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 A HISTORY OF MEDIAEVAL JEWISH PHILOSOPHY

 BY

 ISAAC HUSIK, A. M. , PH. D. ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA

 New York THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 1916

 _All rights reserved_

 COPYRIGHT, 1916 BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY Set up and electrotyped. Published October, 1916. 

This book is issued by the Macmillan Company in conjunction with theJewish Publication Society of America. 

 TO SOLOMON SOLIS COHEN, M. D. AS A TOKEN OF GRATITUDE AND ESTEEM

PREFACE

No excuse is needed for presenting to the English reader a History ofMediæval Jewish Philosophy. The English language, poor enough in bookson Jewish history and literature, can boast of scarcely anything at allin the domain of Jewish Philosophy. The Jewish Encyclopedia has noarticle on Jewish Philosophy, and neither has the eleventh edition ofthe Encyclopedia Britannica. Hastings' Encyclopedia of Religion andEthics will have a brief article on the subject from the conscientiousand able pen of Dr. Henry Malter, but of books there is none. But whilethis is due to several causes, chief among them perhaps being thatEnglish speaking people in general and Americans in particular are moreinterested in positive facts than in tentative speculations, in concreteresearches than in abstract theorizing--there are ample signs that heretoo a change is coming, and in many spheres we are called upon toexamine our foundations with a view to making our superstructure deepand secure as well as broad and comprehensive. And this is nothing elsethan philosophy. Philosophical studies are happily on the increase inthis country and more than one branch of literary endeavor is beginningto feel its influence. And with the increase of books and researches inthe history of the Jews is coming an awakening to the fact that thephilosophical and rationalistic movement among the Jews in the middleages is well worth study, influential as it was in forming Judaism as areligion and as a theological and ethical system. 

But it is not merely the English language that is still wanting in ageneral history of Mediæval Jewish Philosophy, the German, French andItalian languages are no better off in this regard. For while it is truethat outside of the Hebrew and Arabic sources, German books andmonographs are the _sine qua non_ of the student who wishes toinvestigate the philosophical movement in mediæval Jewry, and thepresent writer owes very much to the researches of such men as Joel, Guttmann, Kaufmann and others, it nevertheless remains true that thereis as yet no complete history of the subject for the student or thegeneral reader. The German writers have done thorough and distinguishedwork in expounding individual thinkers and problems, they have gathereda complete and detailed bibliography of Jewish philosophical writings inprint and in manuscript, they have edited and translated and annotatedthe most important philosophical texts. France has also had an importantshare in these fundamental undertakings, but for some reason neither theone nor the other has so far undertaken to present to the generalstudent and non-technical reader the results of their researches. 

What was omitted by the German, French and English speaking writers wasaccomplished by a scholar who wrote in Hebrew. Dr. S. Bernfeld haswritten in Hebrew under the title "Daat Elohim" (The Knowledge of God) areadable sketch of Jewish Religious philosophy from Biblical times downto "Ahad Haam. " A German scholar (now in America), Dr. David Neumark ofCincinnati, has undertaken on a very large scale a History of JewishPhilosophy in the Middle Ages, of which only a beginning has been madein the two volumes so far issued. 

The present writer at the suggestion of the Publication Committee of theJewish Publication Society of America has undertaken to write a historyof mediæval Jewish rationalistic philosophy in one volume--a historythat will appeal alike to the scholar and the intelligent non-technicalreader. Treating only of the rationalistic school, I did not includeanything that has to do with mysticism or Kabbala. In my attempt toplease the scholar and the layman, I fear I shall have succeeded insatisfying neither. The professional student will miss learned notes andquotations of original passages in the language of their authors. Thegeneral reader will often be wearied by the scholastic tone of theproblems as well as of the manner of the discussion and argument. Andyet I cannot but feel that it will do both classes good--the one to getless, the other more than he wants. The latter will find oases in thedesert where he can refresh himself and take a rest, and the former willfind in the notes and bibliography references to sources and technicalarticles where more can be had after his own heart. 

There is not much room for originality in a historical and expositorywork of this kind, particularly as I believe in writing historyobjectively. I have not attempted to read into the mediæval thinkersmodern ideas that were foreign to them. I endeavored to interpret theirideas from their own point of view as determined by their history andenvironment and the literary sources, religious and philosophical, underthe influence of which they came. I based my book on a study of theoriginal sources where they were available--and this applies to all theauthors treated with the exception of the two Karaites, Joseph al Basirand Jeshua ben Judah, where I had to content myself with secondarysources and a few fragments of the original texts. For the rest I triedto tell my story as simply as I knew how, and I hope the reader willaccept the book in the spirit in which it is offered--as an objectiveand not too critical exposition of Jewish rationalistic thought in themiddle ages. 

My task would not be done were I not to express my obligations to thePublication Committee of the Jewish Publication Society of America towhose encouragement I owe the impulse but for which the book would nothave been written, and whose material assistance enabled the publishersto bring out a book typographically so attractive. 

 ISAAC HUSIK. 

 PHILADELPHIA, _July, 1916. _

TABLE OF CONTENTS

 PAGE

 PREFACE vii

 INTRODUCTION xiii

 CHAPTER

 I. ISAAC ISRAELI 1

 II. DAVID BEN MERWAN AL MUKAMMAS 17

 III. SAADIA BEN JOSEPH AL-FAYYUMI 23

 IV. JOSEPH AL-BASIR AND JESHUA BEN JUDAH 48

 V. SOLOMON IBN GABIROL 59

 VI. BAHYA IBN PAKUDA 80

 VII. PSEUDO-BAHYA 106

 VIII. ABRAHAM BAR HIYYA 114

 IX. JOSEPH IBN ZADDIK 125

 X. JUDAH HALEVI 150

 XI. MOSES AND ABRAHAM IBN EZRA 184

 XII. ABRAHAM IBN DAUD 197

 XIII. MOSES MAIMONIDES 236

 XIV. HILLEL BEN SAMUEL 312

 XV. LEVI BEN GERSON 328

 XVI. AARON BEN ELIJAH OF NICOMEDIA 362

 XVII. HASDAI BEN ABRAHAM CRESCAS 388

 XVIII. JOSEPH ALBO 406

 CONCLUSION 428

 BIBLIOGRAPHY 433

 NOTES 439

 LIST OF BIBLICAL AND RABBINIC PASSAGES 449

 INDEX 451

INTRODUCTION

The philosophical movement in mediæval Jewry was the result of thedesire and the necessity, felt by the leaders of Jewish thought, ofreconciling two apparently independent sources of truth. In the middleages, among Jews as well as among Christians and Mohammedans, the twosources of knowledge or truth which were clearly present to the minds ofthinking people, each claiming recognition, were religious opinions asembodied in revealed documents on the one hand, and philosophical andscientific judgments and arguments, the results of independent rationalreflection, on the other. Revelation and reason, religion andphilosophy, faith and knowledge, authority and independent reflectionare the various expressions for the dualism in mediæval thought, whichthe philosophers and theologians of the time endeavored to reduce to amonism or a unity. 

Let us examine more intimately the character and content of the twoelements in the intellectual horizon of mediæval Jewry. On the side ofrevelation, religion, authority, we have the Bible, the Mishna, theTalmud. The Bible was the written law, and represented literally theword of God as revealed to lawgiver and prophet; the Talmud (includingthe Mishna) was the oral law, embodying the unwritten commentary on thewords of the Law, equally authentic with the latter, contemporaneouswith it in revelation, though not committed to writing until many agessubsequently and until then handed down by word of mouth; hencedepending upon tradition and faith in tradition for its validity andacceptance. Authority therefore for the Rabbanites was two-fold, theauthority of the direct word of God which was written down as soon ascommunicated, and about which there could therefore be no manner ofdoubt; and the authority of the indirect word of God as transmittedorally for many generations before it was written down, requiring beliefin tradition. By the Karaites tradition was rejected, and there remainedonly belief in the words of the Bible. 

On the side of reason was urged first the claim of the testimony of thesenses, and second the validity of logical inference as determined bydemonstration and syllogistic proof. This does not mean that the Jewishthinkers of the middle ages developed unaided from without a system ofthought and a _Weltanschauung_, based solely upon their own observationand ratiocination, and then found that the view of the world thusacquired stood in opposition to the religion of the Bible and theTalmud, the two thus requiring adjustment and reconciliation. No! Theso-called demands of the reason were not of their own making, and on theother hand the relation between philosophy and religion was notaltogether one of opposition. To discuss the latter point first, theteachings of the Bible and the Talmud were not altogether clear on agreat many questions. Passages could be cited from the religiousdocuments of Judaism in reference to a given problem both _pro_ and_con_. Thus in the matter of freedom of the will one could argue on theone hand that man must be free to determine his conduct since if he werenot there would have been no use in giving him commandments andprohibitions. And one could quote besides in favor of freedom the directstatement in Deuteronomy 30, 19, "I call heaven and earth to witnessagainst you this day, that I have set before thee life and death, theblessing and the curse: therefore choose life, that thou mayest live, thou and thy seed. " But on the other hand it was just as possible tofind Biblical statements indicating clearly that God preordains how aperson shall behave in a given case. Thus Pharaoh's heart was hardenedthat he should not let the children of Israel go out of Egypt, as weread in Exodus 7, 3: "And I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and multiply mysigns and my wonders in the land of Egypt. But Pharaoh will not hearkenunto you, and I will lay my hand upon Egypt, and bring forth my hosts, my people, the children of Israel, out of the land of Egypt by greatjudgments. " Similarly in the case of Sihon king of Heshbon we read inDeuteronomy 2, 30: "But Sihon king of Heshbon would not let us pass byhim: for the Lord thy God hardened his spirit, and made his heartobstinate, that he might deliver him into thy hand, as at this day. " Andthis is true not merely of heathen kings, Ahab king of Israel wassimilarly enticed by a divine instigation according to I Kings 22, 20:"And the Lord said, Who shall entice Ahab, that he may go up and fall atRamoth-Gilead?"

The fact of the matter is the Bible is not a systematic book, andprinciples and problems are not clearly and strictly formulated even inthe domain of ethics which is its strong point. It was not therefore aquestion here of opposition between the Bible and philosophy, orauthority and reason. What was required was rather a rational analysisof the problem on its own merits and then an endeavor to show that theconflicting passages in the Scriptures are capable of interpretation soas to harmonize with each other and with the results of rationalspeculation. To be sure, it was felt that the doctrine of freedom isfundamental to the spirit of Judaism, and the philosophic analyses ledto the same result though in differing form, sometimes dangerouslyapproaching a thorough determinism, as in Hasdai Crescas. [1]

If such doubt was possible in an ethical problem where one would supposethe Bible would be outspoken, the uncertainty was still greater inpurely metaphysical questions which as such were really foreign to itspurpose as a book of religion and ethics. While it was clear that theBible teaches the existence of God as the creator of the universe, andof man as endowed with a soul, it is manifestly difficult to extractfrom it a rigid and detailed theory as to the nature of God, the mannerin which the world was created, the nature of the soul and its relationto man and to God. As long as the Jews were self-centered and did notcome in close contact with an alien civilization of a philosophic mould, the need for a carefully thought out and consistent theory on all thequestions suggested was not felt. And thus we have in the Talmudicliterature quite a good deal of speculation concerning God and man. Butit can scarcely lay claim to being rationalistic or philosophic, muchless to being consistent. Nay, we have in the Bible itself at least twobooks which attempt an anti-dogmatic treatment of ethical problems. InJob is raised the question whether a man's fortunes on earth bear anyrelation to his conduct moral and spiritual. Ecclesiastes cannot make uphis mind whether life is worth living, and how to make the best of itonce one finds himself alive, whether by seeking wisdom or by pursuingpleasure. But here too Job is a long poem, and the argument does notprogress very rapidly or very far. Ecclesiastes is rambling rather thananalytic, and on the whole mostly negative. The Talmudists were visiblypuzzled in their attitude to both books, wondered whether Job reallyexisted or was only a fancy, and seriously thought of excludingEcclesiastes from the canon. But these attempts at questioning themeaning of life had no further results. They did not lead, as in thecase of the Greek Sophists, to a Socrates, a Plato or an Aristotle. Philo in Alexandria and Maimonides in Fostat were the products not ofthe Bible and the Talmud alone, but of a combination of Hebraism andHellenism, pure in the case of Philo, mixed with the spirit of Islam inMaimonides. 

And this leads us to consider the second point mentioned above, thenature and content of what was attributed in the middle ages to thecredit of reason. It was in reality once more a set of documents. TheBible and Talmud were the documents of revelation, Aristotle was thedocument of reason. Each was supreme in its sphere, and all efforts mustbe bent to make them agree, for as revelation cannot be doubted, soneither can the assured results of reason. But not all which pretends tobe the conclusion of reason is necessarily so in truth, as on the otherhand the documents of faith are subject to interpretation and may meansomething other than appears on the surface. 

That the Bible has an esoteric meaning besides the literal has itssource in the Talmud itself. Reference is found there to a mysticdoctrine of creation known as "Maase Bereshit" and a doctrine of thedivine chariot called "Maase Merkaba. "[2] The exact nature of theseteachings is not known since the Talmud itself prohibits the impartingof this mystic lore to any but the initiated, i. E. , to those showingthemselves worthy; and never to more than one or two at a time. [3] Butit is clear from the names of these doctrines that they centered aboutthe creation story in Genesis and the account of the divine chariot inEzekiel, chapters one and ten. Besides the Halaka and Agada are full ofinterpretations of Biblical texts which are very far from the literaland have little to do with the context. Moreover, the beliefs currentamong the Jews in Alexandria in the first century B. C. Found their wayinto mediæval Jewry, that the philosophic literature of the Greeks wasoriginally borrowed or stolen from the Hebrews, who lost it in times ofstorm and stress. [4] This being the case, it was believed that the Bibleitself cannot be without some allusions to philosophic doctrines. Thatthe Bible does not clearly teach philosophy is due to the fact that itwas intended for the salvation of all men, the simple as well as thewise, women and children as well as male adults. For these it issufficient that they know certain religious truths within their graspand conduct themselves according to the laws of goodness andrighteousness. A strictly philosophic book would have been beyond theirken and they would have been left without a guide in life. But the moreintellectual and the more ambitious are not merely permitted, nay theyare obligated to search the Scriptures for the deeper truths foundtherein, truths akin to the philosophic doctrines found in Greekliterature; and the latter will help them in understanding the Biblearight. It thus became a duty to study philosophy and the sciencespreparatory thereto, logic, mathematics and physics; and thus equippedto approach the Scriptures and interpret them in a philosophical manner. The study of mediæval Jewish rationalism has therefore two sides to it, the analysis of metaphysical, ethical and psychological problems, andthe application of these studies to an interpretation of Scripture. 

Now let us take a closer glance at the rationalistic or philosophicliterature to which the Jews in the middle ages fell heirs. In 529 A. D. The Greek schools of philosophy in Athens were closed by order ofEmperor Justinian. This did not, however, lead to the extinction ofGreek thought as an influence in the world. For though the West wasgradually declining intellectually on account of the fall of Rome andthe barbarian invasions which followed in its train, there were signs ofprogress in the East which, feeble at first, was destined in the courseof several centuries to illumine the whole of Europe with itsenlightening rays. 

Long before 529, the date of the closing of the Greek schools, Greekinfluence was introduced in the East in Asia and Africa. [5] The wholemovement goes back to the days of Alexander the Great and the victorieshe gained in the Orient. From that time on Greeks settled in Asia andAfrica and brought along with them Greek manners, the Greek language, and the Greek arts and sciences. Alexandria, the capital of thePtolemies in Egypt after the death of Alexander, and Antioch, thecapital of Syria under the empire of the Seleucidæ, were well-knowncentres of Greek learning. 

When Syria changed masters in 64 B. C. And became a Roman province, itsform of civilization did not change, and the introduction ofChristianity had the effect of spreading the influence of the Greeks andtheir language into Mesopotamia beyond the Euphrates. The Christians inSyria had to study Greek in order to understand the Scriptures of theOld and the New Testaments, the decrees and canons of the ecclesiasticalcouncils, and the writings of the Church Fathers. Besides religion andthe Church, the liberal arts and sciences, for which the Greeks were sofamous, attracted the interests of the Syrian Christians, and schoolswere established in the ecclesiastical centres where philosophy, mathematics and medicine were studied. These branches of knowledge wererepresented in Greek literature, and hence the works treating of thesesubjects had to be translated into Syriac for the benefit of those whodid not know Greek. Aristotle was the authority in philosophy, Hippocrates and Galen in medicine. 

The oldest of these schools was in Edessa in Mesopotamia, founded in theyear 363 by St. Ephrem of Nisibis. It was closed in 489 and the teachersmigrated to Persia where two other schools became famous, one at Nisibisand the other at Gandisapora. A third school of philosophy among theJacobite or Monophysite Christians was that connected with the conventof Kinnesrin on the left bank of the Euphrates, which became famous as aseat of Greek learning in the beginning of the seventh century. 

Christianity was succeeded in the Orient by Mohammedanism, and thischange led to even greater cultivation of Greek studies on the part ofthe Syrians. The Mohammedan Caliphs employed the Syrians as physicians. This was especially true of the Abbasid dynasty, who came into power in750. When they succeeded to the Caliphate they raised Nestorian Syriansto offices of importance, and the latter under the patronage of theirmasters continued their studies of Greek science and philosophy andtranslated those writings into Syriac and Arabic. Among the authorstranslated were, Hippocrates and Galen in medicine, Euclid, Archimedesand Ptolemy in mathematics and astronomy, and Aristotle, Theophrastusand Alexander of Aphrodisias in philosophy. In many cases the Greekwritings were not turned directly into Arabic but as the translatorswere Syrians, the versions were made first into Syriac, and then fromthe Syriac into Arabic. The Syrian Christians were thus the mediatorsbetween the Greeks and the Arabs. The latter, however, in the course oftime far surpassed their Syrian teachers, developed important schoolsof philosophy, became the teachers of the Jews, and with the help of thelatter introduced Greek philosophy as well as their own developmentthereof into Christian Europe in the beginning of the thirteenthcentury. 

We see now that the impulse to philosophizing came from the Greeks, --andnot merely the impulse but the material, the matter as well as themethod and the terminology. In the Aristotelian writings we finddeveloped an entire system of thought. There is not a branch ofknowledge dealing with fundamental principles which is not thererepresented. First of all Aristotle stands alone as the discoverer ofthe organon of thought, the tool which we all employ in our reasoningand reflection; he is the first formulator of the science and art oflogic. He treats besides of the principles of nature and naturalphenomena in the Physics and the treatise on the Heavens. He discussesthe nature of the soul, the senses and the intellect in his"Psychology. " In the "History of Animals" and other minor works we havea treatment of biology. In the Nikomachean and Eudemian Ethics heanalyzes the meaning of virtue, gives a list and classification of thevirtues and discusses the _summum bonum_ or the aim of human life. Finally in the Metaphysics we have an analysis of the fundamentalnotions of being, of the nature of reality and of God. 

The Jews did not get all this in its purity for various reasons. In thefirst place it was only gradually that the Jews became acquainted withthe wealth of Aristotelian material. We are sure that Abraham Ibn Daud, the forerunner of Maimonides, had a thorough familiarity with the ideasof Aristotle; and those who came after him, for example Maimonides, Gersonides, Hasdai Crescas, show clearly that they were deep students ofthe ideas represented in the writings of the Stagirite. But there is notthe same evidence in the earlier writings of Isaac Israeli, Saadia, Joseph Ibn Zaddik, Gabirol, Bahya Ibn Pakuda, Judah Halevi. They hadpicked up Aristotelian ideas and principles, but they had also absorbedideas and concepts from other schools, Greek as well as Arabian, andunconsciously combined the two. 

Another explanation for the rarity of the complete and unadulteratedAristotle among the Jewish thinkers of the middle ages is that people inthose days were very uncritical in the matter of historical facts andrelations. Historical and literary criticism was altogether unknown, anda number of works were ascribed to Aristotle which did not belong tohim, and which were foreign in spirit to his mode of thinking. Theyemanated from a different school of thought with differentpresuppositions. I am referring to the treatise called the "Theology ofAristotle, "[6] and that known as the "Liber de Causis. "[7] Both wereattributed to Aristotle in the middle ages by Jews and Arabs alike, butit has been shown recently[8] that the former represents extracts fromthe works of Plotinus, the head of the Neo-Platonic school ofphilosophy, while the latter is derived from a treatise of Proclus, aNeo-Platonist of later date. 

Finally a third reason for the phenomenon in question is that the Jewswere the pupils of the Arabs and followed their lead in adapting Greekthought to their own intellectual and spiritual needs. It so happenstherefore that even in the case of Abraham Ibn Daud, Maimonides andGersonides, who were without doubt well versed in Aristotelian thoughtand entertained not merely admiration but reverence for the philosopherof Stagira, we notice that instead of reading the works of Aristotlehimself, they preferred, or were obliged as the case may be, to go tothe writings of Alfarabi, Avicenna and Averroes for their information onthe views of the philosopher. In the case of Gersonides this is easilyexplained. It seems he could read neither Latin nor Arabic[9] and therewas no Hebrew translation of the text of Aristotle. Averroes had takenin the fourteenth century the place of the Greek philosopher and insteadof reading Aristotle all students read the works of the Commentator, asAverroes was called. Of course the very absence of a Hebrew translationof Aristotle's text proves that even among those who read Arabic thedemand for the text of Aristotle was not great, and preference was shownfor the works of the interpreters, compendists and commentators, likeAlfarabi and Avicenna. And this helps us to understand why it is thatIbn Daud and Maimonides who not only read Arabic but wrote theirphilosophical works in Arabic showed the same preference for thesecondhand Aristotle. One reason may have been the lack of historicaland literary criticism spoken of above, and the other the difficulty ofthe Arabic translations of Aristotle. Aristotle is hard to translateinto any language by reason of his peculiar technical terminology; andthe difficulty was considerably enhanced by the fact that the Syriac inmany cases stood between the original Greek and the Arabic, and in thesecond place by the great dissimilarity between the Semitic language andits Indo-European original. This may have made the copies of Aristotle'stext rare, and gradually led to their disuse. The great authority whichnames like Alfarabi, Avicenna and Averroes acquired still further servedto stamp them as the approved expositors of the Aristotelian doctrine. 

Among the Arabs the earliest division based upon a theoretical questionwas that of the parties known as the "Kadariya" and the "Jabariya. "[10]The problem which was the cause of the difference was that of free willand determinism. Orthodox Islam favored the idea that man is completelydependent upon the divine will, and that not only his destiny but alsohis conduct is determined, and his own will does not count. This was thepopular feeling, though as far as the Koran is concerned the questioncannot be decided one way or the other, as it is not consistent in itsstand, and arguments can be drawn in plenty in favor of either opinion. The idea of determinism, however, seemed repugnant to many minds, whocould not reconcile this with their idea of reward and punishment andthe justice of God. How is it possible that a righteous God would forcea man to act in a certain manner and then punish him for it? Hence thesect of the "Kadariya, " who were in favor of freedom of the will. TheJabariya were the determinists. 

This division goes back to a very early period before the introductionof the Aristotelian philosophy among the Arabs, and hence owes itsinception not to reason as opposed to religious dogma, but to a piousendeavor to understand clearly the religious view upon so important aquestion. 

From the Kadariya, and in opposition to the Aristotelian movement whichhad in the meantime gained ground, developed the school of theologiansknown as the "Mutakallimun. " They were the first among the Arabs whodeliberately laid down the reason as a source of knowledge in additionto the authority of the Koran and the "Sunna" or tradition. They werenot freethinkers, and their object was not to oppose orthodoxy as such. On the contrary, their purpose was to purify the faith by freeing itfrom such elements as obscured in their minds the purity of themonotheistic tenet and the justice of God. They started where theKadariya left off and went further. As a school of opposition theirefforts were directed to prove the creation of the world, individualprovidence, the reality of miracles, as against the "philosophers, " _i. E. _, the Aristotelians, who held to the eternity of motion, denied God'sknowledge of particulars, and insisted on the unchanging character ofnatural law. 

For this purpose they placed at the basis of their speculations not theAristotelian concepts of matter and form, the former uncreated andcontinuous, but adopted the atomistic theory of Democritus, denied thenecessity of cause and effect and the validity of natural law, and madeGod directly responsible for everything that happened every moment inlife. God, they said, creates continually, and he is not hampered by anysuch thing as natural law, which is merely our name for that which weare accustomed to see. Whenever it rains we are accustomed to see theground wet, and we conclude that there is a necessary connection ofcause and effect between the rain and the wetness of the ground. Nothingof the kind, say the Mutakallimun, or the Muʿtazila, the oldest sect ofthe school. It rains because God willed that it should rain, and theground is wet because God wills it shall be wet. If God willed that theground should be dry following a rain, it would be dry; and the one isno more and no less natural than the other. Miracles cease to bemiracles on this conception of natural processes. Similarly the dogma ofcreation is easily vindicated on this theory as against the Aristoteliandoctrine of eternity of the world, which follows from his doctrine ofmatter and form, as we shall have occasion to see later. 

The Muʿtazila were, however, chiefly known not for their principles ofphysics but for their doctrines of the unity of God and his justice. Itwas this which gave them their name of the "Men of Unity and Justice, "_i. E. _, the men who vindicate against the unenlightened views ofpopular orthodoxy the unity of God and his justice. 

The discussion of the unity centered about the proper interpretation ofthe anthropomorphic passages in the Koran and the doctrine of the divineattributes. When the Koran speaks of God's eyes, ears, hands, feet; ofhis seeing, hearing, sitting, standing, walking, being angry, smiling, and so on, must those phrases be understood literally? If so God issimilar to man, corporeal like him, and swayed by passions. This seemedto the Muʿtazila an unworthy conception of God. To vindicate hisspirituality the anthropomorphic passages in the Koran must beunderstood metaphorically. 

The other more difficult question was in what sense can attributes beascribed to God at all? It is not here a question of anthropomorphism. If I say that God is omniscient, omnipotent and a living God, Iattribute to God life, power, knowledge. Are these attributes the samewith God's essence or are they different? If different (and they must beeternal since God was never without them), then we have more than oneeternal being, and God is dependent upon others. If they are notdifferent from God's essence, then his essence is not a strict unity, since it is composed of life, power, knowledge; for life is not power, and power is not knowledge. The only way to defend the unity of God inits absolute purity is to say that God has no attributes, _i. E. _, Godis omniscient but not through knowledge as his attribute; God isomnipotent but not through power as his attribute, and so on. God isabsolutely one, and there is no distinction between knowledge, power, and life in him. They are all one, and are his essence. 

This seemed in opposition to the words of the Koran, which frequentlyspeaks of God's knowledge, power, and so on, and was accordinglycondemned as heretical by the orthodox. 

In the tenth century a new sect arose named the "Ashariya" afterAl-Ashari, its founder. This was a party of moderation, and tended toconciliate orthodoxy by not going too far in the direction ofrationalistic thinking. They solved the problem by saying, "God knowsthrough a knowledge which is not different from his essence. "

The other problem to which the Muʿtazila devoted their attention wasthat of the justice of God. This was in line with the efforts of theKadariya before them. It concerned itself with the doctrine of freewill. They defended man's absolute freedom of action, and insisted onjustice as the only motive of God's dealings with men. God must be justand cannot act otherwise than in accordance with justice. 

In reference to the question of the nature of good and evil, theorthodox position was that good is that which God commands, evil thatwhich God forbids. In other words, nothing is in itself good or evil, the ethical character of an act is purely relative to God's attitude toit. If God were to command cannibalism, it would be a good act. TheMuʿtazila were opposed to this. They believed in the absolute characterof good and evil. What makes an act good or bad is reason, and it isbecause an act is good that God commands it, and not the reverse. 

The foregoing account gives us an idea of the nature of the Muʿtazilitediscussions of the two problems of God's unity and God's justice. Theirworks were all arranged in the same way. They were divided into twoparts, one dealing with the question of the unity, and the other withthat of justice. The proofs of the unity were preceded by the proofs ofGod's existence, and the latter were based upon a demonstration that theworld is not eternal, but bears traces of having come to be in time. These are the earmarks by which a Muʿtazilite book could be recognized, and the respect for them on the part of the philosophers, _i. E. _, theAristotelians, was not great. The latter did not consider them worthycombatants in a philosophical fight, claiming that they came withpreconceived notions and arranged their conceptions of nature to suitthe religious beliefs which they desired to defend. Maimonides expressesa similar judgment concerning their worthlessness as philosophicalthinkers. [11]

This school of the Mutakallimun, or of the more important part of itknown as the Muʿtazila, is of great interest for the history of Jewishrationalism. In the first place their influence on the early Jewishphilosophers was great and unmistakable. It is no discovery of a lateday but is well known to Maimonides who is himself, as has just beensaid and as will appear with greater detail later, a strong opponent ofthese to him unphilosophical thinkers. In the seventy-first chapter ofhis "Guide of the Perplexed, " he says, "You will find that in the fewworks composed by the Geonim and the Karaites on the unity of God and onsuch matter as is connected with this doctrine, they followed the leadof the Mohammedan Mutakallimun.... It also happened, that at the timewhen the Mohammedans adopted this method of the Kalam, there arose amongthem a certain sect, called Muʿtazila. In certain things our scholarsfollowed the theory and the method of these Muʿtazila. "

Thanks to the researches of modern Jewish and non-Jewish scholars weknow now that the Rabbanite thinker Saadia and the Karaite writers, likeJoseph Al Basir and Jeshuah ben Judah, are indebted far more to theMohammedan Muʿtazilites than would appear from Maimonides's statementjust quoted. The Rabbanites being staunch adherents of the Talmud, tothe influence of which they owed a national and religiousself-consciousness much stronger than that of the Karaites, who rejectedthe authority of tradition, did not allow themselves to be carried awayso far by the ideas of the Mohammedan rationalists as to become theirslavish followers. The Karaites are less scrupulous; and as they werethe first among the Jews to imitate the Muʿtazila in the endeavor torationalize Jewish doctrine, they adopted their views in all details, and it is sometimes impossible to tell from the contents of a KaraiteMuʿtazilite work whether it was written by a Jew or a Mohammedan. Thearrangement of the work in the two divisions of "Unity" and "Justice, "the discussion of substance and accident, of the creation of the world, of the existence, unity and incorporeality of God, of his attributes, ofhis justice, and of human free will, are so similar in the two that itis external evidence alone to which we owe the knowledge of certainKaraite works as Jewish. There are no mediæval Jewish works treating ofreligious and theological problems in which there is so much aloofness, such absence of theological prepossession and religious feeling as insome Karaite writings of Muʿtazilite stamp. Cold and unredeemed logicgives the tone to the entire composition. 

Another reason for the importance of the Muʿtazilite school for thehistory of Jewish thought is of recent discovery. Schreiner hassuggested[12] that the origin of the Muʿtazilite movement was due to theinfluence of learned Jews with whom the Mohammedans came in contact, particularly in the city of Basra, an important centre of the school. The reader will recall that the two main doctrines of the Muʿtazila werethe unity of God and his justice. The latter really signified thefreedom of the will. That these are good Jewish views would of courseprove nothing for the origin of similar opinions among the Mohammedans. For it is not here a question simply of the dogmatic belief inMonotheism as opposed to polytheism. Mohammedanism is as a religionMonotheistic and we know that Mohammed was indebted very much to Jewsand Judaism. We are here concerned with the origin of a rationalisticmovement which endeavors to defend a spiritual conception of God againsta crude anthropomorphism, to vindicate a conception of his absoluteunity against the threatened multiplication of his essence by theassumption of eternal attributes, and which puts stress upon God'sjustice rather than upon his omnipotence so as to save human freedom. Another doctrine of the Muʿtazila was that the Koran was not eternal asthe orthodox believed, but that it was created. Now we can findparallels for most of these doctrines. Anthropomorphism was avoided inthe Aramaic translations of the Pentateuch, also in certain changes inthe Hebrew text which are recorded in Rabbinical literature, and knownas "Tikkune Soferim, " or corrections of the Scribes. [13] Concern formaintaining the unity of God in its absolute purity is seen in the carewith which the men of the Agada forbid any prayer which may have asemblance, however remote, of dualism. [14] The freedom of the will isclearly stated in the Rabbinic expression, "All is in the hands of Godexcept the fear of Heaven. "[15] And an apparently deterministic passagein Job 23, 13, "But he is one and who can turn him, and what his souldesireth, even that he doeth, " is explained by Rabbi Akiba in thefollowing manner, "It is not possible to answer the words of him whowith his word created the world, for he rules all things with truth andwith righteousness. "[16] And we find a parallel also for the creation ofthe Koran in the Midrashic statement that the Torah is one of the six orseven things created before the world. [17]

These parallels alone would not be of much weight, but they arestrengthened by other considerations. The Muʿtazilite movement seems tohave developed among the ascetic sects, with the leaders of whom itsfounders were in close relation. [18] The ascetic literature bearsunmistakable traces of having been influenced by the Halaka and theAgada. [19] Moreover, there is a Mohammedan tradition or two to theeffect that the doctrine of the creation of the Koran and also of therejection of anthropomorphism goes back to a Jew, Lebid-ibnAl-Aʿsam. [20]

More recently still[A] C. H. Becker proved from a study of certainPatristic writings that the polemical literature of the Christiansplayed an important rôle in the formation of Mohammedan dogma, and heshows conclusively that the form in which the problem of freedom wasdiscussed among the Mohammedans was taken from Christianity. Thequestion of the creation or eternity of the Koran or word of Allah, issimilarly related to the Christian idea of the eternal Logos, who is onthe one hand the Word and the Wisdom, and is on the other identifiedwith Jesus Christ. And the same thing holds of the doctrine ofattributes. It played a greater rôle in Christian dogma than it ever didin Judaism prior to the philosophic era in the middle ages. To be sure, the Patristic writers were much indebted to Philo, in whose writings thegerm of the mediæval doctrine of attributes is plainly evident. But theMohammedan schools did not read Philo. It would seem, therefore, thatSchreiner's view must be considerably modified, if not entirelyrejected, in view of the later evidence adduced by Becker. 

[A] Cf. Zeitschrift für Assyriologie, 1912, 175 ff. 

The more extreme doctrines, however, of the more orthodox Ashariya, suchas the denial of natural law and the necessity of cause and effect, likewise the denial of man's ability to determine his actions, none ofthe Jews accepted. Here we have again the testimony of Maimonides, who, however, is not inclined to credit this circumstance to the intelligenceand judgment of his predecessors, but to chance. His words are, "Although another sect, the Ashariya, with their own peculiar views, wassubsequently established among the Mohammedans, you will not find any ofthese views in the writings of our authors; not because these authorspreferred the opinions of the first named sect to those of the latter, but because they chanced first to become acquainted with the theory ofthe Muʿtazila, which they adopted and treated as demonstratedtruth. "[21]

The influence of the Kalam is present in greater or less degree in thephilosophers up to Abraham Ibn Daud and Maimonides. The latter gave thissystem its death blow in his thoroughgoing criticism, [22] andthenceforth Aristotelianism was in possession of the field until thattoo was attacked by Hasdai Crescas. 

Another sect of the Mohammedans which had considerable influence on someof the Jewish philosophical and ethical writers are the ascetics and theSufis who are related to them. The latter developed their mode of lifeand their doctrines under the influence of the Christian monks, and arelikewise indebted to Indian and Persian ideas. [23] In their mode oflife they belong to the class of ascetics and preach abstinence, indifference to human praise and blame, love of God and absolute trustin him even to the extent of refraining from all effort in one's ownbehalf, and in extreme cases going so far as to court danger. Intheoretical teaching they adopted the emanatistic doctrine of theNeo-Platonic School. This has been called dynamic Pantheism. It isPantheism because in its last analysis it identifies God with theuniverse. At the same time it does not bring God directly in contactwith the world, but only indirectly through the powers or δυνάμεις, hence _dynamic_ Pantheism. These powers emanate successively from thehighest one, forming a chain of intermediate powers mediating betweenGod and the world of matter, the links of the chain growing dimmer andless pure as they are further removed from their origin, while thelatter loses nothing in the process. This latter condition saves theNeo-Platonic conception from being a pure system of emanation like someIndian doctrines. In the latter the first cause actually gives awaysomething of itself and loses thereby from its fulness. The process inboth systems is explained by use of analogies, those of the radiation oflight from a luminous body, and of the overflowing of a fountain beingthe most common. 

The chief exponent of the ethics of the Sufis in mediæval Jewishliterature is Bahya Ibn Pakuda. In his ethical work "The Duties of theHearts, " he lays the same stress on intention and inwardness inreligious life and practice as against outward performance with thelimbs on the one hand and dry scholasticism on the other, as do theSufis. In matters of detail too he is very much indebted to this Arabsect from whose writings he quotes abundantly with as well as withoutacknowledgment of his sources except in a general way as the wise men. To be sure, he does not follow them slavishly and rejects the extremesof asceticism and unworldly cynicism which a great many of the Sufispreached and practiced. He is also not in sympathy with their mysticism. He adopts their teachings only where he can support them with analogousviews as expressed in the Rabbinical writings, which indeed played animportant rôle in Mohammedan ascetic literature, being the source ofmany of the sayings found in the latter. [24]

The systems of thought which had the greatest influence upon Jewish aswell as Mohammedan theology, were the great systems of Plato(especially as developed in Neo-Platonism) and Aristotle. These twophilosophies not merely affected the thinking of Jew and Mohammedan butreally transformed it from religious and ethical discussions intometaphysical systems. In the Bible and similarly in the Koran we have apurely personal view of God and the world. God is a person, he createsthe world--out of nothing to be sure--but nevertheless he is thought ofdoing it in the manner in which a person does such things with a willand a purpose in time and place. He puts a soul into man andcommunicates to him laws and prohibitions. Man must obey these lawsbecause they are the will of God and are good, and he will be rewardedand punished according to his attitude in obedience and disobedience. The character of the entire point of view is personal, human, teleological, ethical. There is no attempt made at an impersonal andobjective analysis of the common aspects of all existing things, theelements underlying all nature. Nor is there any conscious effort at acritical classification of the various kinds of things existing innature beyond the ordinary and evident classification found inGenesis--heaven and earth; in heaven, sun, moon and stars; on earth, grass, fruit trees, insects, water animals, birds, quadrupeds, man. Thenlight and darkness, the seasons of the year, dry land and water. 

In Greek philosophy for the first time we find speculations concerningthe common element or elements out of which the world is made--thematerial cause as Aristotle later called it. The Sophists and Socratesgave the first impulse to a logical analysis of what is involved indescription or definition. The concept as denoting the essence of athing is the important contribution Socrates made to knowledge. Platoobjectified the concept, or rather he posited an object as the basis ofthe concept, and raised it out of this world of shadows to anintelligible world of realities on which the world of particularsdepends. But it was Aristotle who made a thoroughgoing analysis of thingas well as thought, and he was the master of knowledge through themiddle ages alike for Jew, Christian and Mohammedan. 

First of all he classified all objects of our experience and found thatthey can be grouped in ten classes or categories as he called them. Think of any thing you please and you will find that it is either anobject in the strict sense, _i. E. _, some thing that existsindependently of anything else, and is the recipient of qualities, asfor example a man, a mountain, a chair. Or it is a quantity, like four, or cubit; or a quality, like good, black, straight; or a relation likelong, double, master, slave; and so on throughout the ten categories. This classification applies to words and thoughts as well as to things. As an analysis of the first two it led him to more importantinvestigations of speech and thinking and arguing, and resulted in hissystem of logic, which is the most momentous discovery of a single mindrecorded in history. As applied to things it was followed by a morefundamental analysis of all real objects in our world into the twoelements of matter and form. He argued as follows: nothing in thematerial world is permanent as an individual thing. It changes its statefrom moment to moment and finally ceases to be the thing it was. Anacorn passes a number of stages before it is ripe, and when it is placedin the ground it again changes its form continually and then comes outas an oak. In artificial products man in a measure imitates nature. Hetakes a block of marble and makes a statue out of it. He forms a loginto a bed. So an ignorant man becomes civilized and learned. All theseexamples illustrate change. What then is change? Is there any similarityin all the cases cited? Can we express the process of change in aformula which will apply to all instances of change? If so, we shallhave gained an insight into a process of nature which is all-embracingand universal in our experience. Yes, we can, says Aristotle. Change isa play of two elements in the changing thing. When a thing affected withone quality changes into a thing with the opposite quality, there mustbe the thing itself without either of the opposite qualities, which ischanging. Thus when a white fence becomes black, the fence itself orthat which undergoes the change is something neither white nor black. Itis the uncolored matter which first had the form of white and now lostthat and took on the form of black. This is typical of all change. Thereis in all change ultimately an unchanging substratum always the same, which takes on one quality after another, or as Aristotle would say, one_form_ after another. This substratum is _matter_, which in its purityis not affected with any quality or form, of which it is the seat andresidence. The forms on the other hand come and go. Form does not changeany more than matter. The changing thing is the composite of matter andform, and change means separation of the actual components of whichone, the form, disappears and makes room for its opposite. In a givencase, say, when a statue is made out of a block of marble, the matter isthe marble which lost its original form and assumed the form of astatue. In this case the marble, if you take away both the previous formand the present, will still have some form if it is still marble, formarble must have certain qualities if it is to be marble. In that casethen the matter underlying the change in question is not pure matter, itis already endowed with some primitive form and is composite. But marbleis ultimately reducible to the four elements, fire, air, water, earth, which are simpler; and theoretically, though not in practice, we canthink away all form, and we have left only that which takes forms but isitself not any form. This is matter. 

Here the reader will ask, what kind of thing is it that has no formwhatsoever, is it not nothing at all? How can anything exist withoutbeing a particular kind of thing, and the moment it is that it is nolonger pure matter. Aristotle's answer is that it is true that purematter is never found as an objective existence. Point to any realobject and it is composed of matter and form. And yet it is not truethat matter is a pure figment of the imagination; it has an existence ofits own, a potential existence. And this leads us to another importantconception in the Aristotelian philosophy. 

Potentiality and actuality are correlative terms corresponding to matterand form. Matter is the potential, form is the actual. Whateverpotentialities an object has it owes to its matter. Its actual essenceis due to its form. A thing free from matter would be all that it is atonce. It would not be liable to change of any kind, whether progress orretrogression. All the objects of our experience in the sublunar worldare not of this kind. They realize themselves gradually, and are neverat any given moment all that they are capable of becoming. This is dueto their matter. On the other hand, pure matter is _actually_ nothing. It is just capacity for being anything, and the moment it is anything itis affected with form. 

It is clear from this account that matter and form are the bases ofsublunar life and existence. No change, no motion without matter andform. For motion is presupposed in all kinds of change. If then allprocesses of life and death and change of all kinds presuppose matterand form, the latter cannot themselves be liable to genesis and decayand change, for that would mean that matter is composed of matter andform, which is absurd. We thus see how Aristotle is led to believe inthe eternity of matter and motion, in other words, the eternity of theworld processes as we know them. 

Motion is the realization of the potential _qua_ potential. This is anAristotelian definition and applies not merely to motion in the strictsense, _i. E. _, movement in place, or motion of translation, butembraces all kinds of change. Take as an example the warming of the airin a cold room. The process of heating the room is a kind of motion; theair passes from a state of being cold to a state of being warm. In itsoriginal state as cold it is potentially warm, _i. E. _, it is actuallynot warm, but has the capacity of becoming warm. At the end of theprocess it is actually warm. Hence the process itself is theactualization of the potential. That which is potential cannot makeitself actual, for to make itself actual it must be actual, which iscontrary to the hypothesis of its being potential. Potentiality andactuality are contradictory states and cannot exist side by side in thesame thing at the same time in the same relation. There must thereforebe an external agent, itself actual, to actualize a potential. Thus, inthe above illustration, a cold room cannot make itself warm. There mustbe some agency itself actually warm to cause the air in the room to passfrom cold to warm. This is true also of motion in place, that a thingcannot move itself and must be moved by something else. But thatsomething else if itself in motion must again be moved by somethingelse. This process would lead us to infinity. In order that a giventhing shall be in motion, it would be necessary for an infinite numberof things to be in motion. This is impossible, because there cannot bean infinite number of things all here and now. It is a contradiction interms. Hence if anything is to move at all, there must be at the end ofthe finite chain a link which while causing the next link to move, isitself unmoved. Hence the motion existing in the world must be dueultimately to the existence of an unmoved mover. If this being causesmotion without being itself in motion it does not act upon the bodies itmoves as one body acts upon another, for a body can move another bodyonly by being itself in motion. The manner in which the unmoved movermoves the world is rather to be conceived on the analogy of a lovedobject moving the loving object without itself being moved. The personin love strives to approach and unite with the object of his lovewithout the latter necessarily being moved in turn. This is the way inwhich Aristotle conceives of the cause of the world's motion. There isno room here for the creation of the world. Matter is eternal, motion iseternal, and there is an eternal mind for the love of which all motionshave been going on, eternally. 

The unmoved mover, or God, is thus not body, for no body can moveanother body without being itself in motion at the same time. Besides, all body is finite, _i. E. _, it has a finite magnitude. A body ofinfinite magnitude is an impossibility, as the very essence of body isthat it must be bounded by surfaces. A finite body cannot have aninfinite power, as Aristotle proves, though we need not at present gointo the details of his proof. But a being which causes eternal motionin the world must have an infinite power to do this. Hence another proofthat God is not corporeal. 

If God is not subject to motion, he is not subject to change of anykind, for change involves motion. As matter is at the basis of allchange God is without matter, hence he is pure form, _i. E. _, pureactuality without the least potentiality. This means that he is what heis wholly all the time; he has no capacities of being what he is at anytime not. But if he is not corporeal, the nature of his actuality oractivity must be Thought, pure thinking. And the content of his thoughtcannot vary from topic to topic, for this would be change, which isforeign to him. He must be eternally thinking the same thought; and thehighest thought it must be. But the highest thought is himself; henceGod is pure thought thinking himself, thought thinking thought. 

The universe is in the shape of a sphere with the earth stationary inthe centre and the heavens revolving around it exactly as appears to us. The element earth is the heaviest, hence its place is below or, which isthe same thing, in the centre. This is its natural place; and itsnatural motion when away from the centre is in a straight line towardthe centre. Water is the next heaviest element and its natural place isjust above earth; hence the water in the world occupies a positionspherical in shape round about the earth, _i. E. _, it forms a hollowsphere concentric with the earth. Next comes the hollow sphere of airconcentric with the other two. Its natural motion when away from itsplace in the direction of the earth is in a straight line toward thecircumference of the world, not however going beyond the sphere of thelightest element of all, namely, fire. This has its natural placeoutside of the other elements, also in the form of a hollow sphereconcentric with the other three. Its natural motion is in a straightline away from the centre of the world and in the direction of thecircumference. Our earth, water, air and fire are not really theelements in their purity. Each one has in it also mixtures of the otherthree elements, the one which gives it the name predominating. 

All minerals, plants and animals are formed from these four elements byvarious combinations, all together forming the sublunar world, or theworld of generation and decay. No individual thing in this world ispermanent. All are subject to change and to ultimate destruction, thoughthe destruction of one thing is the genesis of another. There is noannihilation. 

The causes of the various combinations of the elements and thegeneration and destruction of mineral, plant and animal resultingtherefrom, are the motions of the heavenly bodies. These are made of apurer substance than that of the four elements, the ether. This isproven by the fact that the heavenly bodies are not subject to change ordestruction. They are all permanent and the only change visible in themis change of place. But even their motions are different from those ofthe four elements. The latter are in a straight line toward the centreor away from it, whereas the heavenly bodies move in a circle eternallyaround the centre. This is another proof that they are not composed ofthe same material as sublunar bodies. 

The heavens consist of transparent spheres, and the stars as well as theplanets are set in them and remain fixed. The motions of the heavenlybodies are due to the revolutions of the spheres in which they are set. These spheres are hollow and concentric. The outermost sphere formingthe outer limit of the universe (the world is finite according toAristotle) is studded with the fixed stars and moves from east to west, making a complete revolution in twenty-four hours. This motion istransmitted to the other spheres which carry the planets. Since, however, we notice in the sun, moon and the other planetary bodiesmotions in the contrary direction in addition to that from east to west, there must be other spheres having the motions apparent to us in thepositions of the planets borne by them. Thus a given body like the sunor moon is set in more than one sphere, each of which has its own propermotion, and the star's apparent motion is the resultant of the severalmotions of its spheres. Without entering into further details concerningthese motions, it will be sufficient for us to know that Aristotlecounted in all fifty-five spheres. First came the sphere of the fixedstars, then in order the spheres of Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Mercury, Venus, Sun, Moon. 

God himself sets the outer sphere in motion, or rather is the eternalcause of its motion, as the object of its desire; and in the same wayeach of the other motions has also its proper mover, likewise a pureform or spirit, which moves its sphere in the same incorporeal andunmoved manner as God. 

Thus we have in the supra-lunar world pure forms without matter in Godand the spirits of the spheres, whereas in the sublunar world matter andform are inseparable. Neither is found separately without the other. 

In man's soul, however, or rather in his intellect we find a form whichcombines in itself the peculiarities of sublunar as well as celestialforms. When in contact with the human body it partakes of the nature ofother sublunar forms exhibiting its activity through matter and beinginseparable from it. But it is not destroyed with the death of the body. It continues as a separate form after death. 

The soul, Aristotle defines as the first entelechy of the body. The termentelechy which sounds outlandish to us may be replaced by the wordrealization or actualization and is very close in meaning to theAristotelian use of the word form. The soul then, according toAristotle, is the realization or actualization or form of the body. Thebody takes the place of matter in the human composite. It has thecomposition and the structure which give it the capacity for performingthe functions of a human being, as in any other composite, say an axe, the steel is the matter which has the potentiality or capacity of beingmade into a cutting instrument. Its cutting function is the form of theaxe--we might almost say the soul of the axe, if it were not for thecircumstance that it cannot do its own cutting; it must be wielded bysomeone else. 

