on the vowels. In 1818 he began to write his Torah Nidreshet, a philosophico-theological work of which he composed only twenty-four chapters, the first twelve being published in the (vols. 16–17, 21–24, 26), and the remainder translated into the Italian language by M. Coen-Porto and published in Mosé (i–ii). In 1879 Coen-Porto published a translation of the whole work in book form. In spite of his father's desire that he should learn a trade, Luzzatto had no inclination for one, and to earn his livelihood he was obliged to give private lessons, finding pupils with great difficulty on account of his timidity. From 1824, in which year his father died, he had to depend entirely upon himself. Until 1829 he earned a livelihood by giving lessons and by writing for the Bikkure ha-Ittim; in that year he was appointed professor at the rabbinical college of Padua. Critical treatment of the Bible At Padua, Luzzatto had a much larger scope for his literary activity, as he was able to devote all his time to literary work. Besides, while explaining certain parts of the Bible to his pupils he wrote down all his observations. Luzzatto was the first Jewish scholar to turn his attention to Syriac, considering a knowledge of this language of significant importance for the understanding of the Targum. His letter published in Kirchheim's Karme Shomeron shows his thorough acquaintance with Samaritan Hebrew. He was also one of the first Jews who permitted themselves to emend the text of the Hebrew Bible (others, though with a lesser degree of originality, include Samson Cohen Modon and Manassa of Ilya); many of his emendations met with the approval of critical scholars of the day. Through a careful examination of the Book of Ecclesiastes, Luzzatto came to the conclusion that its author was not Solomon, but someone who lived several centuries later and whose name was "Kohelet". The author, Luzzatto thinks, ascribed his work to Solomon, but his contemporaries, having discovered the forgery, substituted the correct name "Kohelet" for "Solomon" wherever the latter occurred in the book. While the notion of the non-Solomonic authorship of Ecclesiastes is today accepted by secular scholars, most modern scholars do not ascribe the work to an actual individual named "Kohelet", but rather regard the term as a label or designation of some kind, akin to the Septuagint's translation of "Preacher." As to the Book of Isaiah, in