SAʿĪD IBN HASAN

SAʿĪD IBN HASAN (13th–14th cent.), Alexandrian Jew who converted to Islam in 1298 , became a fanatical Muslim, and oppressed his former coreligionists and the Christians. Saʿīd relates that the cause for his apostasy was a severe illness during which, in a dream, he heard a voice which ordered him to convert. After his conversion, he requested that a public disputation be held between him and the Jewish and Christian scholars in the presence of the sultan. He prided himself that he would prove from the Bible the veracity of the Muslim claims against Judaism. Saʿīd did not succeed in holding this disputation and therefore wrote a polemical book in which he presented his opinions. This book, Maṣāliḥ al-Naẓar fī Nubuwwat Sayyid al-Bashar ("Methods of Study into the Prophecy of the Lord of All Men"), was written in 1320 in the Great Mosque of damascus , where Saʿīd lived at that time. In this book he set out to prove that certain verses of the Bible are allusions to the coming of muhammad , and that it is forbidden to tolerate the adoration of the icons in the churches; he also means to reveal the real nature of the philosophers. However, Saʿīd's knowledge of the Bible, Jewish history, and other branches of literature was scanty and his book is of low standard. Generally, Saʿīd condemns the Christians more than the Jews. According to him, they are the worst disbelievers because they deify Jesus. The philosophers are the enemies of God and of the prophets, his messengers, and were the inventors of idol worship. Their greatest sin is their belief in the eternity of the world, which he tries to refute in a special chapter of his book. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: Goldziher, in: REJ, 30 (1845), 1–23; Weston, in: JAOS, 24 (1903), 312–83; Ashtor, Toledot, 1 (1944), 283–8. (Eliyahu Ashtor)