Page 303 - GK-10

100* Summaries

The Order of Torah Reading
for weekdays and Minchah of Shabbat
from the period of the Geonim

Mordechai Dov Weintraub

When the takanah of reading the Torah on Shabbat was promulgated, no
regulations were provided regarding the content to be read or the manner of
reading it. The development of different reading customs can be discerned.
As to the internal division of readings every week, namely – what will be
read by each of the people called to the Torah – only the parashah of
Ha’azinu was required to be divided in a manner similar to that practiced
by the Levites when they sang in the Temple, and even this only at the
reading of the full parashah on Shabbat morning. As to the other Shabbat
readings, and those of weekday and Shabbat afternoon, there was no
binding custom, even when reading Ha’azinu.

The article displays a transcription of fragments scattered in various
libraries and dating from the period of the Geonim in Babylon. It contains
the order of Torah readings for weekdays, Minchah of Shabbat, and special
occasions (hereinafter ‘Seder Hakeri’ah’). Indeed, the text determines the
verses allocated to the various aliyot, a division that is different in many
details from that which is accepted nowadays, and, as evident from this
work, is already rooted in the period of the Babylonian Geonim. In
addition, this work contains unique ancient reading customs that have been
lost.

It may be concluded with a high degree of probability that this Seder
Hakeri’ah was originally penned in Aramaic in Babylon. It subsequently
made its way to southern Italy where it was edited and additional sections
in Hebrew were added to it. An Italian version dating to the tenth or
eleventh century has has survived until the present day. This copy, which