Semah ben Josiah () was the great-grandson of

Anan ben David Anan Ben David (, ) is widely considered to be a major founder of Karaite Judaism. His followers were called Ananites and, like modern Karaites, did not believe the Rabbinic Jewish Oral Torah, such as the Mishnah, to be authoritative. History F ...

, a

Nasi Nasi may refer to: Food Dishes Nasi Goreng is an Indonesian and Malay word for ''cooked rice'', featured in many Southeast Asian dishes *Nasi goreng, a popular rice dish often simply called ''nasi'' *Other Southeast Asian ''nasi'' dishes: ** Nasi ...

, and the head of the Palestinian yeshiva in the 9th century.

Details

According to a fragment found in the

Cairo Genizah The Cairo Geniza, alternatively spelled the Cairo Genizah, is a collection of some 400,000 Jewish manuscript fragments and Fatimid administrative documents that were kept in the '' genizah'' or storeroom of the Ben Ezra Synagogue in Fustat or Ol ...

T-S 312.82
, Semah reigned as head of the Palestinian Yeshiva for 31 years and was a Rabbanite.The seemingly incongruous fact that these supposedly Karaite princes served in the Palestinian Gaonate can be explained by the fact that only during the 10th century did Karaites claim Anan as their founder and include these Nesi'im in their pedigree, see His children lost the position to the rival Gaonic family. Another Genizah fragment (T-S 12.128) lists Semah as both a

Rosh Yeshiva Rosh yeshiva or Rosh Hayeshiva (, plural, pl. , '; Anglicized pl. ''rosh yeshivas'') is the title given to the dean of a yeshiva, a Jewish educational institution that focuses on the study of traditional religious texts, primarily the Talmud and th ...

and a Nasi. Semah was proceeded in the Gaonate by his brother

Jehoshaphat Jehoshaphat (; alternatively spelled Jehosaphat, Josaphat, or Yehoshafat; ; ; ), according to the Hebrew Bible, was the son of Asa, and the fourth king of the Kingdom of Judah, in succession to his father. His children included Jehoram, who ...

References

Geonim Karaite exilarchs 9th-century people from the Abbasid Caliphate 9th-century rabbis Jewish royalty {{Geonim