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16* Bruno Chiesa and Miriam Goldstein

(risālah = Scripture).8 This trilogy appears already in the writings of Yaʽqūb
al-Qirqisānī,9 Yefet b. ʻEli10 and in a different form, in those of Salmon b.
Yeruḥīm.11 The trilogy is also presented by Elijah b. Abraham (12th c.) in his
Hebrew work entitled The division of Karaites and Rabbanites (‫חלוק הקראים‬
‫)והרבנים‬, in the context of a discussion of the name ‘Karaite’. Elijah states

that others had named them ‘Karaites’ because of their refusal to accept ‘the

new Torah, called Oral Torah’, which goes back to Jeroboam son of Nebat,
who ‘denied belief in the Sender (‫)שולח‬, the messenger (‫)שליח‬, and the divine
message (‫’)שליחות‬.12 Elijah b. Abraham’s use of this trilogy is built on the
theory of Karaite origins as given by Yaʽqūb al-Qirqisānī;13 in contrast and

as will become clear below, Yefet dates Karaite origins to a later period,

around the time of Hillel and Shammai.

8 In a related and nearly contemporaneous work, the Karaite Creed as set
forth by Israel ben Samuel ha-Maʻarabi (al-Maghribī), a judge in Cairo
in the first half of the fourteenth century (ed. E. Mainz, Proc. American
Academy of Jewish Research 22 [1953]: 59), the second article is on the
rusulīyah of Moses (cf. L. Nemoy, “A Modern Egyptian Manual of the
Karaite Faith,” Jewish Quarterly Review 62 [1971]: 3).

9 Cf. for example al-Qirqisānī’s commentary to Gen. 1:26, in H. Ben-
Shammai, “The Doctrines of Religious Thought of Abû Yûsuf Yaʻqûb al-
Qirqisânî and Yefet ben ʻElî” (Ph.D. diss., Hebrew University of Jerusalem,
1977) [Hebrew], II (texts), bet-10 l. 115.

10 Cf. for example Yefet’s commentary to Gen. 1:26: H. Ben-Shammai,
Doctrines, I, p. 195 n. 25; D. Frank, Search Scripture Well. Karaite
Exegetes and the Origins of the Jewish Bible Commentary in the Islamic
East (Leiden: Brill, 2004), 217 n.50, 310 (text); M. Zawanowska, The Arabic
Translation and Commentary of Yefet ben ʻEli the Karaite on the Abraham
Narratives (Genesis 11:10–25:18) (Leiden: Brill, 2012), 93 (and ib. n.9).

11 Salmon b. Yeruḥim in his commentary on Ps. 28:2 (cf. Y.-A ii.1059,
f. 42v–43r; Y.-A. i.1345, f. 140r–v) speaks of four ‘principles’: the
aforementioned trilogy plus the place of prayer (‫)בית התפלה‬. The same is
found in Yehudah Hadassi, Eshkol ha-kofer (Gözlöw, 1836), Alf. 178, yud.

12 Cf. L. Nemoy, “Elijah ben Abraham and His Tract Against the Rabbanites,”
Hebrew Union College Annual 51 (1980): 63–87; the quotation is from 69,
the Hebrew text can be found in S. Pinsker, Lickute Kadmoniot (Vienna:
Adalbert della Torre, 1860), ii, 100.

13 Cf. W. Bacher, “Qirqisani, the Karaite, and His Work on Jewish Sects,”
Jewish Quarterly Review 7 (1895): 694; M.A. Cohen, “Anan Ben David and
Karaite Origins,” Jewish Quarterly Review 68 (1978): 129–145, 224–234;