IBN AL-RABĪB, ABRAHAM

IBN AL-RABĪB, ABRAHAM (also called Abu Isḥāk; first half of the 12th century), Hebrew poet who lived in Andalusia. Abraham was a close friend of judah halevi who compiled three hymns of praise for him on the occasion of his marriage. abraham ibn ezra , too, was one of his admirers and presented him and his father-in-law the nasi, Isaac ibn Muhājir, with a joint hymn of praise. Only a fragment of a poem by him remains, a dirge in which he laments the death of his relations, the nesi'im, members of the Muhājir family. The poem is rhymed and has an alphabetic acrostic. The manuscript, however, only reaches the tenth letter of the alphabet. He was not considered a great poet, and his name is not mentioned in any of the medieval lists of significant Hebrew Andalusian poets. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: J. Schirmann, Shirim Ḥadashim min ha-Genizah (1965), 217f., 267, 272; Judah Halevi, Diwan, ed. by H. Brody, 1 (1894), 179–80; 2 (1909), 29–31, 276.