Yosef Hayyim - Biography

Biography

Yosef Chaim was born in Baghdad where his father, Hakham Eliyahu Chaim, was the active leader of the Jewish community. Yosef Chaim's talents were evident from a young age (composing an anonymous responsum at age 14). When he was 7 years old he fell into a pit and was very close to dying. When he got out the community believed it was a miracle so he decided to dedicate his life to Torah.

He initially studied in his father's library, and, at the age of 10, he left midrash ("school room") and began to study with his uncle, David Chai Ben Meir who later founded the Shoshanim LeDavid Yeshiva in Jerusalem. In 1851, he married Rachel, the daughter of Hakham Ovadia Somekh. They had a daughter and two sons together; Yosef Chaim also studied under his brother in law, Abdallah Somech.

When Yosef Chaim was only twenty-five years old, when his father died. Despite his youth, the Jews of Baghdad accepted him to fill his father's place as the leading rabbinic scholar of Baghdad, though he never filled the official position of Hakham Bashi. He was widely accepted as an authority on Jewish law throughout the Middle East, and his decisions were considered to be of religious legal significance, even outside Sephardi communities. The Sephardic Porat Yosef Yeshiva in Jerusalem, was founded on his advice by Joseph Shalom, of Calcutta, India — one of Rabbi Chaim's patrons.

Chaim clashed with the reformist Bavarian Jewish scholar Jacob Obermeyer who lived in Baghdad from 1869 to 1880, and excommunicated him. Part of the contention was due to Obermeyer and Chaim's conflicting views on promotion of the Zohar.

Yosef Chaim was buried in Baghdad, but there is also a grave attributed to him on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem. His son, Rabbi Yaakov Chai, continued his legacy. Some of his known students are Rabbi Yehuda Fatiyah, Rabbi Yehoshua Sharabani, Rabbi Yehuda Tzadka, Rabbi Ben Zion Abba Shaul, Rabbi Yisrael Abuhatzeira and Rabbi Mordechai Sharabi.