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Be-lingual Hebrew-Italian flyer relating to the expenses incurred by the Jewish community of Menkes, a poor community, in redeeming captives. The Hebrew and Italian are on facing pages, both bearing the names of R. Solomon ben David Hayyim Malach, Sephardi Tohor; Amram Amar, Sephardi Tohor; and Mordecai (Angiola) Nissim, Sephardi Tohor. The discursive flyer discusses the heavy burden placed on the community in fulfilling this mitzvah and requests financial assistance.
The mitzvah of Pidyon shevuyim (ransoming captives) is a religious duty, to ransom a fellow Jew captured by slave dealers or robbers, or imprisoned unjustly by the authorities to be released against ransom paid by the Jewish community. The fulfillment of this mitzvah was regarded by the rabbis of the Talmud as of paramount importance (BB 8a, 8b). It is told of R. Phinehas b. Jair that he went to ransom captives, and because he was fulfilling this duty, a river parted to enable him to cross (Hul, 7a, TJ Dem. 1:3). Maimonides explains that "(The duty of) ransoming captives supersedes (the duty of) charity to the poor..." (Yad, Mattenat Aniyyim, 8:10). To avoid the extraction of exorbitant ransom payments or repeated kidnapping by captors, the rabbis ordained that captives should be redeemed only at their market value as slaves (Git. 4:6; Git 45a; also Ket. 52a, b) unless the captive had been taken in place of the person who had to ransom him. When R. Joshua b. Hananiah was in Rome he ransomed a young man who later became the scholar R. Ishmael b. Elisha. Joshua heard of the young man's imprisonment and went to the prison and said "I swear not to move from here until I ransom him no matter what the price" (Git. 88a). The following rules for the ransoming of captives were laid down in the halakhah:
(1) Women captives should usually be given preference before male captives (Hor. 3:7; Hor. 13a). (2) A person captured together with his father and his teacher may ransom himself first. He is then bound to ransom his teacher and only thereafter his father. A scholar should be given preference even to a king of Israel (Hor. ibid.). (3) The court (bet din) has the power to compel a husband to ransom his wife (Sh. Ar., YD 252:10). (4) Money set aside for charity purposes or for the building of a synagogue may be used to ransom captives (BB8b). (5) A person who delays the fulfillment of this duty and causes an undue prolongation of his fellow-Jew's imprisonment is regarded as if he has spilled his blood (Yad, loc. cit., 8:12). Notwithstanding the limitation set by the Mishnah against excessive ransoms, a person may redeem himself with any amount of ransom demanded by the captors.
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