Geniza Lab

Letter addressed to Abū ʿAlī Aharon ha-Kohen b. Avraham. In Hebrew and Judaeo-Arabic, and quite eloquent. The addressee and his father have long strings of titles. Recto is entirely introductory blessings. The writer continues on verso with a strong rebuke for the lack of letters, especially because he has suffered "illnesses like no one has ever suffered before." He justifies his rebuke with an (unattributed) quote from Kitāb al-Zahra, the treatise on love by the 10th-century Muslim jurist Muḥammad b. Dāwūd al-Ẓāhirī: "Without rebuking lapses, one can't preserve a friendship." The writer sends regards to Abū ʿImrān, who he fears is mad at him and wants to cut off their correspondence, because he hasn't responded to the writer's letters. Regards to Abū Saʿīd as well, and a nice astronomical blessing: פלא זאלת אפלאך עלוהא דאירה ושמס עזהא נאירה וכואכב סעדהא סאירה. ASE