There has been extensive discussion associated with this profile and, for the benefit of future investigators, I would like to offer a summary of key points in the research, excerpted from various of these discussions.
SUMMARY OF INVESTIGATION INTO THE ANCESTRY OF AKIVA OF OFEN
06APR2021:
1) the JE article written by renowned historian and rabbi Meyer Kayserling, who was both an expert on Sephardic Jewry and the Chief Rabbi at Budapest MAKES NO MENTION OF A SEPHARDIC ORIGIN for Akiva of Ofen/Buda, 2) neither of the two reference volumes used by Kayserling (Kohn and Frumkin) MAKE ANY MENTION OF A SEPHARDIC ORIGIN.
22MAY2021:
It has taken this long for the research materials to become available to me and I would like to report my findings so as to tie up this loose end, I am listing the books reviewed here to avoid duplicate work if some future researcher wishes to look for more evidence elsewhere:
a) Exile and Diaspora : studies in the history of the Jewish people presented to Professor Haim Beinart; Jerusalem : Ben-Zvi Institute of Yad Izhak Ben-Zvi and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem ; Madrid : Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas, 1991
b) Moreshet Sepharad = The Sephardi Legacy / edited by Haim Beinart; Jerusalem : Magnes Press, Hebrew University, 1992 (both volumes)
c) The Expulsion of the Jews from Spain / Haim Beinart ; translated by Jeffrey M. Green; Oxford ; Portland, Or. : Littman Library of Jewish Civilization, 2002
d) The Jewish Community of Salonika : History, Memory, Identity / Bea Lewkowicz; London ; Portland, OR : Vallentine Mitchell, 2006
e) Geschichte der Juden in Spanien und Portugal by Meyer Kayserling. Hildesheim, Gerstenberg Verlag, 1978 (Kayersling remember is the historian and rabbi who wrote the Jewish Encyclopedia article about R' Akiva of Budin, the grandson of R' Akiva the Elder of Salonika)
f) Biblioteca española-portugueza-judaica and other studies in Ibero-Jewish bibliography by the author, and by J.S. da Silva Rosa; with a bibliography of Kayserling's publications by M. Weisz. Selected with a prolegomenon by Yosef Hayim Yerushalmi (NB: This volume includes what seems to be a complete list of Kayserling's numerous historical writings, articles, lectures, and books, most of which are in German, and would be a good source of further research for those with access to such materials)
The above in addition to the two prior discussed works by Kohn and Frumkin listed as bibliographic sources at the end of the Jewish Encyclopedia article by Kayersling entitled 'R' Akiba HaCohen of Ofen'.
In all of the above sources there isn't a speck of evidence connecting R' Akiva the Elder of Salonika to the Balearics, Spain, or Portugal. If one considers that Kayserling, who wrote his article about R' Akiva of Budin' for JE in 1901 (at the end of his career) and had already written the 'History of Jews in Spain and Portugal' as well as numerous other books and articles on Sephardic topics by that time, it seems clear that he (Kayserling) had seen no evidence regarding Sephardic origins for R' Akiva of Budin or his grandfather R' Akiva the Elder, or else this evidence would have made its way into one of these writings. To be clear, I have not read every word written by Kayersling and he wrote quite alot, so there could be some reference in another book which I did not see. The above books are the only ones I could obtain at the local library. I am not saying that this absence of evidence proves the question: I am only reporting that despite a fair amount of searching I found no evidence supporting the factoid of R' Akiva the Elder's being a refugee from Spain, Portugal, or the Balearics. I am always open to new evidence so please keep this thread's followers informed if anything new appears on this matter.
