The Karaites and Karaism as Portrayed in Medieval Rabbanite Sources

The objective of the paper is to present and analyze a representative selection of most influential medieval rabbanite source texts (both printed works and manuscripts) containing descriptions of the Karaites and Karaite religion. While doing so, special attention will be paid to the way in which different authors reconstruct the origins and essence of the major split between Judaism and Karaism that occurred within medieval Jewish world on the one hand, and the evolution which over time underwent rabbanite ideas about their Karaite breathers and their religion on the other. The collected reports will be compared with similar descriptions found in medieval Muslim as well as Karaite sources. This will be done against the backdrop of the historical context of fervent religious debates that raged throughout the Middle Ages. The study will lead to a wider discussion of the perception of Karaites by the followers of other religions or religious factions within Judaism, as well as of the reception of certain rabbanite concepts in the Karaite tradition. At last, an attempt will be made to provide answers to a number of questions relevant to this subject, such as: What were the overarching goals of writing these reports within rabbinic Judaism? How do they differ from the narratives created by the Karaites? Who were the target readers of these texts and who actually read them? Why and by whom were they written down? Were they composed out of polemical reasons, or rather an expression of scientific inquiry of their authors?