Forgery and Abrogation of the Torah

Forgery and Abrogation of the Torah: A Theme in Muslim and Christian Polemic in SpainAuthor(s): Norman RothSource: Proceedings of the American Academy for Jewish Research, Vol. 54 (1987), pp. 203-236Published by: American Academy for Jewish ResearchStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3622585 .Accessed: 01/06/2011 10:21

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FORGERY AND ABROGATION OF THE TORAH: A THEME IN MUSLIM AND CHRISTIAN POLEMIC

IN SPAIN

BY NORMAN ROTH

Slow but steady progress is being made toward the point where we may be able to have a comprehensive synthetic analysis of the nature of medieval polemic and the Jewish response to it. The recent appearance of important works like David Berger's edition of the Ni44ahon ha-yashan, with his substantial com-

mentary, is an indication of this progress. Considerably more attention has been given, however, to Christian polemical literature than to that of Islam.1

In connection with my research on relations between Jews, Muslims and Christians in medieval Spain, some important

The bibliography on Christian anti-Jewish polemic is substantial and familiar, of course. The best survey of Muslim polemic, although bibliographi- cal only, remains Moritz Steinschneider, Polemische und apologetische Litera- tur in arabischer Sprache zwischen Muslimen, Christen und Juden (Leipzig, 1877 [Abhandlungen fur die Kunde des Morgenlandes VI. 3], photo rpt. 1966). Other early work includes Martin Schreiner, "Zur Geschichte der Polemik zwischen Juden und Muhammedaner," Z.D.M.G. 42 (1888) (not a very enlightening article); H. Hirschfeld, "Muslim Criticism of the Bible," J.Q.R. 13; and some articles by Ignaz Goldziher, which may readily be consulted in his Gesammelte Schriften (Hildesheim, 1967), vol. I (now in the process of being translated into English). For relations between Muslims and Jews in general in medieval Spain, see my "Some Aspects of Muslim-Jewish Relations in Spain," Estudios en homenaje a don Claudio Sdnchez Albornoz en sus 90 anios (Buenos Aires, 1983) II, 179-214. Naturally, Eliahu Ashtor, The Jews of Moslem Spain (Philadelphia, 173; two vols., an incomplete English translation from the

Hebrew) is helpful for the period, as far as it covers. Berger's edition and translation mentioned is Jewish-Christian Debate in the High Middle Ages (Philadelphia, 1979) with a very useful index to the commentary.

204 NORMAN ROTH [2]

examples of Muslim polemic, although few in number, have come to light. The most important single example is that of Ibn Hazm of C6rdoba, better known for his famous literary work "The Dove's Neck Ring" (Tauq al-hamdma).2 However, whereas in that work he said some rather positive things about Jews whom he had known, his attitude changed considerably after he became a theologian and jurist of renown, and after he had his

dispute with Samuel Ibn Naghrillah, the Jewish prime minister and commander-in-chief of the Muslim kingdom of Granada. That story has often been told, and the short polemical treatise which he wrote against Ibn Naghrillah's attack on Islam has been analyzed.3 Less well known, although not entirely ignored, is Ibn Hazm's impressive history of the various religions of the world and their beliefs.4 One very long section of this deals

exclusively with Judaism, although there are references to Judaism throughout the work, and it is the most polemical section of the entire work. Ibn Hazm was well versed in the Bible in Hebrew, as were numerous other Muslim writers both in Spain and elsewhere. Whereas his observations on biblical textual matters are often valuable, his real purpose was polemical and his attack apparently became the source for most subsequent Muslim polemics, particularly with regard to

charges of "forgery" in the Torah.

2 The correct form of Ibn Hazm's name, often erroneously given, is Abu Muhammad cAl b. Ahmad Ibn Hazm. The best edition and translation (French) of the Tauq is that of Leon Bercher (Alger, 1949). The English translation, The Ring of the Dove, by A.J. Arberry (London, 1953) is unsatisfac- tory, but the Spanish, El collar de la paloma, by E. Garcia Gomez (Madrid, 1952) is acceptable.

3 E. Garcia G6mez, "Polemica religiosa entre Ibn Hazm e Ibn al-Nagrila," Al-Andalus 4 (1936): 1-28; a less adequate treatment in Ashtor, Jews in Moslem Spain II, 122 ff.

4 The correct title of this work would seem to be Kitab alfa$l (not "fial") fi'l-milal wa'l-ahwa' (edition, Cairo, 1903 [photo rpt., Beirut, n.d. (1983?); Spanish translation, complete and quite accurate, by Miguel Asin Palacios, Abenhdzam de Cordoba [Madrid, 1927], especially vol. 2). The title means "Book of distinction concerning the religious communities and sects."

FORGERY AND ABROGATION OF THE TORAH

Long before Islam, the Samaritans had already accused "the cursed Ezra" of forging the Law.5 After the Samaritans, Por- phyry also accused Ezra of forgery. In turn, the rabbis of the talmudic era accused the Samaritans of having made forgeries and corruptions in the text.6

Muslim charges of forgery (tahrif) of the scriptures are found already in the Qur'an (II. 174, those who "conceal" the Book shall consume fire; II. 75, "a party of them that heard the word of Allah, and then changed it," III. 187, they rejected the Book; V. 13, "changing" and forgetting many things; cf. also V. 15).

The foremost exponent of this charge in medieval Islam was none other than Ibn Hazm. After him, we find also the Jewish apostate Sama'ual al-Maghribi (who, if he did not live in Spain, at least originated from that country) referring to Ezra's "forgery." The editor of Sama'ual's work expressed his doubt that Ibn Hazm could have influenced Sama'ual, since the former's work was "probably" not widely circulated because of his theological views.7 This is itself doubtful, and in any case unsubstantiated, and certainly Ibn Hazm's work was known at least in al-Andalus (and, as we shall see, later even in Catalo- nia), and therefore most certainly was known to Sama'ual. In

any event, we need not conjecture that this is so, as the harmony in views and even wording is striking evidence.

In a subsequent paper, the editor further discussed this, and there referred to Spinoza's opinion that Ezra was the author of the Torah and the historical books of the Bible. But Spinoza does not say that Abraham Ibn CEzra declared that Moses was

5 See Abrahm Spiro, "Samaritans, Tobiads and Judahites in Pseudo-Philo," PAAJR 20 (1951: 287, n. 24; Abraham S. Halkin, "Samaritan Polemic Against the Jews," ibid. 7 (1936): 13-59.

6 Salo W. Baron, A Social and Religious History of the Jews (N.Y., 1957) II, 158 and 38; Sifre Devarim, ed. Louis Finkelstein (N.Y., 1969), p. 123.

7 Ijam al-yahud, ed. and tr. Moshe Perlmann (N.Y., 1964 [PAAJR 32]), p. 51 (text), p. 55 (tr.), and cf. p. 97, note B45, and p. 20. Sama'ual's parents were married in Baghdad, but his father was from al-Andalus and it is possible that Sama'ual was born there.

[3] 205

not the author of the Torah, as claimed there; rather, this was Spinoza's own opinion based on his misinterpretation of Ibn cEzra, who is paraphrased at length by him (Spinoza's knowledge of the Hebrew was very inadequate, and thus he must have depended on the Christian Latin translation and summaries of parts of Ibn CEzra's commentaries, just as he had to do for his knowledge of the Bible and Mishnah). Ibn CEzra meant only that the specific passages he cited could not have been written by Moses or during his lifetime. It was dangerous enough, indeed, for a medieval exegete to suggest even minor interpola- tions in the text of the Torah, which is why he couched his suggestion in terms that could be understood only by the scholar, but he was certainly no heretic and would never have dared to state that the Torah in general was not written by Moses.

Thus, the further conjecture in that paper that Sama'ual received his idea of Ezra's "forgery" of the Torah from no less an authority than Ibn CEzra, through the latter's son Isaac who supposedly converted to Islam (doubtful, at best), has nothing to support it.8

In fact, long before Ibn cEzra we find that Ibn Hazm already deduced from the account of the death of Moses (Deut. 34.5 if.) that "this one passage is a faithful witness and perfect proof, a decisive and true argument, that their Torah was altered and that it is a history which a [human] writer wrote, inspired in his ignorance or founded in his imagination," and not the revela-

8 Perlmann, "The Medieval Polemics Between Islam and Judaism," in S.D. Goitein, ed., Religion in a Religious Age (Cambridge, Mass., 1974), pp. 133-34, n. 18; Benedict Spinoza, Tractatus Theologico-Politicus I, ch. viii (in the translation of R.H.M. Elwes [N.Y., 1951], p. 120 ff., especially pp. 129-30; Ibn cEzra on Deut. 1.2, Gen. 12.6 (cf. the "Peirush" to his commentary in the Miqra'ot gedolot ["rabbinical" Bible], and Gen. 22.14, 3.11, 36.31, Deut. 31.22 and 34.10. Neither does the poet Moses Ibn cEzra's statement, cited by Perlmann, have anything to do with this (see his Kitab al-muhad4ara wa'l-mu- ddkara, ed. and tr. A.S. Halkin [Jerusalem 1975], pp. 86-87, line 44 ff.).

