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Zechariah Dhahiri

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Zechariah (Yaḥya) al-Ḍāhirī (Hebrew: זכריה אלצ'אהרי, pronounced [zăχarˈjɔ ˈdˤdˤaːhiri], b. circa 1531 – d. 1608), often spelled Zechariah al-Dhahiri (Arabic: زكريا الضاهري) (16th century Yemen), was the son of Saʻīd (Saʻadia) al-Ḍāhirī, from Kawkaban, in the District of al-Mahwit, Yemen,[1] a place north-west of Sana’a. He is recognized as one of the most gifted Yemenite Jewish poets and rabbinic scholars who left South Arabia in search of a better livelihood, travelling to the Zamorin-ruled Calicut and Cochin in the Indian subcontinent, Hormuz in Safavid Iran, Ottoman-ruled Basra and Irbil in Ottoman Iraq, Bursa and Istanbul in Ottoman Anatolia, Rome in Italy, Aleppo, Damascus, Safed, Tiberias, Jerusalem, and Hebron in Ottoman Syria, Sidon in the Damascus Eyalet, and the Egypt Eyalet, and finally to the Adal Sultanate in Ethiopia, where he returned to Yemen by crossing the Red Sea and alighting at a port city near Mocha. He wrote extensively about his travels and experiences in these places, which he penned in a Hebrew-language rhymed prose narrative, eventually publishing them in a book which he called Sefer HaMusar (The Book of Moral Instruction), in circa 1580.

The book is one of the finest examples of Hebrew literary genius ever written in Yemen, its author making use of a poetic genre known as maqāma,[2] a prosimetric literary genre of rhymed prose with intervals of poetry in which rhetorical extravagance is conspicuous, to describe his journeys. The vocalization of HaMusar gives insight unto scholars into Yemenite Hebrew pronunciation. Al-Ḍāhirī, who was very adept in Hebrew, admitted to having modeled his poetry – two-hundred and seventy-five of which poems are found in his HaMusar and his Sefer Haʻanaḳ – on the Taḥkemoni of Yehuda Alharizi, who, in turn, was influenced by the Arabic maqāmāt of al-Ḥarīrī of Basra.[3] His vivid descriptions of Safed and of Joseph Karo’s yeshiva are of primary importance to historians, seeing that they are a first-hand account of these places, and the only extant account which describes this yeshiva.[4] With his broad Jewish education and his exceptional skills in his use of the Hebrew language, Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī is an important source in the study of Jewish history in the Land of Israel during the Renaissance and of Jewish persecution in Yemen at that time.

Early life and travels

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Little is known of the author's early life, other than the fact that he was an Israelite, descended from the Tribe of Reuben.[5] Al-Ḍāhirī spent at least ten years in his travels away from his native Yemen, where he had left behind a wife and children. He writes of himself that he married a second wife in Cochin (India), being a place of Jewish converts,[6] whom he later divorced because of her old age and lack of upper-teeth.[7] He then travelled to Persia where he took another wife in marriage, which wife bare him twin sons, Joshua and Caleb, but after one year, his young bride died. It was at this time that he decided to leave Persia, leaving his two sons with his brother-in-law, and, presumably, continuing with his travels until eventually he returned home to his family in Yemen.[8] After a stint in Yemen where he and the Jewish community were imprisoned, he eventually returned to visit his sons in Persia, and found them doing well, although his brother-in-law had by that time died.

The author, while writing about his journeys and experiences, cleverly conceals his own identity while narrating his experiences, and describes the experiences of two men in their journey, the two chief protagonists of his travel narrative: Mordechai Haṣidonī and his old crony, Abner ben Ḥeleḳ the Yemenite, which men are, in fact, the author himself.[9] Some scholars had originally thought that the book was largely fictional because of this anomaly. However, modern Israeli scholars now agree that the author was referring to himself in concealed terms (his alter ego), just as he says explicitly about himself in the Introduction to his book, HaMusar. The numerical value of these two names (in Hebrew) is equal to his own real name. This remarkable literary work interweaves folktales, animal fables, riddles, poems, epistles, and travel accounts with pious admonitions, religious polemics, messianic speculations, and philosophical disquisitions in a most engaging fashion.[10] It is not uncommon for al-Ḍāhirī to repeat episodes of his travel narrative, or some important event which happened to the Jewish community of Yemen, in more than one of the book's forty-five chapters.