So far then the human soul forms an inseparable unit with the body whichit informs. As we do not think of the cutting function of an axeexisting apart from the axe, so neither can we conceive of sensation, emotion or memory as existing without a body. In so far as the soul isthis it is a material form like the rest, and ceases with thedissolution of the body. But the soul is more than this. It is also athinking faculty. As such it is not in its essence dependent upon thebody or any corporeal organ. It comes from without, having existedbefore the body, and it will continue to exist after the body is nomore. That it is different from the sensitive soul is proven by the factthat the latter is inherent in the physical organ through which it acts, being the form of the body, as we have seen. And hence when an unusuallyviolent stimulus, say a very bright light or a very loud sound, impingesupon the sense organ, the faculty of sight or hearing is injured to suchan extent that it cannot thereafter perceive an ordinary sight or sound. But in the rational faculty this is not the case. The more intense thethought occupying the thinking soul, the more capable it becomes ofthinking lesser thoughts. To be sure, the reason seems to weaken in oldage, but this is due to the weakening of the body with which the soul isconnected during life; the soul itself is just as active as ever. 

We must, however, distinguish between two aspects of the rational soul, to one of which alone the above statements apply. Thought differs fromsensation in that the latter perceives the particular form of theindividual thing, whereas the former apprehends the essential nature ofthe object, that which constitutes it a member of a certain class. Thesense of sight perceives a given individual man; thought or reasonunderstands what it is to be a member of the human species. Reasontherefore deals with pure form. In man we observe the reason graduallydeveloping from a potential to an actual state. The objects of the sensewith the help of the faculties of sensation, memory and imagination actupon the potential intellect of the child, which without them wouldforever remain a mere capacity without ever being realized. This aspectof the reason then in man, namely, the passive aspect which receivesideas, grows and dies with the body. But there is another aspect of thereason, the active reason which has nothing to do with the body, thoughit is in some manner resident in it during the life of the latter. Thisit is which enables the passive intellect to become realized. For theexternal objects as such are insufficient to endow the rational capacityof the individual with actual ideas, any more than a surface can endowthe sense of sight with the sensation of color when there is no light. It is the active intellect which develops the human capacity forthinking and makes it active thought. This alone, the active intellect, is the immortal part of man. 

This very imperfect sketch of Aristotle's mode of approach to theever-living problems of God, the universe and man shows us the widediversity of his method from that with which the Jews of Biblical andRabbinic tradition were identified. Greek philosophy must have seemed arevelation to them, and we do not wonder that they became suchenthusiastic followers of the Stagirite, feeling as they must have donethat his method as well as his results were calculated to enrich theirintellectual and spiritual life. Hence the current belief of an originalJewish philosophy borrowed or stolen by the Greeks, and still betrayingits traces in the Bible and Talmud was more than welcome to theenlightened spirits of the time. And they worked this unhistoricalbelief to its breaking point in their Biblical exegesis. 

Aristotle, however, was not their only master, though they did not knowit. Plotinus in Aristotelian disguise contributed not a little to theirconception of God and his relation to the universe. The so-called"Theology of Aristotle"[25] is a Plotinian work, and its Pantheisticpoint of view is in reality foreign to Aristotle's dualism. But themiddle ages were not aware of the origin of this treatise, and so theyattributed it to the Stagirite philosopher and proceeded to harmonize itwith the rest of his system as they knew it. 

Aristotle's system may be called theistic and dualistic; Plotinus's ispantheistic and monistic. In Aristotle matter is not created by orderived from God, who is external to the universe. Plotinus deriveseverything from God, who through his powers or activities pervades all. The different gradations of being are static in Aristotle, dynamic inPlotinus. Plotinus assumes an absolute cause, which he calls the One andthe Good. This is the highest and is at the top of the scale ofexistence. It is superior to Being as well as to Thought, for the latterimply a duality whereas unity is prior to and above all plurality. Hencewe can know nothing as to the nature of the Highest. We can know only_that_ He is, not _what_ he is. From this highest Being proceeds by aphysical necessity, as light from a luminous body or water from anoverflowing spring, a second _hypostasis_ or substance, the _nous_ orReason. This is a duality, constituting Being and Knowledge. ThusThought and Being hold a second place in the universe. In a similar wayfrom Reason proceeds the third hypostasis or the _World-Soul_. Thisstands midway between the intelligible world, of which it is the last, and the phenomenal world, of which it is the first. The Soul has a dualaspect, the one spiritual and pertaining to the intelligible world, theother, called _Nature_, residing in the lower world. This is thematerial world of change and decay. Matter is responsible for all changeand evil, and yet matter, too, is a product of the powers above it, andis ultimately a derivative of the Absolute Cause, though indirectly. Matter is two-fold, intelligible and sensible. The matter of the lowerworld is the non-existent and the cause of evil. Matter in a moregeneral sense is the indeterminate, the indefinite and the potential. Matter of this nature is found also in the intelligible world. TheReason as the second hypostasis, being an activity, passes frompotentiality to actuality, its indeterminateness being made determinateby the One or the Good. This potentiality and indeterminateness ismatter, but it is not to be confused with the other matter of thephenomenal world. 

Man partakes of the intelligible, as well as of the sensible world. Hisbody is material, and in so far forth partakes of the evil of matter. But his soul is derived from the universal soul, and if it conductsitself properly in this world, whither it came from without, and holdsitself aloof from bodily contamination, it will return to theintelligible world where is its home. 

We see here a number of ideas foreign to Aristotle, which are foundfirst in Philo the Jew and appear later in mediæval philosophy. Thus Godas a Being absolutely unknowable, of whom negations alone are true justbecause he is the acme of perfection and bears no analogy to theimperfect things of our world; matter in our world as the origin ofevil, and the existence of matter in the intelligible world--all theseideas will meet us again in Ibn Gabirol, in Ibn Daud, in Maimonides, some in one, some in the other. 

Alike in respect to Aristotle as in reference to Plotinus, the Jewishphilosophers found their models in Islamic writers. The "Theology ofAristotle" which, as we have seen, is really Plotinian rather thanAristotelian, was translated into Arabic in the ninth century andexerted its influence on the _Brethren of Purity_, a Mohammedan secretorder of the tenth century. These men composed an encyclopædia offifty-one treatises in which is combined Aristotelian logic and physicswith Neo-Platonic metaphysics and theology. In turn such Jewish writersas Ibn Gabirol, Bahya, Ibn Zaddik, Judah Halevi, Moses and Abraham IbnEzra, were much indebted to the Brethren of Purity. This represents theNeo-Platonic influence in Jewish philosophy. The Arab Aristotelians, AlKindi, Al Farabi, Avicenna and Averroes, while in the main disciples ofthe Stagirite, were none the less unable to steer clear of Neo-Platoniccoloring of their master's doctrine, and they were the teachers of theJewish Aristotelians, Abraham Ibn Daud, Moses ben Maimon, Levi benGerson. 

One other phase must be mentioned to complete the parallelism of Islamicand Jewish philosophy, and that is the anti-philosophic attitude adoptedby Judah Halevi and Hasdai Crescas. It was not a dogmatic and unreasonedopposition based simply upon the un-Jewish source of the doctrines inquestion and their incompatibility with Jewish belief and tradition, such as exhibited itself in the controversies that raged around the"Guide" of Maimonides. Here we have rather a fighting of thephilosophers with their own weapons. Especially do we find this to bethe case in Crescas who opposes Aristotle on philosophic grounds. InJudah Halevi similarly, though with less rigor and little technicaldiscussion, we have nevertheless a man trained in philosophicliterature, who found the philosophic attitude unsympathetic andunsatisfying because cold and impersonal, failing to do justice to thewarm yearning after God of the religious soul. He could not abide thephilosophic exclusion from their natural theology of all that was racialand national and historic in religion, which was to him its very heartand innermost essence. 

In this attitude, too, we find an Arab prototype in the person of AlGazali, who similarly attacked the philosophers on their own ground andfound his consolation in the asceticism and mysticism of the Sufis. 

We have now spoken in a general way of the principal motives of mediævalJewish philosophy, of the chief sources, philosophical and dogmatic, andhave classified the Jewish thinkers accordingly as Mutakallimun, Neo-Platonists and Aristotelians. We also sketched briefly the schoolsof philosophy which influenced the Jewish writers and determined theirpoint of view as Kalamistic, Neo-Platonic or Aristotelian. There stillremains as the concluding part of the introductory chapter, and beforewe take up the detailed exposition of the individual philosophers, togive a brief and compendious characterization of the content of mediævalJewish philosophy. We shall start with the theory of knowledge. 

We have already referred to the attitude generally adopted by themediæval Jewish thinkers on the relation between religion andphilosophy. With the exception of Judah Halevi and Hasdai Crescas thecommonly accepted view was that philosophy and religion were at bottomidentical in content, though their methods were different; philosophytaught by means of rational demonstration, religion by dogmaticassertion based upon divine revelation. So far as the actualphilosophical views of an Aristotle were concerned, they might beerroneous in some of their details, as was indeed the case in respect tothe origin of the world and the question of Providence. But apart fromhis errors he was an important guide, and philosophy generally is anindispensable adjunct to religious belief because it makes the latterintelligent. It explains the why's and the wherefore's of religioustraditions and dogmas. Into detailed discussions concerning the originof our knowledge they did not as a rule go. These strictly scientificquestions did not concern, except in a very general way, the main objectof their philosophizing, which was to gain true knowledge of God and hisattributes and his relation to man. Accordingly we find for the mostpart a simple classification of the sources of knowledge or truth asconsisting of the senses and the reason. The latter contains some truthswhich may be called innate or immediate, such as require no experiencefor their recognition, like the logical laws of thought, and truthswhich are the result of inference from a fact of sensation or animmediate truth of the mind. To these human sources was added traditionor the testimony of the revealed word of God in the written and orallaw. 

When Aristotle began to be studied in his larger treatises and thedetails of the psychology and the metaphysics became known especiallythrough Averroes, we find among the Jews also an interest in the finerpoints of the problem of knowledge. The motives of Plato's idealism andAristotle's conceptualism (if this inexact description may be allowedfor want of a more precise term) are discussed with fulness and detailby Levi ben Gerson. He realizes the difficulty involved in the problem. Knowledge must be of the real and the permanent. But the particular isnot permanent, and the universal, which is permanent, is not real. Henceeither there is no knowledge or there is a reality corresponding to theuniversal concept. This latter was the view adopted by Plato. Gersonidesfinds the reality in the thoughts of the Active Intellect, agreeing inthis with the views of Philo and Augustine, substituting only the ActiveIntellect for their Logos. Maimonides does not discuss the question, butit is clear from a casual statement that like Aristotle he does notbelieve in the independent reality of the universal (Guide III, 18). 

In theoretical physics the Arabian Mutakallimun, we have seen (p. Xxii), laid great stress on the theory of atom and accident as opposed to theconcepts of matter and form by which Aristotle was led to believe in theeternity of the world. Accordingly every Mutakallim laid down hisphysical theory and based on it his proof of creation. This method wasfollowed also by the early Jewish thinkers. The Karaites beforeMaimonides adopted the atomic theory without question. And Aaron benElijah, who had Maimonides's "Guide" before him, was neverthelesssufficiently loyal to his Karaite predecessors to discuss their viewsside by side with those of the Aristotelians and to defend them againstthe strictures of Maimonides. Saadia, the first Rabbanite philosopher, discusses no less than thirteen erroneous views concerning the originand nature of the world, but he does not lay down any principles oftheoretical physics explicitly. He does not seem to favor the atomictheory, but he devotes no special treatment to the subject, and in hisarguments for creation as opposed to eternity he makes use of theKalamistic concepts of substance and accident and composition anddivision. The same is true of Bahya Ibn Pakuda. Joseph Ibn Zaddik isthe first who finds it necessary to give an independent treatment of thesciences before proceeding to construct his religious philosophy, and inso doing he expounds the concepts of matter and form, substance andaccident, genesis and destruction, the four elements and their naturesand so on--all these Aristotelian concepts. Ibn Daud follows in the pathof Ibn Zaddik and discusses the relevant concepts of potentiality andactuality and the nature of motion and infinity, upon which his proof isbased of the existence of God. Maimonides clears the ground first by athorough criticism and refutation of the Kalamistic physics, but he doesnot think it necessary to expound the Aristotelian views which headopts. He refers the reader to the original sources in the Physics andMetaphysics of Aristotle, and contents himself with giving a list ofprinciples which he regards as established. Aristotle is now the masterof all those who know. And he reigns supreme for over a century untilthe appearance of the "Or Adonai" of Hasdai Crescas, who ventured todeny some of the propositions upon which Maimonides based his proof ofthe existence of God--such, for example, as the impossibility of aninfinite magnitude, the non-existence of an infinite fulness or vacuumoutside of the limits of our world, the finiteness of our world and itsunity, and so on. 

These discussions of the fundamental principles of physics were appliedultimately to prove the existence of God. But there was a difference inthe manner of the application. During the earlier period before the"Emunah Ramah" of Abraham Ibn Daud was written, the method employed wasthat of the Arabian Mutakallimun. That is, the principles of physicswere used to prove the creation of the world in time, and from creationinference was made to the existence of a Creator, since nothing cancreate itself. The creation itself in time as opposed to eternity wasproved from the fact of the composite character of the world. Composition, it was said, implies the prior existence of the constituentelements, and the elements cannot be eternal, for an infinite past timeis unthinkable. This method is common to Saadia, Bahya, Joseph IbnZaddik, and others. 

With the appearance of Ibn Daud's masterpiece, which exhibits a moredirect familiarity with the fundamental ideas of Aristotle, the methodchanged. The existence of God is proved directly from physics withoutthe mediation of the doctrine of creation. Motion proves a mover, and toavoid an infinite regress we must posit an unmoved mover, that is, afirst mover who is not himself moved at the same time. An unmoved movercannot be corporeal, hence he is the spiritual being whom we call God. Ibn Daud does not make use of creation to prove the existence of God, but neither does he posit eternal motion as Aristotle does. And theresult is that he has no valid proof that this unmoved mover is a purespirit not in any way related to body. This defect was made good byMaimonides. Let us frankly adopt tentatively, he says, the Aristotelianidea of the eternity of the world, _i. E. _, the eternity of matter andmotion. We can then prove the existence of an unmoved mover who is purespirit, for none but a pure spirit can have an infinite force such as ismanifested in the eternal motion of the world. Creation cannot bedemonstrated with scientific rigor, hence it is not safe to build soimportant a structure as the existence of God upon an insecurefoundation. Show that eternity of the world leads to God, and you aresafe no matter what the ultimate truth turns out to be concerning theorigin of the world. For if the world originated in time there is nodoubt that God made it. 

Thus Maimonides accepted provisionally the eternity of matter andmotion, but provisionally only. No sooner did he prove his point, thanhe takes up the question of the world's origin and argues that whilestrict demonstration there is as yet none either for or againstcreation, the better reasons are on the side of creation. 

Gersonides, on the other hand, was a truer Aristotelian than Maimonidesand he decided in favor of the eternity of matter, though not of thisour world. 

The Jewish Mutakallimun, as we have seen, proved the existence of Godfrom the fact that a created world implies a creator. The next step wasto show that there is only one God, and that this one God is simple andnot composite, and that he is incorporeal. The unity in the sense ofuniqueness was shown by pointing out that dualism or pluralism isincompatible with omnipotence and perfection--attributes the possessionof which by God was not considered to require proof. Maimonides, indeed, pointed out, in his opposition to the Mutakallimun, that if there is aplurality of worlds, a plurality of Gods would not necessarily be inconflict with the omnipotence and perfection of each God in his ownsphere (Guide I, 75), and he inferred the unity of God from hisspirituality. 

The simplicity of God was proved by arguing that if he is composite, hisparts are prior to him, and he is neither the first, nor is he eternal, and hence not God; and the incorporeality followed from his simplicity, for all body is composite. Maimonides proved with one stroke God'sexistence, unity and incorporeality. For his argument from motion leadshim to conceive of the first mover as a "separate" form or intellect. This clearly denotes incorporeality, for body is composed of matter andform. But it also denotes unity, for the immaterial is not subject tonumerical distinction unless the one be the cause and the other theeffect. But in that case the cause alone is God. 

Next in importance to the proof of God's existence, unity andincorporeality, is the doctrine of attributes. We have seen (p. Xxiii)how much emphasis the Arabian Mutakallimun placed upon the problem ofattributes. It was important to Jew, Christian and Mohammedan alike fora number of reasons. The crude anthropomorphism of many expressions inthe Bible as well as the Koran offended the more sophisticated thinkersever since Alexandrian days. Hence it was necessary to deal with thisquestion, and the unanimous view was that the Biblical expressions inquestion are to be understood as figures of speech. The more difficultproblem was how any predicates at all can be applied to God withoutendangering his unity. If God is the possessor of many qualities, eventhough they be purely spiritual, such as justice, wisdom, power, he iscomposite and not simple. The Christian theologians found indeed in thisproblem of attributes a philosophical support for the doctrine of theTrinity. Since God cannot be devoid of power, reason and life, he istrinitarian, though he is one. The difficulty was of course that themoment you admit distinctions within the Godhead, there is no reason forstopping at three. And the Jewish critics were not slow to recognizethis weakness in the system of their opponents. At the same time theyfound it necessary to take up a positive attitude toward the question ofattributes so as to harmonize the latter with God's absolute unity. Andthe essence of the solution of the problem was to explain away theattributes. Saadia says that the ascription of life, power andknowledge to God does not involve plurality in his essence. Thedistinction of three attributes is due to our limited mind andinadequate powers of expression. In reality the essence of which wepredicate these attributes is one and simple. This solution did not seemthoroughgoing enough to Saadia's successors, and every one of the Jewishphilosophers tried his hand at the problem. All agreed that theattributes cannot apply to God in the same signification as they havewhen we use them in our own experience. The meaning of the termattribute was investigated and the attributes were divided into classes, until finally in the system of Maimonides this question too received itsclassical solution. God is conceived as absolutely transcendent andunknowable. No positive predicate can apply to him so as to indicate hisessence. We can say only what he is not, we cannot say what he is. Thereis not the faintest resemblance between him and his creatures. And yethe is the cause of the world and of all its happenings. Positiveattributes signify only that God is the cause of the experiences denotedby the attributes in question. When we say God is just we mean that heis not unjust, and that he is the cause of all justice in the world. Hence Maimonides says there are no essential attributes, meaningattributes expressive of God's essence, and the only predicates havingapplication are negative and such as designate effects of God's causalactivity in the world. Gersonides was opposed to Maimonides's radicalagnosticism in respect of the nature of God, and defended a more humanview. If God is pure thought, he is of the nature of our thought, thoughof course infinitely greater and perfect, but to deny any relationwhatsoever between God's thought and ours, as Maimonides does, isabsurd. 

From God we pass to man. And the important part of man is his soul. Itis proved that man has a soul, that the soul is not material orcorporeal, that it is a substantial entity and not a mere quality oraccident of the body. Both Plato and Aristotle are laid undercontribution in the various classifications of the soul that are foundin Saadia, in Joseph Ibn Zaddik, in Judah Halevi, in Abraham Ibn Daud, in Maimonides. The commonest is the three-fold division into vegetative, animal and rational. We also find the Platonic division into appetitive, spirited and rational. Further psychological details and descriptions ofthe senses, external and internal, the latter embracing the commonsense, memory, imagination and judgment, are ultimately based uponAristotle and are found in Judah Halevi, Abraham Ibn Daud andMaimonides, who derived them from Avicenna and Alfarabi. In theNeo-Platonic writers, such as Isaac Israeli, Solomon Ibn Gabirol, JosephIbn Zaddik, Moses Ibn Ezra, Pseudo-Bahya, Abraham Bar Hiyya, and so on, we also find reference to the World Soul and its emanation fromIntelligence. In the conception of the human soul the Jewishphilosophers vary from the Platonic view, related to the Biblical, thatthe soul is a distinct entity coming into the body from a spiritualworld, and acting in the body by using the latter as its instrument, tothe Aristotelian view that at least so far as the lower faculties ofsense, memory and imagination are concerned, the soul is the form of thebody, and disappears with the death of the latter. The human unit, according to this opinion, is body-and-mind, and the human activitiesare psycho-physical and not purely psychical as they are according toPlato. Some writers occupying intermediate positions combine unwittinglythe Platonic and Aristotelian views, or rather they use Aristotelianexpressions and interpret them Platonically (Saadia, Joseph Ibn Zaddik, Hillel ben Samuel). 

As the influence of the Arab Aristotelians, Alfarabi, Avicenna andespecially Averroes, began to make itself felt, the discussions aboutthe Active Intellect and its relation to the higher Intelligences on theone hand and to the human intellect on the other found their way alsoamong the Jews and had their effect on the conception of prophecy. Aristotle's distinction of an active and a passive intellect in man, andhis ideas about the spheral spirits as pure Intelligences endowing theheavenly spheres with their motions, were combined by the ArabianAristotelians with the Neo-Platonic theory of emanation. The result wasthat they adopted as Aristotelian the view that from God emanated insuccession ten Intelligences and their spheres. Thus the first emanationwas the first Intelligence. From this emanated the sphere of the fixedstars moved by it and the second Intelligence. From this emanated inturn the sphere of Saturn and the third Intelligence, and so on throughthe seven planets to the moon. From the Intelligence of the lunar sphereemanated the Active Intellect and the sublunar spheres of the fourelements. These Intelligences were identified with the angels ofScripture. With some modifications this theory was adopted by theJewish Aristotelians, Abraham Ibn Daud, Maimonides, Levi ben Gerson. 

The Active Intellect was thus placed among the universal Intelligenceswhose function it is to control the motions of the sublunar world, andin particular to develop the human faculty of reason which is in theinfant a mere capacity--a material intellect. Sensation and experiencealone are not sufficient to develop the theoretical reason in man, forthey present concrete, individual material objects, whereas the reasonis concerned with universal truth. The conversion of sense experienceinto immaterial concepts is accomplished through the aid of the ActiveIntellect. And at the end of the process a new intellect is produced inman, the Acquired Intellect. This alone is the immortal part of man andtheoretical study creates it. Averroes believed that this AcquiredIntellect exists separately in every individual so long only as theindividual is alive. As soon as the individual man dies, his acquiredintellect loses its individuality (there being no material body toindividuate it) and there is only one acquired intellect for the entirehuman species, which in turn is absorbed into the Active Intellect. There is thus no individual immortality. Maimonides, it would seem, though he does not discuss the question in his "Guide, " shared the sameview. Gersonides devotes an entire book of his "Milhamot Adonai" to thisproblem, but he defends individuation of the acquired intellect as suchand thus saves personal immortality. 

The practical part of philosophy, ethics, the Mutakallimun among theArabians discussed in connection with the justice of God. In oppositionto the Jabariya and the Ashariya who advocated a fatalistic determinismdenying man's ability to determine his own actions, some going so far asto say that right and wrong, good and evil, are entirely relative toGod's will, the Muʿtazila insisted that man is free, that good and evilare absolute and that God is just because justice is inherently right, injustice inherently wrong. Hence reward and punishment would be unjustif man had not the freedom to will and to act. The Karaites Joseph AlBasir and Jeshua ben Judah discuss the problem of the nature of good andevil and vindicate their absolute character. God desires the goodbecause it is good, and it is not true that a thing is good because Godhas commanded it. Freedom of man is a corollary of the goodness of God. The Rabbanites take it for granted that good is good inherently, andGod desires and commands it because it is identical with his wisdom andhis will. Freedom of man does follow as a corollary from the justice ofGod and it is also taught in the Bible and the Talmud. The very fact ofthe existence of a divine law and commandments shows that man hasfreedom. And those passages in Scripture which seem to suggest that Godsometimes interferes with man's freedom are explained away byinterpretations _ad hoc_. Our own consciousness of power to determineour acts also is a strong argument in favor of freedom. Nevertheless thesubject is felt to have its difficulties and the arguments against freewill taken from the causal sequences of natural events and the influenceof heredity, environment and motive on the individual will are notignored. Judah Halevi as well as Abraham Ibn Daud discuss thesearguments in detail. But freedom comes out triumphant. It is even soughtto reconcile the antinomy of freedom vs. God's foreknowledge. God knowsbeforehand from all eternity how a given man will act at a given moment, but his knowledge is merely a mirror of man's actual decision and notthe determining cause thereof. This is Judah Halevi's view. Abraham IbnDaud with better insight realizes that the contingent, which has nocause, and the free act, which is undetermined, are as suchunpredictable. He therefore sacrifices God's knowledge of the contingentand the free so as to save man's freedom. It is no defect, he argues, not to be able to predict what is in the nature of the caseunpredictable. Maimonides cannot admit any ignorance in God, and takesrefuge in the transcendent character of God's knowledge. What isunpredictable for us is not necessarily so for God. As he is the causeof everything, he must know everything. Gersonides who, as we have seen, is unwilling to admit Maimonides's agnosticism and transcendentalism, solves the problem in the same way as Ibn Daud. God knows events in sofar as they are determined, he does not know them in so far as they arecontingent. There is still another possibility and that is that Godknows in advance every man's acts because no act is absolutely free. Andthere is an advocate of this opinion also. Hasdai Crescas frankly adoptsthe determinist position on the basis of God's knowledge, which cannotbe denied, as well as of reason and experience, which recognizes thedetermining character of temperament and motive. But reward andpunishment are natural and necessary consequences, and are no moreunjust than is the burning of the finger when put into the fire. 

In respect to the details of ethical doctrine and the classification ofthe virtues, we find at first the Platonic virtues and their relation tothe parts of the soul, in Saadia, Pseudo-Bahya, Joseph Ibn Zaddik andeven Abraham Ibn Daud. In combination with this Platonic basisexpression is given also to the Aristotelian doctrine of the mean. Maimonides, as in other things, so here also, adopts the Aristotelianviews almost in their entirety, both in the definition of virtue, in thedivision of practical and intellectual virtues, and the list of thevirtues and vices in connection with the doctrine of the mean. As is tobe expected, the ultimate sanction of ethics is theistic and Biblical, and the ceremonial laws also are brought into relation with ethicalmotives. In this rationalization of the ceremonial prescriptions ofScripture Maimonides, as in other things, surpasses all his predecessorsin his boldness, scientific method and completeness. He goes so far asto suggest that the institution of sacrifice has no inherent value, butwas in the nature of a concession to the crude notions of the peoplewho, in agreement with their environment, imagined that God's favor isobtained by the slaughter of animals. 

Among the peculiar phenomena of religion, and in particular of Judaism, the one that occupies a fundamental position is the revelation of God'swill to man and his announcement of the future through propheticvisions. Dreams and divination had already been investigated byAristotle and explained psychologically. The Arabs made use of thissuggestion and endeavored to bring the phenomenon of prophecy under thesame head. The Jewish philosophers, with the exception of Judah Haleviand Hasdai Crescas, followed suit. The suggestion that prophecy is apsychological phenomenon related to true dreams is found as early asIsaac Israeli. Judah Halevi mentions it with protest. Abraham Ibn Daudadopts it, and Maimonides gives it its final form in Jewishrationalistic philosophy. Levi ben Gerson discusses the finer details ofthe process, origin and nature of prophetic visions. In short thegenerally accepted view is that the Active Intellect is the chief agentin communicating true visions of future events to those worthy of thegift. And to become worthy a combination of innate and acquired powersis necessary together with the grace of God. The faculties chieflyconcerned are reason and imagination. Moral excellence is also anindispensable prerequisite in aiding the development of the theoreticalpowers. 

Proceeding to the more dogmatic elements of Judaism, Maimonides was thefirst to reduce the 613 commandments of Rabbinic Judaism to thirteenarticles of faith. Hasdai Crescas criticised Maimonides's principle ofselection as well as the list of dogmas, which he reduced to six. AndJoseph Albo went still further and laid down three fundamental dogmasfrom which the rest are derived. They are the existence of God, revelation of the Torah and future reward and punishment. 

The law of Moses is unanimously accepted as divinely revealed. And inopposition to the claims of Christianity and Mohammedanism an endeavoris made to prove by reason as well as the explicit statement ofScripture that a divine law once given is not subject to repeal. Thelaws are divided into two classes, _rational_ and _traditional_; theformer comprising those that the reason approves on purely rational andethical grounds, while the latter consist of such ceremonial laws aswithout specific commandment would not be dictated by man's own reason. And in many of these commandments no reason is assigned. Nevertheless anendeavor is made to rationalize these also. Bahya introduced anotherdistinction, viz. , the "duties of the heart, " as he calls them, incontradistinction to the "duties of the limbs. " He lays stress onintention and motive as distinguished from the mere external observanceof a duty or commandment. 

Finally, some consideration is given in the works of the majority of thewriters to eschatological matters, such as the destiny of the soul afterdeath, the nature of future reward and punishment, the resurrection ofthe body and the Messianic period, and its relation to the other world. This brief sketch will suffice as an introduction to the detailedtreatment of the individual philosophers in the following chapters. 

A HISTORY OF MEDIÆVAL JEWISH PHILOSOPHY

MEDIÆVAL JEWISH PHILOSOPHY

CHAPTER I

ISAAC ISRAELI

We know next to nothing about the condition of the Jews in MohammedanEgypt in the ninth and tenth centuries. But the fact that the two firstJewish writers who busied themselves with philosophical problems camefrom Egypt would indicate that the general level of intellectual cultureamong the Jews at that time was not so low as the absence of literarymonuments would lead us to believe. Every one knows of Saadia, the firstHebrew grammarian, the first Hebrew lexicographer, the first Bibletranslator and exegete, the first Jewish philosopher of mediæval Jewry. He was born in Egypt and from there was called to the Gaonate of Sura inBabylonia. But not so well known is his earlier contemporary, Isaac benSolomon Israeli, who also was born in Egypt and from there went later toKairuan, where he was court physician to several of the Fatimide Califs. The dates of his birth and death are not known with certainty, but he issaid to have lived to the age of one hundred years, and to have survivedthe third Fatimide Calif Al-Mansur, who died in 953. Accordingly we mayassume the years of his birth and death as 855 and 955 respectively. 

His fame rests on his work in theory and practice as a physician; and assuch he is mentioned by the Arab annalists and historians ofmedicine. [26] To the Christian scholastics of mediæval Europe he isknown as the Jewish physician and philosopher next in importance toMaimonides. [27] This is due to the accident of his works having beentranslated into Latin by Constantinus Afer, [28] and thus made accessibleto men like Albertus Magnus, Vincent of Beauvais, Thomas Aquinas andothers. For his intrinsic merits as a philosopher, and particularly as aJewish philosopher, do not by any means entitle him to be coupled withMaimonides. The latter, indeed, in a letter which he wrote to SamuelIbn Tibbon, the translator of the "Guide of the Perplexed, " expresseshimself in terms little flattering concerning Israeli's worth as aphilosopher. [29] He is a mere physician, Maimonides says, and histreatises on the _Elements_, and on _Definitions_ consist of windyimaginings and empty talk. We need not be quite as severe in ourjudgment, but the fact remains that Israeli is little more than acompiler and, what is more to the purpose, he takes no attitude in hisphilosophical writings to Judaism as a theological doctrine or to theBible as its source. The main problem, therefore, of Jewish philosophyis not touched upon in Israeli's works, and no wonder Maimonides had nouse for them. For the purely scientific questions treated by Israelicould in Maimonides's day be studied to much better advantage in theworks of the great Arabian Aristotelians, Al Farabi and Avicenna, compared to whom Israeli was mediocre. We are not to judge him, however, from Maimonides's point of view. In his own day and generation he wassurpassed by none as a physician; and Saadia alone far outstrips him asa Jewish writer, and perhaps also David Al Mukammas, of whom we shallspeak later. Whatever may be said of the intrinsic value of the contentof his philosophical work, none can take away from him the merit ofhaving been the first Jew, so far as we know, to devote himself tophilosophical and scientific discussions, though not with the avowed aimof serving Judaism. The rest was bound to come later as a result of theimpulse first given by him. 

The two works of Israeli which come in consideration for our purpose arethose mentioned by Maimonides in his letter to Samuel Ibn Tibbon spokenof above, namely, the "Book of the Elements, "[30] and the "Book ofDefinitions. "[31] Like all scientific and philosophic works by Jewsbetween the ninth and thirteenth centuries with few exceptions, thesewere written in Arabic. Unfortunately, with the exception of a fragmentrecently discovered of the "Book of Definitions, " the originals arelost, and we owe our knowledge of their contents to Hebrew and Latintranslations, which are extant and have been published. [32] We see fromthese that Israeli was a compiler from various sources, and that he hada special predilection for Galen and Hippocrates, with whose writings heshows great familiarity. He makes use besides of Aristotelian notions, and is influenced by the Neo-Platonic treatise, known as the "Liber deCausis, " and derived from a work of Proclus. It is for this reasondifficult to characterize his standpoint, but we shall not go far wrongif we call him a Neo-Platonist, for reasons which will appear in thesequel. 

It would be useless for us here to reproduce the contents of Israeli'stwo treatises, which would be more appropriate for a history of mediævalscience. A brief _résumé_ will show the correctness of this view. In his"Book of the Elements" Israeli is primarily concerned with a definitephysical problem, the definition of an element, and the number andcharacter of the elements out of which the sublunar world is made. Hebegins with an Aristotelian definition of element, analyzes it into itsparts and comes to the conclusion that the elements are the fourwell-known ones, fire, air, water, earth. Incidentally he seizesopportunities now and then, sometimes by force, to discuss points inlogic, physics, physiology and psychology. Thus the composition of thehuman body, the various modes in which a thing may come into being, thatthe yellow and black galls and the phlegm are resident in the blood, thepurpose of phlebotomy, the substantial character of prime form, that thesoul is not an accident, the two kinds of blood in the body, the variouskinds of "accident, " the nature of a "property" and the manner in whichit is caused--all these topics are discussed in the course of proof thatthe four elements are fire, air, water, earth, and not seed or thequalities of heat, cold, dryness and moisture. He then quotes thedefinitions of Galen and Hippocrates and insists that though the wordingis different the meaning is the same as that of Aristotle, and hencethey all agree about the identity of the elements. Here again he takesoccasion to combat the atomic theory of the _Muʿtazila_ and Democritus, and proves that a line is not composed of points. In the last part ofthe treatise he refutes contrary opinions concerning the number andidentity of the elements, such as that there is only one element whichis movable or immovable, finite or infinite, namely, the power of God, or species, or fire, or air, or water, or earth; or that the number istwo, matter and God; or three, matter, form and motion; or six, viz. , the four which he himself adopts, and composition and separation; or thenumber ten, which is the end and completion of number. In the course ofthis discussion he takes occasion to define pain and pleasure, thenature of species, the difference between element and principle. Andthus the book draws to a close. Not very promising material this, itwould seem, for the ideas of which we are in search. 

The other book, that dealing with definitions of things, is morepromising. For while there too we do not find any connected account ofGod, of the world and of man, Israeli's general attitude can be gatheredfrom the manner in which he explains some important concepts. The book, as its title indicates, consists of a series of definitions ordescriptions of certain terms and ideas made use of by philosophers intheir construction of their scheme of the world--such ideas and terms asIntelligence, science, philosophy, soul, sphere, spirit, nature, and soon. From these we may glean some information of the school to whichIsraeli belongs. And in the "Book of the Elements, " too, some of theepisodic discussions are of value for our purpose. 

Philosophy, Israeli tells us, is self-knowledge and keeping far fromevil. When a man knows himself truly--his spiritual as well as hiscorporeal aspects--he knows everything. For in man are combined thecorporeal and the spiritual. Spiritual is the soul and the reason, corporeal is the body with its three dimensions. In his qualities andattributes--"accidents" in the terminology of Israeli--we similarly findthe spiritual as well as the corporeal. Humility, wisdom and othersimilar qualities borne by the soul are spiritual; complexion, stature, and so on are corporeal. Seeing that man thus forms an epitome, as itwere, of the universe (for spiritual and corporeal substance andaccident exhausts the classes of existence in the world), a knowledge ofself means a knowledge of everything, and a man who knows all this isworthy of being called a philosopher. 

But philosophy is more than knowledge; it involves also action. Theformula which reveals the nature and aim of philosophy is to become likeunto God as far as is possible for man. This means to imitate theactivities of God in knowing the realities of things and doing what thetruth requires. To know the realities of things one must study scienceso as to know the various causes and purposes existing in the world. Themost important of these is the purpose of the union in man of body andsoul. This is in order that man may know reality and truth, anddistinguish between good and evil, so as to do what is true and just andupright, to sanctify and praise the Creator and to keep from impuredeeds of the animal nature. A man who does this will receive rewardfrom the Creator, which consists in cleaving to the upper soul, inreceiving light from the light of knowledge, and the beauty of splendorand wisdom. When a man reaches this degree, he becomes spiritual bycleaving to the created light which comes directly from God, andpraising the Creator. This is his paradise and his reward andperfection. Hence Plato said that philosophy is the strengthening andthe help of death. He meant by this that philosophy helps to deaden allanimal desires and pleasures. For by being thus delivered from them, aman will reach excellence and the higher splendor, and will enter thehouse of truth. But if he indulges his animal pleasures and desires andthey become strengthened, he will become subject to agencies which willlead him astray from the duties he owes to God, from fear of him andfrom prayer at the prescribed time. 

We look in vain in Israeli's two treatises for a discussion of theexistence and nature of God. Concerning creation he tells us that whenGod wanted to show his wisdom and bring everything from potentiality toactuality, he created the world out of nothing, not after a model (thisin opposition to Plato and Philo), nor for the purpose of deriving anybenefit from it or to obviate harm, but solely on account of hisgoodness. 

But how did the creation proceed? A fragment from the treatise ofIsraeli entitled "The Book of Spirit and Soul"[33] will give us insummary fashion an idea of the manner in which Israeli conceived of theorder and connection of things in the world. 

In the name of the ancients he gives the following account. God createda splendor. This having come to a standstill and real permanence, aspark of light proceeded from it, from which arose the power of therational soul. This is less bright than the splendor of the Intelligenceand is affected with shadow and darkness by reason of its greaterdistance from its origin, and the intervening Intelligence. The rationalsoul again becoming permanent and fixed, there issued from it likewise aspark, giving rise to the animal soul. This latter is endowed with acogitative and imaginative faculty, but is not permanent in itsexistence, because of the two intervening natures between it and thepure light of God. From the animal soul there likewise issued asplendor, which produced the vegetative soul. This soul, being so farremoved from the original light, and separated from it by theIntelligence and the other two souls, has its splendor dimmed and madecoarse, and is endowed only with the motions of growth and nourishment, but is not capable of change of place. From the vegetative soul proceedsagain a splendor, from which is made the sphere (the heaven). Thisbecomes thickened and materialized so that it is accessible to thesight. Motion being the nature of the sphere, one part of it pushes theother, and from this motion results fire. From fire proceeds air; fromair, water; from water, earth. And from these elements arise minerals, plants and animals. 

Here we recognize the Neo-Platonic scheme of emanation as we saw it inPlotinus, a gradual and successive emanation of the lower from thehigher in the manner of a ray of light radiating from a luminous body, the successive radiations diminishing in brightness and spiritualityuntil when we reach the Sphere the process of obscuration has gone sofar as to make the product material and visible to the physical sense. The Intelligence and the three Souls proceeding from it in order areclearly not individual but cosmic, just as in Plotinus. The relationbetween these cosmic hypostases, to use a Neo-Platonic term, and therational and psychic faculties in man Israeli nowhere explains, but wemust no doubt conceive of the latter as somehow contained in the formerand temporarily individualized, returning again to their source afterthe dissolution of the body. 

Let us follow Israeli further in his account of the nature of thesesubstances. The Intelligence is that which proceeds immediately from thedivine light without any immediate agency. It represents the permanentideas and principles--species in Israeli's terminology--which are notsubject to change or dissolution. The Intelligence contains them all inherself eternally and immediately, and requires no searching orreflection to reach them. When the Intelligence wishes to know anythingshe returns into herself and finds it there without requiring thought orreflection. We can illustrate this, he continues, in the case of askilful artisan who, when he wishes to make anything, retires intohimself and finds it there. There is a difference, however, in the twocases, because Intelligence always knows its ideas without thought orreflection, for it exists always and its ideas are not subject to changeor addition or diminution; whereas in the smith a difficulty may arise, and then his soul is divided and he requires searching and thinking anddiscrimination before he can realize what he desires. 

What has been said so far applies very well to the cosmic Intelligence, the νοῦς of the Neo-Platonists. It represents thought as embracing thehighest and most fundamental principles of existence, upon which allmediate and discursive and inferential thinking depends. Its contentcorresponds to the Ideas of Plato. But the further account of theIntelligence must at least in a part of it refer to the individual humanfaculty of that name, though Israeli gives us no indication where theone stops and where the other begins. 

He appeals to the authority of Aristotle for his division ofIntelligence into three kinds. First, the Intelligence which is alwaysactual. This is what has just been described. Second, the Intelligencewhich is in the soul potentially before it becomes actual, like theknowledge of the child which is at first potential, and when the childgrows up and learns and acquires knowledge, becomes actual. Third, thatwhich is described as the second Intelligence. It represents that stateof the soul in which it receives things from the senses. The sensesimpress the forms of objects upon the imagination (φαντασία) which is inthe front part of the head. The imagination, or phantasy, takes them tothe rational soul. When the latter knows them, she becomes identicalwith them spiritually and not corporeally. 

We have seen above the Aristotelian distinction between the activeintellect and the passive. The account just given is evidently basedupon it, though it modifies Aristotle's analysis, or rather it enlargesupon it. The first and second divisions in Israeli's account correspondto Aristotle's active and passive intellects respectively. The thirdclass in Israeli represents the process of realization of the potentialor passive intellect through the sense stimuli on the one hand and theinfluence of the active intellect on the other. Aristotle seems to haveleft this intermediate state between the potential and the eternallyactual unnamed. We shall see, however, in our further study of this verydifficult and complicated subject how the classification of the variousintellects becomes more and more involved from Aristotle throughAlexander and Themistius down to Averroes and Levi ben Gerson. It issufficient for us to see here how Israeli combines Aristotelianpsychology, as later Aristotelian logic and physics, with Neo-Platonicmetaphysics and the theistic doctrine of creation. But more of thishereafter. 

From the Intelligence, as we have seen, proceeds the rational soul. Inhis discussion of the general nature of the three-fold soul (rational, animal and vegetative) Israeli makes the unhistoric but thoroughlymediæval attempt to reconcile Aristotle's definition of the soul, whichwe discussed above (p. Xxxv), with that of Plato. The two conceptionsare in reality diametrically opposed. Plato's is an anthropologicaldualism, Aristotle's, a monism. For Plato the soul is in its origin notof this world and not in essential unity with the body, which itcontrols as a sailor his boat. Aristotle conceives of the relationbetween soul and body as one of form and matter; and there is no unionmore perfect than that of these two constituent elements of all naturalsubstances. Decomposition is impossible. A given form may disappear, butanother form immediately takes its place. The combination of matter andform is the essential condition of sublunar existence, hence there canbe no question of the soul entering or leaving the body, or of itsactivity apart from the body. 

But Israeli does not seem to have grasped Aristotle's meaning, andascribes to him the notion that the soul is a separate substanceperfecting the natural body, which has life potentially, meaning by thisthat bodies have life potentially before the soul apprehends them; andwhen the soul does apprehend them, it makes them perfect and livingactually. To be sure, he adds in the immediate sequel that he does notmean temporal before and after, for things are always just as they werecreated; and that his mode of expression is due to the impossibility ofconveying spiritual ideas in corporeal terms in any other way. Thismerely signifies that the human body and its soul come into beingsimultaneously. But he still regards them as distinct substances formingonly a passing combination. And with this pretended Aristotelian notionhe seeks to harmonize that of Plato, which he understands to mean notthat the soul enters the body, being clothed with it as with a garment, and then leaves it, but that the soul apprehends bodies by clothing themwith its light and splendor, and thus makes them living and moving, asthe sun clothes the world with its light and illuminates it so thatsight can perceive it. The difference is that the light of the sun iscorporeal, and sight perceives it in the air by which it is borne;whereas the light of the soul is spiritual, and intelligence alone canperceive it, not the physical sense. 

Among the conceptual terms in the Aristotelian logic few play a moreimportant part than those of substance and accident. Substance is thatwhich does not reside in anything else but is its own subject. It is anindependent existence and is the subject of accidents. The latter haveno existence independent of the substance in which they inhere. Thus ofthe ten categories, in which Aristotle embraces all existing things, thefirst includes all substances, as for example, man, city, stone. Theother nine come under the genus accident. Quantity, quality, relation, time, place, position, possession, action, passion--all these representattributes which must have a substantial being to reside in. There is nolength or breadth, or color, or before or after, or here or there, andso on except in a real object or thing. This then is the meaning ofaccident as a logical or ontological term, and in this signification ithas nothing to do with the idea of chance. Clearly substance representsthe higher category, and accident is inferior, because dependent andvariable. Thus it becomes important to know in reference to any objectof investigation what is its status in this respect, whether it issubstance or accident. 

The nature of the soul has been a puzzle to thinkers and philosophersfrom time immemorial. Some thought it was a material substance, someregarded it as spiritual. It was identified with the essence of numberby the Pythagoreans. And there have not been wanting those who, arguingfrom its dependence upon body, said it was an accident and not asubstance. Strange to say the Mutakallimun, defenders of religion andfaith, held to this very opinion. But it is really no stranger than themaintenance of the soul's materiality equally defended by otherreligionists, like Tertullian for example, and the opposition toMaimonides's spiritualism on the part of Abraham ben David ofPosquières. The Mutakallimun were led to their idea by the atomictheory, which they found it politic to adopt as more amenable totheological treatment than Aristotle's Matter and Form. It followed thenaccording to some of them that the fundamental unit was the materialatom which is without quality, and any power or activity in any atom orgroup of atoms is a direct creation of God, which must be re-createdevery moment in order to exist. This is the nature of accident, and itmakes more manifest the ever present activity of God in the world. Thusthe "substantial" or "accidental" character of the soul is one that istouched on by most Jewish writers on the subject. And Israeli alsorefers to the matter incidentally in the "Book of the Elements. "[34]Like the other Jewish philosophers he defends its substantiality. 

The fact of its separability from the body, he says, is no proof of itsbeing an accident. For it is not the separability of an accident fromits substance that makes it an accident, but its destruction, whenseparated. Thus when a white substance turns green, the white color isnot merely separated from its substance but ceases to exist. The soul isnot destroyed when it leaves the body. 

Another argument to prove the soul a substance is this. If the soul werean accident it should be possible for it to pass from the animal body tosomething else, as blackness is found in the Ethiopian's skin, in ebonywood and in pitch. But the soul exists only in living beings. 

We find, besides, that the activity of the soul extends far beyond thebody, and acts upon distant things without being destroyed. Hence itfollows that the soul itself, the agent of the activity, keeps onexisting without the body, and is a substance. 

Having made clear the conception of soul generally and its relation tothe body, he next proceeds to treat of the three kinds of soul. Thehighest of these is the rational soul, which is in the horizon of theIntelligence and arises from its shadow. It is in virtue of this soulthat man is a rational being, discriminating, receptive of wisdom, distinguishing between good and evil, between things desirable andundesirable, approaching the meritorious and departing from wrong. Forthis he receives reward and punishment, because he knows what he isdoing and that retribution follows upon his conduct. 

Next to the rational soul is the animal soul, which arises from theshadow of the former. Being far removed from the light of Intelligence, the animal soul is dark and obscure. She has no knowledge ordiscrimination, but only a dim notion of truth, and judges by appearanceonly and not according to reality. Of its properties are senseperception, motion and change in place. For this reason the animals arefierce and violent, endeavoring to rule, but without clear knowledge anddiscrimination, like the lion who wants to rule over the other beasts, without having a clear consciousness of what he is doing. A proof thatthe animals have only dim notions of things is that a thirsty ass comingto the river will fly from his own shadow in the water, though he needsthe latter for preserving his life, whereas he will not hesitate toapproach a lion, who will devour him. Therefore the animals receive noreward or punishment (this in opposition to the Mutakallimun) becausethey do not know what to do so as to be rewarded, or what to avoid, inorder not to be punished. 

The vegetative soul proceeds from the shadow of the animal soul. She isstill further removed from the light of Intelligence, and still moreweighed down with shadow. She has no sense perception or motion. She isnext to earth and is characterized by the powers of reproduction, growth, nutrition, and the production of buds and flowers, odors andtastes. 

Next to the soul comes the Sphere (the heaven), which arises in thehorizon and shadow of the vegetative soul. The Sphere is superior tocorporeal substances, being itself not body, but the matter of body. Unlike the material elements, which suffer change and diminution throughthe things which arise out of them as well as through the return of thebodies of plants and animals back to them as their elements, thespiritual substances (and also the sphere) do not suffer any increase ordiminution through the production of things out of them. For plants andanimals are produced from the elements through a celestial power whichGod placed in nature effecting generation and decay in order that thisworld of genesis and dissolution should exist. But the splendor of thehigher substances, viz. , the three souls, suffers no change on accountof the things coming from them because that which is produced by themissues from the _shadow_ of their splendor and not from the essence ofthe splendor itself. And it is clear that the splendor of a thing in itsessence is brighter than the splendor of its shadow, viz. , that whichcomes from it. Hence the splendor of the vegetative soul is undoubtedlybrighter than that of the sphere, which comes from its shadow. Thelatter becomes rigid and assumes a covering, thickness and corporealityso that it can be perceived by sight. But no other of the senses canperceive it because, although corporeal, it is near to the highersubstances in form and nobility, and is moved by a perfect and completemotion, motion in a circle, which is more perfect than other motions andnot subject to influence and change. Hence there is no increase ordiminution in it, no beginning or end, and this on account of thesimplicity, spirituality and permanence of that which moves it. TheIntelligence pours of her splendor upon it, and of the light of herknowledge, and the sphere becomes intelligent and rational, and knows, without investigation or reflection, the lordship of its Creator, andthat he should be praised and glorified without intermission. For thisreason the Creator assigned to the Sphere a high degree from which itcannot be removed, and gave it charge of the production of time and thefour seasons of the year, and the month and the day and the hour, andmade it ruler of the production of perishable things in this world ofgeneration and dissolution, so that the upper souls may find bodies toapprehend, to clothe with their light, and to make visible in them theiractivities according to the determination of God. 

The Sphere by its motion produces the four elements, fire, air, water, earth; and the combinations of these in various proportions give rise tothe minerals, plants and animals of this world, the highest of whom isman. 

