Halacha by Haham Eliezer Papo
The books were written by Haham Eliezer ben Shem Tov Papo, (1785-1828) a great gaon and scholar. The books were printed in Belgrad, Yugoslavia in 1865. These are two volumes of halacha (Jewish law). They were printed in Ladino. These are books of laws (dinim). One volume deals with the laws of the mourner. the other deals with laws of the festivals and other general laws.
Haham Eliezer Papo was a major exponent of the musar tradition. Born in Sarajevo in 1785, Haham Papo became an outstanding Hahamnic scholar, deeply devoted to piety and spirituality. He authored books of halakhah, homiletics, and musar, and was profoundly committed to kabbalah as well. Haham Papo served as Haham of the community of Selestria (Bulgaria). He died in 1828 at the age of forty-one.
In spite of the brevity
of his life, Haham Papo achieved remarkable depth and breadth in his Hahamnic
scholarship, and left to posterity a significant literary legacy. It may be
said that Haham Papo, in the early nineteenth century, was the exemplary spokesman
of the Sephardic musar tradition of the eighteenth century. Haham Papo advocated
a tradition-bound, static Judaism. He called for a life of piety and acceptance
of God. He demanded total allegiance to Hahamnic tradition, stressed the need
to live according to traditional patterns and preferred the traditionalism
of Moslem lands to the modernity of Europe. His ultimate focus was not on
life in this world, but on the world to come.
