Salmon ben Jeroham

Salmon ben Jeroham^[1] (Hebrew: שלמון בן ירוחם), also known in Arabic as Sulaym ibn Ruhaym, was a Karaite exegete and controversialist who flourished at Jerusalem between 940 and 960. He was considered one of the greatest authorities among the Karaites, by whom he is called "the Wise" ("HaHakham"), and who mention him after Benjamin Nahawendi in their prayers for their dead great teachers (Karaite Siddur, i. 137b). His principal work, one of several treatises entitled Milhamoth Adonai, was an attack on Saadia Gaon.^[2]

Response to Saadia

In a work entitled Milḥamot Adonai, (not to be confused with books of the same title by Gersonides and Avraham son of Rambam) of which he produced also an Arabic version that is no longer in existence, Salmon attempts to counter the Classic Judaism (Rabbinites), especially Saadia. It is written in verse and is divided into 19 chapters, each of which contains 22 four-lined strophes. After having endeavored in the first two chapters to demonstrate the groundlessness of the oral tradition, he attempts to refute the seven arguments advanced in its behalf by Saadia in the introduction to his commentary on the Pentateuch. Then he criticizes Saadia's views on the Hebrew calendar, the laws concerning incest, the celebration of the second days of the feasts, etc., and accuses him of terms of having, in his polemics against the Karaites, used arguments which are in direct opposition to the teachings of the Mishnah and the Talmud, and which consequently he must have known to be false. Most of the book is ad hominem attacks against Saadia. The Milḥamot Adonai is extant in manuscript in various European libraries; parts of it have been published by Pinsker, Geiger, and Kirchheim.

Bible commentaries

Commentaries on Psalms, Lamentations, Song of Songs, Ecclesiastes and Esther are extant in manuscript. He is known to have composed lost commentaries to Job, Daniel, Ruth, Proverbs, and probably Isaiah and the Pentateuch. Published editions include:

• Psalms 1-10 (Alobaidi 1996) 42-72 (Marwick 1956)
• Lamentations (Feuerstein 1898; Abdul-Karim 1976, dissertation)
• Ecclesiastes (Fraenkel 1903;^[a] Vajda 1971; Riese 1973, dissertation)
• Esther (Wechsler, forthcoming 2024)
• Ruth (lost; Markon 1927 includes the commentary of Yefet ben Ali, misattributed)

References

1. On the pronunciation of this patronymic in Hebrew and Arabic, see the sources cited in The Arabic Translation and Commentary of Yefet ben 'Eli the Karaite on the Book of Esther by Michael G. Wechsler (Brill 2008), pg. 125 note 9.
2. Nemoy, Leon (1969). Karaite anthology, excerpts from the early literature. Yale University Press. Salmon ben Jeroham (Arabic Sulayman, or Sulaym, ibn Ruhaym) was born in Palestine (?) or in Iraq (?) probably some time between the years 910 and 915. As a young man, presumably about his twentieth year, he appears to have gone to Egypt to pursue his studies. For some years afterward he seems to have lived in Jerusalem; in any case, he exhibits in his writings a familiarity with the topography of Jerusalem and the geography of the Holy Land that can only have been acquired from personal experience and observation.

1. Misattributed to Saadia Gaon.

 This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Singer, Isidore; et al., eds. (1901–1906). "Solomon ben Jeroham". The Jewish Encyclopedia. New York: Funk & Wagnalls.

External links

• Jewish Encyclopedia article on Solomon ben Jeroham, by Kaufmann Kohler and Isaac Broydé.