ḥabshūsh family
royalty and the sādah (descendants of the
Prophet Muḥammad), but at the same level as
qabā il, the bedouin. Each lineage established
multiple alliances with various tribal entities to
ensure protection for its members wherever
they wandered. Individuals established warm
relations with Wahidi royalty and the Awaliq
leadership, further enhancing security. Jews
and Arabs were oten invited guests at one
another’s lifecycle events. Dhimmi status was
honored far more in terms of protection than
exploitation. hus, for example, the poll tax
(Ar. jizya; see → Dhimma and → Taxation) for
the entire Habbani community totaled eight
riyals per year, about one smith’s earnings for
one month! here were, of course, problems,
including property disputes, sexual advances
toward Jewish women, and the consequences
of individual conversions to Islam. But aside
from the atermath of the → Aden riots of 1947,
Jews felt secure and liked by their neighbors.
192
Judeo-Arabic and Hebrew was unique and not
easily understood by other Yemeni Jews.
Urged by their Muslim neighbors to remain,
but fearful of being the only Jews in Yemen, the
Habbani were evacuated en masse to Aden and
thence to Israel in July 1950.
Bibliography
Ashkenazi, Tuvia. “he Jews of the Hadramaut,” Edot 2
(1946): 58–71 [Hebrew].
Loeb, Laurence. “Jewish Life in Habban: A Tentative
Reconstruction,” in Studies in Jewish Folklore, ed.
Frank Talmadge (Cambridge, Mass.: Association for
Jewish Studies, 1980), pp. 201–217.
———. “Jewish-Muslim Socio-Political Relations in
Twentieth Century South Yemen,” in Judaeo-Yemenite
Studies: Proceedings of the Second International Congress, ed. Ephraim Isaac and Yosef Tobi (Princeton:
Princeton University Press; Haifa: Institute of
Semitic Studies, 1999), pp. 71–99.
Ratzaby, Yehuda (ed.). Sefer ha-Musar le-Rav Zekharya
al-Ḍ ahrī (Jerusalem: Ben-Zvi Institute, 1965).
Ṣadoq, Moshe. “ Aliyat Yehude Ḥ abban,” in Yehude
Teman (Tel Aviv: Am Oved, 1967), pp. 259–262.
Serjeant,
R. B. “Hud and Other Pre-Islamic Prophets
4. Religious Life
of the Hadramaut,” Le Muséon 67 (1954): 121–179.
Because most of the men were away silver- ———. “A Judeo-Arabic House Deed from Habban
(with Notes on the Former Jewish Communities of
smithing except during the months of Nisan
the Wahidi Sultanate),” Journal of the Royal Asiatic
and Tishre, some of the older men and a few
Society (1953): 117–131.
younger ones, delegated to serve the community, took responsibility for educating the
young boys, organizing prayer, and performing
ritual slaughter. While rabbinic ordination was
not possible, more than a third of the adult men
were fully trained as shoḥtim (ritual slaughterers). By age nine, boys began to accompany
their fathers, uncles, and brothers to apprentice
as silversmiths, but education in Torah, prayer,
and Jewish law took priority most of the day.
By adulthood, Jewish males were, without
exception, literate in Hebrew. Jewish women
were not formally educated until the 1940s,
when several began to learn to read.
With so many men absent much of the year
women were in charge of running the households and also found time to develop elaborate
poetry and games associated with the Sabbath,
minor holidays, and weddings. he Habbanis
produced no extant religious works of distinction, but there was a sizable repertory of religious and semireligious poetry in Hebrew and
→ Judeo-Arabic. he Habbani pronunciation of
EJIW_Batch 5 G-J_161-436.indd 192
Laurence Loeb
Ḥ abshūsh family
he Ḥ abshūsh (Ḥ ibshūsh) family, based in
→ San a, produced several prominent merchants and rabbis who made important contributions to Yemenite Jewish literature and
religious life in the nineteenth and twentieth
centuries. he family name is probably derived
from the Arabic noun ḥ abash (Abyssinia) and
might indicate that the family once had Abyssinian commercial contacts.
