Joseph ben Judah of Ceuta

Joseph ben Judah (Hebrew: יוסף בן יהודה Yosef ben Yehuda) of Ceuta (c. 1160–1226) was a Jewish physician and poet, and disciple of Moses Maimonides.

It is as an address to Joseph that Maimonides introduces his Guide for the Perplexed.

For the first 25 years of his life ben Judah lived with his father, who was an artisan at Ceuta then part of the Almohad Empire.

Joseph ben Judah left the Maghreb, when he was about twenty-five years old, and was already engaged in the practise of medicine (Salomon Munk, "Notice sur Joseph b. Jehudah," in "Jour. Asiatique," 1842, p. 14). When not occupied with professional work he wrote Hebrew poems, which were known to Al-Ḥarizi, and in his "Taḥkemoni" (xviii.) the latter speaks highly of them. Maimonides, to whom Joseph sent his poems together with other compositions from Alexandria, was not so lavish with his praise. He appreciated only the great longing for higher studies which found expression in Joseph ben Judah's poems.

Joseph ben Judah went from Alexandria to Fusṭaṭ (Cairo) and studied logic, mathematics, and astronomy under Maimonides. Maimonides likewise expounded the writings of the Prophets, because Joseph seemed perplexed as to the possibility of reconciling the teachings of the Prophets with the results of metaphysical research. Maimonides advised patience and systematic study; but the disciple left before Maimonides had completed his course of lectures on the Prophets (Maimonides, "Moreh Nebukim," Introduction). His stay with Maimonides was short (Munk, l.c. p. 34): less than two years.

Ben Judah went further east and settled in Aleppo. Here he established himself as a medical practitioner, married, and made a successful commercial journey which enabled him to live henceforth independently and free from care. It was probably in the course of this journey that he witnessed at Baghdad the burning of the works of the philosopher 'Abd al-Salam (1192).

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