Petrus Alfonsi

Petrus Alfonsi (c. 1062–1140) was a Spanish Jewish physician and scholar who became a Christian and wrote the influential Dialogi contra Iudaeos and a popular collection of moral tales. His learning in Hebrew and Arabic sources is occasionally drawn on by later Christian compilers.

A convert from Judaism, Petrus Alfonsi brought a rare command of Hebrew and Arabic learning into the Latin West. His Dialogi contra Iudaeos argued the Christian reading of the Old Testament against Jewish objections, and his Disciplina Clericalis introduced Eastern moral tales to Europe; later Christian compilers occasionally drew on his philological knowledge of the Hebrew Scriptures.