Perhaps the book's most important contribution to historians is in al-Ḍāhirī's description of the Jewish communities in Safed and in Tiberius, during the mid-16th century, as well as a description of Jewish persecution in Yemen during the same century, under the Zaydī imamate. Modern archaeologists are grateful to Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī and credit him with giving a precise description of the location of Tiberias in the 16th century, whose city's walls adjoined the Sea of Galilee. Al-Ḍāhirī's description of Tiberius during that period conforms with that of another writer, viz., that of Rabbi Hayyim ben Joseph Vital, who also described the city's walls.[11] Al-Ḍāhirī is accredited with bringing the Shulchan Aruch to Yemen, as well as kabbalistic books, among other works, which he sold in Yemen at their face value. Other books, he recalls, had been lost at sea.

Upon Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī's return to Yemen in 1568, during the Turkish-Yemeni wars, al-Ḍāhirī was imprisoned in Sana’a, along with other principal persons of the Jewish community, for a period of one year in earnest by the lame theocratic ruler, al-Imām al-Mutahhar b. al-Mutawakkil Yaḥya Sharaf ad-Din, who allegedly suspected them of collaborating with the enemy.[12] Al-Ḍāhirī, writing about this experience, says that he saw his own suffering as God's way of punishing him for his having left the Land of Israel and returning to Yemen.[13] It was during this time that he began to write his momentous work, HaMusar – a record of his travel experiences, at the age of thirty-seven, although it was completed several decades later.[14] Al-Ḍāhirī's travel accounts are styled after the maqāmāt of the famous Spanish schools of poetry, with a rhyming syllabary composed in metered verse, after an exquisite and flowering manner.[15]

After the community's release from prison, the lame king still kept a firm grip upon his Jewish subjects, scattering them in different places throughout the country where they were kept under close-surveillance while working in the many towers built in that country.[16] This close-surveillance continued unabated until the king's death in 1573.[17] After the king's death, the Jews of Yemen were released from their incarceration by the succeeding ruler, who had borne a grudge against the former king and had destroyed his heirs to the throne. It was during this confinement to the towers (between 1569-1573) that Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī also completed another momentous work, which he composed mainly in the late hours of the night, viz., the book, Ṣeidah la’derekh (Victuals for the Road),[18] being a commentary on the Pentateuch where he interweaves kabbalistic themes and philosophy drawn from the Zohar, Rabbi Saadia Gaon, Maimonides’ Guide for the Perplexed, Yosef Albo's Sefer Ha`iqarim and Rabbi Joseph ben Abraham Gikatilla’s Sha'are Orah. He mentions that during the period of this book's compilation, he and his family were not permitted to leave the tower except with prior consent of his overseers.[19] It was at this time that al-Ḍāhirī made a vow to return to the Holy Land, after he had performed a pending vow.[20] It is uncertain whether or not he ever made the return trip.

Al-Ḍāhirī mentions that the community was visited in 1595 – some twenty-seven years after their imprisonment had begun – by an emissary of the rabbis in the Land of Israel, Rabbi Avraham b. Yiṣḥaq Ashkenazi, who had been sent there with many books and with letters of recommendation to raise money for the poor in the Land of Israel.[21] Al-Ḍāhirī, however, deemed it necessary to explain in a letter addressed to the said emissary that the Jewish people in Yemen were too poor themselves to render any assistance to their brothers in the Land of Israel. Scholars of comparative Arabic-Hebrew literature are quick to point out that these hardships facing the Jewish community in Yemen often gave rise to messianic aspirations in al-Ḍāhirī's rhymed prose.[22]

Spanish Jewry’s influence

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Zechariah Ḍāhirī is said to have been instrumental in introducing elements of the Spanish prayer-rite into Yemen, as well as kabbalistic practices.[23]

