Rav Hai Gaon of Pumpedisa

Early years

Rav Hai Gaon zt"l was the last of the Geonim of Pumpedisa, and with his passing the era of the Geonim came to a close. The Geonim were the great Talmudic scholars who headed the yeshivos of Sura and Pumpedisa, and their era lasted nearly 450 years. They flourished in Babylonia from about the year 4350 to 4800, following the Rabbanan Seburai (about 4260 to 4350), who themselves followed the Amoraim (about 3980 to 4260), the sages of the Gemara, which was completed in 4260.

Rav Hai was born in 939 in Babylonia (Iraq), the son of the equally renowned Rav Sherira Gaon, head of the yeshivah of Pumpedisa, a town near present-day Baghdad. He grew up in his father's care and under his teaching. While still young he became known for his remarkable command of the whole Talmud and of the writings of the earlier Geonim, which were carefully kept in the yeshivah's archives. It is thought that he may have helped his father with Rav Sherira's famous Letter.

The writings of Rav Saadia Gaon, the next-to-last Gaon of Sura, who passed away in 942, influenced him, and Rav Hai became skilled in the sciences and in several languages. He knew Persian and Arabic and was familiar with Arabic literature. He allowed children to be taught to write Arabic and to do arithmetic, but he warned against studying philosophy. He also criticized his father-in-law, Rav Shmuel ben Chofni, and others like him, who read the works of non-Jews too often.

Torah and leadership

At the age of 48 Rav Hai was appointed Av Beis Din, head of the highest court and the second highest office after the Gaon. For a time father and son held the two highest positions in the leadership of the Jewish people together. A short time before his father passed away, in 998, Rav Hai succeeded him as Gaon of Pumpedisa. In that same year Rav Shmuel ben Chofni challenged him for the position, and Rav Hai resolved the dispute by marrying Rav Shmuel's daughter.

He served as Gaon for forty years, until his passing on the 20th of Nissan 4798 (1038), at the age of 99. He led during the decline of the Abbasid dynasty, yet he remained a recognised halachic authority.

Jews in every land revered him, from Persia and Turkey in the east to Spain in the west. Questions reached him from the Western Christian countries and from Byzantium as well as from Spain. The greatest Torah scholars of his day sent him inquiries and accepted his rulings as final, among them Rav Shlomo ben Yehuda in Eretz Yisroel, Rabbeinu Nissim of Kairwan in North Africa, and Rabbeinu Nissim's talmid, Rav Shmuel HaNagid of Spain. Rav Hai had a deep influence on Rav Shmuel HaNagid. Avraham ibn Daud wrote that no Gaon before him spread Torah among Israel as widely as Rav Hai did, in the east and in the west, and that none could be compared to him as the last of the Geonim.

Teachings and seforim

Rav Hai's teshuvos (responsa), written in the language of each question, whether Hebrew, Aramaic or Arabic, added greatly to the literature of the Geonim. He and his father together wrote about 1000 of them. He also wrote many halachic works, mostly in Arabic, the spoken language of most Jews in the Arab lands. Some were later translated into Hebrew. Several survive in part, in the original Arabic, in Hebrew translation, or both, and some have been published with commentaries. Other Rabbinic works quote him frequently.

Among his major works is Mishpat Shevuos, also called Shaarei Shevuos, on the laws of oaths, which was translated from Arabic into Hebrew by an unknown translator and first printed in Venice in 5362 (1602). Another is Sefer Mekach uMimkar, on buying and selling, a work of sixty chapters printed together with a summary of a separate work on the laws of loans. Rav Yitzchak al Barceloni translated it from Arabic into Hebrew, and the Arabic original was lost. These works deal with business law, including contracts, agreements and litigation.

He also wrote on the dietary laws, in a work called the Book of the Forbidden and the Permitted, and on the laws of shechitah and tefillin and other areas of daily Jewish life. He wrote commentaries on Tanach, Mishnah and Gemara, including commentaries on at least seven tractates, of which only parts have survived. He composed piyyutim and selichos, in which he expressed bitterly his sense of living in exile from Eretz Yisroel, and as an expert grammarian he wrote treatises on Hebrew and Arabic grammar. In his writings he explained in detail his approach to the principles of faith and to the demands of communal leadership.

Rav Hai was a mekubal (mystic). He held, against the view of his father-in-law, that Hashem performs signs and awe-inspiring acts through the righteous, as He did through the prophets. Yet he strongly opposed those who believed that divine names and charms can change the course of nature, and he declared that nature's laws cannot be altered by such means. He rejected any tendency toward anthropomorphism and taught that passages in the Aggadah that speak of God in human terms are to be understood metaphorically.

Legacy

Rav Hai emphasised the duty of Jewish judges to guide and admonish the people, and their responsibility for the people's conduct and their accountability for its sins. He demanded strong measures against dissenters and thieves, and in certain circumstances even permitted recourse to courts of law. He opposed the complete annulment of vows on the eve of Yom Kippur, and his version of Kol Nidrei asks that Heaven absolve and pardon vows that were left unfulfilled through neglect or under constraint. He respected local liturgical customs but discouraged looking into their reasons, insisting that institutions set by those greater in learning and stature than our generations be kept.

Rav Hai was a scholar of many fields, and his lasting contributions reach halachah, the interpretation of the Gemara and Tanach, and the history of Jewish tradition, customs and prayer. Hashem gave him a long and fruitful life and extraordinary gifts, so that as the last of the Babylonian Geonim he could pass the Geonic heritage on to later generations. He formed an important link in the chain of Torah tradition from Moshe Rabbeinu through the Tannaim, Amoraim and Geonim, at a time when the center of Jewish life was moving from the East to the West.

His work was carried on by his many talmidim and by the leading Torah authorities of the next generation. The respect he enjoyed is reflected in the titles attached to his name, "Father of Israel" and "Teacher of all Jews."