Yihye Bashiri (), also spelt Yahya al-Bashiri (b. ? – d. 1661Dr. Moshe Gavra corrects the date of Bashiri's death as being in 1664 (see: Moshe Gavra, Studies in the Prayer Books of Yemen [Heb. מחקרים בסידורי תימן], vol. 1, Benei Barak 2010, p. 68)), known by his pen-name Avner bar Ner ha-Sharoni,See Yosef Qafih, Agadata Depasḥa, Jerusalem 1959, p. 8 (Hebrew). and by the acronym Maharib (moreinu harav yihye bashiri), was a Yemenite Rabbi, professional scrivener and sofer of the Masoretic Text whose works of Hebrew manuscripts now account for many now stored in public libraries across the globe, including the Jewish Theological Seminary of America (Rab.1276; Rab. 36; Rab. 4550), Cambridge University Library (Add.1726, p. 1-a; Add. 3407), the Russian State Library (MS. Günzburg 869) and the Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion (MS. 764), et al. Rabbi Yiḥyah Salaḥ coined him the epithet, "the great scribe of the Law."Judaeo-Yemenite Studies, Proceedings of the Second International Congress, (Ephraim Isaac & Yosef Tobi (ed.), Princeton University, NJ 1999, p. 41 note 1 (in Hebrew section). A man of uncommon piety, he is also known for an act of intervention on behalf of his community in Yemen, which brought miraculous deliverance to the Jews of Sana'a when they stood in danger of annihilation by the king, on account of libel and slander brought against them.
Background The son of Abraham ben Saadya al-Bashiri, Rabbi Yihye Bashiri lived with his family in the Yemeni territory of ar-Raḥabah near the village of al-Ḥema, a three-hour walking distance north of Sana’a.Judaeo-Yemenite Studies, Proceedings of the Second International Congress, (Ephraim Isaac & Yosef Tobi (ed.), Princeton University, NJ 1999, p. 41 note 2 (in Hebrew section). Although named Yiḥye at birth, the names Ḥayyim and Zechariah were also used by him as its proper Hebrew equivalents.Cf. Catalogue of the British Museum, vol. 3, p. 206, no. 902. Since printed books were very rare in Yemen, a gifted scribe was often employed as an amanuensis in transcribing important Hebrew literary works, but especially in supplying the community with prayerbooks and Torah codices. Many times, the one who ordered the book had special preferences in content, which accounts for the variants found in texts made by a single copyist. Thus, in the preface to the Tiklāl Qadmonim copied by the Yemenite scribe Shalom Qorah in 1938, he notes: "Be apprised that the Baladi-rite prayer books (Arabic plural: tikālil) of our teacher and Rabbi, Yihye Bashiri, may his merit rebound into the life of the world to come, are not at all identical, while some of them are found (on the most-part) based after the printed [Spanish] editions; the reason being that he was scribe and would write for everyone according to his preferences."Yosef Hubara (ed.), Sefer Ha-Tiklāl (Tiklāl Qadmonim), Copyist's Preface, Jerusalem 1964, folio opposite p. 1a.
As early as 1618, he compiled his Tiklāl Bashiri, the Baladi-rite prayerbook in Babylonian supralinear punctuation, a copy of which was made in 1938 and published in facsimile under the name Tiklāl Qadmonim in 1964.Yosef Hubara (ed.), Sefer Ha-Tiklāl (Tiklāl Qadmonim), Jerusalem 1964, p. 14Judaeo-Yemenite Studies, Proceedings of the Second International Congress, (Ephraim Isaac & Yosef Tobi (ed.), Princeton University, NJ 1999, p. 42 note 9 (in Hebrew section). In essence, the rendition used by him in this undertaking was largely based on Maimonides' version of the Jewish prayers, found in his Mishneh Torah, with the addition of other ancient material, such as the Aramaic Megillat Antiochus with a Judeo-Arabic translation.Rabbi Bashiri writes this explicitly, in his own opening statements written in Judeo-Arabic. See: Yosef Hubara (ed.), Sefer Ha-Tiklāl (Tiklāl Qadmonim), Jerusalem 1964, p. 1 That same year (the 1929th year of the Seleucid era = 1618 CE), he also copied the collection of homilies on the Torah, known as Midrash HaGadol, in which he also shed light on its anonymous author, saying that it was first compiled by "Rabbi David b. Amram, of blessed memory, a man of the city of Aden, in the land of Yemen."Yehuda Levy Nahum, in Miṣefunot Yehudei Teiman (מצפונות יהודי תימן), Tel-Aviv 1986, pp. 191–192 (Hebrew); cf. Yosef Hubara (ed.), Sefer Ha-Tiklāl (Tiklāl Qadmonim), Jerusalem 1964, p. 3 note "aleph." In 1619, he copied the Mishnah, of which only Seder Zeraim has survived.Encyclopedia of Yemen Sages (אנציקלופדיה לחכמי תימן), Moshe Gavra (ed.), vol. 1, Benei Barak 2001, p. 51; now at the Jewish Theological Seminary of New York, MS. # 36. The manuscript include certain emendations (proofreaders marks) made by the copyist in the glosses. The following year, in 1620, he would pen another Siddur, and in 1622 (1933 of the Seleucid era) he appended his name to the colophon of a Code of Legal Law which he finished copying that year from an older manuscript of Maimonides' Mishneh Torah.Encyclopedia of Yemen Sages (אנציקלופדיה לחכמי תימן), Moshe Gavra (ed.), vol. 1, Benei Barak 2001, p. 50. The MS. today is at the Jewish Theological Seminary of New York, MS. # 9864, and contains ninety-three pages.