The early Spanish poets of the Golden Age, Moses ibn Ezra (b. circa 1060), Alḥarizi (1170–1235), Rabbi Abraham ibn Ezra (c. 1089–1167), Solomon ibn Gabirol (c. 1020–1058), Judah Halevi (died 1150), among others, had all left an indelible mark on Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī.[24] Some of the greatest exponents of Jewish law had also come from Spain, namely, Maimonides and Alfasi. Other proponents of Jewish law from the Spanish Jewish exiles who were expelled from Spain began to make a name for themselves in the Land of Israel where they had come. Neither al-Ḍāhirī, nor the people of Yemen, were oblivious to this. Al-Ḍāhirī patterns his Sefer Ha`anaḳ (A treatise on Hebrew homonyms) after a work by a similar name written by Moses ibn Ezra. Al-Ḍāhirī's frequent mention of Sephardic prayer rites and customs in his Ṣeidah la’derekh leads one to conclude that al-Ḍāhirī was strongly influenced by the Spanish-rite Siddur (Sephardic Prayer Book), as he brings down portions of its layout in the biblical sections known as Parashat Ṣav and Breishit.[25] So, too, the author shows the influence of kabbalistic practices on his writings, such as where he devotes several chapters to theosophical Kabbalah in his HaMusar,[26] and where he brings down in his Ṣeidah la’derekh an esoteric teaching relating to the blowing of the ram's horn on New Year's Day and which practice is cited in the name of the illustrious Rabbi, Moses Cordovero.[27] In another place, al-Ḍāhirī makes mention of the Sephardic practice where some will refrain from shaving their heads during the Counting of the Omer, while others prohibit the shaving of the head from the beginning of the counting until the thirty-third day of the Counting of the Omer. Here, incidentally, it is alluded that the Yemenite Jewish custom in this regard was different.[28] Even so, al-Ḍāhirī levels harsh words of criticism against Spanish Jewry's lack of poetic style in their daily communications and belles lettres, which, by that time, had mostly been lost by them.[29]

Highlights from journey

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Zechariah (Yaḥya) al-Ḍāhirī visited Rabbi Joseph Karo's yeshiva in Safed, in circa 1567 CE (the kabbalistic philosophies of which he describes in Maimonidean, neo-Platonic terms rather than purely mystical, theosophical, or sefirotic),[30] writing of his impressions on this wise:[31]

I journeyed from Syria, the province, through Upper Galilee, unto the city of Safed, the land of Canaan… I then came into the city, and lo! Within her dwelt the Divine Presence, for within her there is a large community, frowardness being removed far from them, about fourteen thousand in number! In eighteen seats of learning they had come to study the Talmud. There, I saw the light of the Law, and the Jews had light. They surpassed all other communities… Then it was that I knew my estimable worth, based on all my strength and ability, and lo! I had been deficient in several matters. Now, ‘that which is lacking cannot be numbered’ (Eccl. 1:15). I made myself inconspicuous in her midst, while feeling somewhat dejected on account of my inferior knowledge.[32] Within the synagogues and midrashic study halls I had come to hear the expositors who expound upon a certain matter in several ways, seeing that they know every secret thing, from the walls of the ceiling, all the way down to its foundation – but, especially, the great luminary, even the wise man, Rabbi Joseph Karo, from whose seat of learning the wise men of Safed do not quit themselves, for in his heart the Talmud is stored, after he had sat down in learning for seven years, within a confined chamber. Now, aside from several branches of wisdom, within his heart are sealed, both, revelations and mysteries. I went one Sabbath to his seat of learning, to see his honourable and glorious magnanimity. I sat down by the entrance, alongside the doorpost of the gate, while my cogitations from foolishness were sorely gripped by fear. Now, that wise man the elder sat upon a chair, and with his mouth he did amplify the subject matter. By an utterance he would draw man away from his yoke caused by the vicissitudes of time, in drawing him nigh unto the faithful God. He would then clothe him, as it were, in sumptuous apparel fit for those who are free, by his recital of the verse: ‘The Law of the Lord is perfect, reviving the soul’ (Ps. 19:7). He then deliberated on a certain matter by explicating its plain and esoteric sense. Before him were seated about two-hundred very admirable and distinguished pupils, sitting upon benches. When he had finished his words of wisdom, he gestured to a certain disciple opposite him to speak… Now, when that wise man (i.e. Rabbi Joseph Karo) heard the words of that disciple, he was astonished by his eloquence of speech who had given plausible arguments about the soul, and he then raised him up and exalted him above all the pupils that were with him… I stayed there awhile, until the wise man (i.e. Rabbi Joseph Karo) had gestured to his pupils to stand up, and then gave order to each one to learn a Mishna. So they went their way, the pupils who were there gathered and the wise man (i.e. Rabbi Joseph Karo).[33]

