Publications

Click on a category below to expand the list.

Books
  1. Form and Structure in the Poetry of al-Mu‘tamid Ibn ‘Abbād. De Goeje Fund, no. 24. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1974.
  2. 201 Arabic Verbs. Woodbury, N.Y.: Barrons Educational Series, 1978.
  3. Wine, Women, and Death: Medieval Hebrew Poems on the Good Life. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1986; paperback, New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.
  4. The Gazelle: Medieval Hebrew Poetry on God, Israel, and the Soul. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1991; paperback, New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.
  5. The Book of Job (translated, introduced, and annotated). New York: W. W. Norton, 1998; paperback, 1999.
  6. A Short History of the Jewish People. New York: Macmillan, 1998; paperback, New York: Oxford University Press, 2000; Japanese version, Tokyo, 2004; pirated Russian version, 1997; Portuguese edition, 2003.
  7. (Coeditor) The Literature of Al-Andalus (vol. 5 of The Cambridge History of Arabic Literature). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000.
  8. 501 Arabic Verbs. Woodbury, NY: Barrons Educational Series, 2007
  9. The Song of the Distant Dove: Pilgrimage Poems by Judah Halevi. New York: Oxford University Press, 2008.
  10. Vulture in a Cage: Poems by Solomon Ibn Gabirol (New York: Archipelago, October 2016).
Translations
  1. Of Bygone Days, by Mendele Mokher Seforim, in The Shtetl and Other Yiddish Novellas, ed. Ruth R. Wisse (New York: Behrman House, 1973).
  2. “The Sorcerer,” by Isaac Ibn Sahula, in Fiction 7 (1983): 168–84; repr. in Rabbinic Fantasies (see no. 3 below), 295–311.
  3. “Asher in the Harem,” by Shelomo Ibn Ṣaqbel, in Rabbinic Fantasies, ed. David Stern and Mark Mirsky (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1990), 253–67; paperback, New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1998.
  4. “The Gift of Judah: The Misogynist,” by Ibn Shabbetai, in Rabbinic Fantasies, 269–94.
  5. “Four Hebrew Sonnets from Italy” (by Immanuel of Rome, Joseph Ṣarfati, and Moses ben Joab), in Prooftexts 11 (1991): 225–29.
  6. “Judah Abravanel to His Son” (translation of the poem “Zeman hika”), in Judaism 41 (1992): 190–99; abbreviated version in Medieval Iberia, ed. Olivia R. Constable (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1997), 357–63.
  7. Jewish Liturgy in Its Historical Development, by Ismar Elbogen (Philadelphia and New York: Jewish Publication Society and the Jewish Theological Seminary, 1993).
  8. “Buczacz,” by S. Y. Agnon, in Y. Agnon: A Book That Was Lost and Other Stories, ed. Alan Mintz and Anne Golomb Hoffman (New York: Schocken, 1995), 220–26.
  9. Selections from Job in Arion 4 (1997) and in Anthology of World Poetry in Translation, ed. Katherine Washburn and John Major (New York: W. W. Norton, 1998).
  10. “The Battle of Alfuente,” by Samuel the Nagid, in History as Prelude: Muslims and Jews in the Medieval Mediterranean, ed. Joseph Montville (Lanham, Md.: Lexington, 2011)55–69; abbreviated version in Medieval Iberia, 84–90 (see above, translation no. 6).
  11. Chapter from Voyage to the End of the Millennium, by A. B. Yehoshua, in Modern Hebrew Literature, n.s. 19 (1997): 2–8.
  12. “The Lamp Within,” by Moses Ibn Ezra. Translation and notes in Prooftexts 17 (Sept. 1997): 260–65.
  13. “The Unetane Toqef: A New Translation,” in Conservative Judaism 50 (1998): 48–50.
  14. Poems and epistles by Vidal Benvenist Ben Lavi and Solomon ben Meshulam de Piera, in Révue des Études juives 160 (2001): 112–33.
  15. Poems by Immanuel of Rome, Moses ben Joab, Joseph varefati, Leone da Modena, and Jacob Frances, in Prooftexts (volume, date), and in Lady, Take a Lover Now: Music and Poetry from the Ghettos of Renaissance Italy (music CD).