206 [4] NORMAN ROTH

[5] FORGERY AND ABROGATION OF THE TORAH 207

tion of God. He claims to have found altogether 57 passages containing contradictions and errors in the Torah.9

In general, he argues, the transmission of the texts of Jewish and Christian scriptures is lacking in guarantee of authenticity, for their books have been "enormously altered" and interpo- lated to the point where they are apocryphal (muftaCal; fabri- cated, forged). Also, during the long period of Israel's political life, the Torah remained in the hands of the priest (kohen; here as elsewhere Ibn Hazm employs the Hebrew word in Arabic transliteration), so that it could have been corrupted then, as were the books of the Zoroastrians and the Christians.10

The Samaritans, he says, possess an altogether different text of the Torah, although no doubt it is also corrupted (he has not seen it, for they do not consider it permissible to remove it from Palestine and the Jordan region)."

Finally, he concludes his lengthy, and at times perceptive, critique of the Torah by noting that he has discussed its history from the death of Moses to the return of the Jews to Jerusalem, when Ezra (CAzra instead of the usual Arabic "Uzayr; both another indication of his transliteration directly from the Hebrew, and an innovation on his part with respect to Muslim tradition) wrote the Torah.'2

Ibn Khaldin, who is particularly of interest because he is one of the few late medieval (fourteenth century) Muslim writers of

9 Kitab al-fal I, 186; Asin Palacios, Abenhdzam II, 337 (future citations of the Arabic text will be "Fazl," and to the Spanish translation "Abenhdzam," with the understanding that the reference is to these respective volumes of the edition and of the translation).

10 Fal$, 114-15; Abenhdzam, 223. " Fa$l, 117; Abenhdzam, 239-40. In the thirteenth century in Baghdad, a

Jewish writer attempted to refute precisely this charge, in the context of a broader polemic; cf. Ibn Kammana's Examination of the Three Faiths, tr. Moshe Perlmann (Berkeley, 1971), pp. 49-53.

12 Fa1l, 187; Abenhdzam, 338. Of some interest is his statement that the Sadducees alone claimed that CUzayr (so, not Ezra, which he consistently transliterates as CAzra) was the "son of God," and that in this they differed from the rest of the Jews (FasI, 99; Abenhdzam, 211). Thus, it would appear that Ibn

208 NORMAN ROTH [6]

Spanish origin, says that it is "well known" (i.e., commonly argued) that the Jews altered the Torah, but adds that this

opinion is nevertheless "unacceptable to thorough scholars," for divinely revealed scripture would not be dealt with in such a manner. Perhaps he had become convinced by Jewish arguments. Some Muslim theologians, indeed, rejected the charge of

forgery because of doubts this might cast on the authenticity of Islam's own pretensions to biblical traditions.13

Such Muslim charges did not pass unnoticed by Jewish scholars in Spain. An important reply to the charge of forgery is found in Abraham Ibn Daud's philosophycal work ha-Emunah ha-ramah ("the exalted faith"), written in 1168 in Toledo, where he discusses this at length and concludes:

And we find the Torah known everywhere in one text, in which there is no change, among the communities of Israel from India to the extremities of Spain and the Maghrib [West] in the settled world, from the borders of Ifriqiya [moder Tunisia], Ethiopia, and Yemen in the South to the ends of the cities of al-Migus in the ocean which encircles the North... And how could it be possible that Ezra got the agreement of all the people everywhere to follow after 'his' covenant?14

Hazm, at least, did not consider CUzayr to be the same as Ezra, as some Islamic traditions maintained. This, too, was apparently taken over from him by the apostate Sama'ual, who argues that Ezra cannot be CUzayr (Ifham, p. 63 [text], p. 60 [tr.]), which is further proof of Ibn Hazm's influence on him, as there could be no other source for this (see generally the article "'Uzayr" in Encyclopedia of Islam, or, better, Shorter Encyclopedia of Islam).

3 Ibn Khaldin, The Muqaddimah, tr. Franz Rosenthal (Princeton, 1967) I, 20. See the article "Tatrif' in Shorter Encylcopedia of Islam (articles on religious subjects are often of better quality there than in the more complete Encyclopedia of Islam).

14 Ha-Emunah ha-ramah (Frankfurt a.M., 1853), p. 80; my copy of the book lacks the German translation, and the above is my own translation from the Hebrew. The cities of al-Mugus should probably be understood as al-Majuj; i.e., Magog of the mythical lands of Gog and Magog (cf. Fasl, 120, where the same term is used), thus, the extremities of northern Europe and Asia.


In other words, how could this "forgery" be so universally accepted, and in the same text everywhere? Of course, this is not a convincing rebuttal, for it could easily be maintained that the text of the Torah was established in its final form long after Ezra, by the Masoretes, and it was this text which was universally accepted (indeed, there were still significant variations in the text in medieval manuscripts, as the scholars of Spain knew well).

Maimonides may very well have been inspired by this argument of Ibn Daud when he wrote in his "Letter to Yemen" concerning certain Jews who had converted to Islam and were apparently impressed by the argument of abrogation of the Torah:

And when they [Muslims] did not find a single proof in all the Torah, neither a passage nor analogue [shibh], to which they could attach themselves, they found it necessary to say: 'You have substituted the Torah and altered it and eradicated the name of that one [Muhammad] from it.' And they did not find a better argument than this, although it is most abominable and repulsive, and its nullification is obvious to everyone [lil-Camma w'al-khay4al] since the Torah was expounded [translated] in the Syrian language and the Greek and the Persian and Romance hundreds of years before this ignoble one [Muhammad] arose. (14a)

'4 Iggeret Teiman, Epistle to Yemen, ed. Abraham S. Halkin, English tr. Boaz Cohen (N.Y., 1952), p. 38 (text). Since the Hebrew translations, and especially Cohen's English translation from the Hebrew (p. viii) are all more or less inexact, the translation here is my own. It should be noted that al-La(tnf, especially when used by an Andalusian author (which Maimonides always considered himself to be), means "Romance" and not "Latin;" thus is answered Halkin's difficulty in n. 56 there. Also, note that Maimonides uses the term al-fusul for Muhammad, which could be the Arabic word meaning "low, ignoble," or could as easily be the Hebrew pasul. In either case, it is a homonym for rasul, "prophet," in an obviously derogatory sense. This term was frequent both in rabbinical and Qaraite anti-Muslim polemics. Halkin made no com- ment on this in the text, where there should be a note.

[7] 209

210 NORMAN ROTH [8]

Qaraite scholars even took the offensive against such Muslim charges. While the present study is limited to medieval Spain, nevertheless an example of Qaraite rebuttal can be cited from Yafet (not "Yefet") b. CAli, an important exegete frequently cited by Ibn cEzra, in his commentary (in Arabic) on Isa. 47.9- 10, where he refers to "their book the Qur'an [which is] a lie which has no foundation. Muhammad and his companions gathered things from the Torah and wrote them in their book and pretended it was a revelation from God. Thus, they were even worse than sorcerers and magicians...'15

In addition to attacking the Torah itself, and the rest of the Bible, Ibn Hazm also attacked rabbinical and mystical literature. In his refutation of Ibn Naghrillah, he had already called attention to the mystical treatise shiCur qomah ("measure of the [divine] body") and objected that in this work the distance from the front to the back of God is described; and in Seder nashim (transcribed again in Arabic characters), it is said that God has a crown of a certain height. These charges are repeated in the Fasl:

In one of their books, ShiCur qomah, of the books of the Talmud (and the Talmud is their foundation and base of their jurisprudence [fiqh] and ordinances [ahkam] of their religion and law), and it is of the doctrine [aqwal] not 'sayings' [aqdwrl] of their rabbis without disagreement [khilaf] of any of them...16

15 Text of Yafet cited from two mss. in Haggai Ben-Shammai, "Mahadurah ve-nusha'ot mi-peirushey Yafet b. cAll la-miqra" (Hebrew), Alei Sefer 2 (1976): 23-24. In the ms. in Arabic script, the offensive passages are largely in Hebrew, with the Qur'an being called, as usal, qalon (Hebrew "disgrace"). In the ms. in Judeo-Arabic, even more of the offensive passages are rendered in Hebrew (Ben-Shammai commented on this strange fact, but offered no explanation). On the decree of al-Mutawwakil in 850 C.E. concerning the things mentioned in the text, see the text of al-Tabari, translated in Bernard Lewis, Islam (N.Y., 1974), II, 224-25.