In Safed, al-Ḍāhirī also met-up with other great rabbis, such as Rabbi Moses Cordovero, the kabbalist, and Rabbi Moses di Trani.[34]

Al-Ḍāhirī's description of the city of Tiberius is on this wise: “…Now, I quickly passed through that land of great drought, until I reached the far end of the Sea, known as Kinneret , and, lo! Tiberius was closed before me! And when I came into her streets and into the pathways of her palaces, I enquired of a young lad, ‘Where are they, the seven principal men of the city?’ He then said to me, ‘They are seated in the synagogue which is by the wall of the [city’s] fortified enclosure, upon the seaboard of the Kinneret, which lies to the east. I then went there in haste, to see whether it be fat or lean, and when I had arrived there I saw distinguished elders, the glory of the Jews; those well-versed in Scripture and in the Mishna, while others of them had knowledge of the Talmud and of sound reason; still others of them knowledgeable in theoretical Kabbalah, and those who know the proper usage of the language. Now, when I took sight of them, a recurring trepidation came over me, for I by their estimation was young of age, and being but a boorish man who had not yet acquired knowledge, while they were all wise. So I sat down toward the end of the familiar synagogue, keeping silent and wondering at what shall be.”[35] The greatest scholar of Tiberius at that time was Rabbi Eliezer ben Yochai, “in whose generation he was of singular character.” Most had gone there from Spain, amongst whom he names as the community's leader, Rabbi Samuel Hacohen, along with Rabbi Yaakov Halevi, a certain Rabbi Avraham, Rabbi Moshe Gedaliah and Rabbi Avraham Gabriel.[36] The Jewish community of Tiberius is said to have been supported around that time by a wealthy Jewish philanthropist from Istanbul, Doña Gracia Mendes of the House of Nasi (d. 1569), but at her death the community lost thereby all means of support and was compelled to ask for Jewish donations abroad.[37][38]

 
Photo of Tiberias in 1870, View from South-east

Author's poetic style

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There is to be noted in al-Ḍāhirī's style a marked transition from the early Spanish-type of poetry typical of Yemen prior to his time (depicted in the prosaic writings of Daniel berav Fayyūmī and Avraham b. Ḥalfon, both, of Yemenite Jewish provenance) and the later classical Yemenite poetic writings (as depicted in the liturgical poems composed by Yosef ben Israel and Shalom Shabazi).[39] Unlike the latter who compiled works, both, in Hebrew and in Judeo-Arabic, al-Ḍāhirī's corpus of prosaic writings are written almost exclusively in Hebrew.

Much of al-Ḍāhirī's poetry was inspired by the great Spanish poets, while other works are said to have been inspired by Immanuel of Rome.[40] Some of al-Ḍāhirī's poems are panegyrics influenced by the Arabic madiḥ, in praise of great Jewish scholars, such as Rabbeinu Yerucham (1290-1350),[41] a Provençal rabbi who moved to Spain in 1306, following the expulsion of the Jews from France. Other panegyrics were written about Rabbi Obadiah di Bertinoro (c. 1445-1515) and Maimonides.[42]

Sometimes the poet deviates from what is proper usage for a given noun, verb or adjective and changes the word's suffix in order to bring it into conformity with the rhyme.[43] Most scholars agree that al-Ḍāhirī's greatest achievement is not just in his making use of rhymes, but rather in his ability to interweave biblical verse and rabbinic sayings taken from the Talmud and Midrash within those same strophes, which, by Jewish literary standards, is the true sign of genius.[44]

Literary works

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  • HaMusar (The author's travel itinerary; beginning of composition in 1568.)[45]
  • Ṣeidah la’derekh (Commentary on the Pentateuch)[46]
  • Sefer Ha`anaḳ (A treatise on Hebrew homonyms, written in 2148 verses)[47]
  • A Commentary on the Laws of Ritual Slaughter (being a commentary of Maimonides’ Hilkoth Sheḥiṭah – the Laws of Ritual Slaughter)[48]
  • Me’ah Ḳūloth (still in manuscript form) – a collection of one-hundred leniencies practised by the Jewish community of Sana’a with respect to the lungs of ritually slaughtered animals.[49]
  • Liturgical poetry (roughly, ten of which have survived): Includes such works as Ḳiryah Yafefiyah[50] and Adonai mī yağīaʻ ʻad takhlīt ḥokhmathekha,[51] and which are perhaps the most renowned of his liturgical poems.