25MAY2021:
PS: In reference to some earlier discussion in this thread. In the article The “Mother of Israel” or the “Sephardi Metropolis”? Sephardim, Ashkenazim, and Romaniotes in Salonica (Jewish Social Studies: History, Culture, Society vol. 22, no. 1 (Fall 2016): 81–129. Copyright © 2016 The Trustees of Indiana University. doi:10.2979/jewisocistud.22.1.03) authored by Devin E. Naar, Isaac Alhadeff Professor of Sephardic Stud-ies, associate professor of history and Jewish Studies, and chair of the Sephardic Studies Program at the University of Washington. He is the author of Jewish Salonica: Between the Ottoman Empire and Modern Greece (2016). (denaar@uw.edu), Professor Naar repeats the list of synagogues founded in Salonika:
"Known as the “historic congregations,” the 29 initial kehalim established in Salonica through the seventeenth century demonstrate the diverse backgrounds of the city’s Jews. The names of the kehalim referred to the places from which their founders came. The plurality—13—were founded by Jews who arrived not directly from Spain but from Italy (named Italia, Sisilia, Pulia, Otranto); seven by Jews from Spain (Sefarad, Kastiya, Mayorca, Cataluña, Aragon); five from Portugal (Portugal, Lisbon, Evora); and one from North Africa (Mograbis). They joined Greek (Etz Ahaïm, established in the first century), central European (Ashkenaz, 1376), French (Provencia, 1394), and Venetian (1423) congregations that had been established, according to local tradition, prior to 1492." p 86
In the footnote following this passage, Professor Naar cites the following reference for this information: Elias Messinas, The Synagogues of Salonika and Veroia (Athens, 1997) So it seems that the establishment in 1376 of an Ashkenazic Synagogue in Salonika, cited in Wikipedia, is supported by several scholars. Further on in the same article Naar states: "Ashkenazi Jews had deep roots in Salonica, with their first synagogue established, according to local tradition, in 1376 by Jews from Hungary and expanded by Jews from Germany in 1470." p. 103 My guess is that the Buda Jews who built the Salonika temple were not that far removed from the Holy Roman Empire themselves, likely having fled from there about 100 years earlier. This remains to be verified....
28OCT2021:
I have just now seen an article in the Encyclopedia Judaica about R' Akiva HaKohen of Ofen (i.e. Buda: the grandson of R' Akiva the Elder). This article suggests that R' Akiva of Ofen's father was Menahem, rather than Yitzach as shown on this GENI tree. Has anybody investigated this? Who was Menahem HaKohen? Does this raise a question regarding the pedigree shown currently on GENI? Here is the article and the sources are listed there: https://go-gale-com.i.ezproxy.nypl.org/ps/retrieve.do?tabID=T003&am...... If this URL doesn't work, you can find the article on page 563 of Volume 1 of the 2nd Edition of the Encyclopedia. These are the sources listed there: S. Kohn, A zsidók története Magyarországon (1884), 227–8; S. Bűchler, A zsidók története Budapesten (1901), 57–58; idem, in: Magyar-Zsidó Szemle, 27 (1910), 82–83; B. Mandl, in: Mult és Jövő, 25 (1935), 316; MHJ, 2 (1937), 537–8; A. Schreiber, Hebraeische Kodexueberreste in ungarlaendischen Einbandstafeln (1969), 122. [To be clear, except for the Kohn book, I did not check the other sources mentioned at the end of this post, but since these sources were used for the EJ article, it is unlikely that they will provide any data about Akiva of Salonika that was no mentioned in EJ.]
25OCT2022:
I have been reviewing the gravestone from the Ancient Prague Cemetery, as edited by Otto Muneles in 1988 book. The grave of Akiva's daughter Yocheved Horowitz is there. Here is what Muneles comments regarding the family of Akiva (roughly translated):
"...nothing is known about these people [referring to Akiva's ancestry] in the 15th century, but only in the 17th century..." Muneles then goes on to report several entries from the books of the Prague City Council: "Yosef, the brother of Kiba (Akiva), bought in 1523 (ibid., page 211b) for himself and his wife Fromet half a house in the amount of 10 sheqr fr. It seems that in 1532 Yosef got involved in the bankruptcy of the heirs of Meir Horowitz (2111, page 17); In 1533 (ibid., page 57b) Yosef Valach, he and his wife Pyaarle, bought a house from Yosef, Akiva's brother, in the amount of 104 sheqr ch." SOURCE: Epitaphs from the Ancient Jewish Cemetery of Prague, Edited by Otto Muneles, Israel Academy of Sciences and Humanities, Jerusalem, 1988, p. 166 (65).
Meanwhile, Jacobi worked on the Akiba tree, but his work was not finished and there is no HaKohen "A" (as he called this line) in the published Jacobi Papers. There is some partially finished work on the Akiva tree in the unpublished Akiva papers housed in the Paul Jacobi Collection in the National Library of Israel (Givat Ram Campus of Hebrew University). However, it is possible to reconstruct some Jacobi's work on the Akiva tree in the published papers, because of references in the published chapters to the HaKohen "A" line. I have made a gedcom file showing what Jacobi did with this family, which is quite interesting. I cannot upload this to GENI because the profiles are form before 1800 so I an can only offer a download of the gedcom for those interested: https://www.xyvy.info/service/HaKohenA_15gens.zip.
