Abstract

Jews began to compose in Arabic beginning from the ninth century. Parallel to the adoption of the Arabic language, Jewish literature also departed from earlier literary conventions of rabbinic literature and this encouraged by non-Jewish models of composition. The new models are distinguished with regard to preceding periods by a number of key features: a disziplinization of areas of knowledge, such as commentary, linguistic thought, legal and calendrical compendiums, philosophy, but also scientifi c writing, on the one hand, and new forms of discourse (monographic writing and a new type of organizational structure), on the other. This contribution explores the cultural and intellectual embeddedness, as well as the particular modes of knowledge transfer, in Arabic literature written by Jews, with a special reference to astronomy and cosmogony.