That the elements are those mentioned above and nothing else is provedby the definition of element and its distinction from "principle. " Aprinciple is something which, while being the cause of change, and evenpossibly at the basis of change, is not itself subject to change. ThusGod is undoubtedly the cause of everything that happens in the world. Hemay therefore be called a principle of the world, but he does not enterwith his essence the changing things. Hence it is absurd to speak of Godas an element of the sublunar world. Matter, i. E. , primary formlessmatter, does enter all changing things and is at the basis of allchange; but it does not itself change. Hence matter also is a principlebut not an element. An element is something which is itself a compositeof matter and form, and changes its form to become something else inwhich, however, it is contained potentially, not actually. The productultimately goes back to the element or elements from which it was made. When we follow this resolution of a given composite into its elementsback as far as we can until we reach a first which is no longerproduced out of anything in the same way as things were produced fromit, we have the element. Such is the nature of fire, air, water, earth. All things are made from them in the manner above indicated. But thereis nothing prior to them which changes its form to become fire, continues to reside potentially in fire and returns to its originalstate by the resolution of fire. The same applies to the other three. 

The matter is now clear. The elements stand at the head of physicalchange and take part in it. Prior to the elements are indeed matter andform, but as logical principles, not as physical and independententities. Hence it would seem, according to Israeli, that matter andform are side-tracked in the gradual evolution of the lower from thehigher. For the elements, he tells us, come from the motion of theSphere, the Sphere from the shadow of the Soul, the Soul from the shadowof the Intelligence, the Intelligence is created by God. To be sure hetells us that the Sphere is not body, but the matter of body. Yet theSphere cannot take the place of prime matter surely, for it isundoubtedly endowed with form, nay is rational and intelligent, as wehave seen. 

When Israeli says that prior to the four elements there is nothing butthe Omnipotence of God, he means that the sublunar process of change andbecoming stops with the elements as its upper limit. What is above theelements belongs to the intelligible world; and the manner of theirproduction one from the other is a spiritual one, emanation. The Spherestands on the border line between the corporeal and the intelligible, itself a product of emanation, though producing the elements by itsmotion--a process apparently neither like emanation nor like sublunarbecoming and change. 

Creation in Israeli seems to be the same as emanation, for on the onehand he tells us that souls are created, that nothing precedes the fourelements except the Omnipotence of God, and on the other that theelements come from the motion of the Sphere, and the souls issue fromthe shadow of the Intelligence. For matter and form there seems to be noroom at all except as logical principles. This is evidently due to thefact that Israeli is unwittingly combining Aristotelian physics withNeo-Platonic emanationism. For Aristotle matter and form stand at thehead of sublunar change and are ultimate. There is no derivation ofmatter or form from anything. The celestial world has a matter of itsown, and is not the cause of the being of this one except as influencingits changes. God is the mover of the Spheres, but not their Creator, hence he stands outside of the world. This is Theism. In Israeli thereis a continuity of God, the intelligible world and the corporeal, allbeing ultimately the same thing, though the processes in the two worldsare different. And yet he obviates Pantheism by declaring that God is aprinciple not an element. 

We said before that Israeli takes no avowed attitude to Jewish dogma orthe Bible. He never quotes any Jewish works, and there is nothing in hiswritings to indicate that he is a Jew and is making an effort toharmonize Judaism with philosophy and science. In words he refers tocreation _ex nihilo_, which is not necessarily Jewish, it might be justas well Mohammedan or Christian. But in reality, as we have seen, hisideas of the cosmic process are far enough removed from the orthodoxdoctrine of creation as it appears in Bible and Talmud. 

Incidentally we learn also something of Israeli's ideas of God'srelation to mankind, of his commandments, and of prophecy. God createdthe world, he tells us, because of his goodness. He wanted to benefithis creatures. This could not be without their knowing the will of Godand performing it. The will of God could not be revealed directly toeverybody because the divine wisdom can speak only to those in whom therational soul is mistress and is enlightened by the Intelligence. Butpeople are not all of this kind; for some have the animal soulpredominating in them, being on that account ignorant, confused, forward, bold, murderous, vengeful, unchaste like animals; others aremastered by the vegetative soul, i. E. , the appetitive, and are thusstupid and dull, and given over to their appetites like plants. Inothers again their souls are variously combined, giving to their lifeand conduct a composite character. On this account it was necessary forGod to select a person in whom the rational soul is separated, andillumined by the Intelligence--a man who is spiritual in his nature andeager to imitate the angels as far as it is possible for a man to dothis. This man he made a messenger to mankind. He gave him his bookwhich contains two kinds of teaching. One kind is spiritual in itsnature, and needs no further commentary or interpretation. This ismeant for the intellectual and discriminating. The other kind iscorporeal, and requires spiritual interpretation. This is intended forthe various grades of those who cannot understand directly the spiritualmeaning, but who can grasp the corporeal teaching, by which they aregradually trained and prepared for the reception of higher truths. Thesepeople therefore need instructors and guides because a book alone is notsufficient for the purposes of those who cannot understand. 

Dreams and prophecy are closely related, hence an explanation of theformer will also throw light on the latter. A dream is caused by theinfluence of the Intelligence on the soul in sleep. The Intelligencereceives its knowledge directly from God, and serves as a mediatorbetween him and the soul, like a prophet who mediates between God andhis creatures. In communicating to the soul the spiritual forms which itreceived from God, the Intelligence translates them into formsintermediate between corporeality and spirituality in order that theymay be quickly impressed upon the common sense, which is the first toreceive them. The common sense stands midway between the corporeal senseof sight and the imagination, which is in the anterior chamber of thebrain, and is known as phantasy (Aristotelian φαντασία). 

That the forms thus impressed on the common sense in sleep areintermediate between corporeal and spiritual is proved by the fact thatthey are different from the corporeal forms of things seen in the wakingstate. The latter are obscure and covered up, whereas those seen insleep are finer, more spiritual and brighter. Proof of this is that aperson sees himself in sleep endowed with wings and flying betweenheaven and earth. He sees the heavens opening and someone speaking tohim out of the heaven, and so on. There would be no sense in all this ifthese phenomena had no spiritual meaning, for they are contrary tonature. But we know that they have real significance if interpreted by areally thoughtful person. The prophets also in wishing to separatethemselves from mankind and impress the latter with their qualities, showed them spiritual forms of similar kind, which were preternatural. Hence all who believe in prophecy admit that dreams are a part ofprophecy. 

Now these intermediate forms which are impressed upon the common sensein sleep are turned over by it to the phantasy and by the latter to thememory. When the person awakes, he recovers the forms from the memoryjust as they were deposited there by the phantasy. He then consults histhinking power; and if this is spiritual and pure, the Intelligenceendows him with its light and splendor and reveals to him the spiritualforms signified by the visions seen in sleep. He is then able tointerpret the dream correctly. But if his powers of thought are not sogood and are obscured by coverings, he cannot properly remove the huskfrom the kernel in the forms seen in sleep, is not able to penetrate tothe true spirituality beneath, and his interpretation is erroneous. 

This explanation does not really explain, but it is noteworthy as thefirst Jewish attempt to reduce prophecy to a psychological phenomenon, which was carried further by subsequent writers until it received itsdefinitive form for the middle ages in Maimonides and Levi ben Gerson. 

To sum up, Israeli is an eclectic. There is no system of Jewishphilosophy to be found in his writings. He had no such ambitions. Hecombines Aristotelian logic, physics and psychology with Neo-Platonicmetaphysics, and puts on the surface a veneer of theistic creationism. His merit is chiefly that of a pioneer in directing the attention ofJews to the science and philosophy of the Greeks, albeit in Arab dress. There is no trace yet of the Kalam in his writings except in hisallusions to the atomic theory and the denial of reward and punishmentof animals. 

CHAPTER II

DAVID BEN MERWAN AL MUKAMMAS

Nothing was known of Al Mukammas until recently when fragments of hisphilosophical work were found in Judah ben Barzilai's commentary on theSefer Yezirah. [35] The latter tells us that David Al Mukammas is said tohave associated with Saadia, who learned a good deal from him, but thematter is not certain. If this account be true we have a second Jewishphilosopher who preceded Saadia. His chief work is known by the title of"Twenty Chapters, " fifteen of which were discovered in the originalArabic in 1898 by Abraham Harkavy of St. Petersburg. [36] Unfortunatelythey have not yet been published, and hence our account will have to beincomplete, based as it is on the Hebrew fragments in the Yezirahcommentary above mentioned. 

These fragments are sufficient to show us that unlike Israeli, who showslittle knowledge of the Muʿtazilite discussions, Al Mukammas is a realMuʿtazilite and moves in the path laid out by these Mohammedanrationalists. Whether this difference is due to their places ofresidence (Israeli having lived in Egypt and Kairuan, while Al Mukammaswas in Babylon), or to their personal predilections for Neo-Platonismand the Kalam respectively, is not certain. Saadia knows the Kalam; butthough coming originally from Egypt, he spent his most fruitful years inBabylonia, in the city of Sura, where he was gaon. The centres ofArabian rationalism were, as we know, the cities of Bagdad and Basra, nearer to Babylon and Mesopotamia than to Egypt or Kairuan. 

The first quotation in Judah ben Barzilai has reference to science andphilosophy, their definition and classification. Science is theknowledge of the reality of existing things. It is divided into twoparts, theoretical and practical. Theoretical science aims at knowledgefor its own sake; practical seeks an end beyond knowledge, viz. , theproduction of something. We call it then art. Thus geometry is a sciencein so far as one desires to know the nature and relations to each otherof solid, surface, line, point, square, triangle, circle. But if hispurpose is to know how to build a square or circular house, or toconstruct a mill, or dig a well, or measure land, he becomes an artisan. Theoretical science is three-fold. First and foremost stands theology, which investigates the unity of God and his laws and commandments. Thisis the highest and most important of all the sciences. Next comes logicand ethics, which help men in forming opinions and guide them in thepath of understanding. The last is physics, the knowledge of createdthings. 

In the ninth and tenth chapters of his book Al Mukammas discusses thedivine attributes. This was a very important problem in the Muʿtaziliteschools, as we saw in the Introduction, and was treated in Muʿtaziliteworks in the first division, which went by the title of "Bab al Tauhid, "the chapter on the unity. 

God is one--so Al Mukammas sums up the results of his previousdiscussions--not in the sense in which a genus is said to be one, nor inthat in which a species is one, nor as the number one is one, nor as anindividual creature is one, but as a simple unity in which there is nodistinction or composition. He is one and there is no second like him. He is first without beginning, and last without end. He is the cause andground of everything caused and effected. 

The question of God's essence is difficult. Some say it is not permittedto ask what God is. For to answer the question what a thing is is tolimit it, and the limited is the created. Others again say that it ispermitted to make this inquiry, because we can use in our answer theexpressions to which God himself testifies in his revealed book. Andthis would not be limiting or defining his glory because his being isdifferent from any other, and there is nothing that bears anyresemblance to him. Accordingly we should answer the question what Godis, by saying, he is the first and the last, and the visible and thehidden, without beginning or end. He is living, but not through lifeacquired from without. His life is not sustained and prolonged by food. He is wise, but not through acquired wisdom. He hears without ears, seeswithout eyes, is understanding in all his works, and a true judge in allhis judgments. Such would be our answer in accordance with God's owntestimony of himself. 

We must on no account suppose that the expressions living, wise, seeing, hearing, and so on, when applied to God mean the same thing aswhen we ascribe them to ourselves. When we say God is living we do notmean that there was a time when he was not living, or that there will bea time when he will not be living. This is true of us but not of God. His life has no beginning or end. The same thing applies to his wisdom. It is not acquired like ours, it has no beginning or end, and is notsubject to error, forgetfulness, addition or diminution. It is notstrange that his attributes should be so unlike ours, for it is fittingthat the Creator should be different from the thing created, and theMaker from the thing made. 

We must, however, analyze the matter of divine attributes more closely. When we say God is living, we may mean he is living with life as hisattribute, i. E. , that there is an attribute life which makes himliving, or we may deny that there is any such attribute in him as life, but that he is living through himself and not through life as anattribute. To make this subtle distinction clear we will investigatefurther what is involved in the first statement that God is living withlife. It may mean that there was a time when God was not living and thenhe acquired life and became living. This is clearly a wrong and unworthyconception. We must therefore adopt the other alternative, that the lifewhich makes him living is eternal like him, and hence he was alwaysliving from eternity and will continue to be living to eternity. But thematter is not yet settled. The question still remains, Is this lifethrough which he lives identical with his being, or is it distinct fromhis being, or is it a part of it? If we say it is distinct from hisbeing, we are guilty of introducing other eternal beings beside God, which destroys his unity. The Christians are guilty of this very thingwhen they say that God's eternal life is the Holy Ghost, and his eternalWisdom is the Son. If we say that his life is a part of his being, we doinjury to the other aspect of his unity, namely, his simplicity. For tohave parts in one's being implies composition. We are forced thereforeto conclude that God's life is identical with his being. But this isreally tantamount to saying that there is no attribute life which makeshim living, or that he is living not through life. The difference isonly in expression. 

We may make this conception clearer by illustrations from other spheres, inadequate though they be. The soul is the cause of life to the body, i. E. , the body lives through the soul, and when the latter leaves it, the body loses its life and dies. But the soul itself does not livethrough anything else, say through another soul. For if this were thecase this other soul would need again another soul to make it live andthis again another, and so on _ad infinitum_, which is absurd. The soullives through itself. The same thing applies to angels. They livethrough their own being; and that is why souls and angels are called inthe Sacred Scriptures spirits. A spirit is something that is fine andlight and incomposite. Hence their life cannot be due to anythingdistinct from their being, for this would make them composite. 

This statement, however, that souls and angels are living through theirown being must not be understood as meaning that they have no creatorwho gave them being and life. The meaning merely is that the being whichGod gave them is different from the being he gave to bodies. Bodies needa soul to become living, the soul is itself living. So in materialthings, also, the sun shines with its own light and not with lightacquired. The odor of myrrh is fragrant through itself, not throughanything else. The eye sees with its own power, whereas man sees withthe eye. The tongue does not speak with another tongue, man speaks witha tongue, and so on. So we say of God, though in a manner athousand-fold more sublime, that he is living, but not with a life whichis distinct from his being; and so of the other attributes, hearing, seeing, and so on, that we find in the Scriptural praises of him. 

It is necessary to add that as on the one hand we have seen that God'sattributes are identical with his being, so it follows on the other thatthe various attributes, such as wise, seeing, hearing, knowing, and soon, are not different from each other in meaning, though distinct inexpression. Otherwise it would make God composite. The reason we employa number of distinct expressions is in order to remove from God theseveral opposites of the terms used. Thus when we say God is living wemean to indicate that he is not dead. The attribute wise excludes follyand ignorance; hearing and seeing remove deafness and blindness. Thephilosopher Aristotle says that it is truer and more appropriate toapply negative attributes to God than positive. Others have said that wemust not speak of the Creator in positive terms for there is danger ofendowing him with form and resemblance to other things. Speaking of himnegatively we imply the positive without risking offence. 

In the sequel Al Mukammas refutes the views of the dualists, of theChristians and those who maintain that God has form. We cannot afford tolinger over these arguments, interesting though they be, and must hurryon to say a word about the sixteenth chapter, which deals with rewardand punishment. This no doubt forms part of the second Muʿtazilitedivision, namely, the "Bab al ʿAdl, " or section concerning God'sjustice. 

He defines reward as the soul's tranquillity and infinite joy in theworld to come in compensation for the sojourn in this world which sheendured and the self-control she practiced in abstaining from thepleasures of the world. Punishment, on the other hand, is the soul'sdisquietude and sorrow to the end of days as retribution for indulgingin the world's evil pleasures. Both are imposed by God with justice andfairness. It is fitting that the promises of reward and threats ofpunishment consequent upon obedience and disobedience should bespecified in connection with the commandments and prohibitions in theScriptures, because this is the only way to train the soul to practiceself-control. A child who does not fear his teacher's punishment, or hasno confidence in his good will will not be amenable to instruction. Thesame is true of the majority of those who serve kings. It is fear alonewhich induces them to obey the will of their masters. So God incommanding us to do what is worthy and prohibiting what is unworthy sawfit in his wisdom to specify the accompanying rewards and punishmentsthat he who observes may find pleasure and joy in his obedience, and theunobservant may be affected with sorrow and fear. 

As the world to come has no end, so it is proper that the reward of therighteous as well as the punishment of the wicked should be without end. Arguments have been advanced to show that unlike reward which isproperly infinite as is becoming to God's goodness, punishment shouldhave a limit, for God is merciful. On the other hand, it is claimed onthe basis of the finiteness of human action that both reward andpunishment should be finite. But in reality it can be shown in many waysthat reward and punishment should be infinite. Without naming all thearguments--as many as ten have been advanced--in favor of this view, wemay urge some of the more important. 

It was God's own goodness that prompted him to benefit mankind by givingthem laws for their guidance, and not any prior merits on their partwhich gave them a claim on God's protection. God himself is not in anyway benefited by man's obedience or injured by his disobedience. Manknows that it is for his own good that he is thus admonished; and if hewere asked what reward he would like to have for his good deeds he wouldselect no less than infinite happiness. Justice demands that punishmentbe commensurate with reward. The greater the reward and the punishmentthe more effective are the laws likely to be. Besides in violating God'slaw a person virtually denies the eternity of him who gave it, and isguilty of contempt; for he hides himself from men, fearing theirdispleasure, whereas the omnipresence of God has no deterring effectupon him. For such offence infinite punishment is the only fitretribution. 

The question whether the soul alone is rewarded or the body alone orboth has been answered variously. In favor of the soul alone as thesubject of reward and punishment it has been urged that reward raisesman to the grade of angels, who are pure spirits. How then can the bodytake part? And punishment must be of the same nature as reward. On theother hand, it is claimed that the Bible says nothing of man beingraised to the status of angels, and we know in this world of physicalreward and punishment only. The Garden of Eden of which the Bible speaksis not peopled with angels, and that is where the righteous go afterdeath. 

The true solution is that as man is composed of body and soul, and bothshare in his conduct, reward and punishment must attach to both. As wedo not understand the nature of spiritual retribution so the compositeis equally inconceivable to us. But everyone who believes in theresurrection of the dead has no difficulty in holding that the body hasa share in future reward and punishment. 

CHAPTER III

SAADIA BEN JOSEPH AL-FAYYUMI (892-942)

Saadia was the first important Jewish philosopher. Philo of Alexandriadoes not come within our purview as he was not mediæval. Besides hiswork is not systematic, being in the nature of a commentary on HolyWrit. Though Philo was a good and loyal Jew, he stood, so to speak, apart from the real centre of Jewish intellectual and spiritualdevelopment. He was on the one hand too closely dependent on Greekthought and on the other had only a limited knowledge of Jewish thoughtand tradition. The Bible he knew only in the Greek translation, not inthe original Hebrew; and of the Halaka, which was still in the making inPalestine, he knew still less. 

It was different with Saadia. In the tenth century the Mishna and theTalmud had been long completed and formed theoretically as well aspractically the content of the Jew's life and thought. Sura inBabylonia, where Saadia was the head of the academy, was the chiefcentre of Jewish learning, and Saadia was the heir in the main line ofJewish development as it passed through the hands of lawgiver andprophet, scribe and Pharisee, Tanna and Amora, Saburai and Gaon. As thehead of the Sura academy he was the intellectual representative of theJewry and Judaism of his day. His time was a period of agitation andstrife, not only in Judaism but also in Islam, in whose lands the Jewslived and to whose temporal rulers they owed allegiance in the East aswell as in Spain. 

In Islam we saw in the introduction how the various schools of theKadariya, the Muʿtazila and the Ashariya arose in obedience to thedemand of clarifying the chief problems of faith, science and life. InJudaism there was in addition to this more general demand the more localand internal conflict of Karaite and Rabbanite which centred about theproblem of tradition. Saadia found himself in the midst of all this andproved equal to the occasion. 

We are not here concerned with the vicissitudes of Saadia's personallife or of his literary career as opponent of the Karaite sect. Nor canwe afford more than merely to state that Jewish science in the largersense begins with Saadia. Hebrew grammar and lexicography did not existbefore him. The Bible had been translated into several languages beforeSaadia's day, but he was the first to translate it into Arabic, and thefirst to write a commentary on it. But the greatest work of Saadia, thatwhich did the most important service to the theory of Judaism, and bywhich he will be best remembered, is his endeavor to work out a systemof doctrine which should be in harmony with the traditions of Judaism onthe one hand and with the most authoritative scientific and philosophicopinion of the time on the other. Israeli, we have seen, was interestedin science before Saadia. As a physician he was probably more at home inpurely physical discussions than Saadia. But there is no evidence thathe had the larger interest of the Gaon of Sura, namely, to construct asystem of Judaism upon the basis of scientific doctrine. Possibly theexample of Islam was lacking in Israeli's environment, as he does notseem to be acquainted with the theories and discussions of theMutakallimun, and draws his information from Aristotelian andNeo-Platonic sources. Saadia was in the very midst of Arab speculationas is evident from the composition of his _chef d'œuvre_, "Emunotve-Deot, " Beliefs and Opinions. [37]

The work is arranged on the Muʿtazilite model. The two main divisions inworks of this character are _Unity_ and _Justice_. The first begins withsome preliminary considerations on the nature and sources of knowledge. It proceeds then to prove the existence of God by showing that the worldcannot have existed from eternity and must have been created in time. Creation implies a creator. This is followed by arguments showing thatGod is one and incorporeal. The rest is devoted to a discussion of thedivine attributes with the purpose of showing that God's unity andsimplicity are not affected by them. The section on unity closes with arefutation of opposing views, such as those of the dualists orTrinitarians or infidels. The section on Justice centres about thedoctrine of free will. Hence psychology and ethics are treated in thispart of the work. To this may be added problems of a more dogmaticnature, eschatological and otherwise. We shall see in the sequel thatSaadia's masterpiece is modeled on the same plan. 

But not merely the plan and arrangement of his work give evidence of theinfluence upon Saadia of Islamic schools, many of his arguments, thosefor example on the existence of God and the creation of the world, aretaken directly from them. Maimonides, who was a strong opponent of theMutakallimun, gives an outline of their fundamental principles and theirarguments for the existence, unity and incorporeality of God. [38] Someof these are identical with those of Saadia. Saadia, however, is notinterested in pure metaphysics as such. His purpose is decidedlyapologetic in the defence of Judaism and Jewish dogma. Hence we look invain in his book for definite views on the constitution of existingsubstances, on the nature of motion, on the meaning of cause, and so on. We get a glimpse of his attitude to some of these questions in anincidental way. 

The Mutakallimun were opposed to the Aristotelian theory of matter andform, and substituted for it the atomic theory. God created atomswithout magnitude or quality, and he likewise created qualities toinhere in groups of atoms. These qualities they called accidents, andone of their important discussions was whether an accident can last morethan a moment of time. The opinions were various and the accidents wereclassified according to their powers of duration. That is, there weresome accidents which once created continued to exist of their own accordsome length of time, and there were others which had to be re-createdanew every moment in order to continue to exist. Saadia does not speakof matter and form as constituting the essence of existing things; hedoes speak of substance and accident, [39] which might lead us to believethat he held to the atomic theory, since he speaks of the accidents ascoming and going one after the other, which suggests the constantcreation spoken of by the Mutakallimun. On the other hand, when heanswers an objection against motion, which is as old as Zeno, namely, how can we traverse an infinitely divisible distance, since it isnecessary to pass an infinite number of parts, he tells us that it isnot necessary to have recourse to the atomic theory or other theoriesadopted by some Muʿtazilites to meet this objection. We may believe inthe continuity and infinite divisibility of matter, but as long as thisdivisibility is only potentially infinite, actually always finite, ourability to traverse the space offers no difficulty. [40] Finally, inrefuting the second theory of creation, which combines Platonism withatomism, he argues against an atomic theory primarily because of itsimplications of eternity of the atoms, but partly also on other grounds, which would also affect the Kalamistic conceptions of the atoms. [41]These points are not treated by Saadia expressly but are only mentionedincidentally in the elucidation of other problems dealing with thecreation of the world and the existence of God. 

Like Israeli Saadia shows considerable familiarity with Aristoteliannotions as found in the Logic, the Physics and the Psychology. It isdoubtful, however, whether he really knew Aristotle's more importanttreatises at first hand and in detail. The "Categories, " a smalltreatise forming the first book of Aristotle's logic, he no doubt knew, but the other Aristotelian concepts he probably derived from secondarysources. For while he passes in review all the ten categories showingthat none of them is applicable to God, [42] we scarcely find any mentionof such important and fundamental Aristotelian conceptions as matter andform, potentiality and actuality, the four causes, formal, material, efficient and final--concepts which as soon as Aristotle began to bestudied by Al Farabi and Avicenna became familiar to all who wroteanything at all bearing on philosophy, theology, or Biblical exegesis. Nay, the very concepts which he does employ seem to indicate in the wayhe uses them that he was not familiar with the context in which they arefound in the Aristotelian treatises, or with the relation they bear toother views of Aristotle. Thus no one who knew Aristotle at first handcould make the mistake of regarding his definition of the soul as makingthe latter an accident. [43] When Saadia speaks of six kinds of motion[44] instead of _three_, he shows clearly that his knowledge of theAristotelian theory of motion was limited to the little of it that iscontained in the "Categories. "

We are thus justified in saying, that Saadia's sources are Jewishliterature and tradition, the works of the Mutakallimun, particularlythe Muʿtazilites, and Aristotle, whose book on the "Categories" he knewat first hand. 

Saadia tells us he was induced to write his book because he found thatthe beliefs and opinions of men were in an unsatisfactory state. Whilethere are some persons who are fortunate enough to possess the truth andto know that they have it and rejoice thereat, this is not true of all. For there are others who when they have the truth know it not, and hencelet it slip; others are still less fortunate and adopt false anderroneous opinions, which they regard as true; while still othersvacillate continually, going from one opinion and belief to another. This gave him pain and he thought it his duty to make use of his limitedknowledge to help them. A conscientious study of his book will tend toremove doubt and will substitute belief through knowledge for beliefthrough tradition. Another result of such study, not less important, will be improvement of character and disposition, which will affect forthe better a man's life in every respect, in relation to God as well asto his fellowmen. [45]

One may ask why it is that one encounters so many doubts anddifficulties before arriving at true knowledge. The answer is, a humanbeing is a creature, i. E. , a being dependent upon another for itsexistence, and it is in the nature of a creature as such that it mustlabor for the truth with the sweat of its brow. For whatever a man doesor has to do with is subject to time; each work must be accomplishedgradually, step by step, part by part, in successive portions of time. And as the task before him is at the beginning complex, he has toanalyze and simplify it. This takes time; while certainty and knowledgecannot come until the task is accomplished. Before that point is reachedhe is naturally in doubt. [46]

The sources of truth are three. First is that to which the sensestestify. If our normal sense perceives under normal conditions which arefree from illusion, we are certain of that perception. 

The judgment is another source of truth. There are certain truths ofwhich we are certain. This applies especially to such judgments ofvalue, as that truth is good and falsehood is bad. In addition to thesetwo sources of immediate knowledge, there is a third source based uponthese two. This is logical inference. We are led to believe what we havenot directly perceived or a matter concerning which we have no immediateknowledge of the second kind, because we infer it from something elsewhich we have perceived or of which we have immediate certainty. Thus webelieve man has a soul though we have never seen it because we infer itspresence from its activity, which we do see. 

These three sources are universal. They are not peculiar to a given raceor religious denomination, though there are some persons who deny thevalidity of some or all of them. We Jews believe in them and in stillanother source of truth, namely, authentic tradition. [47]

Some think that a Jew is forbidden to speculate or philosophize aboutthe truths of religion. This is not so. Genuine and sincere reflectionand speculation is not prohibited. What is forbidden is to leave thesacred writings aside and rely on any opinions that occur to oneconcerning the beginnings of time and space. For one may find the truthor one may miss it. In any case until a person finds it, he is without areligious guide; and if he does find what seems to him the truth andbases his belief and conduct upon it, he is never sure that he may notlater be assailed by doubts, which will lead him to drop his adoptedbelief. But if we hold fast to the commandments of the Bible, our ownratiocination on the truths of religion will be of great benefit tous. [48]

Our investigation of the facts of our religion will give us a reasonedand scientific knowledge of those things which the Prophets taught usdogmatically, and will enable us to answer the arguments and criticismsof our opponents directed against our faith. Hence it is not merely ourprivilege but our duty to confirm the truths of religion by reason. [49]

Here a question presents itself. If the reason can discover by itselfthe truths communicated to us by divine revelation, why was it necessaryto have recourse to the latter? Why was it not left to the reason aloneto guide us in our belief and in our conduct? The answer is, as wassuggested before, that human reason proceeds gradually and does notreach its aim until the end of the process. In the meantime one is leftwithout a guide. Besides not everybody's reason is adequate to discovertruth. Some are altogether incapable of this difficult task, and manymore are exposed to harassing doubts and perplexities which hinder theirprogress. Hence the necessity of revelation, because in the witness ofthe senses all are equally at home, men and women, young and old. [50]

The most important fact of religion is the existence of God. We know itfrom the Bible, and we must now prove it by reason. The proof isnecessarily indirect because no one of us has seen God, nor have we animmediate certainty of his existence. We must prove it then by themethod of inference. We must start with something we do know withcertainty and proceed from it through as many steps of logical inferenceas may be necessary until we reach the object of our search. [51]

The world and the things in it are directly accessible to our senses andour judgment. How long has the world been in existence and how did itcome to be? The answers to these questions also we do not know throughour senses, and we must prove them by a chain of reasoning. There areseveral possibilities. The world just as it is may have existed frometernity. If so nobody made it; it just existed, and we have no proof ofGod. The world in its present form might have proceeded from a primitivematter. This hypothesis only removes the problem further back. For, leaving aside the question how did this prime matter develop into thecomplex world of our experience, we direct our attention to the primematter itself, and ask, Has it existed from eternity or did it come tobe? If it existed from eternity, then nobody made it, and we have noproof of a God, for by God we mean an intelligent being acting withpurpose and design, and the cause of the existence of everything increation. The third alternative is that whether the world was developedout of a primitive matter or not, it at any rate, or the primitivematter, as the case may be, was made in time, that is, it was createdout of nothing. If so there must have been someone who created it, asnothing can create itself. Here we have proof of the existence of God. It follows therefore that we must first show that the world is noteternal, that it came to be in time, and this is what Saadia does. 

Here are some of his proofs. The world is finite in magnitude. For theworld consists of the earth, which is in the centre, and the heavenssurrounding it on all sides. This shows that the earth is finite, for aninfinite body cannot be surrounded. But the heavens are finite too, forthey make a complete revolution in twenty-four hours. If they wereinfinite it would take an infinite time to complete a revolution. Afinite body cannot have an infinite power. This Saadia regards asself-evident, though Aristotle, from whom this statement is derived, gives the proof. Hence the force or power within the world which keepsit going is finite and must one day be exhausted. But this shows alsothat it could not have gone on from eternity. Hence the world came to bein time. [52]

Another proof is based on the composite character of all things inheaven and earth. Minerals, plants and animals are made up of parts andelements. The heavens consist of spheres, one within the other. Thespheres are studded with stars. But composition implies a time when thecomposition took place. In other words, the parts must have been therefirst and somebody put them together. Hence the world as we see it nowis not eternal. [53]

A special form of composition, which is universal, is that of substanceand accident. Plants and animals are born (or sprout), grow and decay. These manifestations are the accidents of the plant or animal'ssubstance. The heavenly bodies have various motions, lights and colorsas their accidents. But these accidents are not eternal, since they comeand go. Hence the substances bearing the accidents, without which theycannot exist, are also temporal like them. Hence our world is noteternal. [54]

Finally, past time itself cannot be eternal. For this would mean that aninfinite time has actually elapsed down to our day. But this is acontradiction in terms. What is already accomplished cannot be infinite. Infinity is possible only as a potentiality, for example, we may speakof a given length as infinitely divisible. This merely means that onemay mentally continue dividing it forever, but we can never say that onehas actually made an infinite number of divisions. Therefore not merelythe world, but even time must have begun to be. [55]

It will be seen that the first three arguments prove only that the worldin the form which it has now is not eternal. The possibility is not yetexcluded of an eternal matter out of which the world proceeded or wasmade. The fourth argument proves a great deal. It shows that nothingwhich is subject to time can be eternal, hence not even prime matter. God can be eternal because he is not subject to time. Time, as we shallsee later, cannot exist without motion and moving things, hence beforethe world there was no time, and the fourth argument does not apply topremundane existence. 

To complete the first three arguments Saadia therefore proceeds to showthat the world, which we now know came to be in time, must have beenmade by someone (since nothing can make itself), and that too out ofnothing, and not out of a pre-existing eternal matter. 

If an eternal matter existed before the world, the explanation of theorigin of the world is open to two possibilities. One is that there isnothing outside of this matter and the world which came from it. This isabsurd, for it would mean that an unintelligent dead thing is the causeof intelligence and life in the universe. We must therefore haverecourse to the other alternative that someone, an intelligent being, made the world out of the primitive, eternal matter. This is alsoimpossible. For if the matter is eternal like the maker of the world, itis independent of him, and would not be obedient to his will to adaptitself to his purpose. He could therefore not make the world out of it. 

The only alternative left now is that the author of the universe is anintelligent being, and that nothing outside of him is eternal. He aloneis responsible for the existence of the world, which was at one timenothing. Whether he first created a matter and then from it theuniverse, or whether he made the world outright, is of secondaryimportance. [56]

There is still a possibility that instead of making the world out ofnothing, God made it out of himself, _i. E. _, that it emanated from himas light from the sun. This, as we know, is the opinion of theNeo-Platonists; and Israeli comes very close to it as we saw before (p. 6). Saadia is strongly opposed to any such doctrine. 

It is unlikely, he says, that an eternal substance having neither form, condition, measure, place or time, should change into a body or bodieshaving those accidents; or that a wise being, not subject to change orinfluence, or comprehensibility should choose to make himself into abody subject to all of these. What could have induced a just being whodoes no wrong to decree that some of his parts should be subject to suchevils as matter and material beings are afflicted with? It isconceivable only in one of two ways. Either they deserved it for havingdone wrong, or they did not deserve it, and it was an act of violencethat was committed against them. Both suppositions are absurd. The factof the matter is that the authors of this opinion to avoid the theory ofcreation _ex nihilo_ went from the frying pan into the fire. To be sure, creation out of nothing is difficult to conceive, but this is the reasonwhy we ascribe this power to God alone. To demand that we show how thiscan be done is to demand that we ourselves become creators. [57]

The question what existed in place of the earth before it was createdevinces ignorance of the idea of place. By place is meant simply thecontact of two bodies in which the one is the place of the other. Whenthere is no earth and no bodies there is no such thing as place. 

The same thing applies to time. Time means the persistence of existingthings in heaven and earth under changing conditions. Where there is noworld, there is no time. This answers the objection raised by some, namely, how is it possible that before all these bodies were made timeexisted void of objects? Or the other difficulty which is closelyrelated, viz. , Why did not God create the world before he did? Theanswer to both is, there was no before and there was no time, when theworld was not. 

The following question is a legitimate one, Why did God create allthings? And our answer is, there was no cause which made him createthem, and yet they were not made in vain. God wished to exhibit hiswisdom; and his goodness prompted him to benefit his creatures byenabling them to worship him. [58]

We have now proved the existence of God as the cause of the existence ofall things. We must now try to arrive at some notion of what God is asfar as this is in our power. God cannot be corporeal or body, for in ourproof of his existence we began with the world which is body and arrivedat the notion of God as the cause of all corporeal existence. If Godhimself is corporeal our search is not at an end, for we should stillwant to know the cause of him. Being the cause of all body, he is notbody and hence is for our knowledge ultimate, we cannot go beyond him. But if God is not corporeal, he is not subject to motion or rest oranger or favor, for to deny the corporeality of God and still look forthese accidents in him is to change the expression and retain the idea. Bodily accidents involve body. [59]

The incorporeality of God proves also his unity. For what is not bodycannot have the corporeal attributes of quantity or number, hence Godcannot be more than one. [60] And there are many powerful argumentsbesides against a dualistic theory. 

A unitary effect cannot be the result of two independent causes. For ifone is responsible for the whole, there is nothing left for the other, and the assumption of his existence is gratuitous. If the effectconsists of two parts of which each does one, we have really twoeffects. But the universe is one and its parts cannot be separated. [61]Again, if one of them wishes to create a thing and cannot without thehelp of the other, neither is all-powerful, which is inconsistent withthe character of deity. If he can compel the other to help him, they areboth under necessity. And if they are free and independent, then if oneshould desire to keep a body alive and the other to kill it, the bodywould have to be at the same time alive and dead, which is absurd. Again, if each one can conceal aught from the other, neither isall-knowing. If they cannot, they are not all-powerful. [62]

Having proved God's existence, unity and incorporeality, he proceeds todiscuss his most essential attributes, which are, Life, Omnipotence, andOmniscience. These easily follow from what was said before. We cannotconceive a creator _ex nihilo_ unless he is all-powerful; power implieslife; and the thing made cannot be perfect unless its maker knows whatit is going to be before he makes it. 

These three concepts our reason discovers with one act of its thinkingeffort, for they are all involved in the concept, Maker. There is nogradual inference from one to the other. The reason we are forced to usethree expressions is because of the limitations of language. Hence itmust not be thought that they involve plurality in God. They are simplythe implications of the one expression, Maker, and as that does notsuggest plurality in God's essence, but signifies only that there is athing made by the maker, so the three derivative terms, Living, Omnipotent, Omniscient, imply no more. 

The Christians erred in this matter in making God a trinity. They sayone cannot create unless he is living and wise, hence they regard hislife and his wisdom as two other things outside of his essence. But thisis a mistake. For in saying there are several attributes in him distinctone from the other, they say in effect that he is corporeal--an errorwhich we have already refuted. Besides they do not understand whatconstitutes proof: In man we say that his life and his knowledge are nothis essence because we see that he sometimes has them and sometimes not. In God this is not the case. Again, why only three? They say essence, life, wisdom; why do they not add power, or hearing and seeing? If theythink that power is implied in life, and hearing and seeing in wisdom, so is life implied in wisdom. 

They quote Scripture in their support, for example, the verse in IISamuel (23, 2), "The _Spirit_ of the Lord spoke through me, and his_Word_ was upon my tongue. " "Word" denotes, they say, his attribute ofwisdom, and "Spirit" his life, as distinct persons. But they aremistaken. The expressions in question denote the words which God putsinto the mouth of his prophets. There are other similar instances whichthey cite, and in their ignorance of Hebrew take metaphoricalexpressions literally. If they are consistent, they should add many morepersons in the Godhead, in accordance with the many phrases of the Bibleconcerning the hand of God, the eye of God, the glory of God, the angerof God, the mercy of God, and so on. [63]

The above discussion, as also that of Al-Mukammas (p. 19), shows clearlythe origin of the doctrine of attributes as well as its motive. BothAl-Mukammas and Saadia and the later Jewish philosophers owed theirinterest in this problem primarily to the Mohammedan schools in which weknow it played an important rôle (see Introduction, pp. Xxiii, xxvi). But there is no doubt that the problem originated in the Christianschools in the Orient, who made use of it to rationalize the dogma ofthe Trinity. 

There is extant a confession of faith attributed to Jacob Baradæus(sixth century), the founder of the Syrian Church of the Monophysites orJacobites, in which the phrase occurs that the Father is the Intellect, the Son is the Word and the Holy Ghost is Life. In the works of Elias ofNisibis of the Nestorian Church, who lived shortly after Saadia(975-1049), we also find a passage in which the three expressionsessence, life and wisdom are applied to the three persons of theTrinity. The passage is worth quoting. It reads as follows: "As theessence of God cannot receive accidents, his life and his wisdom cannotbe accidents. But whatever is not accident is either substance orperson. Hence as the essence of the Creator and his life and his wisdomare not three substances or three accidents, it is proved that they arethree persons. "[64]

Monotheism was a fundamental dogma of the Mohammedan faith. Hence it wasnecessary for their rationalizing theologians to meet the Trinitarianswith their own weapons and show that the multiplicity of the divineattributes which they could not deny, since the Koran was authority forit, does in no way affect God's unity. The problem was quite asimportant for Judaism as it was for Islam, and for the same reason. Hence Saadia's insistence that inadequacy of language is aloneresponsible for our expressing God's essential attributes in the threewords, Living, Omnipotent, Omniscient; that in reality they are no morethan interpretations of the expression Maker. 

We have now shown that God is one in the two important senses of theword. He is one in the sense that there is no second God beside him; andhe is one in his own essence, _i. E. _, he is simple and not composed ofparts. His Life and his Power and his Wisdom are not distinct one fromthe other and from his essence. They are all one. We have also provedGod's incorporeality. Nevertheless Saadia is not satisfied until he hasshown in detail that God cannot be compared to man in any sense, andthat the anthropomorphic expressions in the Bible must not be takenliterally. In reference to Biblical interpretation Saadia makes thegeneral remark that whenever a verse of Scripture apparently contradictsthe truths of reason, there is no doubt that it is figurative, and aperson who successfully interprets it so as to reconcile it with thedata of sense or reason will be rewarded for it. For not the Bible aloneis the source of Judaism, Reason is another source preceding the Bible, and Tradition is a third source coming after the Bible. [65]

In order to show that God is not to be compared to any other thing increation Saadia finds it convenient to use Aristotle's classification ofall existing things under the ten categories. [66] Everything that existsis either a substance, or it is an accident, _i. E. _, an attribute orquality of a substance. Substance is therefore the first and mostimportant of the categories and is exemplified by such terms as man, horse, city. Everything that is not substance is accident, but there arenine classes of accident, and with substance they make up the tencategories. The order of the categories as Aristotle gives them in histreatise of the same name is, substance, quantity, quality, relation, place, time, position, possession, action, passion. If these categoriesinclude all existing things and we can prove that God is not any ofthem, our object is accomplished. The one general argument is one withwhich we are already familiar. It is that God is the cause of allsubstance and accident, hence he is himself neither the one nor theother. Scripture supports our view, as in Deuteronomy 4, 15: "Take yetherefore good heed of yourselves; for ye saw no manner of form on theday that the Lord spake unto you in Horeb out of the midst of the fire:lest ye corrupt yourselves, and make you a graven image in the form ofany figure, the likeness of male or female, the likeness of any beastthat is on the earth, the likeness of any winged fowl that flieth in theheaven; the likeness of anything that creepeth on the ground, thelikeness of any fish that is in the water under the earth: and lest thoulift up thine eyes unto heaven, and when thou seest the sun and the moonand the stars, even all the host of heaven, thou be drawn away, " etc. And tradition is equally emphatic in this regard. Our sages, who werethe disciples of the prophets, render the anthropomorphic passages inthe Bible so as to avoid an objectionable understanding. This isparticularly true of the Aramaic translation of the Targum. 

Such terms as head, eye, ear, mouth, lip, face, hand, heart, bowels, foot, which are used in relation to God in the Bible, are figurative. For it is the custom of language to apply such terms metaphorically tocertain ideas like elevation, providence, acceptance, declaration, command, favor, anger, power, wisdom, mercy, dominion. Language would bea very inadequate instrument if it confined itself to the literalmeaning of the words it uses; and in the case of God we should belimited to the statement that he is. 

What was said of the nouns above mentioned applies also to other partsof speech, such as verbs attributing human activity to God. Such phrasesas "incline thine ear, " "open thine eyes, " "he saw, " "he heard, " "hespoke" are figurative. So the expression, "the Lord smelled, " whichsounds especially objectionable, denotes acceptance. 

The theophanies in the Bible, where God is represented under a certainform, as in Ezekiel, Isaiah and Kings, do not argue against our view, for there are meant specially created forms for the benefit and honor ofthe prophet. This is what is meant by the "Glory of the Lord, " and"Shekinah. " Sometimes it is simply a created light without an individualform. When Moses asked to see God, he meant the created light. Godcannot be seen with the eye nor can he be grasped in thought orimagination. Hence Moses could not have meant to see God, but thecreated light. His face was covered so that he should not be dazzled bythe exceeding splendor of the beginning of the light, which is too muchfor a mortal to endure; but later when the brightest part passed by, the covering was taken off and Moses saw the last part of the light. This is the meaning of the expression in Exodus 33, 23, "And I will takeaway mine hand, and thou shalt see my back: but my face shall not beseen. "

Having treated of God as the creator of the world and having learnedsomething about his attributes, we must now proceed to the study of man, or which is the same thing, to an investigation of God's relations tothe rational part of his creation in the sublunar world. That man isendowed with a soul cannot be doubted, for the activities of man's soulare directly visible. The problem which is difficult is concerning thenature of the soul. [67] Here opinions differ, and some regard the soulas an accident of the body, some think it is a corporeal substance likeair or fire, while others believe there is more than one soul in man. Itwill be our task to vindicate our own view against these erroneousideas. The soul is too important in its functions to be an accident. Itis neither air nor fire because it has not the properties of thesebodies. And if the soul consisted of two or more distinct parts, theperceptions of sense would not reach the reason, and there would be noco-operation between these two powers. The true view is therefore thatthe soul of man is a substance created by God at the time when the humanbody is completed. The soul has no eternal existence before the body asPlato thought, for nothing is eternal outside of God, as we saw before. Nor does it enter the soul from the outside, but is created with and inthe body. Its substance is as pure as that of the celestial spheres, receiving its light like them, but is much finer than the substance ofthe spheres, for the latter are not rational, whereas the soul is. Thesoul is not dependent for its knowledge upon the body, which without thelatter has neither life nor knowledge, but it uses the body as aninstrument for its functions. When connected with the body the soul hasthree faculties, reason, spirit and desire. But we must not think withPlato that these powers form so many divisions or parts of the soul, residing in different parts of the body. All the three faculties belongto the one soul whose seat is in the heart; for from the heart issue thearteries, which give the body sense and motion. 

The soul was put in the body because from its nature it cannot act byitself; it must have the body as its instrument in order thereby toattain to perfect happiness, for the soul's functions either purify ordefile it. When the soul leaves the body she can no longer repent; allthis must be done while she is in the body. Being placed in the body istherefore a good for the soul. If she were left alone, there would be nouse in her existence or in that of the body, and hence the entirecreation would be in vain, which was made for the sake of man. To askwhy was not the soul made so as to be independent of the body is foolishand tantamount to saying why was not the soul made something else thansoul. The soul is not in any way harmed by being with the body, for theinjury of sin is due to her own free will and not to the body. Moreover, the body is not unclean, nor are the fluids of the body unclean while inthe body; some of them are declared in the Bible to cause uncleannesswhen they leave the body, but this is one of those ordinances which, aswe shall see later, are not demanded by the reason for their own sake, but are specially commanded for a different purpose. As for thesufferings which the soul undergoes by reason of her connection with thebody, some are due to her own negligence, such as cold, heat, and so on, others are inflicted by God for the soul's own good so that she may belater rewarded. 

We see here, and we shall learn more definitely later, that Saadia isopposed to the view of the ascetics--a view Neo-Platonic in itsorigin--that matter and body as such are evil, and that the constanteffort of man must be to free the soul from the taint of the body inwhich it is imprisoned, and by which it is dragged down from itspristine nobility and purity. Saadia's opposition to the belief in thepre-existence of the soul at once does away with the Neo-Platonic viewthat the soul was placed in the body as a punishment for wrongdoing. Thesoul was created at the same time with the body, and the two form anatural unit. Hence complete life involves both body and soul. 

We have seen that God's creation of the world is due to his goodness. His first act of kindness was that he gave being to the things of theworld. He showed himself especially beneficent to man in enabling him toattain perfect happiness by means of the commandments and prohibitionswhich were imposed upon him. The reward consequent upon obedience wasthe real purpose of the commandments. [68]

The laws which God gave us through the prophets consist of two groups. The first embraces such acts as our reason recognizes to be right orwrong, good or bad, through a feeling of approval or disapproval whichGod planted in our minds. Thus reason demands that a benefactor shouldreceive in return for his goodness either a kind reward if he needs it, or thanks if he needs no reward. As this is a general demand of thereason, God could not have neglected it in his own case, and hence thecommandments that we should serve him, that we should not offend orrevile him and the other laws bearing on the same subject. 

It is likewise a demand of the reason that one should prevent thecreatures from sinning against one another in any way. Murder isprohibited because it would lead to the destruction of the race and theconsequent frustration of God's purpose in creating the world. Promiscuous association of the sexes is prohibited in order that man maybe different from the lower animals, and shall know his father and otherrelatives that he may show them honor and kindness. Universal stealingwould lead to indolence, and in the end would destroy itself when thereis nothing more to steal. In a similar way we can explain all lawsrelating to social dealings among mankind. 

The second group of laws has reference to acts which are inherentlyneither right nor wrong, but are made so by the act of God's commandmentor prohibition. This class may be called _Traditional_ in contrast tothe first, which we shall name _Rational_. 

The traditional laws are imposed upon us primarily so that we may berewarded for obeying them. At the same time we shall find on carefulexamination of these laws that they also have a rational signification, and are not purely arbitrary. Thus the purpose of sanctifying certaindays of the year, like Sabbaths and holy days, is that by resting fromlabor we may devote ourselves to prayer, to the acquisition of wisdom, and to converse with our fellows in the interest of religion. Laws ofceremonial purity have for their purpose to teach man humility, and tomake prayer and the visitation of holy places more precious in his eyesafter having been debarred from his privileges during the period of hisuncleanness. 

It is clear that we should not know how to perform the traditionalcommandments without divine revelation since our own reason would nothave suggested them. But even in the case of the rational laws thegeneral principles alone are known to us from our own reason but not thedetails. We know in general that theft, unchastity, and so on, arewrong, but the details of these matters would lead to disagreement amongmankind, and hence it was necessary that the rational laws also bedirectly communicated to us by divine messengers. 

The divine messengers are the prophets. [69] They knew that theirrevelations came from God through a sign which appeared at the beginningof the communication and lasted to the end. The sign was a pillar ofcloud or of fire, or an extraordinary bright light, as we learn in thecase of Moses. 

The genuineness of a prophet's message is tested first of all by thenature of the content, and then by his ability to perform miracles. TheIsraelites would not have believed Moses, notwithstanding his miracles, if he had commanded them to commit murder or adultery. It is because histeaching was found acceptable to the reason that the miraclesaccompanying it were regarded as a confirmation of Moses's divinemission. 

The Jewish Law[70] contains three elements, all of which are necessaryfor effective teaching. First, the commandments and prohibitions, or thelaws proper; second, the reward and punishment consequent upon obedienceand disobedience; and third, examples of historical characters in whichthe laws and their consequences are illustrated. 

