Khalif 'Ali' Attempts to bring back "authentic" Islam
TBD
Abraham ibn Daud in his "Sefer ha-Ḳabbalah" says Khalif 'Ali gave the daughter of the that it was the last Sassanid king, Yezdegerd (624-651/2), who gave his daughter to Bustenai's son Hisdai.[1]
R' Sherira Gaon (Iggeres, Levine ed., p. 101) writes of the encounter between the Moslem caliph, Ali (see above, ch. 36), and the head of the Yeshivah of Peroz-Shavur. "It was he [R' Yitzchak Gaon] who was in Peroz-Shavur when Ali ben Abutaleb conquered* the city, and Mar Yitzchak of Peroz-Shavur went out to him and welcomed him with great friendliness. At that time, there were in Peroz-Shavur ninety thousand Jews, who were received by Ali ben Abutaleb with great friendliness."[2]
The circumstances of this event are noteworthy. R' Yitzchak was the senior of the Babylonian Geonim, having taken office earlier than R' Rava and R' Huna. Now, R' Yitzchak found himself received "with great friendliness" by the ruler of the Moslem Empire, and yet he did not use this opportunity to request any special advantages for his own yeshivah over the other two, nor to achieve any personal gain. Thus, this incident furnishes eloquent proof that in addition to their outstanding scholarship, the Geonim as exemplified by R' Yitzchak Gaon were true successors and disciples of the Sages of the Talmud in the purity of their motives, righteousness, and lack of personal greed or ambition.
R' Yitzchak and his colleagues seem to have been convinced by the friendship displayed by Ali, who "honored and elevated [R' Yitzchak]" (Ravad, Sefer HaKabbalah; see Seder HaChachamim Part 1, p. 62; Ravad gives the date of this event as 640 CE / 4400), that Pumbedisa and Sura were no longer in danger, and that Peroz-Shavur was no longer needed as a potential place of refuge. They therefore disbanded this central yeshivah, and its members were absorbed into Pumbedisa. In this way they restored the situation of Talmudic times, when Sura and Pumbedisa, either jointly or in turn, had reigned supreme.
R' Yitzchak Gaon died sometime after 660 CE (4420). A few years earlier, both Sura and Pumbedisa had inaugurated new Geonim: in Pumbedisa, R' Bustonai, and in Sura, R' Sheshna, whose full name as inscribed on his seal was "R' Mesharsheya Tachlifa" (Iggeres of R'Sherira Gaon, p. 102). R' Bustonai Gaon was succeeded by R'Chana Mari bar R' Yosef, who became Gaon of Pumbedisa in 689 CE (4449), thus completing the first hundred years of the Geonic Era.[3]
'Ali was buried in Kufa Persia, next to the grave of King Jehoiachin, the first Exilarch.