Geniza Lab

Legal notes in the hand of Ḥalfon b. Menashshe (Date: 1100-1138). Partnership record. Seʿadya b. Menashshe ha-Kohen has inherited funds from his father, and places 26 dinars with his maternal uncle Abū Isḥāq Avraham b. Efrayim, who will travel with the funds and remit 11/24 of the profit to Seʿadya’s mother. Avraham’s report of partnership profits is not notarized. The only condition is that Avraham may not invest or lend out the funds to anyone except someone called “Barhun”. Losses are to be split evenly; as the active partner, Avraham is entitled to a larger share of the profits than that for which he would be liable in terms of losses, per Maimonidean criteria (even though the difference between Avraham’s share in the profit and his share in the loss is only 1/24 of the total profit). Per Maimonides, the partners have the flexibility to create such a profit and loss sharing agreement only if they have multiple concurrent business relationships; otherwise the percentage of profits allocated to the active partner must exceed the percentage of losses by at least 1/6 of the total profit, in which case Avraham would have been allocated no less than 2/3 of the profit (since he is to share losses equally with Seʿadya). (Information from Lieberman, "A Partnership Culture", 102)