Ezra Attiya

Judaism portal

Ezra Attiya (31 January 1885 – 25 May 1970) (Arabic: عزرا عطية‎) was one of the greatest teachers of Torah in the Sephardic Jewish world in the 20th century. He was rosh yeshiva of Porat Yosef Yeshiva in Jerusalem for 45 years, nurturing thousands of students who, together with their students, constitute the bulk of Sephardic Torah leadership today.^[1] Among Rabbi Attiya's most famous students are Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu, Rabbi Ben Zion Abba Shaul, and Rabbi Yitzchak Kaduri.

Early life

Rabbi Attiya was born on 31 January 1885 (Tu Bishvat 5645 on the Jewish calendar) in Aleppo, Syria, which was then part of the Ottoman Empire. His parents were Yitzchak and Leah.^[2] He was named after the Prophet Ezra, because his mother prayed for a child at the latter's gravesite.^[3] He had one brother, Eliyahu. His father was a direct descendant of Rabbi Shem Tov Attiya, a disciple of Rabbi Joseph Caro, author of the Shulchan Aruch.^[4]

When Ezra was sixteen years old, his family immigrated to Jerusalem's Old City, to which a large number of rabbis from Aleppo had immigrated.^[1]. Soon after, his father died, leaving an impoverished widow and two orphans. While his mother hired herself out for domestic work in the homes of wealthy people, young Ezra decided to devote his life to Torah study. He went to learn, pray, and sleep on a bench in a small beth midrash in the Bukharim neighborhood of the New City called Shoshanim LeDavid, covering vast amounts of the Talmud with commentaries and poskim (halakhic decisors). As money was scarce in his household, he sustained himself with a nightly meal of dry pita seasoned with salt. In his old age, he told his students, "When I was young, I studied Torah through hardship. If we were truly fortunate, my mother and I had a whole pita to share. On rare occasions we also had an egg, which we divided in half. But the hunger did not bother me in the least."^[2]

In 1907, Rabbi Ezra Harari-Raful, another Aleppo immigrant, established the Ohel Mo'ed Yeshiva in Jerusalem. Rabbi Attiya was asked to join its staff along with distinguished Sephardic Rabbis Yedid HaLevi, head of the Sephardi beit din (rabbinical court) of Jerusalem, Shlomo Laniado, and Abraham Ades. He served as maggid shiur.

Marriage and flight

In 1909, Attiya married Bosila Sallam, daughter of Rabbi Avraham Sallam, a kabbalist.

At the beginning of World War I, there was a general mobilization for the Turkish army, and Rabbi Attiya's colleagues advised him to flee to Egypt. Rabbi Attiya settled with his wife and family in Cairo. At first he attempted to go into business, but quickly lost most of his money. Then he met Nissim Nachum, a wealthy refugee who knew him from Jerusalem. With Nachum's backing, Rabbi Attiya opened a yeshiva named Ahavah VeAchvah in the basement of the Cairo rabbinate. Under his direction, the yeshiva grew to 100 students, attracting many from secular backgrounds. Rabbi Attiya also gave classes to workingmen, and was a dayan on the Cairo beit din.^[1]

His relationship with the Cairo community continued long after he returned to Jerusalem in 1922. In 1947, in response to a request from the city for teachers for the yeshiva, which by now had grown to 200 students, Rabbi Attiya sent two of his top students to Cairo as teachers — Rabbi Shlomo Kassin (who was expelled by the Egyptian government shortly afterwards for "Zionist activities") and Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, who taught there for three years.^[1]

Rosh yeshiva

A Porat Yosef Yeshiva going-away party, circa 1947. Seated, from left: Rabbi Ezra Attiya, Rabbi Baruch Ben Haim, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef. Standing, first row, far left: Rabbi Ben Zion Abba Shaul.

Rabbi Attiya returned to Jerusalem in 1919 and to his teaching position at Ohel Mo'ed Yeshiva. He also studied privately with two leading Sephardic kabbalists, Rabbi Chaim Shaul Dweck and Rabbi Solomon Eliezer Alfandari. When Porat Yosef Yeshiva opened in 1923, Ohel Moed was merged with the new yeshiva and Rabbi Attiya was appointed as the mashgiach ruchani.^[1] Following the sudden death of the rosh yeshiva, Rabbi Shlomo Laniado, in 1925, Rabbi Attiya was named his successor.

