رسالة: T-S Misc.25.9

الوصف

Letter from Yiṣḥaq ha-Melammed ha-Bavli, in Bilbays, to Abū Isḥāq b. Bū l-Rabīʿ and a judge named Eliyya, in Fustat. (Goitein's index card says that the second addressee is not the famous judge Eliyyahu of the 13th century but rather a different Eliyya ha-Dayyan of the 14th century). In Judaeo-Arabic. Eliyya is asked to read the beginning of the letter to the sender's wife. The sender has been in Bilbays for a week or two, trying to persuade the congregation to formally appoint him as a teacher. "They are a flock with no shepherd, unable to discern good and bad." He will try for a little longer and urges his wife to stay put in Fustat. He inquires about conditions of travel from all the caravans arriving from al-Shām. Around this point of the letter he switches to addressing Abū Isḥāq and Eliyya and has many fulsome praises for the Nagid Avraham (II?) and sends regards to many community members in Fustat, including Sulaymān b. Abū l-ʿImrān al-Talmid. (Information in part from Goitein's index card.) There are also a few words in Arabic script, possibly from a prior document.