ALBO.

Graetz.—­IV, 7.

English translation of Ikkarim, Hebrew Review, Vols.  I, II, III.

CHAPTER XIV

THE DIFFUSION OF SCIENCE

     Provencal Translators.—­The Ibn Tibbons.—­Italian
     Translators.—­Jacob Anatoli.—­Kalonymos.—­Scientific
     Literature.

Translators act as mediators between various peoples and ages.  They bring the books and ideas of one form of civilization to the minds and hearts of another.  In the Middle Ages translations were of more importance than now, since fewer educated people could read foreign languages.

No men of letters were more active than the Jews in this work of diffusion.  Dr. Steinschneider fills 1100 large pages with an account of the translations made by Jews in the Middle Ages.  Jews co-operated with Mohammedans in making translations from the Greek, as later on they were associated with Christians in making Latin translations of the masterpieces of Greek literature.  Most of the Jewish translations, however, that influenced Europe were made from the Arabic into the Hebrew.  But though the language of these translations was mostly Hebrew, they were serviceable to others besides Jews.  For the Hebrew versions were often only a stage in a longer journey.  Sometimes by Jews directly, sometimes by Christian scholars acting in conjunction with Jews, these Hebrew versions were turned into Latin, which most scholars understood, and from the Latin further translations were made into the every-day languages of Europe.

The works so translated were chiefly the scientific and philosophical masterpieces of the Greeks and Arabs.  Poetry and history were less frequently the subject of translation, but, as will be seen later on, the spread of the fables of Greece and of the folk-tales of India owed something to Hebrew translators and editors.

Provence was a meeting-place for Arab science and Jewish learning in the Middle Ages, and it was there that the translating impulse of the Jews first showed itself strongly.  By the beginning of the thirteenth century, Hebrew translation had become an art.  True, these Hebrew versions possess no graces of style, but they rank among the best of their class for fidelity to their originals.  Jewish patrons encouraged the translators by material and moral support.  Thus, Meshullam of Lunel (twelfth century) was both learned and wealthy, and his eager encouragement of Judah Ibn Tibbon, “the father of Jewish translators,” gave a strong impetus to the translating activity of the Jews.