ר' יצחק אבן גיאת

Rabbi Yitzchak ben Yehudah ibn Ghayyat (ר’ יצחק אבן גיאת), known as the Ritz Gayyat, was a rishon of Sefarad who lived from about 1038 to 1089. He was a posek, rosh yeshiva, commentator on Tanach and paytan (liturgical poet), and was also learned in philosophy and the sciences.

He was born in Lucena in Muslim Spain (al-Andalus), a city whose people had been mostly Jewish since early times, and he headed its yeshiva. He was close to Rabbi Shmuel HaNagid and then to his son, Rabbi Yehosef. After Rabbi Yehosef was killed in the Granada massacre of 1066, he helped his widow and taught and raised their son Azariah as his own. Some count him as the teacher of the Rif, Rabbi Yitzchak Alfasi. His talmidim included his son Rabbi Yehudah ibn Ghayyat, Rabbi Yosef ibn Sahl and the poet Rabbi Moshe ibn Ezra, and many of the leading poets of the next generation came out of his yeshiva.

He followed the Geonim in halacha. He held their rulings to be as binding as the Gemara itself, and he brought many of their words exactly, taking care to name each Gaon. In this he differed from the Rif, his contemporary, who weighed the words of the Geonim but held only the Gemara as binding. The Rambam, early in his path, drew on the halachic writings of the Geonim, of Rav Nissim Gaon and of the Ritz Gayyat.

In 1089 he went to Cordoba for medical treatment and was niftar there. His bier was carried back to Lucena, and he was buried there beside his fathers.

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