SIBONI

SIBONI (al-Sabʿuni), family of rabbis in Salé, Morocco. The most prominent member, AARON, was rabbi in Salé in the mid-17th century. He edited Moses Albaz's kabbalistic prayer book Heikhal ha-Kodesh (Amsterdam, 1653) and, with jacob sasportas , condemned and wrote against the Shabbateans, particularly for not observing fast days. Aaron spent some time in Amsterdam as an international merchant. One of his letters to Sasportas describes the expulsion of Jews from Oran by the Spanish on Passover 1669 and the subsequent transformation of the synagogue into a church. His sons JOSHUA and DAVID were rabbis in Salé in the late 17th century and wrote homilies, most of which are extant in manuscript. SHALOM, rabbi in Salé in about 1853, composed dirges (kinot) and prayers, which are also extant in manuscript. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: Y. Benaim, Malkhei Rabbanan (1931), 25, 79, 86, 105; Hirschberg, Afrikah, 2 (1966), 105, 112, 253–4.