🆕 📃 Rabbi Yosef vs. the Sorceror, a tale of a miraculous rescue on erev Yom Kippur retold by Rabbi Yehudah heḤasid in RSL Ms. Guenzburg 82 (ca. 12th c.)

Contributor(s):

Aharon N. Varady (transcription), Joseph Dan (translation), Yehudah ben Shmuel of Regensburg and Unknown

Shared on:

28 September 2026 under the Fair Use Right (17 U.S. Code §107 - Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use)

Categories:

Tags:

12th century C.E., 49th century A.M., בהמות behemot, captive animals, captives, entering magical territory, Jewish women, קפיצת הדרך ḳfitsat haderekh

I found the story in the [Russian State Library] Guenzburg ms. 82…in a commentary on the Pentateuch by Rabbi Judah the Pious of Regensburg that was written from memory after Rabbi Judah’s death (1217) by his son. The story, therefore, was known as early as the first years of the thirteenth century, and possibly at the end of the twelft, as there is no reason to believe that Rabbi Judah was its author; he most probably received from an earlier twelfth-century source, either written or oral.

Source (Hebrew)	Translation (English)
”מכשפה לא תחיה“ (שמות כב:יז), ”כל שוכב עם בהמה“ (שמות כב:יח).	“You shall not suffer a sorceress to live” (Exodus 22:17), “Whoever lies with a (tame/domesticated) animal shall surely be put to death” (Exodus 22:18).
מעשה היה במכשף אחד, כשראה יהודיות יפות ביום הכיפורים היה מכשפן ומהפכן לאתונות, ומביאן לתוך ביתו, ובלילה מהפכן לנשים ושוכב עמהן.	Once there was a sorcerer who, whenever he saw beautiful Jewish girls on Yom haKippurim, would turn them into jennies^[1] female donkeys and bring them to his home. At night, he would restore them to womanhood and sleep with them.
היה אחד בעל שמות ושמו ר׳ יוסף, והיה מאותו העיר מהלך שלשה חדשים. שלחו אחריו אדם חסיד וסיפר לו כל המאורע. אמ׳ לו: שב אתי עד יום הכיפורים. התחיל אותו אדם לבכות. אמ״ל ר׳ יוסף: מה מזיק לך, למה תבכה? אמ׳ ליה: יתגנבו הנשים היפות.	There was a master of the Holy Names^[2] Joseph Dan notes that this story “is probably one of the earliest places in European Hebrew literature” where the term בעל שמות is used. whose name was Rabbi Yosef. He lived at a distance of three months’ journey from the sorcerer’s town. The townspeople sent a pious man to tell him what was happening in their town. Rabbi Yosef told him: “Stay with me till Yom haKippurim.” The pious man, upon hearing this, began to cry. Rabbi Yosef asked him: “What is bothering you! Why are you crying?” The Jew answered: “The beautiful girls will be kidnapped again.”^[3] The distance of Rabbi Yosef from the sorceror here implies, I think, a magical act of qefitsat ha-derekh (lit. “jumping/forshortening the road”) was involved in shortening the length of travel for the needed intervention –ANV.
הכניסו לבית המרחץ ורחצו שניהם וכן כולן (?), ובשעה קלו באו למקום שהיה שם מכשף.	When Yom haKippurim arrived, Rabbi Yosef brought him to the public baths, and very soon they came to the place where the sorcerer was.
אמ׳ ר׳ יוסף: אמ׳ מי גנבם, אמרו: אין אנו יודעין מה היה להם. הזכיר השם, בא ועמד על פתח המכשף. קרא לו, והציץ המכשף והשם ראשו בעד החלון. הזכיר השם, ונמתחו הכתלים שסביב צוארו עד שרצו לחנקו. א״ל המכשף, התירני ואומ׳ לך מה עשיתי. א״ל: ביום שילכו בנות ישר׳ היפות יחיפות בלא מנעלים ומקושטות הייתי מכשפן לאתונות, ובלילה הייתי מכשפן לכמות שהיו. א״ל ר׳ יוסף: אנה המשקה ואנה בנות ישר׳? א״ל: במקום פלוני.	Rabbi Yosef asked the people: “Who stole the girls” They answered: “We don’t know anything, we don’t know what happened to them.” So Rabbi Yosef pronounced a Holy Name, and came and stood at the front door of the sorcerer’s house. Rabbi Yosef then called for the sorcerer, who looked out and put his head out of the window. Rabbi Yosef pronounced a Holy Name, and the walls of the house stretched and closed around the sorcerer’s head, almost choking him. The sorcerer then said to Rabbi Yosef: “If you loosen the walls around my head, I shall tell you what I did to the women.” Rabbi Yosef did so, and the sorcerer told him: “On Yom haKippurim, when the beautiful daughters of Israel walked with bare feet and wore beautiful clothes, I would turn them into jennies by magic, and later, at night, return them to their original shape.” Rabbi Yosef then asked: “Where is the magical potion [you used] and where are the girls?” The sorcerer answered: “At such and such a place.”
והוציא את המשקה ואת בנות ישר׳ והזכיר השם ונדבקו הכתלים ונפל הראש לרשות הרבים.	So Rabbi Yosef extracted the potion and the girls [from that place], and then he pronounced another Holy Name, and the walls closed, and the sorcerer’s head fell into the street.
ובא ר׳ יוסף זצ״ל לבית הכנסת ואמ׳: פתחו לי שערי ארון הקודש. פתחו לו והלך ועמד בארון וסגר בעדו, ואחר כך פתחו ולא מצאוהו, כי פרח למקומו.	Rabbi Yosef, blessed be his memory, came then to the synagogue, and said: “Open the doors of the Holy Ark for me.” The people opened the doors, and he went and stood inside the Ark and closed the doors behind him. Later, the people opened the doors and failed to find him there, for he had flown back to his place.^[4] A detail of the procedure used for the qefitsat haderekh, which presages C.S. Lewis’s wardrobe portal to Narnia by about 800 years.
הרי למדת שעל ידי כישוף אדם שוכב עם בהמה ועם נשים, לכך סמך ”כי יפתה“ (שמות כב:טו) סמוך ”מכשפה“ (שמות כב:יז) ו”כל שוכב עם בהמה“ (שמות כב:יח).	By this story you have learned that magic enables a man to sleep with (tame/domesticated) animals and with women, and that is the reason that the Holy Scripture put the verses “And if a man entice a virgin that is not betrothed and lie with her” (Exodus 22:15), “You shall not suffer a sorceress to live” (Exodus 22:17), and “Whoever lies with a (tame/domesticated) animal” (Exodus 22:18) close to each other.

