AL-BARGELONI (i.e. of Barcelona), ISAAC BEN REUBEN

AL-BARGELONI (i.e. "of Barcelona"), ISAAC BEN REUBEN (b. 1043), Spanish talmudist and liturgical poet. In a genizah fragment Al-Bargeloni is described as a pupil of Ḥanokh b. Moses and must, therefore, have studied for some time in Córdoba. His permanent residence was the coastal city of Denia, where he was presumably active as a dayyan until his death. Naḥmanides was one of his descendants. abraham ibn daud extols his learning, including him among the four distinguished contemporaries of Isaac Alfasi, also called Isaac. moses ibn ezra and Al-Ḥarizi praise his poetical talent, especially his ingenuity in interpolating biblical verses into his poems. This skill is particularly manifest in Isaac's azharot, in which all 145 strophes end with a biblical quotation. The azharot have been included in most North African rites published since 1655 and have been frequently published, both alone and together with those of solomon ibn gabirol . Of Isaac's other poems there are extant two introductions to the azharot, two tokheḥot (one unpublished), two mi-khamokha, and an ahavah. His halakhic works consist of commentaries to single tractates of the Talmud (not preserved), and a translation from Arabic to Hebrew of hai gaon 's Sefer ha-Mikkaḥ ve-ha-Mimkar made in 1078. According to Simeon b. Ẓemaḥ Duran (Responsa 1:15), judah b. barzillai al-bargeloni was Isaac's pupil. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: Rapoport, in: Bikkurei ha-Ittim, 10 (1829), 191; Mann, in: REJ, 74 (1922), 157–9; Davidson, Oẓar, 4 (1933), 418; J.H. Schirmann, Shirim Ḥadashim min ha-Genizah (1966), 196–200; Ibn Daud, Tradition, index.