16 Garcia G6mez, "Polemica religiosa entre Ibn Hazm e Ibn al-Nagrila," p. 21. Fasl, 221; Abenhdzam, 385-86. The edited Arabic text reads "shcar tuma" for Shi'ur qomah, but this could easily be a copyist's error since Arabic t and q


In other words, he believed that this work was actually a part of the Talmud, and not midrash but rather of binding legal validity.

The attitude of the medieval Jews to this mystical treatise was at best ambiguous. While the geonim Sherira and Hai (Hayyah) may have accepted it, Sacadyah was inclined to be skeptical, and in any event "allegorized" the statement about God's height. Ibn cEzra, too, made it an allegory of the macrocosm (as Moses Narboni claimed for Maimonides). Maimonides, in fact, at first accepted the work, and then apparently had second thoughts and rejected it as the work of Byzantine Jewish preachers (possible because he became aware of Muslim hostil- ity to the views expressed, as in the work of Ibn Hazm).'7

Other Muslim writers knew of the work. Jamal al-Din Abu'l- Faraj CAbd al-Rahman b. cAli, known as Ibn al-Jawzi (1116- 1200, not to be confused with another writer of that name), a famous "Hanbalite" scholar and respected preacher and trav- eler, raised the charge of "association" (of forms with the deity) in his work Talbis Iblfs ("Deception of the devil"). He cites the

are quite easily confused. See generally Alexander Altmann, "Moses Narboni's Epistle on the Shi'ur Qomah," in Alexander Altmann, ed., Jewish Medieval and Renaissance Studies (Cambridge, Mass., 1967), p. 228. Altmann refers to the translation of Ibn Hazm's work, and correctly objects that Asin missed the

point that Ibn Hazm asserts the Shicur qomah to be, not part of the "dicta," but of the doctrine of the rabbis. I believe that by the world aqawil, Ibn Hazm intended aggadic sayings of the Talmud, Midrash, etc., and that his point is that this work is "official theology" (my translation differs in some minor points from that of Altmann there).

17 For details on these various opinons, see Altmann's cited article, pp. 226, 227, 230, 231-32, 239-40. However, the fifteenth-century Spanish Jewish scholars Shem Tov Ibn Shem Tov had no reservations about accepting the work as that of Judah ha-nasi, redactor of the Mishnah! (Sefer ha-emunot [Ferrara, 1555; photo rpt., 1969], f. 23a). For medieval microcosm-macrocosm theories, see Joseph Ibn Saddiq, Der Mikrokosmos ('Olam ha-qatan) (Breslau, 1903), and

generally George P. Conger, Theories of Macrocosms and Microcosms in the History of Philosophy (N.Y., 1950), p. 36 ff., Henry Malter's brilliant article "Personifications of Soul and Body," J.Q.R. (n.s.) 2 (1912): 453 ff., and Samuel

212 NORMAN ROTH [ 10]

"Hanbalite" theologian Abu cAbdallah b. Hamid who said "the Jews maintain that God who is to be worshipped is a man of

light upon a throne of light, having on his head a crown of light, and having the same members as a human being."18

There can be no doubt that this is a reference to the ShiCur

qomah. According to the extant fragments of that text, exaggerated measurements are given for various parts of the divine

body, and it is said: "His body is like a crystal [or beryl; tarshish] and its brightness shines greatly from the midst of the dark- ness..."19

Ibn al-Jawzi's charge that the Jews teach that God has a crown of light comes also from Ibn Hazm, who cites the Seder nashim, which he says is a "commentary on the laws of menstruation" (tafJir ahkam al-hai4), which mentions the crown of God and the angel responsible for it, Sandalfut (Sandalfon, of

course). According to this, he could only have been referring to the tractate Niddah, which deals with menstruation. In fact, these things are found not in Niddah, but in Hagigah 13b (part of the order MoCed, not Nashim): Sandalfon forms crowns for God, which is explained there as an allegory for the prayers of men which ascend and become "crowns."20 All of these matters

Kotteck, "Microcosm and Macrocosm According to Some Jewish Medieval Works Up to the Twelfth Century," Janus 64 (1977): 205-15.

"8 Tr. by D.S. Margoliouth, "'The Devil's Delusion' By Ibn al-Jauzi," Islamic Culture 9 (1935): 1-21, 187-208, 377-99 (the polemical section), 553-51. The citation here is from p. 377 (this article, and the work itself, has been ignored by all writers who have dealt with Muslim anti-Jewish polemic).

19 I cite the text of one of the versions, found in an early printed edition of the mystical work Sefer Raziel, as reprinted in Judah Eisenstein, OSar ha-midrashim (N.Y., 1915) II, 563a. None of the moder authorities (Scholem, Altmann, etc.) have noted this text, which is more readily accessible than the Merkavah Shlemah (Jerusalem, 1922), which they cite.

20 Fasl, 221; Abenhdzam, 386. The statement in .Hagigah 13b is repeated in the midrash "Macyan hokhmah" in A. Jellinek, ed., Beit ha-midrash (Leipzig, 1853-77; rpt. Jerusalem, 1967) I, 58, and in Eisenstein, op. cit. II, 306; German translation in A. Wunsche, Aus Israels Lehrhallen (Leipzig, 1907-09; rpt. Hildesheim, 1967) I, 127


have to do with the visions of Isaiah and Ezekiel, which were referred to in Jewish tradition as the "Work of the Chariot" (ma'aseh merkavah), considered esoteric knowledge which was not to be discussed publicly or with the improperly prepared student.21

The objection to the references to God sitting on a throne is a bit more difficult to understand, for the throne of Allah occupies a prominent place in Muslim theology (Qur'an VII.52; X.2; XIII.2; XXVII.25; XXXII.4; and of course the all-important "Throne verse," 11.255, which became part of the confession [shahada] of Islam). References to the allegory of the "throne of God" in rabbinic literature are too numerous to list.22

The allegorical nature of the Throne is particularly empha- sized by Maimonides, and almost certainly he was reacting, at least in part, to Muslim polemic such as that of Ibn al-Jawzi, as well as to the doctrine of the Throne generally in Islam. According to Maimonides, "throne" when applied to God, is nothing but an allegory for the heavens, which indicates to those who reflect upon them "the greatness of Him who caused them to exist and move," and the throne ought not to be imagined as "a thing outside His essence or as a created being from among the beings created by him" (so Pines' translation; actually the text reads "created [thing]," not "being"), which would be heresy (kufr; not mere "infidelity").23 Much of what he says there appears to have been influenced by Ibn Sina (Avi- cenna), who wrote:

21 See, e.g., Moses b. Maimon, Guide of the Perplexed, tr. Shlomo Pines

(Chicago, 1963), III, introduction; pp. 415-16, 417-30; Mishneh Torah, Mada'c

Yesodey ha-Torah, 2.11-12. 22 See, e.g., C.G. Montefiore and H. Loewe, A Rabbinic Anthology (Philadel-

phia, 1960), index, s.v., "throne;" Pirke de Rabbi Eliezer, tr. Gerald Friedlander

(N.Y., 1965), index. 23 Guide I.1, p. 23; 1.9, pp. 34-35; I. 28, p. 61; I. 70, p. 172; II. 26, p. 330 ff.

Pines somewhat incorrectly translated "created being" (p. 35), confusing mak-

luq with makaliq (the former means simply "created," a created thing).

religious laws generally state that God is on the throne. Among other things this expression means that the throne is the last of the created corporeal [physicial] existents. The anthropomorphists among the adherents of religious laws claim that God, the Exalted, is on the throne... The philosophers who adhere to religious laws have agreed that what is meant [is the heaven, or ninth celestial sphere].24

Nevertheless, Maimonides here conveniently ignored such bla- tant statements as: "Seven things were created before the world was created... [including] the throne of glory" (Pesahim 54a; Nedarim 39b), although he mentions this later (p. 331) as a "strange" teaching.

Ibn Hazm also argues against the Jews who claim that the Torah cannot be abrogated, and insists that abrogation simply means that "God commands the practice of a certain thing for a certain time, after which, with the passing of that time, he prohibits its practice." For instance, all Jews recognize that the law of Jacob differed from the law of Moses; e.g., Jacob married both Leah and Rachel and had them as wives simultaneously, "which was prohibited by the law of Moses" (cf. Lev. 18.18).25

As further examples of apparent ch;anges in God's law he gives the order to kill all the peoples of Canaan (Deut. 7.1-5), but when the Gibeonites tricked the Hebrews into making a

24 "On the Proof of Prophecies" (Ft ithbat al-nubuwwat), tr. Michael E. Marmula in Ralph Lerner and Muhsin Mahdi, eds., Medieval Political Philoso- phy (Ithaca, N.Y., 1963), p. 118. I think there is no doubt that Maimonides was influenced by Ibn Sina here; cf. also the commentary of"Efodi" (Isaac b. Moses ha-Levy, Profiat Duran) in the Hebrew editions of Guide with commentaries, on 1.9. Some examples of the influence of Muslim philosophers on Maimonides are given in the chapter "Maimonides and Some Muslim Sources" in my book Maimonides. Essays and Texts (Madison, Wisc., 1986).

