Responsum: On Prostitutes’ Gifts to the Synagogue

Born in Rabat, Morocco, Raphael Aaron Ben Simeon (Ben-Simeon) immigrated to Jerusalem in 1854 with his father, R. David ben Shimon, the Radvash, a rabbinic leader of the Maghrebi (North African Jewish) community in Jerusalem. In his youth Ben Simeon studied both classical Jewish texts and modern maskilic works in Hebrew. He also learned Arabic and European languages. In 1891 Ben Simeon became hakham bashi (chief rabbi) of Cairo, a post he held until 1921. He was a noted halakhist (legal scholar), and was particularly valued for his creative legal responses to the challenges of Western influence on Sephardic and Mizrahi Jewish ways of life. These included a ban on clandestine betrothal (to prevent women from becoming agunot; that is, women whose husbands have left them without issuing a divorce, thus leaving them unable to remarry); permission to use piped water for ritual baths, and discussions about the use of new technologies like electricity and matches on festivals. he also wrote on the history of Moroccan and Egyptian Jews. Upon retiring in 1921, Ben Simeon settled in Tel Aviv.