יונה נבון

Rav Yonah Navon (5473/1713–16 Shevat 5520/1760) was among the leading chachamim of Yerushalayim in the eighteenth century — a mekubal, a shadar, the author of Nechpah BaKesef and the rebbe of the Chida. He was born in Yerushalayim to Rav Chanun Navon and was orphaned of him at nine. In his youth he learned in the yeshiva Beit Yaakov (Pereira) under Rav Yisrael Meir Mizrachi, author of the responsa Pri HaAretz, and was counted among the chachamim of the yeshiva Yefa’er Anavim. When Rav Chaim ben Attar founded Knesset Yisrael in 5502/1742 he began to teach there, and from 5506/1746, at thirty-three, he stood at its head; years afterward he led the yeshiva Gedulat Mordechai together with his friend the dayan Rav Shem Tov Gabbai.

He was sent as a shadar to Turkey, Greece, Egypt, Algiers and Tunis, and returned to Yerushalayim after two years; while in Turkey he printed the first volume of Nechpah BaKesef in Kushta in 5508/1748, responsa across all four chelkei Shulchan Aruch together with a commentary on the Tosafot of the Re’em on the Semag. The second volume appeared in Yerushalayim in 5603/1843. He also wrote Get Mekushar on the laws of gittin, built as a discussion of the Get Pashut of the Maharam ben Chaviv, along with a commentary on hilchot Pesach and collected responsa and derashot.

Two of the giants of the following generation were his close talmidim: Rav Chaim Yosef David Azulai, the Chida, and Rav Yom-Tov Algazi. He accustomed them from a young age to write teshuvot in halachah, going over what they wrote and setting down his comments; the Chida wrote of him that he left almost no posek like him in those regions, and that he was a chasid and a mekubal. After his return from his travels he was appointed a dayan in the beit din of the Rishon LeTzion Rav Yitzchak HaKohen Rappaport, and his name stands on a number of takanot of Yerushalayim, among them one on the modesty of women’s dress and the ban on card-playing of 5514/1754. He was a brother-in-law of Rav Yitzchak Zerachiah Azulai, the father of the Chida, and the son-in-law of Rav David di Silva; his grandson Rav Yonah Moshe Navon later served as Rishon LeTzion. He was niftar at forty-seven and buried in Yerushalayim.