Menahem Ben Aaron Ibn Zerah - Zedah La-Derek

In honor and for the benefit Abravanel, Menahem wrote Zedah la-Derek (Ferrara, 1554). This work occupies a peculiar position among codes, and is in a certain sense unique. As the author states in the introduction (ed. Sabbionetta, p. 166), it is intended mainly for rich Jews who associate with princes and who, on account of their high station and their intercourse with the non-Jewish world, are not over-rigorous in regard to Jewish regulations. For such a class of readers a law-codex must not be too voluminous, but must contain the most essential laws, especially those that the higher classes would be inclined to overstep.

The Ẓedah la-Derek is divided into five parts (comprising altogether 372 sections), which may be summarized as follows:

• Part i.: The ritual and all that is related to it, as, for example, the regulations concerning phylacteries, zizit, etc.
• Part ii.: Laws concerning forbidden foods.
• Part iii.: Marriage laws.
• Part iv.: Sabbath and feast-days.
• Part v.: Fast-days and laws for mourning. As a supplement to the last part is a treatise on the Messiah and on the resurrection of the dead.

Menahem sought to emphasize the ethical side of the Law in his work. He was not satisfied with merely stating the regulations like other religious codifiers: he tried also to give a reason for them. Deficient as the Ẓedah la-Derek is as a code, its author has succeeded remarkably well in bringing to light the religious element in the Jewish ceremonial. At the same time he is far removed from mysticism (comp. ib. ed. Sabbionetta, iv. 4, 1, p. 187), possessing an unusually wide mental horizon. Although his parents and brothers fell victims to religious hatred, he still maintained that the superiority of Israel as the "chosen people" is based upon their fulfilling God's word, and "that a non-Jew who lives in accordance with God's will is more worthy than a Jew who does not perform it" (ib. i. 1, 33, p. 39). In dogmatical questions Menahem was more inclined to a strictly Orthodox point of view than to a philosophical one, although he believed that the Biblical stories of the Creation and the Bible's teaching about the resurrection contained mysteries, which he did not venture to solve. In a Turin manuscript (A. iv. 37) are given laws by him on shehitah and bedikah, perhaps excerpted from his larger work.