Geniza Lab

Business letter from 1094, addressed by Avraham b. Natan Av (former judge in Ramla and later Cairo) to Nahray b. Nissim, when the latter was already the “eminent member” of the Jerusalem yeshiva. Avraham b. Natan expresses regret for the mistakes he committed during communal strife in Tyre, and additionally notes that there were only three Qaraites still left in that city. The writer complains about his fate with the remark, “I am in immediate danger and my future is in jeopardy. I have not acquired a portion in the World to Come, or a good reputation here, or material gains... Had God guided me, when I first arrived among them, my religion and my honor would have remained untainted.” (S. D. Goitein, Mediterranean Society, 5:204, 327, 564, 596; Marina Rustow, Heresy and the Politics of Community, 330, note 20) EMS See also Goitein's index card.