In 1623, he wrote a "Taj" (Codex) containing the first five books of Moses, now in a private collection in Israel. (Hebrew)
Rabbi Bashiri also made a handwritten copy of Nathan ben Jehiel's seminal work, the Arukh.MS. at the National Library of Israel, Ms. Heb. 4°1190, or microfilm # B-314. Several works of kabbalah were copied by the scribe before 1630, including Rabbi Moses ben Jacob Cordovero's Ohr ha-Yakar ("A Precious Light") and Ohr Neerav ("A Pleasant Light").Today, the MS. is held at the Jewish Theological Seminary of New York, MS. no. 1767, which also includes Rabbi Hayyim ben Joseph Vital 's commentary on Isaac Luria's Ha-Idrat Ha'azinu, certain novellæ and the prayer of Rav Hamnona the elder, inter alia. Rabbi Yiḥyah Salaḥ (Maharitz) frequently makes mention of him in his writings, especially in what concerns orthography.Cf. Maharitz, Questions & Responsa Pe'ulath Sadiq, vol. 1, responsum # 100 (101), Jerusalem 1979, where Maharitz writes that in the Torah scrolls written by Rabbi Yihye Bashiri the letter aleph was made without a yod at its upper shaft, and appeared simply as a dot which joined the roof of the aleph. See ibid. (vol. 1), responsum # 14, where he mentions "the Masorah of Rabbi Yihye Bashiri," and see ibid. (vol. 1), responsum # 24, where he writes: "And I shall take notice of the elders (Psalm 119:100), of our teacher and Rabbi, Yihye Bashiri, of blessed memory, and of our teacher and Rabbi, David b. Aaron Ha-Cohen Iraqi, in the generation that preceded us, the most-distinguished scribes, the leaders over the thousands of Israel, where no hidden matter was concealed from them, and even so, in their codices (tijan) they did not bring-up anything about this," i.e. in what concerns פרשת צו וידבר ה' דכל חלב (Lev. 7: 23), which, in the Yemenite tradition, is an Open Section. See also Maharitz's Ḥeleq ha-Diqduq, on the biblical lection, Noah (Genesis 9:29), concerning the last waw in the word ויהיו, of ויהיו כל ימי נח (Published by Shelomo Qareh in a facsimile edition, Jerusalem 1982), inter alia. The Pentateuch codices penned by Rabbi Yihye Bashiri were considered authoritative by the Yemenite Jews, as far as their accuracy touching the Masoretic Text is concerned, and his younger rabbinic votaries who came after him have given to his work the honorific title "the Masorah of Rabbi Yihye Bashiri".David Solomon Sassoon, Ohel Dawid - Descriptive Catalogue of the Hebrew and Samaritan Manuscripts in the Sassoon Library, London, vol. 1, Oxford University Press:London 1932, p. 202.
The texts of old Yemenite Siddurs copied by Bashiri are an invaluable source for comparing the variae lectiones (Textual variations) of liturgy before the redaction of the Babylonian Talmud. For example, in all older Yemenite Siddurs copied by Bashiri is found the version "He who redeems Israel" in the second blessing after Shema Yisrael and on the night of Passover, that is, in the present-progressive tense instead of in the past tense (), although the requirement made by Rava in the Talmud (Pesaḥim 117b; Berakhoth 14a) calls for saying it in the past tense. Scholars point out that the Yemenite practice was the original custom in Yemen before Rava's interdict.Moshe Gavra, Studies in the Prayer Books of Yemen (Heb. מחקרים בסידורי תימן), vol. 1, Benei Barak 2010, pp. 68, 260–261; Moshe Gavra, Studies in the Prayerbook - The Passover Haggadah, vol. 1, Benei Barak 1988, pp. 146–153. For the old version, see the Passover Haggadah published by Rabbi Yaakov Subeiri, where he brings down photocopies of one of Rabbi Yihye Bashiri's Siddurs, with the version גואל ישראל. Compare Jerusalem Talmud (Berakhoth 1:5) which brings down a statement to the effect that whenever one makes a blessing over "redemption," just as we do in those verses which succeed the recital of "Hear, O Israel," etc., he sometimes mentions God's future redemption (Go'el Yisroel), while at other times he mentions God's past redemption (Ga'al Yisroel).
Enactment concerning Ketubbah
In the Yemenite ketubbah – aside from the principal obligation of 200 silver pieces for a virgin (504 grammes of fine silver), (reprinted from Jerusalem editions, 1907, 1917 and 1988), Bekhorot 8:7, s.v. and 100 silver pieces (252 grammes of fine silver) for a widow or divorced woman – there was written a unique clause: "Now this nedunya (largess; dowry) which she brought into him [upon wedlock] is valued at one-hundred silver-[alloyed] qaflas. All has been received by this bridegroom, and has come into his hand, and has become his possession, and he has incurred every-thing upon himself as it were a loan [given unto him], and a debt."
The nedunya, or what is often translated as 'the bride's outfit' (trousseau), is more effectually translated as 'largess,' or 'dowry,' since it is traditionally bestowed upon a man's daughter by her father before she marries (such as jewellery, clothing, household items, etc.), and she brings the same items and their value into the marriage, over which things her husband takes full responsibility, although they are deemed as merely a loan unto him; meaning, he is able to freely make use of them while married to her, but must return them unto her father in the event of his wife's early death. In Yemen, the standard value of a woman's nedunya was written in her ketubba as being "one-hundred qaflas" (the qaflah being a unit of weight that was equal to a dirham of about 3.0 – 3.36 grammes). If the woman's father were a liberal man, he would not demand the return of such items.