25 FaSl, 101; Abenhdzam, 214. On abrogation, see already Sacadyah Gaon, Book of Beliefs and Opinions, tr. Samuel Rosenblatt (New Haven, 1948), p. 147 if., and Moses b. Maimon, Mishneh Torah: Shoftim, "Melakhim" 11.4,3 (only in the uncensored Rome, 1480 edition; rpt., Jerusalem, 1955). This is also discussed, and the passage translated, in my Spanish article (see n.59 below).

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[ 13] FORGERY AND ABROGATION OF THE TORAH 215

pact with them, God himself ordered them not to be killed (Joshua 9). He also objects that Isa. 66. 18-21 permits ministers in the Temple from among the Persians (which he either deduced from references there to other nations, or apparently he misunderstood Sacadyah's Arabic translation of Isaiah, which he may have consulted, where he translated verse 20: "horse [or chariots] and riders" as khail wa'l-fursan, "horses and

riders," which Ibn Hazm may have understood as the plural of al-furs, "Persians").26 "In whatever sense, therefore, in which the Jews interpret these words of Isaiah," he says, "it must result in an abrogation [naskh] of that which the Torah established. In truth, it is foretelling [indhdn] of the Muslim religion by which the Persians, Arabs and other peoples have come to occupy the Temple and the rest of the houses of Allah."

Unfortunately, we possess almost no comments in any of the rabbinical literature on this passage, and of the medieval commentaries in which we would be interested; only that of Ibn CEzra on Isaiah is extant. He says on verse 21: "those that come I shall take to be priests before me, and Levites." Both Rashi and Qimhi cite the statement of Rabbi Elcazar (so, not "Elicezer" as in the printed texts) in the "Aggadat Tehillim" (according to Rashi) that God will take from among the Gentiles priests and Levites ("from those who bring [=Gentiles] and from those who are brought [=Israelites]," according to Qimhi's text; but in fact the edited text of the citation has "from those who bring but not from those who are brought," which obviously makes no sense. Thus, Qimhi's version, supported also by the Yalqut, is correct.). This statement is found, in fact, in two different midrashim.27

26 Fa4l, 101-02; Abenhdzam, 216, with Asin's unlikely explanation there in n.93. Sa'adyah's translation (Judeo-Arabic) of Isaiah in his Oeuvres, ed. J. Derenbourg (Paris, 1893-99; rpt. Hildesheim, 1979) I, 100.

27 Peirush Rabbenu Avraham Ibn cEzra Cal Yesha'yahu, ed. and tr. M. Fried- lander (London, 1873; rpt. N.Y., n.d.), p. 115 (text). Midrash Tehillim (which was known as "Aggadat Tehillim"), ed. Solomon Buber (Vilna, 1891; rpt. Jerusalem, 1977) on Ps. 87, section 6 (p. 190), and Mekilta (Mekhilta), ed. and

Thus, indeed, Jewish interpretation agreed here with Ibn Hazm, at least to the extent that in the messianic era priests and Levites would be chosen also from among the Gentiles.

Ibn al-Jawzi also addressed the subject of abrogation of the laws of the Torah, noting that "Adam" was permitted marriage with sisters (he confused Jacob, who married both Leah and Rachel, with Adam), and was allowed to work on the Sabbath, both of which were prohibited by Moses.28 Sama'ual al-Magh- ribi also mentions the prohibition of work on the Sabbath previously permitted as proof of abrogation, but makes no mention of Jacob's marriage of sisters.29

Since Islam is a religion predicated on the belief in Muham- mad as the "messenger" and prophet of God par excellence, it was only natural that Muslims should attribute to other religions (Zoroastrianism, Manicheism, Judaism) a similar doctrine of "belief' in their prophets. Also with regard to Christianity, while denying as blasphemy of the worst kind the belief in the divinity of Jesus, Muslims were willing to accept Jesus as a prophet. However, the truth is that Judaism is not predicated on a belief in Moses, who was merely a transmitter (however elevated above other prophets he may have been) of divine revelation. The belief, in other words, is in the message and not in the messenger.

As a result of this mistaken understanding of Judaism, Mus- lim polemics focuses also on the "miracles" of Moses as presumed proof (from the Jewish viewpoint) of his superiority. Ibn Hazm states that Muslims only believe in Moses and Jesus as prophets because they supposedly foretold the coming of Muhammad. Indeed, he questions why Moses should be believed at all; if because of miracles, he (Ibn Hazm) has already demonstrated in previous chapters that there is no difference in

tr. Jacob Lauterbach (Philadelphia, 1949) I, 93-94 (surprisingly, Buber did not notice the citation in Mekhilta, nor did Lauterbach mention Midrash Tehillin).

28 Margoliouth, op. cit., p. 378. 29 Ijam, pp. 8-9 (text), pp. 34-35 (tr.).



this respect between miracles performed by Moses and those of others. Jesus and Muhammad should equally be believed on this basis. There is no difference between the Jews who admit the prophecy of some and deny that of others and the Magians who admit the divine mission of Zoroaster but deny that of Moses and the other prophets, or the Manicheans who believe in the mission of Jesus, and the Sabeans who deny that of Abraham and the prophets but admit that of Enoch (Idris) and others. Indeed, "each of these sects and religions says much more of Moses and the rest of your prophets than [Jews] say of Jesus and Muhammad. They [the prophets] are spoken of in their books, and this is famous and well known."30

Sama'ual also criticizes the Jews for their "belief' in the miracles of Moses merely on the basis of tradition. He returns again to the charge about miracles, asserting that traditions concerning the miracles of Jesus and Muhammad must equally validate their prophecies.31 Again, it is obvious he derived these ideas from Ibn Hazm.

Maimonides certainly was aware of Sama'ual's book, and it seems that he responded specifically to it in his letter to the Jews of Yemen (there is nc space to discuss this in detail here, but it will be fully analyzed in a forthcoming book on relations between Jews and Gentiles in Spain). It would also seem probable that he was familiar with the work of Ibn Hazm (why should he not have been, when in the Guide he says he read every book ever written on the histories of religions?), and therefore that he had in mind these polemical remarks about Moses and miracles in his own discussion of these in the Guide.

There, he first refers to his earlier distinctions between Moses and the prophets. In one of these, he stated that Moses was the chief of all prophets before and after him, "superior in attaining knowledge of God to any person who ever lived or will live... All

30 Fal1, 104, 102; Abenhdzam, 219, 216-17 (his translation of the last

sentence there is incorrect). 31 Op. cit., pp. 12-13 (text), pp. 36-37 (tr.).

[15] 217

his powers of sense [the senses] and fantasy were repressed and pure reason remained." There is no mention here of miracles whatsoever.32

Also in the Mishneh Torah, the same general distinctions between Moses and the prophets are made, again with no mention of miracles. On the contrary, he specifically denies that Moses was believed because of miracles:

Moses our teacher was not believed by Israel because of the miracles he did, for one who believes because of miracles has in his heart a doubt that possibly the miracle is done by enchantment and magic. Rather, all the miracles which Moses did in the wilderness were because of necessity, not to bring proofs as to his prophecy... In what did they believe in him? Because of the presence at Mt. Sinai [maCamad har Sinay], which we saw with our eyes and not a stranger, and our ears heard and not another's.33

Similarly, in the Guide, he notes that Moses differed from the prophets in "apprehension" of God, which was different "all the more, from the apprehension of all those who came in other religious communities."34

32 Introduction to "IHeleq" (commentary on mishnah Sanhedrin, ch. 10.1), in Moses b. Maimon, Mishnah cim peirush..., ed. Joseph Kafib (not "Kafah") (Jerusalem, 1963), vol. 3, pp. 142-43; there is an English translation by Arnold Wolf, reprinted in Isadore Twersky, ed., A Maimonides Reader (N.Y., 1972), p. 419 (the translation of that passage is reliable, unlike most of the rest of it).

33 Mishneh Torah: Madac, "Yesodey ha-Torah" 8.2. Incidentally, the expression macamad har Sinay is one of several first coined by Maimonides, here and in the commentary on Avot 1.17 (cf. also Epistle to Yemen, ed. A.S. Halkin and tr. Boaz Cohen [N.Y., 1952], p. vi of the translation, n. 4; however, Maimonides does not there use the expression, and Ibn Tibbon's translation of Sacadyah, where he used the expression, was made in 1186, thus long after the Mishneh Torah [finally redacted in 1178] from which he of course borrowed it). See also M.T. there, 7.6, on Moses and prophecy (and cf. my Maimonides, index s.v. "prophecy").

