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224 spwiiil <iimrtfr callt'd tlif Mnlmll i-Yeliudiyeli, which iscliiscil at suiisft ami openi'd at dawn. Tlit-y dress like the rest of the Afjrliaiis. except that

towns n

numrnini; for prolialily as a distinctthe" fall of .lerusideni, but Sevenil of them arc doctors. ive mark (sec Haihik). They arc exempt from military service, but instead pay" a /mrhim/i. or war-tax. 'in 1880 Aynb Khan ordered the Jews of Herat to supply for a liarbicah 30(1 laborers and 'iWM tomans (ciiua'l to 10.000 AtlsIrian tlorins). atwl this caused many to tlee back to See Balkii, Kauil, K..ndauak, Giiazni, Persia. thej"

wear a

lilaek tiirlian,

saiil to

lie

and Herat. Bibliography: Bellew, Rac«» nf AfahanMan, 1880, p. Benjamin Allii- Ziit. <l. Ju<l. 1878, p. 810. 1880, p. 271

l.i; II..

M<i«'e l'iVi<i<(, chap. rxxv. Tt-T« (only vague references); J(u: Chniii. (Kl. 4 and 11, 1878. Auc hi. 18»e.

AFIA,

224

THE JEWISH ENCYCLOPEDIA

Afla Africa

AARON

A



physician,

philosopher,

and mathematician of Salonica. who lived about

He was the teacher of Daniel ben Penihyah, ho assisted in the translation from the Spanish into Hebrew of Abraham Zacuto's "Almanac." He was also helpfid to the pieacher Moses Almosuino in his Hebrew translation of Juan Sacrobosco's"El Tratado de ia Es|)hcia " (Treatise on the He wrote "Opiniones Sacailas dc los Sphere). mas Autenticos y Antiguos Philosophos (jue Sobre la Alma Esciivierou, y sus Detiniciones" (Selected Opinions of the most Authentic and Ancient Philosophers on the Soul, and their Delinitious), Venice, 1,")40.

whom

1568. Steinsohneliler, Hchr. Uchers. p. 64.5; serliuB. Bilil. EniK-l'dil.Jtul. vp. net seq.

BiBLioGRAPnY



Kay-

M. K.

AFI?OMEN

(pip'SS)- '^ piece broken off the cake of unleavened bread, mazznh (usually from the middle one of the three cakes called Cohen. Levi, and Israel), at the beginning of the Sedku service on Passover eve. It is secreted under the pillow of the head of the family, who presides at the seikr table, and it is eaten at the conclusion of the meal. The word is of Greek derivation, according to some authorities from i-l Kuftov; that is, a call for the after-dinner pastime (ku/io^); others hold that it is from c-mcliiiiov (festal song). The Jewish form of it occurs in iMislmah Pes. x. 8, which says: "One should not break olf the communion meal of the paschal lamb by starting another entertainment, calletl either eTriKuuinv [festal song], or, according to others, i^iKuiwv [an after-meal dessert or pasThis rule of making the paschal lamb the time]." last thing to be jmrtaken of in company was applied at a later time (see Rab and Samuel in Pes. 119i) to the Passover bread; and the piece eaten at

the end of the meal received the name Afikomen. In order to awaken the curiosity of the children the Atikomen was broken off the mazzah at the bethe custom arising perhaps ginning of the seder from a misunderstanding of the passage in Pes. 109(7, "They hasten [the eating of] the mazzahin order to keep "the children awake/' which may also be translated, "They snatch away the mazzah ": and soil became customary to allow the children to abstract the Atikomen from under the pillow of the master of the iiouse, and to keep it until redeemed by him

with presents. Subseipiently It became quite common among the Jews, by way of witticism, to Siiy "To eat much Atikomen is to live long"; and when a man died advanced in years it was said. " He ate too much Atikomen. " A piece of the Atikomen used to be jireserved in every house from year to year, and in Eastern

countries it was supposi'd. when carried in a comer of the arlxi' hinful. to guard agaiusl the evil eye. IlinLiooRAPnv: Jastrow. Did. s. v.; I,. Luw. Lflieniiallrr, p.:tl8; Samuel Krauss, GriicliiKltc mid Latciiiinche LclinwUrter, 11. 107. a..


