History of the Jews, Vol. 3 (of 6)Graetz, Heinrich
History
History of the Jews, Vol. 3 (of 6)
Graetz, Heinrich
Jews -- History
It was only when Al-Muktadir was killed in a rebellion (October, 932),
and Kahir, who was so poor that he was obliged to borrow clothes for
the ceremony of installation, became Caliph, that David's party,
which could pour more money into the empty treasury, gained the
victory. In order to bring about the downfall of his opponent, the
Exilarch squandered the money that had been extorted from the various
communities. Saadiah was soon forbidden by the Caliph to continue in
office, perhaps also to stay in Sora (commencement of 933). The rival
Exilarch Hassan was banished to Khorasan, where he died. Saadiah now
lived in retirement in Bagdad for four years (933-937). His health had
suffered severely through the constant quarrels and the annoyance he
had received, and he became melancholy. But this did not interfere with
his intellectual activity. It was during his retirement that his best
works, bearing the stamp of freshness and originality, were written.
He wrote Talmudic treatises, composed poetical pieces and prayers
in prose, full of religious fervor. He also arranged a prayer book
(Siddur), after the manner of Amram, collected the rules of the
calendar (Ibbur), wrote a polemic against the Massoret, Aaron ben
Asher, of Tiberias, and was in general particularly prolific in
literary composition during this period. The greatest of his works,
however, are his two philosophical writings, the one a commentary on
the "Book of the Creation" (Sefer Yezirah), the other his _magnum opus_
on Faith and Creed. Both these works are in Arabic. Saadiah was the
first to set up a tolerably complete system of religious philosophy.
The Karaite teachers, it is true, were fond of lengthy philosophical
disputations, which they frequently introduced on most unsuitable
occasions, but they were never able to develop a complete and perfect
religious system, and the Arabs, too, had as yet no systematic
philosophy. Saadiah, by his own unaided intellectual power, built up
a Jewish philosophy of religion, although he borrowed his method of
treatment and his philosophical themes from the Arabic Mutazilist
school. His composition on the Ten Commandments, in which he strove to
bring them into relation with the Ten Categories of the Aristotelian
philosophy, belongs to his earlier and less excellent efforts.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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