Rav Saadia Gaon

Saadia ben Yosef was born in Fayyum, Egypt, in 4642 — in a country not counted among the centres of learning. In Babylonia the office of Gaon passed within a few families, and appointing an outsider was unheard of. Yet by thirty he was known throughout the Jewish world, and in 928, at forty-six, the exilarch made him Gaon of Sura, an academy by then nearly extinguished.

Whatever he touched, he did first. He translated the Torah into Arabic with a commentary — the Tafsir, on which all the Jewry of the Islamic lands was raised. He wrote Emunot veDeot, the first systematic work of Jewish philosophy. He composed the first Hebrew dictionary and grammar, the first ordered prayer book with instructions and his own liturgical poems, and works on the calendar and inheritance law.

At twenty-three he wrote the Kitab ar-Radd ala Anan, the first refutation of Anan, the founder of Karaism; he fought the Karaites almost single-handed for the rest of his life, and after his books the movement ceased to grow. Later, around 4682 (921–922), he took on Aaron ben Meir of the Land of Israel, who tried to move the fixing of the festivals back to Jerusalem, and preserved one calendar for the whole people. He lost his office for refusing to endorse a ruling of the exilarch he considered unjust, and spent his years of disgrace writing. They were reconciled shortly before his death in 4702.