 * AFRICA

Bible ha.s no general name for it has for Eurojie or .sia. The word " Ham." from the Hebri'W root DOn (to be hot), which is appliitl in the later Psidms (Ixxviii. .'il cv. 23. 27; cvi. 22) to Egypt, is the nearest approach to a general name, inasnuich as it api)lies directly to the hot southern countries (Book of Jubilees, Next in importance is the term "Cush." corviii.). responding to the Greek f'Uof Kmaaalaf. the Cushite Africa, niiy



The

more than



tribe, in I'lutiin lis "Lives" ("Alexander." Ixxii.), and also occurring freiiucntly in the works of other Greek writers in the form KiKroaioi (Knobel. " Viilkerta-

der Genesis." p. 2.J0. Giessen. 1850). " Kossaioi " or the " Kissia Chora" of the ancients, it is true, are to be Age. sought in Asia, but it is supposed that a migration of these peoples took ])lace, and there are many ))hilological. historical, and ethnological proofs of such an occurrence. Since wo of the jieoples mentioned as belonging to the sons of Ham (Gen. x. 6), fel

Biblical

The

I

Mizraim and t'aiiaan, are perfectly well known, it is evident that the enumeration proceeds from south to north; and (m this basis Cush must be the southernmost of he Hamit ic peoples. The ancient Greeks and Komans regarded thes(i peoples collectively as Ethioi)ians (Ivnobel, "Volkertafel der Genesis"), which goes far to prove that the terms "Cush" and "Ethiojiia" Both terms w<-re used origiare nearly e(|iiivalcnt. nally to designate various nations in Asia and .Vfrica, but their use was afterward limited to the countries south of Egypt. Even in its closer application, the Hebrew terni " Cush," as used in Gen. X. includes peone, at least, of the descendples out.side of Africa. ants of Ham, Sheba (Gen. X. 7), must be identified with a nation in southwest Arabia (I)illmann. " Die definitely Genesis.".'ilhed..p. isl. Leipsic. 1880). bounded African continent, as known to-day, was not thought of by the Bil)lical writers. On the contrary, the territory "on both sides of the Red Sea formed for them an etlinic unit, which was sharply distinguished from the rest of Africa. After Ethiopia. Egypt and Libya are the two most Tin" Hi'brcw name for imijortant lands of Africa. Egypt is D'lVO (compare the Plienician Muzni, for I

.

A

which rea<l Mnnni in Stephanus Byzantinus under the word Ai)i--or: Babylonian, Muzri.Mizir (Schrader, " K.A.T.," 2d ed," p. 89; ancient Persian, Mudrnja; Septuaginta, ^festn•m, South Arabian, Mizr; Arabic ^fll^l•). The Hebrew term has not been sufficiently explained, but it certainly shows a dual form "which can best be interpreted as referring to From a philological the upper and lower districts. standpoint, however, the form may be dilferently explained, and the seeming sign of the dual may be regarded as a locative ending (Barth, "Xominalbildimg in den Semitischen Sprachcn." p. 319). The two uanu'S Cush and .Mizraim. therefore, designate the

—

entire eastern portion of the African continent known Several of the countries adjacent to to antiiiuity. Egypt are "also found in the table of peoples as givea

"Phut" is mentioned as of equal rank with Egypt (Gen. x. 6; compare also Nahum. iii. 9; The Jer. xlvi! 9; Ezek. xxvii. 10, xxx. 5, xxxviii. Septuagint, a recognized authority In Egyptian in Genesis.

.')).

•The histfirv of the Jews in the various subdivisions of the Here African continent is treated under separate headings. only a genera! survey of that history is presented.