HA-MABDIL:
A hymn signed with the acrostic "Isaac ha-Ḳaṭon" (Isaac ben Judah ibn Ghayyat, 1030-89), obviously written for the Ne'ilah service of the Day of Atonement, but now used in the Habdalah at the close of the Sabbath. Of its many musical settings the finest is the following old Spanish melody.
Bibliography:
- Zunz, Literaturgesch. pp. 14, 554;
- De Sola and Aguilar, Ancient Melodies of the Spanish and Portuguese Jews, No. 24;
- Young Israel, ii. 242;
- Pauer and Cohen, Traditional Hebrew Melodies, No. 7;
- Baer, Ba'al Tefillah, No. 430.
