In the eighteenth century, under the Karamanli dynasty (1711–1835), the Community Council of Tripolitania consisted not only of a president and notables but also of rabbis and scholars. The latter were responsible for the education of the children and for the rabbinical court (Heb. bet din). The Tripolitanian community often looked to Palestine for teachers and rabbinic leadership, and that is how Rabbi Masʿūd Ḥayy ben Aaron Raccah came to settle in Tripoli. Born in Izmir, Turkey, in 1690, he studied under Ḥayyim ben Moses Abulafia and Isaac ben Judah ha-Kohen Rapoport…