He served as rosh yeshiva for 45 years. One of his greatest accomplishments was to change the way that yeshiva education was viewed in the Sephardic world. Until that time, full-time Torah learning past the age of bar mitzvah was reserved for gifted students from Sephardic homes; most Sephardic boys went to work to help support their families. Rabbi Attiya did everything he could to enable boys to continue learning into their teens, many times offering to underwrite the costs of their education. In one case, a poor boy from Iraq applied for admission to the yeshiva but could not provide the necessary tuition. Rabbi Attiya went to Rabbi Ben Zion Chazan, the yeshiva's founder and secretary, and offered to reduce his own salary to accommodate the boy. Rabbi Chazan then offered to reduce his own salary as well. The boy went on to become a respected talmid chacham.^[1]

Rabbi Attiya was similarly instrumental in keeping the young Ovadia Yosef in the Torah world. At one point, the promising young scholar suddenly stopped coming to yeshiva for several days. Rabbi Attiya paid a visit to his home and was shocked by the poverty he saw there. Ovadia's father explained that he owned a small grocery store and needed his son to work for him. Rabbi Attiya's efforts to convince the father of the importance of Torah learning fell on deaf ears. The next morning, when the father entered his store, he found Rabbi Attiya standing there wearing a work apron. The rosh yeshiva explained that he had come to the store early that morning when Ovadia was opening up. He had told the boy that he had found a substitute worker who would work without pay, and sent him back to yeshiva. "You said that you needed someone to help and could not afford to pay. I am that someone. Your son's learning is more important than my time!" The father finally conceded and allowed his son to continue learning.^[5]

Rabbi Attiya was personally involved with every student in his yeshiva. He tested the younger boys every two to three months, gave a daily shiur to the older boys, taught a nightly shiur to the married kollel students, and gave a weekly mussar lecture — often lasting up to two hours — to the entire yeshiva.^[1]

He also developed a unique Sephardic approach to Torah and Mussar. He always carried a copy of the mussar classic, Chovot ha-Levavot ("Duties of the Heart") on his person, and strongly advised his students to do the same. He instructed every class in the yeshiva to begin each day with a short mussar lesson.^[1]

He was greatly respected by Torah leaders such as Rabbi Tzvi Pesach Frank and the Chazon Ish. After visiting with him, the Chazon Ish expressed the opinion, "The rosh yeshivah possesses the power of reasoning like one of the Rishonim."^[6] He had an encyclopedic knowledge of all areas of Torah. One of his leading students, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef, testified at Rabbi Attiya's funeral that his teacher knew the entire Choshen Mishpat (the section of the Shulchan Aruch dealing with monetary laws) by heart.^[4]

Rabbi Attiya also served as a dayan on the Sephardi beit din of Jerusalem. His opinion was sought and valued by rabbinical leaders and laymen alike.

Rabbi Attiya fulfilled his goal of training Sephardic Torah scholars who could build Sephardic communities at large. During his tenure, he trained thousands of students, including many of the future leaders of Sephardi Jewry in Israel, the United States, Europe, South Africa and South America. These students included: Rabbi Ovadia Yosef and Rabbi Mordechai Eliyahu, future Sephardi Chief Rabbis of Israel; Rabbi Yitzchak Kaduri, renowned Kabbalist; Rabbi Yehuda Tzadkah, who succeeded him as rosh yeshiva of Porat Yosef; Rabbi Ben Zion Abba Shaul; Rabbi Baruch Ben Haim, who became a leader of the Syrian Jewish community in Brooklyn, New York; Rabbi Eliyahu BenHaim, Rabbi of the Mashadi community in Great Neck, NY; and Rabbi Zion Levy, future Chief Rabbi of Panama.

Leadership under fire

Rabbi Attiya's tenure as rosh yeshiva was marked by political upheaval. When the 1929 Arab riots cut off access to the yeshiva building in the Old City, Rabbi Attiya moved classes to several synagogues in the New City and appointed advanced students to teach them, while he personally supervised every location. During the Israel War of Independence, the yeshiva again evacuated to synagogues in the Katamon, Geula and Bucharim neighborhoods.^[7] This time, however, the yeshiva building was burned to the ground by Jordanian troops, and thousands of Rabbi Attiya's unpublished writings were burned along with it. He refused to rewrite them, feeling that they were not meant for publication. Instead, his students would be his lifetime achievement.^[1] After the war, the yeshiva moved into a new building in the Geula neighborhood. The original yeshiva campus was rebuilt and reopened in the 1970s.

Final years

Advancing age and weakness forced Rabbi Attiya to give up much of his responsibilities at the yeshiva. However, he continued to make himself available for advice and consultation with anyone who needed him. In this way, he continued to nurture the Sephardic Torah leaders he had trained and dispatched to communities around the world.

In 1969, he became seriously ill and drifted in and out of a coma for an entire year. He died in Jerusalem on the morning of 25 May 1970 (19 Iyar 5730) and was buried on Har HaMenuchot.

References