A new set of projects and discoveries is spotlighting the heritage of Yemenite Jewry, including rare manuscripts, historical documents, reconstructed clothing, and a children’s Torah-reading initiative. The material comes from the work of a preservation institute documenting what it calls major finds from Yemenite Jewish history.
The headline discovery is a page and excerpt from "Tefuot Re’em," a manuscript written about 100 years ago, in 1926, by Rabbi Abraham Arusi after he immigrated to Israel. Arusi, writing at age 48, included a passage about a future "new wonder" that the institute says eerily describes smartphones, hair transplants, and plastic surgery, including a device carried in the bosom that lets two people speak and see each other from far away. Five researchers examined the manuscript and confirmed its dating and authorship, and the full book is due out in about six months.
The institute also says it has uncovered a previously unknown halakhic responsum attributed to Maimonides, preserved in a unique manuscript written about 400 years ago by Rabbi Yochanan Mizrahi in the Rada’a district of Yemen. Other finds include a copy of a practical-kabbalah work by Rabbi Shalom Shabazi, one of only three surviving rare rabbinic hats once worn by leading Yemenite rabbis, and a royal parchment signed by the king of Yemen approving a synagogue in Rad’a and the land purchase for the Jewish community.
Separately, the institute said it has completed a 25-year project to accurately reconstruct Yemenite Jewish clothing, beginning in China with the women’s head covering known as the "matasar" and ending in India with the original wedding clothes for bride and groom. It also published a photo album with about 250 images, many never before seen, taken by the first Jewish photographer in Yemen, Yechiel Chayibi, with nearly all of the people identified after two years of research. In another campaign, 120 children were invited to record the first three verses of the sixth blessing, and the first 120 who read correctly will be included in a digital singing book and receive books and purchase vouchers. The campaign also led 750 people to sign that they would wear a wrapped tallit on Friday night, following Yemenite custom.
