Simeon Kayyara
Encyclopedia
Simeon Kayyara was a Jewish-Babylonian halakist of the first half of the 9th century. The early identification of his surname with "Qahirah," the Arabic
name of Cairo
(founded 980), was shown by J.L. Rapoport (Teshubot ha-Ge'onim, ed. Cassel, p. 12, Berlin, 1848) to be impossible. Neubauer's suggestion (M.J.C. ii, p. viii) of its identification with Qayyar in Mesopotamia
is equally untenable. It is now generally and more correctly assumed that "Kayyara" is derived from a common noun, and, like the Syro-Arabic "qayyar," originally denoted a dealer in pitch or wax. Rabbinic sources often refer to Kayyara as Bahag, an abbreviation of Ba'al Halakhot Gedolot (="author of the Halakhot Gedolot"), after his most important work.
in a codified form, and seems to represent the first attempt to treat it according to its contents rather than according to the arrangement of its treatises.
As to the time of its composition all the older authorities are silent. Abraham ibn Daud
alone has an allusion to this problem, which has caused much perplexity. According to him (Sefer ha-Kabbalah, in M. J. C. i. 63), "Simeon Kayyara wrote his work in the year 741, and after him lived Yehudai Gaon
, author of the Halakhot Pesukot, which he compiled from Simeon's Halakhot Gedolot." This statement cannot be relied upon, as Simeon Kayyara in fact lived in the century following Yehudai Gaon; and Halevy is of the opinion that the names were inadvertently switched, though this reading creates as many problems as it solves.
Many ancient authorities, like the geonim
Sherira and Hai ben Sherira , and others, support Kayyara's authorship; and according to A. Epstein, there can be no doubt that Simeon Kayyara wrote the Halakhot Gedolot. It would also seem from the statements of these authorities that Simeon Kayyara's chief sources were the She'eltot of Achai Gaon
and the Halakhot Pesukot of Yehudai Gaon
.
Other authors, in particular from France, Germany and Italy, ascribe this work to Yehudai Gaon
. Some scholars have tried to reconcile these two views by saying that the core of the work was written by Yehudai Gaon and that Simeon Kayyara later expanded it. Halevy holds that this "core" is to be identified with the Halakhot Pesukot. Louis Ginzberg
(in his Geonica) is of the opinion that the Babylonian recension (see below) is the work of Yehudai Gaon and that Simeon Kayyara expanded it into what is now known as the Spanish recension. Both these views were formed before the discovery of the sole surviving manuscript of the Halakhot Pesukot, and the question may need to be reassessed.
's Halakhot Pesukot, since the original form of that work had been lost. (It has since been found: see Yehudai Gaon
.) A comparison with the redaction of Yehudai Gaon's composition which has been preserved as the Halakhot Pesukot or Hilkot Re'u (ed. Schlossberg, Versailles, 1886), showed that most of the halakhot
in that recension were found in the Halakhot Gedolot, although they deviate from it both in wording and in arrangement. Simeon Kayyara, however, used yet another recension of the Halakhot Pesukot, and at times cites both. There were of course other sources at his disposal which have not been preserved. Not only does the fact that both the She'eltot and the Halakhot Pesukot were used, but also certain passages in the Halakhot Gedolot of themselves, prove that the work was composed about the year 825, apparently at Sura
, since many explanations and usages of the Halakhot Gedolot are elsewhere cited under the names of Geonim
of that place.
and in North Africa
the legal decisions of the Geonim
were incorporated into the book, and its whole appearance was so changed that gradually a different recension was developed. The original or Babylonian redaction exists in printed form in the editions of Venice (1548), Amsterdam (1762), Vienna (1810), etc., and finally in that of Warsaw (1874, with an index of passages and notes by S. A. Traub). This redaction was used by the Babylonian geonim
and by the German and northern French scholars; for the citations of the latter from the Halakhot Gedolot, which work they ascribe to Yehudai Gaon
, refer to this recension.
The second or so-called Spanish redaction (Mahadurat Aspamia) exists in a manuscript in the Vatican library
, and has been edited by A. Hildesheimer in the collection of the Mekitze Nirdamim (Berlin, 1888-92). The material of this recension is much richer and more comprehensive, since it contains many passages from the Talmud
, mnemonic introductory words ("simanim"), the order of the weekly lessons, and, most important of all, legal decisions of the Geonim
, usually indicated by the term "shedar" (="he sent"), which are lacking in the earlier redaction . The first gaon of whom a "teshubah" is mentioned in this recension is Yehudai Gaon
; the last, Tzemah ben Paltoi (d. 890). A. Epstein has concluded, accordingly, that this redaction was made, or rather finished, about the year 900, in some place where the Jews were in close literary correspondence with the Babylonian seminaries. This was either in Spain or in northern Africa—probably in Kairwan, the center of Talmudic studies at that time. Evidence in favor of Kairwan is supplied by a passage in the Halakhot Gedolot (ed. Hildesheimer, p. 175), which mentions a usage as being common among the "Bene Afrika"; for it is known that "Afrika" frequently connotes Kairwan.
