ABSTRACT
Abu Sa’id Ibn Abi al-Husain was major Samaritan scholar in the second half of the thirteenth century. He lived in Egypt and issued many religious fatwas, which were widely distributed among the Samaritans of his time. Classical Arabic historians usually considered the Samaritans a Jewish sect. The Samaritan Torah, besides being written in the different, Samaritan alphabet, contains some significant differences from the Hebrew Bible, including reverence for Mount Gerizim, rather than Mount Zion, as the location chosen by God for a holy temple. Abu Sa’id is one of the few translators in the Classical period to attach an introduction, or any paratexts, to his translation. In Abu Sa’id’s case, the introduction, though rather short, was perhaps inevitable to promote a new mode of reading and to engage in an (oppositional) dialogue with his predecessors.
