THEOLOGICAL CONTEXT 35
To the extent that he adopted Mutazilite rather than Asharite views, this
was most probably not a result of mere chance or of blind following, but
refl ected his deliberate choice. The same holds true for Saadya’s Karaite
contemporary, Qirqisani, whose theology is indeed close to that of the
Mutazila. Qirqisani’s discussion of divine attributes includes a detailed
refutation of the position of Ashari’s precursor Ibn- Kullab. This refutation
testifi es to the choice Qirqisani exercised when following the Mutazila.^36
Even in the work of the Karaite Yusuf al- Basir, who was deeply infl uenced
by the MutaziliteAbd al- Jabbar, one can see clearly that the dependence
on the Mutazila was far from being automatic, but rather mea sured and
carefully thought out.^37
As is his wont, Maimonides makes a point of telling his reader that
his analysis of the kalam does not rely on hearsay, but rather on his own
readings. Michael Schwarz has pointed out the discrepancy between
Maimonides’ description of the kalam system and what we know of the
Mutazila or the Ashariyya of the tenth century. Schwarz was able to
demonstrate that Maimonides’ detailed analysis of the kalam refl ects ex-
tensive readings of the later mutakallimun, with whose system it agrees
to a great extent. Maimonides, however, presents his schema as valid
for any kalam work: “When I studied the books of these mutakallimun,
as far as I had the opportunity... I found that the method of all the
mutakallimun was one and the same.”^38 It is of course possible that this
is the kalam with which Maimonides was familiar, and that he was igno-
rant of the differences between schools and the nuances that distinguished
individual authors, or that his memory failed him, or that he reported not
what he had read but what he had extrapolated.^39 Neither of these possi-
bilities seems to me to square with Maimonides’ personality. To some
extent, he may have simplifi ed the picture intentionally, drawing a carica-
ture in order to facilitate his task of polemicist. In this as in other matters,
however, one can also recognize Maimonides’ phenomenological drive: to
gloss over the differences and to paint with large strokes of the brush,
which will allow him to make sense of the resulting picture.
(^36) See H. Ben- Shammai, “Major Trends in Karaite Philosophy and Polemics in the Tenth
and Eleventh Centuries,” in M. Polliack, ed., Karaite Judaism: A Guide to its History and
Literary Sources (Leiden, 2003), 339– 62.
(^37) SeeAl-Kitab al- Muhtawi de Yusuf al- Basir, G. Vajda and D. Blumenthal, eds. (Leiden,
1985), 152.
(^38) Guide 1.71 (Dalala, 123– 24; Pines, 179); and see M. Schwarz, “Who Were Maimonides’
Mutakallimun? Some Remarks on Guide of the Perplexed Part I, Chapter 73,” Maimonid-
ean Studies 1 (1991): 159– 209; 3 (1992– 93): 143– 72; Ivry, “The Guide and Maimonides’
Philosophical Sources,” in Seeskin, The Cambridge Companion to Maimonides, 71– 75.
(^39) Davidson, Moses Maimonides, 90.