Saʿadia Gaon’s Tafsīr of the Hebrew Bible in an Arab-Muslim Context: A Paradigm Shift?

Abstract

There is a widely held assumption that translating sacred texts in line with the sociocultural and linguistic contexts of specific audiences is a recent trend that came out of nowhere, one that is motivated by the eccentric interests of an isolated group of translators whose translation strategies and products are deemed non-conformist at best or heretical at worst. This article calls this assumption into question using a case study of the work of Saʿadia Gaon (882–942), one of the pioneer translators of the Hebrew Bible into Judaeo-Arabic. The key hypothesis on which this paper is premised is that Saʿadia’s tafsīr strategies effected a paradigmatic shift in the Arabic translation of the biblical text. Through studying specific examples from Saʿadia’s translation of the Torah and the book of Psalms, this article seeks to identify his translation strategies, locating them in the sociocultural context in which he produced the translations. Specific focus is laid on issues around anthropomorphism and the use of idiomatic Islamic expressions. The article also reflects on the reception of Saʿadia’s work and the impact it had on later generations of translators and readers.