Biography
Sar Shalom Sharabi was born in Jewish Sharab, Yemen. He moved to Eretz Israel, then under Ottoman rule, in fulfilment of a vow. On his way he stayed in India, Baghdad and Damascus. In Damascus, he was involved in a dispute of Halacha over the minimum olive size kezayit of matzah that one should eat at the Pesach Seder.
In Israel he made a strong impression on the local rabbinic sages, and is frequently mentioned in their books. At Bet El Yeshiva, he belonged to a group of 12 mekubalim along with Hida, Rabbi Yom-Tov Algazi and other sages of Sephardic and Yemenite congregations. He remained at Bet El Yeshiva until his death, eventually becoming Rosh Yeshiva. He himself was a devotee of the teachings of Rabbi Isaac Luria, and a principal innovator within Lurianic Kabbalah.
Popular tradition links his departure from Yemen with a miracle that occurred after a rich Muslim-Arab woman tried to seduce him. In Bet El he worked as a servant and hid his learning from others; when his knowledge of Kabbalah was accidentally discovered, he became a member of the kabbalistic circle. According to legend, the prophet Elijah appeared to him, and he is understood by the major Kabbalists as being himself the Gilgul of the Arizal. His grandson, Solomon Moses Hai Gagin Sharabi, wrote a poem of praise on his mastery of the Etz Hayyim and Shemonah She'arim of Hayyim Vital. Members of Bet El continue to prostrate themselves on his grave on the Mount of Olives on the anniversary of his death.
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