  16. Cantos 1 and 2 of Miqdash me‘at, by Moses de Rieti, in Prooftexts 23 (Jan. 2003): 25–93.
  17. Seven poems by Judah Halevi, in Essays on Hebrew Literature in Honor of Avraham Holtz, ed. Z. B-Y. Ginor (New York: Jewish Theological Seminary, 2003).
  18. Five poems by Judah Halevi in Pequod 48–60 (2005): 289–93.
  19. Two poems by Todoros Abulafia in Medieval Iberia, ed. Olivia R. Constable. 2d ed., in press.
  20. Various prayers and hymns, translation and commentary in Debra Band and Raymond Scheindlin, Kabbalat Shabbat (Honeybee, 2016).
  21. “The Man in Linen” by S.Y. Agnon, in Alan Mintz and Jeffrey Saks, eds., A City in Its Fullness (Toby, New Milford, CT, 2016).
Articles
  1. “Structure in Arabic Poetry: Three Poems by al-Mu‘tamid Ibn ‘Abbād,” Humaniora Islamica 1 (1973): 173–86.
  2. “Rabbi Moshe Ibn Ezra on the Legitimacy of Poetry,” Medievalia et Humanistica, n.s. 7 (1976): 101–15.
  3. “The Influence of Muslim Arabic Cultural Elements on the Literature of the Hebrew Golden Age,” Conservative Judaism 35 (1982): 63–72.
  4. “A Miniature Anthology of Hebrew Wine Poems,” Prooftexts 4 (1984): 269–300.
  5. “A Miniature Anthology of Hebrew Love Poems,” Prooftexts 5 (1985): 105–35.
  6. “Fawns of the Palace and Fawns of the Field,” Prooftexts 6 (1986): 189–203.
  7. “The Book of Delight: Maqāma or Bildungsroman?” [in Hebrew] (review article), Hadoar (October 3, 1986): 26–29.
  8. “Redemption of the Soul in Golden Age Religious Poetry,” Prooftexts 10 (1990): 49–67.
  9. “Die Fäden des Hebräischen: Jüdische Sprachen in den Kulturen der Welt,” in Jüdische Lebenswelten: Essays (book accompanying the exhibition Jüdische Lebenswelten, Berlin, 1992), ed. Andreas Nachama (Frankfurt: Jüdischer Verlag, Suhrkamp, 1991), 68–85.
  10. “The Jews in Muslim Spain,” in The Legacy of Islamic Spain, ed. Salma Khadra Jayyusi (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1992), 188–200.
  11. “Hebrew Poetry in Medieval Iberia,” in Convivencia: Jews, Muslims, and Christians in Medieval Spain, ed. V. Mann et al. (New York: George Braziller, 1992), 39–59.
  12. “Al-Harizi’s Astrologer: A Document of Jewish-Muslim Relations,” Studies in Muslim-Jewish Relations 1 (1993): 165–75.
  13. “Ibn Gabirol’s Religious Poetry and Arabic Zuhd Poetry,” Edebiyat 4 (1993): 229–242; Hebrew version in Proceedings of the First International Conference on the Heritage of the Jews of Spain (Tel Aviv, July 1991), ed. Aviva Doron, 71–82.
  14. “Contrasting Religious Experience in the Liturgical Poems of Solomon Ibn Gabirol and Judah Halevi,” Prooftexts 13 (May 1993): 141–62; Hebrew version in Masoret hapiyut, ed. Binyamin Bar-Tiqva and Ephraim Hazan (Ramat Gan: Bar Ilan University, c. 1996).
  15. “Ibn Gabirol’s Religious Poetry and Sufi Poetry,” Sefarad 54 (1994): 109–42.
  16. “The Love Stories of Jacob ben Eleazar: Between Arabic and Romance” [in Hebrew], Proceedings of the Eleventh World Congress of Jewish Studies, Division C, vol. 3 (Jerusalem, 1994), 16–20.
  17. “Is There a Khafajian Style? Recent Studies of Ibn Khafaja” (review article), Edebiyat 6 (1995): 123–30.
