“I have always loved the Holy Tongue”: Isaac Casaubon, the Jews, and a Forgotten Chapter in Renaissance Scholarship (Carl Newell Jackson Lectures)

Fusing high scholarship with high drama, Anthony Grafton and Joanna Weinberg uncover a secret and extraordinary aspect of a legendary Renaissance scholar’s already celebrated achievement. The French Protestant Isaac Casaubon (1559–1614) is known to us through his pedantic namesake in George Eliot’s Middlemarch. But in this book, the real Casaubon emerges as a genuine literary hero, an intrepid explorer in the world of books. With a flair for storytelling reminiscent of Umberto Eco, Grafton and Weinberg follow Casaubon as he unearths the lost continent of Hebrew learning—and adds this ancient lore to the well-known Renaissance revival of Latin and Greek. The mystery begins with Mark Pattison’s nineteenth-century biography of Casaubon. Here we encounter the Protestant Casaubon embroiled in intellectual quarrels with the Italian and Catholic orator Cesare Baronio. Setting out to understand the nature of this imbroglio, Grafton and Weinberg discover Casaubon’s knowledge of Hebrew. Close reading and sedulous inquiry were Casaubon’s tools in recapturing the lost learning of the ancients—and these are the tools that serve Grafton and Weinberg as they pore through pre-1600 books in Hebrew, and through Casaubon’s own manuscript notebooks. Their search takes them from Oxford to Cambridge, from Dublin to Cambridge, Massachusetts, as they reveal how the scholar discovered the learning of the Hebrews—and at what cost. (20101122) “[An] extraordinary book.” —New RepublicFusing high scholarship with high drama, Anthony Grafton and Joanna Weinberg uncover a secret and extraordinary aspect of a legendary Renaissance scholar's already celebrated achievement. The French Protestant Isaac Casaubon (1559–1614) is known to us through his pedantic namesake in George Eliot's Middlemarch. But in this book, the real Casaubon emerges as a genuine literary hero, an intrepid explorer in the world of books. With a flair for storytelling reminiscent of Umberto Eco, Grafton and Weinberg follow Casaubon as he unearths the lost continent of Hebrew learning—and adds this ancient lore to the well-known Renaissance revival of Latin and Greek.The mystery begins with Mark Pattison's nineteenth-century biography of Casaubon. Here we encounter the Protestant Casaubon embroiled in intellectual quarrels with the Italian and Catholic orator Cesare Baronio. Setting out to understand the nature of this imbroglio, Grafton and Weinberg discover Casaubon's knowledge of Hebrew. Close reading and sedulous inquiry were Casaubon's tools in recapturing the lost learning of the ancients—and these are the tools that serve Grafton and Weinberg as they pore through pre-1600 books in Hebrew, and through Casaubon's own manuscript notebooks. Their search takes them from Oxford to Cambridge, from Dublin to Cambridge, Massachusetts, as they reveal how the scholar discovered the learning of the Hebrews—and at what cost. Fusing high scholarship with high drama, Anthony Grafton and Joanna Weinberg uncover a secret and extraordinary aspect of a legendary Renaissance scholar's already celebrated achievement. The French Protestant Isaac Casaubon (1550-1614) is known to us through his pedantic namesake in George Eliot's Middlemardz. But in this book, the real Casaubon emerges as a genuine literary hero, an intrepid explorer in the world of books, With a flair for storytelling reminiscent of Umberto ken, Grafton and Weinberg follow Casaubon as he unearths the lost continent of Hebrew learning and adds this ancient lore to the well known Renaissance revival of Latin and Greek Contents......Page 8 List of Illustrations......Page 10 A Note to Readers......Page 12 1. Rabbi Isaac Casaubon......Page 14 2. How CasaubonRead Hebrew Texts......Page 73 3. Wider Horizons in Hebraic Studies......Page 134 4. Casaubonand Baronio......Page 177 5. The Teller and the Tale......Page 244 Appendix 1......Page 306 Appendix 2......Page 320 Appendix 3......Page 342 Glossary......Page 346 Bibliography......Page 348 Acknowledgments......Page 380 Index......Page 382