State document: T-S F4.27

Description

Official correspondence in Arabic. Wide line spacing. Four lines preserved: . . ذلك ولما حضروا واعادوا . . . قررنا الامر على ما كاتبناك به من ان يكون كل منهم يصلي في البيعة من غير ان يستبدها(؟) واحد دون اخر وان يدخلوا الى الحضرة . . . الشيخ ابي نصر داود بن اسحق . . . الشيخ ابي سعد . . . The sender is reporting on a decision that was taken after a group of people arrived: that each of them will "pray in the homage" (yuṣallī fī l-bayʿa) without any one of them oppressing or perhaps imposing their version on the other (min ghayr an yastabidduhā(?) wāḥid dūn ākhar). The meaning of this unclear but presumably has to do with a controversy over whose authority should be recognized in prayers. Then mentions Abū Naṣr Dāwūd b. Isḥāq (this is probably the Qaraite courtier Abū Naṣr David b. Yiṣhaq ha-Levi active in the first half of the 11th century) and Abū Saʿd (al-Tustarī?). Reused on recto for Hebrew literary text.