But the written law would not accomplish its purpose without belief intradition. This is fundamental, for without it no individual or societycan exist. No one can live by what he perceives with his own sensesalone. He must depend upon the information he receives from others. Andwhile this information is liable to error either by reason of theinformant being mistaken or his possible purpose to deceive, these twopossibilities are eliminated in case the tradition is vouched for not byan individual, but by a whole nation, as in the case of the Jewishrevelation. 

As Saadia's emphasis on tradition, apart from its intrinsic importancefor Judaism, has its additional motive in refuting Karaism, so thefollowing discussion against the possibility of the Law being abrogatedis directed no doubt against the claims of the two sister religions, Christianity and Mohammedanism. [71]

Abrogation of the law, Saadia says, is impossible. For in the firstplace tradition has unanimously held to this view, and in the secondplace the Law itself assures us of its permanent validity, "Mosescommanded us a law, an inheritance for the assembly of Jacob" (Deut. 33, 4). The law constitutes the national existence of our people; hence aswe are assured by the Prophets that the Jewish nation is eternal, theLaw must be likewise. We must not even accept the evidence of miraclesin favor of a new law abrogating the old. For as we saw before, it wasnot primarily Moses's miracles that served to authenticate his teaching, but the character of the teaching itself. Now that the law of Mosesstood the test of internal acceptability and external confirmation bythe performance of miracles, its declaration of permanent validitycannot be upset by any new evidence even if it be miraculous. 

Man[72] alone of all created things was given commandments andprohibitions, because he is superior to all other creatures by reason ofthe rational faculty which he possesses, and the world was created forhim. Man's body is small, but his mind is great and comprehensive. Hislife is short, but it was given him to assist him to the eternal lifeafter death. The diseases and other dangers to which he is subject areintended to keep him humble and God-fearing. The appetites and passionshave their uses in the maintenance of the individual and the race. 

If it is true that God gave man commandments and that he rewards andpunishes him according to his conduct, it follows that unless weattribute injustice to God he must have given man the power to do and torefrain in the matters which form the subject of the commandments. Thisis actually the case and can be proven in many ways. Everyone isconscious of freedom in his actions, and is not aware of any forcepreventing him in his voluntary acts. The Bible testifies to this whenit says (Deut. 30, 19), "I have set before you life and death ... Therefore choose thou life, " or (Malachi 1, 9), "From your hand has thisthing come. " Tradition is equally explicit in the statement of theRabbis (Berakot 33b), "Everything is in the hands of God except the fearof God. " To be sure God is omniscient and knows how a given individualwill act in a given case, but this does not take away from the freedomof the individual to determine his own conduct. For God's knowledge isnot the _cause_ of a man's act, or in general of a thing's being. Ifthat were so, all things would be eternal since God knows all thingsfrom eternity. God simply knows that man will choose of his own freewill to do certain things. Man as a matter of fact never acts contraryto God's knowledge, but this is not because God's knowledge determineshis act, but only because God knows the final outcome of a man's freedeliberation. 

Since it is now clear from every point of view that God does notinterfere with a man's freedom of action, any passages in the Biblewhich seem to indicate the contrary are not properly understood, andmust needs be interpreted in accordance with the evidence we haveadduced from various sources including the Bible itself. Thus when Godsays (Exod. 7, 3) "I will harden the heart of Pharaoh, " it does notmean, as many think, that God forced Pharaoh to refuse to let Israel go. The meaning rather is that he gave Pharaoh strength to withstand theplagues without succumbing to them, as many of the Egyptians did. Thesame method should be followed with all the other expressions in theBible which appear to teach determinism. 

A man's conduct has an influence upon the soul, making it pure or impureas the case may be. [73] Though man cannot see this effect, since thesoul is an intellectual substance, God knows it. He also keeps a recordof our deeds, and deals out reward and punishment in the world to come. This time will not come until he has created the number of souls whichhis wisdom dictates. At the same time there are also rewards andpunishments in this world as an earnest of what is to come in thehereafter. 

A man is called righteous or wicked according as his good or bad deedspredominate. And the recompense in the next world is given for thispredominating element in his character. A righteous man is punished forhis few bad deeds in this world, and rewarded for his many good deeds inthe world to come. Similarly the wicked man is paid for his good deedsin this world, while the punishment for his wickedness is reserved. Thisanswers the old problem of the prosperity of the wicked and the miseryof the righteous in this world. 

There are also sufferings of the righteous which are not in the natureof punishment for past conduct, but in view of the future so as toincrease their reward in the world to come for the trials they enduredwithout murmuring. The sufferings of little children come under thishead. 

On the other hand, a sinner is sometimes well treated and his lifeprolonged for one of the following reasons: To give him time to repent, as in the case of Manasseh; that he may beget a righteous son, likeAhaz, the father of Hezekiah; to use him as God's tool to punish othersmore wicked than he--witness the rôle of Assyria as Isaiah describes itin chapter ten of his prophecies; for the sake of the righteous who isclosely related to him, as Lot was saved for the sake of Abraham; or inorder to make the punishment more severe later, as in the case ofPharaoh. 

That there is another world after this one in which man is rewarded andpunished can be proved from reason, from Scripture and fromtradition. [74] It is not likely from what we know of God's wisdom andgoodness that the measure of happiness intended for the soul is what itgets in this world. For every good here is mixed with evil, the lattereven predominating. No one is really content and at peace in this worldeven if he has reached the top of the ladder of prosperity and honor. There must be a reason for this, which is that the soul has anintuitional longing for the other world which is destined for it. Thereare many things from which the soul is bidden to abstain, such as theft, adultery, and so on, which it desires, and abstention from which causesit pain. Surely there must be reward awaiting the soul for thissuffering. Often the soul suffers hatred, persecution and even death forpursuing justice as she is bidden to do. Surely she will be rewarded. Even when a person is punished with death for a crime committed in thisworld, the same death is inflicted for one crime as for ten crimes. Hence there must be another world where all inequalities are adjusted. 

It is also evident that the men of the Bible believed in a hereafter. Else why should Isaac have consented to be sacrificed, or why should Godhave expected it? The same applies to Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah, who preferred to be thrown into the fiery furnace rather than fall downin worship before the golden image of Nebuchadnezzar; and to Daniel whowas thrown into the den of lions for disobeying the order of the kingand praying to God. They would not have done this if they did notbelieve in another world, where they would be rewarded for theirsufferings in this one. 

Tradition and the Rabbinical literature are filled with reference to afuture world. We need mention only one or two. In the Ethics of theFathers (ch. 4) we read that this world is like the vestibule to theother world. Another statement in the Talmudic treatise Berakot (p. 17a)reads that "in the world to come there is no eating and drinking, norgiving in marriage, nor buying and selling, but the righteous sit withtheir crowns on their heads and enjoy the splendor of the Shekinah. "

With regard to the condition of the soul after death and the nature ofreward and punishment in the next world, there is a variety of opinions. Those who hold that the soul is corporeal or that it is an accident ofthe body believe it is destroyed with the death of the body. We havealready refuted their opinion. Others, like the Platonists, the Dualistsand the Pantheists, who believe in the pre-existence of the soul eitheras a separate entity or as a part of God, hold that after the death ofthe body the soul returns to its original condition. Our belief asstated above (p. 37) is opposed to this. But there are some callingthemselves Jews who believe in metempsychosis, that the soul migratesfrom one person to another and even from man to beast, and that in thisway it is punished for its sins and purged. They see a confirmation oftheir view in the fact that some persons exhibit qualities which arecharacteristic of lower animals. But this is absurd. The soul and thebody form a natural unit, the one being adapted to the other. A humanbody cannot unite with the soul of an animal, nor an animal body with ahuman soul. They try to account by their theory for the suffering oflittle children, who could not have sinned in their own person. But wehave already explained that the suffering of children is not in thenature of punishment, but with a view to subsequent reward, and theymust admit that the first placing of the soul in the body and giving itcommandments is not in the nature of compensation for any past merit, but with a view to later reward. Why not then explain the suffering ofchildren in the same way?[75]

As the body and the soul form a natural unit during life and a man'sconduct is the combined effort of the two constituent parts of hisbeing, it stands to reason that future reward and punishment should beimposed upon body and soul in combination. Hence the doctrine of theresurrection of the body, which is alluded to in the Bible and madeinto a religious dogma by the Rabbis, has support also in thereason. [76] Many objections have been advanced against it, but they canbe easily answered. The strongest objection might seem to be that whichattempts to show that resurrection is a logical contradiction. Theargument is that the elements making up a given body during life findtheir way after the death of the person into the body of another, towhich they are assimilated and of which they form a part. Hence it isimpossible to resurrect two bodies out of the material common to both. But this argument is untrue to fact. Every human body has its ownmatter, which never enters into the composition of any other body. Whenthe person dies and the body decomposes, each element returns to itsplace in nature, where it is kept until the resurrection. 

But there is another event which will happen to Israel before the timeof the resurrection. In accordance with the promises of the Prophets webelieve that Israel will be delivered from exile by the Messiah. [77]Reason also supports this belief, for God is righteous, and since he hasplaced us in exile partly as a punishment for wrongdoing, partly for thepurpose of trying us, there must be a limit to both. 

Messiah the son of David will come, will deliver Jerusalem from theenemy and settle there with his people. When all the believingIsraelites have been gathered from all the nations to the land ofPalestine, then will come the resurrection. The Temple will be rebuilt, the light of the Shekinah will rest upon it, and the spirit of prophecywill be vouchsafed to all Israel, young and old, master and servant. This blessed period will last until the end of time, _i. E. _, until thisworld will give place to the next, which is the place of reward andpunishment. 

We describe the future habitation and status of the soul as Garden ofEden (Paradise) and Gehenna. [78] The former expression is intended tosuggest happiness, there being nothing pleasanter in the world than agarden. The term Gehenna is associated in the Bible with Tofteh, whichwas a place of impurity not far from the Temple. In reality, however, God will create a substance which will combine light and heat in such away that the righteous will enjoy the light only, while the wicked willbe tortured by the heat. All this Saadia infers from Biblical passages. 

There will be no eating and drinking in the next world, and hence noneed of a heaven and an earth like ours, but there will be place andtime, since creatures cannot do without it. There will be no successionof day and night, for these are of use only for our present life andoccupations, but will be unnecessary there. There will, however, be aspecial period for worship. 

Reward and punishment in the next world will both be eternal. It standsto reason that God should _promise_ eternal reward and punishment so asto inspire mankind with the highest possible degree of hope and fear, that they may have no excuse for not heeding the commandments soforcibly impressed upon them. Having made the promise, his justiceprompts him to fulfil it, and those who suffer have themselves to blame. 

We have now completed in outline Saadia's system of Judaism. There aremany details which we necessarily had to leave out, especially in themore dogmatic part of his work, that dealing with specific Jewishdoctrines, which he constructs on the basis of Rabbinical literature andBiblical allusions interpreted so as to harmonize with the statements ofthe Rabbis. Many questions specifically theological and eschatologicalassumed importance in his mind by reason of his surroundings. I mean theMohammedan schools and sects, and the Karaite discussions which wereclosely modelled after them. The most important part of his systemphilosophically is that which deals with creation and the attributes ofGod. His discussions of the soul and of free will are less thorough, andthe details of his doctrines of resurrection, future reward andpunishment, the redemption of Israel and the Messiah are almost purelydogmatic. For a scientific ethic there is no room at all in the body ofhis work. A man's conduct is prescribed for him in the divinecommandments, though in a general way the reason sees the right and thewrong of the so-called rational group of laws. Still as an after thoughtSaadia added a chapter to the "Emunot ve-Deot" in which he attempts togive a psychological basis for human conduct. Noting the varioustendencies of individuals and sects in his environment to extremes inhuman behavior, some to asceticism, some to self-indulgence, be it thelust of love or of power, he lays emphasis on the inadequacy of any onepursuit for the demands of man's complex nature, and recommends aharmonious blending of all things for which men strive. [79]

God alone, he says, is a real unity, everything else is by the veryreason of its being a creature essentially not one and simple, butcomposite and complex. So man has a love and desire for many things, andalso aversion for many things. And as in other objects in nature ittakes a combination of several elements to constitute a given thing, soin man it is by a proper systematization of his likes and dislikes thathe can reach perfection of character and morals. It cannot be that Godintended man to pursue one object all his life to the exclusion of allothers, for in that case he would have implanted only one desire in maninstead of many. You cannot build a house of stones alone neither canyou develop a perfect character by one pursuit and one interest. 

Pursuit of one thing is likely to result in harm, for example, over-indulgence in eating brings on disease. Wisdom is therefore neededin regulating one's conduct. The principle here is control of one'slikes and dislikes. Of the three faculties of the soul, reason, spiritand desire, reason must be the master of the other two. If any matteroccurs to a person's imagination, he must try it with his reason to seewhether it is likely to benefit or injure him, and pursue or avoid itaccordingly. If, on the other hand, he allows the lower parts of hissoul to rule his reason, he is not a moral man. 

The reader will recognize Plato in the last statement. The division ofthe soul into the three faculties of reason, spirit and desire isPlatonic, as we have already seen, and the attempt to base an ethic onthe proper relation between the powers of the soul also goes back toPlato. But Saadia tries to show that the Bible too favors thisconception. 

When Ecclesiastes tells us (1, 14), "I have seen all the works that aredone under the sun; and, behold, all is vanity and a striving afterwind, " he does not mean that there is nothing worth striving after, forhe would then be condemning the objects of God's creation. His meaningis that it is vain to pursue any one thing to the exclusion of everyother. He then proceeds to name three prominent objects of pursuit, wisdom, pleasure and worldly gain--all is vain when taken by itself. Aproper combination of all is to be recommended as is delicately hintedin the same book (2, 3), "I searched in mine heart how to cheer my fleshwith wine, mine heart yet guiding me with wisdom, and how to lay hold onfolly. "

CHAPTER IV

JOSEPH AL-BASIR AND JESHUA BEN JUDAH

I. _Joseph Al-Basir (11th century)_[80]

Joseph ben Abraham, euphemistically surnamed on account of hisblindness, al-Basir (the seer), was a Karaite and lived in Babylonia orPersia in the beginning of the eleventh century. His philosophical workis closely modelled on the writings of the Arabian Mutakallimun, theMuʿtazilites. Unlike Saadia, who tacitly accepts some of their methodsand views, al-Basir is an avowed follower of the Kalam and treats onlyof those questions which are common to Jew and Mohammedan, avoiding, forexample, so important an issue as whether it is possible that the law ofGod may be abrogated--a question which meant so much to Saadia. Thedivision of his investigation into the two parts, Unity and Justice, isa serious matter with him; and he finds it necessary to tell us inseveral instances why he chose to treat a given topic under the one orthe other heading. In spirit and temperament he is a thoroughgoingrationalist. Brief and succinct to the point of obscurity, he betraysneither partiality nor emotion, but fearlessly pushes the argument toits last conclusion and reduces it to its lowest terms. 

Saadia (above p. 28) puts revelation as a fourth source of truthparallel to sense, judgment and logical inference. To be sure he, in oneinstance (p. 35), speaks of the reason as preceding the Bible even astradition follows it, but this is only a passing observation, and isproperly corrected by the view expressed elsewhere (p. 28) that while aJew is not forbidden to speculate, he must not set the Bible aside andadopt opinions as they occur to him. Al-Basir does not leave the matterin this unsettled condition. He definitely gives priority--logicalpriority, to reason. Knowledge, he says, must precede revelation. Theprophet as the messenger of God cannot be believed on his word, for theopponent may have the same claim. Not only must the prophetauthenticate his mission by the performance of a miracle which cannot beexplained by natural means, but we must know besides that he who senthim has our good at heart and would not deceive us. A knowledge of theexistence, power and wisdom of the creator must therefore precede ourbelief in the prophet's mission. To take these truths from the words ofthe prophet and then give him credence because God sent him would bereasoning in a circle. The minimum of knowledge therefore which isindispensable before we can make any appeal to the words of the prophetis rational proof of the existence, power and wisdom of God. Having thisminimum the person who is not practiced in speculative investigation mayrely for the rest of the creed, for example, the unity of God and hisother attributes, upon the words of the Bible. For if we knowindependently that God is Omnipotent and Omniscient, and the prophet cansubstantiate his claim to be a divine messenger by the performance ofgenuine miracles, his reliability is established and we are safe inaccepting all that he has to say without proof; but the fundamentalthing to do is to establish the prophet's reliability, and for this anindependent source of evidence is necessary. This is the reason. 

Our problem therefore is to prove the power and wisdom of God, whichwill imply his existence. We cannot do this directly, for we cannot seeGod. Hence the only method is to prove the existence of a powerful andwise creator through his creation. We must prove his power in doingthings which we cannot do, such as the ability to create our bodies. Butfor this it is necessary to show that our bodies--and the same willapply to the other bodies of the world, and hence to the world as awhole--were created, _i. E. _, that there was a time when they were not. This leads us to an analysis of the constituents of body. All bodiesconsist of atoms and their "accidents, " or conditions and qualities. Theprimary accidents, which are presupposed by all the rest, are thefollowing four, combination, separation, motion and rest. Without theseno body can exist, for body is the result of a combination andseparation of atoms at rest or in motion. But combination and separationare the acts of a combiner and separater, as we can infer from theanalogy of our own acts. Our acts have ourselves as their creators, hence the acts visible in the combinations and separations of atoms toform bodies must also have their creator. 

The attributes of the creator we infer from the nature of his work. Sowe call God "Powerful, " meaning that he had the power to create theworld. As creation denotes power, so the success and harmony of theproduct argues wisdom; and this power and wisdom thus established arenot disproved by an occasional production or event which is not perfect, a monstrosity for example, or disease and suffering. We say in referenceto these that God must have a deeper object in view, to inspire mankindwith the fear of God, and in order to increase their reward in the nextworld. 

The attribute of Life follows from the other two, for life denotes thepossession or capacity of power and knowledge. 

Thus al-Basir has the same three essential attributes as Saadia. Hisproof of the existence of God is also identical with one of the proofsof Saadia. But he shows himself a more loyal follower of the Kalam byfrankly adopting the atomic theory, whereas Saadia opposes it (p. 25). 

Other predicates of God are perception, will, unity, incorporeality andeternity. 

Perception is one of the most important expressions of life, but it mustnot be confused with knowledge or wisdom. The latter embraces thenon-existent as well as the existent, the former the existent only. Itis in virtue of the former attribute that we speak of God as "hearing"and "seeing. "

"Willing" is another attribute of God, and those are wrong who identifyGod's will with his knowledge, and define God's willing to mean that hisworks take place in accordance with his knowledge. God's will must be aspecial attribute since we see in creation traces of free will. To bethe will of God it must not reside in anything different from God, andyet it cannot inhere in God as the subject, for only body is capable ofbeing the subject of accidents. The only solution, therefore, is thatGod exercises his voluntary activity through a will which he creates, awill not residing in any subject. 

This discussion of the nature of God's will seems a case of hairsplitting with a vengeance, and al-Basir is not the author of it. As inhis other doctrines so in this also he is a faithful follower of theMuʿtazila, and we shall see more of this method in his discussion of theunity of God despite the plurality of his attributes. 

But we shall first take up the attributes of incorporeality andeternity, which can be dismissed in a few words. 

God is eternal because the only other alternative is that he is created. But if so there is a creator, and if the latter is again created, hemust likewise have a creator, and so we are led to infinity, whichcannot be, the infinite regress being in all cases an impossibilityaccording to an axiom of the Kalam. We must, therefore, have an eternalcreator somewhere, and he is God. 

From God's eternity follows his incorporeality, for we have shown beforethat all body is created, since it presupposes combination andseparation, and the latter a combiner and separater. 

When we speak of the unity of God we mean first that there is no secondGod, and then that his own essence has no composition or plurality init. Two Gods is an absurdity, for the one might desire what the otherdoes not, and he whose will predominates is the real God. It is noobjection to say that in their wisdom they would never disagree, becausethe _possibility_ is there, and this makes the above argument valid. Again, if there were two Gods they would have to be completely alike intheir essential attributes, and as space cannot hold them apart, sincethey are not bodies, what is there to constitute them two?

The other problem, of God's simplicity, is more difficult. Does not themultiplicity of attributes make God's essence multiple and composite?The form which this question took was this. Shall we say that God isomnipotent through Power, omniscient through Knowledge, and so on? Ifso, this Power, Knowledge, etc. , are created or eternal. If the Power, say, is created, then God must have had power in order to create it, hence was powerful not through Power. If the Power is eternal, we havemore than one God, and "Power" as an eternal would also be Wise andLiving, etc. ; Wisdom would also be powerful, living, etc. , and so onwith the other attributes, a doctrine closely bordering on Christianityand reminding one of Augustine. The principle of monotheism could notallow such a conception as this. If Power is neither created noreternal, it follows that God is omnipotent not through Power as anexternal cause or a distinct entity, but through his own essence. Theattributes Power, Wisdom, Life, are not anything distinguishable fromeach other and from God's essence. They are modes or conditions ofGod's essence, and are known along with it. 

The same considerations which prompted us to conceive God as one andsimple, make impossible the belief in the eternity of God's word. Thiswas a point much discussed in the Mohammedan schools, and was evidentlydirected against Christianity, where the Word or Logos was identifiedwith the second person in the Trinity. Eternity, Al-Basir says, isincompatible with the idea and purpose of speech. God speaks with a wordwhich he creates. This adds no new predicate to God, but is implied inhis Power. The attribute omnipotent implies that when he wills he canmake himself understood by us as we do through speech. 

We notice that Al-Basir is more elaborate in his discussion of theattributes than Saadia, and like Al-Mukammas he makes use of the formulæof the Kalam, "omnipotent not with Power, omniscient not with Wisdom. "Saadia does not follow the Kalam so closely, but is just as emphatic inhis endeavor to show that the three essential attributes are onlyverbally three; conceptually and really they are one. 

The doctrine of the attributes brings to a close the section on unity, and the second division of the investigation is entitled Justice andFairness. The main problems here are the nature of good and evil and therelation of God to them, the question of free will and other subordinatetopics, theological and eschatological. 

With regard to the first question two extreme positions are possible, which were actually held by Mohammedan schools of Al-Basir's day. One isthat nothing is good or bad in itself, our reason not recognizing it assuch; that the divine command or prohibition makes the thing good orbad. Hence, the representatives of this opinion say, God, who standsabove his commands and prohibitions, is not bound by them. Good and badhold for the subject, not for the author. The acts of God do not comewithin the classification, and hence it is possible that God may do whatwe regard as injustice. Some, in their endeavor to be consistent and tocarry the argument to its last conclusion, did not even shrink from the_reductio ad absurdum_ that it is possible God may lie; for, said they, if I promise a boy sweetmeats and fail to keep my promise, it is noworse than if I beat him. 

For this school there is no problem of evil, because ethicaldistinctions do not apply to God's doings. Whatever God does is good. The other school came under the influence of Greek thought andidentified the idea of God with the idea of the Good. They maintainedthat from the nature of God's essence it was not only his duty to do thegood, but that it was impossible for him to do anything else. Doing goodis a necessity of his nature, and our good and evil are also his goodand evil. Ethical values are absolute and not relative. 

Neither of these radical views can be maintained. The first is refutedby its own consequences which only very few of its advocates were boldenough to adopt. The possibility of God telling a falsehood, which isimplied in the purely human validity of good and evil, is subversive ofall religion. God would then cease to be trustworthy, and there would beno reason for giving him obedience. Besides, if revelation alonedetermines right and wrong, it would follow that if God chose to reversehis orders, our moral judgments would be turned the other way around, good would be evil, and evil good. Finally, if good and bad aredetermined by the will of God only, those who do not believe inrevelation would be without an idea of right and wrong, but this ismanifestly not true. 

But the other opinion, that God is compelled by the necessity of hisnature to do the good, is also erroneous. In the first place it detractsfrom God's omnipotence to say he cannot do wrong. Besides, if he iscompelled by an inner necessity to do the good, he must always have donethis, and the world would have existed from eternity. It is just aswrong to say that it is the duty of God to do what is good and usefulfor man. For this is due to a confusion of the good or generous with theobligatory. Any deed to which no blame attaches may be called good. Ifno praise attaches to it either, it is indifferent. If it is deservingof praise and its omission does not call forth blame, it is a generousact. A duty is an act the omission of which deserves blame. 

Now the truth in the question under discussion is midway between the twoextremes. God is able to do good as well as evil, and is under nonecessity. The notions of right and wrong are absolute and not merelyrelative. God never does wrong because evil has no attractive power _perse_. Wrong is committed always as a means to an end, namely, to gain anadvantage or avoid an injury. God is not dependent upon anything; heneeds no advantages and fears no injuries. Hence there is nothing toprompt him to do wrong. The good on the other hand attracts us by itsinherent goodness, not for an ulterior end. If the good were done onlyfor the sake of deriving some benefit external to the good itself, God, who is self-sufficient, would not do anything either good or evil. Goddoes the good always and not the bad, because in his wisdom he sees thedifference between them. It was a deed of generosity in God to havecreated the world and given life to his creatures, but it was not aduty. 

This conception of the nature of good and evil leaves on our hands theproblem of evil. Why does a good God permit disease and suffering toexist in the world? In particular, how explain the suffering and deathof innocent children and harmless animals?

The answer of Al-Basir is that infliction of pain may under certaincircumstances be a good instead of an evil. In human relations a personis permitted to inflict pain on another in self-defence, or to preventthe pain from becoming worse, as, for example, when a finger isamputated to save the hand. The infliction of pain is not onlypermitted, it becomes a duty in case of retribution, as in a court ofjustice; and finally it is permitted to inflict temporary pain if itwill result in a greater advantage in the future. The last two casesapply also to God's treatment of his creatures. Disease and sufferingare either punishment for offences committed, or are imposed with a viewto later reward. In the case of children the last explanation alone isapplicable. They will be rewarded in the next world. At the same timethe parents are admonished to repentance and good conduct. 

The most difficult question of the section on justice is that of freewill and foreknowledge. Is man master of his actions? If so, how can wereconcile this with God's omniscience, who knows beforehand how theperson will act at a given moment? Is man free to decide at the lastmoment in a manner contrary to God's knowledge? If so, we defend freedomat the expense of God's omniscience. If man is bound to act as Godforeknew he would act, divine knowledge is saved, man's freedom lost. Al-Basir has no doubt man is free. Our own consciousness testifies tothis. When we cut off our finger bitten by a snake, we know that weourselves did it for a purpose, and distinguish it from a case of ourfinger being cut off by order of an official, before whom we have beenaccused or maligned. One and the same act can have only one author andnot two, and we know that we are the authors of our acts. There is amuch closer connection between an agent and his act than between aknower and his knowledge, which may be the common property of many, andno one doubts that a man's knowledge is his own. 

The dilemma above mentioned with its two horns, of which one deniesGod's knowledge, the other man's freedom, is puzzling enough, to besure. But we are not bound to answer it since it is purely hypothetical. We do not know of a real instance in which a man's decision tended to becontrary to God's foreknowledge of its outcome. Just as we should refuseto answer the question whether an actual case of injustice on the partof God would prove his ignorance or dependence, because we know throughirrefutable proofs that God is wise and without need; so here we say manhas freedom though God knows he will act thus and so, and refuse to saywhether in case the unbeliever turned believer it would prove God'signorance or change in his knowledge. 

God's creation was a pure act of grace. But once having done this andcommunicated to us a knowledge of himself and his will, it is now hisduty to guide us in the right path, by sending us his prophets. Thecommandments and prohibitions must never be contrary to the knowledge ofreason. We must see in the commandments means of guidance, in theprohibitions a protection against destructive influences. If they hadnot this rational basis, we do not see why God should have imposed themupon us. 

Having given us reason to know his being, and having announced his truththrough the prophets, it is his duty to reward those who knew him andwere obedient, eternally in the next world, and to punish eternally theunbeliever. If one has merits and sins, they are balanced against eachother. If the sinner repents of his evil deeds, it is the duty of God toaccept his repentance and remit his punishment. 

2. _Jeshua ben Judah_[81]

Jeshua ben Judah or, as he is known by his Arabic name, Abu al-FarajFurkan ibn Asad, was likewise a Karaite, a pupil of Joseph Al-Basir, and flourished in Palestine in the second half of the eleventh century. His point of view is essentially the same as that of his teacher, Al-Basir. He is also a follower of the Muʿtazilite Kalam and as strong arationalist as his master. He agrees with Al-Basir that we cannot getcertain knowledge of the creation of the world and the existence of Godfrom the Bible. This information must come originally from rationalspeculation. It should then be applied to the miracles of the prophetsso as to prove the authenticity of their mission and the truth of theirannouncements. 

He adopts the atomic theory, though he is opposed to the view that atomsare created ever anew by God from moment to moment, and that there is nonatural and necessary sequence or continuity in the phenomena of theworld or qualities of bodies, all being due to habit, and custom inducedin us by God's uninterrupted creations. As in his philosophicaldiscussions he is a follower of the Kalam, so in his legalistic works heis indebted to the Mohammedan schools of religious law. 

Like Al-Basir, Jeshua ben Judah regards as the corner stone of hisreligious philosophy the proof that the world was created, _i. E. _, thatit is not eternal. His arguments are in essence the same, thoughdifferently formulated. In their simplest form they are somewhat asfollows. The world and its bodies consist of atoms and their accidents. Taking a given atom for the sake of argument we know that it isimmaterial to it, so far as its own essence is concerned, whether itoccupy one place or another. As a fact, however, it does occupy adefinite place at a given moment. This must be due to a cause. And asthe atom in question in the course of time changes its place, this showsthat the cause which kept it in the former place has disappeared andgiven way to a new cause, and so on. In other words, the successivecauses which determine the positions and motions of the atoms are notpermanent, hence not eternal but created. The necessary inference isthat the atoms or the bodies, which cannot exist without these createdcauses (else they could not occupy one place rather than another), mustalso be created. 

Another form of the argument for creation is this. The eternal has nocause. It exists by virtue of its own essence, and is not dependent onanything else. If now the atoms were eternal, they would have to persistin the same condition all the time; for any change would imply a causeupon which the atom is dependent, and this is fatal to its eternity. Butthe atoms do constantly change their condition and place. Hence they arecreated. 

If the things of the world are created, someone must have created them. This is clear. But there may be room for the supposition that thiscreative agency is a "_cause_, " _i. E. _, an impersonal entity, which bynecessity produces other things from itself. Hence we must hasten to saythat this conception of the Creator is impossible because incompatiblewith our results so far. A necessarily producing cause cannot be withoutcreating, hence an eternal cause implies an eternal effect--whichcontradicts our idea of a created world proved above. We say, therefore, that the Creator is not a "cause" but an "agent, " _i. E. _, one actingwith will and choice. 

God is incorporeal because body consists of atoms, and atoms, we haveshown, are created. Besides, if he were corporeal, he could not createbodies any more than we can. He would furthermore be limited to adefinite place, and the same arguments cited above to prove that atomsare dependent on a cause would apply to him. Finally we as corporealbeings cannot exert an influence on objects except by coming in contactwith them. God causes the seed to grow without being in contact with it. Hence he is not body, and the scriptural passages apparently teachingthe contrary must be explained otherwise. 

Jeshua ben Judah likewise agrees with Al-Basir in regarding the natureof good and evil as absolute, not relative. Like his master he opposesthose who make God's command and prohibition the sole creators of goodand evil respectively, as on the other hand he refuses to agree with theview that God is bound by necessity to do the good. Our reasondistinguishes between good and evil as our senses between white andblack. 

Among other arguments in favor of the absolute character of right andwrong, which we have already found in Al-Basir, appears the following. If good and evil mean simply that which God commands and prohibitsrespectively, and the distinction holds only for us but not for God, itfollows that God may do what we think is evil. If this be so, we have noground for believing in the good faith of the prophet--God might havesent him to deceive us--and the alleged basis of right and wrong isremoved. 

We conclude therefore that good and evil are absolute and are bindingupon God as well. God can do evil as well as good, but being omnipotenthe can accomplish his purpose just as easily by doing good as by doingevil, and hence surely prefers to do good. Besides, all evil doing isthe result of some need, but God has no needs, being self-sufficient, hence he does not do evil. 

It follows from the above that God had a purpose in creating the world. For an act without a purpose is vain and hence bad. This purpose cannothave been egoistic, since God is without need, being above pleasure andpain. The purpose must therefore have been the well-being of hiscreatures. 

CHAPTER V

SOLOMON IBN GABIROL

With Gabirol the scene of Jewish intellectual activity changes from theeast to the west. Prior to the middle of the tenth century the centre ofJewish learning was in Babylonia. The succession of Geonim in theTalmudical schools of Sura and Pumbadita, and particularly the greatfame of Saadia, made all the other Jewish communities of the world lookto Babylonia as the spiritual centre. They considered it a privilege tocontribute to the support of the great eastern academies and appealed totheir spiritual heads in cases of doubt in religious matters. Some ofthis glory was reflected also upon the neighboring countries underMohammedan domination, Palestine, Egypt, and Kairuan or northern Africato the west of Egypt. Thus all the men, Rabbanites as well as Karaites, whom we treated so far lived and flourished in the east in one of thefour countries mentioned. Christian Europe was intellectually on a lowlevel, and as far as scientific studies were concerned, the Jews underChristian rule were no better than their temporal rulers. 

But a new era dawned for Jewish literature with the accession to powerof the Umayyad caliph Abd al Rahman III, as head of Mohammedan Spain orAndalusia. He was a liberal man and a patron of learning. Hasdai ibnShaprut, a cultured and high-minded Jew, was his trusted adviser, andlike his royal patron he protected and encouraged Jewish learning, Talmudical as well as scientific. When Moses ben Enoch, a learnedemissary from the Babylonian Academy, was ransomed by the Jewishcommunity of Cordova and made the head of a Talmudical school in thatcity, the beginning of the end of Babylonian Jewish supremacy was athand. Moses ben Enoch the Talmudist, Menahem ben Saruk, the grammarianand lexicographer, and Dunash ben Labrat, the poet--all three under thedistinguished patronage of Hasdai ibn Shaprut--inaugurated the long lineof Spanish Jewish worthies, which continued almost five centuries, constituting the golden era of Jewish literature and making of Spainthe intellectual centre of all Jewry. 

Solomon ibn Gabirol was not merely the first Jewish philosopher inSpain, he was the first Spanish philosopher, that is, he was the firstphilosophical writer in Andalusia. Ibn Badja, the first Mohammedanphilosopher in Spain, was born at least a half century after Gabirol. The birth of Gabirol is generally placed in 1021 and his death in 1058, though some have put it as late as 1070. 

The fate of Gabirol in the history of Jewish literature was a peculiarone. Highly celebrated as a synagogal poet in the Sephardic as well asAshkenazic community, his fame as a great philosopher was earlyovershadowed by his successors, and his chief work, the "Fountain ofLife, " was in the course of time quite forgotten. The Arabic originalwas lost and there was no Hebrew translation. The Tibbonides, Judah, Samuel and Moses, who translated everything worth while in Jewishphilology, science and philosophy from Arabic into Hebrew, either didnot know of Gabirol's masterpiece or did not think it important enoughto translate. To judge from the extant fragments of the correspondencebetween Samuel ibn Tibbon and Maimonides, it would seem that both weretrue; that is that Samuel ibn Tibbon had no access to Gabirol's "FonsVitæ, " and that if he had had such access, Maimonides would havedissuaded him from translating it. Maimonides actually tells histranslator[82] that the only books worth studying are those of Aristotleand his true commentators, Alexander of Aphrodisias, Themistius, Averroes. Alfarabi and Avicenna are also important, but other writings, such as those of Empedocles, Pythagoras, Hermes, Porphyry, represent apre-Aristotelian philosophy which is obsolete, and are a waste of time. The books of Isaac Israeli on the "Elements" and on "Definitions, " areno better, seeing that Israeli was only a physician and no philosopher. He is not familiar with the "Microcosmus" of Joseph ibn Zaddik, butinfers from a knowledge of the man that his work is based upon thewritings of the "Brothers of Purity"; and hence, we may add, notstrictly Aristotelian, and not particularly important. Not a word ishere said about Gabirol, apparently because Samuel ibn Tibbon had notinquired about him. But from Maimonides's judgment concerning the worksof "Empedocles, " we may legitimately infer that he would have been nomore favorable to Gabirol; for, as we shall see, Gabirol's system isalso based upon a point of view similar to that of the so-called"Empedocles. " What the Tibbonides left undone was, however, partiallyaccomplished about a half century later by the commentator and criticShem Tob Falaquera (1225-1290). Apparently in agreement with Abraham ibnDaud that Gabirol's profuseness in his philosophic masterpiece made itpossible to reduce it to a tenth part of its size, Falaquera did notfind it necessary to translate the whole of the "Mekor Hayim" intoHebrew, giving us instead a translation of selected parts, which in hisestimation contained the gist of Gabirol's teaching. The absence of acomplete Hebrew translation of Gabirol's philosophical work meant ofcourse that no one who did not know Arabic could have access toGabirol's "Mekor Hayim, " and this practically excluded the majority oflearned Jews after the first half of the thirteenth century. But theselections of Falaquera did not seem to find many readers either, as maybe inferred from the fact that so far only one single manuscript of thistranslation is known. 

_En revanche_, as the French would say, the Christian Scholastics of thethirteenth century made Gabirol their own and studied him diligently. His fundamental thesis of a universal matter underlying all existenceoutside of God was made a bone of contention between the two dominantschools; the Dominicans, led by Thomas Aquinas, opposing thisun-Aristotelian principle, the Franciscans with Duns Scotus at theirhead, adopting it as their own. "Ego autem redeo ad sententiamAvicembronis, " is a formula in Duns Scotus's discussion of the principleof matter. [83]

The translation of Gabirol's philosophy into an accessible language, which was not considered desirable by Jews, was actually accomplished byChristians. About a century before Falaquera a complete translation intoLatin was made in Toledo of Gabirol's "Fountain of Life, " under thetitle "Fons Vitæ. " This translation was made at the instance of Raymond, Archbishop of Toledo in the middle of the twelfth century, by DominicusGundissalinus, archdeacon of Segovia, with the assistance of a convertedJewish physician, Ibn Daud (Avendehut, Avendeath), whose name afterconversion became Johannes Hispanus or Hispalensis. Unlike the Hebrewepitome of Falaquera this translation was not neglected, as is clearfrom the rôle Gabirol's philosophy plays in the disputations of theschools, and from the fact that there are still extant four manuscriptsof the complete translation, one of an epitome thereof, and there isevidence that a fifth manuscript existed in 1375 in the Papallibrary. [84] As Ibn Sina was corrupted by the Latin writers intoAvicenna, and Ibn Roshd into Averroes, so Ibn Gabirol became in turn, Avencebrol, Avicembron, Avicebron; and the Scholastics who fought abouthis philosophy had no idea he was a Jew and celebrated as a writer ofreligious hymns used in the synagogue. He was regarded now as aMohammedan, now as a Christian. 

This peculiar circumstance will help us to get an inkling of the reasonfor the neglect of Gabirol's philosophy in the Jewish community. It isclear that a work which, like the "Fons Vitæ, " made it possible for itsauthor to be regarded as a Mohammedan or even a Christian, cannot havehad the Jewish imprint very deeply stamped upon its face. Nay more, while the knowledge of its having been translated from the Arabic mayhave been sufficient in itself to stamp the author as a Mohammedan, there must have been additional indications for his Scholastic admirersto make them regard him as a Christian. An examination of the work lendssome semblance of truth to these considerations. 

Gabirol nowhere betrays his Jewishness in the "Fons Vitæ. " He neverquotes a Biblical verse or a Talmudic dictum. He does not make any overtattempt to reconcile his philosophical views with religious faith. Thetreatise is purely speculative as if religious dogma nowhere existed toblock one's way or direct one's search. Abraham Ibn Daud, the author ofthe philosophical treatise "Emunah Ramah" (The Exalted Faith), and thepredecessor of Maimonides, criticises Gabirol very severely, and thatnot merely because he disagrees with him in the conception of matter andfinds Gabirol's reasoning devoid of cogency and logical force--many badarguments, he says, seem in the mind of Gabirol to be equivalent to onegood one--but principally because Gabirol failed to take a Jewishattitude in his philosophizing, and actually, as Ibn Daud tells us, maintains views dangerous to Judaism (below, p. 198). 

This will easily account for the fact that Gabirol, celebrated as he wasas a poet, was lost sight of generally as a philosopher. The matter ismade clearer still if we add that his style in the "Mekor Hayim" isagainst him. It is devoid of all merit whether of literary beauty or oflogical conciseness and brevity. It is diffuse to a degree andfrequently very wearisome and tedious. One has to wade through pagesupon pages of bare syllogisms, one more flimsy than another. 

Finally, the point of view of Gabirol was that of a philosophy that wasrapidly becoming obsolete, and Maimonides, the ground having been madeready by Ibn Daud, gave this philosophy its death-blow by substitutingfor it the philosophy of Aristotle. 

We now understand why it is that, with few exceptions here and there, Gabirol's philosophical work was in the course of time forgotten amongthe Jews, though his name Avicebron as well as some of his chiefdoctrines were well known to the Scholastic writers. To be sure, evenstudents of Scholastic literature had no direct access to Gabirol'streatise as it was never printed and no one knew whether there werestill any manuscripts of it extant or not. The only sources ofinformation concerning Avicebron's philosophy were Aquinas'srefutations, and Duns Scotus's defence, and other second-hand referencesin the writings of the Scholastics. Who Avicebron was no one knew. Itwas not until 1819 that Amable Jourdain, [85] in tracing the history ofthe Latin translations of Aristotle, came to the conclusion that moremust be known about the philosophy of Avicebron's "Fons Vitæ" if weintended to understand the Scholastics. In 1845 Solomon Munk discoveredin the national library at Paris the epitome of Falaquera mentionedabove, and comparing it with the views of Avicebron as found in thediscussions of the Scholastics, made the important discovery that themysterious Avicebron was neither a Mohammedan nor a Christian but a Jew, and none other than the famous poet Solomon ibn Gabirol. Then began asearch for copies of a Latin translation, which was rewarded amply. BothMunk and Seyerlen discovered manuscript copies of the "Fons Vitæ, " andnow both the Hebrew epitome of Falaquera and the Latin translation ofGundissalinus are accessible in print. [86] So much for the interestinghistory of Gabirol. Now a word as to his views. 

Shem Tob ibn Falaquera, in the brief introduction which he appends tohis epitome of the "Mekor Hayim" says, "It seems to me that Solomon ibnGabirol follows in his book the views of the ancient philosophers as wefind them in a book composed by Empedocles concerning the 'FiveSubstances. '[87] This book is based upon the principle that allspiritual substances have a spiritual matter; that the form comes fromabove and the matter receives it from below, _i. E. _, that the matter isa substratum and bears the form upon it. " He then adds that Aristotleattributes a similar view to his predecessors, but that this view isinconsistent with Aristotle's own thinking. For in his opinion what ismaterial is composite and possessed of potentiality. Hence only thosethings have matter which are subject to generation and decay, and ingeneral change from one state to another. 

Without going into detail as to the nature of this work of Empedoclesnamed by Falaquera as the source of Gabirol's views--expositions ofthese so-called Empedoclean views and fragments from Empedocles's bookhave been found in Arabian and Hebrew writers[88]--it is sufficient forus to know that it has nothing to do with the real Empedocles, theancient Greek philosopher; that it was another of the many spuriouswritings which circulated in the middle ages under famous names ofantiquity; and that like the "Theology of Aristotle, " and the "Liber deCausis, " mentioned in the Introduction (p. Xx), it was Neo-Platonic incharacter. 

Thus Gabirol was a Neo-Platonist. This does not mean that he did notadopt many important Aristotelian conceptions. Neo-Platonism itselfcould not have arisen without Aristotle. The ideas of matter and form, and potentiality and actuality, and the categories, and so on, hadbecome the fixed elements of philosophical thinking, and no new systemcould do without them. In this sense Plotinus himself, the founder ofNeo-Platonism, is an Aristotelian. When we speak of Gabirol as aNeo-Platonist, we mean that the essence of his system is Neo-Platonic. He is not a dualist, but a monist. God and matter are not opposed as twoultimate principles, as they are in Aristotle. Matter in Gabirol isultimately identified with God. In this he goes even beyond Plotinus. For whereas in Plotinus matter occupies the lowest scale in thegradation of being as it flows from the One or the Good (_cf. _Introduction, p. Xxxviii), and becomes equivalent to the non-existent, and is the cause of evil, in Gabirol matter is the underlying substancefor all being from the highest to the lowest, with the one exception ofthe Creator himself. [89] It emanates from the essence of the Creator, forming the basis of all subsequent emanations. [90] Hence the spiritualsubstances of the celestial world, or, to use a more technical and moreprecise term--since spirit is not located in heaven or anywherespatially--the intelligible world, have matter underlying theirform. [91] In fact, matter itself is intelligible or spiritual, notcorporeal. [92] Corporeality and materiality are two different things. There are various gradations of matter, to be sure; for the prime matteras it emerges from the essence of the Creator pervades all existencefrom highest to lowest, and the further it extends from its origin theless spiritual and the more corporeal it becomes until in the sublunarworld we have in the matters of its particular objects, corporealmatter, _i. E. _, matter affected with quantity and magnitude and figureand color. [93] Like Plotinus, Gabirol conceives of the universe as aprocess of a gradually descending series of existences or worlds, as theKabbalistic writers term them; these cosmic existences radiating orflowing out of the superabundant light and goodness of the Creator. Thetwo extremes of this graded universe are God at the one end, and thecorporeal world at the other. Intermediate between these are thespiritual substances, Intelligence, Soul and Nature. [94] Man as amicrocosm, a universe in little, partakes of both the corporeal andintermediate worlds, and hence may serve as a model of the constitutionof the macrocosm, or great universe. His body is typical of thecorporeal world, which consists of the lowest matter, viz. , that whichhas no other form except that of corporeality, or extension, and theforms of figure, color, and so on, borne on top of the extension. [95]

Body as such is at rest and is not capable of action. To act it needs anagent. Hence it needs an agency to compose its parts and hold themtogether. We call this agency Nature. Man's body also grows, isnourished and propagates its kind as do plants. This likewise must haveits non-corporeal cause. This we call vegetative soul. Man has alsosense perception and local motion like the animals. The principle orsubstance causing this is the animal soul. Man also thinks and reasonsand reflects. This is brought about by the rational soul. Finally, manhas a still higher function than discursive thought. The latter has tosearch and to pass from premise to conclusion, whereas the apprehensionof the intelligence takes place "without seeking, without effort, andwithout any other cause except its own essence, because it is full ofperfection. " In other words, it is immediate intellectual intuition ofwhich Gabirol speaks here. The Intelligence is capable of this becauseit has in itself, constituting its essence, all the forms of existence, and knowledge means possession of the forms of the things known. 

As man is typical of the universe, it follows that there are cosmicexistences corresponding to the principles or powers just enumerated inman, and the relation of the latter to the former is that of theparticular to the general. Hence there is a cosmic Intelligence, acosmic soul embracing the rational, the animal and the vegetative parts, and a cosmic nature. Of these the more perfect is the cause of the lessperfect; hence the order in which we named them represents the order ofcausation or of emanation from the prime source. 

The lowest of these emanations is the matter which sustains extension ormagnitude, and with it the process ceases. This matter is no longer thesource of an additional form of existence. The various qualities andattributes which inhere in this corporeal matter are caused by thespiritual substances above. For like the prototype of all generosity andgoodness the First Essence or God, every one of the spiritual substancesproceeding from him has the same tendency of imparting its form or formsto the substance next below it. But the forms thus bestowed are nolonger the same as they are in the essence of the bestowing substance, as it depends upon the recipient what sort of form it will receive. Aninferior receiving substance will receive a superior form in an inferiorway. That is, the form which in the substance above the one in questionis contained in a spiritual and unitary manner, will be transformed inthe substance below it into something less spiritual, less unified, andmore nearly corporeal, _i. E. _, visible and tangible. Hence the visibleand tangible, and in general the sensible qualities of particular thingsin the sublunar world, are in reality descended from a line of spiritualancestors in the forms of the simple substances, Intelligence, Soul andNature. But it is their distance from the prime source, which increaseswith every transmission of influence, together with the cruder nature ofthe receiving substance, that makes the resulting forms corporeal andsensible. The matter may be made clear if we use the analogy of light, which is invisible as long as it is in air because it penetrates it, but becomes visible when it comes in contact with a gross body which itcannot penetrate. It then remains on the surface condensed, and becomesvisible to the senses. 

We thus see that the higher substance acts upon the lower and containsall that is found in the latter, though in a more perfect and simplemanner. The lower substances flow from the higher and yet the latter arenot diminished in their essence and power. [96]

That ordinary material objects are composed of matter and form isadmitted and we need not now prove it, as we have already discussed thesubject in the Introduction, where we gave an outline of theAristotelian philosophy. The principle peculiar to Gabirol is that notmerely the material objects of the sublunar world, but that theintelligible or spiritual substances also are composed of matter andform. [97] Whenever two things have something in common and something inwhich they differ, that which they have in common is the matter, that inwhich they differ is the form. Two things absolutely simple must beprime to each other, _i. E. _, they must have nothing in common, for ifthey have anything in common they have everything in common, and theyare no longer two things but one. Hence a spiritual substance must becomposite, for it must have something by which it differs from acorporeal substance, and something, viz. , substantiality, which it hasin common with it. In the same way the intelligible substances, Intelligence and Soul, have their substantiality in common, and theydiffer in form. Hence they are composed of matter and form, and thematter must be the same in all the intelligible substances; for theirdifferences are due to their forms, hence if their matters alsodiffered, they would have to differ in form, but matter as such has noform. Hence matter in itself is everywhere the same. 

As the Intelligence is the highest existence next to God, and iscomposed of matter and form, these are respectively the universal matterand universal form, embracing all subsequent matters and forms. [98]Hence the Intelligence in knowing itself knows everything, as everythingis contained in it. And as it is prior to everything and the cause ofeverything it has an immediate knowledge of all things without effort orsearching. 

But what is the origin of universal matter and universal form which, inconstituting Intelligence, are the fundamental principles of allexistence?[99] The answer is they come from the First Essence, God. Unity comes before duality or plurality, and there is no true unityexcept in God. Whatever issues from him is _ipso facto_, as a productwhich is not God, affected with duality. Matter and Form is thisduality. Their union is necessary and real, and it is only in thoughtthat we can keep them apart. In reality they form a unit, their unionvarying in perfection according as they are nearer or further away fromtheir origin. Hence the union is closest in Intelligence, the firstdivine emanation, and least close in corporeal objects of the sublunarworld, where plurality is the order of the day. 