4 Guide 11.35, pp. 367-68. Generally, Maimonides was skeptical concerning miracles; see especially Guide II.29, p. 345, and, concerning the miracles discussed there, p. 368, and his apparent approval of the rational interpretation of Moses Ibn Chiqatillah, see Uriel Simon, Arbaca gishot le-Sefer Tehillim


[ 17] FORGERY AND ABROGATION OF THE TORAH 219

Ibn Hazm also claims that Jews have denied the transforma- tion of physical entities (ihalat al-tabd'iC, change of natural

characteristic) into another by loss of its essential attributes, or the creation of phenomena impossible by nature, the denial of which is like the denial of prophecy, for only these things distinguish a prophet from one who is not.35

Goldziher also published the text of a statement by Muham- mad b. al-Hasan al-Shaybani (d. 805 C.E., he was the foremost authority of the "Hanafite" school of law) to the effect that all the Jews of cIraq recognize that Allah is the true God (i.e., is the same as God), but they claim that Muhammad was sent as a prophet only to the Arabs but not to the Jews, taking literally the statement (Qur'an LXII.2) that Allah sent the Prophet to the "unlettered" nations (the Arabs) only. Thus, the Jews are not to be believed if they claim to believe in Allah and his prophet, for they mean God, and that the Prophet was sent to the Arabs. Even if a Jew professes faith in Islam, this may merely mean the "truth" of his own law (Judaism).36

We see, therefore, that the issue of the nature of prophecy was of great importance not only in theoretical polemical debate, but in the practicalities of actual life.

Other criticisms of the Bible found in Muslim polemics, and especially in great detail in Ibn Hazm, include the charge of "anthropomorphism." He begins his attack with Gen. 1.26, God making man in his image (form) and likeness. "Form" (Sura) would be acceptable as an attribute, as when it is said "the

(Ramat Gan, 1982; cf. my review of this important book in Hebrew Studies 25

[1984]: 210-13), pp. 97-98, and n. 9; and see also the commentary of Qimhi on I Kings 17.17, citing "some who say," almost verbatim as in the Guide, and thus

obviously he means Ibn Chiqatillah. 35 FaSl, 155; Abenhdzam, 296. Maimonides does cite the view of the rabbis in

the Midrash, which is also his view, that there is no permanent change in the natural order, and that miracles are only that which is ordained in the nature of a thing (Guide 11.29, p. 345; cf. also I. 73, p. 207).

36 "Usages juifs d'apres la litterature religieuse des Musulmans," R.E.J. 28

(1894): 91-92; rpt. in his Gesammelte Schriften III, 338-39.

work of Allah" or "formed by Allah," but "likeness" (shabah) implies an image of God, which is false.37 There is much more of this kind of thing, detailing anthropomorphic expressions in the Bible. Of course, the Qur'an itself contains anthropomor- phisms which Muslim commentary attempted to explain away. Elsewhere in the Fail, he also criticized strongly the views of al- Ashcari on divine attributes, which he considered anthropomorphic. Sama'ual also criticized anthropomorphism in the Bible, but rather briefly.38

Again, it is obvious that Maimonides was responding to Muslim polemic when, in the Guide and elsewhere, he dismissed all anthropomorphic statements in the Bible as allegory; especially when he discusses this very passage in Genesis, and says: "People have thought that in the Hebrew language image [4elem] denotes the shape and configuration of a thing," and goes on to explain that "image" here refers to the intellectual apprehension of man, and that this is an "equivocal" or "amphibolous" term (in Arabic mushakkak, which simply means "doubtful, uncertain").39 Many passages in the Guide are devoted to explaining allegorically various apparent anthropo- morphisms of the Bible.

Ibn Hazm's attack on the anthropomorphism, and in fact his entire polemic, is not of mere academic interest as a written treatise alone, for he specifically states that he debated publicly, ("before the people") with "some Jews" about these matters. We know that one of the Jews with whom he debated was Ibn Naghrillah, but according to this statement there were others as well.

37 Fayl, 117-18, also pp. 161, 164; Abenhdzam, 240, 303, 308. 38 Ifham, p. 45 (text), p. 52 (tr.). 39 Guide I.1, pp. 21-22. See the important commentary of Moses Narboni

(ed. J. Goldenthal [Vienna, 1828; rpt. in Qadmoney meforshey ha-Moreh, Jerusalem, 1961]) and also the commentary of Solomon Maimon Giv'at ha- Moreh, f. 2b. See the observations of Harry A. Wolfson, "The Jewish Kalam," Seventy-Fifth Anniversary Volume of the Jewish Quarterly Review (Philadelphia, 1967), pp. 563-68.



It would appear that Abraham Ibn Daud was at least partially influenced by Muslim beliefs such as those found in Ibn Hazm's treatise when he wrote that the Hebrew words for "God" in the Bible (Elohim, etc.) do not always mean God, but sometimes angels and the like. The Christians always translate the Tetra- grammaton as "Lord" in such expressions as "And YHVH said," etc., "however, the Muslim never admitted that God, may he be blessed, spoke with the prophets or appeared to [them], but it is found that they refer to Gabriel or the faithful spirit and similar names." Some ignorant Jews, on the other hand, interpret all such statements in the Bible literally and so come to the error of anthropomorphism. There are even some "of the ignorant of our people" who take the verse "Let us make man in our form and image" literally, and "for the majority [of people] the form is matter... especially the face, and therefore they think this passage requires that God made man according to his matter and image, and thus fall into complete error."40

Judah b. Barzilai of Barcelona who wrote in the same period as Ibn Daud, also complained of Jewish heretics who accused the rabbis of anthropomorphic views:

40 ha Emunah ha-ramah, p. 91. This is further proof that many Jews actually did hold anthropomorphic views, as Abraham b. David of Posquiere stated in his strictures on Maimonides, and contrary to Wolfson in the article cited, p. 571

(there p. 562, he discussed an earlier statement in ha-Emunah ha-ramah, p. 47, but partly because he overlooked the passage here quoted his conclusions on the

passage he did discuss cannot be accepted). On anthropomorphism, see also Isaac Ibn Latif, "Iggeret ha-teshuvah," QoveS al-yad, 1: 55 and the letter of Nahmanides in "Iggrot qena'ot" in Moses b. Maimon, Qoves teshuvot, ed. A.

Lichtenberg (Leipzig, 1859; photo rpt. Westmead, England, 1969)III, 9d; and the letter of an unknown contemporary of Abraham Maimuni, ed. and tr. A.S. Halkin in Tarbiz 25 (1956): 420 (tr.), 426 (text); and see the letter of the Damascus nasi Hodayah b. Yishay to Abraham Maimuni denouncing all the French Jews for their belief in anthropomorphism (ed. David Simonsen in

Festschrift J. Guttmann, p. 221). All these substantiate the fact that anthropomorphic beliefs were much more common among medieval Jews than Wolfson assumed.

[19] 221

we have found in the world the divided of heart, the wicked of the land, heretics who are pursuers of Israel and stand among us and blind themselves [cf. Lam. 3.65 and the commentary of Ibn cEzra] to say to the sages of Israel, God forbid, that they ascribe image or form to our creator - far be it from all the holy seed to do this at all; may [God] punish the heretical evil ones... and all the more so the rest of the peoples of evil who deny the essence [of faith] and say many errors.41

Since he describes these heretics as "standing among us" and distinguishes them from the "peoples of evil" (by which he always means the Christians), there is no doubt that he refers here to Jewish heretics (minim) and not Christians. Indeed, we never hear of Christians who raised a charge of anthropomorphism against the Jews, for they themselves were "guilty" of this position and were attacked along with Jews for this in Muslim polemic.

Undoubtedly, the most interesting Jewish reply to Ibn Hazm comes from an unlikely source, Solomon Ibn Adret, a thirteenth-century rabbi of Barcelona. The manuscript of his "letter" (the title given to it by the editor, but there is no evidence that it was a "letter" to anyone; rather it was an independent treatise) was published in the last century.

