ASHKENAZI, ABRAHAM BEN JACOB
- ASHKENAZI, ABRAHAM BEN JACOB
- ASHKENAZI, ABRAHAM BEN JACOB (1811–1880), Sephardi chief
rabbi of Ereẓ Israel. Ashkenazi was born in Larissa, in Greece, but c.
1820 his family settled in Jerusalem where he studied under Samuel
Arvaẓ, and was successively appointed a dayyan in the
bet din of Benjamin Mordecai Navon, av bet din
(1864), and rishon le-Zion, the title given to the Sephardi
chief rabbi (1869). He was head of the Bet Jacob Pereira and the Tiferet
Israel yeshivot. He was responsible for the purchase of the site of the
traditional grave of Simeon ha-Ẓaddik in Jerusalem. During his years of
office he introduced many important changes in the organization of the
community. He was on friendly terms with the Greek patriarch. Ashkenazi
was decorated by Emperor Franz Josef during the latter's visit to
Jerusalem, and by the sultan. In 1847 he was sent on a mission to North
Africa. Ashkenazi wrote approbations to many books. Some of his responsa
have been published (chiefly in the responsa Benei Binyamin
(1876–81) of Benjamin Navon, and the Kappei Aharon (1874–86)
of Aaron Azriel); but most of them remained unpublished. Ashkenazi had a
remarkable knowledge of halakhic
literature and was said to know the responsa of Solomon b. Abraham
adret by heart. Together with Jacob Kapiluto he edited
Takkanot Yerushalayim on the regulations and customs of the
city (1869). A ruling published under the title Yismaḥ Moshe
(1874) upholding the will of the caid Nissim Samama of Tunis provoked
considerable controversy, but the rabbis of Ereẓ Israel, Egypt, and
Smyrna upheld his decision. Ashkenazi's most important work, an
extensive commentary on the Ḥukkat ha-Dayyanim of Abraham b.
Solomon ibn Tazrat, a disciple of Adret, has not been published. In it
he assesses the views of the early and late halakhic authorities,
particularly of Adret. The work is a real contribution to Jewish
jurisprudence. Some of his essays and eulogies were published in
Ha-Levanon, Ḥavaẓẓelet, Yehudah vi-Yerushalayim, etc. He had
an intimate knowledge of the lives of the scholars of Jerusalem, and it
was he who encouraged A.L. Frumkin to write his Toledot Ḥakhmei
Yerushalayim. His son ISAAC, a well-known
talmudist, was one of the leaders of the Jerusalem community (1908).
-BIBLIOGRAPHY:
A.M. Luncz (ed.), Lu'aḥ Ereẓ Yisrael, 13 (1908), 85–86; I.
Badahab, Ki be-Yiẓḥak Shenot Ḥayyim (1928), 4–5, 24–27; M.D.
Gaon, Yehudei ha-Mizraḥ be-Ereẓ Yisrael, 2 (1938), 121–2; S.
Halevy, Ha-Sefarim ha-Ivriyyim… (1963), 66, 80–81, 85, index.
Encyclopedia Judaica.
1971.
Look at other dictionaries:
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