COMPIÉGNE DE WEIL, LUDWIG – Convert to Christianity; lived at Paris, later at Metz, in the second half of the seventeenth century. He was a descendant of the rabbi Jacob Weil of Nuremberg. Having embraced Christianity while still a youth, he studied...
COMPRAT VIDAL FERUSSOL – See Farissol, Jacob Ben Ḥayyim Comprat Vidal.
COMTINO, MORDECAI BEN ELIEZER – Turkish Talmudist and scientist; lived at Adrianople and Constantinople; died in the latter city between 1485 and 1490. The earliest date attached to any of his writings is 1425. The form of his family name is doubtful. In...
CONANIAH – 1. A Levite who in the reign of Hezekiah had charge of the offerings and tithes brought to the Temple. Associated with him in this work was his brother, Shimei (II Chron. xxxi. 12, 13; A. V. "Cononiah").2. Leader of the Levites...
CONAT, ABRAHAM BEN SOLOMON – Italian printer, Talmudist, and physician: flourished at Mantua in the second half of the fifteenth century. He obtained the title of "ḥaber" (associate of a rabbi) for his learning, but displayed it chiefly in the choice of...
CONCIO (V04p204001.jpg), JOSEPH B. GERSHON – Italian author; lived at Asti and Chieri in the beginning of the seventeenth century. He published several Hebrew poems, including: "Ot le-Ṭobah," twenty-two sentences on Talmudic arguments in the order of the Hebrew alphabet,...
CONCORDANCE – An alphabetical list of all the words in a book, with references to the passages where each word is found. The appellation indicates the concordance or similarity of all such passages. In Jewish literature the term is applied...
CONCUBINAGE – See Pilegesh.
CONDITIONS – Qualifications or limitations annexed to an agreement by which it may be continued, altered, or rendered of no effect upon the performance or non-performance of something, or the happening or non-happening of an uncertain event....
CONDOM – County seat in the department of Gers, France. Jews were found there at the beginning of the fourteenth century. In order to pass through this locality, they were heavily taxed. A Jewess, not enceinte, had to pay eight deniers...
CONDUITS – See Aqueducts in Palestine.
CONEGLIANO – A prominent Jewish family of northern Italy. The spelling "Conian," according to Kaufmann, is a misreading of the Hebrew . It takes its name from the town of Conegliano, which at one time belonged to the republic of Venice. A...
CONEGLIANO, IMMANUEL – See Ponte, Lorenzo Da.
CONEY – A small herbivorous animal (Hyrax Syriacus or Hyrax Daman) mentioned in the Bible. "Coney" is the traditional rendering of the Hebrew "shafan" ( ), which occurs four times in the O. T. (Lev. xi. 5; Deut. xiv. 7; Ps. civ. 18;...
CONFERENCES, RABBINICAL – Assemblies of rabbis to determine common courses of action or common principles of faith. Rabbinical conferences are a late phenomenon in the history of Judaism, dating, as they do, only from the fourth decade of the nineteenth...
CONFESSION OF SIN – Biblical Data: The Scriptures repeatedly prescribe confession of sin as a means to expiation and atonement. "It shall be that when he is guilty of any one of these things, he shall confess that he hath sinned in that thing"...
CONFIRMATION, THE RITE OF – Earliest Confirmations. Solemn form of initiation of the Jewish youth into their ancestral faith. The rite is mentioned officially for the first time in an ordinance issued by the Jewish consistory of the kingdom of Westphalia...
CONFISCATION AND FORFEITURE – 1. Confiscation: Appropriation of private property to the public use or treasury. Confiscation of the property of peaceable aliens in Palestine who belonged to a nation at war with Israel, is not mentioned in either Biblical or...
CONFISCATION OF HEBREW BOOKS – The first known decree directed against Hebrew literature is one of the emperor Justinian (553) forbidding the Jews to use "what is called by them 'The Second Edition'" (Secunda Editio, δευτέρωσις). Apparently this term was used...
CONFLICT OF LAWS – A disagreement between the laws of two states with reference to litigation affecting private rights claimed to be subject to their jurisdiction.The Mosaic law recognizes no distinction between a native and a foreigner (Ex. xii....
CONFLICT OF OPINION – Rarely did an opinion expressed by one of the rabbis of the Talmud pass unchallenged. In questions involving logical reasoning, or the interpretation of some Biblical passage, or an opinion of an earlier authority, there were...
CONFLICT OF PASSAGES – See Hermeneutics.
CONFORTE – Hebrew literary historian; born in Salonica about 1618; died about 1685. Conforte came of a family of scholars. His early instructors were R. Israel Ẓebi, R. Judah Girasi, and R. Baruch Angel. As a young man he studied the...
CONGREGATION – 1. An assembly convoked for a certain time and purpose ( = ἐκκλησία, I Kings viii. 65; Joel ii. 16; Ps. xl. 10. For and in Ps. xxvi. 12, lxviii. 26, "assemblies" would be more correct than "congregations" [A.V.]; and in Ps....
CONGRESS OF JEWISH WOMEN – One of the denominational congresses of the World's Parliament of Religions, held at the Columbian Exposition in Chicago, Ill., 1893. It was the first delegate body of Jewish women ever called together. There were present 93...