The existence of this treatise was noted by Steinschneider, who didn't seem to consider it of much importance and was even somewhat doubtful as to its authenticity. Only two other scholars have noted the existence of the work: Schreiner, who correctly realized that it was a reply to Ibn Hazm, and Zucker, who completely denied its authenticity but also argued that it was a reply to Ibn Hazm (he was unaware that Schreiner had already established this far more satisfactorily).42

41 Peirush Sefer YeSirah (Berlin, 1885; photo rpt. Jerusalem, 1971), p. 13. 42 Text ed. J. Perles, R. Salomo b. Abraham b. [sic] Adereth [sic] (Breslau,

1863), Hebrew section, pp. 1-24. Steinschneider, op. cit., pp. 3, 363. Martin Schreiner, "Die apologetische Schrift des Salomo b. Adret gegen Muhamme- daner," Z.D.M.G. 48 (1894); 39-42. Moshe Zucker, "Berurim be-toldot ha-



Since Steinschneider, unlike his usual practice, did not exam- ine the treatise carefully at all, we can dismiss his doubts. However, it is necessary to consider Zucker's objections, in spite of the fact that he ignored Schreiner's conclusions. The fact that Ibn Adret was not apparently aware of what Zucker called the "considerable" Muslim polemic on the forgery of the Torah is not surprising, since he did not know Arabic; nor, in fact, is Muslim polemic on this subject so "considerable." Neither Saladyah Gaon nor Judah ha-Levy mention this specifically, contrary to what Zucker claimed, but only dealt in a general way with the impossibility of the Torah ever changing. Furthermore, it is clear from the treatise that the author never saw the complete original work of Ibn Hazm or even a detailed summary of it. This fact alone precludes the possibility, which Zucker suggested, that it could have been written by an eleventh-century author, who certainly would have known Arabic and would have seen Ibn Hazm's entire work (as Maimonides, for instance, undoubtedly did still in the twelfth century). Furthermore, the style and language are unquestionably those of Ibn Adret in his other writings, and show a definite resem- blance to his similar anti-Christian polemical treatise (discussed below).

He begins with a reply to Ibn Hazm by saying: "I saw a fool, wise in his eyes, a certain Muslim idiot [kesil e.ad YishmaCel]" who presumed to speak against the Torah. Now, this certainly does not mean that he actually "saw" this man, but rather learned of it second hand. Since Ibn Adret did not know Arabic at all, he may have seen a short synopsis of Ibn Hazm's translated in Hebrew (although extensive search failed to turn up any reference to what might have been such a translation), or more likely he may have heard about it from Jews who did understand Arabic, either in Castile or even in Aragon-Catalo- nia.

vikuhim ha-datiym she-bein ha-yahadut ve-ha-Islam," Festschrift Armand

Kaminka (Wien, 1937), pp. 31-48.

[21] 223

Ibn Adret expresses his amazement and outrage at the charge of forgery in the Torah, saying that "all" the religions agree that the Torah is in its entirety that which was received by Moses from God. "We have not heard one of the masters of the religions disagree with this and deny the essentials, and the Christians and Muslims are all in agreement on this without any reservation." Such a statement, of course, could not have been made by an eleventh-century author, or by anyone familiar with Muslim polemic. He continues: "And the Christians, who are antecedent to the Muslim people who whore after their [Christians'] error, and who [the Christians] are our antagonists in this faith and dig after us so that they do not leave a thing [by which] to turn us away, abstained from this [charge]... and if this [charge] were true, they without doubt would have arrived at this conclusion" (that the Torah was forged).43

He refers specifically to Ibn Hazm's charge (without ever naming him, for he apparently did not know who the author was) about the exaggerated numbers of the descendants of the sons of Jacob. He denies that he ever could have debated these matters with a Jewish scholar ("And as to his saying that many of our scholars were confused by the reply of his errors, the thing is a lie and he bears false testimony against the scholars or he distorts, for he never spoke with one of our scholars"). In fact, Ibn Hazm there states that he discussed this with Ibn Naghrillah, who certainly was a scholar known by reputation to Ibn Adret; but either he did not recognize the name (which is corrupt in the Arabic text), or, more likely, no name was mentioned in the summary he used.44

Further, he complains, the "madman" (which he repeatedly calls the author) claims that the Torah was never in the hands of the people, but only in the hands of a priest, which is false (as we have seen, Ibn Hazm indeed said this). Also, he claimed that the prayers which Jews recite daily were not decreed by Moses, only

43 Text cited, p. 2. 44 Ibid., p. 3; cf. Ibn Hazm, Fayl, 169-70; Abenhdzam, 315.

224 [22] NORMAN ROTH


the sacrifices. Ibn Adret's reply to this is of great interest, distinguishing three classes of commandments (an expansion of his very important similar analysis in his Responsa I, 94, which is absolute proof that Ibn Adret was the author of this treatise).

While his reply, frankly, is not a very satisfactory rebuttal, and certainly does not deal with the most important charges made by Ibn Hazm (which, of course, he did not see in their complete form), it is of interest in demonstrating that Jews in the thirteenth century in Spain were still sensitive to Muslim polemics.

Of more profound significance is his reply to a Christian critic of Judaism, which deals with some of the issues found also in Ibn Hazm, and thus gives us a good idea of what Ibn Adret would have replied had he had access to the complete text. The circumstances of his debate with the Christian scholar can be learned from his reference to it in one of his responsa.45 The Jewish community of Lerida informed him that one of the "scholars of the Muslims" spoke against the Jewish religion. The community requested Ibn Adret's help in writing a reply to this attack. He answered: "Therefore I have decided to write a book concerning the debate I had with one of their scholars on these same matters and more than this... and I arrange before you in an abridged form what the disputant said and the essence of my reply." From the rather detailed summary which follows,

45 Text, ed. Perles, p. 24 ff. It may also be seen in part in Ibn Adret, Hidushey ha-Rashba Cal aggadot ha-Shas (Jerusalem, 1966), pp. 30-36; however, it is not part of the commentary on the aggadot, an erroneous identification made already by Perles. It is, in fact, the "book" which Ibn Adret himself mentions (She'elot u-teshuvot IV. 187). Neither Baer, Epstein, Neuman, or others who have written on the Jews of Spain have seen any of these works. There is a very brief note, of little consequence, on the responsum only, in Sefarad 39 (1979): 111-20. The anti-Christian polemical treatise (only) of Ibn Adret has been discussed briefly by Ina Willi-Plein and Thomas Willi, Glaubensdoch und Messiasbeweis (Neu- kirchen-Vluyn, 1980), pp. 87-100, and less satisfactorily by Jeremy Cohen, The Friars and the Jews (Ithaca, N.Y., 1982), pp. 156-63. They have tended to emphasize rather different aspects of the work, even with regard to the anti- Christian polemic, than those discussed here.

it is possible to see that this is taken precisely from Ibn Adret's polemical treatise of his debate with a Christian scholar. There we find almost verbatim the same exchange concerning the controversial passage (Gen. 49.10): "the sceptre shall not depart from Judah." Precisely where the ms. of that polemical treatise breaks off, the rest of the argument can in part be restored on the basis of the summary in this responsum.

Thus, there is no doubt that when Ibn Adret said in his reply to the community of Lerida that he had a debate with one of "their" scholars, he meant a Christian, and when he stated his intent to write a "book" about this, he referred to the polemical treatise mentioned. This raises some doubt as to the text of the Lerida question, where perhaps instead of "one of the scholars of the Muslims" (ehad mi-hakhmey ha-ummot yishmaCelim; anyway an awkward phrase), it should read "Christians" (ha-ummot ha-no4rim), and perhaps it was changed because of the censors. Nevertheless, Lerida had been an important Mus- lim center in the early medieval period, and there still remained a Mudejar (Muslims under Christian domination) population. It is possible that it was from one of these that Ibn Hazm's arguments came indirectly to the attention of Ibn Adret. Nevertheless, Ibn Adret in his reply clearly refers to his polemical treatise based on a debate with a Christian scholar, and there he says specifically "one of the Christian scholars replied to me"46 (the editor, indeed, quite plausibly suggested that this was none other than Ram6n Marti, whose Pugiofidei deals with the same ideas debated here).

Ibn Adret begins this treatise with the praise of the Torah and the wisdom it brings. He says the peoples of the world are divided into two classes, the first being the "philosophizers" who refuse to acknowledge religions or revelation at all (he specifically excludes the "great philosophers" like Plato and

4 Text in Perles, p. 30. Perles' suggestion of the relationship of the Chris- tian's arguments with those of the Pugiofidei is rather more valid than Cohen, op.cit., would indicate.



