48 CHAPTER TWO
Dahrite, or the “denier of prophecy.” Maimonides does not see any need
to relate to Ibn al- Rawandi himself or to mention him anywhere by name.
All of the elements characteristic of Ibn al- Rawandi appear in Maimo-
nides’ writings under the name of Elisha-Aher.
The dynamics that lead Maimonides in this “creative reading” are com-
plex, and its subtlety deserves to be traced with care. We would be wrong
to summarize it in a simplifi ed way, and to state, for instance, that Mai-
monides identifi es the minim of the Talmud with Muslim freethinkers
rather than with Karaite Jews, since his identifi cation of the term min
seems to change according to the context.
Maimonides moves between various registers: past and present, He-
brew and Arabic. When reading the Hebrew and Aramaic texts, he thinks
fi rst of all about traditions regarding sectarians from the Second Temple
period. He is cognizant of the views (expressed by both Karaites and Rab-
banites) that present these sectarians as the precursors of Karaism. He is
also aware of the fact that Karaites can sometimes be called minim, and
may himself use this appellation when it is meant to exhort his own Rab-
banite congregation.
When he translates minim into Arabic, and speaks of zanadiqa, the
Arabic appellation conjures up a whole new set of associations, with their
own characteristics. The archetypal Muslim zanadiqa are, for him, the
freethinkers of the Muslim past, and their image triggers the appropriate
orthodox reaction: they are anathema, they deserve the death penalty,
spilling their blood is licit. In this context, Maimonides rec ords such exe-
cutions in the contemporary Maghreb.^85 The literary images of the past,
both Jewish and Muslim, are clearly very vivid in his mind.
When, however, he returns, with this set of Jewish- Muslim images of
the heretic to think about its implications regarding the Karaite next
door, the juxtaposition of his own reality with the literary legacy reveals
a “cognitive dissonance.” The half- mythical ostracized min/zindiq fi ts
badly into the relatively irenic social coexistence of Karaites and Rab-
banites, and at this point, Maimonides breaks sharply: one should not be
carried away with the literary images. The contemporary Karaites are to
be treated as erring Jews, not as dangerous enemies. When it comes to the
actual life of the contemporary Jewish community, Maimonides’ fi nal
(^85) Wa- qad inamala min hadhahalacha le- maasefi ashkhas kathirin fi bilad al- maghrib
kulliha;Commentary on the Mishnah,Hullin 1.2, Qodashim, 176; and see note 65, above.
Since the paragraph discusses the application of capital punishment in “the days of Exile,”
this sentence is usually understood in this context, too; see Baron, Social and Religious His-
tory of the Jews, 5:280. No such executions of budding heresiarchs by Jewish courts in the
West are known to us. One should note, however, that Maimonides becomes uncharacter-
istically vague in this sentence, and his wording may refer to Jewish courts as well as to
what he has seen in Muslim courts in Almohad North Africa.