Kol Sason (Ethics), Rabbi Sason [Shindookh], scribe: Abraham Shalom Joseph Abdul Razzaq, Baghdad: 1843
Rabbi Sason Shindookh (1747-1830), scion of a distinguished Baghdadi family, served numerous communal functions in his native city: mohel (circumciser), shohet (ritual slaughterer), sofer (scribe of ritual texts), overseer of marriages, and cantor, Torah reader, and preacher in the Great Synagogue. A polymath, he also authored or created numerous kabbalistic, halakhic, artistic, and poetic works, including a number of piyyutim (liturgical poems) still current among Iraqi Jewry. He had a particular interest in musar, to which the present text is dedicated. In forty-three chapters, Kol sason treats the main components of religious ethics, including themes like love and fear of God, repentance, proper etiquette, and various positive and negative character traits. These discussions are generally interspersed with stories, parables, and especially poems that help convey the chapter’s lesson.
