there is an intellectual exchange that captures and reinforces the social bond between the two men. The place of panegyric in the mutuality of a relationship is sometimes stated expressly. After pleading with Abū al-Ḥasan Ibn Murīl to send him a letter, Halevi wrote: “Read my poem and forget not my covenant (briti).”36 Failing to recognize the covenant between the two men could lead to the dissolution of the relationship.
A panegyric written during Mosheh Ibn Ezra’s youth to a certain Abū al-Fatḥ Ben Azhar asks the mamdūḥ to intercede with another patron who had looked unfavorably upon the poet, requests a letter from the mamdūḥ, and offers him the poem, “Bind upon your throat a necklace made from the finest of our jacinth and beryl.”37 Here there is no request for money but rather for the performance of a favor.
The very first poem of Ibn Ezra’s collection of homonymic epigrams, Sefer ha-‘anaq (Book of the necklace), dedicated to Avraham Ibn al-Muhājir, refers to poetry as a gift and alludes to the name of the patron (father of many nations, i.e., Abraham; cf. Gn 17:4):
Listen to these [verses], O princes of poetry, singers of the age,
and raise up their preciousness as an offering and gift
to the father of many nations, a prince who holds power38 so much that he struggled with men and with God!39
In all likelihood, Ibn Ezra received financial support from the known courtier though the patron-poet relationship likely extended beyond the dedication of a single book in exchange for pay. We might presume that the intellectual bond preceded the commissioning of the work and that the dedication functioned within a system of embedded exchange.
Gift language also permeates Ibn Ezra’s poems sent to fellow intellectuals from the late stage of his life after he had left al-Andalus; one poem bears the superscription, “He wrote from Castile to the exalted Nasi, his brother, may God have mercy on him, before he met him.” In the poem, Ibn Ezra refers to the “covenant of love” between himself and the mamdūḥ (“should I forget it, may my right hand wither”; cf. Ps 137:5) and concludes with a dedicatory section whereby the poet consecrates the poem to the mamdūḥ as a gift, “Here is a gift of poetry.”40 This subject brings us to the next section of this chapter.
Dedicating Poems
Beatrice Gruendler calls attention to the dedicatory section of Arabic panegyric as a “speech act,” phrasing that combines “action and utterance,” whereby the words of dedication have the effect of constituting the poem as the recipient’s possession (even when delivered orally). Arabic panegyrics sometimes collapse the entire relationship between poet and patron, with the poem as a mediating device, into a single neat word, manaḥtukahā, “[Herewith] I dedicate it to you.” Gruendler stresses the reciprocal nature of the patron-poet relationship, how the “benefits and duties of the patron mesh with the benefits and rights of the poet,” engendered most poignantly in the dedication, “which ties a firm and far-reaching bond between the two.”41
As Dan Pagis notes, Mosheh Ibn Ezra used dedications with great frequency both in poems and in letters, most often using phrases such as “take this poem” or “behold this poem.”42 In a poem appended to a letter for Shelomoh Ibn Ghiyat, itself a response to a poem, Yehudah Halevi includes a dedication that fills eight lines.43 Prior to this, Shemuel ha-Nagid used dedications in the few panegyrics that he composed for others.44 In one, the Nagid praises his mamdūḥ, “I love you, beloved of my soul, as I love my own soul” and stresses the mamdūḥ’s wisdom, knowledge in Talmud, and alacrity in religious observance before concluding: “Take from me words chosen from bdellium, rhymes on a scroll.”45 There is no reason to think that the Nagid was paid for these verses, especially given the intimacy of the language suggesting near social parity.
Again, dedicatory language appears in poems that participated in patronage relationships that included the bestowing of material objects. A poem by Ibn Gabirol begins with a dedication, “Take this poem and its hidden stores, its precision and poetic themes…. Lord of my soul, may his heart and ears be attentive to understand my eloquence, also my poem and its supplications.” The poet thus gives the mamdūḥ the poem and hopes that his pleas will be heard in return. We do not know exactly what these requests entailed; they might have been for something tangible, such as money or a garment, or possibly something more abstract, but the exchange was portrayed as belonging to the world of embedded, rather than disembedded, exchange.46
Dedications seem to have been introduced into Hebrew panegyric in al-Andalus and to have spread from there to authors in the Islamic East. An anonymous panegyric sent to the Yemeni merchant and community leader Maḍmūn II refers both to the gifts given by the mamdūḥ to the community and to the poet’s gift to the mamdūḥ. The poet praises the “nagid of the nation of God” for his valor and kindness and includes, “He succored the whole nation and supported its falling, young and old alike. His generosity is like the rain; those who seek his gifts are glad.” In the lengthy dedication, the poet identifies himself as a Levite (i.e., a singer) and writes, “Hear this, nagid of the wise men of Torah,47 lord of the rulers and glory of the gaons, take this gift that is here presented; I sent it to remove anguish.”48 The poet’s gift was not presented in the hope of specific remuneration but was inscribed within a reciprocal bond between leader and community.
We close this part of the chapter with a translation and discussion of a fascinating epistolographic poem (TS 13 J 19.21; Figure 7) mentioned and transcribed by Goitein and later published by Yehudah Ratzhaby.49 It was sent by the student (talmid) Yiṣḥaq Ibn Nissim Parsi to his peer Abū Zikri Yiḥye Ibn Mevorakh. The author had received a letter from the latter that contained verses based on a famous poem by Ibn Gabirol (“I am the poet and the poem is my slave!”).50 Parsi now responds with a letter of his own, opening with the Jewish version of the basmallah (be-shem ha-raḥman, “in the name of the Merciful”) and two biblical verses, all typical of letter introductions. He then inscribes a poem in the same meter and rhyme as Ibn Gabirol’s and undoubtedly of the poem he had received from Ibn Mevorakh. The metered poem begins in line four:
1. In the name of the Merciful,
2. The meek shall inherit the earth and shall delight (Ps 37:7).
3. Great peace unto them who love your Torah (Ps 119:165).
4. To you, O prince, beloved and friend of my soul! Peace unto you, my people’s lord and confidant
5. whom mountains have raised up as a gift (teshurah)! I have sent you [this poem] to be a mantle.
6. If you please, let it be your mantle veil, wrap yourself and turn to its foundation
7. so that princes will consult you as an oracle (Jb 12:8) and poets will praise you for its splendor.
8. Verily, poetry is your eternal slave but the poems of others you enslave for your use!
9. May my poem be a friend of pure heart to you. Your heart hurt me by leaving;
10. it was connected to my heart all your days like a chain bound to a neck.
11. I delighted in your letter’s arrival; in your kindness you gave me a choice gift.51
12. The poem came and I was in awe of its treasure, and on Shelomoh Ibn Gabirol it was based!
13. I was astounded by your words, my
