you'." A Christian came to Abbahu with the quibbling question: "How could your God in His priestly holiness bury Moses without providing for purificatory rites, yet oceans are declared insufficient?" Abbahu replied: "Does it not say, 'The Lord comes with fire'? Fire is the true element of purification, according to Numbers 31:23." Another question of the same character: "Why the boastful claim, 'What nation on earth is like Your people Israel', since we read, 'All the nations are as nothing before Him'?" Abbahu replied: "Do we not read of Israel, he 'shall not be reckoned among the nations'?" Abbahu made a notable exception with reference to the Tosefta's statement that the Gilyonim (Gospels) and other books of the heretics (Minnin) are not to be saved from a fire on Shabbat: "the books of those [written by Minnin for the purpose of debating with Jews] at Abidan may or may not be saved." In regard to the line "Barukh Shem Kevod Malkhuto" (Blessed be the Name of His glorious Kingdom) recited after the Shema, Abbahu says that in Palestine, where the Christians look for points of controversy, the words should be recited aloud (lest the Jews be accused of silently tampering with the unity of God proclaimed in the Shema), whereas in the Babylonian city of Nehardea, where there are no Christians, the words are recited with a low voice. Preaching directly against the Christian dogma, Abbahu says: "A king of flesh and blood may have a father, a brother, or a son to share in or dispute his sovereignty, but the Lord says, 'I am the Lord your God! I am the first - that is, I have no father; and I am the last - that is, I have no brother; and besides me there is no God - that is, I have no son'". His comment on Numbers 23:19 has a still more polemical tone: "God is not a man that he should lie; neither the son of man, that he should repent; if a man says: 'I am God,' he is a liar; if he says: 'I am a son of man,' he will have cause to regret it; and if he says, 'I will go up to heaven,' he has said [something] but will not keep his word". Some of his controversies on Christian theological subjects, as on Adam, on Enoch, and on the resurrection, are