Draft of an Adoption Contract
It was as follows: Mr. Elijah son of So-and-so from a certain city appeared before us and said to us thus:
“You know that my wife died. She left me a little girl who is sixteen days old today, and I am unable to raise her. So now be witnesses for me and make a symbolic acquisition from me, effective immediately, using all the appropriate fixed terms and emphatic expressions and all the terms of titles of right, and hand it over to al-Sitt so that it can serve her as a writ and document from this day forth to the effect that I have received from al-Sitt—daughter of a man nicknamed Abū ’l-Barakāt ibn Rawḥ al-Ramlī, wife of [a man] nicknamed Abū ’l-Ma‘ālī ibn Levi, known as Ibn Nu‘mān—five gold dinars, and I have sold for them this little girl of mine who was mentioned before, whose mother died this week. She can bring her up as she wishes. I do not object to anything that she does with her. I have also taken upon myself that I will not request her [back] from her and will not go near a place if she is there. I have also taken upon myself effective immediately to release this al-Sitt from all that she [i.e., the daughter] will earn in her house and with her and from everything that will accrue to her from the house of this al-Sitt, from her husband, from the marriage payment, and from [payments] for humiliation and damage.
I have no claims upon her in any of these things, in anything that . . . or in anything else, neither during her life . . .1 nor after she dies. I have granted this al-Sitt and her heirs release effective immediately from all types of oaths, both serious and light, even oaths by implication, and [I will] not [raise against her] even a grievance during her life and after her death. I will not say that she neglected her [the daughter] so that she died. Likewise, I have taken upon myself effective immediately that I, this Elijah son of So-and-so, will hand over to this al-Sitt mentioned above everything that she expended upon this daughter of mine from the day when she received her from me, which is the date2 . . .”
Source: JTS ENA NS 17.31.
Notes
[Illegible.—Trans.]
[According to the Geniza scholar S. D. Goitein, this provision was included in case the girl, when she grew up, wished to return to her father’s family.—Trans.]
Credits
Elijah and al-Sitt bint Abū l-Barakāt ibn Rawḥ al-Ramlī, Draft of an Adoption Contract, JTS ENA NS 17.31.
Published in: The Posen Library of Jewish Culture and Civilization, vol. 3: Encountering Christianity and Islam.