  18. “Poet and Patron: Ibn Gabirol’s Palace Poem,” Prooftexts 16 (Jan. 1996): 31–47.
  19. “The Hebrew Qasīda,” in Qasida Poetry in Islamic Asia and Africa, ed. Stefan Sperl and Christopher Shackle, 2 vols. (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1996), 1:121–35, accompanied by translations in 2:141–53.
  20. “El poema de Ibn Gabirol y la fuente del Patio de los Leones,” Cuadernos de la Alhambra 29–30 (1993–94): 185–89.
  21. “Secular Hebrew Poetry in Fifteenth-Century Spain,” in Crisis and Creativity in the Sephardic World, ed. Benjamin R. Gampel (New York: Columbia University Press, 1997), 25–37, 301–7.
  22. “La situación social y el mundo de valores de los poetas hebreos,” in La sociedad medieval a través de la literatura hispanojudía, ed. Angel Sáenz-Badillos and Ricardo Izquierdo Benito (Cuenca: Ediciones de la Universidad de Castilla–La Mancha, 1998).
  23. “Medieval Jewish Literature,” in From Mesopotamia to Modernity, ed. Burton L. Visotzky and David E. Fishman (Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1999), 127–66.
  24. “Moses Ibn Ezra,” in The Literature of Al-Andalus (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 252–64.
  25. “H. Schirmann, The History of Hebrew Poetry in Muslim Spain, and The History of Hebrew Poetry in Christian Spain and Southern France [in Hebrew] (review article), Zion 64 (1999/2000): 384–99.
  26. “Communal Prayer and Liturgical Poetry,” in Judaism in Practice, ed. Fine (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2001), 39–51.
  27. “Old Age in Hebrew and Arabic Zuhd Poetry,” in Judíos y musulmanes en al-Andalus y el Magreb: Contactos intelectuales, Collection de la Casa de Velázquez, no. 74 (Madrid: Casa de Velázquez, 2002), 85–104.
  28. “Merchants and Intellectuals, Rabbis and Poets: Judeo-Arabic Culture in the Golden Age of Islam,” in Cultures of the Jews: A New History, ed. David Biale (New York: Schocken, 2002), 313–86.
  29. Commentary on Cantos 1 and 2 of Miqdash me‘at by Moses Rieti (coauthor), Prooftexts 23 (January 2003): 64–93.
  30. “Samuel ha-Nagids Gedicht über die Schlacht von Alfuente als ein Kunstwerk jüdisch-arabischer Kultur,” Judaica (2004).
  31. “El cantar de la paloma callada,” in Poesía hebrea en al-Andalus, ed. Angel Sáenz-Badillos and Judit Targarona (University of Granada, 2003), 187–211; English version in Bringing the Hidden to Light: Studies in Honor of Stephen A. Geller, ed. Kathryn F. Kravitz and Diane M. Sharon (Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2007), 217–35.
  32. “Islamic Motifs in a Poem by Judah Halevi,” Maghreb Review 29 (2004): 40–52; Hebrew version in Le’ot zikaron (Ahron Mirsky Festschrift), ed. E. Hazan and Y. Yahalom (Ramat-Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 2006).
  33. “Ibn Zabara’s Demon,” in Gazing on the Deep: Ancient Near Eastern and Other Studies in Honor of Tzvi Abusch, J. Stackert, B. N. Porter, and D. P. Wright (Bethesda, Md.: CDL, 2010), 621–35.
  34. “The Ascension of Moses in a Poem by Amittai ben Shefatya,” in The Experience of Jewish Liturgy: Studies Dedicated to Menahem Schmelzer, ed. Debra Reed Blank (Leiden: Brill, 2011), 245–61.
  35. “Caged Vulture: Ibn Gabirol’s Poetic Manifesto,” in Ot letova (Tova Rosen Festschrift), ed. E. Yassif, H. Ishay, and U. Kfir (Beersheva: Ben-Gurion University Press, 2012).
  36. “A Panegyric Qaṣīda by Judah Halevi, Its Antecedent by Solomon Ibn Gabirol, and Its Afterlife,” in Mark R. Cohen Festschrift (2013).
