Again, though he vigorously opposed Karaism, he adopted its love of philology, and by his translation of the Bible into Arabic helped forward a sounder understanding of the Scriptures.
At the age of thirty-six Saadiah received a remarkable honor; he was summoned to Sura to fill the post of Gaon.

This election of a foreigner as head of the Babylonian school proves, first, that Babylonia had lost its old supremacy, and, secondly, that Saadiah had already won world-wide fame.

Yet the great work on which his reputation now rests was not then written.

Saadiah's notoriety was due to his successful championship of Rabbinism against the Karaites.

His determination, his learning, his originality, were all discernible in his early treatises against Anan and his followers.