From northern Africa or Spain
this recension was carried into Italy
: it was used by the scholars of these three countries; and all of them regarded Simeon Kayyara as its author. In the 12th century the recension was brought to northern France
, and in the 13th to Germany
, where it is sometimes cited by the scholars of both countries as "Halakhot Gedolot shel Aspamia" (see R. Tam, Sefer ha-Yashar, No. 509; Or Zarua, B. M. No. 276; Sanh. No. 23). On the other hand, the Babylonian redaction in the 13th century reached Italy, where it was used by Isaiah di Trani
(see Ha-Makria, No. 31).
Arabic language
Arabic is a name applied to the descendants of the Classical Arabic language of the 6th century AD, used most prominently in the Quran, the Islamic Holy Book...
name of Cairo
Cairo
Cairo , is the capital of Egypt and the largest city in the Arab world and Africa, and the 16th largest metropolitan area in the world. Nicknamed "The City of a Thousand Minarets" for its preponderance of Islamic architecture, Cairo has long been a centre of the region's political and cultural life...
(founded 980), was shown by J.L. Rapoport (Teshubot ha-Ge'onim, ed. Cassel, p. 12, Berlin, 1848) to be impossible. Neubauer's suggestion (M.J.C. ii, p. viii) of its identification with Qayyar in Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia is a toponym for the area of the Tigris–Euphrates river system, largely corresponding to modern-day Iraq, northeastern Syria, southeastern Turkey and southwestern Iran.Widely considered to be the cradle of civilization, Bronze Age Mesopotamia included Sumer and the...
is equally untenable. It is now generally and more correctly assumed that "Kayyara" is derived from a common noun, and, like the Syro-Arabic "qayyar," originally denoted a dealer in pitch or wax. Rabbinic sources often refer to Kayyara as Bahag, an abbreviation of Ba'al Halakhot Gedolot (="author of the Halakhot Gedolot"), after his most important work.
The Halakhot Gedolot
Kayyara's chief work was the Halakhot Gedolot (הלכות גדולות), or, as it is called by some Jewish-Spanish authors, to distinguish it from later halakhic codices of a similar nature, "Halakhot Rishonot". It gives the entire halakhic and practical material of the TalmudTalmud
The Talmud is a central text of mainstream Judaism. It takes the form of a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, philosophy, customs and history....
in a codified form, and seems to represent the first attempt to treat it according to its contents rather than according to the arrangement of its treatises.
As to the time of its composition all the older authorities are silent. Abraham ibn Daud
Abraham ibn Daud
Abraham ibn Daud was a Spanish-Jewish astronomer, historian, and philosopher; born at Toledo, Spain about 1110; died, according to common report, a martyr about 1180. He is sometimes known by the abbreviation Rabad I or Ravad I. His mother belonged to a family famed for its learning...
alone has an allusion to this problem, which has caused much perplexity. According to him (Sefer ha-Kabbalah, in M. J. C. i. 63), "Simeon Kayyara wrote his work in the year 741, and after him lived Yehudai Gaon
Yehudai Gaon
Yehudai ben Nahman was the head of the yeshiva in Sura from 757 to 761, during the Gaonic period of Judaism...
, author of the Halakhot Pesukot, which he compiled from Simeon's Halakhot Gedolot." This statement cannot be relied upon, as Simeon Kayyara in fact lived in the century following Yehudai Gaon; and Halevy is of the opinion that the names were inadvertently switched, though this reading creates as many problems as it solves.
Many ancient authorities, like the geonim
Geonim
Geonim were the presidents of the two great Babylonian, Talmudic Academies of Sura and Pumbedita, in the Abbasid Caliphate, and were the generally accepted spiritual leaders of the Jewish community world wide in the early medieval era, in contrast to the Resh Galuta who wielded secular authority...
Sherira and Hai ben Sherira , and others, support Kayyara's authorship; and according to A. Epstein, there can be no doubt that Simeon Kayyara wrote the Halakhot Gedolot. It would also seem from the statements of these authorities that Simeon Kayyara's chief sources were the She'eltot of Achai Gaon
Achai Gaon
Achai Gaon was a leading scholar in the period of the Geonim, an 8th-century Talmudist of high renown. He enjoys the distinction of being the first rabbinical author known to history after the close of the Talmud...
and the Halakhot Pesukot of Yehudai Gaon
Yehudai Gaon
Yehudai ben Nahman was the head of the yeshiva in Sura from 757 to 761, during the Gaonic period of Judaism...
