I. Babylonian Jewry and the Geonic Age
Baghdad and its predecessor centers — Sura, Pumbedita — were the intellectual capital of rabbinic Judaism. Saadia Gaon translated the Torah into Judeo-Arabic; Benjamin of Tudela's account of Baghdad is among the most detailed in his Travels.
II. Sacred Books in the Abbasid Capital
Baghdad sat at the hub of routes carrying pointed codices from Tiberias to Cairo. Babylonian supralinear vocalization coexisted with Tiberian imports.
III. From Ottoman Rule to Mass Emigration
By the 1940s Baghdad housed over 80,000 Jews. The Farhud of 1941 and Operation Ezra and Nehemiah (1950–1952) ended the community's millennium-long presence.