Hebrew poet and contemporary of Judah Ha-Levi. He came from a famous Jewish family in Granada, Spain. At first he was fascinated by the beauty of nature and the pleasures of life. After experiencing rejection and disappointment in love, he took to wandering. He wrote so many religious poems pleading for forgiveness that he became known as Hasallach, or the penitential poet. A master of form and literary technique, Ibn Ezra made excellent use of the riches of the Hebrew language in his secular and religious poetry. His book Shirat Yisrael (The Poetry of Israel) is of great value for the study of Hebrew poetry and its Arabic influences.