See also

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References

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  1. ^ Amram Qorah, Saʻarath Teiman, Jerusalem 1987, p. 5
  2. ^ Called also maḥbereth, or “word synthesis,” in the Yemenite Hebrew vernacular. Sefer Ha-Mūsar, in the local parlance spoken in Yemen, was called maḥberoth (the plural form of maḥbereth).
  3. ^ Adena Tanenbaum, Kabbalah in a literary key: Mystical motifs in Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī’s Sefer Hamūsar, Ohio State University, Brill Co. Leiden 2009, p. 1; Sefer Ha-Mūsar (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari), Introduction, Benei Baraq 2008, p. 14
  4. ^ Adena Tanenbaum, Didacticism or Literary Legerdemain? Philosophical and Ethical Themes in Zechariah Aldahiri's Sefer Hamusar, in Adaptations and Innovations: Studies on the Interaction between Jewish and Islamic Thought and Literature from the Early Middle Ages to the Late Twentieth Century, Dedicated to Professor Joel L. Kraemer, ed. Y. Tzvi Langermann and Josef Stern (Leuven: Peeters Publishers, 2008), pp. 355-79
  5. ^ Zechariah Al-Dhahiri, Sefer Ha-Mūsar (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari), Chapter Twenty-five, Benei Barak 2008 (Hebrew), p. 163. This is one of the more extraordinary anecdotes, since the king’s Minister and Prince, Aharon Iraqi Ha-Kohen, had not yet burnt the family registers of the Jews in Yemen, and he recalled on this one page his family’s pedigree.
  6. ^ Al-Dhahiri, Zechariah. Sefer Ha-Musar (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari), Bnei Barak 2008, p. 67 (Hebrew). This view is supported by Rabbi Yehezkel Rachbi of Cochin who, in a letter addressed to Tobias Boas of Amsterdam in 1768, wrote: "We are called 'White Jews,' being people who have come from the Holy Land, (may it be built and established quickly, even in our days), while the Jews that are called 'Black' they became such in Malabar from proselytization and emancipation. However, their status and their rule of law, as well as their prayer, are just as ours." See: Sefunot; online edition: Sefunot, Book One (article: "Sources for the History on the Relations Between the White and Black Jews of Cochin"), p. רמט, but in PDF p. 271 (Hebrew)
  7. ^ Zechariah Al-Dhahiri, Sefer Ha-Mūsar, Introduction (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari), Chapter Eight, Benei Barak 2008 (Hebrew), pp. 67–71.
  8. ^ Zechariah Al-Dhahiri, Sefer Ha-Mūsar (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari), Chapter Sixteen, Benei Barak 2008 (Hebrew), pp. 105–106.
  9. ^ Zechariah Al-Dhahiri, Sefer Ha-Mūsar, Introduction (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari) Benei Barak 2008 (Hebrew), p. 14.
  10. ^ Adena Tanenbaum, Kabbalah in a literary key: Mystical motifs in Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī’s Sefer Hamūsar, Ohio State University, Brill Co. Leiden 2009, p. 1
  11. ^ Yosef Stefansky, Archaeologist, Safed and Tiberius in Rabbi Zechariah al-Dhahiri’s Sefer Ha-Mūsar
  12. ^ Zechariah Al-Dhahiri, Sefer Ha-Mūsar, Introduction (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari) Benei Barak 2008 (Hebrew), p. 13
  13. ^ Sefer Ha-Mūsar (ed. Yehuda Ratzaby), Chapter Twenty-five, Ben-Zvi Institute, Jerusalem 1965 (Hebrew), pp. 287-288; ibid. (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari), Benei Baraq 2008 (Hebrew), p. 162
  14. ^ Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī, Sefer Ha-Mūsar, Introduction (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari) Benei Barak 2008, p. 13, note 1.
  15. ^ Margalioth, Mordechai, ed. (2003). Encyclopedia of Great Men in Israel (Being a Biographical Dictionary of Jewish Sages and Scholars from the 9th to the End of the 18th Century) (in Hebrew). Vol. 1. Tel-Aviv: Yavneh Publishing House. p. 460. OCLC 52841127.
