Eliezer Ashkenazi

A peripatetic and polemic-prone scholar versed in rabbinic and secular philosophical and scientific writings, Eliezer Ashkenazi, whose birthplace is unknown, studied under Joseph Taitatsak in Salonika. He served in professional rabbinic capacities in Egypt, Cyprus, Italy (Venice and Cremona), Bohemia, and Poland (Poznań and Kraków), and he met or corresponded with peers across Europe and the Mediterranean, including Joseph Karo, Azariah de’ Rossi, with whom he had an intellectual affinity, and Judah Loew ben Bezalel (the Maharal of Prague), with whom he clashed sharply. Ashkenazi’s Ma‘ase ha-shem (Deeds of the Lord) follows a rationalist approach to biblical exegesis, incorporating scientific and medical findings.