Community Magazine September 2011

Portrait of a Spiritual Giant Azoulay’s latest work, The Ben Ish Hai: The Life and Times of Hacham Yosef Haim explores the remarkable life of one of the most extraordinary Torah figures of modern times. Hacham Ovadia Yosef, shelita , personally encouraged Azoulay to undertake the task of chronicling the life of the Ben Ish Hai – just as he himself did in an article in the journal Kol Sinai (Elul, 5722/1962) “in order to proclaim our great and boundless appreciation for his exalted level of holiness.” According to Rabbi Shemuel Choueka of Congregation Ohel Simcha in Elberon, NJ, Hacham Yosef Haim was the spiritual leader in Baghdad who “overshadowed everyone who lived in his time…and reenergized and revitalized halacha ”. And his powerful influence on halacha continues to resonate, so that today, any halachic discourse among Sephardic poskim is considered incomplete without consideration of the Ben Ish Hai’s rulings. This new work is thus a vital link in the chain between our past and present, giving us the opportunity to learn and gain inspiration from a towering figure who shaped modern Sephardic religious observance. A Scion of a Torah Dynasty Hacham Yosef Haim was affectionately known as the Ben Ish Hai (literally, “son of a living man”), the title of his most popular work which is based upon the description of King David’s general, Benayahu ben Yehoyada (Shemuel II 23:20). He was born in Baghdad, Iraq on 27 Av, 5594/ September 1, 1834, into what Azoulay describes as “a dynasty of towering Torah giants that had led Iraqi Jewry for generations.” He was preceded by his father and grandfather, Hacham Eliyahu Haim and Hacham Moshe Haim, whose Torah scholarship and tireless devotion to their community earned them the reverence and love of Jews throughout Iraq. In the introduction to his work, Azoulay describes the tremendous impact this illustrious family had upon the Iraqi Jewish community: Under the capable leadership of Hacham Moshe, his students and his successors, Torah study began to flourish once again in Iraq. The community again produced towering Torah personalities who devoted themselves tirelessly to teaching their communities and injecting new life and spirit into religious observance among Iraqi Jewry. And while there were many outstanding Torah personalities during this period, nobody was as successful in the effort to revitalize Torah in Babylon as Hacham Yosef Haim. Meticulously researched, the book contains anecdotal information about the life of the Ben Ish Hai and the history of the Jewish community in Iraq, a review of the extensive writings of the Ben Ish Hai , eulogies given upon the passing of the great saddik , as well as descriptions of correspondence between the Ben Ish Hai and various rabbis around the world. These correspondences testify to the far- reaching influence the Ben Ish Hai had on world Jewry, while the details of his life illustrate to us the sheer strength of character and devotion to Hashem and Torah that guided this eminent hacham in everything he did. As a young child, he used money given to him to buy treats for Shabbat to buy hallot for a destitute woman so that she could enjoy Shabbat, exhibiting a level of maturity and sensitivity rarely seen at such a tender age. As a leader of the Jewish world, he was presented with numerous requests for financial assistance to the needy in Israel and always immediately set out to raise funds and distribute them. The Ben Ish Hai had a deep love and affinity for the Land of Israel and the people who lived there. He fulfilled a lifelong dream when he embarked in 1869 on an arduous journey to Eress Yisrael where he stayed for five months. His trip took him to the renowned center of Kabbalah learning, Yeshivat Bet El in Jerusalem where he met with distinguished hachamim, to the graves of the sadikim in Meron, and to Me’arat Hamachpela in Hebron. During his visit to Hebron, the sage was accosted by angry Arabs, an incident which drove him to work When the movie, The Syrian Jewish Community : Our Journey Through History, was first shown in october 2010 at Avery Fisher Hall in lincoln Center, it was billed as the largest gathering of New York and New Jersey’s Syrian and near Eastern Jewish communities in history. The acclaimed documentary was later screened several more times at various venues in brooklyn, Manhattan and the Jersey Shore area. Attended by individuals from all walks of life, the great fanfare that accompanied the movie testified to the growing pride among Sephardic communities for their history and heritage. The feature-film quality production chronicled the history of the first Syrian immigrants who landed on the lower East Side of Manhattan. With poignant interviews, the movie portrayed the pride and stoicism of the first generation of Syrian Jews that set the foundation for our life here. Thefirst inaplannedseriesofmotion-picturedocumentaries, the film was commissioned by the Sephardic Heritage Museum, which will soon be opening in lakewood, New Jersey, as part of the larger goal of preserving Sephardic culture. This project, eight years in the making, has as its centerpiece a unique collection of original, unpublished Torah manuscripts written by Syrian rabbis of previous generations. A collection of artifacts from Aleppo and Damascus are partnered with thousands of photos collected from community members along with hours of videotaped personal interviews which chronicle life in Syria and the early years in America. Joseph Sitt, whoacquired thefirst set ofmanuscriptsandspearheaded the project, explained in an interview with Community , “We send our children to school and they learn Greek history, Roman history, European history and American history. Why shouldn’t they learn our own history – the history of Middle Eastern Jewry? The real motivation behind the museum is the need to inspire pride in the great legacy that we’ve inherited from our forbears. We often tend to look elsewhere, outside our community, for wisdom, for rabbinic scholarship. i think a lot of it is because many people do not realize the incredible legacy that we’ve inherited, and which we are all a part of.” Sephardic Pride in Film 38 Community magazine