  16. ^ Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī, Sefer Ha-Mūsar (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari), Chapter Forty-five, Benei Barak 2008, p. 272.
  17. ^ Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī, Sefer Ha-Mūsar (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari), Chapter Twelve, Benei Barak 2008, p. 88.
  18. ^ Ṣeidah la’derekh, published in Taj – Pentateuch, 2 volumes, Hasid Publishers, Jerusalem 1991 (Hebrew)
  19. ^ Yehuda Ratzaby, Torathan shelivnei Teiman (the Torah of the Sons of Yemen), Kiryat Ono 1995 (Hebrew), pp. 45-46, where he quotes from the Epilogue of the book, Ṣeidah la’derekh, and where the author writes of himself: “Let no wise man of the wise men of Israel blame me about what I have established in this book, except if he finds therein an error, whether arising from mine own analytical study or about the book’s composition. Let him correct that which is crooked, and may his reward be doubled. Now, those who are greater than me, unto the dust of whose feet mine own dust is unable to attain, they [too] have been errant in several matters, yet, they are at ease and unmolested. How much more then, and a fortiori, me, who am imprisoned along with the children of my household. We cannot leave the entrance of the tower without permission. Now, [although] the highest of the highest keeps watch (i.e. God), besides the constraints laid upon us at this time, I have no more than what I am able to procure for my sustenance on a daily basis, and am oppressed by the king’s retinue to do their business, [while] in mine own labour all throughout the day, I am not at ease, nor do I have rest, neither do I have the leisure, excepting only during the nights. Occasionally, if I should find respite in obtaining enough provisions for four or five days, my scarcity is greeted with some relief; I am happy with my portion, and my mind is then at rest a little, and I will then arise in the final third watch of the night, according to my fervid wish, to engage in the work of heaven, etc.”
  20. ^ Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī, Sefer Ha-Mūsar (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari), Chapter Twelve, Benei Barak 2008, p. 89.
  21. ^ Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī, Sefer Ha-Mūsar (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari), Chapter Forty, Benei Barak 2008, pp. 248-250
  22. ^ Yosef Tobi, Politics and poetry in the works of Shalom Shabazī, Journal: Israel Affairs, Publisher: Routledge 2014, pp. 4, 8; Zechariā Al-Ḏāhrī, Sefer Hammusar (ed. Yehuda Ratzaby), Ben Zvi Institute, Jerusalem 1965, pp. 7-32; 36-37 (Hebrew)
  23. ^ TEMA - Journal of Judeo-Yemenite Studies (ed. Yosef Tobi), vol. 7. Association for Society and Culture, Netanya 2001. Article: Nosaḥ ha-tefillah shel yehudei teyman, pp. 29 – 30 (Hebrew)
  24. ^ Yehuda Amir, Bayn Rabbi Zechariah al-Dhahiri le'rabbi Yosef ben Yisrael, Article: Rabbi Zechariah al-Dhahiri in the Adulation of Rabbi Yosef ben Israel, (Hebrew), pp. 77–78
  25. ^ Ṣeidah la’derekh on Leviticus, chapter 7, published in Tāj – Pentateuch, vol. 2, Ḥasid Publishers, Jerusalem 1991 (Hebrew), p. 28 (14b); ibid. vol. 1, on the verse in Genesis 2:1, p. 5 (3a)
  26. ^ Cf. Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī, Sefer Ha-Mūsar (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari), Chapter Three, Benei Barak 2008, pp. 34–41 (Hebrew)
  27. ^ Ṣeidah la’derekh on Leviticus Parashat Amor, published in Tāj – Pentateuch, vol. 2, Ḥasid Publishers, Jerusalem 1991 (Hebrew), p. 118 (59b), although, when compared to the handwritten MSS., a printer’s error had befallen the printed text.