This process by which universal matter and form issue from God may becalled creation. [100] But we must conceive of it on the analogy of waterflowing from a fountain in continued and uninterrupted succession. Theonly difference is that the emanation from God takes place withoutmotion and without time. 

The union of universal form and universal matter must be thought of as astamping of the form upon the matter. Matter has in itself no actual ordefinable existence. It serves merely as a _tabula rasa_, as a potentialbackground, as an empty receptacle, as a reflecting mirror for form tobe written, filled out, impressed or reflected therein or upon. Hence wemay view God as the spectator, universal matter as the mirror, anduniversal form as the reflection of the spectator in the glass. Godhimself does not enter the glass, only his reflection is outlinedtherein. And as matter and form are really the whole world, it wouldfollow that the universe is a reflection of God, though God remains inhimself and does not enter the world with his essence. 

We may also picture to ourselves this impression of form upon matter onthe analogy of speech. The speaker's words impress ideas upon the soulof the listener. So God speaks and his Word or Will impresses form uponmatter. The world is created by the Word or the Will[101] of God. 

In all these similes matter appears as something external to God, uponwhich he impresses form. But this is not strictly true, since matter hasno real existence without form, and has never so existed. The existenceof matter and form is simultaneous, and both come from God, matter fromhis essence, form from his attribute, or his Wisdom, or his Word, or hisWill. And yet in God, who is a perfect unity, essence and attribute areone. It is the Will of God, not God himself, that must be regarded asthe spectator, whose outline is reflected in the mirror of matter in theabove simile. It is the Will of God that writes form upon the chart ofmatter, and thereby produces a world. It is in virtue of the Will thatGod is said to be in everything. 

But what is this will of God as distinguished from God himself, since inGod there can be no duality of any kind? Gabirol's answer is not clearor satisfactory. The will, he says, is identical with God if we considerit apart from its activity; considered as active it is different fromthe divine essence. Exactly to describe it is impossible, but thefollowing is an approximation. It is a divine power producing matter andform, binding them together, pervading them throughout their extentabove and below, as the soul pervades the body, and moving and orderingeverything. 

God himself, or the First Essence, can be known only through the Will aspervading everything, _i. E. _, through his effects in the world. And inthis way too only his existence can be known but not his essence as heis in himself, because God is above everything and infinite. The soulmay know Intelligence because though the latter is above the soul thereis some similarity between them. But the First Essence has no similarityto Intelligence, therefore no intelligence can know it. 

There is a kind of mystic knowledge by which man may come in touch withthe spiritual substances and rise even to universal matter, which isabove Intelligence. "If you wish to form a picture of these substances, "the master says to the disciple in the "Fons Vitæ, " "you must raise yourintellect to the last intelligible, you must purify it from all sordidsensibility, free it from the captivity of nature and approach with theforce of your intelligence to the last limit of intelligible substancethat it is possible for you to comprehend, until you are entirelydivorced from sensible substance and lose all knowledge thereof. Thenyou will embrace, so to speak, the whole corporeal world in your being, and will place it in one corner of your soul. When you have done thisyou will understand the insignificance of the sensible in comparisonwith the greatness of the intelligible. Then the spiritual substanceswill be before your eyes, comprehending you and superior to you, and youwill see your own being as though you were those substances. Sometimesit will seem to you that you are a part of them by reason of yourconnection with corporeal substance; and sometimes you will think youare all of them, and that there is no difference between you and them, on account of the union of your being with their being, and theattachment of your form to their forms. " The pupil assures the teacherthat he has followed this advice and seen the whole corporeal worldfloating in the spiritual substances as a small boat in the sea, or abird in the air. "When you have raised yourself to the first universalmatter, " replies the teacher, "and illumined its shadow, you will seethere the wonder of wonders. Pursue this therefore diligently and withlove, because this is the purpose of the existence of the human soul, and in this is great delight and extreme happiness. "[102]

But Gabirol does not promise a knowledge of the Most High even throughthis royal road of ecstasy, unless we suppose that in the promise ofseeing in universal matter the wonder of all wonders there may be acovert allusion to a glimpse of the deepest secret of all, the essenceof God. 

All knowledge is according to Gabirol embraced in the following threetopics, (1) Matter and Form, (2) the Active Word or Will, (3) the FirstEssence or God. By far the larger part of the "Fons Vitæ" is devoted tothe first subject. Only brief hints are given of the second and third, and Gabirol refers us to a special work of his on the Will, which hesays he wrote. There is no trace of any such treatise. At any rate it isclear from the little that is contained on the Divine Will in the "FonsVitæ" that the Will forms an important element in Gabirol's philosophy. This is the more remarkable because it is not an essential element inNeo-Platonism, upon which Gabirol's system is based. Nay, the doctrineof a divine will scarcely has any place in the form of emanation taughtby Plotinus. The cosmic process is conceived there as necessary andimpersonal. And but for the introduction of the Will in the "Fons Vitæ"we should be forced to understand Gabirol in the same way. Thedifficulty in Neo-Platonism is that God is at the same time transcendentand, through his powers or emanations, immanent in the world. God isabove all being and at the same time is the cause of and pervades allexistence. Gabirol must have felt not merely this purely philosophicaldifficulty, but as a Jew, Pantheism as well as impersonalism must havebeen objectionable to him. Hence he mitigates both by introducing thedivine will as mediating between God and the world. This brings God incloser and more personal touch with his creation. The cosmic process isnot a necessary and impersonal flow or radiation but a voluntaryactivity having a purpose. The solution is unsatisfactory, as all suchsolutions are bound to be, because it introduces as many difficulties asit solves. The nature of this divine Will is ambiguous. If it is God'swill, and God is the One in whom there can be no distinctions, we haveonly a new word, and nothing is solved. If on human analogy we areinclined to take the will seriously, we are endangering God's unity. This dilemma Gabirol does not succeed in removing. His system still hasa strong flavor of Pantheism, and moreover his identification of theWill of God with the Wisdom and the Word of God, and his hypostatizationof the latter as in a sense a being distinct from God, reminds usstrongly of Philo's Logos, which became the Logos of Christianity, thesecond person in the Trinity. This is the reason why William ofAuvergne, bishop of Paris in the thirteenth century, regarded Avicebronas a Christian. And these same reasons were no doubt adequate toestrange Jewish readers, as Abraham ibn Daud expressly tells us abouthimself, though his terms are general (see above, p. 62). 

Gabirol is also the author of an ethical work which he composed in 1045. Though of little importance philosophically, or perhaps because of this, the "Tikkun Middot ha-Nefesh" (Improvement of the Qualities of the Soul)fared much better than its more important companion, the "Mekor Hayim. "Not only did it have the privilege of a Hebrew translation at the handsof the father of translators, Judah ibn Tibbon, but the original Arabicitself is still extant and was recently published with an Englishtranslation by Stephen S. Wise (1901). [103] The Hebrew translation alsohad the good fortune of being reprinted several times. This is due tothe fact that the "Tikkun Middot ha-Nefesh" is a popular work, dealingwith morals, and does not go into metaphysical questions. It is full ofBiblical citations, which stamps it as Jewish; and there are also in itquotations from Arabic writers serving to illustrate the argument andlending variety and interest to the style. 

The larger question of the aim of human life is touched on in the "FonsVitæ. " We are told there that the ultimate aim of man's existence isthat the soul should unite with the upper world to which itbelongs. [104] The particular human soul is according to Gabirol a part, though not in a physical sense, of the cosmic soul, which is one of theuniversal spiritual substances (see above, p. 66). Hence its own realexistence is spiritual and eternal, and independent of the body. Itsentrance into the body obscures its spiritual vision, though it does notlose all touch with the higher world from which it came. The senses andthe data of sense perception are not an end in themselves; they are onlya means for the soul through them to recall the higher knowledge whichwas its own in its spiritual existence, and thereby win its return tothe intelligible world. Man's duty therefore in this world is to striveto attain this higher life for his soul. This is brought about by meansof _knowledge_ and _practice_. This knowledge has to do with knowing allthings as they really are, and particularly the intelligible substancesand the Prime Essence. Practice signifies to keep away as far aspossible from things of sense, which are foreign to the soul and mightinjure it. What more particularly the things are which are beneficial tothe soul, and what are injurious, we learn from Gabirol's ethicaltreatise. Man's soul has a higher and a lower nature. The higher poweris the reason or rational soul, the lower is the animal or vegetativesoul; and man's business is to see that the reason rules over the lowernature. 

Gabirol does not give us any test by which we can tell whether a givenact or feeling belongs to the lower or higher nature except to say thatthe appetites are diseases of the body which must be cured; that they donot belong to the rational soul, and to satisfy them is not theattainment of a good. Gabirol's method of treating virtue and vice, orrather the virtues and the vices, is to relate them to the five sensesand the four humors in man, which in turn correspond to the fourelements, fire, air, water, earth, and the four primitive qualities, hot, cold, moist, dry. This division of the elements, the humors, thequalities and the senses was a commonplace of the physiological andmedical science of the time. We have met it in Isaac Israeli (see above, p. 3), and it goes back to Aristotle and Galen and Hippocrates. Theoriginality, though a queer one to be sure, of Gabirol is to bring theethical qualities of man into relation with all these. Theapproximations are forced in every instance and often ludicrous. Insteadof attempting to give a psychological analysis of the qualities inquestion, he lays stress on their physical basis in one of the fivesenses, as we shall see presently. 

The great world, we are told, was created out of the four elements, andsimilarly man, the microcosm, also consists of four naturescorresponding to the elements. Thus the four humors, upon the harmoniouscombination of which the health of man's body depends, viz. , blood, phlegm, black gall, and red gall, correspond respectively to air, water, earth, fire. Man is endowed besides with five senses. If he is wise hewill use his senses properly and in the right measure, like a skilfulphysician who calculates carefully what proportion of each drug shouldbe prescribed. 

The sense of sight is the noblest of the senses, and is related to thebody as the sun to the world. The philosophers have a wonderful sayingconcerning the eye that there are spiritual tints in the soul which arevisible in the movements of the eyelids--pride and haughtiness, humilityand meekness. Accordingly the ethical qualities due to the sense ofsight are pride, meekness, modesty and impudence, besides thesubordinate qualities derived from these. 

Pride is common in a person of a warm disposition in whom the red gallpredominates. Many wise men exhibit this quality out of place, foolsadopt it until they are mastered by it, and it is prevalent in youth. Itmay be useful when it keeps a man away from vice and unworthy things, inspiring him to rise to nobility of character and the service of God. But generally it is useless and leads to many evils, especially if itcauses one to be self-opinionated, refusing to seek the advice ofanyone. When a man sees this quality gaining mastery over him, he shouldconsider the origin and end of existing things. When he sees that allthings are destined to pass away, and himself likewise, his pride willchange to humility. 

Meekness is closer to virtue than the quality mentioned before, becausehe who possesses it withholds his desire from seeking gratification. Itis a quality manifested by the prophets and leads to honor. "The fruitsof lowliness, " a philosopher has said, "are love and tranquillity. "Contentment is of a kind with meekness. The greatest riches arecontentment and patience. He who esteems his rank but lightly enhancesman's estimation of his dignity. A wise man has said, "Be humble withoutcringing, and manly without being arrogant. Arrogance is a wildernessand haughtiness a taking refuge therein, and altogether a going astray. "

Modesty is connected with humility but is superior to it, for it is asister of reason, and reason, as everybody knows, is the most importantquality, which separates man from beast and brings him near to theangels. You never see a modest person without sense, or a person of goodsense who is not modest. A man must be modest not only before others butalso to himself. Modesty and faithfulness, it is said, are closelyrelated, and the one cannot be had truly without the other. 

The impudent man is disliked by God and by man, even if he be wise andlearned. If one has this quality it is the duty of his friend andassociate to break him of it by reproving him. It is of value only whenused in defence of the Torah and in behalf of God and the truth. 

Space will not permit us to treat in detail of the other senses and thevirtues and vices depending upon them, but we shall indicate brieflyGabirol's method of relating the ethical qualities to the physicalsenses. 

Thus the sense of hearing, which is next in importance to sight has asits qualities hate, love, mercy and cruelty. It takes some fine insight, he says, to see the connection of these qualities with the sense ofhearing, but the intelligent and discerning reader will find this hintsufficient. I hope he will not blame me, Gabirol continues, if I do notbring together all the reasons and the scriptural passages to provethis, for human flesh is weak, especially in my case on account of myvexatious experiences and disappointments. We find in the Bible loveassociated with hearing: "_Hear_, O Israel ... And thou shalt _love_ theLord thy God" (Deut. 6, 4). Hate follows hearing in the phrase: "WhenEsau heard the words of his father ... And Esau hated Jacob" (Gen. 27, 34-41). Mercy is related to hearing in Exod. (22, 26), "And I will hearfor I am merciful. " Finally cruelty is to refuse to listen, as we findin the case of Pharaoh (Ex. 9, 12), "And the Lord hardened the heart ofPharaoh, and he hearkened not unto them. "

In a similar manner Gabirol proves that the sense of smell has fourqualities, anger, favor, envy, wide-awakeness; the sense of taste, thefour qualities, joy, sorrow, regret, calmness; while liberality, niggardliness, courage and cowardice are related to the sense of touch. 

The relation of the ethical qualities to the senses, humors, elementsand primitive physical qualities is exhibited in the following table, asit appears in the Arabic text of the "Aslah al-Ahlak, " the originaltitle of Gabirol's ethical work. 

[Illustration]

Among Gabirol's religious poems there is one which interests usparticularly because it bears traces of the philosophy of the "FonsVitæ. " It is the most important of his hymns and is found in theprayer-book of the Sephardic ritual for the Day of Atonement. "The RoyalCrown, " as the poem is entitled, is an appeal to God for mercy andforgiveness, and is based upon the contrast between the greatness of Godand the insignificance of man. The first part is therefore devoted to apoetical description of God's attributes and the wonders of the cosmicsystem, as conceived in the astronomical science of the day. A fewquotations will give us an idea of the style and character of the hymnand its relation to the "Fons Vitæ. "

"Thine are the mysteries, which neither fancy nor imagination cancomprehend; and the life, over which dissolution hath no power. Thine isthe _Throne_ exalted above all height; and the habitation concealed inthe eminence of its recess. Thine is the existence, from the shadow ofwhose light sprung every existing thing; of which we said, under itsprotecting shadow shall we live.... 

"Thou art One, the first of every number, and the foundation of allstructure. Thou art One, and in the mystery of the Unity all the wise inheart are astonished; for they cannot define it. Thou art One, and thyUnity can neither be lessened nor augmented; for nothing is therewanting or superfluous. Thou art One, but not such a one as is estimatedor numbered; for neither plurality, nor change, form, nor physicalattribute, nor name expressive of thy quality, can reach thee.... "

In the same way he treats God's other attributes, existent, living, great, mighty. Then he continues:

"Thou art light, and the eyes of every pure soul shall see thee; for theclouds of iniquity alone hide thee from her sight.... Thou art mosthigh, and the eye of the intellect desireth and longeth for thee; but itcan only see a part, it cannot see the whole of thy greatness.... 

"Thou art God, who by thy Divinity supportest all things formed; andupholdest all creatures by thy Unity. Thou art God, and there is nodistinction between thy godhead, unity, eternity or existence; for allis one mystery; and although each of these attributes is variouslynamed, yet the whole point to one end. 

"Thou art wise, and wisdom, which is the _fountain of life_, flowethfrom thee; and compared with thy wisdom, the knowledge of all mankind isfolly. Thou art wise; and didst exist prior to all the most ancientthings; and wisdom was reared by thee. Thou art wise; and hast notlearned aught from another, nor acquired thy wisdom from anyone else. Thou art wise; and from thy wisdom thou didst cause to emanate a ready_will_, an agent and artist as it were, to draw existence out ofnon-existence, as light proceeds from the eye. Thou drawest from thesource of light without a vessel, and producest everything without atool. "

Then follows a description of the constitution of the sublunar world, the terrestrial sphere consisting of part earth, part water, and beingsurrounded by the successive spheres of air and fire. Then follow inorder the spheres of the Moon, Mercury, Venus, Sun, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, the spheres of the fixed stars, and the outermost sphereembracing all and giving to the entire heaven the diurnal motion fromeast to west. He then continues:

"Who can understand thy tremendous mysteries, when thou didst exaltabove the ninth orb, the sphere of the _Intelligence_; that is the innertemple; for the tenth shall be holy to the Lord. This is the spherewhich is exalted above all the highest, and which no imagination canreach; and there is the hiding-place, wherein is the canopy for thyglory.... 

"O Lord! who can come near thy understanding, when thou didst place onhigh above the sphere of the Intelligence the _Throne of thy glory_, where is the glorious dwelling of the hiding-place; there also is themystery and the _foundation_ (matter); so far the intellect may reachand no further; for above this art thou greatly exalted upon thy mightythrone, where no man may come up to thee.... 

"Who can comprehend thy power, when thou didst create from the splendorof thy glory a pure lustre? From the rock of rocks was it hewn, and dugfrom the hollow of the cave. Thou also didst bestow on it the spirit ofwisdom, and didst call it soul. Thou didst form it hewn from the flamesof intellectual fire, so that its spirit burneth as fire within it. Thoudidst send it forth to the body to serve and guard it; it is as fire inthe midst of it, and yet doth not consume it; for _from the fire of thesoul the body was created_, and called into existence from nothing, because the Lord descended thereto in fire. "

Here we see the Intelligence spoken of as standing above the heavenlyspheres. This clearly represents the cosmic Intelligence as a creationof God, "which is exalted above all the highest, " hence the firstproduct of God's light. And yet the _Throne of Glory_ is said to beplaced even above the sphere of the Intelligence. He speaks of it as themystery and the foundation (Yesod), beyond which the intellect cannotreach. This is apparently a contradiction, but becomes clear when welearn what is meant by the Throne of Glory, and by "foundation. " In the"Fons Vitæ" Gabirol tells us that matter receives form from the FirstEssence through the medium of the Will, which latter therefore, as itbestows form upon matter, sits in it and rests upon it. And hence, hesays, matter is as it were the stool (cathedra) of the One. The word"yesod" (foundation) which Gabirol applies in the "Keter Malkut" (RoyalCrown) to the Throne of Glory is the same that Falaquera uses for matterthroughout in his epitome of the "Mekor Hayim. " Hence it is clear thatthe Throne of Glory which is above the Intelligence is nothing else thanGabirol's matter. And we know from the "Fons Vitæ" that matter is reallyprior to Intelligence as it exists in the knowledge of God, but that inreality it never was, as a creation, without form; and that with form itconstitutes the Intelligence. Finally there is also a reference in thepoem to the will as emanating from God's wisdom, and like an "agent andartist drawing existence out of non-existence as light proceeds from theeye. " The process of creation is thus compared with the radiation oflight in the sentence just quoted, and likewise in the following: "Thoudrawest from the source of light without a vessel, and producesteverything without a tool. "

We do not know whether Gabirol wrote any commentaries on the Bible--noneare extant, nor are there any references to such works--but from hisexegetical attempts in his ethical work discussed above (p. 71 ff. ) andfrom citations by Abraham ibn Ezra of Gabirol's explanations of certainpassages in Scripture, we gather that like Philo of Alexandria beforehim and Maimonides and a host of philosophical commentators after him, he used the allegorical method to reconcile his philosophical views withthe Bible, and read the former into the latter. [105]

Thus we are told that Eden represents the presence of God, the gardenplanted in Eden stands for the angelic beings or, according to anotherinterpretation, for the world of sense. By the river which flows out ofEden is meant prime matter which issues from the essence of Godaccording to the "Fons Vitæ. " The four divisions of the river are thefour elements; Adam is the rational soul, Eve, as the Hebrew nameindicates, the animal soul, and the serpent is the vegetative orappetitive soul. The serpent entices Adam to eat of the forbidden tree. This means that when the lower soul succeeds in controlling the reason, the result is evil and sin, and man is driven out of the Garden, _i. E. _, is excluded from his angelic purity and becomes a corporeal being. 

It is clear from all this that Gabirol's omission of all reference toJewish dogma in the "Fons Vitæ" was purely methodological. Philosophy, and religion or theology should be kept apart in a purely philosophicalwork. Apologetics or harmonization has its rights, but it is a differentdepartment of study, and should be treated by itself, or in connectionwith exegesis of the Bible. 

While it is true that Gabirol's influence on subsequent Jewishphilosophy is slight--at most we find it in Moses and Abraham ibn Ezra, Abraham ibn Daud and Joseph ibn Zaddik--traces of his ideas are met within the mysticism of the Kabbala. Gabirol's "Fons Vitæ" is a peculiarcombination of logical formalism with mystic obscurity, or profundity, according to one's point of view. The latter did not appeal to purerationalists like Ibn Daud or Maimonides, and the former seemedunconvincing, as it was employed in a lost cause. For Neo-Platonism wasgiving way to Aristotelianism, which was adopted by Maimonides and madethe authoritative and standard philosophy. It was different with theKabbala. Those who were responsible for its spread in the thirteenthcentury must have been attracted by the seemingly esoteric character ofa philosophy which sees the invisible in the visible, the spiritual inthe corporeal, and the reflection of the unknowable God in everything. There are certain details also which are common to both, such as theanalogies of irradiation of light or flowing of water used to representthe process of creation, the position of the Will, the existence ofmatter in spiritual beings, and so on, though some of these ideas arecommon to all Neo-Platonic systems, and the Kabbala may have had accessto the same sources as Gabirol. 

CHAPTER VI

BAHYA IBN PAKUDA

All that is known of the life of Bahya ben Joseph ibn Pakuda is that helived in Spain and had the office of "Dayyan, " or judge of the Jewishcommunity. Not even the exact time in which he lived is yet determined, though the most reliable recent investigations make it probable that helived after Gabirol and was indebted to the latter for some of his viewsin philosophy as well as in Ethics. [106] So far as traditional data areconcerned we have equally reliable, or rather equally unreliablestatements for regarding Bahya as an older contemporary of Gabirol(eleventh century), or of Abraham ibn Ezra (1088-1167). Neither of thesetwo data being vouched for by any but their respective authors, wholived a long time after Bahya, we are left to such indirect evidence asmay be gathered from the content of Bahya's ethical work, the "Duties ofthe Hearts. " And here the recent investigations of Yahuda, the latestauthority on this subject and the editor of the Arabic text of Bahya'smasterpiece (1912), force upon us the conclusion that Bahya wrote afterGabirol. Yahuda has shown that many passages in the "Duties of theHearts" are practically identical in content and expression with similarideas found in a work of the Arab philosopher Gazali (1059-1111). Thisleaves very little doubt that Bahya borrowed from Gazali and hence couldnot have written before the twelfth century. 

To be sure, there are arguments on the other side, which would givechronological priority to Bahya over Gabirol, [107] but without goinginto the details of this minute and difficult discussion, it may be saidgenerally that many of the similarities in thought and expressionbetween the two ethical works of Gabirol and Bahya rather point in favorof the view here adopted, namely, that Bahya borrowed from Gabirol, while the rest prove nothing for either side. In so far as a reader ofthe "Duties of the Hearts" recognizes here and there an idea met with inGabirol's "Fons Vitæ, " there can scarcely be any doubt that the latteris the more original of the two. Gabirol did not borrow his philosophyor any part thereof from Bahya. Despite its Neo-Platonic character the"Fons Vitæ" of Gabirol is the most independent and original of Jewishmediæval productions. The "Duties of the Hearts" owes what originalityit has to its ethics, which is the chief aim of the work, and not at allto the introductory philosophical chapter. As we shall see later, theentire chapter on the existence and unity of God, which introduces theethical teachings of Bahya, moves in the familiar lines of Saadia, AlMukammas, Joseph al Basir and the other Jewish Mutakallimun. There isbesides a touch of Neo-Platonism in Bahya, which may be due to Gabirolas well as to Arabic sources. That Bahya did not borrow more from the"Fons Vitæ" than he did is due no doubt to the difference in temperamentbetween the two men. Bahya is not a mystic. Filled as he is with thespirit of piety and warmth of heart--an attitude reflected in his style, which helped to make his work the most popular moral-religious book inJewish literature--there is no trace of pantheism or metaphysicalmysticism in his nature. His ideas are sane and rational, and theirexpression clear and transparent. Gabirol's high flights in the "FonsVitæ" have little in common with Bahya's modest and brief outline of thefamiliar doctrines of the existence, unity and attributes of God, forwhich he claims no originality, and which serve merely as the backgroundfor his contribution to religious ethics. That Bahya should have taken afew leading notions from the "Fons Vitæ, " such as did not antagonize histemperament and mode of thinking, is quite possible, and we shall bestexplain such resemblances in this manner. 

As Abraham ibn Ezra in 1156 makes mention of Bahya and his views, [108]we are safe in concluding that the "Duties of the Hearts" was writtenbetween 1100 and 1156. 

As the title of the work indicates, Bahya saw the great significance ofa distinction made by Mohammedan theologians and familiar in theirascetic literature, between outward ceremonial or observance, known as"visible wisdom" and "duties of the limbs, " and inward intention, attitude and feeling, called "hidden wisdom" and "duties of thehearts. "[109] The prophet Isaiah complains that the people are diligentin bringing sacrifices, celebrating the festivals and offering prayerwhile their hands are full of blood. He informs them that such conductis an abomination to the Lord, and admonishes them to wash themselves, to make themselves clean, to put away the evil of their deeds frombefore God's eyes; to cease to do evil; to learn to do well, to seek forjustice, to relieve the oppressed, to do justice to the fatherless, toplead for the widow (Isa. 1, 11-17). This is a distinction betweenduties to God and duties to one's fellow man, between religious ceremonyand ethical practice. Saadia makes a further distinction--also found inArabic theology before him--between those commandments and prohibitionsin the Bible which the reason itself approves as right or condemns aswrong--the rational commandments--and those which to the reason seemindifferent, and which revelation alone characterizes as obligatory, permitted or forbidden--the so-called "traditional commandments. "

Bahya's division is identical with neither the one nor the other. Ethical practice may be purely external and a matter of the limbs, quiteas much as sacrifice and ceremonial ritual. On the other hand, one mayfeel profoundly moved with the spirit of true piety, love of God andloyalty to his commandments in the performance of a so-called"traditional commandment, " like the fastening of a "mezuzah" to thedoor-post. Bahya finds room for Saadia's classification but it is withhim of subordinate importance, and is applicable only to the "duties ofthe limbs. " Among these alone are there some which the reason unaided byrevelation would not have prescribed. The "duties of the heart" are allrational. Like all precepts they are both positive and negative. Examples of positive duties of the heart are, belief in a creator whomade the world out of nothing; belief in his unity and incomparability;the duty to serve him with all our heart, to trust in him, to submit tohim, to fear him, to feel that he is watching our open and secretactions, to long for his favor and direct our actions for his name'ssake; to love those who love him so as to be near unto him, and to hatethose who hate him. Negative precepts of this class are the opposites ofthose mentioned, and others besides, such as that we should not covet, or bear a grudge, or think of forbidden things, or desire them orconsent to do them. The common characteristic of all duties of the heartis that they are not visible to others. God alone can judge whether aperson's feeling and motives are pure or the reverse. 

That these duties are incumbent upon us is clear from every point ofview. Like Saadia Bahya finds the sources of knowledge, particularly ofthe knowledge of God's law and religion, in sense, reason, written lawand tradition. Leaving out the senses which are not competent in thisparticular case, the obligatory character of the duties of the heart isvouched for by the other three, reason, law, tradition. 

From reason we know that man is composed of soul and body, and that bothare due to God's goodness. One is visible, the other is not. Hence weare obliged to worship God in a two-fold manner; with visible worshipand invisible. Visible worship represents the duties of the limbs, suchas prayer, fasting, charity, and so on, which are carried out by thevisible organs. The hidden worship includes the duties of the heart, forexample, to think of God's unity, to believe in him and his Law, toaccept his worship, etc. , all of which are accomplished by the thoughtof the mind, without the assistance of the visible limbs. 

Besides, the duties of the limbs, the obligation of which no one doubts, are incomplete without the will of the heart to do them. Hence itfollows that there is a duty upon our souls to worship God to the extentof our powers. 

The Bible is just as emphatic in teaching these duties as the reason. The love of God and the fear of God are constantly inculcated; and inthe sphere of negative precepts we have such prohibitions as, "Thoushalt not covet" (Exod. 20, 17); "Thou shalt not take vengeance, norbear any grudge" (Lev. 19, 18); "Thou shalt not hate thy brother in thyheart" (ib. 17); "You shalt not go astray after your own heart" (Num. 15, 39); "Thou shalt not harden thy heart nor shut thy hand from thyneedy brother" (Deut. 15, 7), and many others. 

Rabbinical literature is just as full of such precepts as the Bible, andis if possible even more emphatic in their inculcation. Witness suchsayings as the following: "Heaven regards the intention" (Sanh. 106b):"The heart and the eye are two procurers of sin" (Jer. Berak. 1), andmany others, particularly in the treatise Abot. 

The great importance of these duties is also made manifest by the factthat the punishment in the Bible for unintentional misdeeds is morelenient than for intentional, proving that for punishment the mind mustshare with the body in the performance of the deed. The same is true ofreward, that none is received for performing a good deed if it is notdone "in the name of heaven. "

They are even more important than the duties of the limbs, for unlikethe latter the obligation of the duties of the heart is always in force, and is independent of periods or circumstances. Their number, too, isinfinite, and not limited, as are the duties of the limbs, to sixhundred and thirteen. 

And yet, Bahya complains, despite the great importance of these duties, very few are the men who observed them even in the generations precedingours, not to speak of our own days when even the external ceremonies areneglected, much more so the class of precepts under discussion. Themajority of students of the Torah are actuated by desire for fame andhonor, and devote their time to the intricacies of legalistic discussionin Rabbinic literature, and matters unessential, which are of no accountin the improvement of the soul; but they neglect such important subjectsof study as the unity of God, which we ought to understand anddistinguish from other unities, and not merely receive parrot fashionfrom tradition. We are expressly commanded (Deut. 4, 39), "Knowtherefore this day, and reflect in thy heart, that the Eternal is theGod in the heavens above, and upon the earth beneath: there is noneelse. " Only he is exempt from studying these matters whose powers arenot adequate to grasp them, such as women, children and simpletons. 

Moreover Bahya is the first, he tells us, among the post-Talmudicalwriters, to treat systematically and _ex professo_ this branch of ourreligious duties. When I looked, he says, into the works composed by theearly writers after the Talmud on the commandments, I found that theirwritings can be classified under three heads. First, exposition of theTorah and the Prophets, like the grammatical and lexicographicaltreatises of Ibn Janah, or the exegetical works of Saadia. Second, briefcompilations of precepts, like the works of Hefez ben Yazliah and theresponsa of some geonim. Third, works of a philosophico-apologeticcharacter, like those of Saadia, Al Mukammas and others, whose purposeit was to present in an acceptable manner the doctrines of the Torah, toprove them by logical demonstration, and to refute the criticisms anderroneous views of unbelievers. But I have not seen any book dealingwith the "hidden wisdom. "[110]

Here we see clearly the purpose of Bahya. It is not the rationalizationof Jewish dogma that he is interested in, nor the reconciliation ofreligion and philosophy. It is the purification of religion itself fromwithin which he seeks to accomplish. Sincerity and consistency in ourwords and our thoughts, so far as the service of God is concerned, isthe fundamental requirement and essential value of the duties of theheart. To be sure this cannot be attained without intelligence. Theknowledge of God and of his unity is a prerequisite for a properunderstanding and an adequate appreciation of our religious duties. Philosophy therefore becomes a necessity in the interest of a purer andtruer religion, without reference to the dangers threatening it fromwithout. 

Having found, he continues in the introduction to the "Duties of theHearts, " that all the three sources, reason, Bible and tradition, command this branch of our religious duties, I tried to think about themand to learn them, being led from one topic to another until the subjectbecame so large that I feared I could not contain it all in my memory. Ithen determined to write the subject down systematically in a book formy own benefit as well as for the benefit of others. But I hesitatedabout writing it on account of my limitations, the difficulty of thesubject and my limited knowledge of Arabic, the language in which Iintended writing it because the majority of our people are best familiarwith it. But I thought better of it and realized that it was my duty todo what I could even if it was not perfect; that I must not yield to theargument springing from a love of ease and disinclination to effort; forif everyone were to abstain from doing a small good because he cannot doas much as he would like, nothing would ever be done at all. 

Having decided to compose the work, he continues, I divided the subjectinto ten fundamental principles, and devoted a section of the book toeach principle. I endeavored to write in a plain and easy style, omitting difficult expressions, technical terms and demonstrations inthe manner of the dialecticians. I had to make an exception in the firstsection dealing with the existence and unity of God, where the sublet ofthe subject required the employment of logical and mathematical proofs. For the rest I made use of comparisons or similes, adduced support fromthe Bible and tradition, and also quoted the sages of othernations. [111]

We have already seen in the introduction that Bahya was indebted for hisideas to the ascetic and Sufic literature of the Arabs, and Yahuda, whois the authority in this matter of Bahya's sources, has shown recentlythat among the quotations of the wise men of other nations in Bahya'swork are such as are attributed by the Arabs to Jesus and the gospels, to Mohammed and his companions, to the early caliphs, in particular thecaliph Ali, to Mohammedan ascetics and Sufis. [112]

In selecting the ten general and inclusive principles, Bahya lays downas the first and most fundamental the doctrine of the deity, or as it iscalled in the works of the Kalam, the Unity. As God is a true unity, being neither substance nor accident, and our thought cannot graspanything except substance or accident, it follows that we cannot knowGod as he is in himself, and that we can get a conception of him and ofhis existence from his creatures only. The second section is thereforedevoted to an examination of creation. Then follow in order sectionstreating of the service of God, trust in God, action for the sake of Godalone, submission to God, repentance, self-examination, separation fromthe pleasures of the world, love of God. 

In his discussion of the unity of God, Bahya follows the same method asSaadia, and the Kalam generally, _i. E. _, he first proves that the worldmust have been created; hence there must be a creator, and this isfollowed by a demonstration of God's unity. The particular arguments, too, are for the most part the same, as we shall see, though differentlyexpressed and in a different order. The important addition in Bahya ishis distinction between God's unity and other unities, which is notfound so strictly formulated in any of his predecessors, and goes backto Pseudo-Pythagorean sources in Arabian literature of Neo-Platonicorigin. 

In order to prove that there is a creator who created the world out ofnothing we assume three principles. First, nothing can make itself. Second, principles are finite in number, hence there must be a firstbefore which there is no other. Third, every composite is "new, " _i. E. _, came to be in time, and did not exist from eternity. 

Making use of these principles, which will be proved later, we proceedas follows: The world is composite in all its parts. Sky, earth, starsand man form a sort of house which the latter manages. Plants andanimals are composed of the four elements, fire, air, water, earth. Theelements again are composed of matter and form, or substance andaccident. Their matter is the primitive "hyle, " and their form is theprimitive form, which is the root of all forms, essential as well asaccidental. It is clear therefore that the world is composite, andhence, according to the third principle, had its origin in time. As, according to the first principle, a thing cannot make itself, it musthave been made by some one. But as, in accordance with the secondprinciple, the number of causes cannot be infinite, we must finallyreach a first cause of the world before which there is no other, andthis first made the world out of nothing. 

Before criticising this proof, from which Bahya infers more than islegitimate, we must prove the three original assumptions. 

The proof of the first principle that a thing cannot make itself isidentical in Bahya with the second of the three demonstrations employedby Saadia for the same purpose. It is that the thing must either havemade itself before it existed or after it existed. But both areimpossible. Before it existed it was not there to make itself; after itexisted there was no longer anything to make. Hence the firstproposition is proved that a thing cannot make itself. 

The proof of the second proposition that the number of causes cannot beinfinite is also based upon the same principle as the fourth proof inSaadia for the creation of the world. The principle is this. Whateverhas no limit in the direction of the past, _i. E. _, had no beginning, but is eternal a _parte ante_, cannot have any stopping point anywhereelse. In other words, we as the spectators could not point to anydefinite spot or link in this eternally infinite chain, because thechain must have traversed infinite time to reach us, but the infinitecan never be traversed. Since, however, as a matter of fact we can anddo direct our attention to parts of the changing world, this shows thatthe world must have had a beginning. 

A second proof of the same principle is not found in Saadia. It is asfollows: If we imagine an actual infinite and take away a part, theremainder is less than before. Now if this remainder is still infinite, we have one infinite larger than another, which is impossible. If we saythe remainder is finite, then by adding to it the finite part which wastaken away, the result must be finite; but this is contrary tohypothesis, for we assumed it infinite at the start. Hence it followsthat the infinite cannot have a part. But we can separate in thought outof all the generations of men from the beginning those that livedbetween the time of Noah and that of Moses. This will be a finite numberand a part of all the men in the world. Hence, as the infinite can haveno part, this shows that the whole number of men is finite, and hencethat the world had a beginning. 

This proof is not in Saadia, but we learn from Maimonides ("Guide of thePerplexed, " I, ch. 75) that it was one of the proofs used by theMutakallimun to prove the absurdity of the belief in the eternity of theworld. 

The third principle is that the composite is "new. " This is provedsimply by pointing out that the elements forming the composite are priorto it by nature, and hence the latter cannot be eternal, for nothing isprior to the eternal. This principle also is found in Saadia as thesecond of the four proofs in favor of creation. [113]

We have now justified our assumptions and hence have proved--what?Clearly we have only proved that this _composite_ world cannot haveexisted _as such_ from eternity; but that it must have been composed ofits elements at some point in time past, and that hence there must be acause or agency which did the composing. But there is nothing in theprinciples or in the demonstration based upon them which gives us aright to go back of the composite world and say of the elements, thesimple elements at the basis of all composition, viz. , matter and form, that they too must have come to be in time, and hence were created outof nothing. It is only the composite that argues an act of compositionand elements preceding in time and by nature the object composed ofthem. The simple needs not to be made, hence the question of its havingmade itself does not arise. It was not made at all, we may say, it justexisted from eternity. 

The only way to solve this difficulty from Bahya's premises is by sayingthat if we suppose matter (or matter and form as separate entities) tohave existed from eternity, we are liable to the difficulty involved inthe idea of anything having traversed infinite time and reached us;though it is doubtful whether unformed matter would lend itself to theexperiment of abstracting a part as in generations of men. 

Be this as it may, it is interesting to know that Saadia having arrivedas far as Bahya in his argument was not yet satisfied that he provedcreation _ex nihilo_, and added special arguments for this purpose. 

Before proceeding to prove the unity of God, Bahya takes occasion todismiss briefly a notion which scarcely deserves consideration in hiseyes. That the world could have come by accident, he says, is too absurdto speak of, in view of the evidence of harmony and plan and wisdomwhich we see in nature. As well imagine ink spilled by accident formingitself into a written book. [114] Saadia also discusses this view as theninth of the twelve theories of creation treated by him, and refutes itmore elaborately than Bahya, whose one argument is the last of Saadia'seight. 

In the treatment of creation Saadia is decidedly richer and morecomprehensive in discussion, review and argumentation. This was to beexpected since such problems are the prime purpose of the "Emunotve-Deot, " whereas they are only preparatory, though none the lessfundamental, in the "Hobot ha-Lebabot, " and Bahya must have felt thatthe subject had been adequately treated by his distinguishedpredecessor. It is the more surprising therefore to find that in thetreatment of the unity of God Bahya is more elaborate, and offers agreater variety of arguments for unity as such. Moreover, as has alreadybeen said before, he takes greater care than anyone before him to guardagainst the identification of God's unity with any of the unities, theoretical or actual, in our experience. There is no doubt that thisemphasis is due to Neo-Platonic influence, some of which may have cometo Bahya from Gabirol, the rest probably from their common sources. 

We see, Bahya begins his discussion of the unity of God, that the causesare fewer than their effects, the causes of the causes still fewer, andso on, until when we reach the top there is only one. Thus, the numberof individuals is infinite, the number of species is finite; the numberof genera is less than the number of species, until we get to thehighest genera, which according to Aristotle are ten (the tencategories). Again, the causes of the individuals under the categoriesare five, motion and the four elements. The causes of the elements aretwo, matter and form. The cause of these must therefore be one, the willof God. (The will of God as immediately preceding universal matter andform sounds like a reminiscence of the "Fons Vitæ". )

God's unity is moreover seen in the unity of plan and wisdom that isevident in the world. Everything is related to, connected with anddependent upon everything else, showing that there is a unitaryprinciple at the basis. 

If anyone maintains that there is more than one God, the burden of prooflies upon him. Our observation of the world has shown us that there is aGod who made it; hence one, since we cannot conceive of less than one;but why more than one, unless there are special reasons to prove it?

Euclid defines unity as that in virtue of which we call a thing one. This means to signify that unity precedes the unitary thing by nature, just as heat precedes the hot object. Plurality is the sum of ones, hence plurality cannot be prior to unity, from which it proceeds. Hencewhatever plurality we find in our minds we know that unity precedes it;and even if it occurs to anyone that there is more than one creator, unity must after all precede them all. Hence God is one. 

This argument is strictly Neo-Platonic and is based upon the idealism ofPlato, the notion that whatever reality or attributes particular thingsin our world of sense possess they owe to the real and eternal types ofthese realities and attributes in a higher and intelligible (using theterm in contradistinction to sensible) world in which they participate. In so far as this conception is applied to the essences of things, itleads to the hypostatization of the class concepts or universals. Notthe particular individual whom we perceive is the real man, but thetypical man, the ideal man as the mind conceives him. He is not aconcept but a real existent in the intelligible world. If we apply italso to qualities of things, we hypostatize the abstract quality. Heatbecomes really distinct from the hot object, existence from the existentthing, goodness from the good person, unity from the one object. And athing is existent and one and good, because it participates inExistence, Unity and Goodness. These are real entities, intelligibleand not sensible, and they give to our world what reality it possesses. 

Plotinus improved upon Plato, and instead of leaving these Ideas asdistinct and ultimate entities, he adopted the suggestion of Philo andgathered up all these intelligible existences in the lap of theuniversal Reason, as his ideas or thoughts. This universal Reason is inPhilo the _Logos_, whose mode of existence is still ambiguous, and israther to be understood as the divine mind. In Plotinus it is the firststage in the unfoldment of the Godhead, and is a distinct _hypostasis_, though not a person. In Christianity it is the second person in theTrinity, incarnated in Jesus. In Israeli, Gabirol and the other JewishNeo-Platonists, it occupies the same place as the _Nous_ in Plotinus. InBahya, whose taint of Neo-Platonism is not even skin deep, there is nouniversal Reason spoken of. But we do not really know what his ideas mayhave been on the subject, as he does not develop them in this direction. 

To return to Bahya's arguments in favor of the unity of God, we proceedto show that dualism would lead to absurd conclusions. Thus if there ismore than one creator, they are either of the same substance or they arenot. If they are, then the common substance is the real creator, and wehave unity once more. If their substances are different, they aredistinct, hence limited, finite, composite, and hence not eternal, whichis absurd. 

Besides, plurality is an attribute of substance, and belongs to thecategory of quantity. But the creator is neither substance nor accident(attribute), hence plurality cannot pertain to him. But if he cannot bedescribed as multiple, he must be one. 

If the creator is more than one, it follows that either each one of themcould create the world alone, or he could not except with the help ofthe other. If we adopt the first alternative, there is no need of morethan one creator. If we adopt the second, it follows that the creator islimited in his power, hence, as above, composite, and not eternal, whichis impossible. Besides, if there were more than one creator, it ispossible that a dispute might arise between them in reference to thecreation. But all this time no such thing has happened, nature beingalways the same. Hence God is one. Aristotle also agrees with us, for heapplies in this connection the Homeric expression, "It is not good tohave many rulers, let the ruler be one" (Iliad, II, 204; Arist. , Metaphysics, XII, ch. 10, p. 1076a 4). [115]

So far as Bahya proves the unity of God he does not go beyond Saadia, some of whose arguments are reproduced by him, and one or two of aNeo-Platonic character added besides. But there is a decided advance inthe analysis which follows, in which Bahya shows that there are variouskinds of unity in our experience, and that the unity of God is unique. 

We apply the term one to a class, a genus, a species, or an individual. In all of these the multiplicity of parts is visible. The genus animalcontains many animals; the species man embraces a great many individualmen; and the individual man consists of many parts and organs andfaculties. Things of this sort are one in a sense and many in a sense. 

We also apply the term one to an object in which the multiplicity ofparts is not as readily visible as in the previous case. Take forexample a body of water which is homogeneous throughout and one part islike another. This too is in reality composed of parts, matter and form, substance and accident. It is in virtue of this composition that it issubject to genesis and decay, composition and division, union andseparation, motion and change. But all this implies plurality. Hence inboth the above cases the unity is not essential but accidental. It isbecause of a certain appearance or similarity that we call a thing or aclass one, which is in reality many. 

Another application of the term one is when we designate by it the basisof number, the numerical one. This is a true one, essential asdistinguished from the accidental referred to above. But it is mentaland not actual. It is a symbol of a beginning which has no other beforeit. 

Finally there is the real and actual one. This is something that doesnot change or multiply; that cannot be described by any materialattribute, that is not subject to generation and decay; that does notmove and is not similar to anything. It is one in all respects and thecause of multiplicity. It has no beginning or end, for that which has issubject to change, and change is opposed to unity, the thing beingdifferent before and after the change. For the same reason the real onedoes not resemble anything, for resemblance is an accident in theresembling thing, and to be possessed of accidents is to be multiple. Hence the true one resembles nothing. Its oneness is no accident in it, for it is a purely negative term in this application. It means notmultiple. [116]

We have now shown that there is a creator who is one, and on the otherhand we have analyzed the various meanings of the term one, the last ofwhich is the most real and the purest. It remains now to show that thispure one is identical with the one creator. This can be proved in thefollowing way. The world being everywhere composite contains the one aswell as the many--unity of composition, plurality of the parts composed. As unity is prior by nature to plurality, and causes do not run on toinfinity (see above, p. 87), the causes of the world's unity andmultiplicity cannot be again unity and multiplicity of the same kindforever. Hence as multiplicity cannot be the first, it must beunity--the absolute and true unity before which there is no other, andin which there is no manner of multiplicity. But God is the one cause ofthe universe, as we have shown, hence God and this true unity are thesame. 

We can show this also in another way. Whatever is an accidentalattribute in one thing is an essential element in some other thing. Thusheat is an accidental attribute in hot water. For water may lose itsheat and remain water as before. It is different with fire. Fire cannotlose its heat without ceasing to be fire. Hence heat in fire is anessential element; and it is from fire that hot water and all other hotthings receive their heat. The same thing applies to the attribute ofunity. It is accidental in all creatures. They are called one becausethey combine a number of elements in one group or concept. But they arereally multiple since they are liable to change and division and motion, and so on. Hence there must be something in which unity is essential, and which is the cause of whatsoever unity all other things possess. ButGod is the cause of the universe, hence he is this true and absoluteunity, and all change and accident and multiplicity are foreign tohim. [117]

This unity of God is not in any way derogated from by the ascription tohim of attributes. For the latter are of two kinds, "essential" and"active. " We call the first essential because they are permanentattributes of God, which he had before creation and will continue tohave when the world has ceased to be. These attributes are three innumber, Existing, One, Eternal. We have already proved every one ofthem. 

Now these attributes do not imply change in the essence of God. They areto be understood in the sense of denying their opposites, _i. E. _, thathe is not multiple, non-existent or newly come into being. They alsoimply each other as can easily be shown, _i. E. _, every one of the threeimplies the other two. We must understand therefore that they are really_one_ in idea, and if we could find one term to express the thoughtfully, we should not use three. But the three do not imply multiplicityin God. 

The "active" are those attributes which are ascribed to God by reason ofhis actions or effects on us. We are permitted to apply them to himbecause of the necessity which compels us to get to know of hisexistence so that we may worship him. The Biblical writers use them veryfrequently. We may divide these into two kinds: First, those whichascribe to God a corporeal form, such as (Gen. 1, 27), "And God createdman in his image, " and others of the same character. Second, thoseattributes which refer to corporeal movements and actions. These havebeen so interpreted by our ancient sages as to remove the corporealityfrom God by substituting the "Glory of God" for God as the subject ofthe movement or act in question. Thus, (Gen. 28, 13) "And behold theLord stood above it, " is rendered by the Aramaic translator, "and beholdthe _glory of God was present_ above it. " Saadia deals with this matterat length in his "Emunot ve-Deot, " in his commentary on Genesis, and onthe book "Yezirah. " So there is no need of going into detail here. Weare all agreed that necessity compels us to speak of God in corporealterms so that all may be made to know of God's existence. This theycould not do if the prophets had spoken in metaphysical terms, for noteveryone can follow such profound matters. But having come to theknowledge of God in this simpler though imperfect way, we can thenadvance to a more perfect knowledge of him. The intelligent andphilosophical reader will lose nothing by the anthropomorphic form ofthe Bible, for he can remove the husk and penetrate to the kernel. Butthe simple reader would miss a very great deal indeed if the Bible werewritten in the language of philosophy, as he would not understand it andwould remain without a knowledge of God. 

Despite its predominant anthropomorphism, however, the Bible does giveus hints of God's spirituality so that the thoughtful reader may alsohave food for _his_ thought. For example, such expressions as (Deut. 4, 15), "Take ye therefore good heed unto yourselves; for ye saw no mannerof form on the day that the Lord spake unto you in Horeb out of themidst of the fire, " and many others are meant to spur on thediscriminating reader to further thought. The same applies to all thosepassages in which the word "name" is inserted before the word God as theobject of praise to indicate that we do not know God in his essence. Anexample of this is, "And they shall bless the name of thy glory" (Neh. 9, 5). For the same reason the name of God is joined in the Bible toheaven, earth, the Patriarchs, in such phrases as the God of theheavens, the God of Abraham, and so on, to show that we do not knowGod's essence but only his revelation in nature and in history. This isthe reason why after saying to Moses, "I am sent me unto you" (Ex. 3, 14), he adds (ib. 15), tell them, "the God of your fathers, the God ofAbraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob sent me unto you. " Themeaning is, if they cannot understand God with their reason, let themknow me from history and tradition. [118]

In Bahya's treatment of the divine attributes we already have in briefthe main elements which Maimonides almost a century later made classic, namely, the distinction between essential and active attributes, and theidea that the former are to be understood as denying their opposites, _i. E. _, as being in their nature not positive but negative. The outcometherefore is that only two kinds of attributes are applicable to God, negative and those which are transferred or projected from the effectsof God's activity as they are visible in nature. Saadia had already madethe distinction between essential and active attributes, but it wasquite incidental with him, and not laid down at the basis of hisdiscussion, but casually referred to in a different connection. AlMukammas speaks of negative attributes as being more applicable to Godthan positive, as Philo had already said long before. But thecombination of these two, negative and active, as the only kinds ofdivine attributes is not found in Jewish literature before Bahya. 

