David Kimhi
rabbi
David Kimhi (Hebrew: ר׳ דָּוִד קִמְחִי, also Kimchi or Qimḥi) (1160–1235), also known by the Hebrew acronym as the RaDaK (רַדָּ״ק) (Rabbi David Kimhi), was a medieval rabbi, biblical commentator, philosopher, and grammarian.
Early life
Kimhi was born in Narbonne, a city in Provence, Occitania, then under the rule of Philip II of France. He was the youngest son of Rabbi Joseph Kimhi and the brother of Moses Kimhi, both also biblical commentators and grammarians.
Kimhi was raised by his older brother Moses following the untimely death of their father. Later, he supported himself by teaching Talmud to the young. He was well versed in the whole range of Hebrew literature, and became the most illustrious representative of his name. Works of the Kimhi family were underwritten by the ibn Yahya family of Lisbon in the Kingdom of Portugal.
Rabbinic career and scholarship
Kimhi saw himself primarily as a compiler and summarizer. As a noted Hebrew grammarian, his book Mikhlol (מכלול) and his dictionary of the Hebrew language called Sefer HaShorashim (ספר השורשים, "Book of Roots") draws heavily on the earlier works of Judah ben David Hayyuj and Jonah ibn Janah, as well as from the work of his father. These two books were originally written as one, although over the years they have come to be printed separately.
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This entry incorporates text from “David Kimhi” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.