Catalogo di Opere Ebraiche Greche Latine ed Italiane stampate dai Celebri Tipografi Soncini ne' Secoli XV e XVI, Compilato da Gaetana Zaccaria Antonucci, p. 113; Steinschneider, Supplementum Catalogi libr. hebr.in Biblioth. Bodleiana, in Centralblatt für Bibliothekswesen (Leipzig, 1894), Vol. XI, p. 486, and JE., vol. VI, p. 578, art. Incunabula.
- ↑ See Antonucci, Catalogo, etc., pp. 53–54.
- ↑ See, for instance, Hebrew text, c. I, p. 9, n. 1.
