A fascinating enigma surrounds the name of Rabbi Yosef Hayyim of Baghdad.

How did a quiet Torah scholar of only twenty-five find himself at the helm of the

community that he would lead like a king for the next fifty years, with no official

position or salary?

How did his word go forth from an Arab land to become law in Jewish communities

worldwide, including Israel, India, and Shanghai, from his day – an era predating

modern transportation and instant communication – to the present, over a century

after his death?

Why do Sephardic communities around the world follow his halachic rulings?

Why are his songs, especially Va’amartem Ko Lehai, sung by Jews everywhere?

How did one human being write hundreds of works on Talmud, halachah, Scripture

and Kabbalah?

Why are his writings studied by Sephardim and Ashkenazim, from scholarly rabbis to

ordinary laymen?

How did he continue to study, teach, write, guide, advise, and rule on halachic

questions in wealth, in prison, and then in poverty?

This volume sheds light on the spiritual giant who became known posterity as the

Ben Ish Hai