Greetings. On the inyan of the weak level of Jews in Persia discussed in this gemara, do meforshim comment that it is significant that most of the anti-Talmudic minim that emerged in the time of the gaonim came from cities in Persia far from the gaonim and the yeshivas? Nahawand, Damaghan, Isfahan, etc.?

So it seems that even several hundred years after the Talmud was closed there were some Jews away from Bavel who did not believe that the Torah had to be limited to the chachomim of the Gemara and they could disagree with them, (which meant they were in fact rejecting the whole Oral Torah itself, even without necessarily intending that specifically).

David Goldman, NYC