It is worth noting also that Bahya does not lay down the threeattributes, Power, Wisdom and Life as fundamental or essential in themanner of the Christians, the Arab Mutakallimun, and the Jewish Saadia. Bahya, as we have seen, regards as God's essential attributes, existence, unity, eternity. Herein, too, he seems to anticipateMaimonides who insists against the believers in essential attributesthat the attributes, living, omnipotent, omniscient, having a will, areno more essential than any other, but like the rest of the qualitiesascribed to God have reference to his activity in nature. [119]

We have now gone through Bahya's philosophical chapter giving us themetaphysical basis of his ethico-religious views. That his purpose ispractical and not theoretical is clear from his definition of what hecalls the "acknowledgment of the unity of God with full heart, " not tospeak of the title of the book itself, the meaning of which we explainedat the beginning of this section, and the nine chapters in Bahya's workfollowing upon the first, which constitute its real essence and purpose. To acknowledge the unity of God with full heart means, he tells us, thatone must first know how to prove the existence and unity of God, todistinguish God's unity from every other, and then to make his heart andhis tongue unite in this conception. [120] It is not a matter of theintellect merely, but of the heart as affecting one's practical conduct. The adequacy of the conception is destroyed not merely by thinking ofGod as multiple, or by worshiping images, sun, moon and stars; it ismade null and void likewise by hypocrisy and pretence, as when oneaffects piety before others to gain their favor or acquire a reputation. The same disastrous result is brought about by indulging the lowphysical appetites. Here the worship of the appetites is brought intocompetition and rivalry with devotion to the one God. [121]

Our object being to trace the philosophical conceptions in mediævalJewish literature, we cannot linger long in the study of the rest ofBahya's masterpiece, which is homiletical and practical rather thantheoretic, and must content ourselves with a very brief résumé of itsprincipal contents. 

In studying the nature and attributes of God we reached the conclusionthat while a knowledge of him is absolutely necessary for a proper modeof life, we cannot form an idea of him as he is in himself, and are leftto such evidence as we can gather from the world of which he is theauthor. It becomes our duty, therefore, to study nature, as a whole andin its parts, conscientiously and minutely, in order to realize clearlythe goodness and wisdom of God as exhibited therein. For various reasonswe are apt to neglect this study and miss the insight and benefitsarising therefrom. Chief among these hindering circumstances are ourexcessive occupations with the pleasures of this world, and theaccidents and misfortunes to which mortal is heir, which blind him tohis real good, and prevent him from seeing the blessing in disguiselurking in these very misfortunes. 

But it is clear that man has a duty to study the divine goodness andwisdom as exhibited in nature, else of what use is his faculty of reasonand intelligence, which raises him above the beast. If he neglects it, he places himself below the latter, which realizes all the functions ofwhich it is capable. Bible and Talmud are equally emphatic in urging usto study the wonders of nature. 

The variety of natural phenomena and the laws they exhibit give evidenceof the personality of God and the existence of his will. A being withoutwill, acting by necessity of nature, acts with unswerving uniformity. 

Heaven and earth, plant and animal, all creatures great and small, bearwitness, in their structure and relations, in their functions and mutualservice and helpfulness, to the wisdom and goodness of God. Above all isthis visible in man, the highest of earthly beings, the microcosm, therational creature, the discoverer and inventor of arts and sciences. Inthe laws and statutes which were given to him for the service of God, and in the customs of other nations which take the place of our divinelaw, we see God's kindness to man in securing his comfort in this worldand reward in the next. 

Pride is the great enemy of man, because it prevents him fromappreciating what he owes to God's goodness. Pride makes him feel thathe deserves more than he gets, and blinds him to the truth. [122]

We all recognize the duty of gratitude to a fellow man who has done us afavor, although all such cases of benefit and service between man andman, not excepting even the kindness of a father to his child, will befound on examination to be of a selfish nature. The benefit to self maynot in all cases be conscious, but it is always there. It is a father'snature to love his child as part of himself. Moreover, these humanfavors are not constant, and the person benefited stands comparativelyon the same level of existence and worth as his benefactor. How muchgreater then is the duty incumbent upon us to appreciate God's favorswhich are not selfish, which are constant, and which are bestowed by thegreatest of all beings upon the smallest of all in respect of physicalstrength. 

The only way in which man can repay God for his kindness, and show anappreciation thereof is by submitting to him and doing those thingswhich will bring him nearer to God. In order to realize this it isnecessary to abandon the bad qualities, which are in principle two, loveof pleasure and love of power. The means enabling one to obtain thisfreedom are to abstain from too much eating, drinking, idling, and soon, for the first, and from too much gossip, social intercourse, andlove of glory for the second. It may be difficult to do this, but onemust make up one's mind to it, like the invalid who is ready to lose alimb in order to save his life. 

The problem of free will is perplexing indeed and interferes with theproper attitude toward God and his worship. The best way out of thedifficulty is to act as if we were free, and on the other hand to haveconfidence in God as the author of everything. 

We have seen that the reason bids us recognize our duty to God in returnfor his goodness to us. At the same time we are not left to thesuggestions and promptings of the reason alone. We have a positive lawprescribing our conduct and the manner and measure of expressing ourgratitude to God. This is made necessary by the constitution of man'snature. He is a composite of body and spirit. The former is at home inthis lower world and is endowed with powers and qualities which tend tostrengthen it at the expense of the spirit, a stranger in this world. Hence the necessity of a positive law to cure the spirit from the illsof the body by forbidding certain kinds of food, clothing, sexualindulgence, and so on, which strengthen the appetites, and commandingsuch actions as prayer, fasting, charity, benevolence, which have theopposite tendency of strengthening the reason. 

The positive law is necessary and useful besides because it prescribesthe middle way, discouraging equally the extremes of asceticism and ofself-indulgence. It regulates and defines conduct, and makes it uniformfor old and young, intelligent and unintelligent. It institutes newoccasions of worship and thanksgiving as history reveals newbenefactions of God to his people in various generations. The law alsocontains matters which the reason alone would not dictate, and of whichit does not understand the meaning. Such are the "traditionalcommandments. " The reason why the law prescribes also some of theprinciples of the "rational commandments" is because at that time thepeople were so sunk in their animal desires that their minds wereweakened, and there was need of putting both classes of commandments onthe same level of positive prescription. But now the intelligent personobserves them in accordance with their distinct origin, whereas themasses simply follow the law in both. 

The admonition of the positive law serves as an introduction to thesuggestions of our own reason and prepares the way for the latter. Thefirst is absolutely necessary for the young, the women and those of weakintellectual power. To worship God not merely because the law prescribesit, but because reason itself demands it denotes a spiritual advance, and puts one in the grade of prophets and pious men chosen of God. Inthis world their reward is the joy they feel in the sweetness of divineservice; in the next world they attain to the spiritual light which wecannot declare or imagine. [123]

One of the duties of the heart is to trust in God. Apart from the Biblewhich commands us to have trust in God, we can come to the sameconclusion as a result of our own reflection. For in God alone arecombined all the conditions necessary to confidence. He has the power toprotect and help us, and the knowledge of our needs. He is kind andgenerous and has a love for us and an interest in our welfare, as wehave shown in a previous discussion. Trust in God is of advantagereligiously in giving a person peace of mind, independence and freedomto devote himself to the service of God without being worried by thecares of the world. He is like the alchemist who changes lead intosilver, and silver into gold. If he has money he can make good use of itin fulfilling his duties to God and man. If he has not, he is gratefulfor the freedom from care which this gives him. He is secure againstmaterial worries. He does not have to go to distant lands to look forsupport, or to engage in hard and fatiguing labor, or to exploit otherpeople. He chooses the work that is in consonance with his mode oflife, and gives him leisure and strength to do his duty to God and man. 

The suffering of the good and the prosperity of the bad, whichapparently contradicts our conclusion, is a problem as old as the world, and is discussed in the Bible. There is no one explanation to cover allcases, hence no solution is given in the Bible. But several reasons maybe brought forward for this anomaly. The righteous man may suffer by wayof punishment for a sin he has committed. He may suffer in this world inorder that he may be rewarded in the next. His suffering may be anexample of patience and goodness to other people; especially in a badgeneration, to show off their wickedness by contrast with his goodness. Or finally the good man may be punished for not rebuking his generationof evil doers. In a similar way we may explain the prosperity of thewicked. 

Trust in God does not signify that one should neglect one's work, becareless of one's life, health and well-being, or abandon one's effortto provide for one's family and dependents. No, one must do all thesethings conscientiously, at the same time feeling that if not for thehelp of God all effort would be in vain. In the matter of doing one'sduty and observing the commandments, whether of the limbs or the heart, trust in God can apply only to the last step in the process, namely, therealization in practice. He must trust that God will put out of the wayall obstacles and hindrances which may prevent him from carrying out hisresolutions. The choice and consent must come from a man's own will, which is free. The most he may do is to trust that God may removetemptations. 

While it is true that good deeds are rewarded in this world as well asin the next, a man must not trust in his deeds, but in God. It may seemstrange that there is no reference in the Bible to reward in thehereafter. The reasons may be the following. Not knowing what the stateof the soul is without the body, we could not understand the nature offuture reward, and the statement of it in the Bible would not have beena sufficient inducement for the people of that time to follow thecommandments. Or it is possible that the people knew by tradition ofreward after death, hence it was not necessary to specify it. 

As knowledge of nature and of God leads to trust in him, so ignoranceleads away from it. It is as with a child, who develops in his manner oftrusting in things; beginning with his mother's breast and risinggradually as he grows older and knows more, until he embraces otherpersons and attains to trust in God. [124]

We said before (p. 83) that the duties of the limbs are imperfect unlessaccompanied by the intention of the heart. A man's motive must besincere. It must not be his aim to gain the favor of his fellowmen or toacquire honor and fame. The observance of the prescribed laws must bemotived by the sole regard for God and his service. This we call the"unity of conduct. " The meaning is that a man's act and intention mustcoincide in aiming at the fulfilment of God's will. In order to realizethis properly one must have an adequate and sincere conception of God'sunity as shown above; he must have an appreciation of God's goodness asexhibited in nature; he must submit to God's service; he must have trustin God alone as the sole author of good and evil; and correspondingly hemust abstain from flattering mankind, and must be indifferent to theirpraise and blame; he must fear God, and have respect and awe for him. When he is in the act of fulfilling his spiritual obligations, he mustnot be preoccupied with the affairs of this world; and finally he mustalways consult his reason, and make it control his desires andinclinations. [125]

Humility and lowliness is an important element conducive to "unity ofconduct. " By this is not meant that general helplessness in the face ofconditions, dangers and injuries because of ignorance of the methods ofaverting them. This is not humility but weakness. Nor do we mean thattimidity and loss of countenance which one suffers before a superior inphysical power or wealth. The true humility with which we are hereconcerned is that which one feels constantly before God, though it showsitself also in such a person's conduct in the presence of others, insoft speech, low voice, and modest behavior generally, in prosperity aswell as adversity. The truly humble man practices patience andforgiveness; he does good to mankind and judges them favorably; he iscontented with little in respect to food and drink and the needs of thebody generally; he endures misfortune with resignation; is not spoiledby praise, nor irritated by blame, but realizes how far he is fromperfection in the one case, and appreciates the truth of the criticismin the other. He is not spoiled by prosperity and success, and alwaysholds himself under strict account. God knows it, even if his fellowmendo not. 

Humility, as we have described it, is not, however, incompatible with acertain kind of pride; not that form of it which boasts of physicalexcellence, nor that arrogance which leads a man to look down uponothers and belittle their achievements. These forms of pride are bad anddiametrically opposed to true humility. Legitimate mental pride is thatwhich leads a person blessed with intellectual gifts to feel grateful toGod for his favor, and to strive to improve his talents and share theirbenefits with others. [126]

Humility is a necessary forerunner of repentance and we must treat ofthis duty of the heart next. It is clear from reason as well as from theLaw that man does not do all that is incumbent upon him in the serviceof God. For man is composed of opposite principles warring with eachother, and is subject to change on account of the change of his mentalqualities. For this reason he needs a law and traditional custom to keephim from going astray. The Bible also tells us that "the imagination ofthe heart of man is evil from his youth" (Gen. 8, 21). Therefore God wasgracious and gave man the ability and opportunity to correct hismistakes. This is repentance. 

True repentance means return to God's service after having succeeded inmaking the reason the master of the desires. The elements in repentanceare, (1) regret; (2) discontinuance of the wrong act; (3) confession andrequest for pardon; (4) promise not to repeat the offence. 

In respect to gravity of offence, sins may be divided into threeclasses: (1) Violation of a positive commandment in the Bible which isnot punished by "cutting off from the community. " For example, dwellingin booths, wearing fringes, and shaking the palm branch. (2) Violationof a negative commandment not so punished. (3) Violation of a negativecommandment the penalty for which is death at the hands of the court, and being "cut off" by divine agency; for example, profanation of thedivine name or false oath. In cases of the first class a penitent is asgood as one who never sinned. In the second class he is even superior, because the latter has not the same prophylactic against pride. In thethird class the penitent is inferior to the one who never sinned. 

Another classification of offences is in two divisions according to thesubject against whom the offence is committed. This may be a humanbeing, and the crime is social; or it may be God, and we have sin in theproper sense of the term. Penitence is sufficient for forgiveness in thelatter class, but not in the former. When one robs another or insultshim, he must make restoration or secure the pardon of the offended partybefore his repentance can be accepted. And if the person cannot befound, or if he died, or is alive but refuses to forgive his offender, or if the sinner lost the money which he took, or if he does not knowwhom he robbed, or how much, it may be impossible for him to atone forthe evil he has done. Still if he is really sincere in his repentance, God will help him to make reparation to the person wronged. [127]

Self-examination is conducive to repentance. By this term is meanttaking stock of one's spiritual condition so as to know the merits onehas as well the duties one owes. In order to do this conscientiously aman must reflect on the unity of God, on his wisdom and goodness, on theobedience which all nature pays to the laws imposed upon it, disregardof which would result in the annihilation of all things, includinghimself. A man should review his past conduct, and provide for hisfuture life, as one provides for a long journey, bearing in mind thatlife is short, and that he is a stranger in this world with no one tohelp him except the goodness and grace of his maker. He should cultivatethe habit of being alone and not seek the society of idlers, for thatleads to gossip and slander, to sin and wrong, to vanity and neglect ofGod. This does not apply to the company of the pious and the learned, which should be sought. He should be honest and helpful to his friends, and he will get along well in this world. All the evils and complaintsof life are due to the fact that people are not considerate of oneanother, and everyone grabs for himself all that he can, more than heneeds. One should examine anew the ideas one has from childhood to besure that he understands them in the light of his riper intellect. Heshould also study again the books of the Bible and the prayers which helearned as a child, for he would see them now in a different light. Hemust try to make his soul control his body, strengthening it withintellectual and spiritual food for the world to come. These efforts andreflections and many others of a similar kind tend to perfect the souland prepare it to attain to the highest degree of purity, where the evildesire can have no power over her. [128]

In self-examination temperance or abstemiousness plays an importantrôle. Let us examine this concept more closely. By abstemiousness in thespecial sense in which we use it here we do not mean that generaltemperance or moderation which we practice to keep our body in goodorder, or such as physicians prescribe for the healthy and the sick, bidding them abstain from certain articles of food, drink, and so on. Wemean rather a more stringent abstemiousness, which may be calledseparation from the world, or asceticism. We may define this to meanabstention from all corporeal satisfactions except such as areindispensable for the maintenance of life. 

Not everyone is required to practice this special form of temperance, nor is it desirable that he should, for it would lead to extinction ofthe human race. At the same time it is proper that there shall be a fewselect individuals, ascetic in their habits of life, and completelyseparated from the world, to serve as an example for the generality ofmankind, in order that temperance of the more general kind shall be thehabit of the many. 

The object of God in creating man was to try the soul in order to purifyit and make it like the angels. It is tried by being put in an earthybody, which grows and becomes larger by means of food. Hence God putinto the soul the desire for food, and the desire for sexual union toperpetuate the species; and he made the reward for the satisfaction ofthese desires the pleasure which they give. He also appointed the "evilinclination" to incite to all these bodily pleasures. Now if this "evilinclination" gets the upper hand of the reason, the result is excess andruin. Hence the need of general abstemiousness. And the ascetic classserve the purpose of reinforcing general temperance by their example. 

But in the asceticism of the few there is also a limit beyond which oneshould not go. Here too the middle way is the best. Those extremists wholeave the world entirely and live the life of a recluse in the desert, subsisting on grass and herbs, are farthest from the middle way, and theBible does not approve of their mode of life, as we read in Isaiah (45, 18) "The God that formed the earth and made it; he that hathestablished it, --not in vain did he create it, he formed it to beinhabited. " Those are much better who without leaving for the desertpass solitary lives in their homes, not associating with other people, and abstaining from superfluities of all kinds. But the best of all arethose who adopt the mildest form of asceticism, who separate from theworld inwardly while taking part in it outwardly, and assisting in theordinary occupations of mankind. These are commended in the Bible. Witness the prayer of Jacob (Gen. 28, 20), the fasting of Moses fortydays and forty nights on the mount, the fasting of Elijah, the laws ofthe Nazirite, Jonadab ben Rechab, Elisha, prescriptions of fasting onvarious occasions, and so on. [129]

The highest stage a man can reach spiritually is the love of God, andall that preceded has this as its aim. True love of God is that felttoward him for his own sake because of his greatness and exaltation, andnot for any ulterior purpose. 

The soul is a simple spiritual substance which inclines to that which islike it, and departs from what is material and corporeal. But when Godput the soul into the body, he implanted in it the desire to maintainit, and it was thus affected by the feelings and desires which concernthe health and growth of the body, thus becoming estranged from thespiritual. 

In order that the soul shall attain to the true love of God, the reasonmust get the upper hand of the desires, all the topics treated in thepreceding sections must be taken to heart and sincerely andconscientiously acted upon. Then the eyes of the soul will be opened, and it will be filled with the fear and the love of God. [130]

CHAPTER VII

PSEUDO-BAHYA

It had been known for a number of years that there was a manuscripttreatise in Arabic on the soul, which was attributed on the title pageto Bahya. In 1896 Isaac Broydé published a Hebrew translation of thiswork under the title "Torot ha-Nefesh, " ("Reflections on theSoul"). [131] The original Arabic was edited by Goldziher in 1907. [132]The Arabic title is "Maʿani al-Nafs, " and should be translated "Conceptsof the soul, " or "Attributes of the soul. "

There seems little doubt now that despite the ascription on the titlepage of the manuscript, the treatise is not a work of Bahya. It is veryunlikely that anything written by so distinguished an author as Bahya, whose "Duties of the Hearts" was the most popular book in the middleages, should have been so thoroughly forgotten as to have left no tracein Jewish literature. Bahya as well as the anonymous author refer, inthe introductions to their respective works, to their sources or totheir own previous writings. But there is no reference either in the"Duties of the Hearts" to the "Attributes of the Soul, " or in the latterto the former. A still stronger argument against Bahya as the author ofour treatise is that derived from the content of the work, which movesin a different circle of ideas from the "Duties of the Hearts. " Ouranonymous author is an outspoken Neo-Platonist. He believes in thedoctrine of emanation, and arranges the created universe, spiritual andmaterial, in a descending series of such emanations, ten in number. TheMutakallimun he opposes as being followers of the "Naturalists, " whodisagree with the philosophers as well as the Bible. Bahya, on the otherhand, is a strict follower of the Kalam in his chapter on the "Unity, "as we have seen (p. 86), and the Neo-Platonic influence is very slight. There is no trace of a graded series of emanations in the "Duties of theHearts. "[133]

The sources of the "Attributes of the Soul" are no doubt the variousNeo-Platonic writings current among the Arabs in the tenth and eleventhcenturies, of which we spoke in the Introduction (p. Xx) and in thechapter on Gabirol (p. 63 f. ). Gabirol himself can scarcely have hadmuch influence on our author, as the distinctive doctrine of the "FonsVitæ" is absent in our treatise. The reader will remember that matterand form, according to Gabirol, are at the basis not merely of thecorporeal world, but that they constitute the essence of the spiritualworld as well, the very first emanation, the Universal Intelligence, being composed of universal matter and universal form. As we shall seethis is not the view of the "Attributes of the Soul. " Matter hereoccupies the position which it has in Plotinus and in the encyclopædiaof the Brethren of Purity. It is the fourth in order of emanations, andthe composition of matter and form begins with the celestial sphere, which is the fifth in order. Everything that precedes matter isabsolutely simple. At the same time it seems clear that he was familiarwith Gabirol's doctrine of the will. For in at least two passages in the"Attributes of the Soul" (chs. 11 and 13)[134] we have the series, vegetative soul, spheral impression, [psychic power--omitted in ch. 13], universal soul, intellect, will. 

The "Categories" of Aristotle is also clearly evident in the "Attributesof the Soul. " It is the ultimate source of the definition of accident asthat which resides in substance without being a part of it, but yet insuch a way that without substance it cannot exist. [135] The number ofthe species of motion as six[136] points in the same direction. This, however, does not prove that the author read the "Categories. " He mighthave derived these notions, as well as the list of the ten categories, from the writings of the Brethren of Purity. The same thing applies tothe statement that a spiritual substance is distinguished from acorporeal in its capacity of receiving its qualities or accidentswithout limits. [137] This probably goes back to the De Anima ofAristotle where a similar contrast between the senses and the reason isused as an argument for the "separate" character of the latter. Thedoctrine of the mean in conduct[138] comes from the ethics of Aristotle. The doctrine of the four virtues and the manner of their derivation isPlatonic, [139] and so is the doctrine of reminiscence, viz. , that thesoul recalls the knowledge it had in its previous life. [140]

Ibn Sina is one of the latest authors mentioned in our work; hence itcould not have been written much before 1037, the date of Ibn Sina'sdeath. The _terminus ad quem_ cannot be determined. 

As the title indicates, the anonymous treatise is concerned primarilywith the nature of the soul. Whatever other topics are found therein areintroduced for the bearing they have on the central problem. A study ofthe soul means psychology as well as ethics, for a completedetermination of the nature of the soul necessarily must throw light notonly upon the origin and activity of the soul, but also upon its purposeand destiny. 

The first error, we are told, that we must remove concerning the soul, is the doctrine of the "naturalists, " with whom the Muʿtazilites amongthe Arabs and the Karaites among the Jews are in agreement, that thesoul is not an independent and self-subsistent entity, but only an"accident" of the body. Their view is that as the soul is a corporealquality it is dependent for its existence upon the body and disappearswith the latter. Those of the Muʿtazilites who believe in "Mahad"(return of the soul to its origin), hold that at the time of theresurrection God will bring the parts of the body together with itsaccident, the soul, and will reward and punish them. But theresurrection is a distinct problem, and has nothing to do with thenature of the soul and its qualities. 

The true opinion, which is that of the Bible and the true philosophers, is that the soul is a spiritual substance independent of the body; thatit existed before the body and will continue to exist after thedissolution of the latter. The existence of a spiritual substance isproved from the presence of such qualities as knowledge and ignorance. These are opposed to each other, and cannot be the qualities of body assuch, for body cannot contain two opposite forms at the same time. Moreover, the substance, whatever it be, which bears the attributes ofknowledge and ignorance, can receive them without limit. The moreknowledge a person has, the more capable he is of acquiring more. Nocorporeal substance behaves in this way. There is always a limit to abody's power of receiving a given accident. We legitimately conclude, therefore, that the substance which bears the attributes of knowledgeand ignorance is not corporeal but spiritual. [141]

To understand the position of the soul and its relation to the body, wemust have an idea of the structure and origin of the universe. Theentire world, upper as well as lower, is divided into two parts, simpleand composite. The simple essences, which are pure and bright, arenearer to their Creator than the less simple substances which comeafter. There are ten such creations with varying simplicity, followingeach other in order according to the arrangement dictated by God'swisdom. As numbers are simple up to ten, and then they begin to becompound, so in the universe the ten simple substances are followed bycomposite. 

The first of these simple creations, which is nearest to God, is calledin Hebrew "Shekinah. " The Torah and the Prophets call it "Name" (Exod. 23, 21), also "Kabod, " Glory (Is. 59, 19). God gave his name to thenearest and first of his creations, which is the first light, andinterpreter and servant nearest to him. Solomon calls it "Wisdom" (Prov. 8, 22); the Greeks, Active Intellect. The second creation is called bythe Prophets, "the Glory of the God of Israel" (Ezek. 8, 9); by theGreeks, Universal Soul, for it moves the spheres through a natural poweras the individual soul moves the body. The soul partakes of theIntelligence or Intellect on the side which is near to it; it partakesof Nature on the side adjoining the latter. Nature is the thirdcreation. It also is an angel, being the first of the powers of theuniversal soul, and constituting the life of this world and its motion. 

These three are simple essences in the highest sense of the word. Theyare obedient to their Creator, and transmit in order his emanation andthe will, and the laws of his wisdom to all the worlds. The fourthcreation is an essence which has no activity or life or motionoriginally, but only a power of receiving whatever is formed and createdout of it. This is the _Matter_ of the world. From it come the bodieswhich possess accidents. In being formed some of its non-existence isdiminished, and its matter moves. It is called "hyle, " and is the sameas the darkness of the first chapter in Genesis. For it is a mistake tosuppose that by darkness in the second verse of the first chapter ismeant the absence of the light of the sun. This is accidental darkness, whereas in the creation story the word darkness signifies somethingelemental at the basis of corporeal things. This is what is known asmatter, which on account of its darkness, _i. E. _, its imperfection andmotionlessness, is the cause of all the blemishes and evils in theworld. In receiving forms, however, it acquires motion; its darkness issomewhat diminished, and it appears to the eye through the forms whichit receives. 

The fifth creation is the celestial Sphere, where for the first time wehave motion in its revolutions. Here too we have the first compositionof matter and form; and the beginning of time as the measure of theSphere's motion; and place. The sixth creation is represented by thebodies of the _stars_, which are moved by the spheres in which they areset. They are bright and luminous because they are near the first simplebodies, which were produced before time and place. The last four of theten creations are the four elements, fire, air, water, earth. Theelement earth is the end of "creation. " What follows thereafter is"formation" and "composition. " By creation is meant that which resultsthrough the will of God from his emanation alone, and not out ofanything, or in time or place. It applies in the strictest sense to thefirst three only. The fifth, namely the Sphere, already comes frommatter and form, and is in time and place. The fourth, too, enters intothe fifth and all subsequent creations and formations. Still, the termcreation is applicable to the first ten, though in varying degrees, until when we reach the element earth, creation proper is at an end. This is why in the first verse in Genesis, which speaks of heaven andearth, the term used is "bara" (created), and not any of the otherterms, such as "yazar, " "ʿasah, " "kanah, " "paʿal, " and so on, whichdenote formation. 

From earth and the other elements were formed all kinds of minerals, like rocks, mountains, stones, and so on. Then plants and animals, andfinally man. 

Man who was formed last bears traces of all that preceded him. He isformed of the four elements, of the motions of the spheres, of themixtures of the stars and their rays, of Nature, of the Universal Soul, the mother of all, of the Intellect, the father of all, and finally ofthe will of God. But the order in man is reversed. The first twocreations, Intellect and Soul, appear in man last. 

The soul of man, embracing reason and intellect, is thus seen to be adivine emanation, being related to the universal soul and Intellect. Onits way from God to man it passes through all spheres, and every oneleaves an impression upon her, and covers her with a wrapper, so tospeak. The brightness of the star determines the ornament or "wrapper"which the soul gets from it. This is known to the Creator, whodetermines the measure of influence and the accidents attaching to thesoul until she reaches the body destined for her by his will. The longerthe stay in a given sphere the stronger the influence of the sphere inquestion; and hence the various temperaments we observe in persons, which determine their character and conduct. For at bottom the soul isthe same in essence and unchangeable in all men, because she is anemanation from the Unchangeable. All individual differences are due tothe spheral impressions. These impressions, however, do not take awayfrom the soul its freedom of will. [142]

In the rest of his psychology and ethics the anonymous author followsPlatonic theories, modified now and then in the manner of Aristotle. Thus we are told that the soul consists of three powers, or three souls, the vegetative, the animal and the rational. We learn of the existenceof the vegetative soul from the nourishment, growth and reproductionevidenced by the individual. The animal soul shows its presence in themotions of the body. The existence of the rational soul we have alreadyshown from the attributes of knowledge and ignorance. 

The vegetative soul comes from certain spheral influences, themselvesdue to the universal soul, and ultimately to the will of God. It is thefirst of the three to make its appearance in the body. It is alreadyfound in the embryo, to which it gives the power of motion in its ownplace like the motion of a plant or tree. Its seat is in the liver, where the growth of the embryo begins. Its function ceases about thetwentieth year, when the growth of the body reaches its limit. 

The animal soul springs from the heart. Its functioning appears afterbirth when the child begins to crawl, and continues until the personloses the power of locomotion in old age. The rational soul resides inthe middle of the brain. She knows all things before joining the body, but her knowledge is obscured on account of the material coverings whichshe receives on her way down from her divine source. [143]

The virtue of the vegetative soul is temperance; of the animal soul, courage; of the rational soul, wisdom. When these are harmoniouslycombined in the individual, and the two lower souls are controlled bythe higher, there results the fourth virtue, which is justice, and whichgives its possessor the privilege of being a teacher and a leader of hispeople. In Moses all these qualities were exemplified, and Isaiah (11, 1-4) in describing the qualities of the Messianic King also enumeratesthese four cardinal virtues. "The spirit of wisdom and understanding"represents wisdom, "the spirit of counsel and strength" stands forcourage; "the spirit of knowledge and fear of the Lord" denotestemperance; and justice is represented in the phrase, "and he will judgethe poor with righteousness. "[144]

Virtue is a mean between the two extremes of excess and defect, each ofwhich is a vice. Thus an excess of wisdom becomes shrewdness and cunningand deceit; while a defect means ignorance. The true wisdom consists inthe middle way between the two extremes. Similarly courage is a meanbetween foolhardiness and rashness on the side of excess, and cowardiceon the side of defect. Temperance is a mean between excessive indulgenceof the appetites on one side and utter insensibility on the other. Themean of justice is the result of the harmonious combination of the meansof the last three. If the rational soul has wisdom and the two othersouls are obedient to it through modesty and courage, their substancechanges into the substance of the rational soul, _i. E. _, their badqualities are transformed into the four virtues just mentioned. Then thetwo lower souls unite with the rational soul and enjoy eternal happinesswith it. On the other hand, if the rational soul follows the senses, itswisdom changes into their folly, its virtues into their vices, and itperishes with them. [145]

The immortality of the soul is proved as follows. Things composed ofelements return back to their elements, hence the soul also returns toits own origin. The soul is independent of the body, for its qualities, thought and knowledge, are not bodily qualities, hence they becomeclearer and more certain after the soul is separated from the body thanbefore, when the body obscured its vision like a curtain. The fact thata person's mind is affected when his body is ill does not show that thesoul is dependent in its nature upon the body; but that acting as itdoes in the body by means of corporeal organs, it cannot perform itsfunctions properly when these organs are injured. 

Since death is a decree of God, it is clear that he has a purpose inchanging the relations of body and soul. But if the soul comes to anend, this change would be a vain piece of work of which he cannot beguilty. Hence it follows that the destruction of the body is in orderthat we may exist in another similar form, similar to the angels. [146]

The purpose of the soul's coming into this world is in order that shemay purify the two lower souls; also that she may know the value of herown world in comparison with this one, and in grieving for having leftit may observe God's commandments, and thus achieve her return to herown world. 

In the matter of returning to their own world after separation from thebody, souls are graded according to the measure of their knowledge andthe value of their conduct. These two conditions, ethical and spiritualor intellectual, are requisite of fulfilment before the soul can regainits original home. The soul on leaving this world is like a clean, whitegarment soaked in water. If the water is clean, it is easy to dry thegarment, and it becomes even cleaner than it was before. But if thewater is dirty, no amount of drying will make the garment clean. 

Those souls which instead of elevating the two lower souls, vegetativeand animal, were misled by them, will perish with the latter. Betweenthe two extremes of perfection and wickedness there are intermediatestages, and the souls are treated accordingly. Those of the proud willrise in the air and flying hither and thither will not find a restingplace. Those which have knowledge, but no good deeds, will rise to thesphere of the ether, but will be prevented from rising higher by theweight of their evil deeds, and the pure angels will rain down upon themarrows of fire, thus causing them to return below in shame and disgrace. The souls of the dishonest will be driven from place to place withoutfinding any rest. Other bad souls will be punished in various ways. Those souls which have good deeds but no knowledge will be placed in theterrestrial paradise until their souls recall the knowledge they had intheir original state, and they will then return to the Garden of Edenamong the angels. [147]

CHAPTER VIII

ABRAHAM BAR HIYYA

Abraham bar Hiyya, the Prince, as he is called, lived in Spain in thefirst half of the twelfth century. He also seems to have stayed sometime in southern France, though we do not know when or how long. Hisgreatest merit lies not in his philosophical achievement which, if wemay judge from the only work of a philosophical character that has comedown to us, is not very great. He is best known as a writer onmathematics, astronomy and the calendar; though there, too, his mostimportant service lay not so much in the original ideas he propounded, as in the fact that he was among the first, if not the first, tointroduce the scientific thought current in the Orient and in MoorishSpain into Christian Europe, and especially among the Jews of France andGermany, who devoted all their energies to the Rabbinical literature, and to whom the Arabic works of their Spanish brethren were a sealedbook. 

So we find Abraham bar Hiyya, or Abraham Savasorda (a corruption of theArabic title Sahib al-Shorta), associated with Plato of Tivoli in thetranslation into Latin of Arabic scientific works. And he himself wrotea number of books on mathematics and astronomy in Hebrew at the requestof his friends in France who could not read Arabic. Abraham bar Hiyya isthe first of the writers we have treated so far who composed ascientific work in the Hebrew language. All the others, with theexception of Abraham ibn Ezra, wrote in Arabic, as they continued to dountil and including Maimonides. 

The only one of his extant works which is philosophical in content isthe small treatise "Hegyon ha-Nefesh, " Meditation of the Soul. [148] Itis a popular work, written with a practical purpose, ethical andhomiletic in tone and style. The idea of repentance plays an importantrôle in the book, and what theoretical philosophy finds place therein isintroduced merely as a background and basis for the ethical andreligious considerations which follow. It may be called a miniature"Duties of the Hearts. " As in all homiletical compositions in Jewishliterature, exegesis of Biblical passages takes up a good deal of thediscussions, and for the history of the philosophic movement in mediævalJudaism the methods of reading metaphysical and ethical ideas into theBible are quite as important as these ideas themselves. 

The general philosophical standpoint of Abraham bar Hiyya may becharacterized as an uncertain Neo-Platonism, or a combination offundamental Aristotelian ideas with a Neo-Platonic coloring. Thus matterand form are the fundamental principles of the world. They existedpotentially apart in the wisdom of God before they were combined andthus realized in actuality. [149] Time being a measure of motion, cameinto being together with the motion which followed upon thiscombination. Hence neither the world nor time is eternal. This isPlatonic, not Aristotelian, who believes in the eternity of motion aswell as of time. Abraham bar Hiyya also speaks of the purest form aslight and as looking at and illuminating the form inferior to it andthus giving rise to the heavens, minerals and plants. [150] This is allNeo-Platonic. And yet the most distinctive doctrine of Plotinus and thelater Neo-Platonists among the Arabs, the series of emanatinghypostases, Intellect, Universal Soul, Nature, Matter, and so on, iswanting in the "Hegyon ha-Nefesh. "[151] Form is the highest thing heknows outside of God; and the purest form, which is too exalted tocombine with matter, embraces angels, seraphim, souls, and all formsrelated to the upper world. [152] With the exception of the names angel, seraphim, souls, this is good Aristotelian doctrine, who also believesin the movers of the spheres and the active intellect in man as beingpure forms. 

To proceed now to give a brief account of Abraham bar Hiyya's teaching, he thinks it is the duty of rational man to know how it is that man whois so insignificant was given control of the other animals, and endowedwith the power of wisdom and knowledge. In order to gain this knowledgewe must investigate the origins and principles of existing things, sothat we may arrive at an understanding of things as they are. This thewise men of other nations have realized, though they were not privilegedto receive a divine Torah, and have busied themselves with philosophicalinvestigations. Our Bible recommends to us the same method in the wordsof Deuteronomy (4, 39), "Know therefore this day, and reflect in thyheart, that the Lord is God in the heavens above, and upon the earthbeneath: there is none else. " This means that if you understandthoroughly the order of things in heaven above and the earth beneath, you will at once see that God made it in his wisdom, and that he is theonly one and there is no one beside him. The book of Job teaches thesame thing, when it says (19, 26) "And from my flesh I shall beholdGod. " This signifies that from the structure of the body and the form ofits members we can understand the wisdom of the Creator. We need nothesitate therefore to study the works of the ancients and the wise menof other nations in order to learn from them the nature of existence. Wehave the permission and recommendation of Scripture. [153]

Starting from a consideration of man we see that he is the last ofcreated things because we find in him additional composition over andabove that found in other creatures. Man is a "_rational animal_. ""Animal" means a body that grows and moves and at last is dissolved. "Rational" refers to the power of knowledge, of inferring one thing fromanother, and discriminating between good and evil. In this man differsfrom other animals. Descending in the scale of existence we find thatthe plant also grows and dies like the animal, but it does not move. Stones, metals and other inanimate bodies on the earth, change theirforms and shapes, but unlike plants they have no power of growing orincreasing. They are the simplest of the things on the earth. Theydiffer from the heavenly bodies in that the latter never change theirforms. Proceeding further in our analysis, we find that body, thesimplest thing so far, means length, breadth and depth attached tosomething capable of being measured. This definition shows that body isalso composed of two elements, which are theoretically distinct untilGod's will joins them together. These are "hyle" (matter)--what has nolikeness or form, but has the capacity of receiving form--and form, which is defined as that which has power to clothe the hyle with anyform. Matter alone is too weak to sustain itself, unless form comes toits aid. Form, on the other hand, is not perceptible to sense unless itclothes matter, which bears it. One needs the other. Matter cannot_exist_ without form; form cannot _be seen_ without matter. Form issuperior to matter, because it needs the latter only to be seen but canexist by itself though not seen; whereas matter cannot _exist_ withoutform. These two, matter and form, were hidden in God, where they existedpotentially until the time came to produce them and realize them _inactu_. 

Matter is further divided into two kinds. There is pure matter, whichenters into the composition of the heavens, and impure matter, formingthe substance of terrestrial bodies. Similarly form may be divided atfirst into two kinds; closed and sealed form, too pure and holy to becombined with matter; and open and penetrable form, which is fit tounite with matter. The pure, self-subsistent form gazes at andilluminates the penetrable form, and helps it to clothe matter with allthe forms of which the latter is capable. 

Now when God determined to realize matter and form _in actu_, he causedthe pure form to be clothed with its splendor, which no hyle can touch. This gave rise to angels, seraphim, souls, and all other forms of theupper world. Not all men can see these forms or conceive them in themind, because they do not unite with anything which the eye canperceive, and the majority of people cannot understand what they cannotperceive with their corporeal senses. Only those who are given toprofound scientific investigations can understand the essence of theseforms. 

The light of this pure form then emanated upon the second form, and bythe word of God the latter united with the pure matter firmly andpermanently, so that there is never a change as long as they are united. This union gave rise to the bodies of the heavens (spheres and fixedstars) which never change their forms. Then the form united with theimpure matter, and this gave rise to all the bodies in the sublunarworld, which change their forms. These are the four elements, and theproducts of their composition, including plants. [154]

So far we have bodies which do not change their places. Then a lightemanated from the self-subsisting form by the order of God, the splendorof which spread upon the heaven, moving from point to point, and causedthe material form (_i. E. _, the inferior, so-called penetrable form) tochange its place. This produced the stars which change their positionbut not their forms (planets). From this light extending over the heavenemanated another splendor which reached the body with changing form, giving rise to the three species of living beings, aquatic, aerial andterrestial animals, corresponding to the three elements, water, air, earth; as there is no animal life in fire. 

We have so far therefore three kinds of forms. (1) The pureself-subsistent form which never combines with matter. This embraces allthe forms of the spiritual world. (2) Form which unites with body firmlyand inseparably. These are the forms of the heavens and the stars. (3)Form which unites with body temporarily. Such are the forms of thebodies on the earth. The forms of the second and third classes cannotexist without bodies. The form of class number one cannot exist withbody. To make the scheme complete, there ought to be a fourth kind ofform which can exist with as well as without body. In other words, aform which unites with body for a time and then returns to its originalstate and continues to exist without body. Reason demands that theclassification should be complete, hence there must be such a form, andthe only one worthy of this condition is the soul of man. We thus have aproof of the immortality of the soul. [155]

These are the ideas of the ancient sages, and we shall find that theyare drawn from the Torah. Thus matter and form are indicated in thesecond verse of Genesis, "And the earth was _without form_ (Heb. Tohu)and _void_ (Heb. Bohu). " "Tohu" is matter; "Bohu" (בו הוא = בהו)signifies that through which matter gains existence, hence form. "Water" (Heb. Mayim) is also a general word for any of the variousforms, whereas "light" (Heb. Or) stands for the pure subsistent form. By"firmament" (Heb. Rakiaʿ) is meant the second kind of form which uniteswith the pure matter in a permanent and unchangeable manner. "Let therebe a _firmanent_ in the midst of the _waters_" (Gen. 1, 6) indicatesthat the "firmament" is embraced by the bright light of the first day, that is the universal form, from which all the other forms come. "Andlet it divide between _water_ and _water_" (_ib. _) signifies that the"firmament" stands between the self-subsistent form and the third kindof form above mentioned, namely, that which unites with body and givesrise to substances changing their forms, like minerals and plants. The"luminaries" (Heb. Meorot) correspond to the second light mentionedabove. We shall find also that the order of creation as given in Genesiscoincides with the account given above in the name of the ancientsages. [156]

It would seem as if the self-subsisting form and the two lightsemanating from it are meant to represent the Intellect, Soul and Natureof the Neo-Platonic trinity respectively, and that Abraham bar Hiyyapurposely changed the names and partly their functions in order to makethe philosophical account agree with the story of creation in Genesis. 

With regard to the intellectual and ethical condition of the soul andits destiny, the speculative thinkers of other nations, arguing fromreason alone and having no divine revelation to guide or confirm theirspeculations, are agreed that the only way in which the soul, whichbelongs to a higher world, can be freed from this world of body andchange is through _intellectual excellence_ and _right conduct_. Accordingly they classify souls into four kinds. The soul, they say, mayhave health, sickness, life, death. Health signifies _wisdom_ or_knowledge_; sickness denotes _ignorance_. Life means the _fear of God_and _right conduct_; death is _neglect of God_ and _evil practice_. Every person combines in himself one of the two intellectual qualitieswith one of the two ethical qualities. Thus we have four classes ofpersons. A man may be wise and pious, wise and wicked, ignorant andpious, ignorant and wicked. And his destiny after death is determined bythe class to which he belongs. Thus when a man who is wise and piousdeparts this world, his soul by reason of its wisdom separates from thebody and exists in its own form as before. Owing to its piety it willrise to the upper world until it reaches the pure, eternal form, withwhich it will unite for ever. If the man is wise and wicked, the wisdomof the soul will enable it to exist without body; but on account of itswickedness and indulgence in the desires of this world, it cannot becomecompletely free from the creatures of this world, and the best it can dois to rise above the sublunar world of change to the world of theplanets where the forms do not change, and move about beneath the lightof the sun, the heat of which will seem to it like a fire burning itcontinually, and preventing it from rising to the upper light. 

If the man is ignorant and pious, his soul will be saved from body inorder that it may exist by itself, but his ignorance will prevent hissoul from leaving the atmosphere of the lower world. Hence the soul willhave to be united with body a second, and a third time, if necessary, until it finally acquires knowledge and wisdom, which will enable it torise above the lower world, its degree and station depending upon themeasure of intellect and virtue it possesses at the time of the lastseparation from the body. The soul of the man who is both ignorant andwicked cannot be saved from the body entirely, and dies like a beast. 

These are the views of speculative thinkers which we may adopt, but theycannot tell us what is the content of the terms _wisdom_ and _rightconduct_. Not having been privileged to receive the sacred Law, which isthe source of all wisdom and the origin of rectitude, they cannot tellus in concrete fashion just what a man must know and what he must do inorder to raise his soul to the highest degree possible for it to attain. And if they were to tell us what they understand by wisdom and rightconduct, we should not listen to them. Our authority is the Bible, andwe must test the views of the philosophers by the teaching of the Bible. 

If we do this we find authority in Scripture also for belief in theimmortality of the soul. Thus if we study carefully the expressions usedof the various creations in the first chapter of Genesis, we notice thatin some cases the divine command is expressed by the phrase, "Let therebe... , " followed by the name of the thing to be created; and theexecution of the command is expressed by the words, "And there was... , "the name of the created object being repeated; or the phrase may besimply, "And it was so, " without naming the object. In other cases theexpression "Let there be" is not used, nor the corresponding "And therewas. "

This variation in expression is not accidental. It is deliberate andmust be understood. Upon a careful examination we cannot fail to seethat where the expression "Let there be" is used, the object so createdexists in this world permanently and without change. Thus, "Let there belight" (Gen. I, 3). If in addition we have the corresponding expression, "And there was, " in connection with the same object and followed by itsname, it means that the object will continue its everlasting existencein the next world also. Hence, "And there was light" (_ib. _). In thecreation of the firmament and the luminaries we have the expression, "Let there be"; the corresponding expression at the end is in each casenot, "And there was... , " but, "And it was so. " This signifies that inthis world, as long as it lasts, the firmament and luminaries arepermanent and without change; but they will have no continuance in thenext world. In the creation of the sublunar world we do not find thephrase, "Let there be, " at all, but such expressions as, "Let the watersbe gathered together" (_ib. _ 9), "Let the earth produce grass" (_ib. _11), and so on. This means that these things change their forms and haveno permanent existence in this world. The phrase, "And it was so, "recording the realization of the divine command, signifies that they donot exist at all in the next world. 

The case is different in man. We do not find the expression, "Let therebe, " in the command introducing his formation; hence he has nopermanence in this world. But we do find the expression, "And the manbecame (lit. _was_) a living soul" (_ib. _ 2, 7), which means that hewill have permanent existence in the next world. The article before theword man in the verse just quoted indicates that not every man livesforever in the next world, but only the good. What manner of man he mustbe in order to have this privilege, _i. E. _, of what nation he must be amember, we shall see later. This phase of the question the speculativethinkers cannot understand, hence they did not investigate it. Reasonalone cannot decide this question; it needs the guidance of the Torah, which is divine. 

Consulting the Torah on this problem, we notice that man isdistinguished above other animals in the manner of his creation in threerespects. (1) All other living beings were created by means of somethingelse. The water or the earth was ordered to produce them. Man alone wasmade directly by God. (2) There are three expressions used for thecreation of living things, "create" (Heb. Bara), "form" (Heb. Yazar), and "make" (Heb. ʿasah). The water animals have only the first (_ib. _ 1, 21), as being the lowest in the scale of animal life. Land animals havethe second and the third, "formed" and "made" (_ib. _ 1, 25; 2, 19). Man, who is superior to all the others, has all the three expressions (_ib. _26, 27; 2, 7). (3) Man was given dominion over the other animals (_ib. _1, 28). 

As man is distinguished above the other animals, so is one nationdistinguished above other men. In Isaiah (43, 7) we read: "Every onethat is called by my name, and whom I have _created_ for my glory; Ihave _formed_ him; yea, I have _made_ him. " The three terms, created, formed, made, signify that the reference is to man; and we learn fromthis verse that those men were created for his glory who are called byhis name. But if we inquire in the Bible we find that the nation calledby God's name is Israel, as we read (_ib. _ 1), "Thus said the Lord thatcreated thee, O Israel, Fear not; for I have redeemed thee, I havecalled thee by thy name; thou art mine, " and in many other passagesbesides. The reason for this is their belief in the unity of God andtheir reception of the Law. At the same time others who are notIsraelites are not excluded from reaching the same degree throughrepentance. [157]

There is no system of ethics in Abraham bar Hiyya, and we shall in thesequel select some of his remarks bearing on ethics and pick out theethical kernel from its homiletical and exegetical husk. 

Man alone, he tells us, of all animal creation receives reward andpunishment. The other animals have neither merit nor guilt. To be sure, their fortune in life depends upon the manner in which they respond totheir environment, but this is not in the way of reward and punishment, but a natural consequence of their natural constitution. With man it isdifferent, and this is because of the responsible position man occupies, having been given the privilege and the ability to control all animalcreation. [158]

The psychological basis of virtue in Abraham bar Hiyya is Platonic inorigin, as it is in Pseudo-Bahya, though we do not find the fourcardinal virtues and the derivation of justice from a harmoniouscombination of the other three as in the Republic of Plato, to whichPseudo-Bahya is ultimately indebted. 

