The Life & Scholarship of Hacham Ovadia Yosef

Maran: The Life & Scholarship of Hacham Ovadia Yosef takes a look at one of the most influential and beloved rabbis of the past century, whose life’s work has altered the course of Sephardic society in Israel and across the globe, and whose leadership has benefited all of world Jewry, Ashkenazim and Sephardim alike.

Hacham Ovadia was many things: an extraordinary posek, an engaging teacher, a sensitive and devoted bet din judge, a political powerbroker, and a rabbi tirelessly dedicated to the Jewish People. This book focuses on his life, his mission in restoring the primacy of halachah among Sephardic communities, his infinite ahavat Yisrael, and his vast scholarship, brilliant halachic rulings, and the halachic approach he developed and promulgated. Much of this book is based on Hacham Ovadia’s own words in his lectures and writings.

This work is a product of years of extensive research conducted by well-known Sephardic author Yehuda Azoulay and his team, who combed through Hacham Ovadia Yosef’s fifty-three published works. The autobiographical information, anecdotes, and opinions of Hacham Ovadia, which were unearthed among his halachic responsa, have become the heart of this book. In this way we present to you a unique understanding of this larger-than-life figure and his far-reaching accomplishments.

Hacham Ovadia was a remarkable blend of scholarly genius and human sensitivity; boldness and humility; courage and compassion. We have included inspirational vignettes, excerpts from key lectures, scholarly discussions on core issues, and many actual halachic rulings, so that every reader, at every level, will gain inspiration from this exceptional sage.

This beautifully written and fascinating book on Hacham Ovadia’s multifaceted life and accomplishments will both inform and inspire you, from the beginning until the very last page.