  28. ^ Ṣeidah la’derekh on Leviticus, Parashat Amor, published in Tāj – Pentateuch, vol. 2, Ḥasid Publishers, Jerusalem 1991 (Hebrew), p. 108 (54b).
  29. ^ Zechariā Al- Ḏāhrī, Sefer Hammusar (ed. Yehuda Ratzaby), Chapter Twenty-four, Ben Zvi Institute, Jerusalem 1965, p. 278; in Morechai Yitzhari’s 2008 edition, p. 157; see also Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī, Sefer Ha-Mūsar (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari), Chapter Forty, Benei Barak 2008, p. 248.
  30. ^ The date of al-Ḍāhirī’s visit to the Land of Israel is alluded to in Chapter Twenty-Five of al-Ḍāhirī’s book, Sefer Ha-Mūsar. There, he writes: “…Now, in Tiberius there was the wise man, [Rabbi Eliezer] Ben Yochai, in whose generation he was of singular character; in the year, et ha-keves he-eḥad = את הכב"ש ה'אחד, I moved on from there into the village of Kanah, the city of Jonah, the son of Amitai, and from there to Shechem and to Jerusalem, and Hebron the place of my fathers.” The year is denoted in Hebrew characters, in the form of a biblical verse (i.e. “the one lamb” – Exo. 29:39), each Hebrew character having a numerical value. The year given is highlighted as הכב"ש (ה = 5; כ = 20; ב = 2; ש = 300), which, being rearranged, is actually השכ"ב (327), believed to have been the abbreviated form of the year, without the millennium. By adding the numerical value of the first letter of the next word, ה in the word האחד, it brings us to the millennium 5; that year being 5,327 anno mundi, or what was then 1567 CE. Thus is it explained in Yehuda Ratzaby’s 1965 edition of HaMusar, p. 287, who relied upon the date of 1567, based upon Avraham Yaari’s calculations (Masa'ot Eretz Yisrael, Tel-Aviv 1946, p. 196). Mordechai Yitzhari, however, in his 2008 edition of HaMusar, p. 162, for reasons unexplained, appends the date of 1565. It should be pointed out here that if we were to strictly apply the numerical values in the word השכ"ב alone, with the view that it already includes the millennium of 5, the year of al-Dhahiri’s visit to the Land of Israel would have been in 1562 CE.
  31. ^ Zachariā Al-Ḏāhrī, Sefer Hammusar (ed. Yehuda Ratzaby), Ben-Zvi Institute, Jerusalem 1965 (Hebrew), pp. 116–117
  32. ^ Translation of this last clause follows Yehuda Ratzaby’s explanation of the Hebrew in Zachariā Al-Ḏāhrī’s Sefer Hammusar (Chapter Six), Ben-Zvi Institute, Jerusalem 1965 (Hebrew), p. 116
  33. ^ Al-Dhahiri, Zechariah (Yaḥya). Sefer Ha-Mūsar. Benei Baraq 2008 (Hebrew), pp. 58, 62.
  34. ^ Zachariā Al-Ḏāhrī, Sefer Hammusar (ed. Yehuda Ratzaby), Chapter Twenty-five, Ben-Zvi Institute, Jerusalem 1965 (Hebrew), p. 287; Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī, Sefer Ha-Mūsar (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari), Chapter Twenty-five, Benei Baraq 2008 (Hebrew), p. 162.
  35. ^ Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī, Sefer Ha-Mūsar (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari), Chapter Twenty-three, Benei Baraq 2008 (Hebrew), p. 147.
  36. ^ Zachariā Al-Ḏāhrī, Sefer Hammusar (ed. Yehuda Ratzaby), Chapter Twenty-four, Ben-Zvi Institute, Jerusalem 1965 (Hebrew), p. 279
  37. ^ Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī, Sefer Ha-Mūsar (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari), Chapter Twenty-four, Benei Baraq 2008 (Hebrew), p. 157.
  38. ^ Cecil Roth, Doña Gracia of the House of Nasi, Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1948, pp. 120–121
  39. ^ Yosef Tobi, Politics and poetry in the works of Shalom Shabazī, Journal: Israel Affairs, Publisher: Routledge 2014, p. 3
  40. ^ Zachariā Al-Ḏāhrī, Sefer Hammusar (ed. Yehuda Ratzaby), Preface, Ben-Zvi Institute, Jerusalem 1965, p. 16 (Hebrew)
