Benjamin Dionyse Ben-Immanuel Musafia
Benjamin Dionyse Ben-Immanuel Musafia [1]
a Jewish savant, celebrated also as a physician, was born about 1619. He practiced medicine with great repute at Hamburg and Gliickstadt. As an author he is noted for his treatise on Potable Gold ( מֵי זָהָב ). He also made additions to the Hebrew Lexicon of Nathan benJechiel (q.v.) under the title of מוּסִ הָעָיוּךְ . Besides, he compiled a dictionary entitled וֶכֶר רִב, giving the Hebrew words in seven poems for all the days of the week (Amst. 1635; Wilna, 1863). He also wrote the disputes between R. Jacob Sasportas and himself, entitled עֵדוּת בְּיִעִקֹב, the Testimony in Jacob (Amst. 1672). He commented on the Jerusalem Talmud, and studied a subject that was still more obscure and intricate, since he tried to explain the Flux and Reflux of the Sea, a treatise which he dedicated to king Christian IV of Denmark, under the title מֵי הִיִּם (Epistola Regia de maris reciprocatione [Amst. 1642]). See Furst, Bibl. Jud. 2:408 sq.; Gratz, Gesch. d. Juden, 10:24, 26, 202, 227, 243, 244; Jost, Gesch. d. Juden. u.s. Sekten, 3:170; Kayserling, Gesch. d. Juden in Portugal, page 298; Lindo, Hist. of the Jews in Spain, etc., page 368; Basnage, Hist. of the Jews (Taylor's transl.), page 741; De Barrios, Vida de Ishac Uziel, page 48; Cassel, Leitfaden fur Jud. Geschichte u. Literatur, page 102; Steinschneider, Bibliog. Handbuch, page 98; Delitzsch, Zur Gesch. d. Jid. Poesie (Leips. 1836), page 76; Etheridge, Introd. to Heb. Literature, page 389. (B.P.)
