Honorific Prefix: | Sheikh |
Abdullah bar Negm | |
Native Name Lang: | myz |
Citizenship: | Iraqi |
Birth Date: | 20th century |
Birth Place: | Qal'at Saleh, Iraq |
Death Date: | 2009 |
Death Place: | Nijmegen, Netherlands |
Years Active: | 1947–2009 |
Occupation: | Mandaean priest |
Spouse: | Sharat (daughter of Abdullah Khaffagi) |
Parents: | Negm bar Zahroon (father) |
Children: | Rafid al-Sabti |
Relatives: | Ram Zihrun (great-grandfather) |
Religion: | Mandaeism |
Ordained: | 1947 |
Rishama of Baghdad |
Sheikh (Rabbi) Abdullah bar Negm (Arabic: عبدالله ابن نجم; born in Qal'at Saleh, Iraq; died 2009, Nijmegen, Netherlands) was an Iraqi Mandaean priest who served as the Rishama (Mandaean patriarch) of Baghdad, Iraq during the latter half of the 20th century.[1] [2]
Rabbi Negm was born into the Khaffagi (written Mandaic: Kupašia) clan.[2] In 1947, his father, Rabbi Negm bar Zahroon, who had just become a ganzibra that same year, initiated him into the Mandaean priesthood.[2] Abdullah bar Negm's ordination was mentioned in his father's two-page letter to E. S. Drower, which was dated February 4, 1948.[2]
Abdullah bar Negm married Rabbi Abdullah Khaffagi's daughter Šarat (Sharat) from Ahvaz, Iran.[2] Rafid al-Sabti, a tarmida currently residing in Nijmegen, Netherlands, is the son of Rabbi Abdullah.[2]
Abdullah bar Negm became Rishama of Baghdad after Dakhil Aidan's death in 1964.
Rabbi Abdullah bar Negm was known for initiating Sheikh Haithem (now known as Brikha Nasoraia, a ganzibra and professor living in Sydney, Australia) into the priesthood in Iraq, as well as the majority of well-known Mandaean priests in the diaspora.[2]
He later emigrated with his wife to the United Kingdom. After his wife died in the United Kingdom, Abdullah bar Negm moved to Nijmegen, Netherlands to be with his family members. He died in the Netherlands in 2009.[3] [4]
Abdullah bar Negm's grandfather is the son of Ram Zihrun, one of the survivors of the 1831 cholera epidemic that nearly wiped out the Mandaean priesthood.[5]