  41. ^ Zechariah Al-Dhahiri, Sefer Ha-Mūsar (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari), Chapter Twenty-one, Benei Barak 2008 (Hebrew), pp. 135-136.
  42. ^ Zechariah Al-Dhahiri, Sefer Ha-Mūsar (ed. Mordechai Yitzhari), Chapter Eighteen, Benei Barak 2008 (Hebrew), pp. 118-119.
  43. ^ Zachariā Al-Ḏāhrī, Sefer Hammusar (ed. Yehuda Ratzaby), Preface, Ben-Zvi Institute, Jerusalem 1965, pp. 13-14 (Hebrew)
  44. ^ Zachariā Al-Ḏāhrī, Sefer Hammusar (ed. Yehuda Ratzaby), Preface, Ben-Zvi Institute, Jerusalem 1965, p. 13 (Hebrew)
  45. ^ Several MSS exist: one of which is the Günzburg MS. 1306, Russian State Library, Moscow (ref. 48786); another is the Sassoon MS. at Toronto University in Canada, written in 1585, while yet another is a MS at the National Library of Israel, Jerusalem, Ms. Heb. 8°6748.
  46. ^ Jewish Theological Seminary, Lutzki MS. 931, New York. Written in 1685 (anno 1,996 of the Seleucid Era). Near the time of the author, the original work had undergone a later interpolation by an unknown second-hand who calls himself “Haḥosheq” (or, “he that desires [this work]”) and where he expounds in greater depth upon some of the ideas brought down in al-Ḍāhirī’s commentary.
  47. ^ Günzburg MS. 1306, Russian State Library, Moscow. The copyist writes the year 1588 as the date of its copying. A microfilm copy of this work is available at the National Library of Israel in the Hebrew University of Jerusalem (Givat Ram Campus), Manuscript Dept., Microfilm reel # F-48786. The first three of these works here mentioned are explicitly named by the author in Chapter Forty-five of Sefer Ha-Mūsar, p. 272 in Morechai Yitzhari’s edition.
  48. ^ In the Preface of his work on ritual slaughter, Rabbi Zechariah al-Dhahiri has mentioned the purpose of his writing a commentary on Maimonides' work on the laws governing ritual slaughter: “Now even though it is not fitting to add unto the words of Maimonides, of blessed memory,... we are [nevertheless] still in need of Hamūdaʻī to know his (i.e. Maimonides’) intentions, for his words are obscure in some halachic places, while in some places he inclined after the stringent view, although that same man in the Talmud represents only a single opinion [against the majority], and whose words were rejected, and therefore one must know these places, owing to our feebleness – we the people who dwell in darkness, in the land of Yemen, so that he who understands those places where they were lenient in them might be able to eat with permission, rather than waste the money of Israel; seeing that the Torah takes pity upon him in several places. Wherefore, it behooved me to seek after them and to write them down, that they may be plainly rehearsed by the one who looks [at them].”
  49. ^ There is a dispute amongst scholars whether or not this work actually belonged to Rabbi Zechariah al-Ḍāhirī. Some say that it, like Ṣeidah la’derekh, had gone through a later recension.
  50. ^ Published in nearly every Yemenite Dīwan. See the Yemenite Dīwan, Sefer Shirei S. Shabazī Haggadol (ed. Yosef Hasid), Jerusalem 1976 (Hebrew), p. 2
  51. ^ Rabbi Yiḥye Ṣāliḥ, Tiklāl ‘Eṣ Ḥayyim (ed. Shimon Tzalach), vol. 4, Jerusalem 1971 (Hebrew), pp. 252b-255a. This piyyut, based on Kabbalah, has been placed in the Yemenite Baladi-rite Prayer Book, in the midst of Solomon ibn Gabirol’s Keter Malkhut and which is recited in the synagogues on Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement).

Further reading

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  • Kiddush on the Night of Sabbath, by Rabbi Zechariah al-Dhahiri (סדר קידוש לילי שבת לרבי זכריה אלצ'אהרי), Yosef Tobi, in: Afiqim: Journal of Spiritual Awakening and Culture (October 1978), Tel-Aviv; pp. 10–11 (Hebrew)
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