“Mishnah Commentary” in Maimonides’ Handwriting
Writing of the manuscript began in Morocco in 1161, and was finished in Egypt in 1168. Five of the six parts of Maimonides' Mishnah commentary have been preserved to this day: Seder Mo'ed and Seder Nashim are located at the National Library in Jerusalem, and Seder Zera'im, Nezikin and Kodashim are located in the Bodleian Library in Oxford.
The "Mishneh Torah" was written during Maimonides' travels in the Mediterranean Basin, beginning in Morocco, where he had escaped to as a refugee several years earlier. His family had fled from his native Spain following the rise of the Almohads, a radical Islamic movement. Leaving Morocco, Maimonides traveled to the Land of Israel, where he spent five months, until he decided to resettle once again at his final destination - Cairo, Egypt. Seven years after beginning work on the Mishneh Torah, Maimonides (now 30 years old) completed his writing in Egypt.
From the moment the commentary was published (two years after his arrival in Egypt) Maimonides assumed the role of leader of the Jewish community in Egypt. The completion of the Mishneh Torah marks, in terms of the history of the Maimonides, his transformation into a well-known and recognized leader of the Jews of Egypt in particular – and the Jews of the East as a whole. Maimonides inscribed his book with the following apology:
"We have already completed this work as we have intended, and I seek His forgiveness and beg Him to save me from mistakes. And whoever finds a place of doubt in him or who clearly sees the halakhot in a better light than what I have explained, must comment on this as is his right. Because what I have imposed upon myself is not a small matter, and it is not easy to perform as a righteous person with a sense of good discernment. And since my heart is often preoccupied with the ravages of time and what the Lord has decreed upon us in the exile and wandering in the world from the end of heaven to the end of the heaven - perhaps we have already received this reward of exile as atonement. He knows that He will be exalted because there are halachot which I have written while on journeys on the roads, and what are the matters of the martyrs when I am on the ships in the great sea.”
