Note 1 — LETTER OF AL-HĀSHIMĪ INVITING AL-KINDĪ TO EMBRACE ISLAM.

There can be very little doubt but that this document has come down to us in an imperfect condition and has suffered mutilation at the hands of Christian copyists: the almost entire absence of any refutation of such distinctively Christian doctrines as that of the Blessed Trinity, and the references to such attacks to be found in al-Kindī’s reply, certainly indicate the excision of such passages as might have given offence to Christian readers.1