R. Yaakov Mutzafi
1900 CE–1983 CE · Modern · Jerusalem
R. Yaakov Mutzafi (1900-1983) was the leading Baghdadi-Jerusalem kabbalist of the postwar generation — heir to the Sephardic-Lurianic tradition of the Beit El academy and the spiritual leader of the Iraqi-Jewish community in Jerusalem. Born in Baghdad and brought up as a disciple of the Ben Ish Chai's circle, he made aliyah in 1934 and became rosh yeshiva of Yeshivat Bnei Tzion, the principal Iraqi-Jerusalem learning center.
His responsa, collected as Sho'el u-Meishiv, and his kabbalistic-homiletic Torah commentary Ish Sadeh are widely used in Mizrachi communities. He was a rosh yeshiva of the Sephardic Porat Yosef system and the spiritual mentor of his more famous son, R. Ben Zion Mutzafi.
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BaghdadIraq
What they did here
Born in Baghdad; studied with the senior disciples of the Ben Ish Chai.
Baghdad in this era
Baghdad in the modern era remained home to one of the Middle East's oldest and most culturally rich Jewish communities, even as the wider world convulsed with emancipation, nationalism, and catastrophe. Under Ottoman rule through the nineteenth century and then British mandate after World War I, Iraqi Jews—numbering around 150,000 by the twentieth century's mid-point—enjoyed relative security and prosperity, dominating trade and serving as merchants, money-changers, and professionals. The community maintained vibrant yeshivas where traditional Babylonian Jewish learning flourished, and Hebrew printing presses produced works that circulated throughout the Levantine world. Yet this stability proved fragile: growing Arab nationalism, the founding of Israel in 1948, and subsequent Arab-Israeli wars ignited violent upheaval. Massive Jewish emigration followed, with over 100,000 Iraqi Jews airlifted to Israel between 1950 and 1952 in Operation Ezra and Nehemiah. The storied Jewish quarter, once filled with synagogues and study halls stretching back centuries, emptied within a generation. Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, born in Baghdad in 1920, carried this heritage of Iraqi Jewry with him into his monumental career as a leading Sephardic halakhic authority and spiritual guide to hundreds of thousands of Jews worldwide.
About Baghdad
Major Mizrahi center; home of Yosef Hayyim (Ben Ish Chai).
Works
No works attributed in the corpus yet.