  37. “On the Poem ‘Your Words Are Perfumed with Myrrh,” by Judah Halevi” [in Hebrew], in Shmuel Leiter memorial volume, pp. 214-23 (forthcoming).
  38. “Hebrew Belles-Lettres” chapter in vol. 5 of The Cambridge History of Judaism, (forthcoming).
Reviews
  1. Brody and H. Schirmann, eds., Solomon Ibn Gabirol: Secular Poetry; and Dov Jarden, ed., The Secular Poetry of Solomon Ibn Gabirol [in Hebrew], in Hadoar 56, no. 25 (April 29, 1977): 415–16.
  2. Andras Hamori, On the Art of Medieval Arabic Literature, in Speculum 52 (1977): 688–90.
  3. Hayim Schwarzbaum, The Mishle Shu’alim (Fox Fables) of Rabbi Berechiah HaNakdan, in Association of Jewish Studies Newsletter 28 (March 1981): 20–21.
  4. James A. Bellemy and Patricia Owen Steiner, Ibn Sa‘īd al-Maghribī, The Banners of the Champions: An Anthology of Medieval Arabic Poetry from Andalusia and Beyond, in Journal of the American Oriental Society 110 (1990): 524–25.
  5. Alsina Trias and Gregorio del Olmo Lete, El Dīwān de Yosef ibn Ṣaddīq, in Jewish Quarterly Review 80 (1991): 423–26.
  6. Michael A. Sells, Desert Tracings: Six Classic Arabian Odes by Alqama, Shánfara, Labīd, ‘Antara, al-A‘shā, Dhū al-Rumma, in Journal of the American Oriental Society 111 (1991): 158–60.
  7. Nehemia Allony, Studies in Language and Literature, vol. 4 [in Hebrew], in Hadoar (April 17, 1992): 24–25.
  8. Isaac Jack Lévy, And the World Stood Silent: Sephardic Poetry of the Holocaust, in Melton Journal 26 (1992): 20–21.
  9. Shulamit Elizur, Liturgical Poems by Eleazar Qiliri [in Hebrew], in Hadoar 72 (1993): 20–21.
  10. Ross Brann, The Compunctious Poet: Cultural Ambiguity in Muslim Spain, in Journal of the American Oriental Society 113 (1993): 125–27.
  11. Jacob Lassner, Demonizing the Queen of Sheba: Boundaries of Gender and Culture in Postbiblical Judaism and Medieval Islam, in Al-Masaq 8 (1995): 198–204.
  12. Peter Cole, Selected Poems of Shmuel HaNagid, in Commentary (November 1996): 61–64.
  13. Arie Schippers, Spanish Hebrew Poetry and the Arabic Literary Tradition: Arabic Themes in Hebrew Andalusian Poetry, in Journal of the American Oriental Society 117 (1997): 188–90.
  14. Leon J. Weinberger, Jewish Poet in Muslim Egypt: Moses Dari’s Hebrew Collection, in Hebrew Studies 61 (2000): 343–47.
  15. Moses Hadas, Fables of a Jewish Aesop, in Forward (August 2002).
  16. Yosef Tobi, The Relationship between Hebrew and Arabic Poetry in the Middle Ages [in Hebrew], in Pe‘amim (2003).
  17. Shulamit Elizur, The Liturgical Poems of Rabbi Pinhas Ha-Kohen [in Hebrew], in Katharsis 6 (2005): 105–21.
Encyclopedia Articles
  1. Encyclopaedia Judaica. Marcus, Joseph; Oberman, Julius; Obermeyer, Jacob.
  2. Dictionary of the Middle Ages. Hebrew Belles-Lettres; Abraham Ibn Ezra; Hebrew Poetry.
  3. Encyclopedia of Religion. Baḥya Ibn Pakuda.
  4. Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics, new edition. Hispano-Arabic Poetry; Hebrew Love Poetry.
