Acharonim1540–1631Cairo; Alexandria; Algiers
Rabbi Chaim Kafusi (the Baal HaNes)
Halakha and responsa, Torah commentary
- Sifrei Chaim
- Be’or HaChaim
- Baal HaNes
- The Mekhilta of Rashbi
- Cairo
- Alexandria
- Damietta
- Algiers
- Egyptian Jewry
- The Maharikash
Halakha and responsa, Torah commentary
His responsa reflect the life of the Jews of Egypt and the Ottoman Empire over more than 60 years, among them halakhic disputes with the rabbi of Egypt, the Maharikash. In his commentary on the Torah, Be’or HaChaim, he interprets by plain sense and allusion.
A halakhic authority and commentator, one of the great sages of Egypt in the 16th and 17th centuries, born in Algiers to a family of Spanish origin. His life was full of suffering and wandering between Cairo, Alexandria and Damietta, and according to a legend his sight was miraculously restored after he went blind, and from then on he was called “Baal HaNes”. His responsa stayed in manuscript for centuries; he also wrote Be’or HaChaim on the Torah and Sifrei Chaim on the Mekhilta, and died in 1631.
The archive doesn’t yet record Rabbi Chaim Kafusi’s teachers, so the road to Sinai can’t be drawn yet.