The presence of Arabic culture in Jacob Ben Eleazar's <em>Sefer ha-meshālīm</em>

Résumé

This article analyses the Arab influence on Jacob Ben Eleazar’s Sefer ha- meshālīm (The Book of Stories) based on research in the large inventories of medieval Arabic literature existing in the Middle East, North Africa and Iberia. Jacob Ben Elʿazar lived in thirteenth century Christian Spain. He wrote Sefer ha-meshālīm, a book divided into ten chapters and written in rhymed prose, applying the rules of the Arabic maqāma. This article focuses on the third and fourth chapters of the book and attempts to answer the following question: Is there any Arab influence on the selected chapters? Chapter 3 features a debate held by a group of poets discussing similarities in poetry, while Chapter 4 includes a literary debate between the sword and the pen. The reason for choosing these two chapters is their obvious similarity with literary debates found in Arabic literature.