.
Other authors, in particular from France, Germany and Italy, ascribe this work to Yehudai Gaon
Yehudai Gaon
Yehudai ben Nahman was the head of the yeshiva in Sura from 757 to 761, during the Gaonic period of Judaism...
. Some scholars have tried to reconcile these two views by saying that the core of the work was written by Yehudai Gaon and that Simeon Kayyara later expanded it. Halevy holds that this "core" is to be identified with the Halakhot Pesukot. Louis Ginzberg
Louis Ginzberg
Rabbi Louis Ginzberg was a Talmudist and leading figure in the Conservative Movement of Judaism of the twentieth century. He was born on November 28, 1873, in Kovno, Lithuania; he died on November 11, 1953, in New York City.-Biographical background:...
(in his Geonica) is of the opinion that the Babylonian recension (see below) is the work of Yehudai Gaon and that Simeon Kayyara expanded it into what is now known as the Spanish recension. Both these views were formed before the discovery of the sole surviving manuscript of the Halakhot Pesukot, and the question may need to be reassessed.
Sources
The A. Hildesheimer edition of the Halakhot Gedolot, Index, p. 140, gives no less than 83 passages in which the She'eltot has been cited (Reifmann, in Bet Talmud, iii. 111 et seq., gives 109 passages); and it has in addition more than 40 literal though unacknowledged quotations from this same source. At the time of that edition it was more difficult to trace material borrowed from Yehudai GaonYehudai Gaon
Yehudai ben Nahman was the head of the yeshiva in Sura from 757 to 761, during the Gaonic period of Judaism...
's Halakhot Pesukot, since the original form of that work had been lost. (It has since been found: see Yehudai Gaon
Yehudai Gaon
Yehudai ben Nahman was the head of the yeshiva in Sura from 757 to 761, during the Gaonic period of Judaism...
.) A comparison with the redaction of Yehudai Gaon's composition which has been preserved as the Halakhot Pesukot or Hilkot Re'u (ed. Schlossberg, Versailles, 1886), showed that most of the halakhot
Halakha
Halakha — also transliterated Halocho , or Halacha — is the collective body of Jewish law, including biblical law and later talmudic and rabbinic law, as well as customs and traditions.Judaism classically draws no distinction in its laws between religious and ostensibly non-religious life; Jewish...
in that recension were found in the Halakhot Gedolot, although they deviate from it both in wording and in arrangement. Simeon Kayyara, however, used yet another recension of the Halakhot Pesukot, and at times cites both. There were of course other sources at his disposal which have not been preserved. Not only does the fact that both the She'eltot and the Halakhot Pesukot were used, but also certain passages in the Halakhot Gedolot of themselves, prove that the work was composed about the year 825, apparently at Sura
Sura
A sura is a division of the Qur'an, often referred to as a chapter. The term chapter is sometimes avoided, as the suras are of unequal length; the shortest sura has only three ayat while the longest contains 286 ayat...
, since many explanations and usages of the Halakhot Gedolot are elsewhere cited under the names of Geonim
Geonim
Geonim were the presidents of the two great Babylonian, Talmudic Academies of Sura and Pumbedita, in the Abbasid Caliphate, and were the generally accepted spiritual leaders of the Jewish community world wide in the early medieval era, in contrast to the Resh Galuta who wielded secular authority...
of that place.
Interpretations and redactions
In the course of time the Halakhot Gedolot underwent many changes. In SpainSpain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
and in North Africa
North Africa
North Africa or Northern Africa is the northernmost region of the African continent, linked by the Sahara to Sub-Saharan Africa. Geopolitically, the United Nations definition of Northern Africa includes eight countries or territories; Algeria, Egypt, Libya, Morocco, South Sudan, Sudan, Tunisia, and...
the legal decisions of the Geonim
Geonim
Geonim were the presidents of the two great Babylonian, Talmudic Academies of Sura and Pumbedita, in the Abbasid Caliphate, and were the generally accepted spiritual leaders of the Jewish community world wide in the early medieval era, in contrast to the Resh Galuta who wielded secular authority...
were incorporated into the book, and its whole appearance was so changed that gradually a different recension was developed. The original or Babylonian redaction exists in printed form in the editions of Venice (1548), Amsterdam (1762), Vienna (1810), etc., and finally in that of Warsaw (1874, with an index of passages and notes by S. A. Traub). This redaction was used by the Babylonian geonim
Geonim
Geonim were the presidents of the two great Babylonian, Talmudic Academies of Sura and Pumbedita, in the Abbasid Caliphate, and were the generally accepted spiritual leaders of the Jewish community world wide in the early medieval era, in contrast to the Resh Galuta who wielded secular authority...
and by the German and northern French scholars; for the citations of the latter from the Halakhot Gedolot, which work they ascribe to Yehudai Gaon
Yehudai Gaon
Yehudai ben Nahman was the head of the yeshiva in Sura from 757 to 761, during the Gaonic period of Judaism...
