Geniza Lab

Responsum by Moshe Maimonides. A copy. The responsum corresponds to #355 in Blau's edition ("I am very troubled by various matters, and my body is week, and I have no ability to even read the letters, let alone respond to them..."). Another copy of the same responsum may be found in ENA 2743.3. (Information from Amir Ashur via FGP)

Legal document. Dated: Av 4959 AM, which is 1199 CE. Location: Probably Alexandria, where legal documents in this period tend to be dated according to the anno mundi calendar as opposed to the Seleucid calendar used in Fustat and the other towns of Egypt. Concerns Sitt al-Gharb bt. Yehuda, the divorcee of Abū Naṣr Elʿazar ha-Kohen b. Shelomo al-Ṣayrafī al-Miṣrī. Friedman has synthesized her story based on (a) T-S 8.239 + Bodl. MS heb. a 3/36 (her ketubba, drawn up in Qūṣ); (b) T-S NS J455 (a court record from Aleppo, 1189 CE, in which Abū Naṣr agrees to send her a bill of divorce with the agent Avraham ha-Talmid b. Ḥananel); (c) Moss. VII,75 (that very bill of divorce, which reached its destination); and (d) MS 8254, fol. 15, the present document. Sitt al-Gharb has remarried. Her new husband, Abū l-Ḥasan b. Ibrāhīm, wishes to do business with the half-house that belongs to Sitt al-Gharb. Apparently she was not in agreement. This document certifies that the husband should be prohibited from doing anything with her property until an order arrives from Maimonides. Maimonides is titled "Rayyis" in this document, as he had returned to the post of the Head of the Jews by this date (though 'rayyis' is also sometimes used for any respected physician or dignitary). Information from Friedman's 1988 article, pp. 181–85.

Letter addressed to Moshe Maimonides. In Hebrew and Judaeo-Arabic. NB: The identifications and bibliography on FGP (an autograph responsum of Avraham Maimonides) actually refer to MS 8254, fol. 17.

Letter from Miryam to her brother, Moses Maimonides (1170-1204). Miryam asks her brother to enquire after the whereabouts of her son and to induce him to contact her, last quarter of the 12th century.

Petition from Hibatallāh b. Bū l-Faḍl Ibn al-Shofeṭ to Moshe Maimonides. Dating: ca. 1180 CE. The sender complains concerning a part of the revenue of the house of Ibn Pinḥas in Fustat, which had been allocated to him some time before. The petition is written in a very flowery and flattering style, in which besides biblical phrases there are also some more original figures of speech. (Information from Gil, Documents, pp. 325 #79)

Maimonides' decree on menstrual purity. Dated 1487 Seleucid, which is 1176 CE. See Eve Krakowski, "Maimonides' Menstrual Reform in Egypt," JQR (2020), 245–89.

Avraham Maimonides (in office as head of the Jews 1205-1237) is asked about the procedure in which a party appears in court together with an attorney, and answers that the defendant is obliged to respond to claims and arguments made by the attorney, but questions addressed by the defendant to the claimant have to be answered by the latter in person. (Information from Mediterranean Society, II, p. 335, 600)

The opening of a circular letter for "all the cities of the Rīf" in the name of Moses Maimonides. BL OR 5533.1, T-S 12.238, and T-S 16.9 are all versions of the same letter.

Incomplete letter to Moses Maimonides congratulating him on becoming the Head of the Jews of Egypt. The name of the sender is not preserved; Friedländer conjectured that the letter was written by Yosef Ibn ʿAqnīn. The sender is concerned that the new duties will keep Maimonides from writing books. (Information from Friedländer, Ein Gratulationsbrief an Maimonides, in Cohen, & Cohen, Hermann. (1912). Judaica : Festschrift zu Hermann Cohens siebzigstem geburtstage. Berlin: Verlag von Bruno Cassirer, p. 257-261.)

Recto: Letter from Moshe b. Ḥalfon b. Y[...], probably in Yemen, to a judge (who had a son named Netanel), probably in Fustat. In Judaeo-Arabic. Dating: Ca. 1168–1204, based on Maimonides' years in Egypt. The sender asks the addressee to ask Moshe Maimonides to issue a decision in a case between the sender and a judge (dayyān). The sender apologizes for sending two copies of this letter—he did so because of the vicissitudes of the journey. He sends regards to various people, including probably Munajjā al-Kohen. Verso: Postscript containing a similar request from Yaḥyā b. Muqbil, asking the addressee to obtain Maimonides' decision for him and send it together with the decision for Moshe b. Ḥalfon. Underneath is another postscript, apparently containing only a greeting. Goitein suggests convincingly that this letter was sent from Yemen, on the basis of the style, the script, the names, and the fact that two copies were sent. (Information in part from Goitein's index card.)

Letter by Meir b. al-Hamadani to Maimonides, asking him to accept his son as his assistant for the study of medicine. He stresses that he dared to apply to him only because he had heard that Maimonides' nephew, who had worked under him thus far, now practiced elsewhere. He promises to pay Maimonides a higher honorarium than the former apprentice. Information from Mediterranean Society, II, p. 248. On verso there is a medical prescription (nuskha li-l-khayālāt) containing twelve ingredients, along with a record of four donations received in a pesiqa dated 1225/26 CE (1537 Seleucid). ASE.

