Isaac Chelo Explained

Isaac Chelo (also Hilo, Hilu or Khelo), in Hebrew יצחק חילו, was a rabbi of the 14th century. His place of residence is unclear. Carmoly wrote "Laresa du royaume d'Aragon", which Scholem interpreted as an erroneous spelling of Lerida.^[1] However, Shapira took it to mean Larissa in Thessaly. Chelo is famous for an itinerary of the Holy Land first published in 1847. However, the document is now commonly considered a 19th-century forgery.

Chelo's Itinerary

In 1847, the controversial^[2] French scholar Carmoly published an account Les chemins de Jérusalem (The Roads from Jerusalem), purporting to be Chelo's description of Jerusalem and seven roads leading from it, written in 1334.^[3] An English translation was published by Adler in 1930.^[4]

Carmoly wrote that the original Hebrew manuscript was in his own library, but when his library was catalogued after his death no such manuscript was found.^[5]

Scholem examined the library in 1925 and found nine lines of an 18th-century copy of the Itinerary. He charged that the Itinerary had a number of anachronisms, contradictions, and quotations from Kabbalistic works postdating Chelo.^[6] On this basis, Scholem judged the Itinerary to be a forgery, written or greatly expanded by Carmoly himself. This assessment has been accepted by Mikhal Ish-Shalom,^[7] Dan Shapira, Joshua Prawer^[8] and Yoel Elitsur.^[9]

Prawer also alleged that there was no Jewish community in Hebron at the time the Itinerary claimed to describe one. Prawer wrote that "This itinerary is unfortunately still being quoted by unwary scholars, even though the forgery was proved almost 50 years ago."

Notes and References

1. G. Scholem . 1934 . ספר שבילי דירושלים המיוחס לר' יצחק חילו - מזויף (The Book of the Way to Jerusalem Attributed to R. Isaac Hilo - a Forgery) . Zion . 6 . 39–53, 220–221 . 23540112 .
2. He has been accused of fabrications by several scholars, see Cecil . Roth . Cecil Roth. Forgeries . 7 . 125–126.
3. Book: E. Carmoly . 1847 . Itinéraires de la Terre Sainte des XIII^e, XIV^e, XV^e, XVI^e et XVII^e siècle, traduits de I'hébreu, et accompagnés de tables, de cartes et d 'éclaircissements . A. Vandale . Bruxelles .
4. Book: Elkan Nathan Adler . Jewish Travellers in the Middle Ages . 1930 . Routledge . Dover 1987 . London . 130–150.
5. Dan D. Y. Shapira . Remarks on Avraham Firkowicz and the Hebrew Mejelis "Document" . Acta Orientalia Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae . 59 . 2 . 131–180 . 2006. 10.1556/AOrient.59.2006.2.1 .
6. Shapira (2006), citing G. Scholem . 1934 . ספר שבילי דירושלים המיוחס לר' יצחק חילו - מזויף (The Book of the Way to Jerusalem Attributed to R. Isaac Hilo - a Forgery) . Zion . 6 . 39–53, 220–221 . 23540112 .
7. Mikhal Ish-Shalom . על "שבילי דירושלים" ל יצחק בר' יוסף חילו (On "Shevile Dirushalaim" of R. Isaac b. R. Joseph Chelo). Tarbiẕ . 1935 . 197–209 . 23583704.
8. Book: Joshua Prawer . The History of the Jews in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem . Oxford University Press . 1988 . 277 n.85 . Students of itineraries always remember the very famous and clever forgery of a mid-19th-century scholar of repute, E. Carmoly, who invented the itinerary of one Isaac Chelo..
9. Book: Yoel Elitsur . Ancient place names in the Holy Land . Magnes Press, Hebrew University . 2004 . 183.