This is an early wizard battle tale found in RSL Ms. Guenzburg 82, fol. 78b-79a, first transcribed by Joseph Dan in his article סיפורים דימונולוגיים מכתבי יהודה החסיד (“Demonological stories from the writings of Yehudah he-Ḥasid”) and published in Tarbits (vol. 30, 1961), as story #29 on pp. 288-289. The English translation by Dan, was re-printed in chapter 15 of Jewish Mysticism vol. 2: The Middle Ages, pp. 359-360, and first published in “An Early Source of the Yiddish Akdamot Story,” in Hebrew University Studies in Literature, vol. 1 (1993), pp. 39-46. I’ve slightly modified Dr. Dan’s translation in places, replacing “asses” with “jennies” for itanot (female donkeys), “broth” with “potion” for mashqeh, and re-hebraicizing popular names.

Source(s)

RSL Ms. Guenzburg 82 fol. 78b-79a

Notes

Notes
1	female donkeys
2	Joseph Dan notes that this story “is probably one of the earliest places in European Hebrew literature” where the term בעל שמות is used.
3	The distance of Rabbi Yosef from the sorceror here implies, I think, a magical act of qefitsat ha-derekh (lit. “jumping/forshortening the road”) was involved in shortening the length of travel for the needed intervention –ANV.
4	A detail of the procedure used for the qefitsat haderekh, which presages C.S. Lewis’s wardrobe portal to Narnia by about 800 years.

Aharon N. Varady (transcription)

Aharon Varady (M.A.J.Ed./JTSA Davidson) is a volunteer transcriber for the Open Siddur Project. If you find any mistakes in his transcriptions, please let him know. Shgiyot mi yavin; Ministarot naqeni שְׁגִיאוֹת מִי־יָבִין; מִנִּסְתָּרוֹת נַקֵּנִי "Who can know all one's flaws? From hidden errors, correct me" (Psalms 19:13). If you'd like to directly support his work, please consider donating via his Patreon account. (Varady also translates prayers and contributes his own original work besides serving as the primary shammes of the Open Siddur Project and its website, opensiddur.org.)

Joseph Dan (translation)

Joseph Dan (יוסף דן; 1935–2022)[, born in Budapest, Hungary, was an Israeli scholar of Jewish mysticism. He taught for over 40 years in the Department of Jewish Thought at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He was the first incumbent of the Gershom Scholem Chair in Jewish Mysticism at The Hebrew University.