Shalom ibn Yaḥyā Ḥ abshūsh (1825–1905)
was appointed head of the San a yeshiva ater
the death of Yaḥyā Badīhī in 1887. As the
yeshiva closed permanently during the Turkish
siege of San a, Shalom was the last incumbent
of this oice; he died in the ensuing period
of famine and civil unrest. Shalom wrote a
number of works. His Qorban Toda (he
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193
hank-Ofering) on the laws of ritual slaughter,
is a series of novellae on Yaḥyā ben Jacob Ṣāliḥ’s
Meqor Ḥ ayyim (Fountain of Life). His Shoshannat ha-Melekh (he King’s Lily) is an abridgment, with brief commentary, of Ṣāliḥ’s volume
of responsa, Pe ulat Ṣaddiq (he Labor of the
Righteous).Yehuda Ratzaby says that Shalom
was also the author of a kabbalistic work entitled Liqquṭe Ketuvim (A Chrestomathy of the
Hagiographa; Ms. Qāiḥ 47/1).
he member of the Ḥ abshūsh family who is
best known to contemporary historians is the
coppersmith, author, and communal leader
Ḥ ayyim ibn Yaḥyā → Ḥ abshūsh (1839–1899),
who accompanied the French orientalist Joseph
→ Halévyon his journey through Yemen and
wrote about it in a → Judeo-Arabic work entitled Ru yā al-Yaman (A Vision of Yemen). He
also wrote an important collection of essays on
Yemenite Jewish history entitled Halikhot Tema
(he Ways of Yemen).
Solomon ibn Yaḥyā Ḥ abshūsh (1856–1921),
Ḥ ayyim’s younger brother, was a successful
merchant who wrote a chronicle in Hebrew
entitled Sefer Eshkolot Merorot (he Book of
Bitter Clusters). he irst part of the work
describes the Yemenite revolt against the Ottomans (1904–1905). he second part discusses
the sufering of the Jews of San a under the
Zaydī regime of Imām Yaḥyā Muḥammad
Ḥ amīd al-Dīn (1904–1948). It includes the text
of the Zaydī → dhimma agreement, apparently
modeled on the Pact of ‘Umar, which was
imposed on the Jews in 1905. Solomon witnessed many of the events he describes, but he
also made some use of Muslim chronicles.
Jehiel ben Aaron Ḥ abshūsh (Hibshoosh)
(1908 or 1913–2002), Solomon’s grandson, let
San a for Israel in 1927 and there became a
prominent advocate for Yemenite Jewry. In
1970 he settled in New York, where he continued this work. He wrote proliically on the Jews
of Yemen and on the Ḥ abshūsh family. He visited Yemen in 1989 and wrote about the state
of its remaining Jews in his She erit ha-Peleṭa
be-Teman (he Surviving Remnant of Yemen;
Jerusalem, 1990).
EJIW_Batch 5 G-J_161-436.indd 193
ḥabshūsh, ḥayyim
Bibliography
Gavra, Moses. Enṣiqlopedya le-Ḥ akhme Teman (Bnei
Brak: Makhon le-Ḥ eqer Ḥ akhme Teman, 2001),
vol. 1, pp. 132–136.
Ḥ abshūsh, Solomon. Sefer Eshkolot Merorot, in HaTemanim, ed. S. D. Goitein (Jerusalem: Ben-Zvi
Institute, 1983), pp. 171–196.
Qoraḥ, Amram b. Yaḥyā. Sa arat Teman: Qorot haYehudim be-Teman (Jerusalem: Mosad Harav Kook,
1954).
Ratzaby, Yehuda. Toratan sheli-Vene Teman: Meḥ abberim ve-Ḥ ibburim (Ḳiryat Ono: Mekhon Mishnat
ha-Rambam, 1995).
Tobi, Yosef, and Shalom Seri, Yalqut Tema n (Tel Aviv:
Amutat E eleh ba-Tamar, 2000).
Alan Verskin
Ḥ abshūsh, Ḥ ayyim
Ḥ ayyim ben Yaḥyā (Yiḥye) Ḥ abshūsh
(Ḥ ibshūsh) al-Futayḥī was born in 1839 in
→ San ā to a well-known Yemeni rabbinical
family. His work as a coppersmith gave him an
interest in the ancient Sabean copper inscriptions, which he initially collected for their
magical properties. When the French orientalist Joseph → Halévy went to → Yemen in 1869
in search of the inscriptions, Ḥ abshūsh ofered
to be his guide. he encounter with Halévy was
transformational. Ḥ abshūsh developed a lifelong fascination with European thought and
the writing of history. He also came to believe
that the fate of Yemenite Jewry depended upon
Europe and repeatedly campaigned for Europeans to involve themselves on its behalf.
Ḥ abshūsh was an active member of Dor De a
or Darād a (Generation of Reason), a rationalist movement, founded by Yiḥye → Qāiḥ, that
campaigned against belief in the Kabbala and
championed the modernization of Yemenite
Jewish education (see → Dar Da School). He
was also prominent in the opposition to Joseph
Abd Allāh (1888–1893), the last of Yemen’s
false messiahs (see → Messianism in Yemen).
