Abstract
By the end of the ninth century CE, the Jews of Babylonia had long formed communal organizations that epitomized their cultural, political, and religious achievements. The community’s basic structure—including the exilarch, the leader of the Jewish people in exile—may have been established as early as the mid-second century CE, when the Parthians ruled the area.
Fast-forward some five centuries. In the seventh century, when Omar, the second caliph of Islam, took over Babylonia, he ratified and enhanced Jewish self-governance. The Jews continued to be led by an exilarch—in recognition of the fact that no matter how prosperous