TOBIAH BEN ELIJAH OF VIENNE (BURGUNDY) (called also Tobias of Burgundy or simply R. Tobias):

By: Executive Committee of the Editorial Board., A. Peiginsky

French tosafist of the thirteenth century. He was a younger contemporary, and perhaps also a pupil, of Isaac ben Abraham of Dampierre, at whose funeral he was present in 1210. Authors of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries speak of Tobiah as a very prominent teacher of the Law; and he is known also as a Bible commentator and liturgical poet. It seems that he wrote a highly important casuistic work, from which the many decisions quoted in his name were taken. His pupil Abraham ben Ephraim often refers, in his "Sefer ha-Miẓwot," to Tobiah as an authority.

Tobiah is quoted in the Tosafot (B. Ḳ. 69b), several times in "Mordekai," in the "Shibbole ha-Leḳeṭ," and in "Tashbez." His religious poetry, inspired by the persecutions of his coreligionists, consists of "seliḥot," included in a Burgundian Maḥzor. They are impressive in style, and show mastery of form. It appears from a passage in a Cambridge manuscript that Jehiel of Paris visited Tobiah on his journey to Palestine in 1260.

E. C. A. Pe.