Yehudah ben Shmuel of Regensburg

Yehudah ben Shmuel of Regensburg (Judah b. Samuel, 1150 – 22 February 1217), also called Yehudah heḤasid in Hebrew, was a leader of the Ḥassidei Ashkenaz. Judah was born in the small town of Speyer in the modern day Rhineland-Palatinate state in Germany in 1150 but later settled in Regensburg in the modern day state of Bavaria in 1195. He wrote much of Sefer Hasidim (Book of the Pious), as well as a work about Gematria, and Sefer Hakavod (the latter mainly lost). Yehudah was descended from an old family of kabbalists from Northern Italy that had settled in Germany. His grandfather Kalonymus was a scholar and parnas in Speyer (died 1126). His father Shmuel, also called heḤasid, haKadosh, and haNavi, was president of a bet ha-midrash in Speyer, and from him Yehudah, together with his brother Abraham, received his early instruction. He founded a yeshiva in Regensburg and secured many pupils. Among those who became famous were Eleazar of Worms, author of the Roḳeaḥ; Isaac ben Moses of Vienna, author of Or Zarua; and Baruch ben Samuel of Mainz, author of Sefer ha-Ḥokmah. Eleazar applies to his teacher in several passages terms expressive of the highest esteem, such as "father of wisdom". He was also a student, of one of the authors of Tosafot, and was the teacher of the Maharam of Rothenburg. He composed liturgical songs, but the authenticity of those attributed to him is uncertain. As regards his Shir Hayichud (seven parts; the eighth is called Shir HaKavod), printed in Tiengen, 1560, there is very great divergence of opinion, and the question of its authorship is still undecided. According to Zunz, it seems to be genuine, as do also his prayer Yechabeh Dim`ati and his selicha Gadol Yichudcha Elohim Beyisrael. More probably, according to the sources, his father, or a certain Samuel Ḥazzan, who died as a martyr at Erfurt in 1121, composed the Shir ha-Yiḥud, and Judah himself wrote a commentary on it. Several prayers are erroneously attributed to Judah; e.g., Zunz wrongly ascribes to him the alphabetical teḥinnah Ezkera Yom Moti. He wrote also commentaries on several parts of the daily prayers and on the Maḥzor.

Unknown

Sometimes the best we can do in attributing a historical work is to indicate the period and place it was written, the first prayer book it may have been printed in, or the archival collection in which the manuscript was found. We invite the public to help to attribute all works to their original composers. If you know something not mentioned in the commentary offered, please leave a comment or contact us.

Stable Link: https://opensiddur.org/?p=69333

Associated Image:

Black and Gray Donkeys

(This image is set to automatically show as the "featured image" in shared links on social media.)

Terms of Use: Be a mentsch (a conscientious, considerate person) and adhere to the following guidelines:

Properly attribute the work to Aharon N. Varady (transcription), Joseph Dan (translation), Yehudah ben Shmuel of Regensburg and Unknown.
Clearly indicate the date you accessed the work and in what ways, if any, you modified it. (If you have adapted the work, let us know so that the contributor might consider endorsing your revision.)
Provide the stable link to this resource: <https://opensiddur.org/?p=69333>.
Indicate that the original work was shared under the Fair Use Right (17 U.S. Code §107 - Limitations on exclusive rights: Fair use). (To redistribute or remix this work in any format, modified or unmodified, you must refer to the terms of the license under which the work is shared.)

Additional Notes:

The views expressed in this work represent the views of their creator(s) and do not necessarily represent the views of the Open Siddur Project's developers, its diverse community of volunteer contributors, or its institutional partners.
We strongly advise against printing sacred texts and art containing divine names as these copies must be regarded with reverence, complicating their casual treatment and disposal.
If you must dispose of a printed sacred text (one containing Divine Names), please locate the closest genizah (often established by a synagogue) and contact its custodians for further instructions. We also recommend using Morah Yehudis Fishman's Prayer for Adding a Work to the Genizah.

Support this work: The Open Siddur Project is a volunteer-driven, non-profit, non-commercial, non-denominational, non-prescriptive, gratis & libre Open Access archive of contemplative praxes, liturgical readings, and Jewish prayer literature (historic and contemporary, familiar and obscure) composed in every era, region, and language Jews have ever prayed. Our goal is to provide a platform for sharing open-source resources, tools, and content for individuals and communities crafting their own prayerbook (siddur). Through this we hope to empower personal autonomy, preserve customs, and foster creativity in religious culture.

ויהי נעם אדני אלהינו עלינו ומעשה ידינו כוננה עלינו ומעשה ידינו כוננהו׃ (תהלים צ:יז) · "May the pleasantness of אדֹני our elo’ah be upon us; may our handiwork be established for us — our handiwork, may it be established." (Psalms 90:17)