Elijah (oratorio) Austrian bass Joseph Staudigl. Mendelssohn had discussed an oratorio based on Elijah in the late 1830s with his friend Karl Klingemann, who had provided him with the libretto for his comic operetta "Die Heimkehr aus der Fremde", which resulted in a partial text that Klingemann was unable to finish. Mendelssohn then turned to , the librettist for his earlier oratorio "St. Paul", who quickly abandoned Klingemann's work and produced his own text that combined the story of Elijah as told in the Book of Kings with psalms. In 1845, the Birmingham Festival commissioned an oratorio from Mendelssohn, who worked with
Eliezer ben Elijah Ashkenazi nor his lofty ideas" (Nobeloth Hokhmah, Samuel b. Judah Loeb Ashkenazi, Basilia 1631, p. 46a). Ashkenazi's wife, Rachel, died at Cracow April 3, 1593. Her epitaph, still extant, bears witness to her piety and benevolence ("Monatsschrift," xliv. 360). His son Elijah published the liturgic collection, "Zibhe Shelamim," and wrote a short elegy on his father, which was used as the latter's epitaph. Eliezer ben Elijah Ashkenazi Eliezer (Lazer) ben Elijah Ashkenazi (1512–December 13, 1585) () was a Talmudist, rabbi, physician, and many-sided scholar. Though of a German family (according to some, the relative of Joseph Colon; see Marco Mortara, "Indice