His heart was grieved when he saw the confusion concerning matters of religion that prevailed among his contemporaries, finding an unintelligent belief and unenlightened views current among those who professed Judaism while those who denied the faith triumphantly vaunted their errors.
The tenth section, on the best mode of life for mankind in this world, must be regarded as an appendix, since its admonitions to moral conduct supplement the exhortations to right thought and right belief contained in the main body.
The most important points contained in the individual sections are as follows: For the doctrine of the creation of the world, Saadia offers four proofs; three of these show the influence of Aristotelian philosophy, which may also be traced elsewhere in his writings.
After this section, the author shows a deep religious feeling about the relation to the Deity sustained by the human soul when permeated by the true knowledge of God.
According to a classification borrowed by Saadia from the Muʿtazila but based upon an essentially Jewish view, the commandments are divided into those of reason and of revelation, although even the latter may be explained rationally, as is shown by numerous examples.
This is followed by theses on the essential content of the Bible and the credibility of Biblical tradition, by a detailed refutation of the Christian and Islamic view that the Law revealed in Israel has been repealed, and by a polemic against a series of Hiwi al-Balkhi's objections to the authority of the Scriptures.
In contrast, the description of the last class, that of the contrite, leads him to detailed considerations, based upon the Bible, of repentance, prayer, and other evidences of human piety.
Here Saadia refutes the objections made, based on nature, reason, and the Bible, to the doctrine of the resurrection of the dead, and presents the proof for it contained in tradition.
He then discusses ten questions bearing on this doctrine, which are of interest as "affording an insight into popular views that then prevailed, and which, despite their singularity, could not be ignored even by such a man as Saadia" (Guttmann).
The teachings regarding Messianic redemption are based almost entirely on statements of the Bible and the Talmud, the definite year of salvation being fixed by an interpretation of well-known passages in the Book of Daniel.
The system of ethics contained in the appendix is based mostly on a description and criticism of thirteen different objects of life, to which Saadia adds his own counsels for rational and moral living.
He also adds that in the case of each of the five senses, only the concordant union of sensuous impressions is beneficial, thus showing how great the need is for a harmonious combination of the qualities and the impulses of the soul of man.
Another translation, or rather paraphrase, of the Kitāb al-Amānāt wa l-Iʿtiqādāt, of uncertain authorship, is contained in several manuscripts (the most important being MS. Vatican 266); large portions of this rendering were edited by Gollancz (ha-Nakdan, Berechiah (1902).
The seventh section, on the resurrection, is contained in two versions, the first of which, the basis of the translation of ibn Tibbon, has been edited by Bacher in the "Steinschneider Festschrift," pp.