Geniza Lab

Letter, possibly from the office of Yehoshua Maimonides, recommending a man who is “poor but from a good family.” The community of Fustat is asked to help by taking up a collection in the synagogue, referred to as a ‘pesiqa.’ (Mark Cohen, The Voice of the Poor in the Middle Ages: An Anthology of Documents from the Cairo Geniza, Princeton University Press, 2005, 197) EMS. Bibliography: Mentioned in Goitein, "The Twilight of the House of Maimonides," Tarbiz 54 (1984), 67–104.

Recto: Note from a certain ʿUzziel. In Judaeo-Arabic. Explaining that the collection of pledges (pesiqa) has been delayed because it was mismanaged from the outset. The sender says he is always trying to expedite it, and he will deal with the matter as soon as he is free. Dating: ca. 12th–13th century. (S. D. Goitein, Mediterranean Society 2:544) EMS. Verso: Business accounting in Judaeo-Arabic and in Arabic script. (Information from CUDL)

Complete calligraphic letter without names or details, reminding some persons to induce the jamā‘a (community) to contribute to the collection (מן מאלהם במא אלהמהם אללה). (Information from Goitein's index cards) EMS and VMR

Letter by Ḥalfon to the Dayyan Yosef explaining that the Nagid told him that the daughter of the late Mufaddal b. al-Dimyati al-Kohen was otherwise engaged and should not have married Nissim Abu al-Ma‘ani, the writer’s business partner. (Information from Goitein's index cards) EMS

Petition of a cantor, son of a judge, who is sick and poor, asking God and a Nasi for help (the Nagid Mevorakh per Goitein's identification of the writer). See Oded Zinger, Women, Gender, and Law, 83, 324; S. D. Goitein, Mediterranean Society 2:109. EMS. "I have become chronically ill. I cannot move from my place more than a span without pains and screams. As God is my witness, I cannot even stand to pray. I have entered serious straits because of my illness and poverty. By Moses and Aaron, I have no silver except what I receive from the synagogue on Mondays. My illness requires a lot of money. I beseech you to aid me and address my situation, like you address the situation of strangers and converts and captives. If you delay, I will perish and die, lost." ASE.

Letter written by a Byzantine scribe in Egypt on behalf of an unnamed blind man, addressed to a charitable administrator called ‘Eli ha-Kohen b. Hayyim and his son Efrayim. Dating: ca. 1090 CE. The letter details that the poor man’s wife and children are due to come up from Alexandria but they have written to say they cannot afford the cost of a boat ride, and so the writer requests that Eli ha-Parnas hold a collection and “do not let the oppressed return in shame.” The foreign scribe spells Alexandria with a qof instead of the expected kaf. (Ben Outhwaite, “Byzantines in the Cairo Genizah,” in Jewish Reception of Greek Bible Versions, ed. Nicholas de Lange, Julia Krivoruchko, and Cameron Boyd-Taylor, 183, 197-201) EMS

Letter from Avraham b. Rav Shelomo the Yemeni, in Jerusalem, to Eliyyahu the Judge in Fustat. Avraham lives with Eliyyahu's son, the physician Abu Zikri, and he conveys the good news that Abu Zikri has recovered from his febrile illness and has not relapsed for forty days. Avraham's family recently arrived from Bilbays. On verso are jottings and accounts in the hand of Shelomo b. Eliyyahu. Same writer and recipient as T-S 13J21.5, which was written not long after this one (Goitein's note cards suggest ca. 1214). Alan Elbaum.

Letter requesting charity in which the petitioner describes that he is unemployed, starving, from a distant land (al-Raḥba), and has ‘uncovered his face’ to the addressee. EMS. NB: This was previously listed as T-S 8J16.29 on PGP.

Letter addressed to Abu Sahl b. Moshe, the cantor, in which the writer requests aid in a mixture of Hebrew and Judeo-Arabic. In a post-scripted note, the petitioner also requests some food should the addressee have a Jewish celebration. (Mark Cohen, Voice of the Poor in the Middle Ages, Princeton University Press: 2005, 57-8). "By constant fasting and hunger my eyesight has become faint and my heart blotted out, so that I do not know what I am writing" (Goitein, Med Soc V:87). EMS.

Letter. Strongly-worded admonition to a Muqaddam to deal with the estate of a widow and her daughter, in accordance with instructions by the Nagid. (Information from Goitein's index cards) EMS Verso: Biblical citations from Leviticus 8:26-27 and 30-31. (Information from CUDL)

Letter from a widow, with one orphaned daughter and whose house had collapsed, petitioning a high-ranking official in the community for assistance. The woman employs the common strategy of appealing especially for her fatherless daughter, and indicates furthermore that she herself was an orphan. (Mark Cohen, Voices of the Poor, 89) EMS

Letter from Yahya b. ‘Ammar (basis for identification unclear), who had reached Jerusalem with the help of a benefactor in Fustat, petitioning for assistance so that he may remain in Jerusalem (“Har-El”(?)). The letter, written by a scribe, utilizes the biblical phrase from Psalm 61:5, that God may cover his would-be benefactor “with the cover (be-seter) of His wings.” The verso contains a line from Psalm 119:165 and notes that the letter was dictated by Saadya b. Futuh. (Mark Cohen, Voices of the Poor, 23; and S. D. Goitein, Mediterranean Society, 5:35, 514) EMS

