DAVID BEN DANIEL

DAVID BEN DANIEL (fl. second half of the 13th century), exilarch in Mosul, Mesopotamia. David was descended from the exilarch Josiah b. Zakkai and a grandson of the exilarch david b. zakkai II. In 1288 David issued a threat of excommunication edict against R. Solomon b. Samuel (Petit), who came to Acre from France and revived the propaganda against Maimonides' works. David was supported by 11 rabbis, who accepted his authority and joined him in signing the edict. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: Mann, in Sefer Zikkaron … S. Poznański (1927), 23–25, 32; S. Poznański, Babylonische Geonim (1914), 120–2. (Tovia Preschel) DAVID BEN ḤAYYIM OF CORFU DAVID BEN ḤAYYIM OF CORFU (d. 1530), rabbi and halakhic authority, known sometimes as MaHaRDaKh (Morenu HaRav David ha-Kohen). David was born on the island of Corfu. He studied under judah minz in Padua and was much influenced by the Ashkenazi method of study. He served in the rabbinate in communities in Greece (including Corfu and Patras), and was in halakhic correspondence with distinguished contemporaries, among them Elijah Mizraḥi , moses alashkar , Jacob ibn Ḥabib , and Joseph Taitaẓak . Among his disciples were his son-in-law, David Vital, and samuel kalai . He spent the last year of his life in Adrianople, where he died. Most of his works were destroyed in a conflagration there. A few responsa were rescued and published in Constantinople in 1537 by his son, Ḥayyim; they show him to be an outstanding halakhist, with a definite tendency toward stringency. In his vehement dispute from 1520 to 1525 with Benjamin Ze'ev of Arta with regard to permission given to an agunah to remarry, he took an extreme stand in opposition to the lenient attitude adopted by other rabbis (see Res. Benjamin Ze'ev (Venice, 1539), nos. 1–17, 239, 246–9). He also declared that those Marranos who could have fled from their persecutors and did not do so were to be regarded as apostates. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: Conforte, Kore, 31–35; Graetz-Rabbinowitz, 6 (1898), 433–4; 7 (1899), 31, 36–37; H.J. Zimmels, Die Marranen in der rabbinischen Literatur (1932), 30–32; Rosanes, Togarmah, 1 (19302), 79–80. (Abraham David) DAVID BEN HEZEKIAH DAVID BEN HEZEKIAH (d. before 1090), exilarch in Babylonia, son of the exilarch hezekiah b. david . David was in Jerusalem for a period during the gaonate of solomon b. judah (1025–51). It seems that he wanted to be recognized as nasi in Ereẓ Israel, but did not succeed. Later, still during the lifetime of his father, he apparently visited Egypt. He then returned to Baghdad, and when his father died in 1058, succeeded him as exilarch. It is not known whether, like his father, he also acted as rosh yeshivah of Pumbedita. In 1090 his son Hezekiah is mentioned as exilarch. His grandson David b.   Hezekiah was also exilarch and was followed in the first half of the 12th century by his son Ḥasdai. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: S. Poznański, Babylonische Geonim (1914), 1–3; Mann, Egypt, 2 (1922), index; Mann, Texts, 1 (1931), 208; idem, in: Sefer Zikkaron … S.A. Poznański (1927), 22f. (Abraham David)