BERECHIAH BEN ISAAC GERUNDI (called also YIẒḤAḲI):
Payyeṭan; lived in the twelfth century, probably at Lunel. Although he wrote nothing on the Halakah, his brother Zerahiah Gerundi, in his "Sefer ha-Maor," cites him as an authority on the treatise Giṭṭin (to 15b). Berechiah's poems, the greater part of which are printed in the Maḥzorim of diverse rites, are: (1) "Kerobah," a form of piyyuṭ, for the Sabbath following the feast of Purim; (2) Azharot, for the feast of Tabernacles, in which all the precepts concerning this feast are enumerated; (3) introduction to Kaddish; (4) poems for Purim; (5) prayers for Atonement; (6) a poem on the Habdalah.
Bibliography:
- Zunz, Literaturgesch. pp. 463, 495;
- Landshuth, 'Ammude ha-'Abodah, pp. 56, 63, 117;
- Gross, Gallia Judaica, p. 255.
