Our Great Sephardic Rabbis by: Ike Sultan
Hacham Yoseif Haim, know as the Ben Ish Hai, is undoubtably the greatest Sephardic Torah scholar in his time. Rabbi Joseph Chaim ben Elijah was born in Baghdad, ca. 1835, and studied under Rabbi Abdallah Someich. Although the en Ish hai was the spiritual leader of his community he never served as official rabbi of Baghdad, since he did not want take compensation for his Torah. Al-Chakam wrote many works, about both halachah and Kabbalah. One of these books, Ben Ish Chai, a brief summary of practical halachah (comparable to the Kitzur Shulchan Aruch popular among Ashkenazic Jews), remains very popular among Sephardic Jews to this day. Rabbi Joseph Chaim also edited the text of the Sephardic prayer book, in which he included kabbalistic elements. His responsa include answers to queries from Baghdad, Iraq, and all over the Far East - India, Singapore, Ceylon, Kurdistan, and elsewhere. Accordingly, valuable historical and sociological information about these communities can be gleaned from his responsa. Rabbi Joseph Chaim visited Israel, where he was received with great honor by the local rabbis. He died in 1909.
Every Saturday night immediately following havdalah, the Ben Ish Chai would ascend to the attic of his house to study, permitting no one to disturb him. It was rumored that on these occasions, Eliyahu HaNavi would appear to him to teach him Torah. The young men of his bais hamidrash, Bet Midrash Zilcha, wanted to test the veracity of this report. So they dispatched one of their ranks, Rabbi Yehoshua Sharboni, to ... "rush up the steps and enter the Ben Ish Chai's attic room without knocking, on the pretext of posing a specific question to him. Then you will see for us whether or not Eliyahu is there." No sooner was Shabbat over than Rabbi Yehoshua did as he was told. Half-way up the stairs, he met Rabbi Yoseif Chaim descending, who stopped to say: "My wise Yehoshua, in the bais hamidrash are they debating this perplexing problem...? Go down and tell them that the explanation is as follows..."
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