Geniza Lab

Letter from a man in debt and unable to meet his commitments, petitioning for help collecting charity promised by the nagid but not received, specifically the pledges (usually made in a synagogue) for a particular week. The writer describes that his children have died of hunger and that he has been hiding from a creditor and is confined to the house “like a woman,” thus unable to earn money through work. The pledges intended for the petitioner had been transferred to the cantor, the elder Bu Sa‘d, and so the writer requests his “master intercede on my behalf so that I am paid that week’s pledges.” (Mark Cohen, Voices of the Poor, 78-9) EMS