Letter of petition, draft, addressed to “our lord” Mevorakh during his first term in office, from the “holy community of Malij and its cantor.” Only the prefaratory laudes and the address on the back have been preserved. (Mark Cohen, Jewish Self-Government in Medieval Egypt, 167; and Marina Rustow, “The Diplomatics of Leadership: Administrative Documents in Hebrew Script from the Geniza,” in Christians and Jews in Muslim Societies: Jews, Christians and Muslims in Medieval and Early Modern Times: A Festschrift in Honor of Mark R. Cohen, ed. A. Franklin, R.E. Margariti, M. Rustow, and U. Simonsohn, 167) EMS Verso: Address, in 2 lines, and 4 lines of Hebrew script in a different hand and ink which have been crossed through. (Information from CUDL)

Letter from a certain Efrayim concerning consignments of wheat and sums of money, written in a very polite form with many Hebrew phrases, among them biblical citations such as Deuteronomy 26:11. (Information from CUDL) See also Goitein's index card.

Letter to Peraḥya ha-Ḥaver about a visit of the carrier of the note, Abū l-ʿAysh, to the Nagid for the issue of whether he had to pay the capitation tax (jāliya) in Fustat or in Peraḥya's location. Verso: Accounts and jottings in Hebrew and Arabic script, mentioning people including Abū l-Ḥasan the doctor, Yeḥiʾel and Nissim. (Information from Goitein's index cards and CUDL) EMS

Fragment of a letter from Nehemya ha-Kohen, the Pumbedita Gaon, to one of the members of the Babylonian community in Fustat, probably the beginning of 963. Asks to renew the connections between them by a gaon’s emissary, probably Shlomo b. Eli b. Tavnai, and by Tuv Aluf and the sons of Aaron ha-Baghdadi. (Gil, Kingdom, vol. 2, #17) VMR

Letter from the Alexandrian community to Shemuel ha-Levi, "the prince of Levites, the glory of doctors" b. Shelomo, requesting his help in countering a decree that forbade saying piyyutim (Heb. sacred poetry) during prayer. Goitein argued that the letter was written from a country town in Egypt while Friedman suggested that the letter originated from the Jerusalemite Synagogue in Fustat and that the decree forbidding piyyutim was part of the Hasidic reforms of prayer which Avraham Maimonides tried to implement. In Frenkel's opinion, the letter was sent from Alexandria. There are a few indications for this in the letter: The mentioning of 'the evils of gentiles' (recto - line 17) fits well with Alexandria which was known for its fanatic atmosphere and for its not uncommon anti-Jewish acts of violence; see Goitein, Med. Soc. 2:278-281. The same is true for the mention of an epidemic lung disease common to Alexandria (recto, right margin line 1 and the note to this line). Furthermore, Alexandria was known for its characteristic prayer customs, to which the Alexandrian Jewish community adhered with zeal; see for example the responsa sent by Saadya b. Berakhot ha-Melammed from Alexandria to Maimonides (Maimonides, Responsa, vol. 1, #113, p. 196; vol. 1, #118, p. 202; vol. 2, #163, pp. 311-312; vol. 2, #259, p. 485). Friedman's argument that the decree forbidding piyyutim originated from Avraham Maimonides fits well with the argument that the letter was sent from Alexandria. A group of pious followers (Heb. Hassidim) of Avraham Maimonides settled in Alexandria and strove to implement in the wider community the principals of their creed. The reference to these pious followers as 'judges, cantors and managers of pious foundations' (Verso, line 3) agrees with other hints about the followers of Avraham Maimonides as enjoying material benefits and neglecting their spiritual mission. On the active followers of Avraham Maimonides in Alexandria see Goitein, 'Our Rabbi Avraham,' Trabitz 33 (1964): 181-197. (Information from Frenkel.) [The suggestion that barāsīm refers to an epidemic lung disease is doubtful. Though the Pahlavi birsām originally meant "pleurisy," in the Arabic medical literature, the word was used interchangeably with sirsām, i.e., phrenitis or delirium. Al-Razi notes that even if physicians sometimes distinguished the two terms, laypeople regarded them as fully synonymous. See Ullmann, Islamic Medicine, pp. 29-30. Both the disease and the death are metaphorical in this letter: "O Israel, if you see that we have been ended and killed by the frenzies brought against us (by our persecutors), know that we have been killed for the sake of the rite of our fathers and grandfathers and prophets..." It would not be a martyrdom to be killed by a disease. ASE.]

Recto: Letter from Natan, a foreigner from Jerba (the island off the coast of Ifrīqiyya), who claims that he has been unjustly placed under house detention by the Muslim authorities. House arrest was imposed for unpaid debts in general, not just for the capitation tax. Unable to acquit himself of the entire obligation he owed he had been paying interest for nine months as well as the fee for house arrest (payment for the guardsman, called tarsīm), the normal procedure in such cases, a form of 'debtor's prison.' He asks assistance from a notable, a Jewish courtier with connections to the Muslim government. (Information from Cohen.) Join by Oded Zinger.

Letter, beautifully written, by a woman married for 15 years addressed to Masliah, the head of the Jewish community in Egypt (1127-1138), complaining about neglect and asking him to intervene with her husband to grant her divorce and payment of her dues. (Information from Mediterranean Society, III, p. 186 and CUDL)

Left side of a letter of appeal for charity, from Shaul ha-Levi. What is preserved seems to contain learned discussion of charity. (Information from Goitein's index cards)