a centre
of learning.]

[Footnote 143: See Berliner, pp. 45, 47, 54, and 57, for
particulars derived from the Talmud and Midrash as to the
several centres of Jewish learning in Babylonia.]

[Footnote 144: This synagogue is repeatedly mentioned in the
Talmud. Zunz (Note 255) omits mentioning Aboda Zarah, 43 b,
where Rashi explains that Shafjathib was a place in the
district of Nehardea, and that Jeconiah and his followers
brought the holy earth thither, giving effect to the words
of the Psalmist: "For thy servants take pleasure in her
stones, and favour the dust thereof" (Ps. cii. 14).]

[Footnote 145: Benjamin visited the various seats of
learning in the neighbourhood, and thus came again to
Nehardea, which has been already mentioned on p. 34. Rab
Jehuda, not Rab, is there associated with Samuel.]

[Footnote 146: Asher, at this stage of Benjamin's narrative,
has the following note: "For the illustration of that
portion of our text which treats of Arabia, we refer the
reader to the Rev. S.L. Rapoport's paper, 'Independent Jews
of Arabia,' which will be found at the end of these notes."
No such account appeared in the work, but in the _Bikkure
Haittim_ for the year 1824, p. 51, there appears an
interesting essay in Hebrew on the subject by Rapoport, to
which the reader is referred. It is a matter of history that
the powerful independent Jewish communities which were
settled at Yathrib, afterwards called Medina, and in the
volcanic highlands of Kheibar and Teima called the Harrah,
were crushed by Mohammed. Dr. Hirschfeld, in the _Jewish
Quarterly Review_, vol. XV, p. 170, gives us the translation
of a letter found in the Cairo _Genizah_, addressed by
Mohammed to the people of Kheibar and Maqna, granting them
certain privileges from which the Jews, who were allowed to
remain in their homes, benefited. Omar, the second Caliph,
broke the compact, but allowed them to settle at Kufa on the
Euphrates. Although pilgrims pass annually up and down the
caravan tracks to Mecca, the information respecting the old
Jewish sites in the Harrah is most meagre. Edrisi and
Abulfeda throw no light on Benjamin's account. In the year
1904 an able work by Mr. D.G. Hogarth appeared under the
title of _The Penetration of Arabia_, being a record