‘And no one can now find them?’ ‘No one,’ replied Rabbi Zimri: ‘but, according to that learned doctor, Moses Hallevy, they are in a valley in the mountains of Lebanon, which was sealed up by the Archangel Michael.’
‘The illustrious Doctor Abarbanel, of Babylon,’ said Rabbi Maimon, ‘gives one hundred and twenty reasons in his commentary on the Gemara to prove that they sunk under the earth at the taking of the Temple.’
‘No one reasons like Abarbanel of Babylon,’ said Rabbi Zimri.
‘The great Rabbi Akiba, of Pundebita, has answered them all,’ said Rabbi Maimon, ‘and holds that they were taken up to heaven.’
‘And which is right?’ inquired Rabbi Zimri.
‘Neither,’ said Rabbi Maimon.
‘One hundred and twenty reasons are strong proof,’ said Rabbi Zimri.
‘The most learned and illustrious Doctor Aaron Mendola, of Granada,’ said Rabbi Maimon, ‘has shown that we must look for the Tombs of the Kings in the south of Spain.’
‘All that Mendola writes is worth attention,’ said Rabbi Zimri.
‘Rabbi Hillel,[40] of Samaria, is worth two Mendolas any day,’ said Rabbi Maimon.