Ḥ abshūsh is primarily known for two posthumously published books (discussed below),
both of which he began in 1893 and may have
originally intended as a single work. Ḥ abshūsh
died in San ā in 1899.
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ḥabshūsh, ḥayyim
1. Ru yā al-Yaman
Ru yā al-Yaman (Jud.-Ar. A Vision of Yemen)
documents Ḥ abshūsh’s journey through northeastern Yemen in 1869–70 as the native guide
of Joseph Halévy. he book was written some
twenty years aterwards at the request of the
Austrian orientalist Edouard → Glaser. It begins
in Hebrew, but then, again at Glaser’s request,
continues in San ānī → Judeo-Arabic. As
emerges from its pages, Ḥ abshūsh respected
Halévy’s learning and was grateful to him for
broadening his cultural horizons, but at the
same time considered Halévy unsympathetic
and contemptuous toward Yemenite Jewry and
believed that he had misinformed his compatriots in Europe about them. Ḥ abshūsh
intended his book to counter Halévy’s portrayal
by enlightening the Jews of Europe about the
history, culture, and plight of Yemenite Jewry.
hus, he frequently digresses from the travel
narrative to provide information on these matters. Although his focus is on the Jews, the
work is also an important source for Islamic
history.
In Ru yā al-Yaman Ḥ abshūsh provides a
unique, richly detailed account of daily life,
economic conditions, family dynamics, religious life, folk beliefs, and regional diferences.
He describes Halévy’s revolutionary efect in
these spheres, especially in regard to internal
debates about the Kabbala. Ḥ abshūsh also discusses Jewish-Muslim interactions in some
detail. Unlike previous Yemenite chroniclers,
he treats not only the tragedies but the instances
of good relations between Jews and Muslims.
Of particular interest in this regard are his discussions of the diferences between customary
Yemenite tribal law (Ar. urf ) and the Islamic
law of the → dhimma, how the strength of each
varied from place to place, and their efect on
Jewish customs. Tribal customary law deined
the relationship between Muslims and Jews
within the framework of patron-client (Ar. jār)
relations that had existed since pre-Islamic
times. It aforded Jews many freedoms and
privileges prohibited by Islamic law. Ḥ abshūsh’s
account of the persecutions of Jews provides
important information about their efect on
Jewish migration and settlement. Also signii-
EJIW_Batch 5 G-J_161-436.indd 194
194
cant is his account of the efect of the → Ottoman conquest of San ā (1872) on the Jews and
the mixed results of Ottoman attempts to
improve their treatment.
he fact that Halévy never mentioned
Ḥ abshūsh in his writings and the discrepancies
between the travel routes in their respective
writings has led some to doubt that Ḥ abshūsh
really accompanied him. he question cannot be deinitively resolved. Whether or not
Ḥ abshūsh did in fact accompany Halévy, his
book is invaluable to students of Yemenite
social history.
2. Halikhot Tema
Halikhot Tema (Heb. he Ways of Yemen) is
a short collection of disparate Hebrew essays
mainly about Yemenite Jewish history. It is
based upon both oral sources and a wide
assortment of written material. Use is also
made of Muslim chronicles to which most Jews
had little access. he work covers the decrees of
Imām Yaḥyā al-Hādī (890), the expulsion of the
Turks from San ā (1629), Sabbatean activity in
Yemen (see Shabbetay Ṣevi), the expulsion of the
Jews to → Mawza (1679) and its atermath, the
adoption of the Sephardic liturgy in Yemen,
the nineteenth-century dung-gathering edict,
and the activities of Joseph Abd Allāh. It also
contains an essay on the plight of elderly Jews
and a letter written by Ḥ abshūsh to a society of
London missionaries who were active in
Yemen.
Bibliography
Gavra, Moses. Enṣiqlopedya le-Ḥ akhme Teman (Bnei
Brak: Makhon le-Ḥ eqer Ḥ akhme Teman, 2001),
vol. 1, pp. 132–136 [Hebrew].
Goitein, S. D. (ed.). Masa ot Ḥ abshush, ed. S. D. Goitein
(Jerusalem: Ben-Zvi Institute, 1983) [Hebrew].
Ḥ abshūsh, Yechiel b. Aaron. Mishpaḥat Ḥ abshush (Israel,
1985) [Hebrew].
Koraḥ, Amram b. Yaḥyā. Se arat Teman: Korot haYehudim bi-Teman (Jerusalem: Mosad Harav Kook,
1954), pp. 51–55 [Hebrew].
Qāiḥ, Joseph. “Qorot Yisra el be-Teman” = “Halikhot
Tema,” Sefunot 2 (1958): 246–286 [Hebrew].
Alan Verskin
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