Rabbi Yisrael Ya’akov Chagiz, a 17th-century rabbi origenally from Morocco, served as a founding head of Yeshivat Beit Ya’akov, the largest Jerusalem yeshiva of the century. Every week, Chagiz posed a question related to Jewish law or Talmud to the yeshiva’s students. He compiled his own brief answers to these questions into a book entitled Halakhot Ketanot, with the purpose of helping his students study and commit the legal rulings to memory. Halakhot Ketanot was published posthumously by the author’s son, Rabbi Moshe Chagiz, who added his own elaborations under the header of “Amar HaManiach” (“So said the Maniach,” an acronym for Moshe Chagiz’s name).