CHRISTIANITY AND JUDAISM UNDER ISLAM IN MEDIEVAL IRAQ

In the present paper two attitudes towards Christianity among Jews in Medieval Iraq are discussed, viz. Da' ud al-Muqammas (second half of the 9th century) and Sa'd b. Mansur Ibn Kammuna (second half of the 13th century). Da'ud al-Muqammas was writing in a period when Christianity may have been an attractive alternative for intellectual Jews. His major work still available, Ishrun Maqala, "Twenty chapters", is an anti-Christian tract demonstrating the continuing validity of Judaism. Addressing a Gentile readership in his Tanqih al-abhath li'l-milal al-thalath, "The examination of the inquiries into the three faiths", Sa'd b. Mansur Ibn Kammuna upholds the validity of Judaism and Christianity against the claims of Islam in a period when Islam had been reduced to the same status as Judaism and Christianity in the early period of Mongol rule of Iraq.