Man has three powers, we are told, which some call three souls. One isthe power by which he grows and multiplies like the plants of the field. The second is that by which he moves from place to place. These twopowers he has in common with the animal. The third is that by which hedistinguishes between good and evil, between truth and falsehood, between a thing and its opposite, and by which he acquires wisdom andknowledge. This is the soul which distinguishes him from the otheranimals. If this soul prevails over the lower two powers, the man iscalled meritorious and perfect. If on the other hand the latter prevailover the soul, the man is accounted like a beast, and is called wickedand an evil doer. God gives merit to the animal soul for the sake ofthe rational soul if the former is obedient to the latter; and on theother hand imputes guilt to the rational soul and punishes her for theguilt of the animal soul because she did not succeed in overcoming thelatter. [159]

The question of the relative superiority of the naturally good who feelsno temptation to do wrong, and the temperamental person who has tosustain a constant struggle with his passions and desires in order toovercome them is decided by Abraham bar Hiyya in favor of the former onthe ground that the latter is never free from evil thought, whereas theformer is. And he quotes the Rabbis of the Talmud, according to whom thereward in the future world is not the same for the two types of men. Hewho must overcome temptation before he can subject his lower nature tohis reason is rewarded in the next world in a manner bearing resemblanceto the goods and pleasures of this world, and described as preciousstones and tables of gold laden with good things to eat. On the otherhand, the reward of the naturally perfect who is free from temptation ispurely spiritual, and bears no earthly traces. These men are representedas "sitting under the Throne of Glory with their crowns on their headsand delighting in the splendor of the Shekinah. "[160]

His theodicy offers nothing remarkable. He cites and opposes a solutionfrequently given in the middle ages of the problem of evil. This isbased on the assumption that God cannot be the cause of evil. How thenexplain the presence of evil in the world? There is no analysis orclassification or definition of what is meant by evil. Apparently it isphysical evil which Abraham bar Hiyya has in mind. Why do some peoplesuffer who do not seem to deserve it? is the aspect of the problem whichinterests him. One solution that is offered, he tells us, is that evilis not anything positive or substantial. It is something negative, absence of the good, as blindness is absence of vision; deafness, absence of hearing; nakedness, absence of clothing. Hence it has nocause. God produces the positive forms which are good, and determinesthem to stay a definite length of time. When this time comes to an end, the forms disappear and their negatives take their place automaticallywithout the necessity of any cause. 

Abraham bar Hiyya is opposed to this solution of the problem, though hegives us no philosophic reason for it. His arguments are Biblical. Godis the cause of evil as well as good, and this is the meaning of theword "judgment" (Heb. Mishpat) that occurs so often in the Bible inconnection with God's attributes. The same idea is expressed in Jeremiah(9, 23) "I am the Lord which exercise loving kindness, judgment andrighteousness in the earth. " Loving kindness refers to the creation ofthe world, which was an act of pure grace on the part of God. It was nota necessity. His purpose was purely to do kindness to his creatures andto show them his wisdom and power. Righteousness refers to the kindnessof God, his charity so to speak, which every one needs when he dies andwishes to be admitted to the next world. For the majority of men havemore guilt than merit. Judgment denotes the good and evil distributed inthe world according to the law of justice. Thus he rewards the righteousin the next world, and makes them suffer sometimes in this world inorder to try them and to double their ultimate reward. He punishes thewicked in this world for their evil deeds, and sometimes he gives themwealth and prosperity that they may have no claim or defence in the nextworld. Thus evil in this world is not always the result of misconductwhich it punishes; it may be inflicted as a trial, as in the case ofJob. Abraham bar Hiyya's solution is therefore that there is no reasonwhy God should not be the author of physical evil, since everything isdone in accordance with the law of justice. [161]

CHAPTER IX

JOSEPH IBN ZADDIK

Little is known of the life of Joseph ben Jacob ibn Zaddik. He lived inCordova; he was appointed _Dayyan_, or Judge of the Jewish community ofthat city in 1138; and he died in 1149. He is praised as a Talmudicscholar by his countryman Moses ibn Ezra, and as a poet by Abraham ibnDaud and Harizi, though we have no Talmudic composition from his pen, and but few poems, whether liturgical or otherwise. [162] His fame restson his philosophical work, and it is this phase of his career in whichwe are interested here. "Olam Katon" or "Microcosm" is the Hebrew nameof the philosophical treatise which he wrote in Arabic, but which we nolonger possess in the original, being indebted for our knowledge of itto a Hebrew translation of unknown authorship. [163] Maimonides knewJoseph ibn Zaddik favorably, but he was not familiar with the"Microcosm. " In a letter to Samuel Ibn Tibbon, the translator of his"Guide of the Perplexed, " Maimonides tells us that though he has notseen the "Olam Katon" of Ibn Zaddik, he knows that its tendency is thesame as that of the Brothers of Purity (_cf. _ above, p. 60). [164] Thissignifies that its trend of thought is Neo-Platonic, which combinesAristotelian physics with Platonic and Plotinian metaphysics, ethics andpsychology. 

An examination of the book itself confirms Maimonides's judgment. Inaccordance with the trend of the times there is noticeable in Ibn Zaddikan increase of Aristotelian influence, though of a turbid kind; adecided decrease, if not a complete abandonment, of the ideas of theKalam, and a strong saturation of Neo-Platonic doctrine and point ofview. It was the fashion to set the Kalam over against the philosophersto the disadvantage of the former, as being deficient in logicalknowledge and prejudiced by theological prepossessions. This is attestedby the attitude towards the Mutakallimun of Judah Halevi, Maimonides, Averroes. And Ibn Zaddik forms no exception to the rule. Thecircumstance that it was most likely from Karaite writings, which foundtheir way into Spain, that Ibn Zaddik gained his knowledge of Kalamisticideas, was not exactly calculated to prepossess him, a Rabbanite, intheir favor. And thus while we see him in the manner of Saadia and Bahyafollow the good old method, credited by Maimonides to the Mutakallimun, of starting his metaphysics with proofs of the world's creation, andbasing the existence of God, his unity, incorporeality and otherattributes on the creation of the world as a foundation, he turns intoan uncompromising opponent of these much despised apologetes when hecomes to discuss the nature of God's attributes, of the divine will, andof the nature of evil. And in all these cases the target of his attackseems to be their Karaite representative Joseph al-Basir, whoseacquaintance we made before (p. 48 ff. ). 

He laid under contribution his predecessors and contemporaries, Saadia, Bahya, Pseudo-Bahya, Gabirol; and his sympathies clearly lay with thegeneral point of view represented by the last, and his Mohammedansources; though he was enough of an eclectic to refuse to followGabirol, or the Brethren of Purity and the other Neo-Platonic writings, in all the details of their doctrine; and there is evidence of anattempt on his part to tone down the extremes of Neo-Platonic tendencyand create a kind of level in which Aristotelianism and Platonism meetby compromising. Thus he believes with Gabirol that all things corporealas well as spiritual are composed of matter and form;[165] but when itcomes to defining what the matter of spiritual things may be, he tellsus that we may speak of the genus as the matter of the species--adoctrine which is not so Neo-Platonic after all. For we do not have togo beyond Aristotle to hear that in the definition of an object, whichrepresents its _intelligible_ (opposed to sensible) essence, the genusis like the matter, the difference like the form. Of the universal andprime matter underlying all created things outside of God, of whichGabirol says that it is the immediate emanation of God's essence andconstitutes with universal form the Universal Intelligence, Ibn Zaddikknows nothing. Nor do we find any outspoken scheme of emanation, such aswe see in Plotinus or with a slight modification in the cyclopœdia ofthe Brethren of Purity, or as it is presupposed in the "Fons Vitæ" ofGabirol. Ibn Zaddik does refer to the doctrine of the divine Will, whichplays such an important rôle in the philosophy of Gabirol and of thePseudo-Empedoclean writings, which are supposed to have been Gabirol'ssource. [166] But here, too, the negative side of Ibn Zaddik's doctrineis developed at length, while the positive side is barely alluded to ina hint. He takes pains to show the absurdity of the view that the divinewill is a momentary entity created from time to time to make possiblethe coming into being of the things and processes of our world--a viewheld by the Mutakallimun as represented by their spokesman al-Basir, butwhen it comes to explaining his own view of the nature of the divinewill, and whether it is identical with God or not, he suddenly becomesreticent, refers us to the writings of Empedocles, and intimates thatthe matter is involved in mystery, and it is not safe to talk about ittoo plainly and openly. Evidently Ibn Zaddik was not ready to go all thelength of Gabirol's emanationism and Neo-Platonic mysticism. 

The Aristotelian ideas, of which there are many in the "Microcosm, " areprobably not derived from a study of Aristotle's works, but fromsecondary sources. This we may safely infer from the way in which heuses or interprets them. An Aristotelian definition is a highlytechnical proposition in which every word counts, and requires adefinition in turn to be understood. In the Aristotelian context thereader sees the methodical derivation of the concept; and the severaltechnical terms making up the definition are made clear by illustrativeexamples. Aside from the context the proposition is obscure even in theoriginal Greek. Now conceive an Arabic translation of an Aristoteliandefinition taken out of its context, and you do not wonder that it ismisunderstood; particularly when the interpreter's point of view istaken from a school of thought at variance with that of Aristotle. Thisis exactly what happens to Ibn Zaddik. He quotes approvingly Aristotle'sdefinition of the soul, and proceeds to interpret it in a manner notintended by the author of the "De Anima. "[167] If he had read thecontext he could not have misunderstood the definition as he did. 

Unlike his predecessors, Ibn Zaddik did not confine himself to a specialtopic in philosophy or to the metaphysical aspects of Judaism. IsaacIsraeli and Gabirol discuss special questions in Physics and Metaphysicswithout bringing them into relation with Judaism or the text of theBible. Saadia takes cognizance of philosophical doctrine solely with aview to establishing and rationalizing Jewish dogma, and only in so faras it may thus be utilized. Bahya and Abraham bar Hiyya confine theirphilosophical outlook within still narrower limits, having Jewish ethicsas their primary concern. All of the latter make a feature of Biblicalinterpretation, which lends to their work the Jewish stamp and to theirstyle the element of homeliness and variety. To this they owe in ameasure their popularity, which, however, cannot be said for Abraham barHiyya, whose "Hegyon ha-Nefesh" was not printed until the second half oflast century. The "Microcosm" of Ibn Zaddik is the first compendium ofscience, philosophy and theology in Jewish literature. And yet it is asmall book; for Ibn Zaddik does not enter into lengthy discussions, nordoes he adorn his style with rhetorical flourishes or copious quotationsfrom Bible and Talmud. The "Olam Katon" is clearly meant for beginners, who require a summary and compendious view of so much of physics, psychology, metaphysics and ethics as will give them an idea of theposition of man in the world, and his duties, theoretical and practical, in this life, that he may fulfil his destiny for which he was created. It is very possible that Ibn Zaddik modelled his work on theEncyclopædia of the Brethren of Purity, leaving out all that he regardedas unessential or objectional and abridging the rest. 

Accordingly, the "Microcosm" is divided into four parts. The first parttreats of what is called in the Aristotelian classification of thesciences Physics, _i. E. _, the principles and constitution of thecorporeal world and its processes. The second treats of man, includinganthropology and psychology. The third is devoted to a discussion of theexistence, unity, incorporeality and other attributes of God, based uponthe doctrine of the creation of the world. This bears the stamp of theKalam, and is indebted to the writings of Saadia, Bahya and Josephal-Basir. It covers the topics usually treated by the Mutakallimun inthe division of their works, known by the name of "Bab al Tauhid, "treatise on Unity. The fourth part corresponds to the "Bab al Adi" ofthe Kalam, _i. E. _, the second division of Kalamistic works devoted totheodicy, or vindication of God's justice in his dealings with mankind. Hence it includes theological questions of an ethical nature, likefreedom of the will, reasons for divine worship, the nature of rewardand punishment, and so on. 

The book was written, Ibn Zaddik tells us, in answer to the question ofa pupil concerning the meaning of such terms as "perfection" and"permanent good, " used by philosophers. They are not of this world thesemen say, and yet every man of intelligence should seek them. This is avery difficult subject, made more so by the small number of personsengaged in its study. Particularly in our own generation is this true, that the value of knowledge and investigation is not recognized. Peopleare Jews in name only, and men only in outward appearance. Former ageswere much superior in this regard. 

Two fundamental requisites are necessary for the knowledge of oursubject. They are the knowledge of God, and performance of his will. Forthis purpose we must understand the works of the philosophers. But thesein turn require a knowledge of the preliminary sciences of arithmetic, geometry, music, astronomy, and logic. This takes a long time and islikely to weary the student, especially the beginner. I have thereforemade it my purpose to show how a man can know himself, for from aknowledge of self he will come to a knowledge of all. Man is called"Microcosm, " a world in miniature, because he has in him represented allthe elements of the universe. His body resembles the corporeal world;his rational soul the spiritual world. Hence the importance of knowinghimself, and hence the definition of philosophy as a man's _knowledge ofhimself_. Philosophy is the science of sciences and the end thereof, because it is the path to a knowledge of the Creator. [168]

Here we see at the outset Ibn Zaddik's Neo-Platonic tendency to make ashort cut to knowledge through the study of man instead of the painfuland laborious mastery of the preliminary sciences. And so it was thatthe Neo-Platonists added little to Aristotle's study of nature, concentrating their attention upon the intelligible or spiritual world. 

The first thing we must do then is to show that the human body issimilar to the corporeal world. This will require an analysis of thestructure of the latter. But before examining the _objects_ ofknowledge, we must say a word about the process of knowing. Manperceives things in two ways--through sense and through intellect. Hissenses give him the accidents of things, the shell or husk, so to speak. He perceives color through sight, sound through hearing, odor throughsmell, and so on. It takes reason to penetrate to the essence of anobject. Take as an example a book. The sense of sight perceives itscolor, and through the color its form. This is then apprehended by thepower of imagination or representation. The latter in turn hands it overto the cogitative power of the rational soul, from the reflection ofwhich results the spiritual reality of the object, which is itsknowledge. So we see that the reason knows the essence and reality of athing, whereas the senses know only its husk and its accidents. Thissame thing is stated by the philosopher in another form. The senses, hesays, know only the particular, the universal can be known by theintellect only. This is because the soul is fine and penetrating, whilethe body is gross, and can reach the surface only. 

We may also classify knowledge from another point of view as necessary(or immediate), and demonstrated (or mediate). Necessary knowledge isthat which no sane man can deny. Such knowledge may be of the senses, asthe sight of the sun or the sound of thunder; or it may be of thereason, such as that the whole is greater than its parts. We may thenenumerate four kinds of things known directly without the help of otherknowledge, (1) The percepts of the senses. (2) Truths generally admittedby reason of their self-evidence. (3) Traditional truths, _i. E. _, truths handed down by a reliable and wise man, or by a community worthyof credence. (4) First principles or axioms. These four can be easilyreduced to two; for traditional truths ultimately go back to thetestimony of the senses; while first principles or axioms are includedin self-evident propositions. We thus have two kinds of necessary orimmediate knowledge, the data of sense, and self-evident propositions. The latter kind is superior to the former, because man shares senseknowledge with the lower animals; whereas rational propositions arepeculiar to him alone. 

Demonstrated knowledge is built upon necessary knowledge, and is derivedfrom it by means of logical inference. [169]

We may now proceed to discuss the principles of the corporeal world. Matter is the foundation and principle of a thing. All things, naturalas well as artificial, are composed of matter and form. Wood is thecommon matter of chair and bed. Their forms are different. So the commonmatter of the four elements is the prime matter endowed with the form ofcorporeality, _i. E. _, with the capacity of filling place. This form ofcorporeality makes the prime matter corporeal substance. Matter isrelative to form, form is relative to matter. 

Spiritual things also have matter and form. In corporeal artificialthings like ring or bracelet, the matter is gold, the form is the formof ring or bracelet, the efficient cause is the art of the goldsmith, the final cause or purpose is the adornment. In spiritual things we maycompare genus to matter, species to form, specific difference toefficient cause, the individual to the final cause. 

Everything exists either by itself (_per se_) or in something else. Matter exists by itself, form exists in something else, in matter. Matter is potentially substance; after it assumes a form it becomesactual substance. In reality there is no matter without form, but inthought we can remove the form and leave the matter. 

Substance may be described as that which bears opposite and changingqualities. No substance can be the opposite of another substance throughits substantiality, but through its accidents; for opposition resides inquality. Matter receiving form is substance. Absolute substance issimple and spiritual, for it cannot be perceived through the fivesenses. When the philosophers say that all body is substance, and thatthe individual is a substance, they use substance in contradistinctionto accident, meaning that the individual exists by itself, and needs notanother for its existence, unlike accidents, which must have somethingto exist in. 

This absolute substance, which is simple and spiritual, seems to beidentical with Gabirol's "substantia quæ sustinet decem prædicamenta, "the substance which supports the ten categories. Gabirol means by itthat which remains of a corporeal substance when we take away from iteverything that qualifies it as being here or there, of a particularnature or size, in a given relation, and so on. 

The expression corporeal world includes the celestial spheres and allwhich is under them. To be sure, the body of the sphere is differentfrom the other bodies in matter and form and qualities. It consists of afifth nature, different from the four elements. It is not cold, or itwould move downward like earth and water. It is not warm, or it wouldmove upward like air and fire. It is not wet, for it would then rolllike the waves of the sea. Nor is it dry, for it would condense and notmove at all. Not being any one of these qualities, which constitute ourfour elements, the sphere is not a composite of them either; for thesimple is prior to the composite, and we cannot regard the elements ofthe sublunar world as prior and superior to the spheres. 

The sphere is neither light nor heavy. For light and heavy are relativeterms. An object is heavy when out of its natural place, light when inits natural place. Thus a stone is heavy when it is away from the earth, which is its natural place, but is light when it comes to rest where itbelongs. The sphere is never out of its place or in its place, as itmoves constantly in a circle. Hence it is neither light nor heavy. 

Ibn Zaddik's definition of light and heavy as being relative, anddependent on the relation of the object to its natural place ispeculiar, and would lead him to say that fire and air are also heavywhen out of their natural place, which is outside of, and above earthand water. But this does not seem in consonance with the Aristotelianuse of these terms. According to Aristotle an object is heavy if itstendency is to move to the centre of the world; it is light if it movesaway from the centre to the circumference. Hence earth and water areheavy, fire and air are light. The natural place of a body or element isthat to which it has a tendency to move, or in which it has a tendencyto rest, when left to itself. Hence a body will always move to itsnatural place when away from it and under no restriction; and itsheaviness or lightness does not change with its position. 

To continue, the sphere moves in a circle, the most perfect of allmotions, having neither beginning nor end. It is more perfect than allbodies, and the knowledge of God is not hidden from it as it is hiddenfrom us. Whatever moves in a circle must move around a body at rest; forif it moves around another moving body, this second body must haveanother body around which it moves, and this third body another, and soon _ad infinitum_, which is impossible. Hence the sphere moves around abody at rest. This is the earth. 

The four elements of the sublunar world are, fire, air, water, earth. Intheir purity these elements have neither color nor taste, nor odor norany other sensible property. For the elements are simple bodies, whereasthe sensible qualities are the result of the composition of theelements. If air had color, we should see it as we see all coloredthings; and all other things would appear to us in the color of air, asis the case when we look through a colored glass. The same argumentapplies to water. 

The elements change into each other. We see water changing under theeffect of heat into vapor, and the vapor condenses again under theinfluence of cold and changes back to water, namely, rain. Air changesinto fire when flint strikes iron. Fire cannot exist here unless it hassomething to take hold of; otherwise it changes into air. Earth andwater change into each other very slowly, because earth is hard tochange. 

The basis of the four elements is a substance filling place as a resultof its assuming the form of corporeality, _i. E. _, extension in threedirections. Filling place, it moves; moving, it becomes warm. When itsmotion is completed, it necessarily comes to rest and becomes cold. Heatand cold are the active powers, wet and dry are the passive qualities, wet being associated with heat, dry with cold. The mixture of thesequalities with the corporeal basis results in the four elements. 

The three natures, mineral, plant, animal are composed of the fourelements. When a seed is put in the ground it cannot grow without water, and sunshine and air. These form its food, and food is assimilated tothe thing fed. Our bodies are composed of the four elements, becausethey are nourished by plants. The general process of the sublunar worldis that of genesis and dissolution. The genesis of one thing is thedissolution of another. The dissolution of the egg is the genesis of thechicken; the dissolution of the chicken is the genesis of the fourelements; for in the living being the elements are potential, and theybecome actual when the animal dies. This continuous process of genesisand dissolution proves that this world is not permanent, for the basisof its processes is change. [170]

The human body corresponds to the corporeal world, and is similar to itin its nature and matter. Man's body is subject to genesis and decaylike other objects. It is composed of the elements and returns to them. It has in it the nature of minerals, plants and animals. It has thepower of growth, sustenance and reproduction like plants. Man is likeanimal in having motion and sensation. He has the spirited power and theappetitive like other animals. His body is perfect because it hasresemblances to all kinds of plants and animals. His body as a wholeresembles great trees, his hair is like grass and shrubs. Animals havevarious qualities according to the relation of the animal soul to thebody. Thus the lion has strength, the lamb meekness, the fox shrewdness, and so on. Mankind includes all of these qualities. In the same wayvarious animals have various instincts resembling arts, such as theweaving of the spider, the building of the bird and the bee, and so on. They also subsist on various foods. Man alone combines all arts and allkinds of food. 

The human body has three dimensions like inanimate bodies. It is alsosimilar to the bodies of plants and animals, and at the same time isdistinguished alone among animals by its erect position. This is due tothe fact that man's nature is proportionate, and his body is purer andfiner than other bodies. Thus we see when oil is pure, its flame risesin a straight line; when the oil is impure the flame is not straight. Another thing proving that man's nature is superior to that of otheranimals is that the latter live in that element which is akin to theirconstitution--fish in water, birds in air, quadrupeds on land. Man alonecan inhabit all three. Another reason for man's erect position is thathe is a plant originating in heaven. Hence his head, which is the root, faces heaven. [171]

Man has three souls, a plant soul, an animal soul and a rational soul. He must have a plant soul to account for the fact that man grows likeother plants and dies like them. For if he can grow without a plantsoul, plants can do the same. And if this too is granted, then there isno reason why mountains and stones should not grow also. Again, if mancan grow without a plant soul, he can live without an animal soul, andknow without a rational soul, which is absurd. 

The faculty of the vegetative soul is the appetitive power, whose seatis in the liver. Its subordinate powers are those of nutrition andgrowth. Through it man feels the need of food and other natural desires. He has this in common with the lower animals. It is the first power thatappears in man while he is still in his mother's womb. First comes thepower which forms the combined seed of the male and the female into ahuman being in its proper form and nature. In doing this it requires theassistance of the "growing" power, which begins its activity as soon asthe first member is formed, and continues until the period of youth iscompleted. This power in turn needs the assistance of the nourishingpower, which accompanies the other two from the beginning of theiractivity to the end of the person's life. All this constitutes the plantsoul, and it must not be supposed that these powers are separated fromone another, and that one is in one place and another in another place. _They are all spiritual powers derived from the universal powers in theupper world. _

When the form of the being is complete, the animal soul makes itsappearance. This soul is carried in the spirit of the animal or man, which is found in the pure blood of the arteries. There are twomembranes in every artery, making two passages, one for blood and theother for the spirit or wind. The seat of the animal soul is in theheart, and it is borne in the pure red blood. This is why we see in theheart two receptacles; in one is spirit, in the other, blood. Henceafter death we find congealed blood in the one, while the other isempty. Death happens on account of the defective "mixture" of the heart. This means that the four humors of which the body is composed, namely, blood, yellow and black gall and phlegm, lose the proper proportionalityin their composition, and one or other of them predominates. An animaldoes not die unless the mixture of the heart is injured, or the heart iswounded seriously. Death is also caused by disease or injury of thebrain. For the brain is the origin of the nerves which control thevoluntary activities by means of contraction and expansion. If the chestdoes not contract, the warm air does not come out; if it does notexpand, the cold air does not come in; and if the air does not come inor out, the heart loses its proportionality, and the animal dies. Thefunctions of the animal soul are sensation and motion. This motion maybe active as well as passive. The active motions are those of thearteries, and the expansion and contraction of the chest which resultsin respiration. The passive motions give rise to the emotions of anger, fear, shame, joy, sorrow. 

Anger is the motion of the spirit within the body toward the outside, together with the blood and the humors. This is found in animals also. Fear is the entrance of the soul within, leaving the surface of thebody, and causing the extremities to become cold. Shame is a motioninward, and forthwith again outward. Sorrow is caused in the same way asfear, except that fear is sudden, while sorrow is gradual. This is whyfear sometimes kills when the body is weak. Joy is motion outward. Joymay kill too, when it is very great, and the person is weak and withoutcontrol. Joy is of the nature of pleasure, except that pleasure isgradual, while joy is sudden. 

Pain is that feeling we have when we are taken out of our natural stateand put into an unnatural. Pleasure is felt when we are restored to thenatural. Take, for example, the heat of the sun. When a person isexposed to it, the sun takes him out of his natural state. Heat is thenpainful, and pleasure is produced by the thing which restores him to hisnatural state; in this case a cold spring and a drink of cold water. Similarly a person walking in the snow and cold air feels pain by reasonof the cold taking him out of his natural state. Heat then gives himpleasure by restoring him. The same thing applies to hunger and thirst, sleeping and waking, and other things which give us pleasure and pain. Without pain there is no pleasure, and the pleasure varies in accordancewith the antecedent pain. 

Life is the effect of the animal soul. The disappearance of the effectdoes not necessarily involve the disappearance of the cause, as thedisappearance of the smoke does not require the cessation of the fire. Death means simply the separation of the soul, not the destructionthereof. It does not follow because the human soul remains after thedeath of the body, that the soul of the ox and the ass continueslikewise, for the two souls are different. Animals were created for thesake of man, whereas man exists for his own sake. Moreover, man's lifeis ultimately derived from his rational soul. For if the animal soul ofman were the ultimate source of life, the rational soul too would bedependent for its life upon the former, and hence would be inferior toit, which is absurd. It remains then that the _rational soul givesexistence to the animal soul in man_. 

Sleep is the rest of the senses, as death is their entire cessation. Thepurpose of sleep is to give the brain rest so that the "spirit" of thesoul should not be dissolved and the "mixture" of the body injuredsuddenly and cause death. The heart rests continually betweencontraction and expansion, hence it needs no special rest at night. Waking is the activity of the senses and the exercise of their functionsto satisfy the desires of the body. The motions of the soul in thewaking state are in the interest of the needs of the body. During sleepthe soul looks out for itself, for its better world, being then freefrom the business of the body. If it is pure and bright, and the bodyis free from the remnant of food, and the thought is not depressed bysorrow and grief--then the soul is aroused in its desire for the future, and beholds wonderful things. [172]

No one can deny that man has a rational soul because speech is anattribute which man has above all other animals. The soul is not acorporeal thing, for if it were it would have to occupy place like body, and would have color and form and other qualities like body. Moreover, it would require something else to give it life like body. In otherwords, the soul would require another soul, and that soul another soul, and so on _ad infinitum_, which is impossible. Hence the soul is not acorporeal thing. 

Nor can we say that the soul is _in_ the body. For if it were, it woulditself be body; since only body can fill the empty place in anotherbody, as water fills a jar. 

The soul is a substance and not an accident. An accident is a qualitywhich makes its appearance in something else, and has no permanence. Ifthen the rational soul is an accident of the body, it has no permanence, and man is sometimes rational and sometimes not. This is absurd, for inthat case there could be no purpose in giving him commandments andstatutes. 

There are inseparable accidents to be sure, like the color of theEthiopian's skin. But in that case we know the color is an accidentdespite its inseparability, from the fact that in other things color isan accident and may be removed. This will not apply to the reason. Forwe do not find anything in which reason is a removable accident. Themoment you remove reason, you remove man, for reason is essential toman. The fact that as a result of an injury a man may lose his reason isno argument against us, for this happens only when an injury isinflicted on the brain, which is the reason's instrument. This accountsfor the fact, too, that men in good health if given henbane to drinklose their reason, because the drink affects the brain. On the otherhand, we see that those afflicted with a certain disease of theintestines, which causes their death, are more rational and brighter atthe time of death than ever before, showing that the soul cannot be anaccident depending upon the "mixture" of the body. 

To regard the soul as an accident, while the body is a substance, wouldmake the soul inferior to the body. This is absurd. For we have thebody in common with the beasts; whereas it is in virtue of the reasonthat we are given commandments, and reward and punishment in the worldto come. 

If the soul is neither a corporeal thing nor an accident of body, itmust be a spiritual substance. And the best definition of the soul isthat of Aristotle, who says it is _a substance giving perfection to anatural organic body, which has life potentially_. Every phrase in thisdefinition tells. "Substance" excludes the view that the soul is anaccident. "Giving perfection" signifies that the soul is that whichmakes man perfect, bringing him to the next world, and being the purposenot merely of his creation and the composition of his body, but of thecreation of matter as well. "Natural organic body" indicates that thebody is an organon, or instrument in the function of the soul, thelatter using the body to carry out its own purposes. The rational soulis like a king; the animal soul is like an official before the king, rebuking the appetitive soul. 

In the discussion of the last paragraph we have a good example of theuncritical attitude of Ibn Zaddik toward the various schools ofphilosophical thought, particularly those represented by Plato andAristotle. This attitude is typical of the middle ages, which appealedto authority in philosophy as well as in theology, and hence developed aharmonistic attitude in the presence of conflicting authorities. Aidedby their defective knowledge of the complete systems of the ancientGreek philosophers, by the difficulties and obscurities incident totranslations from an alien tongue, and by the spurious writingscirculating in the name of an ancient Greek philosopher, the precisedemarcation of schools and tendencies became more and more confused, andit was possible to prove that Plato and Aristotle were in entireagreement. Thus Ibn Zaddik has no scruple in combining (unconsciously, to be sure) Platonic and Neo-Platonic psychology with the Aristoteliandefinition representing quite a different point of view. The one isanthropological dualism, regarding the soul as a distinct entity whichcomes to the body from without. The other is a biological monism, inwhich the soul is the reality of the body, the essence of itsfunctioning, which makes the potentially living body an actually livingbody. We cannot enter here into a criticism of the elements of theAristotelian definition of the soul as rendered and interpreted by IbnZaddik, but will merely say that it misses completely the meaning ofAristotle, and shows that Ibn Zaddik did not take it from the "De Anima"of Aristotle, but found it without its context in some Arabic work. 

To return from our digression, the three souls, Ibn Zaddik tells us, arespiritual powers; every one of them is a substance by itself of benefitto the body. The rational soul gets the name soul primarily, and theothers get it from the rational soul. The _Intellect_ is called soulbecause the rational soul and the Intellect have a common matter. Andhence when the soul is perfected it becomes intellect. This is why therational soul is called potential intellect. The only difference betweenthem is one of degree and excellence. The world of Intellect issuperior, and its matter is the pure light, Intellect in which there isno ignorance, because it comes from God without any intermediate agency. 

Here we see just a touch of the Neo-Platonic doctrine of emanation, ofwhich the Universal Intellect is the first. But it is considerably toneddown and not continued down the series as in Plotinus or the Brethren ofPurity. 

The accidents of the soul are spiritual like the soul itself. They are, knowledge, kindness, goodness, justice, and other similar qualities. Ignorance, wrong, evil, and so on, are not the opposites of thosementioned above, and were not created with the soul like the others. They are merely the absence of the positive qualities mentioned before, as darkness is the absence of light. God did not create any defect, nordid he desire it. Evil is simply the result of the incapacity of a giventhing to receive a particular good. If all things were capable ofreceiving goods equally, all things would be one thing, and the Creatorand his creatures would be likewise one. This was not God's purpose. 

There is a tacit opposition to the Mutakallimun in Ibn Zaddik'sarguments against the view that the soul is an accident, as well as inhis statement in the preceding paragraph that the bad qualities and evilgenerally are not opposites of the good qualities and good respectively, but that they are merely privations, absences, and hence not created byGod. This is a Neo-Platonic doctrine. Pseudo-Bahya, we have seen (p. 108f. ), and Abraham bar Hiyya (p. 123 f. ) adopt the Kalamistic view in thelatter point, and solve the problem of evil differently. 

The function of the rational soul is knowledge. The rational soulinvestigates the unknown and comprehends it. It derives general rules, makes premises and infers one thing from another. Man alone has thisprivilege. It is in virtue of the rational soul that we have been givencommandments and prohibitions, and become liable to reward andpunishment. Brute animals have no commandments, because they have noreason. The soul has reason only potentially, and man makes it actual bystudy. If the reason were actual originally in the soul, there would beno difference between the soul's condition in its own world and in thisone; and the purpose of man, which is that he may learn in order tochoose the right way and win salvation, would have no meaning. 

The existence of many individual souls, all of which have the soulcharacter in common, shows that there is a universal soul by virtue ofwhich all the particular souls exist. This division of the universalsoul into many individual souls is not really a division of the formerin its essence, which remains one and indivisible. It is the bodieswhich receive the influence of the universal soul, as vessels in the sunreceive its light according to their purity. Hence the existence ofjustice and evil, righteousness and wrong. This does not, however, meanto say that the reception of these qualities is independent of a man'schoice. Man is free to choose, and hence he deserves praise and blame, reward and punishment. 

The rational soul is destined for the spiritual world, which is a pureand perfect world, made by God directly without an intermediate agency. It is not subject to change or defect or need. God alone created thisspiritual world to show his goodness and power, and not because heneeded it. The world is not like God, though God is its cause. It is noteternal _a parte ante_, having been made out of nothing by God; but itwill continue to exist forever, for it cannot be more perfect than itis. It is simple and spiritual. This applies also to the heavenlyspheres and their stars. 

Man is obliged to reason and investigate, as all nations do according tothe measure of their capacities. No animal reasons because it has notthe requisite faculty. But if man should neglect to exercise the powergiven him, he would lose the benefit coming therefrom and the purpose ofhis existence. There would then be no difference between him and thebeast. 

The first requisite for study and investigation is to deaden the animaldesires. Then with the reason as a guide and his body as a model, manacquires the knowledge of the corporeal world. From his rational soul hecomes to the knowledge of the existence of a spiritual world. Finally hewill learn to know the Creator, who is the only real existent, fornothing can be said truly to exist, which at one time did not exist, orwhich at some time will cease to exist. When a man neglects thisprivilege which is his of using his reason, he forfeits the name man, and descends below the station of the beast, for the latter never fallsbelow its animal nature. 

It is very important to study the knowledge of God, for it is thehighest knowledge and the cause of human perfection. The prophets arefull of recommendations in this regard. Jeremiah says (31, 33), "Theyshall all know me, from the least of them even unto their greatest. "Amos (5, 6) bids us "Seek for the Lord and you shall live. " Hosealikewise (6, 3) recommends that "We may feel it, and strive to know theLord. "[173]

The first loss a man suffers who does not study and investigate is thathe does not understand the real existence of God, and imagines he isworshipping a body. Some think God is light. But this is as bad as toregard him body. For light is an accident in a shining body, as isproved by the fact that the air receives the light of the sun, and laterit receives the shadow and becomes dark. And yet these people are notthe worst by any means, for there are others who do not trouble toconcentrate their minds on God, and occupy their thoughts solely withthe business and the pleasures of this world. These people we do notdiscuss at all. We are arguing against those who imagine they are wisemen and students of the Kalam. In fact they are ignorant persons, and donot know what logic is and how it is to be used. 

Before giving our own views of the nature and existence of God, we mustrefute the objectionable doctrines of these people. Joseph al-Basir in awork of his called "Mansuri" casts it up to the Rabbanites that inbelieving that God descends and ascends they are not true worshippers ofGod. But he forgets that his own doctrines are no better. Anyone whobelieves that God created with a newly created will and rejects by meansof a newly created rejection has never truly served God or known him. Just as objectionable is their view that God is living but not with liferesiding in a subject, powerful but not with power, and so on. We shalltake up each of these in turn. 

The Mutakallimun refuse to believe that God's will is eternal, for fearof having a second eternal beside God. And so they say that whenever Godwills, he creates a will for the purpose, and whenever he rejectsanything he creates a "rejection" with which the objectionable thing isrejected. But this leads them to a worse predicament than the one fromwhich they wish to escape, as we shall see. If God cannot createanything without having a will as the instrument in creating, and forthis reason must first create a will for the purpose--how did he createthis will? He must have had another will to create this will, and athird will to create the second, and so on _ad infinitum_, which isabsurd. If he created the first will without the help of another will, why not create the things he wanted outright without any will? Besides, in making God will at a given time after a state of not willing, theyintroduce change in God. 

As for the other dictum, that God is "living but not with life, ""powerful but not with power, " "knowing but not with knowledge, " and soon; what do they mean by this circumlocution? If they say "living" toindicate that he is not dead, and add "but not with life, " so as toprevent a comparison of him with other living things, why not say also, "He is body, but not like other bodies"? If the objection to calling himbody is that body is composite, and what is composite must have beencomposed by someone and is not eternal, the same objection applies to"living. " For "living" implies "breathing" and "possessed of sensation, "hence also composite and created. If they reply, we mean life peculiarto him, we say why not also body peculiar to him? You see these peopleentangle themselves in their own sophisms, because they do not know whatdemonstration means. [174]

Having disposed of the errors of the Mutakallimun, we must now presentour own method of investigation into the nature of God. To know a thing, we investigate its four causes--material, formal, efficient and final. What has no cause but is the cause of all things, cannot be known inthis way. Still it is not altogether unknowable for this reason. Itsessence cannot be known, but it may be known through its activities, orrather effects, which suggest attributes. We cannot therefore knowconcerning God _what_ he is, nor _how_ he is, nor _on account of what_, nor _of what kind_, nor _where_, nor _when_. For these can apply only toa created thing having a cause. But we can ask concerning him, _whether_he is; and this can best be known from his deeds. 

We observe the things of the world and find that they are all composedof substance and accident, as we saw before (p. 131). These arecorrelative, and one cannot exist without the other. Hence neitherprecedes the other. But accident is "new" (_i. E. _, not eternal), henceso is substance. That accident is new is proved from the fact that restsucceeds motion and motion succeeds rest, hence accidents constantlycome and go and are newly created. 

Now if substance and accident are both new there must be something thatbrought them into being unless they bring themselves into being. But thelatter is impossible, for the agent must either exist when it bringsitself into being, or not. If it exists it is already there; if it doesnot exist, it is nothing, and nothing cannot do anything. Hence theremust be a being that brought the world into existence. This is God. 

God is one, for the cause of the many must be the one. If the cause ofthe many is the many, then the cause of the second many is a third many, and so on _ad infinitum_; hence we must stop with the one. God is to theworld as unity is to number. Unity is the basis of number without beingincluded in number, and it embraces number on all sides. It is thefoundation of number; for if you remove unity, you remove number; butthe removal of number does not remove unity. The one surrounds number onall sides; for the beginning of number is the one, and it is also themiddle of number and the end thereof. For number is nothing but anaggregate of ones. Besides, number is composed of odds and evens, andone is the cause of odd as well as even. 

If there were two eternal beings, they would either coincide in allrespects, and they would be one and not two. Or they would differ. Inthe latter case, the world is either the work of both or of one only. If of both, they are not omnipotent, and hence not eternal. If of oneonly, then the other does not count, since he is not eternal, and thereis only one. 

By saying God is one we do not mean that he comes under the category ofquantity, for quantity is an accident residing in a substance, and allsubstance is "new. " What we mean is that the essence of God is trueunity, not numerical unity. For numerical unity is also in a sensemultiplicity, and is capable of multiplication and division. God's unityis alone separate and one in all respects. 

God is not like any of his creatures. For if he were, he would bepossessed of quality, since it is in virtue of quality that a thing issaid to be like another, and quality is an accident contained in asubstance. 

God is self-sufficient and not in need of anything. For if he neededanything at all, it would be first of all the one who created him andmade him an existent thing. But this is absurd, since God is eternal. Wemight suppose that he needs the world, which he created for somepurpose, as we sometimes make things to assist us. But this, too, isimpossible. For if he were dependent upon the world for anything, hecould not create it. It is different with us. We do not create things;we only modify matter already existing. 

Again, if God created the world for his own benefit, then either he wasalways in need of the world, or the need arose at the time of creating. If he was always in need of the world, it would have existed with himfrom eternity, but we have already proved that the world is not eternal. If the need arose in him at the time of creation, as heat arises in abody after cold, or motion after rest, then he is like created things, and is himself "new" and not eternal. To say the need was always there, and yet he did not create it until the time he did would be to ascribeinability to God of creating the world before he did, which is absurd. For one who is unable at any given time, cannot create at all. Itremains then that he does not need anything, and that he created theworld by reason of his goodness and generosity and nothing else. 

The question of God's will is difficult. The problem is this. If God'swill is eternal and unchanging, and he created the world with his will, the world is eternal. If we say, as we must, that he created the worldafter a condition of non-creation, we introduce a change in God, asomething newly created in him, namely, the will to create, which didnot exist before. This is a dilemma. My own view is that since God'screating activity is his essence, and his essence is infinite andeternal, we cannot say he created _after_ a condition of non-creation, or that he willed _after_ a condition of non-willing, or that he wasformerly not able. And yet we do not mean that the world is eternal. Itwas created a definite length of time before our time. The solution ofthe problem is that time itself was created with the world; for time isthe measure of motion of the celestial sphere, and if there are nospheres there is no time, and no before and after. Hence it does notfollow because the world is not eternal that _before_ its creation Goddid not create. There is no _before_ when the world is not. 

We objected to the view of the Mutakallimun (p. 142), who speak of Godcreating a will on the ground that if he can create a will directly hecan create the world instead. Our opinion is therefore that God's willis eternal and not newly created, for the latter view introducescreation in God. There is still the difficulty of the precise relationof the will to God. If it is different from God we have two eternals, and if it is the same as God in all respects, he changes when hecreates. My answer is, it is not different from God in any sense, andthere is no changing attribute in God. But there is a subtle mystery inthis matter, which it is not proper to reveal, and this is not the placeto explain it. The interested reader is referred to the book ofEmpedocles and other works of the wise men treating of this subject(_cf. _ above, p. 64). 

God created the world out of nothing, and not out of a pre-existentmatter. For if the matter of the world is eternal like God, there is nomore reason for supposing that God formed a world out of it than that itformed a world out of God. 

The world is perfect. For we have repeatedly shown that its creation isdue entirely to God's goodness. If then it were not perfect, this wouldargue in God either ignorance or niggardliness or weakness. [175]

Most of the ancients avoided giving God attributes for fear of makinghim the bearer of qualities, which would introduce plurality andcomposition in his essence. The proper view, however, is this. As God'sessence is different from all other essences, so are his attributesdifferent from all other attributes. His attributes are not differentfrom him; his knowledge and his truth and his power are his essence. Theway man arrives at the divine attributes is this. Men have examined hisworks and learned from them God's existence. They then reflected on thisexistent and found that he was not weak; so they called him strong. Theyfound his works perfect, and they called him wise. They perceived thathe was self-sufficient, without need of anything, and hence without anymotives for doing wrong. Hence they called him righteous. And so on withthe other attributes. All this they did in order that people may learnfrom him and imitate his ways. But we must not forget that all theseexpressions of God's attributes are figurative. No one must suppose thatif we do not say he has life, it means he is dead. What we mean is thatwe cannot apply the term living to God literally, in the sense in whichwe apply it to other living things. When the Bible does speak of God asalive and living, the meaning is that he exists forever. The philosopheris right when he says that it is more proper to apply negativeattributes to God than positive. [176]

Taking a glance at Ibn Zaddik's theology just discussed in its essentialoutlines, we notice that while he opposes vigorously certain aspects ofKalamistic thought, as he found them in al-Basir, the Karaite, his ownmethod and doctrine are not far removed from the Kalam. His proof of thecreation of the world from its composite character (substance andaccident) is the same as one of Saadia, which Maimonides cites as aKalamistic proof. We have already spoken of the fact that the method ofbasing one's theology upon the creation of the world is one that isdistinctive of the Kalam, as Maimonides himself tells us. And thismethod is common to Saadia, Bahya and Ibn Zaddik. In his discussion ofthe attributes Ibn Zaddik offers little if anything that is new. Hisattitude is that in the literal and positive sense no attribute can beapplied to God. We can speak of God negatively without running the riskof misunderstanding. But the moment we say anything positive we dobecome thus liable to comparing God with other things; and suchcircumlocutions as the Kalamistic "Living without life, " and so on, donot help matters, for they are contradictory, and take away with onehand what they give with the other. The Biblical expressions must betaken figuratively; and the most important point to remember is thatGod's essence cannot be known at all. The manner in which we arrive atthe divine attributes is by transferring them from God's effects innature to his own essence. All this we have already found in Bahya muchbetter expressed, and Bahya is also without doubt the source of IbnZaddik's discussion of God's unity. 

We must now review briefly the practical part of Ibn Zaddik's philosophyas it is found in the fourth part of the "Microcosm. " In the manner ofBahya he points out the importance of divine service and obedience tothe commandments of God, viewing man's duties to his maker as anexpression of gratitude, which everyone owes to his benefactor. LikeBahya he compares God's benefactions with those of one man to another toshow the infinite superiority of the former, and the greater duty whichfollows therefrom. 

The commandments which God gave us like the act of our creation are forour own good, that we may enjoy true happiness in the world to come. Asit would not be proper to reward a person for what he has not done, Godgave man commandments. The righteous as well as the wicked are free todetermine their own conduct, hence reward and punishment are just. 

Like Saadia and Bahya before him, Ibn Zaddik makes use of thedistinction (or rather takes it for granted) between rational andtraditional commandments; pointing out that the latter also have a causeand explanation in the mind of God even though we may not know it. Insome cases we can see the explanation ourselves. Take for instance theobservance of the Sabbath. Its rational signification is two-fold. Itteaches us that the world was created, and hence has a Creator whom weworship. And in the second place the Sabbath symbolizes the futureworld. As one has nothing to eat on the Sabbath day unless he hasprepared food the day before, so the enjoyment of the future worlddepends upon spiritual preparation in this world. 

In his conduct a man must imitate God's actions by doing good and mercyand kindness. Without the knowledge of God a person's good deeds are ofno account and no better than the work of idolaters. In fact it is notpossible to do good deeds without a knowledge of God, for he is thesource of all good, and there is no true good without him. When a foolis seen with good qualities such as mercy and benevolence, they are dueto the weakness of his animal soul, the spirited part of his nature. Similarly if this fool abstains from pleasures, it is because of theweakness of his appetitive soul. 

Thus we see that knowledge comes first in importance; for knowledgeleads to practice, and practice brings reward in the world to come. Asthe purpose of man's creation is that he may enjoy the future life, wisdom or knowledge is the first requisite to this great end. 

The four principal qualities constituting goodness or virtue are (1)knowledge of God's attributes; (2) righteousness or justice; (3) hope;(4) humility. All other good qualities are derived from these. Jeremiahnames some of them when he says (9, 23), "I am the Lord who exercisekindness, justice and righteousness on the earth; for in these things Idelight, saith the Lord. " Similarly Zephaniah (2, 3) bids us, "Seek yethe Lord, all ye meek of the earth, who have fulfilled his ordinances;seek righteousness, seek meekness. "

The four qualities of wisdom or knowledge, righteousness, hope andhumility are without doubt modified descendants of the four Platonicvirtues, wisdom, courage, temperance and justice, which we still find intheir original form and in their Platonic derivation and psychologicalorigin in Pseudo-Bahya (_cf. _ above p. 111). 

Reward and punishment of the real kind, Ibn Zaddik thinks, are not inthis world but in the next. In this way he accounts for the fact of theprosperity of the wicked and the sufferings of the righteous. Anotherproof that this world cannot be the place of final reward and punishmentis that pleasure in this world is not a real good, but only a temporaryrespite from disease. Pain and pleasure are correlative, as we sawbefore (p. 136). In fact pleasure is not a good at all; for if it were, then the greater the pleasure, the greater the good, which is not true. Reward in the next world is not a corporeal pleasure at all. 

The evil which happens to the righteous in this world is often a naturaloccurrence without reference to reward and punishment, and may becompared to the natural pleasures which men derive from the sense ofsight and the other senses, and which have nothing to do with reward andpunishment. Sometimes, too, this evil is inflicted upon the good man toforgive his sins. Real reward and punishment are in the future life, and as that life is spiritual, the reward as well as the punishment istimeless. 

The Mutakallimun think that animals and little children are alsorewarded in the next world for ill treatment, suffering and death whichare inflicted upon them in this world. So we find in Joseph al Basir'sMansuri. But this is absurd. If the killing of animals is a wrong, Godwould not have commanded us to do it, any more than he ordered us tokill human beings in order that he may reward them later. Moreover, weshould then deserve punishment for killing animals if that is wrong, andthere would follow the absurdity that God commanded us to do that forwhich we deserve punishment. Besides, if the animals deserve reward andpunishment, they should have been given commandments and laws likeourselves. If this was not done because animals are not rational, rewardand punishment are equally out of place for the same reason. 

When the soul leaves the body in death, if she exercised her reason inthe pursuit of knowledge, she will continue her existence forever in theupper world. This is her happiness, her reward and her paradise, namely, to cleave to her own world, and to shine with the true light emanatingfrom God directly. This is the end of the human soul. But if she did notexercise her reason and did not pursue right conduct, she will not beable to return to the spiritual world, for she will have lost her ownspirituality. She will be similar to the body, desiring this world andits pleasures. Her fate will be to revolve forever with the sphere inthe world of fire, without being able to return to her world. Thus shewill be forever in pain, and homeless. 

When the Messiah comes, the pious men of our nation, the Prophets, thePatriarchs and those who died for the sanctification of the name, _i. E. _, the martyrs, will be brought back to life in the body, and willnever die again. There will be no eating and drinking, but they willlive like Moses on the mountain basking in the divine light. The wickedwill also be joined to their bodies and burned with fire. [177]

CHAPTER X

JUDAH HALEVI

In Judah Halevi the poet got the better of the rationalist. Not thatJudah Halevi was not familiar with philosophical thinking and did notabsorb the current philosophical terminology as well as the ideascontained therein. Quite the contrary. He shows a better knowledge ofAristotelian ideas than his predecessors, and is well versed inNeo-Platonism. While he attacks all those views of philosophers whichare inconsistent to his mind with the religion of Judaism, he speaks inother respects the philosophic language, and even makes concessions tothe philosophers. If the reason should really demand it, he tells us, one might adopt the doctrine of the eternity of matter without doing anyharm to the essence of Judaism. [178] As for the claims of reason to ruleour beliefs, he similarly admits that that which is really proved in thesame absolute manner as the propositions in mathematics and logic cannotbe controverted. But this opinion need cause one no difficulty as thereis nothing in the Bible which opposes the unequivocal demands of thereason. [179] He cannot consistently oppose all philosophy and science, for he maintains that the sciences were originally in the hands of theJews, and that it was from them that the Chaldeans borrowed them andhanded them over to the Persians, who in turn transferred them to Greeceand Rome, their origin being forgotten. [180] At the same time he insiststhat philosophy and reason are not adequate means for the solution ofall problems, and that the actual solutions as found in the writings ofthe Aristotelians of his day are in many cases devoid of alldemonstrative value. Then there are certain matters in theory as well asin practice which do not at all come within the domain of reason, andthe philosophers are bound to be wrong because they apply the wrongmethod. Revelation alone can make us wise as to certain aspects of God'snature and as to certain details in human conduct; and in thesephilosophy must fail because as philosophy it has no revelation. Withall due respect therefore to the philosophers, who are the most reliableguides in matters not conflicting with revelation, we must leave them ifwe wish to learn the truth concerning those matters in which they areincompetent to judge. 

