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This important work, the largest of the midrashic collections, came to popular attention in the late 19th century through the efforts of Jacob Saphir, Solomon Schechter and David Zvi Hoffmann. In addition to containing midrashic material that is not found elsewhere, such as part of the Mekhilta of Rabbi Shimon ben Yochai. Most of the Mekhilta of Rabbi Shimon ben Yochai is found in the Midrash HaGadol, which, heretofore, has only been available in scattered and fragmented manuscripts. The Midrash HaGadol, along with the other extant fragmented manuscripts, were used by scholars to reconstruct the ancient Mekhilta. Midrash HaGadol contains what are considered to be more correct versions of previously known Talmudic and midrashic passages.
Discovery and publication
The existence of the Midrash HaGadol was first brought to the attention of Jewish scholarship by Jacob Saphir, who in his Even Sapir (1866) reports seeing a manuscript of the work in the possession of the Chief Rabbi of Yemen. His remarks about the "discovery" are reproduced in Fish (1940), where he describes a work on the entire Torah containing "twice as much as our Midrash Rabbah". While this collection was new to European Jewry, it was probably well known to the Yemenite Jews.
The first manuscript was brought from Yemen to Jerusalem and then to Berlin in 1878 by Mr Saphir, and this midrash subsequently became the subject of much scholarly attention. There are currently approximately two hundred manuscripts of this work residing in various public and private Hebraica collections, according to the catalog of the Institute of Microfilmed Hebrew Manuscripts.
Manuscript page from Midrash HaGadol on Genesis.
The Midrash HaGadol on Genesis was first published by Solomon Schechter in 1902. A large portion of Midrash HaGadol on Exodus was then published by David Zvi Hoffmann in 1913. Midrash HaGadol on Book of Numbers was published by S. Fisch in 1940 in a more accessible style than the previous efforts, which were principally arranged for a scholarly audience. More recent editions listed by Strack & Stemberger (1991) are those on Genesis and Exodus by M. Margulies (1967), on Leviticus by E.N. Rabinowitz (1932) and Adin Steinsaltz (1975), on Numbers by E.N. Rabinowitz (1973), and on Deuteronomy by S. Fish (1972). The Mossad Harav Kook in Jerusalem has also published a five-volume edition.
Authorship
According to Higger (1934), the work dates to the late 14th century. A discussion of its authorship is provided in Fish (1940), wherein he reviews the evidence in favor of the three then-prevailing opinions regarding authorship of the Midrash HaGadol, variously that it is the work of Maimonides' son, Rabbi Abraham Maimonides, which opinion follows that of Yiḥyah Salaḥ (an opinion disputed in later generations), or else compiled by David bar Amram al-Adani.
After discounting Maimonides as a possible author, and reviewing some compelling factors in favor of the other two possible authors, Fish (1940) offers the conciliatory hypothesis that the work was composed in Judeo-Arabic by Abraham Maimonides and translated into Hebrew by David al-Adani. While Fish offers possible explanations for how the work, if indeed authored by Abraham Maimonides in Egypt, came first to be "lost" and then to be rediscovered in Yemen, Strack & Stemberger (1991) find the attribution to Abraham Maimonides "only extremely weakly attested," and report that modern scholars almost uniformly attribute the work in its entirety to David bar Amram al-Adani. S. Fish concedes this as well in his Encyclopaedia Judaica article on the topic.
The Midrash HaGadol contains material from Mekhilta of Rabbi Shimon ben Yochai , Sifri Zutta, Mekhilta le-Sefer Devarim, Mekhilta of Rabbi Ishmael, Sifre, and other unknown midrashic sources. In addition, the midrash makes use of the work of Maimonides and Isaac Alfasi, as well as many geonic writings, but the sources are never cited, a unique characteristic of this midrash. All these various sources are fused in such a way that the product is a new literary creation in which the original ingredients can frequently not be unambiguously discriminated.
A "Midrash HaGadol that was brought from Aden" is cited by Joseph Shalit Riqueti in Sefer Chochmat HaMishkan (1676), but it is not known whether this is the same as this Midrash HaGadol.
References
^ Fisch, Solomon, ed. (1957). Midrash Haggadol on the Pentateuch (Numbers) (in Hebrew). Vol. 1. London: L. Honig & Sons. p. 23 (Preface). OCLC1049027075.
All of the extant manuscripts used in printing the Midrash HaGadol were taken out of Yemen, and/or are in the possession of Yemenite Jewish families. In the Midrash HaGadol`s Introduction to the Book of Deuteronomy, it cites the various manuscripts used in reproducing its printed copy, one belonging to Yosef and Avraham Sharabi; one now in the Hebrew University Library collection; four in the Mossad HaRav Kook library collection; one belonging to the Ben-Zvi Institute library collection; one being in a private collection belonging to Meir Benayahu; and the last one belonging to the Bodleian Library collection in Oxford, England (opp. add. 4 124a), all being of Yemenite Jewish provenance. There is another manuscript now in the Berlin Staatsbibliothek Library (Or. 1207), also of Yemenite Jewish provenance, as noted in its colophon. In the Introduction to the Midrash HaGadol (on Numbers, Mossad Harav Kook edition), other manuscripts are also mentioned, one belonging to Azriel Abyadh-HaLivni; another belonging to the late Yisrael Yeshayahu; another to Rabbi Yechiel Shelomo Kessar; another to Rabbi Shalom Tzabari; another to the Rambam Library in Tel Aviv, Israel; and yet another to the Dr Israel Mehlmann Library in Jerusalem, Israel inter alia. Other manuscripts were known to be in the possession of the late Rabbi Shalom b. Yosef Halevi Alsheikh and of the Hibshush brothers in Tel-Aviv, as well as private collections in the hand of the late Mordecai Margalioth and of Rabbi Y. L. HaCohen Fishman, as noted in the Introduction to the Midrash HaGadol (on Genesis), Mosad HaRav Kook edition.
E.g. in Midrash HaGadol on Exodus 30:34 (Mossad HaRav Kook edition), s.v. נטף ושחלת וחלבנה, the glosses note that the quotation used in the Midrash HaGadol on the Holy Incense has been taken directly from Maimonides' Mishneh Torah (Hilchot Kelei HaMikdash 2:4), whose words are these: והשחלת היא הציפורן שנותנין בני אדם במוגמרות, וחלבנה כמו דבש שחור היא וריחה קשה והיא שרף אילנות בערי יון. There are many other scattered excerpts taken from Mishneh Torah, as Zvi Meir Rabinowitz notes in his Preface to the Midrash HaGadol on Numbers (Mossad HaRav Kook edition, p. 8)
Midrash HaGadol, on Book of Numbers, Foreword written by Fish, pp.5–ff..
See infra., note on Avraham Al-Naddaf.
Avraham Al-Naddaf, in his book, Ḥoveret Seridei Teiman (חוברת שרידי תימן), published in Jerusalem in 1928, pp. 7a-b (letter "gimel"), and which contains an inventory of books of Yemenite Jewish provenance, attributes the book to David bar Amram al-Adani. See Ḥoveret Seridei Teiman, pp. 14–15 in PDF.
Talmud Readers by Adolf Behrman