Maimonides Didn’t Write The Epistle to Yemen

The authorship of the Epistle to Yemen, ascribed to Rabbi Moses ben Maimon, commonly known as Maimonides, and also referred to by the acronym Rambam, has been the focal point of a new trend in S’fardic rabbis who can only be termed “Rambamists” proselytizing anti-Muslim views. When Maimonides’ own well documented responsa to Obadiah the Proselyte, clarifies that Islam is not idolatry, and that it is permissible for Jews to pray in mosques, the modern Rambamist will point to comments ascribed to Maimonides in the most problematic work associated with him. This short piece will set out to explain evidence we have that the authorship of the Risalat l’Yemen was pseudoepigraphical in nature, and not a historical letter penned by Maimonides, but ascribed to him later to give the opinion weight.

In “Moses Maimonides,” author Alan Davidson, writes of the contradictions within the Epistle:

The final section of the Epistle to Yemen deals with a self-styled Messiah who had recently appeared in Yemen. The Epistle explains to Jacob that the man in question was a demented soul and it outlines criteria for identifying a genuine Messiah. According to those criteria, the Messiah will be a prophet close to the level of the biblical prophet Moses and hence someone who excels in intellectual and ethical virtue; he will be completely unknown until he is revealed; he will first appear in Palestine; and he will establish his credentials through “sings and marvels.” God will bring about that all nations of the world will stand in awe of him.[1] The description raises additional problems. At the time when he wrote the Epistle to Yemen, Maimonides was working on his Mishneh Torah, and the Mishneh Torah flatly rejects the notion ‘that the Messiah will have to perform signs and marvels’ to establish his credentials: He will prove himself instead by enforcing observance of the Written and Oral Laws among Jews, conducting a successful war against the gentiles, rebuilding the Holy Temple, and gathering in the exiles. The section outlining criteria for identifying a genuine Messiah therefore looks suspicious.[2] If we reject it as spurious, we shall have to assume that an unknown person fabricated it and he or another party combined it with the authentic sections to piece together the Epistle as known today. The situation remains puzzling.[3]

Two fairly complete manuscripts of the Arabic text have been preserved, both written in Hebrew characters. Author Hebert Alan Davidson clarifies that “they differ from one another in several places, the most significant difference being Epistle to Yemen 98-102 dealing with false messiahs” and is the completion of the already problematic, albeit more physically consistent (in terms of manuscript consistency), messianic account.[4]

It is within this section which Davidson describes as the area of “the most significant difference,” that we find reference to the entiremeshuga` problem, as well as a somewhat problematic explanation of Muhammad couching the historical actions of Omar.

Perhaps Maimonides was the author of the Epistle and allowed himself to obfuscate the anti-Jewish persecution that he was dealing with. Perhaps he was acting out of character, twisted the rabbinic rules that he was applying, and went as far as blatantly to contradict himself… Perhaps. But the bottom line is that there are very strong, although maybe not conclusive, grounds for rejecting the authenticity of Maimonides’ authorship of the Epistle. There are no grounds for affirming his authorship apart from his being named as the author in manuscripts of one of the two Hebrew translations and by persons writing two centuries after his death. We have seen more than once that the attribution of a work to Maimonides in a manuscript commands little credibility… on that scenario, the unknown author fashioned the five sections with which he completed the Epistle mainly or wholly from Maimonides, while adjusting what he found there in order to serve his purposes.[5]

It is possible, even most logical, to suggest that this entire matter of Muhammad as ha’meshuga`, of the Daniel prophecy, of vitriolic plays on words such as pasul and qalon were fabricated by the same individual who inserted clearly anti-Maimonides qualifications for the Mashiach.

This is not so difficult to imagine in the context. No doubt, Maimonides is responsible for critiques therein of Arabist behavior against the Yemenite Jewish community. This, like the discussion of the Mashiach, would have been the springboard for a scribe’s hand to insert the views of Yemenite Jewish backlash (against all non-Jewish oppressors of the time, Christians in the Holy Land, and Muslims in Yemen and various places abroad).

The opinion is clearly more indicative of the latter than of anything we read from Maimonides elsewhere. This is something of an understatement to describe as controversial. Nevertheless, it is the most logical, the most neutral, academic and unemotionally invested way of looking at otherwise inexplicable contradictions within this isolated text. Furthermore, this is the only explanation that harmonizes with what we see playing out in the legacy of Maimonides’ progeny.

Virtually the only thing to be said with any confidence about the snarled situation is that the copy of the Epistle sent by Maimonides to the Yemenite Jewish community could not possibly have called Muhammad “madman,” or called the Quran “disgrace.”[6]

Nevertheless, such criticism and scathing accounts (real or fabricated), or specific issues with varieties of kalam should not distract us too much from the results borne out in the legacy of Maimonides, with regards to Judeo-Sufism. Neither should his criticism of Muslims in general lead us to imagine him as despondent from (let alone opposed to), Islaamic thought in specific manifestations (e.g. Mu`taziliyyah and Tasawwuf). To elaborate, one need not merely examine the pages of Maimonides’ works for Islaamic references, influences and corroboration, rather the true authentication of this position is to be found in the legacy of the Maimonides family.

For more information and a discussion on this topic, watch my video “Was the Epistle to Yemen actually written by Maimonides?” here.

[1] Epistle to Yemen 88-92; English translation [xvii]. For the Messiah’s prophetic gifts, see Mishneh Torah: H. Teshuba 9.2; cf. pp 492
[2] Mishneh Torah: H. Melakim 11:3-4. Shailat, Letters and Essays of Moses Maimonides pp. 157-8, Herein the struggles to harmonize the descriptions of the Messiah in the Epistle with the description in the Mishneh Torah expressed; cf. pp 492
[3] (Davidson, 1932) pp. 493
[4] Ibid. pp. 493
[5] Ibid pp. 509
[6] Ibid pp. 493