Responsa of R Hananel concerning the using of the Assyrian script for secular purposes. Maimonides responsa om this matter is mentioned. AA

Draft of a Hebrew letter from Moshe b. Levi ha-Levi to a distinguished physician also named Moshe (but probably not Maimonides because Moshe b. Levi blesses his "sons" rather than "son"). The writer just spent a week in the household of Dr. Moshe, hoping to gain a livelihood of 10 dirhams a week, as he had been struggling to support himself during this drought. However, Moshe b. Levi became embarrassed by all the trouble Dr. Moshe went to on his behalf, so he ran away. He also complains that he could not find any water with which to wash his hands. He now writes this letter begging Dr. Moshe to judge him favorably and to continue bestowing his favor on him. He reminds Dr. Moshe that he still owes Moshe half of a dirham from the book sale for the three tractates (the other draft lists Yoma, Sukkah, and Beitzah) and half of a dirhamfor Sefer Kinyan. T-S Misc.28.140 is a more developed version of the letter, with opening blessings and a signature.

Letter from a member of the nasi family of Mosul addressed to Shelomo b. Yishay describing a visit of the writer when he was a young boy to the house of Moses Maimonides. He mentions a servant of Maimonides, describing him as the “keeper of the curtain,” a duty similar to that of an usher. (S. D. Goitein, Mediterranean Society, 4:381, 454; 5:65, 522) EMS

Letter of complaint to Maimonides regarding funds for the Qodesh. Written in the hand of Meʾir b. Hillel b. Ṣadoq Av. The plaintiff asks why arrangements made for him by the mutawallī Isaiah ha-Levi b. Mišaʾel have become void; and if they are void for him, why should not the other leases and deeds of rent of ruined lots be discontinued as well. The complaint was probably submitted in 1171 or somewhat later and it emerges that the agreement made with Isaiah stipulated that the plaintiff was to rebuild a ruin of the qodesh and live in it until his investment in repairs was balanced out by a hypothetical rent, in the meantime paying only the ground rent (ḥikr) to the government. Maimonides was apparently opposed to this agreement, possibly because of legal principles regarding permission to make deals with properties of the qodesh. In the second part of the letter, the writer requests Maimonides to answer various questions on the study of the Law which he had previously asked him, and to which he now adds a question on the attitude to astronomy. He also asks him for some of his books, to be copied for him, the cost to be paid from the money due to him, if the debt is recognized. Below on verso are rhymed Hebrew wedding verses in a crude hand. (Information from CUDL and Gil, Documents, pp. 363 #94)

Legal query addressed to Maimonides, whose autograph responsum is written underneath the query. The question regards an elderly widow who accused a teacher of asking her to sleep with him. The writer insists that she is merely trying to destroy the reputation of a man who would never do such a thing, and he asks how the man should proclaim his innocence. Maimonides responds that her claim should not be believed without witnesses, that anyone who has been slandered can excommunicate his slanderer by name, but may not obtain a blanket excommunication against all who accuse him. However, still better in this case is to put an end to the gossip and avoid any kind of public discussion or excommunication. The handwriting of the questioner closely resembles that of Moshe b. Levi ha-Levi (see also ENA 2808.16 in which Moshe b. Levi asks the recipient to obtain an answer to a fatwa that he had previously sent to Fustat). ASE. Ed. Joshua Blau, R. Moses b. Maimon: Responsa, (Hebrew; 3 vols; Jerusalem, 1957–1986): Vol. 2, pp. 522-3, #274.

Maimonides’ epitome of Galen’s περὶ τῶν πεπονθότων τόπων (De locis affectis), from the second and third treatises, in Judaeo-Arabic, in Maimonides’ own hand. On the margin of P1 f.2v there is an example of Maimonides’ Arabic handwriting. (Information from CUDL)

Autograph letter from Maimonides to his pupil Ṭoviyya. The letter consists entirely of a detailed prescription of a regimen (tadbīr).

Autograph leaves of Maimonides, Treatise on sexual intercourse. (Information from CUDL)

Letter to Maimonides with autograph response on verso. "T-S Arabic Box 46, fol. 97, is a small sheet of paper the verso of which contains a note with a request for medical advice. It is interesting to note the ethical note introduced into this medical business by the sentence: 'since my entire aim in this matter is to seek the nearness to God'. The writer presumably means that through preserving health it is possible to better devote onself to the service of God. This brings to mind another similar request addressed to Maimonides in a letter published by D. H. Baneth [see the autograph letter published by Baneth, "Me-halifat ha-Mikhtavin shel ha-Rambam", Studies in Memory of Asher Gulak and Samuel Klein, pp. 50 ff.]: 'I desire from your bounty, my lord--since you, together with God, can heal my soul and its organs, so that it can employ itself in the study of the sciences--to prescribe for me what I should eat, since this is necessary, so that I can more easily understand these matters [the philosophical problems described in the first part of the letter]'. That letter has also in common with ours the fact that Maimonides' reply is written on the back of the sheet." - S. M. Stern. There are two blocks of text in Maimonides's hand on verso, at ninety degrees to each other. One is almost entirely illegible, does not appear to relate to the question on recto, and (very speculatively) could be a responsum for a legal question that the writer sent separately (though Stern would differ, as he read "dirham of lemon" where I read "shall be bound by a vow"). The other block is the answer to the dietary questions on recto. ASE.