Rav Yehuda Yehoshua Tzadka

Early years

Rav Yehuda Yehoshua Tzadka zt"l, Rosh Yeshiva of Porat Yosef, was born in Yerushalayim on 13 January 1910. His father, Rav Shaul Tzadka, was a merchant from Baghdad who had come to Eretz Yisroel around 1900. His mother, Simcha, was a niece of the Ben Ish Chai. Rav Yehuda was also a great-great-grandson of Rav Tzadka Chutzin, author of Tzedoka U'Mishpot.

The family made their home in the Bais Yisrael neighborhood of Yerushalayim. As a boy, Rav Yehuda learned at Talmud Torah Bnei Tzion, located in the Bukharim Quarter. Afterward he joined the Porat Yosef Yeshiva in the Old City, only a year after its founding. After the passing of the Rosh Yeshiva, Rav Shlomo Laniado, he became a talmid of the new Rosh Yeshiva, Rav Ezra Attia, to whom he grew very close and from whom he went on to learn for forty-five years.

Rav Yehuda was a diligent student and rose to the top of his class. During the day he learned in the yeshiva, and in the evenings he went to the Be'er Sheva shul in Bais Yisrael. Every Friday night he learned in the Shoshanim L'Dovid synagogue, a gathering place for Sephardi talmidei chachamim.

Torah and leadership

In 1937, when Rav Yehuda was twenty-seven, Rav Attia recommended him to take the place of a senior lecturer who could no longer teach. His first class included Rav Ovadia Yosef, Rav Ben Zion Abba Shaul, Rav Yehuda Moallem, Rav Baruch Ben Haim and Rav Ezra Ades, all of whom later became leaders of the Sephardi Torah world.

Rav Yehuda taught in the classic Sephardi way, centered on the Maharsha and the Maharam. Like Rav Attia, he also gave great weight to the study of musar, such as the Mesilas Yesharim. He had a gift for fitting each shiur to the level of his talmidim. He loved Torah and those who learn it, and he rushed to perform mitzvos. He lived simply, and he encouraged his talmidim to be content without luxuries.

Rav Yehuda was fully qualified to serve as a dayan, and he was invited to join a new regional bais din founded by Rav Reuven Katz, the Rav of Petach Tikva. He chose to stay in Porat Yosef, learning and teaching.

When the Jordanian army took the Old City in the war of 1948, Rav Yehuda oversaw Porat Yosef talmidim who were learning in shuls across Geula, Katamon and the Bukharim Quarter. Once the war was over, he spent four months in England collecting funds for a new yeshiva building, which was built in Geula in the mid-1950s.

Outside the yeshiva, Rav Yehuda worked throughout Eretz Yisroel to persuade Sephardi families to educate their children in Torah rather than in secular schools. At rallies of the P'eylim organization he spoke for the Torah education of new immigrants, and on registration days he went from school to school, pleading with parents to enroll their children in Torah schools. After the State was founded, he went to the absorption camps, which housed Sephardi Jews who had fled or been expelled from Arab lands. He asked the parents there to keep their children out of secular schools, and he encouraged the established communities to open Torah schools for the immigrants' children.

In time Rav Yehuda became the Menahel Ruchani (spiritual director) of the yeshiva. When Rav Attia passed away in May 1970, the directors asked Rav Yehuda to become the new Rosh Yeshiva, and he accepted. Then a new sign appeared on his classroom door reading "Rabbi Yehuda Tzadka, Rosh Yeshiva," and he had it removed and would not accept the title.

Teachings and seforim

In 1984 Rav Yehuda published his sefer Kol Yehuda, whose title means "The Voice of Yehuda." It combines halacha and aggadah and reflects his approach to every area of life.

Later years and passing

In his later years Rav Yehuda suffered a series of heart attacks, but each time he recovered and returned to his teaching. Even in the hospital he still rose at midnight for Tikkun Chatzos and davened vasikin (at sunrise). Rav Elazar Shach once visited him and found him lying in an intensive-care bed, absorbed in a sefer.

His last heart attack came during the night of Tzom Gedalyah in 1991, and he was brought to the hospital. Two weeks later he had a stroke and fell into a coma. Rav Yehuda passed away on 12 Cheshvan 5752 (20 October 1991) and was buried in a family plot in the Sanhedria Cemetery.

Legacy

In 1934 Rav Yehuda married Fahima Batat, the daughter of Rav Selim Tzalach Batat of Baghdad. Their family included five sons and two daughters. Fahima passed away at the age of fifty-seven, and Rav Yehuda later married Tamar Asuderi, who survived him.

Rav Ben Zion Abba Shaul succeeded him as Rosh Yeshiva. After Rav Ben Zion's passing in 1998, Rav Yehuda's son, Rav Moshe Tzadka, took over as head of the Geula branch of Porat Yosef. Rav Yehuda had been a talmid and then a teacher at the yeshiva for almost seventy years.