So neither Muneles nor Jacobi found any evidence connecting HaGaon Rabbi Akiva HaCohen Katz, of Ofen to Rabbi Yitzhak HaCohen Katz, [of Galata] or Rabbi Akiva Hakohen Katz, ABD Saloniki (Alter of Salonika)
22AUG2022:
I heard that Dr. Micheal Miller (Associate Professor Nationalism Studies Program / Jewish Studies Program Central European University Quellenstraße 51, Vienna) is writing a book about the History of Hungarian Jewry.
Dr. Miller is the author of all these books: Rabbis and Revolution: The Jews of Moravia in the Age of Emancipation (Stanford, 2011), Cosmopolitanism, Nationalism and the Jews of East Central Europe (Routledge, 2014), Moravští Židé v době emancipace (Nakladatelství Lidové Noviny, 2015), Zwischen Prag und Nikolsburg: Jüdisches Leben in den böhmischen Ländern (Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2019), Prague and Beyond: Jews in the Bohemian Lands (University of Pennsylvania, 2021)
So I asked Dr. Miller whether he could provide any information regarding the origins of Rabbi Akiva the Elder of Salonika (whose grandson is surely part of the history of Hungarian Jewry). His only reply was to ask whether I had checked: "Muneles's כתובות מבית-העלמין היהודי העתיק בפראג". [I believe this is the same book I referenced in the 25OCT2022 post.]
26AUG2022:
Considering the lack of information Dr. Miller has on this topic and our lack of findings, I conclude that there is no further historical information available on the prior ancestry of R'Akiva the Elder. There is still the possibility of identifying a modern descendant of R' Akiva to find out if they are in one of the J-Z18271 branches. This could confirm the R' Akiva legend of descent from one of the Aharon HaCohen branches. We've done everything humanly possible, now is it up to the divine plan.
18JAN2023:
Legend of descent from an Akiva of Salonika was probably invented by R' Yosef Cohen Zedek (see Elef Margoliot # 186), the same person who Rosenstein says was responsible for creating the legend that Dreyzel Auerbach is actually Miryam Luria, regarding descent from Rashi (The Lurie Legacy by Neil Rosenstein, Avotaynu (New Jersey) 2004, p. 277: page is imaged as media on profile of Dreizel Miriam Zeisel Schrenzel, [ReMA Gd.mother] https://www.geni.com/photo/view?album_type=photos_of_me&id=......).
Taking this one step further, the connection between HaGaon Rabbi Akiva HaCohen Katz, of Ofen and Rabbi Yitzhak HaCohen Katz, [of Galata] isn't documented by extrinsic and contemporaneous evidence, which means there isn't a known connection between Akiva of Uban and anyone from Salonika, Galata, or Sepharad. Akiva of Uban's line should end with him, or a father names Menachem (according to Jacobi Papers: Vol. 2, p. 29, 17.1m).
At one point I also reviewed the catalogue of gravestones from the oldest Jewish cemetery of Salonika and did not find any persons who might be Akiva of Salonika, or his family. Of course that could mean that the stone is lost, or that Akiva of Salonika was buried elsewhere, perhaps in or near Galata in Turkey, where his son Yitzach is said to have been Chief Rabbi.
As reported above, I have found no support for the contention that Akiva of Ofen descends from Akiva of Salonika, let alone any concrete evidence of the existence of an Akiva of Salonkia who was an exile from Spain or Portugal.
In relation to the post of 26AUG2022, I am pursuing the possibility of locating Akiva of Ofen descendants via genetic genealogy. At the moment I have a hypothesis that the Akiva line is: J-BY32851, but this is not yet confirmable. I am actively seeking to sample any persons who believe they are son-after-son descendants of Akiva of Ofen. On 18MAR2021, Eli Rubin posted: “Men from the lines of Dr. Leopold "Leo" Karpeles, Stephen Schorr Kon, and Otto Karpe are all direct father-son descendants of Akiva.” So far no descendants from these lines have stepped forward to join the discussion or to provide a sample for testing.
That is the current status of my research on this topic as of this date. Please keep me posted of any novel findings of relevance.
