תּוֹלְדוֹת
Rav Yisrael Sarug Ashkenazi, whose name also appears as Saruk and Srugo and who is called the Ris and the Mahari Sarug, was active in the years between about 1590 and 1610 and was the principal figure who spread the Kabbalah of the Arizal through Italy and western Europe. Little is known of his early years; some hold that he was born in Egypt. He presented himself to his talmidim as a direct talmid of the Arizal in Tzefat. Rav Shlomo Shlomil, author of Shivchei HaAri, writes in his letters that he married Rav Sarug’s daughter, and relates that Rav Sarug gathered every available manuscript of the Arizal’s teachings and laid out large sums to obtain them.
Rav Yosef Avivi assembled his route from the testimony of the chachamim he met along it: Salonika before 5352/1592, where he saw Rav David Shemaryah; Ragusa and the Illyrian coast; Ferrara and Venice between 1592 and 1600, where he met Rav Menachem Azariah of Fano, Rav Aharon Berachiah of Modena and Rav Yehuda Aryeh of Modena; Gorizia, where he met Rav Yissachar Ber Eilenburg; Venice again in 5363/1603; Frankfurt between 1603 and 1606; and Krakow. He also taught in Amsterdam, where Rav Avraham Cohen de Herrera became his talmid. It was he who moved Rav Menachem Azariah of Fano to spend heavily on acquiring the Arizal’s manuscripts.
His shitah relies on the writings of Rav Chaim Vital and Rav Yosef ibn Tabul that were in his hands, together with his own chiddushim, and it binds Kabbalah to Jewish philosophy; at its center stands the Olam HaMalbush, an early emanation between the Ein Sof and Adam Kadmon that gives place to everything emanated after it. He would reveal to his talmidim the root of their neshamot in earlier gilgulim. Among the sefarim of his beit midrash are Limudei Atzilut, Drush HaMalbush, Shever Yosef, Ma’ayan HaChochmah, Kitzur Olam HaTikkun, a perush on Sifra DeTzniuta, and Ne’im Zemirot Yisrael on three of the Arizal’s piyyutim for Shabbat. Emek HaMelech of Rav Naftali Hertz Bachrach was written along his lines, and his teachings are cited in Chabad chassidut.
במקום שהמסורות חלוקות. Rav Chaim Vital's list of those who entered to learn by the Arizal does not include Rav Sarug, and his own sefarim do not name the Arizal as his rebbe; sources differ on whether he learned from him directly.
רבי ישראל סרוג (סרוק), ידוע גם בראשי תיבות שמו - הרי"ס, היה מקובל ומפיץ קבלת האר"י באירופה.
Israel Sarug Ashkenazi (Hebrew: ר׳ ישראל סרוג אשכנזי, also סרוק Saruk or Srugo, known also as רי״ס the Ris and מהר״י סרוג Mahari Sarug, was a pupil of Isaac Luria who devoted himself at the death of his master to the propagation of Lurianic Kabbalah, through which he gained many adherents in various parts of Italy. Among these, the most prominent were Menahem Azariah da Fano, whom he persuaded to spend large sums of money in the acquisition of Luria's manuscripts; and Aaron Berechiah of Modena, author of the Ma'avar Yabbok. Sarug also lectured in various places in Germany and in Amsterdam. In the latter city one of his disciples was Abraham Cohen de Herrera.