Eleazar be-Rabbi Qillar

Eleazar be-Rabbi Qillar was unknown before the discovery of poems by him in the Cairo Geniza, signed with his name in an acrostic. Because his name is so similar to that of the seventh-century Eleazar be-Rabbi Qillir, Qillar’s identity has only recently been established. The poems preserved in Qillar’s name are all yotserot. A yotser is meant to be recited inside the blessing before the Shema‘ that begins “He who creates (yotser) light.”