رسالة: T-S 13J19.16

الوصف

Letter from Shelomo b. Yehuda to a personality in Fustat. Dating (Gil): ca. 1030 CE. Describes the aftermath of the excommunication of the Qaraites on the Mount of Olives on Hoshaʿna Rabba in 1029. The Qaraites had demanded that those who declared the ḥerem, who were now imprisoned in Damascus, would "never again be called by the title ḥaver and never serve the house of Israel in all of Palestine, in greater or lesser service, neither in law nor in any other matter” (quotation from T-S 13J13.28 + T-S AS 120.62, PGPID 949). There followed a meeting in the market in Ramla to discuss the Qaraite demands; the gaʾon says that he asked “that the matter be resolved without a stipulation [being placed] either upon or against” the Rabbanites. The Qaraites refused: “Rather, they said, ‘Our time has come! This is the day we have hoped for; we have lived to see it!" (Lamentations 2:16) Then he goes off on a long aside complaining about the Qaraites elders of Jerusalem — in a more intimate tone than in his vatic Hebrew letters: they can't agree on a single point of law ("they differ from each other in school of law, each one forming his own madhhab"), yet they are unanimous in their hatred of the Rabbanites. He refers obliquely and mockingly to Qaraite authors such as Daniʾel al-Qūmisī, Salmon b. Yeroḥam and Yefet b. ʿEli: "They see themselves as ‘lilies’ (shoshanim) and everyone else as ‘thorns’; they consider themselves ‘wise ones’ (maskilim), but they disagree as to who among them is wise.” Some other details of this live polemic session are equally fascinating: the gaʾon complains about their lack of fellow-feeling, and the Qaraites retort that they're the ones serving the state in the interest of the Jewish collectivity: “They should be ashamed. Which of us is obligated to his followers concerning the many laws of Israel that are not written, we or they? But when one mentions this to them, they feel ashamed and say, ‘It is not so. If God, may He be exalted, gave us a high position in the service of power [fī khidmat sulṭān], it was so that our followers might attain their wishes over others.” In response to which the gaʾon drops a short citation from Ecclesiastes (7:15–18) warning against attributing worldly success to divine favor: “[Sometimes a righteous man perishes in spite of his righteousness, and sometimes a wicked one endures in spite of his wickedness. So do not be excessively righteous or excessively wise, or you might be disappointed, and do not be excessively wicked or excessively foolish, or you might die before your time.] It is best to grasp one without letting go of the other.” Then he continues complaining about the Qaraites' lack of fellow-feeling while noting that they nonetheless continue to marry Rabbanites: "They have marked us with the status of one whose prayer God does not accept, but if to them we appear thus, why should they procreate with us or marry us?" He then refers to the continuation of the affair: the Rabbanites had succeeded in blocking the Qaraite demands through the mediation of Fatimid officials: “‘Blessed is the Lord, God of our fathers, who put it into the mind of ’our lord ‘the king’ [cf. Ezra 7:27], may he live forever, and into the mind of our lord the vizier, may God save him, to speak on our behalf and to seek what is good for us, may His name be elevated for all eternity.” Presumably this refers to T-S 13J7.29 (PGPID 1243), a decree of al-Ẓāhir to the governor of Palestine, Anūshtakīn al-Duzbarī, ordering him not to show partiality in his treatment of “the two parties,” a decree issued in response to a petition from the gaʾon's party. Then he goes on to describe how some Rabbanites in Jerusalem had spread a rumor saying that the Qaraites had burnt three Rabbanite figures in effigy on Purim. He sends the elders Abū l-Barakāt Netanʾel ha- Kohen and Abū ʿAlī Muḥsin b. Ḥusayn on a fact-finding mission, and the effigy story turns out to be slander; Abū ʿAlī Muḥsin b. Ḥusayn advises the gaʾon "that I had no way out of this libel but to announce an excommunication on whoever did what was said and on whoever spread slander of non-existent things in order to endanger people.” The gaʾon complies and declares another ban "on a fast day in the majlis in the Jewish market” in Ramla, urging his followers "not to exact retribution on them (the Qaraites) for what they have inflicted upon us.” The assembly answered: “Cast the ban and cast the ban! Behold, we are suffering mightily from the terrible thing they (the slanderers) have said, even though it happened against our will. [Cast the ban] lest a decree [ḥujja] be issued against us [saying] that this happened because of us!” So he did (verso): “we cast the ban and we ended [the affair], but it troubled many of them, since they knew that they were [the ones] bringing this about.” (Information from Rustow, Heresy, 218–26.) There is a copy of the first part of the letter that has survived as well: T-S 13J16.15 (PGPID 7998).