| ẒARFATI – Oriental Jewish family, traced by the bibliographer Azulai to a line of French rabbis descended from Rashi through his grandson Rabbenu Tam.Elijah Ẓarfati: Moroccan Talmudist; chief rabbi of Fez about 1770; grandson of Samuel... |
| ẒARIFA – Name of a goddess mentioned in a single passage of the Talmud ('Ab. Zarah 12a) as having been worshiped at Ashkelon. Kohut, Levy, and other Jewish lexicographers identify her with Serapis; but the Hebrew spelling would seem to... |
| ZARKA – See Accents in Hebrew. |
| ZARḲO, JUDAH BEN ABRAHAM – Hebrew poet distinguished for the elegance of his style; flourished at Rhodes in the sixteenth century. During a residence at Constantinople he wrote his "Leḥem Yehudah" (Constantinople, 1560), which contains an allegory on the... |
| ZARZA, SAMUEL IBN SENEH – Spanish philosopher; lived at Valencia in the second half of the fourteenth century. According to Zunz, his surname is derived from the Spanish town Zarza (= "thorn-bush"), and is accordingly synonymous with the Hebrew "seneh."... |
| ZARZAL, ABRAHAM IBN – Spanish physician and astronomer; flourished in the first half of the fourteenth century at the court of the Nasserites in Granada, where a certain Pharez ben Abraham ibn Zarzal, who may have been his father, was physician in... |
| ZARZAL, MOSES IBN – Spanish physician and poet; physician in ordinary to Henry III. of Castile; flourished in the latter half of the fourteenth and the first part of the fifteenth century; son of Abraham ibn Zarzal. On March 6, 1405, he was at... |
| ZAUSMER, JACOB DAVID BEN ISAAC – Polish Masorite of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries; rabbi of Zausmer, near Cracow; died before 1644. He was the author of the "Perush ha-Massorah" and of the "Ṭa'ame ha-Massorah" (Lublin, 1616); the former work... |
| ZAUSMER, JACOB BEN SAMUEL – Polish rabbi and preacher; flourished at Zausmer in the seventeenth century. He was the author of the "Bet Ya'aḳob." (Dyhernfurth, 1696), a work containing 174 responsa. In the preface he says that he wrote also "Toledot... |
| ZAYIN (ו) – Seventh letter of the Hebrew alphabet. The meaning of the name is uncertain. In sound the letter is a sonant sibilant, its phonetic value corresponding to the English "z." It interchanges with the surd sibilant ("s"), and occurs... |
| ZBARAZER – See Ehrenkranz, Benjamin Wolf. |
| ZBITKOVER, SAMUEL – See Warsaw. |
| ZEALOTS – Zealous defenders of the Law and of the national life of the Jewish people; name of a party opposing with relentless rigor any attempt to bring Judea under the dominion of idolatrous Rome, and especially of the aggressive and... |
| ZEBAḤIM – Treatise in the Mishnah, the Tosefta, and the Babylonian Talmud, dealing mainly with the laws and regulations to be observed in making animal offerings. In the Tosefta this treatise is called "Ḳorbanot" (Sacrifices), while its... |
| ẒEBA'OT ADONAI – See Adonai. |
| ZEBEDEE – Father of the apostles James and John, and husband of Salome; a native of Galilee and a fisherman by calling (Matt. iv. 21, xxvii. 56; Mark xv. 40). It seems from the mention of his boat and hired servants (ib. i. 20) that... |
| ẒEBI BEN AARON – See Kaidanover, Ẓebi Hirsch. |
| ẒEBI ASHKENAZI – See Ashkenazi, Ẓebi Hirsch ben Jacob. |