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Author: Moses ben Nachman (Ramban)
Torat HaAdam is Ramban’s 13th-century work on the laws surrounding the end of life, including the treatment of a dying person on Shabbat, confession, burial, and mourning. The book was considered an essential source of authority, quoted often by medieval scholars and incorporated by Rabbi Jacob ben Asher and Rabbi Joseph Karo into their monumental codes, Arba’ah Turim and Shulchan Arukh, respectively. The title Torat HaAdam (likely a reference to II Samuel 7:19) is absent from the work’s manuscripts but appears on the title page of the first printed edition. Other medieval scholars also refer to the work by this title. The book includes a section entitled Sha’ar HaGemul, on reward and punishment, theodicy, heaven and hell, and the afterlife.