Geniza Lab

Letter in the hand of Shelomo b. Eliyyahu to Ḥisday ha-Nasi (a Qaraite communal leader) concerning a husband who wishes to divorce the wife he had been coerced into marrying in Alexandria. The husband demands to pay the marriage gift in installments (i.e., never completely) after all that he had suffered from her bad character (al-tarbut raʿa). He has been with her for three years, but it feels like twenty. He is perishing from his illness (maraḍ) and poverty and bad wife. If his request is refused, he threatens to flee the country and leave her an ʿaguna. Shelomo is probably not writing on his own behalf, as it is unlikely that he would consult a Qaraite Nasi for a legal opinion. Contains elements of both a petition and responsum. There is a provocative (mis)quotation of Leviticus 14:45 on verso: "I have broken (should be: he shall break) down the house, the stones of it, and the timber thereof, etc." With this the husband is comparing his wife (referred to as one's 'house' in Judaeo-Arabic) with a house stricken with ẓaraʿat. (Information from CUDL and Oded Zinger, Women, Gender and Law: Marital Disputes According to Documents of the Cairo Geniza, 87, 149, 180, 220, 260.) EMS. ASE.