Aristotle from this charge); the second are the peoples who acknowledge revelation, and these are the Hebrews, the Mus- lims, and the Christians "and possibly more." One of these, however (the Christians), divide commandments into three categories: allegorical and figurative; literal, but given for a specific time (like sacrificial laws, etc.); and those that remain but are changed in meaning by them (Sabbath, etc.). Another (the Muslims) agree that the commandments are literal, but assert that they are limited to a specific period in history, and replaced by a new prophet (Muhammad).47

Ibn Adret rejects the "allegorical" interpretation of commandments; first, because God spoke to Moses "face to face" and gave him the commandments, and secondly, hecause it is impossible to say that some should be literal and some allegorical. Even the Christians, "who dispute with us and search and investigate after us", admit this and do not charge Jews with any change in the Law. They even investigate every letter of the text, so that if a scribal change (tiqqun soferim) has been made, the Christians accuse the Jews of deliberate falsification (but never of changing the commandments).48

The Christian scholar (possibly, as mentioned, Ram6n Marti) argued that the commandments were given only to accustom the Jews to serve God, and after a time they were abrogated except for those dealing with the holiness of God, prayer, etc. Ibn Adret easily dismissed this argument.

47 Perles, pp. 24-26. 48 These are corrections in the pointing of vowels and other changes to

improve the reading, made by the Massoretes. There is yet no good book on the process of the formation of the Hebrew text of the Bible, and even the articles in the Cambridge History of the Bible are of little help on this. The best available discussion is still that of Christian D. Ginsburg, Introduction to the Massoretic- Critical Edition of the Hebrew Bible (London, 1897; rpt. N.Y., 1966), pp. 347- 63. Ibn Adret deals with tiqqun soferim and their purpose at some length, pp. 32-34, which is of interest if anyone ever desires to write the much-needed history of the Hebrew text of the Bible. This was, indeed, also one of the subjects raised by Marti in Pugiofidei.

[251 227

The second part of the debate begins with the abrogation of the entire Torah and the Christian claim that the commandments are only "figures" alluding to future matters, and once these events have taken place, the commandments alluding to them are abrogated. An example is the sacrificial lamb of Passover "which is a memorial to allude to what they [Chris- tians] claim happened" (the crucifixion).49

Another objection raised is the length of the present exile, for which no specific duration was stated in the Bible (as, supposedly, was done for the first exile). Also, the Christian argued from the Talmud itself that there is proof of the abrogation of the Torah in the future.

His first proof is Berakhot 12b: "Ben Zoma said to the sages, Since when do we refer to the exodus from Egypt in the days of the messiah?," etc., from which the Christian argued that it is implied the commandments are given only for a specified time (many commandments are said to be for the purpose of remem- bering the exodus; thus, if this does not apply in the messianic era, apparently these commandments are abrogated).

The second proof is from Niddah 61b: "Rabbi Joseph said, This means the commandments are abrogated in the future."50

The third is from cAvodah zarah 3a, where the statement is made that in the future God will judge the Gentiles because they did not accept the Torah, and when they claim that they are now willing to observe it, it can be said that it is written: "the commandments which I command you today" - today to do them, and not tomorrow. "And these mistaken ones [the Chris- tians] explain 'tomorrow' as [meaning] after the resurrection,"

49 Op. cit., p. 35 (again, these points are found in Pugiofidei). 50 Here, "the future" (atrid la-vo ) most probably means after the resurrection;

cf. the discussion of this text by Alejandro Diez Macho, ",Cesara la 'Tora' en la edad mesianica?," Estudios biblicos 13 (1954): 47-48 (an important and virtually unknown article, in vol. 12 [1953]: 115-58, and 13: 5-51); and cf. my article mentioned below in n. 59, which deals with these issues and with Diez Macho's provocative article.



Ibn Adret concludes, and they claim this is a proof that "the sages of Israel admitted that the commandments are not eternal and shall be abrogated in the future, and therefore the quarreler [the disputant] has permission to say that even in this time they are abrogated since there is no difference between us except a greater or lesser length of time" (i.e., he thinks that even the rabbis admit that commandments are abrogated in the messianic era, and the only quarrel is whether the messianic era has arrived or not).

Ibn Adret's reply to the first objection is based on the Talmud (Berakhot 12b), for he says the purpose of reciting the creed (Shemac Yisrael; Deut. 6.4-9, etc.) is to recall the miracles which God performed in the exodus, and God's providence, and this intention will be fulfilled (in the days of the messiah) in the gathering of the Jews from among all the peoples from the lands all over the world, which will be an ever greater miracle than the exodus. As to the second objection, the commandments are abrogated in the future, he replies that "future" can refer to any time from near to the distance, but that in this statement (Niddah 61b) it means after death and that the dead are exempt from commandments. Similarly, the statement in CA.Z. refers to the day of judgement, but not to the days of the messiah which are to be no different than this present time.

The Christian further argued that most of the commandments are only figures of things that were to come in the future (i.e., in the time of Jesus), and that the present exile was made long only because the Jews did not admit this and because "they hated him [Jesus] groundlessly." He sought to bring proof for this from the statement (Yoma 9b) that the first Temple was destroyed because of idolatry, adultery and murder, and the second was destroyed because of groundless hatred. To this Ibn Adret replied with a question: Who made this statement? If it was a Jew, he could have been referring to hatred of Jesus; if a Christian, we do not believe him; and if a Jewish heretic (min), neither Jews nor Christians should trust a heretic. Furthermore, inasmuch as the Christian had argued that this "groundless

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hatred" must have been something equal to the three sins for which the first Temple was destroyed (and thus could not refer to hatred between men, but rather to the Jews' hatred of Jesus), the reply is that according to Christian belief the Jews also murdered Jesus and had rejected Jesus (as God), and this would surely be worse than any idolatry at the time of the first Temple. Therefore, "groundless hatred" would be nothing compared to such "crimes," for which the Temple should have been destroyed. The fact that only "groundless hatred" is given as the cause for the destruction of the second Temple therefore shows that it had nothing to do with Jesus.

Next he deals with the problem of the extended duration of the exile, and after explaining why the Christian doctrine of original sin must be rejected, he explains that there is sin which many people are guilty of, and all feel the effects and suffer from it. Thus, the exile is a punishment for all, the guilty and the innocent who must suffer with them because of the sins of the many.

He then refutes the possibility of incarnation. The chief objection is that God, by definition without body or form, could not in any way be contained in a body without placing a limitation of physical form on him. The Christian replied that "these are philosophical arguments, and you won't find religion by way of philosophy, which produces several difficulties for all religions."51

After the debate on Gen. 49.10, where the ms. breaks off, the debate continued (as can be seen in the summary in the responsum cited) on the statement of the Talmud (Yevamot 82a) that there is only a first and second "inheritance" (conquest of the land of Israel), but not a third; thus, there is apparently no hope for the Jews to regain their land.

In his reply, Ibn Adret explains that the sanctity of the Land

51 Text, p. 45 (this is probably the only time that Ibn Adret, generally an opponent of philosophy, was accused of being a philosopher!).



was bestowed by the conquest of Joshua52 and that the sages have debated whether this sanctity (with regard to certain commandments dependent on the Land) was nullified by the exile or not. There are those who maintain that the first "inheritance," the conquest of Joshua, caused no sanctification (i.e., no permanent sanctification), since Joshua, being a prophet, knew that the Jews would be exiled to Babylon. Therefore, when Ezra returned, he had to sanctify the Land a second time, but even he only sanctified certain localities. Further, there is an argument as to whether that sanctification by Ezra was eternal and the commandments dependent on the Land even now are to be considered biblical, or whether that sanctification was also only temporary and the commandments are rabbinical. Ibn Adret himself accepts this second interpretation, and says that the prophecies of the Bible concerning the restoration of the Jews permanently to their homeland refers of necessity to this diaspora and its end.53

Having concluded our analysis both of Ibn Adret's polemic against Ibn Hazm and against the Christian disputant (possibly Ram6n Marti), we see that the question of the annulment of commandments in some future time was central to medieval polemic.54 It may be useful, therefore, to review briefly the

52 The subject of the conquests and sanctity of the Land of Israel is a very complex one in Jewish law, deserving a monograph. See, e.g., Megillah 1Oa, Yevamot 82b (and Tosafot there), Niddah 47a (all of which are quoted by Ibn Adret; unfortunately, the editor did not supply the sources of any of the talmudic citations), Shevi'it 6.1, Hallah 4.8, and Moses b. Maimon, M.T. Terumot 1.6 and Beit ha-behirah ch. 6, etc., and see especially "Eshtori ha- Parhi," (sometimes called Issac b. Moses), Kaftor va-ferak, ed. A.M. Luncz (Jerusalem, 1897), I. 221 ff., ch. 10 (there was an earlier edition by Ziv Edelmann [Berlin, 1851; photo rpt. Jerusalem, 1980] which contains many errors, although the notes are sometimes of value; in that edition, it is p. 37 ff.).

53 The summary of the remainder of the debate is in She'elot u-teshuvot IV, 187.

54 This seems to have been overlooked by Wilhelm Bacher, Tradition und Tradenten in den Schulen Palastinas und Babyloniens (Leipzig, 1914; rpt. Berlin, 1966), e.g., pp. 507, 512, 514, where he enumerated the discussions

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talmudic statements concerning this and the discussion of these by some of the rabbinical authorities of medieval Spain.

