text · B0046

Halachot Pesukot הלכות פסוקות

The first code — the Bavli reduced to its operative rulings, in the Talmud's own Aramaic. Yehudai Gaon's little book invented the genre that runs through Halachot Gedolot and the Rif to the Shulchan Aruch, and it was lost for a millennium until a single Yemenite manuscript surfaced.

I. Who

Hebrew: הלכות פסוקות
Era: geonim

II. When

Traditional: from Rav Yehudai Gaon of Sura, c. 4517–4521 AM
Civil (computed): 4510–4530 AM · 750–770 CE
Academic: mid-8th c. CE; attributed to Yehudai Gaon, likely finalized by his school
Duration: ≈20 years
Precision: approximate

IV. What

Language: Babylonian Aramaic
Redaction: Transmitted under the name of Rav Yehudai Gaon (Yehudai Gaon), the blind gaon of Sura; geonic tradition already relates that his students wrote in his name, and modern scholarship reads the book as issuing from his school — the atlas keeps the traditional author edge and records the qualification here.
Structure: Decided law only ("pesukot" — adjudicated): the Bavli's practical halachot stripped of the dialectic, arranged by subject, and limited to laws applicable in the exile — omitting the Temple- and Land-dependent orders.

V. How do we know

Claim	Evidence	Confidence	Sources
The work distills the Bavli to decided practical law, arranged by topic and confined to what applies after the churban — the template every later halachic code follows.	tradition reconstruction	★★★★☆	S. Sassoon (ed.), Sefer Halachot Pesuqot le-Rav Yehudai Gaon (1950), introduction R. Brody, The Geonim of Babylonia and the Shaping of Medieval Jewish Culture (1998)
The ascription to Yehudai Gaon is the tradition's, with an old asterisk: geonic-era testimony already has his students writing responsa in his name because he would not write, and scholarship accordingly treats the book as from Yehudai's school and teaching even if not from his hand. authored_by follows the traditional ascription per atlas policy; this claim carries the scholarly qualification.	tradition reconstruction	★★★☆☆	R. Brody, The Geonim of Babylonia (1998), on Yehudai Gaon and the Halachot Pesukot
The book itself was lost after the rishonim (surviving in Hebrew reworkings such as Halachot Ketzuvot and in quotation) until a manuscript was found in Sana'a, Yemen, and published by Sassoon in 1950 — the recovered text is the atlas's earliest surviving geonic code.	reconstruction	★★★★☆	S. Sassoon (ed.), Sefer Halachot Pesuqot (1950), introduction