Biography
Rav Matzliach HaKohen Gaon ben Shlomo (מצליח הכהן גאון) was the Gaon of Eretz Yisrael and head of its yeshiva, Geon Yaakov, which he moved to Fustat in Egypt. From at least 1127 he also bore the title Ra’is al-Yahud (Head of the Jews), which he held until his death in 1139.
He was the son of Rav Shlomo ben Eliyahu HaKohen, Gaon of Eretz Yisrael before him, and of Sitt al-Ahl, and came from the family of Kohanim that had led the yeshiva since the middle of the eleventh century. He had a brother, Tzadok; two sons, of whom nothing more is known; and a daughter, Alma’ah. During the First Crusade, when the Crusaders took the cities of Eretz Yisrael, the yeshiva moved from Tyre to Hadrach near Damascus, with his father at its head. Rav Matzliach lived there and worked beside his father; little is known of his life in those years.
When his father passed away in 1127, Rav Matzliach brought the yeshiva to Fustat. There he led the congregation of Jews from Eretz Yisrael and Syria, whose center was the Ben Ezra synagogue, where the prayers followed the nusach of Eretz Yisrael. He kept a court of officials and poets and had wide ties with the Jews of the surrounding lands. As the geonim did, he gave drashot at special times of the year, joining halacha and aggadah and building on the drashot and peirushim of Rav Saadia Gaon.
He was close to the Caliph al-Hafiz, who gave him a robe of honor and high titles, “Glory of the Kingdom and Crown of Leadership.” In 1138 a Sunni vizier named Ridwan took office and persecuted the Christians and the Jews. Rav Matzliach was killed in 1139. After his death the Gaonate of Eretz Yisrael split between Damascus and Fustat.
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Where traditions differ. It is not fully certain that he was killed in 1139.
רב מצליח הכהן גאון בן שלמה הכהן, היה צאצא לשושלת גאוני ישיבת גאון יעקב הארצישראלית. הקים את הישיבה בפוסטאט שבמצרים ועמד בראשותה עד הריגתו בשנת 1139.
Maṣliaḥ ben Solomon ha-Cohen, alternatively Matzliach, was a Gaon and the leader of the Indigenous Israel in Fustat, the principal Talmudic academy and central legalistic body of the Jewish community in Indigenous Israel. He also held the title of Ra'is al-Yahud, from at least 1127 until his possible murder in 1139. After his death, the Gaonate split between Damascus in Syria and Fustat in Egypt.
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