The Talmud (Niddah 61b) explains Ps. 88.6 "free among the dead" that since they are dead, they are free from the obligation of the commandments. It is unfortunate that we have neither the laws of Isaac al-Fasi nor the commentaries of any of the Spanish rabbis on this section of the Talmud (Nahmanides, whose commentary is extent, says nothing on this).

The statement is found also in Shabbat 30a and 15 lb. In the former citation, it is said, "Always let a man occupy himself with Torah and the commandments before he dies, for when he is dead he is exempt from the Torah and the commandments" (all talmudic citations are in my own translation here). It then cites the same verse from Psalms, giving the same explanation. In the latter citation, simply the verse from Psalms and the explanation is given, but the Talmud then goes on to say that in the days of the messiah there is neither merit nor obligation (i.e., reward or punishment), which was interpreted by the medieval authorities to mean that the commandments are to be annulled. In Niddah 61 b, the statement is made that a garment of kelaim (prohibited mixed threads) may be made into a shroud for the dead, which Rav Joseph says indicates that commandments shall be annulled in the future, and again the verse of Psalms is cited as support. Even more striking is the statement in J. Megillah 1.5: "R. Yohanan said, The prophets and the writings [Hagiographa] shall in the future be annulled, but the Pentateuch shall not; what is the reason? 'a great voice which was not heard again' [Deut. 5.19; the Hebrew implies "was not added to"]. R. Simon b. Laqish said, Even the book of Esther and the laws [of Purim] shall not be annulled in the future."54

Maimonides faithfully follows the decision of both authori-

between R. Yohanan and Resh Laqish. Fuller details on the question of the annulment of the commandments and of Esther, etc., will be found in my article cited in n. 59 below.



ties in the Jerusalem Talmud cited, and rules that "all the books of the prophets and the writings shall be annulled in the future, in the days of the messiah, except for the book of Esther which shall continue to exist like the Pentateuch and the laws of the oral Torah which are not to be annulled ever" (M. T. Zemanim, "Megillah" 2.18). Abraham b. David in his strictures there makes an incredible statement: "Not a word shall be annulled from all the books, since there is not a book in which there is nothing to be learned [!], but thus they said: even if the rest of the books cease to be read, the book of Esther shall not cease being read in the congregation." This is, obviously, sheer nonsense; but also probably indicates that he had not seen or did not remember the Jerusalem Talmud cited above.

There is, however, a problem which the medieval rabbis (or, specifically, Ibn Adret) noted and explained. There would appear to be a contradiction in that it is the same R. Yohanan who in Niddah is reported to have said that the commandments are to be annulled in the future. Ibn Adret explained there is no contradiction, for there he refers to the period when a person is dead, but in the Jerusalem Talmud he refers to the days of the messiah when people are alive, and the commandments will still be in force.55

Yom Tov Ishbili, however, cites Shabbat 15 lb as proof that the "future time" is the time of the messiah, in which there is neither reward nor punishment, and adds that the statement in Niddah does not contradict Samuel (Shabbat 15 1b), as some say (by whom he means Ibn Adret), inasmuch as Samuel agrees that the commandments shall be annulled in the future, but holds that the resurrection does not occur in the days of the messiah, but "afterwards at the end of everything;" however, he agrees that the dead do not observe commandments.56

55 Ibn Adret, Hidushey... agadot ha-Shas, on Berakhot 12b. 56 Ishbili, H.idushey ha-RITVA... Niddah (Jerusalem, 1978), pp. 388-89; cf.

Ibn Adret, Hidushey ha-RaSHBA (standard eds.) on Berakhot 18b, "Dalyyeh."

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More important is the connection which Ishbili makes with Christian polemic:

And if a heretic of the disciples of Jesus should murmur to you saying that since the commandments are annulled in the future, this means the Torah was given only for a finite period of time, and therefore Jesus was able to add to and delete from it, say to him that only one who is afraid [literally, "whose heart bruises him" - Megillah 6b; note that in modem Hebrew the expression has a completely different meaning] could say this; for the Torah was not given for a finite period but for as long as the world exists - while there is merit or punishment - and one is neither allowed to add to or delete from it. But in the world to come, when there is neither merit nor punishment, it shall be annulled ipso facto, and the scripture says, 'Today to fulfill them, and tomorrow to receive their reward' [Deut. 7.11, as interpreted in CEruvin 22a]. Just as it is annulled in the future world, so it is annulled for the dead in the grave, since they are exempt from commandments.

He adds that this is also the opinion of his teacher (Aaron b. Joseph ha-Levy of Barcelona), but notes the opinion of "some" (again, Ibn Adret) that the commandments are never to be annulled, even after the resurrection, and that the talmudic statement only refers to the dead who are exempt from the commandments; an opinion with which he disagrees.57

Ishbili, who himself was a student of Ibn Adret as well as his colleague Aaron b. Joseph ha-Levy, is also apparently the last of the Jewish authorities in medieval Spain to have expressed strong polemical reaction to Islam (Simon b. Semah Duran, whose Qeshet u-magen contains anti-Muslim polemic, fled Majorca in 1391 and went to North Africa where he composed that treatise). Although he agreed with Maimonides, with respect to the debate over wine, that Muslims "do not worship idols at all," he is elsewhere said to have written that the faith of

57 Ishbili, op. cit., pp. 390-91; Ibn Adret on Berakhot, and Nissim b. Reuben there; cf. also Isaac b. Sheshet Perfet, She'elot u-teshuvot (Vilna, 1878; rpt. Jerusalem, 1968), No. 124.



Muslims, even though they believe in the unity of God, is considered "complete idolatry" with regard to the law requiring Jews to be killed rather than transgress by conversion; "for one who admits their faith denies that the Torah of Moses is true, as it is found in our hands, and everything like this is idolatry."58 This, too, was of course diametrically opposed to the well- known view of Maimonides with regard to the Almohad "per- secution" that one was not required to die rather than give at least the appearance of conversion (of course, Maimonides himself certainly did not convert to Islam at any time, in spite of the fact that some modem writers continue to believe the long- disproven myth). It is clear that Ishbili was led to take his extreme position only because of the Muslim charges of forgery and abrogation of the Torah, with which he must have been familiar from Ibn Adret's treatise.

Conclusions

In this article, we have brought to light some new aspects of medieval anti-Jewish polemic, both Muslim and Christian, and some Jewish responses to it in medieval Spain. These texts, and even the subjects with which they deal, have generally been ignored in previous discussion of polemics. They are an important aspect of the history of the Jews of medieval Spain. We have shown that, contrary to earlier assertions, the important and at times even perceptive criticisms of Ibn Hazm did indeed influence subsequent Muslim anti-Jewish polemic, including the apostate Sama'ual. Ibn Hazm's polemic was also widely known in the Jewish world, and elicited significant response from Abraham Ibn Daud, Maimonides, and Ibn Adret. The extent to which Maimonides, in particular, responded to Mus- lim polemical attacks in his writing has not been previously mentioned.

58 Ishbili, Hidushey ha-RITVA PesaIim, ed. Judah Leibowitz (Jerusalem, 1983) to f. 25b (p. 56).

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In many ways, the most important text discussed here is the reply of Ibn Adret, and the comparison of that treatise to his response to the Christian disputant, probably Ramon Marti.

The similarities of the polemical charges in the Muslim and Christian material lie chiefly in the attack on the Torah. In the former, the charge is forgery and deliberate falsification of stories and numbers and the like, whereas in the latter the chief charge is the abrogation of the Torah and of specific commandments which were supposedly intended only for a specified time. New material from the Jewish sources dealing with these issues, in part the subject also of a companion article elsewhere,59 is presented here.

There is yet another similarity. Ibn Hazm was, without doubt, the most learned Muslim scholar of religions, with a thorough knowledge of the Bible, and with at least some acquaintance with talmudic and Jewish mystical sources (more, indeed, than has been presented in this article). The Christian disputant of Ibn Adret, most likely Ram6n Marti, was also quite thoroughly versed in talmudic and midrashic literature, as is evident not only from this polemic but from his Pugio fidei (some, indeed, have even mistakenly written that he was himself of Jewish origin).

The result is that we have, in these two figures, a degree of sophistication and knowledge in their polemical arguments which was considerably above the level that usually prevailed in medieval polemics. This makes the study of their charges, and of the Jewish response to them, all the more significant for the broader history of polemic, as well as for the history of the Jews of medieval Spain.

9 "Seis edades durara el mundo. Temas de la polemica espaiiola," Ciudad de Dios 99 (1986): 45-65.

236 [34] NORMAN ROTH

Forgery and Abrogation of the Torah

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