MARGALIOT, REUBEN

MARGALIOT, REUBEN (1889–1971), rabbinic scholar and author. Born in Lemberg (Lvov), Margaliot qualified as a rabbi, but remained in business, eventually as a bookseller. Having been active in the Mizrachi movement in Lvov, he settled in Israel in 1935, becoming librarian of the Rambam Library in Tel Aviv. He devoted several studies to ḥasidic lore such as Or ha-Me'ir and Marganita de-R. Meir (1926, 1964); and Hillula de-Ẓaddikaya (1929, 1961). At a later stage he turned to Kabbalah, producing a monumental annotated edition of the Zohar (1964⁴), of the Tikkunei Zohar (1948), of M.Ḥ. Luzzatto's Zohar Ḥadash (1953), and of the early kabbalistic work Sefer ha-Bahir (1951). He also wrote Sha'arei Zohar (1956), a comparative study of the Zohar's system. Margaliot also wrote on the *Emden-*Eybeschuetz controversy and received a reply from G. Scholem (1941).

Earlier he had also published sermons and homiletical material and annotations to Ḥayyim b. Moses *Attar's pentateuchal commentary Ner la-Ma'or (1932, 1959). He wrote biographies of S. Edels (1912); of Ḥayyim b. Moses Attar (1925); of Maimonides' son Abraham (1930), whose Milḥamot Adonai he published in 1953; as well as Le-Toledot Anshei Shem bi-Lvov (1950), on the scholars of his native city. On Talmud and halakhah Margaliot wrote among others Margaliyyot ha-Yam (novellae on tractate Sanhedrin, 1958) and Nefesh Ḥayyah on the Shulḥan Arukh Oraḥ Ḥayyim (1954²). Of special interest is a study of the halakhic aspects of a political resettlement of Ereẓ Israel (Kavvei Or, 1921) written under the impact of the Balfour Declaration. Among halakhic studies in a more modern vein and idiom are his Yesod ha-Mishnah va-Arikhatah ("Foundations of the Mishnah and Its Redaction," 1956⁴); and Meḥkarim be-Darkhei ha-Talmud ("Studies in Talmudic Methodology," 1967). Also of importance are his editions of medieval texts, particularly his annotated Sefer Ḥasidim, attributed to Judah b. Samuel (12^th century), first published in 1924 and republished many times since. Margaliot also prepared an edition of the responsa of the tosafist *Jacob of Marvège (She'elot u-Teshuvot min ha-Shamayim, 1957³); of the disputations of Naḥmanides with Pablo Christiani in Barcelona in 1263 (with a biography of Naḥmanides, 1929); and of Jehiel of Paris of 1240 (1928, 1944). He received the Israel Prize in 1957 for his research on Kabbalah and Ḥasidism.

bibliography:

Kressel, Leksikon, 2 (1967), 421–3.