The Book of Beliefs and Opinions

Se‘adya ben Joseph al-Fayyūmī, from the town of Dilāṣ in the Fayyūm region of Egypt, was one of the most significant figures in the early medieval world, reshaping rabbinic thought and literary culture according to the norms of the medieval Islamicate intellectual world in which he lived. Se‘adya played a decisive role in communal events and numerous intellectual fields. He polemicized against Karaites; composed early and influential works in Judeo-Arabic, of biblical exegesis, theology, linguistics, and law; composed a prayer book; and wrote liturgical poetry. He also translated much of the Hebrew Bible into Judeo-Arabic. Se‘adya began his literary career in Egypt but, around the year 900, went to study in the Palestinian academy in Tiberias. In 902, while still young, he composed the first Hebrew dictionary, the Egron, revising and expanding it until 930, when it had more than a thousand entries. At some point before 921, he came to Baghdad and participated in the calendar controversy that shook the Jewish world in 921 and 922. In 928, he was chosen to head the Sura academy by the exilarch David ben Zakkai. Only two years later, however, they began a conflict that went on for six or seven years, each of them deposing the other and appointing a replacement, until they finally reconciled.