David ben Judah

David ben Judah was an exilarch during the first half of the ninth century. In his bid for office, David was opposed by another member of the exilarchal dynasty named Daniel. The dispute between the two candidates is mentioned in the Epistle of Sherira Gaon, as well as in the Syriac chronicles of Michael the Syrian and Bar Hebraeus.

According to the latter sources, David was backed by the Jews of Tiberias, while Daniel, described as a follower of ʿAnan ben David, had the support of the Babylonians. The same sources connect the conflict with a proclamation by the Abbasid caliph al-Maʿmūn (d. 833) allowing religious groups of at least ten people to appoint their own leaders. David is generally thought to have been the victor in the controversy, but a reference to the grave of “the exilarch Daniel in the time of al-Maʿmūn” in an eleventh-century letter from the Cairo Geniza recently led to the suggestion that each of the candidates may have viewed himself as the legitimate appointee. Sherira notes in the Epistle that in David ben Judah’s time the exilarchate lost its authority over the Pumbedita yeshiva. David had a son named Judah who was an exilarch in the second half of the ninth century.

Arnold Franklin

Bibliography

Gil, Moshe. The Jews in Islamic Countries in the Middle Ages (Leiden: Brill, 2004).

Goode, Alexander. “The Exilarchate in the Eastern Caliphate, 637–1258,” Jewish Quarterly Review, n.s. 31 (1940): 149–169.

Citation Arnold Franklin. " David ben Judah." Encyclopedia of Jews in the Islamic World. Executive Editor Norman A. Stillman. Brill Online , 2013. Reference. Jim Harlow. 01 February 2013 <http://referenceworks.brillonline.com/entries/encyclopedia-of-jews-in-the-islamic-world/david-ben-judah-SIM_0006400>