, refer to this recension.
The second or so-called Spanish redaction (Mahadurat Aspamia) exists in a manuscript in the Vatican library
Vatican Library
The Vatican Library is the library of the Holy See, currently located in Vatican City. It is one of the oldest libraries in the world and contains one of the most significant collections of historical texts. Formally established in 1475, though in fact much older, it has 75,000 codices from...
, and has been edited by A. Hildesheimer in the collection of the Mekitze Nirdamim (Berlin, 1888-92). The material of this recension is much richer and more comprehensive, since it contains many passages from the Talmud
Talmud
The Talmud is a central text of mainstream Judaism. It takes the form of a record of rabbinic discussions pertaining to Jewish law, ethics, philosophy, customs and history....
, mnemonic introductory words ("simanim"), the order of the weekly lessons, and, most important of all, legal decisions of the Geonim
Geonim
Geonim were the presidents of the two great Babylonian, Talmudic Academies of Sura and Pumbedita, in the Abbasid Caliphate, and were the generally accepted spiritual leaders of the Jewish community world wide in the early medieval era, in contrast to the Resh Galuta who wielded secular authority...
, usually indicated by the term "shedar" (="he sent"), which are lacking in the earlier redaction . The first gaon of whom a "teshubah" is mentioned in this recension is Yehudai Gaon
Yehudai Gaon
Yehudai ben Nahman was the head of the yeshiva in Sura from 757 to 761, during the Gaonic period of Judaism...
; the last, Tzemah ben Paltoi (d. 890). A. Epstein has concluded, accordingly, that this redaction was made, or rather finished, about the year 900, in some place where the Jews were in close literary correspondence with the Babylonian seminaries. This was either in Spain or in northern Africa—probably in Kairwan, the center of Talmudic studies at that time. Evidence in favor of Kairwan is supplied by a passage in the Halakhot Gedolot (ed. Hildesheimer, p. 175), which mentions a usage as being common among the "Bene Afrika"; for it is known that "Afrika" frequently connotes Kairwan.
From northern Africa or Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
this recension was carried into Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
: it was used by the scholars of these three countries; and all of them regarded Simeon Kayyara as its author. In the 12th century the recension was brought to northern France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, and in the 13th to Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, where it is sometimes cited by the scholars of both countries as "Halakhot Gedolot shel Aspamia" (see R. Tam, Sefer ha-Yashar, No. 509; Or Zarua, B. M. No. 276; Sanh. No. 23). On the other hand, the Babylonian redaction in the 13th century reached Italy, where it was used by Isaiah di Trani
Isaiah di Trani
Isaiah di Trani ben Mali , better known as the RID, was a prominent Italian Talmudist.- Biography:...
(see Ha-Makria, No. 31).
Jewish Encyclopedia bibliography
- A. Epstein, in Ha-Goren, iii. 46 et seq.;
- A. Harkavy, Teshubot ha-Ge'onim, pp. xxvii., 374 et seq.;
- J.L. Rapoport, in Kerem ?emed, vi. 236;
- Schorr, in ZunzLeopold ZunzLeopold Zunz was a German Reform rabbi and writer, the founder of what has been termed "Jewish Studies" or "Judaic Studies" , the critical investigation of Jewish literature, hymnology and ritual...
Jubelschrift (Hebr. part), pp. 127 et seq.; - He-haluk, xii. 81 et seq.;
- Weiss, Dor, iv. 26, 32 et seq., 107, 264;
- Brüll, in his Jahrb. ix. 128 et seq.;
- Grätz, Gesch. v. 234;
- idem, in Monatsschrift, vii. 217 et seq.;
- S. T. Halberstam, ib. viii. 379 et seq., xxxi. 472 et seq.;
- I. HalevyYitzhak Isaac Halevy RabinowitzYitzhak Isaac Halevy was a rabbi, Jewish historian, and founder of the Agudath Israel organization. Relatively little of his correspondence survived the Holocaust, and so information concerning his activities is scarce...
, Dorot ha-Rishonim, iii. 200 et seq.; - see also the bibliography of the article Yehudai ben Nahman.
External links
- Jewish Encyclopedia article for Simeon Kayyara, by Richard Gottheil and Max Schloessinger.