 Isaac Israeli corresponded with Saadya ben Joseph al-Fayyumi (882–942) prior to the latter’s departure from Egypt. Saadya later became the head (Gaon) of the Talmudic Academy of Sura and one of the most influential figures in the medieval Judaism. Saadya Gaon was known for his Jewish legal rulings, his arrangement of the Jewish prayer book (Siddur), his translation of the Hebrew Bible into Arabic, his liturgical poetry and his philosophical work The Book of Beliefs and Opinions (Arabic: Kitab al-‘Amanat wal-‘Itikadat, Hebrew: Sefer emunot ve-decot). Altmann and Stern suggest that it is possible that Saadya Gaon’s concept of rational commandments was influenced by Israeli’s concept of “intellectual precepts” from his Book of Definitions. (Isaac Israeli, p. 217) However, it is also possible that Saadya Gaon’s conception may have been a product of the vibrant and somewhat ecumenical intellectual culture of Baghdad, in which a group of theologians known as the Muta‘zilites reconciled logic and science with Islamic theology, arguing for the rationality of God and His actions.