The Convergence of Judaism and Islam. Religious, Scientific, and Cultural Dimensions

Pharmacopoeias for the Hospital and the Shop r 207

30. R. Sa ̔adyah Gaon (269–331/882–942) was a theologian, philosopher, and phi-
    lologist, one of a very few Jewish thinkers to be mentioned in the Arabic biographical
    literature. He was the head of the Talmudic academy at Sura, and his Tafsir is the first
    translation of the Torah into Arabic. P. B. Fenton, “Sa ̔adya ben Yōsēf,” Encyclopaedia of
    Islam 2, 8: 661.


31. Yehuda Ratzaby, A Dictionary of Judaeo-Arabic in R. Sa ̔adya’s Tafsir (Ramat-Gan,
    1985), 101 (Hebrew).


32. Exodus 28:1–43 describes the garments of the high priest in detail, using the words
    shesh and bad. Both words are conventionally translated as “linen”—in other words, Rab-
    binic Jewish tradition knows no other cloth originating from plant fibers used for the
    priestly garments. See Nahum Sarna (commentary), Exodus = Shemōt: The Traditional
    Hebrew Text with the New JPS Translation (Philadelphia, 1991).


33. I consulted the extant Karaite translations/commentaries on Exodus noted in
    Meira Polliack, The Karaite Tradition of Arabic Bible Translation (Leiden, 1997), appen-
    dix 3. In all cases, shesh was translated as harir, “silk.” The verses containing bad were not
    translated.


34. Elinor Lieber, “The Medical Works of Maimonides: A Reappraisal,” in Moses Mai-
    monides: Physician, Scientist, and Philosopher, ed. F. Rosner and S. Kottek (Northvale,
    N.J., 1982), 15.


35. Minhaj al-dukkan, 15.


36. Another citation from the Jewish prayer book. The first blessing recited before the
    Shema ̔ refers to God as “He who in His goodness renews the work of creation each day
    constantly.”


37. Minhaj al-dukkan, 265.


38. Ibid., 271.


39. “A Father’s Admonition by Judah Ibn Tibbon,” and “The Gate of Instruction At-
    tributed to Maimonides,” in Hebrew Ethical Wills, ed. and trans. I. Abrahams (Philadel-
    phia, 1926), 1:51–93, 101–17.


40. Ibid., 1:56.


41. Minhaj al-dukkan, 268.


42. Hebrew Ethical Wills, 1:68.


43. Minhaj al-dukkan, 268.


44. Ibid., 268.


45. Hebrew Ethical Wills, 1:80–81.


46. Minhaj al-dukkan, 16.