ELIEZER BEN SAMUEL OF VERONA

ELIEZER BEN SAMUEL OF VERONA (early 13^th century), Italian tosafist. Eliezer was a pupil of Isaac b. Samuel of Dampierre (Roke'aḥ 377) and the teacher of *Avigdor b. Elijah Kohen Ẓedek of Vienna. He was a colleague of *Eleazar b. Judah of Worms and of Abraham b. Moses of Regensburg. He wrote tosafot to the Talmud, and those to Bava Batra (from 144b ff.) in particular are attributed to him. One of his rulings gave rise to considerable controversy. He permitted the widow of a certain Solomon b. Jacob to remarry, seven years after he had disappeared when the ship in which he was sailing sank near Pesaro in 1214. He sent his ruling to "the communities of the Rhine and of Cologne," but Baruch b. Samuel of Mainz forbade the agunah to remarry. After Baruch's death, Abraham b. Moses of Mainz sent Eliezer's ruling to Eliezer b. Joel ha-Levi, but he confirmed the prohibition (Sefer Ravyah, 4 (1965), 133–43). Eliezer's responsa to *Isaac b. Moses of Vienna (Or Zaru'a) are quoted in Zedekiah b. Abraham's Shibbolei ha-Leket (ed. by S. Buber (1886), nos. 13, 237, and 247) and in Sefer Issur ve-Hetter (no. 9) by the same author (published in Ha-Segullah, 1, 1934). There is also mention of his biblical exegesis (Zunz, in hb, 7 (1864), 20ff.). Isaac Or Zaru'a calls Eliezer and *Isaiah di Trani the Elder "the two kings of Israel." *Hillel of Verona was his grandson.

bibliography:

Zunz, Schr, 3 (1876), 250f.; S. Buber (ed.), Shibbolei ha-Leket ha-Shalem (1886), introd., 9; V. Aptowitzer, Mavole-Sefer Ravyah (1938), 195, 311f., 429–32; Urbach, Tosafot, 357–9, 504f.

[Yehoshua Horowitz]