  5. Encyclopaedia of Islam, new edition. Al-Mu‘amid Ibn ‘Abbād; al-Sharīf al-Ṭalīq.
  6. Encyclopedia of Arabic Literature. abū Ishāq al-Ilbīrī; abū Madyan al-Tilimsani; al-A‘mā al-Tutīlī; Hafsa bint al-Hājj al-Rukunīya; Ibn ‘Abbād al-Rundi; Ibn Gabirol; Ibn Gharsīya; Ibn al-Haddād; Ibn al-Khatīb; Ibn al-Labbāna; Ibn Sahl al-Ishbīlī Maimonides; al-Mu‘tamid Ibn ‘Abbād; al-Shiblī; al-Shusturī; abū l-Walīd al-Himyarī; ‘Alī b. ‘Abd al-Ghānim al-Ḥusri; Aḥmad Ibn al-Abbār; Ibn Bāqī; Ibn Darrāj al-Qastallī; Ibn Khafāja; Ibn Sharīf al-Rundī; Ibn Zamraq; Moshe Ibn Ezra; al-Sharīf al-Talīq.
  7. Encyclopedia of Jews in the Islamic World (2010). Poetry in the Medieval Islamic World; Judah Halevi.
  8. Histoire des relations entre Juifs et musulmans (2013): Ḥasdai Ibn Shaprut; Samuel Ibn Naghrila.
Miscellaneous Publications
  1. “The Purim Miracle and Its Historical Lesson” [in Hebrew]. Essay. Hadoar 57, no. 20 (March 24, 1978): 311.
  2. “Judaism Is My Art Form.” Essay. Sh’ma 14 (1984): 132–34.
  3. “Gerson D. Cohen.” Necrology. Hebrew version in Mad‘ei hayahadut 32 (1992): 46–48; English version in Proceedings of the American Academy for Jewish Research 58 (1992): 15–18.
  4. “Gerson D. Cohen.” Necrology. Conservative Judaism 45 (1993): 14–18.
  5. “Abraham S. Halkin.” Necrology. Conservative Judaism 45 (1993): 27–31.
  6. “Society and Culture of Medieval Sephardic Jewry: An Interdisciplinary Approach.” Syllabus, with Prof. Benjamin Gampel, in Sephardic Studies in the University (Hackensack, N.J.: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 1994).
  7. “Museum of Death, Museum of Life.” Essay. Tikkun 8, no. 6 (1993): 85–87.
  8. “Beauty from Tainted Sources.” Essay. Sh’ma 25/490 (March 17, 1995): 3–12.
  9. Chronicles of the Jewish People. Illustrated book (New York: Michael Friedman Publishing Group, 1996).
  10. “The Assassination in Light of Jewish Religious Law.” Essay. Tikkun 11, no. 1 (1996): 64–65.
  11. Review of Journey to the End of the Millennium, by A. B. Yehoshua, Forward (January 15, 1999).
  12. Review of The David Story, by Robert Alter. Forward (September 10, 1999).
  13. “The Judeo-Arabic Renaissance,” Sh’ma (November 2000): 4–5.
  14. Occasional essays on religious topics in Forward.
  15. “The Diwan of Judah Halevi,” in World Literature and Its Times 6: Middle Eastern Literatures and Their Times, ed. Joyce Moss (Detroit: Gale, 2004), 141–51.
  16. “The Inner Art of Prayer,” in The Unfolding Tradition: Jewish Law after Sinai, ed. Eliot Dorff (New York: Aviv, 2005), 395–404.
  17. Foreword to The Song of Songs: The Honeybee in the Garden, illustrated and commented on by Debra Band (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 2005).
  18. Untitled piece on Judah Halevi included in “Table Talk,” in The Threepenny Review (spring 2006): 4–5.
  19. “High Holiday Memoir,” Kerem (2007).
Works in Progress
  1. Essay: ”Hebrew School Memoir” (completed but unpublished)
  2. Article: “Hever the Pious: Religion in the Tahkmeoni by Judah al-Harizi” forthcoming
  3. Article: “Al-Harizi’s Hebrew Translation of the Guide of the Perplexed in its Cultural Context” in The Guide of the Perplexed in Translation: A History of the Translations of Maimonides’ Guide.  (University of Chicago Press, forthcoming).
  4. Translations: Thirty-eight Hebrew poems by poets of the early modern period, to appear in in a collective work ed. by Yosef Kaplan.

Links

Archipelago Books
Debra Band
Jewish History Tours
Janice Meyerson