This characterization of Judah Halevi's attitude is brief andinadequate. But before proceeding to elaborate it with more detail andgreater concreteness, it will be well to sketch very briefly the littlewe know of his life. [181]

Judah Halevi was born in Toledo in the last quarter of the eleventhcentury. This is about the time when the city was taken from theMohammedans by the emperor Alphonso VI, king of Leon, Castile, Galiciaand Navarre. At the same time Toledo remained Arabic in culture andlanguage for a long while after this, and even exerted a great influenceupon the civilization of Christendom. The Jews were equally well treatedin Toledo by Mohammedan emir and Christian king. The youth of Halevi wastherefore not embittered or saddened by Jewish persecutions. It seemsthat he was sent to Lucena, a Jewish centre, where he studied the Talmudwith the famous Alfasi, and made friends with Joseph ibn Migash, Alfasi's successor, and Baruh Albalia, the philosopher. A poet bynature, he began to write Hebrew verses early, and soon became famous asa poet of the first order in no manner inferior to Gabirol. His livinghe made not from his verses, but like many others of his day bypracticing the art of medicine. Later in life he visited Cordova, already in its decline through the illiberal government of the Almoraviddynasty. The rulers were strict religionists, implicit followers of the"fukaha, " the men devoted to the study of Mohammedan religion and law;and scientific learning and philosophy were proscribed in their domains. Men of another faith were not in favor, and the Jews who, unlike theChristians, had no powerful emperor anywhere to take their part, had tobuy their lives and comparative freedom with their hard earned wealth. Here Halevi spent some time as a physician. He was admitted in courtcircles, but his personal good fortune could not reconcile him to thesufferings of his brethren, and his letters give expression to hisdissatisfaction. He wrote a variety of poems on subjects secular andreligious; but what made him famous above all else was his strongnationalism, and those of his poems will live longest which giveexpression to his intense love for his people and the land which wasonce their own. That it was not mere sentiment with Judah Halevi heproved late in life when he decided to leave his many friends and hisbirthplace and go to Palestine to end his life on the soil of hisancestors. It was after 1140 that he left Spain for the East. Unfavorable winds drove him out of course to Egypt, and he landed atAlexandria. From there he went to Cairo at the invitation of hisadmirers and friends. Everywhere he was received with great honor, hisfame preceding him, and he was urged to remain in Egypt. But nodissuasion could keep him from his pious resolve. We find him later inDamietta; we follow him to Tyre and Damascus, but beyond the last cityall trace of him is lost. We know not whether he reached Jerusalem ornot. Legend picks up the thread where history drops it, and tells ofJudah Halevi meeting his death at the gates of the holy city as withtears he was singing his famous ode to Zion. An Arab horseman, the storygoes, pierced him through with his spear. 

This sketch of Halevi's life and character, brief and inadequate as itis, will prepare us to understand better his attitude to philosophy andto Judaism. His was not a critical intellect whose curiosity is notsatisfied until the matter in dispute is proved in logical form. Reasonis good enough in mathematics and physics where the objects of ourinvestigation are accessible to us and the knowledge of their natureexhausts their significance. It is not so with the truths of Judaism andthe nature of God. These cannot be known adequately by the reason alone, and mere knowledge is not enough. God and the Jewish religion are notsimply facts to be known and understood like the laws of science. Theyare living entities to be acquainted with, to be devoted to, to love. Hence quite a different way of approach is necessary. And not everyonehas access to this way. The method of acquaintance is open only to thosewho by birth and tradition belong to the family of the prophets, who hada personal knowledge of God, and to the land of Palestine where Godrevealed himself. [182]

We see here the nationalist speaking, the lover of his people and oftheir land and language and institutions. David Kaufmann has shown thatJudah Halevi's anti-philosophical attitude has much in common with thatof the great Arab writer Al Gazali, from whom there is no doubt that heborrowed his inspiration. [183] Gazali began as a philosopher, then lostconfidence in the logical method of proof, pointed to the contradictionsof the philosophers, to their disagreements among themselves, and wentover to the Sufis, the pietists and mystics of the Mohammedan faith. There are a number of resemblances between Gazali and Halevi as Kaufmannhas shown, and there is no doubt that skepticism in respect of thepowers of the human reason on the one hand, and a deep religious senseon the other are responsible for the point of view of Gazali as well asHalevi. But there is this additional motive in Halevi that he wasdefending a persecuted race and a despised faith against not merely thephilosophers but against the more powerful and more fortunate professorsof other religions. He is the loyal son of his race and his religion, and he will show that they are above all criticism, that they are thebest and the truest there are. Maimonides, too, found it necessary todefend Judaism against the attacks of philosophy. But in his case it wasthe Jew in him who had to be defended against the philosopher in him. Itwas no external enemy but an internal who must be made harmless, and themethod was one of reconciliation and harmonization. It is still truer tosay that with Maimonides both Judaism and philosophy were his friends, neither was an enemy. He was attached to one quite as much as to theother. And it was his privilege to reconcile their differences, to thegreat gain, as he thought, of both. Judah Halevi takes the stand of onewho fights for his hearth and home against the attacks of foreign foes. He will not yield an inch to the adversary. He will maintain his own. The enemy cannot approach. 

Thus Halevi begins his famous work "Kusari": "I was asked what I have tosay in answer to the arguments of philosophers, unbelievers andprofessors of other religions against our own. " Instead of working outhis ideas systematically, he wanted to give his subject dramaticinterest by clothing it in dialogue form. And he was fortunate infinding a historical event which suited his purpose admirably. 

Some three or four centuries before his time, the king of the Chazars, apeople of Turkish origin living in the Caucasus, together with hiscourtiers and many of his subjects embraced Judaism. Hasdai ibn Shaprut, the Jewish minister and patron of learning of Cordova, in the tenthcentury corresponded with the then king of the Chazars, and received anaccount of the circumstances of the conversion. In brief it was that theking wishing to know which was the true religion invited representativesof the three dominant creeds, Judaism, Christianity and Mohammedanism, and questioned them concerning the tenets of their respective faiths. Seeing that the Christian as well as the Mohammedan appealed in theirarguments to the truth of the Hebrew Bible, the king concluded thatJudaism must be the true religion, which he accordingly adopted. Thisstory gave Halevi the background and framework for his composition. Heworks out his own ideas in the form of a dialogue between the JewishRabbi and the king of the Chazars, in which the former explains to theking the essentials of the Jewish religion, and answers the king'squestions and criticisms, taking occasion to discuss a variety oftopics, religious, philosophical and scientific, all tending to show thetruth of Judaism and its superiority to other religions, to philosophy, Kalam, and also to Karaism. 

The story is, Halevi tells us, in the introduction to his book, that theking of the Chazars had repeated dreams in which an angel said to him, "Your intentions are acceptable to God, but not your practice. " Hisendeavors to be faithful to his religion, and to take part in theservices and perform the sacrifices in the temple in person only led tothe repetition of the dream. He therefore consulted a philosopher abouthis belief, and the latter said to him, "In God there is neither favornor hatred, for he is above all desire and purpose. Purpose andintention argue defect and want, which the fulfilment of the intentionsatisfies. But God is free from want. Hence there is no purpose orintention in his nature. 

"God does not know the particular or individual, for the individualconstantly changes, whereas God's knowledge never changes. Hence Goddoes not know the individual man and, needless to say, he does not hearhis prayer. When the philosophers say God created man, they use the wordcreated metaphorically, in the sense that God is the cause of allcauses, but not that he made man with purpose and intention. 

"The world is eternal, and so is the existence of man. The character andability of a person depend upon the causes antecedent to him. If theseare of the right sort, we have a person who has the potentialities of aphilosopher. To realize them he must develop his intellect by study, andhis character through moral discipline. Then he will receive theinfluence of the 'Active Intellect, ' with which he becomes identified sothat his limbs and faculties do only what is right, and are wholly inthe service of the active Intellect. 

"This union with the active Intellect is the highest goal of man; and hebecomes like one of the angels, and joins the ranks of Hermes, Æsculapius, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle. This is the meaning of theexpression 'favor of God. ' The important thing is to study the sciencesin order to know the truth, and to practice the ethical virtues. If onedoes this, it matters not what religion he professes, or whether heprofesses any religion at all. He can make his own religion in order todiscipline himself in humility, and to govern his relations to societyand country. Or he can choose one of the philosophical religions. Purityof heart is the important thing, and knowledge of the sciences. Then thedesired result will come, namely, union with the active intellect, whichmay also result in the power of prophecy through true dreams andvisions. "

The king was not satisfied with the statement of the philosopher, whichseemed to him inadequate because he felt that he himself had thenecessary purity of heart, and yet he was told that his practice was notsatisfactory, proving that there is something in practice as such apartfrom intention. Besides, the great conflict between Christianity andIslam, who kill one another, is due to the difference in religiouspractice, and not in purity of heart. Moreover, if the view of thephilosophers were true, there should be prophecy among them, whereas inreality prophecy is found among those who did not study the sciencesrather than among those who did. 

The king then said, I will ask the Christians and the Mohammedans. Ineed not inquire of the Jews, for their low condition is sufficientproof that the truth cannot be with them. So he sent for a Christiansage, who explained to him the essentials of his belief, saying amongother things, We believe in the creation of the world in six days, inthe descent of all men from Adam, in revelation and Providence, inshort, in all that is found in the law of Moses and in the otherIsraelitish Scriptures, which cannot be doubted because of the publicitywhich was given to the events recorded therein. He also quoted thewords of the gospel, I did not come to destroy any of the commandmentsof Israel and of Moses their teacher; I came to confirm them. 

The king was not convinced by the Christian belief, and called aMohammedan doctor, who in describing the specific tenets ofMohammedanism also mentioned the fact that in the Koran are quoted thePentateuch and Moses and the other leaders, and the wonderful thingsthey did. These, he said, cannot be denied; for they are well known. 

Seeing that both Christian and Mohammedan referred to the law of Mosesas true, and as evidence that God spoke to man, the king determined tocall a Jewish sage also, and hear what he had to say. 

The Jewish "Haber, " as Judah Halevi calls him, began his discourse bysaying, We Jews believe in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, who tookthe children of Israel out of Egypt, supported them in the wilderness, gave them the land of Canaan, and so on. 

The king was disappointed and said, I had determined not to consult theJews in this matter at all, because their abject condition in the worlddid not leave them any good quality. You should have said, he told theJew, that you believe in him who created the world and governs it; whomade man and provides for him. Every religionist defends his belief inthis way. 

The Jew replied, The religion to which you refer is a rational religion, established by speculation and argument, which are full of doubt, andabout which there is no agreement among philosophers, because not allthe arguments are valid or even plausible. This pleased the king, and heexpressed a wish to continue the discourse. The Rabbi then said, Theproper way to define one's religion is by reference to that which ismore certain, namely, actual experience. Jews have this actualexperience. The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob spoke to Moses anddelivered the Israelites out of Egypt. This is well known. God gaveIsrael the Torah. To be sure, all others not of Israel who accept theLaw will be rewarded, but they cannot be equal to Israel. There is apeculiar relation between God and Israel in which the other peoples donot share. As the plant is distinguished from the mineral, the animalfrom the plant, and man from the irrational animal, so is the propheticindividual distinguished above other men. He constitutes a higherspecies. It is through him that the masses became aware of God'sexistence and care for them. It was he who told them things unknown tothem; who gave them an account of the world's creation and its history. We count now forty-five hundred years from the creation. This was handeddown from Adam through Seth and Enos to Noah, to Shem and Eber, toAbraham, Isaac and Jacob, to Moses, and finally to us. Moses came onlyfour hundred years after Abraham in a world which was full of knowledgeof heavenly and earthly things. It is impossible that he should havegiven them a false account of the division of languages and therelations of nations without being found out and exposed. 

The philosophers, it is true, oppose us by maintaining that the world iseternal. But the philosophers are Greeks, descended from Japheth, whodid not inherit either wisdom or Torah. Divine wisdom is found only inthe family of Shem. The Greeks had philosophy among them only during theshort time of their power. They borrowed it from the Persians, who hadit in turn from the Chaldeans. But neither before nor after did theyhave any philosophers among them. 

Aristotle, not having any inherited tradition concerning the origin ofthe world, endeavored to reason it all out of his own head. Eternity wasjust as hard to believe in as creation. But as he had no true andreliable tradition, his arguments in favor of eternity seemed to him tobe the stronger. Had he lived among a people who had reliable traditionson the other side, he would have found arguments in favor of creation, which is more plausible than eternity. Real demonstration cannot becontroverted; and there is nothing in the Bible which opposes what thereason unequivocally demands. But the matter of eternity or creation isvery difficult. The arguments on one side are as good as those on theother. And tradition from Adam to Noah and Moses, which is better thanargument, lends its additional weight to the doctrine of creation. Ifthe believer in the Torah were obliged to hold that there is a primitiveeternal matter from which the world was made, and that there were manyworlds before this one, there would be no great harm, as long as hebelieves that this world is of recent origin and Adam was the firstman. [184]

We see now the standpoint of Judah Halevi, for the "Haber" is of coursehis spokesman. Philosophy and independent reasoning on such difficultmatters as God and creation are after all more or less guess work, andcannot be made the bases of religion except for those who have nothingbetter. The Jews fortunately have a surer foundation all their own. Theyhave a genuine and indisputable tradition. History is the only truescience and the source of truth; not speculation, which is subjective, and can be employed with equal plausibility in favor of oppositedoctrines. True history and tradition in the case of the Jews goes backultimately to first hand knowledge from the very source of all truth. The prophets of Israel constitute a higher species, as much superior tothe ordinary man as the ordinary man is to the lower animal, and theseprophets received their knowledge direct from God. In principle JudahHalevi agrees with the other Jewish philosophers that true reason cannotbe controverted. He differs with them in the concrete application ofthis abstract principle. He has not the same respect as Maimonides forthe actual achievements of the unaided human reason, and an infinitelygreater respect for the traditional beliefs of Judaism and the Biblicalexpressions taken in their obvious meaning. Hence he does not feel thesame necessity as Maimonides to twist the meaning of Scriptural passagesto make them agree with philosophical theories. 

According to this view Judah Halevi does not find it necessary with thephilosophers and the Mutakallimun painfully to prove the existence ofGod. The existence of the Jewish people and the facts of their wonderfulhistory are more eloquent demonstrations than any that logic ormetaphysics can muster. But more than this. The philosophical view ofGod is inadequate in more ways than one. It is inaccurate in content andincorrect in motive. In the first place, they lay a great deal of stresson nature as the principle by which objects move. If a stone naturallymoves to the centre of the world, they say this is due to a cause callednature. And the tendency is to attribute intelligence and creative powerto this new entity as an associate of God. This is misleading. The realIntelligence is God alone. It is true that the elements, and the sun andmoon, and the stars exert certain influences, producing heat and cold, and various other effects in things material, by virtue of which theselatter are prepared for the reception of higher forms. And there is noharm in calling these agencies Nature. But we must regard these asdevoid of intelligence, and as mere effects of God's wisdom andpurpose. [185]

The philosopher denies will in God on the ground that this would arguedefect and want. This reduces God to an impersonal force. We Jewsbelieve God has will. The word we use does not matter. I ask thephilosopher what is it that makes the heavens revolve continually, andthe outer sphere carry everything in uniform motion, the earth standingimmovable in the centre? Call it what you please, will or command; it isthe same thing that made the air shape itself to produce the sounds ofthe ten commandments which were heard, and that caused the characters toform on the Tables of Stone. [186]

The motive of the philosopher is also different from that of thebeliever. The philosopher seeks knowledge only. He desires to know Godas he desires to know the exact position and form of the earth. Ignorance in respect to God is no more harmful in his mind thanignorance respecting a fact in nature. His main object is to have trueknowledge in order to become like unto the Active Intellect and to beidentified with it. As long as he is a philosopher it makes nodifference to him what he believes in other respects and whether heobserves the practices of religion or not. [187]

The true belief in God is different in scope and aim. What God is mustbe understood not by means of rational proofs, but by prophetic andspiritual insight. Rational proofs are misleading, and the heretics andunbelievers also use rational proofs--those for example who believe intwo original causes, in the eternity of the world, or in the divinity ofthe sun and fire. The most subtle proofs are those used by thephilosophers, and they maintain that God is not concerned about us, andpays no attention to our prayers and sacrifices; that the world iseternal. It is different with us, who heard his words, his commands andprohibitions, and felt his reward and his punishment. We have a propername of God, Jhvh, representative of the communications he made to us, and we have a conviction that he created the world. The first was Adam, who knew God through actual communication and the creation of Eve fromone of his ribs. Cain and Abel came next, then Noah and Abraham, Isaacand Jacob, and so on to Moses and the Prophets, who came after him. Allthese called him Jhvh by reason of their insight. The people whoreceived the teaching of the Prophets, in whom they believed, alsocalled him Jhvh, because he was in communication with men; and theselect among them saw him through an intermediate agency, calledvariously, Form, Image, Cloud, Fire, Kingdom, Shekinah, Glory, Rainbow, and so on, proving that he spoke to them. [188]

As the sun's light penetrates different objects in varying degrees, forexample, ruby and crystal receive the sun's light in the highest degree;clear air and water come next, then bright stones and polished surfaces, and last of all opaque substances like wood and earth, which the lightdoes not penetrate at all; so we may conceive of different minds varyingin the degree to which they attain a knowledge of God. Some arrive onlyas far as the knowledge of "Elohim, " while others attain to a knowledgeof Jhvh, which may be compared to the reception of the sun's light inruby and crystal. These are the prophets in the land of Israel. Theconception involved in the name "Elohim" no intelligent man denies;whereas many deny the conception of Jhvh, because prophecy is an unusualoccurrence even among individuals, not to speak of a nation. That is whyPharaoh said (Exod. 5, 2), "I know not Jhvh. " He knew "Elohim, " but notJhvh, that is a God who reveals himself to man. "Elohim" may be arrivedat by reasoning; for the reason tells us that the world has a ruler;though the various classes of men differ as to details, the mostplausible view being that of the philosophers. But the conception ofJhvh cannot be arrived at by reason. It requires that prophetic visionby which a person almost becomes a member of a new species, akin toangels. Then the doubts he formerly had about "Elohim" fall away, and helaughs at the arguments which led him to the conception of God and ofunity. Now he becomes a devotee, who loves the object of his devotion, and is ready to give his life in his love for him, because of the greathappiness he feels in being near to him, and the misery of being awayfrom him. This is different from the philosopher, who sees in theworship of God only good ethics and truth, because he is greater thanall other existing things; and in unbelief nothing more than the faultof choosing the untrue. [189]

Here there is clearly a touch of religious poetry and mysticism, whichreveals to us Halevi's real attitude, and we have no difficulty inunderstanding his lack of sympathy with what seemed to him the shallowrationalism of the contemporaneous Aristotelian, who fancied in hisconceit that with a few logical formulæ he could penetrate themysteries of the divine, when in reality he was barely enabled to skimthe surface; into the sanctuary he could never enter. 

Though, as we have just seen, Halevi has a conception of God as apersonal being, acting with purpose and will and, as we shall see moreclearly later, standing in close personal relation to Israel and theland of Palestine, still he is very far from thinking of himanthropomorphically. In his discussion of the divine attributes heyields to none in removing from God any positive quality of thoseascribed to him in the Bible. The various names or appellatives appliedto God in Scripture, except the tetragrammaton, he divides, according totheir signification, into three classes, _actional_, _relative_, _negative_. Such expressions as "making high, " "making low, " "makingpoor, " almighty, strong, jealous, revengeful, gracious, merciful, and soon, do not denote, he says, feeling or emotion in God. They are ascribedto him because of his visible acts or effects in the world, which wejudge on the analogy of our own acts. As a human being is prompted toremove the misery of a fellowman because he feels pity, we ascribe allinstances of divine removal of misery from mankind to a similar feelingin God, and call him merciful. But this is only a figure of speech. Goddoes remove misery, but the feeling of pity is foreign to him. We calltherefore the attribute merciful and others like it actional, meaningthat it is God's acts which suggest to us these appellations. 

Another class of attributes found in the Bible embraces such expressionsas blessed, exalted, holy, praised, and so on. These are calledrelative, because they are derived from the attitude of man to God. Godis blessed because men bless him, and so with the rest. They do notdenote any essential quality in God. And hence their number does notnecessitate plurality in God. Finally we have such terms as living, one, first, last, and so on. These too do not denote God's positive essence, for in reality God cannot be said to be either living or dead. Life aswe understand it denotes sensation and motion, which are not in God. Ifwe do apply to God the term living, we do so in order to exclude itsnegative, dead. Living means not dead; one means not many; first meansnot having any cause antecedent to him; last means never ceasing to be. Hence we call these attributes negative. [190]

We see that Judah Halevi is at one with Bahya and Joseph ibn Zaddik inhis understanding of the divine attributes. The slight difference in themode of classification is not essential. 

This God chose Israel and gave them the ten commandments in order toconvince them that the Law originated from God and not from Moses. Forthey might have had a doubt in their minds, seeing that speech is amaterial thing, and believe that the origin of a law or religion is inthe mind of a human being, which afterwards comes to be believed in asdivine. For this reason God commanded the people to purify themselvesand be ready for the third day, when they _all_ heard the word of God, and were convinced that prophecy is not what the philosophers say itis--a natural result of man's reason identifying itself with the ActiveIntellect through the help of the imagination, which presents truevisions in a dream--but a real communication from God. Not only did theyhear the word of God, but they saw the writing of God on the Tables ofStone. 

This does not mean that we believe in the corporeality of God; Heavenforbid, we do not even think of the soul of man as corporeal. But wecannot deny the things recorded, which are well known. Just as Godcreated heaven and earth, not by means of material tools as a man does, but by his will, so he might have willed that the air should conveyarticulate sounds to the ear of Moses, and that letters should be formedon the Tables of Stone to convey to the people the ideas which he wantedthem to know. They might have happened in a still more wonderful waythan I have been able to conceive. 

This may seem like an unwarranted magnifying of the virtues of ourpeople. But in reality it is true that the chain of individuals fromAdam to Moses and thereafter was a remarkable one of godly men. Adam wassurely a godlike man since he was made by the hand of God and was notdependent on the inherited constitution of his parents, and on the foodand climate he enjoyed in the years of his growth. He was made perfectas in the time of mature youth when a person is at his best, and wasendowed with the best possible soul for man. Abel was his successor inexcellence, also a godly man, and so down the line through Seth andNoah, and so on. There were many who were unworthy and they wereexcluded. But there was always one in every generation who inherited thedistinguished qualities of the Adam line. And even when, as in the caseof Terah, the individual was unworthy in himself, he was important asbeing destined to give birth to a worthy son, who would carry on thetradition, like Abraham. Among Noah's sons, Shem was the select one, andhe occupied the temperate regions of Palestine, whereas Japheth wentnorth and Ham went south--regions not so favorable to the development ofwisdom. [191]

The laws were all given directly to Moses with all their details so thatthere is no doubt about any of them. This was absolutely necessary, forhad there been any detail left out, a doubt might arise respecting itwhich would destroy the whole spiritual structure of Judaism. This isnot a matter which philosophical reasoning can think out for itself. Asin the natural generation of plant and animal the complexity of elementsand conditions is so great that a slight tilting of the balance in thewrong direction produces disease and death, so in the spiritual creationof Israel the ceremonies and the laws are all absolutely essential tothe whole, whether we understand it or not, and none could be left tospeculation. All were given to Moses. 

Moses addressed himself to his own people only. You say it would havebeen better to call all mankind to the true religion. It would be betteralso perhaps that all animals should be rational. You have forgottenwhat I said about the select few that worthily succeeded Adam as theheart of the family to the exclusion of the other members, who are asthe peel, until in the sons of Jacob all twelve were worthy, and fromthem Israel is descended. These remarkable men had divine qualitieswhich made them a different species from ordinary men. They were aimingat the degree of the prophet, and many of them reached it by reason oftheir purity, holiness and proximity to the Prophets. For a prophet hasa great influence on the one who associates with him. He converts thelatter by awakening in him spirituality and a desire to attain that highdegree which brings visible greatness and reward in the world to come, when the soul is separated from the senses and enjoys the heavenlylight. We do not exclude anyone from the reward due him for his goodworks, but we give preference to those who are near to God, and wemeasure their reward in the next world by this standard. Our religionconsists not merely in saying certain words, but in difficult practicesand a line of conduct which bring us near to God. Outsiders too mayattain to the grade of wise and pious men, but they cannot become equalto us and be prophets. [192]

Not only is Israel a select nation to whom alone prophecy is given as agift, but Palestine is the most suitable place in the world forcommunion with God, as a certain spot may be best for planting certainthings and for producing people of a particular character andtemperament. All those who prophesied outside of Palestine did so withreference to Palestine. Abraham was not worthy of the divine covenantuntil he was in this land. Palestine was intended to be a guide for thewhole world. The reason the second Temple did not last longer than itdid is because the Babylonian exiles did not sufficiently love theirfatherland and did not all return when the decree of Cyrus permittedthem to do so. [193]

Israel is the heart among the nations. The heart is more sensitive thanthe rest of the body in disease as in health. It feels both moreintensely. It is more liable to disease than the other organs, and onthe other hand it becomes aware sooner of agencies dangerous to itshealth and endeavors to reject them or ward them off. So Israel is amongthe nations. Their responsibility is greater than that of other nationsand they are sooner punished. "Only you have I loved out of all thefamilies of the earth, " says Amos (3, 2), "therefore will I visit uponyou all your iniquities. " On the other hand, God does not allow our sinsto accumulate as he does with the other nations until they deservedestruction. "He pardons the iniquities of his people by causing them topass away in due order. " As the heart is affected by the other organs, so Israel suffers on account of their assimilation to the other nations. Israel suffers while the other nations are in peace. As the elements arefor the sake of the minerals, the minerals for the sake of the plants, the plants for the sake of the animals, the animals for the sake of man, so is man for the sake of Israel, and Israel for the sake of theProphets and the pious men. With the purification of Israel the worldwill be improved and brought nearer to God. [194]

Associated with Israel and Palestine as a third privilege anddistinction is the Hebrew language. This is the original language whichGod spoke to Adam. The etymologies of Biblical names prove it. It wasricher formerly, and has become impoverished in the course of time likethe people using it. Nevertheless it still shows evidence ofsuperiority to other languages in its system of accents which shows theproper expression in reading, and in its wonderful system of vowelchanges producing euphony in expression and variation in meaning. [195]

The highest type of man, we have seen, is the Prophet, for whose sakeIsrael and the whole of humanity exists. He is the highest type becausehe alone has an immediate knowledge of Jhvh as distinguished from"Elohim, " the concept of universal cause and power, which thephilosopher also is able to attain. Jhvh signifies, as we have seen, thepersonal God who performs miracles and reveals himself to mankindthrough the prophet. We wish to know therefore how Judah Haleviconceives of the essence and process of prophetic inspiration. We arealready aware that he is opposed to the philosophers who regard thepower of prophecy as a natural gift possessed by the man of pureintellect and perfect power of imagination. To these Aristotelians, aswe shall have occasion to see more clearly later, the human intellect isnothing more than an individualized reflection, if we may so term it, ofthe one universal intellect, which is--not God, but an intellectualsubstance wholly immaterial, some nine or ten degrees removed from theGodhead. It is called the Active Intellect, and its business is togovern the sublunar world of generation and decay. As pure thought theActive Intellect embraces as its content the entire sublunar world inessence. In fact it bestows the forms (in the Aristotelian sense) uponthe things of this world, and hence has a timeless knowledge of all theworld and its happenings. The individualized reflection of it in thehuman soul is held there so long as the person is alive, somewhat as adrop of water may hold the moon until it evaporates, and the reflectionis reabsorbed in the one real moon. So it is the Active Intellect whichis the cause of all conceptual knowledge in man through itsindividualizations, and into it every human intellect is reabsorbed whenthe individual dies. Some men share more, some less in the ActiveIntellect; and it is in everyone's power, within limits, to increase andpurify his participation in the influence of the Active Intellect bystudy and rigorous ethical discipline. The prophet differs from theordinary man and the philosopher in degree only, not in kind. Hisknowledge comes from the influence of the Active Intellect as does theknowledge of the philosopher. The difference is that in the prophet'scase the imagination plays an important rôle and presents concretevisions instead of universal propositions, and the identification withthe Active Intellect is much closer. 

This conception of prophecy, which in its essentials, we shall see, wasadopted by Abraham ibn Daud, Maimonides and Gersonides, naturally wouldnot appeal to Judah Halevi. Prophecy is the prerogative of Israel and ofPalestine. The philosophers have nothing to do with it. A merephilosopher has no more chance of entering the kingdom of prophecy thana camel of passing through the eye of a needle. [B] Have the philosophersever produced prophets? And yet, if their explanation is correct, theirranks should abound in them. Prophecy is a supernatural power, and theinfluence comes from God. The prophet is a higher species of mortal. Heis endowed with an internal eye, a hidden sense, which sees certainimmaterial objects, as the external sense sees the physical objects. Noone else sees those forms, but they are none the less real, for thewhole species of prophetic persons testify to their existence. Inordinary perception we tell a real object from an illusion by appealingto the testimony of others. What appears to a single individual only maybe an illusion. If all persons agree that the object is there, weconclude it is real. The same test holds of the prophetic visions. Allprophets see them. Then the intellect of the prophet interprets thevision, as our intellect interprets the data of our senses. The lattergive us not the essence of the sensible object, but the superficialaccidents, such as color, shape, and so on. It is the work of the reasonto refer these qualities to the essence of the object, as king, sun. Thesame holds true of the prophet. He sees a figure in the form of a kingor a judge in the act of giving orders; and he knows that he has beforehim a being that is served and obeyed. Or he sees the form in the act ofcarrying baggage or girded for work; and he infers that he is dealingwith a being that is meant for a servant. What these visions really wereit is not in all cases possible to know with certainty. There is nodoubt that the Prophets actually saw the hosts of heaven, the spirits ofthe spheres, in the form of man. The word angel in the Bible (Heb. Mal'ak) means messenger. What these messengers or angels were we cannottell with certainty. They may have been specially created from the fineelementary bodies, or they belonged to the eternal angels, who may bethe same as the spiritual beings of whom the philosophers speak. We canneither reject their view nor definitely accept it. Similarly theexpression, "The Glory of Jhvh, " may denote a fine body following thewill of God and formed every time it has to appear to a prophet, or itmay denote all the angels and spiritual beings, Throne and Chariot andFirmament, and Ofannim and Galgalim, and other eternal beingsconstituting, so to speak, the suite of God. 

[B] This simile represents Halevi's thought. He does not use thisexpression. 

Even such phrases as, "They saw the God of Israel" (Exod. 24, 10), "Hesaw the form of Jhvh" (Num. 12, 8), the Rabbinic expression "MaaseMerkaba" (work of the divine chariot, _cf. _ above, p. Xvi), and thelater discussions concerning the "Measure of the divine stature" (ShiʿurKomah), must not be rejected. These visual images representative of Godare calculated to inspire fear in the human soul, which the bareconception of the One, Omnipotent, and so on, cannot produce. [196]

As Judah Halevi is unwilling to yield to the philosophers and explainaway the supernaturalism of prophecy, maintaining rather on the contrarythat the supernatural character of the prophetic vision is an evidenceof the superior nature of Israel as well as of their land and theirlanguage, so he insists on the inherent value of the ceremonial law, including sacrifices. To Saadia, and especially to Bahya and Maimonides, the test of value is rationality. The important laws of the Bible arethose known as the rational commandments. The other class, the so-calledtraditional commandments, would also turn out to be rational if we knewthe reason why they were commanded. And in default of exact knowledge itis the business of the philosopher to suggest reasons. Bahya lays thegreatest stress upon the commandments of the heart, _i. E. _, upon thepurity of motive and intention, upon those laws which concern feelingand belief rather than outward practice. Judah Halevi's attitude isdifferent. If the only thing of importance in religion were intentionand motive and moral sense, why should Christianity and Islam fight tothe death, shedding untold human blood in defence of their religion. Asfar as ethical theory and practice are concerned there is no differencebetween them. Ceremonial practice is the only thing that separates them. And the king of the Chazars was told repeatedly in his dreams that hisintentions were good but not his practice, his religious practice. To besure the ethical law is important in any religion, but it is notpeculiar to religion as such. It is a necessary condition of sociallife, without which no association is possible, not even that of arobber band. There is honesty even among thieves. Religion has itspeculiar practices, and it is not sufficient for an Israelite to observethe rational commandments alone. When the Prophets inveigh againstsacrifices; when Micah says (6, 8), "He hath shewed thee, O man, what isgood; and what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and tolove mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God, " they mean that theceremonies alone are not sufficient; but surely a man is not fully anIsraelite if he neglects the ceremonial laws and observes only therational commandments. We may not understand the value of the ceremoniallaws, the meaning of the institution of sacrifices. But neither do weunderstand why the rational soul does not attach itself to a body exceptwhen the parts are arranged in a certain manner and the elements aremixed in a certain proportion, though the reason needs not food anddrink for itself. God has arranged it so, that only under certainconditions shall a body receive the light of reason. So in the matter ofsacrifices God has ordained that only when the details of thesacrificial and other ceremonies are minutely observed shall the nationenjoy his presence and care. In some cases the significance of certainobservances is clearer than in others. Thus the various festivals arealso symbolic of certain truths of history and the divine government ofthe world. The Sabbath leads to the belief in the exodus from Egypt andthe creation of the world; and hence inculcates belief in God. [197]

In his views of ethics Judah Halevi is more human than Bahya, beingopposed to all manner of asceticism. The law, he says, does not demandexcess in any direction. Every power and faculty must be given its due. Our law commends fear, love and joy as means of worshipping God; so thatfasting on a fast day does not bring a man nearer to God than eating anddrinking and rejoicing on a feast day, provided all is done with a viewto honoring God. A Jewish devotee is not one who separates himself fromthe world. On the contrary, he loves the world and a long life becausethereby he wins a share in the world to come. Still his desire is toattain the degree of Enoch or Elijah, and to be fit for the associationof angels. A man like this feels more at home when alone than incompany of other people; for the higher beings are his company, and hemisses them when people are around him. Philosophers also enjoy solitudein order to clarify their thoughts, and they are eager to meet disciplesto discuss their problems with them. In our days it is difficult toreach the position of these rare men. In former times when the Shekinahrested in the Holy Land, and the nation was fit for prophecy, there werepeople who separated themselves from their neighbors and studied the lawin purity and holiness in the company of men like them. These were theSons of the Prophets. Nowadays when there is neither prophecy norwisdom, a person who attempted to do this, though he be a pious man, would come to grief; for he would find neither prophets nor philosophersto keep him company; nor enough to keep his mind in that high state ofexaltation needed for communion with God. Prayer alone is notsufficient, and soon becomes a habit without any influence on the soul. He would soon find that the natural powers and desires of the soul beginto assert themselves and he will regret his separation from mankind, thus getting farther away from God instead of coming nearer to him. 

The right practice of the pious man at the present day is to give allthe parts of the body their due and no more, without neglecting any ofthem; and to bring the lower powers and desires under the dominion ofthe higher; feeding the soul with things spiritual as the body withthings material. He must keep himself constantly under guard andcontrol, making special use of the times of prayer for self-examination, and striving to retain the influence of one prayer until the time comesfor the next. He must also utilize the Sabbaths and the festivals andthe Great Fast to keep himself in good spiritual trim. In addition hemust observe all the commandments, traditional, rational, and those ofthe heart, and reflect on their meaning and on God's goodness andcare. [198]

Judah Halevi has no doubt of the immortality of the soul and of rewardand punishment after death, though the Bible does not dwell upon thesematters with any degree of emphasis. Other religions, he admits, makegreater promises of reward after death, whereas Judaism offers divinenearness through miracles and prophecy. Instead of saying, If you dothus and so, I will put you in gardens after death and give youpleasures, our Law says, I will be your God and you will be my people. Some of you will stand before me and will go up to heaven, walking amongthe angels; and my angels will walk among you, protecting you in yourland, which is the holy land, not like the other nations, which aregoverned by nature. Surely, he exclaims, we who can boast of such thingsduring life are more certain of the future world than those whose solereliance is on promises of the hereafter. It would not be correct, theRabbi says to the king of the Chazars, who was tempted to despise theJews as well as their religion because of their material and politicalweakness, to judge of our destiny after death by our condition duringlife, in which we are inferior to all other people. For these verypeople, like the Christians and Mohammedans, glory in their founders, who were persecuted and despised, and not in the present power andluxury of the great kings. The Christians in particular worship the manwho said, "Whosoever smiteth thee on thy right cheek, turn to him theother also. And if a man ... Take away thy coat, let him have thy cloakalso" (Matth. 5, 39). Accordingly our worth is greater in the sight ofGod than if we were prosperous. It is true that not all of us accept ourmiserable condition with becoming humility. If we did, God would notkeep us so long in misery. But after all there is reward awaiting ourpeople for bearing the yoke of the exile voluntarily, when it would bean easy matter for any one of us to become a brother to our oppressorsby the saying of one word. 

Our wise men, too, have said a great deal about the pleasures andsufferings awaiting us in the next world, and in this also they surpassthe wise men of other religions. The Bible, it is true, does not laystress on this aspect of our belief; but so much is clear from the Biblealso, that the spirit returns to God. There are also allusions to theimmortality of the soul in the disappearance of Elijah, who did not die, and in the belief of his second coming. This appears also from theprayer of Balaam, "Let me die the death of the righteous, and may mylast end be like his" (Num. 23, 10), and from the calling of Samuel fromthe dead. The idea of paradise (Gan Eden) is taken from the Torah, andGehenna is a Hebrew word, the name of a valley near Jerusalem, wherefire always burned, consuming unclean bones, carcases, and so on. Thereis nothing new in the later religions which is not already found inours. [199]

An important ethical problem which Judah Halevi discusses morethoroughly than any of his predecessors is that of free will, which hedefends against fatalistic determinism, and endeavors to reconcile withdivine causality and foreknowledge. We have already seen (p. Xxi) thatthis was one of the important theses of the Muʿtazilite Kalam. And thereis no doubt that fatalism is opposed to Judaism. A fatalisticdeterminist denies the category of the contingent or possible. He saysnot merely that an event is determined by its proximate cause, he goesfurther and maintains that it is determined long in advance of any ofits secondary causes by the will of God. It would follow then that thereis no way of preventing an event thus predetermined. If we take pains toavoid a misfortune fated to come upon us, our very efforts may carry ustoward it and land us in its clutches. Literature is full of storiesillustrating this belief, as for example the story of Œdipus. Againstthis form of belief Judah Halevi vindicates the reality of thecontingent or possible as opposed to the necessary. No one except theobstinate and perverse denies the possible or contingent. Hispreparations to meet and avoid that which he hopes and fears prove thathe believes the thing amenable to pains and precautions. If he had notthis belief, he would fold his hands in resignation, never taking thetrouble to supply himself with arms to meet his enemy, or with water toquench his thirst. To be sure, we may argue that whether one preparehimself or omit to do so, the preparation or neglect is itselfdetermined. But this is no longer the same position as that maintainedat the outset. For we now admit that secondary causes do play a part indetermining the result, whereas we denied it at first. The will is oneof these secondary causes. Accordingly Judah Halevi divides all acts orevents into four classes, divine, natural, accidental and voluntary. Strictly divine events are the direct results of the divine will withoutany intermediate cause. There is no way of preparing for or avoidingthese; not, that is, physically; but it is possible to prepare oneselfmentally and morally, namely, through the secrets of the Torah to himwho knows them. 

Natural events are produced by secondary causes, which bring the objectsof nature to their perfection. These produce their effects regularly anduniformly, provided there is no hindrance on the part of the otherthree causes. An example of natural events would be the growth of aplant or animal under favorable conditions. Accidental events are alsoproduced by secondary causes, but they happen by chance, not regularlyand not as a result of purpose. Their causes are not intended for thepurpose of bringing perfection to their chance effects. These too may behindered by any one of the other three causes. An example of a chanceevent might be death in war. The secondary cause is the battle, but itspurpose was not that this given person might meet his death there, andnot all men die in war. 

Finally, voluntary acts are those caused by the will of man. It is thesethat concern us most. We have already intimated that the human will isitself a secondary cause and has a rôle in determining its effect. It istrue that the will itself is caused by other higher causes until we getto the first cause, but this does not form a _necessary_ chain ofcausation. Despite the continuous chain of causes antecedent to a givenvolition the soul finding itself in front of a given plan is free tochoose either of the two alternatives. To say that a man's speech is asnecessary as the beating of his pulse contradicts experience. We feelthat we are masters of our speech and our silence. The fact that wepraise and blame and love and hate a person according to his deliberateconduct is another proof of freedom. We do not blame a natural oraccidental cause. We do not blame a child or a person asleep when theycause damage, because they did not do the damage deliberately and withintention. If those who deny freedom are consistent, they must eitherrefrain from being angry with a person who injures them deliberately, orthey must say that anger and praise and blame and love and hate aredelusive powers put in our souls in vain. Besides there would be nodifference between the pious and the disobedient, because both are doingthat which they are by necessity bound to do. 

But there are certain strong objections to the doctrine of freedom. Ifman is absolutely free to do or forbear, it follows that the effects ofhis conduct are removed from God's control. The answer to this is thatthey are not absolutely removed from his control. They are still relatedto him by a chain of causes. 

Another argument against free will is that it is irreconcilable withGod's knowledge. If man alone is the master of his choice, God cannotknow beforehand what he will choose. And if God does know, the mancannot but choose as God foreknew he would choose, and what becomes ofhis freedom? This may be answered by saying that the knowledge of athing is not the cause of its being. We do not determine a past event bythe fact that we know it. Knowledge is simply evidence that the thingis. So man chooses by his own determination, and yet God knowsbeforehand which way he is going to choose, simply because he sees intothe future as we remember the past. [200]

Judah Halevi's discussion of the problem of freedom is fuller than anywe have met so far in our investigation. But it is not satisfactory. Apart from his fourfold classification of events which is open tocriticism, there is a weak spot in the very centre of his argument, which scarcely could have escaped him. He admits that the will is causedby higher causes ending ultimately in the will of God, and yet maintainsin the same breath that the will is not determined. As free the will isremoved from God's control, and yet it is not completely removed, beingrelated to him by a chain of causes. This is a plain contradiction, unless we are told how far it is determined and how far it is not. Surely the aspect in which it is not determined is absolutely removedfrom God's control and altogether uncaused. But Judah Halevi isunwilling to grant this. He just leaves us with the juxtaposition of twoincompatibles. We shall see that Hasdai Crescas was more consistent, andadmitted determinism. 

We have now considered Judah Halevi's teachings, and have seen that hehas no sympathy with the point of view of those people who were calledin his day philosophers, _i. E. _, those who adopted the teachingsascribed to Aristotle. At the same time he was interested in maintainingthat all science really came originally from the Jews; and in order toprove this he undertakes a brief interpretation of the "Sefer Yezirah"(Book of Creation), an early mystic work of unknown authorship and date, which Judah Halevi in common with the uncritical opinion of his dayattributed to Abraham. [201] Not to lay himself open to the charge ofinconsistency, he throws out the suggestion that the Sefer Yezirahrepresented Abraham's own speculations before he had the privilege of aprophetic communication from God. When that came he was ready to abandonall his former rationalistic lucubrations and abide by the certainty ofrevealed truth. [202] We may therefore legitimately infer that JudahHalevi's idea was that the Jews were the originators of philosophy, butthat they had long discarded it in favor of something much more validand certain; whereas the Greeks and their descendants, having nothingbetter, caught it up and are now parading it as their own discovery andeven setting it up as superior to direct revelation. 

Natural science in so far as it had to do with more or less verifiabledata could not be considered harmful, and so we find Judah Halevi takingpains to show that the sages of Rabbinical literature cultivated thesciences, astronomy in connection with the Jewish calendar; anatomy, biology and physiology in relation to the laws of slaughter and theexamination of animal meat (laws of "Terefa"). [203]

But so great was the fascination philosophy exerted upon the men of hisgeneration that even Judah Halevi, despite his efforts to shake itsauthority and point out its inadequacy and evident inferiority torevelation, was not able wholly to escape it. And we find accordinglythat he deems it necessary to devote a large part of the fifth book ofthe Kusari to the presentation of a bird's eye view of the currentphilosophy of the day. To be sure, he does not give all of it the stampof his approval; he repeatedly attacks its foundations and lays baretheir weakness. At the same time he admits that not every man has faithby nature and is proof against the erroneous arguments of heretics, astrologers, philosophers and others. The ordinary mortal is affected bythem, and may even be misled for a time until he comes to see the truth. It is therefore well to know the principles of religion according tothose who defend it by reason, and this involves a knowledge of scienceand theology. But we must not, he says, in the manner of the Karaites, advance all at once to the higher study of theology. One must firstunderstand the fundamental principles of physics, psychology, and so on, such as matter and form, the elements, nature, Soul, Intellect, DivineWisdom. Then we can proceed to the more properly theological matters, like the future world, Providence, and so on. 

Accordingly Judah Halevi gives us in the sequel a brief account such ashe has just outlined. It will not be worth our while to reproduce it allhere, as in the first place Judah Halevi does not give it as the resultof his own investigation and conviction, and secondly a good deal of itis not new; and we have already met it in more or less similar formbefore in Joseph ibn Zaddik, Abraham bar Hiyyah, and others. We mustpoint out, however, the new features which we did not meet before, explain their origin and in particular indicate Judah Halevi'scriticisms. 

In general we may say that Judah Halevi has a better knowledge ofAristotelian doctrines than any of his predecessors. Thus to take oneexample, which we used before (p. 138), Aristotle's famous definition ofthe soul is quoted by Isaac Israeli, Saadia, Joseph ibn Zaddik as wellas by Judah Halevi. Israeli does not discuss the definition indetail. [204] Saadia and Ibn Zaddik show clearly that they did notunderstand the precise meaning of the definition. Judah Halevi is thefirst who understands correctly all the elements of the definition. Andyet it would be decidedly mistaken to infer from this that Judah Halevistudied the Aristotelian works directly. By a fortunate discovery of S. Landauer[205] we are enabled to follow Judah Halevi's source with thecertainty of eyewitnesses. The sketch which he gives of the Aristotelianpsychology is taken bodily not from Aristotle's De Anima, but from ayouthful work of Ibn Sina. Judah Halevi did not even take the trouble topresent the subject in his own words. He simply took his model andabridged it, by throwing out all argumentative, illustrative andamplificatory material. Apart from this abridgment he follows hisauthority almost word for word, not to speak of reproducing the ideas inthe original form and order. This is a typical and extremely instructiveinstance; and it shows how careful we must be before we decide that amediæval writer read a certain author with whose ideas he is familiarand whom he quotes. 

In the sketch of philosophical theory Judah Halevi first speaks of thehyle (ὕλη) or formless matter, which according to thephilosophers was in the beginning of things contained within the lunarsphere. The "water" in the second verse of Genesis ("and the spirit ofGod moved upon the face of the water") is supposed by them to denotethis primitive matter, as the "darkness" in the same verse and the"chaos" ("Tohu") in the first verse signify the absence of form andcomposition in the matter (the Aristotelian στέρησις). God thenwilled the revolution of the outermost sphere, known as the diurnalsphere, which caused all the other spheres to revolve with it, therebyproducing changes in the hyle in accordance with the motions of thesphere. The first change was the heating of that which was next to thelunar sphere and making it into pure fire, known among the philosophersas "natural fire, " a pure, fine and light substance, without color orburning quality. This became the sphere of fire. The part that wasfurther away changed as a result of the same revolution into the sphereof air, then came the sphere of water, and finally the terrestrial globein the centre, heavy and thick by reason of its distance from the placeof motion. From these four elements come the physical objects bycomposition. The forms (in the Aristotelian sense) of things are imposedupon their matters by a divine power, the "Intellect, and Giver ofForms"; whereas the matters come from the hyle, and the accidentalproximity of different parts to the revolving lunar sphere explains whysome parts became fire, some air, and so on. 

To this mechanical explanation of the formation of the elements JudahHalevi objects. As long as the original motion of the diurnal sphere isadmittedly due not to chance but to the will of God, what is gained byreferring the formation of the elements to their accidental proximity tothe moving sphere, and accounting for the production of mineral, plantand animal in the same mechanical way by the accidental composition ofthe four elements in proportions varying according to the differentrevolutions and positions of the heavenly bodies? Besides if the latterexplanation were true, the number of species of plants and animalsshould be infinite like the various positions and formations of theheavenly bodies, whereas they are finite and constant. The argument fromthe design and purpose that is clearly visible in the majority of plantsand animals further refutes such mechanical explanation as is attemptedby the philosophers. Design is also visible in the violation of thenatural law by which water should always be above and around earth;whereas in reality we see a great part of the earth's surface abovewater. This is clearly a beneficent provision in order that animal lifemay sustain itself, and this is the significance of the words of thePsalmist (136, 6), "To him that stretched out the earth above thewaters. "

The entire theory of the four elements and the alleged composition ofall things out of them is a pure assumption. Take the idea of the worldof fire, the upper fire as they call it, which is colorless, so as notto obstruct the color of the heavens and the stars. Whoever saw such afire? The only fire we know is an extremely hot object in the shape ofcoal, or as a flame in the air, or as boiling water. And whoever saw afiery or aëry body enter the matter of plant and animal so as to warrantus in saying that the latter are composed of the four elements? True, weknow that water and earth do enter the matter of plants, and that theyare assisted by the air and the heat of the sun in causing the plant togrow and develop, but we never see a fiery or aëry body. Or whoever sawplants resolved into the four elements? If a part changes into earth, itis not real earth, but ashes; and the part changed to water is not realwater, but a kind of moisture, poisonous or nutritious, but not waterfit for drinking. Similarly no part of the plant changes to real air fitfor breathing, but to vapor or mist. Granted that we have to admit thewarm and the cold, and the moist and the dry as the primary qualitieswithout which no body can exist; and that the reason resolves thecomposite objects into these primary qualities, and posits substances asbearers of these qualities, which it calls fire, air, water andearth--this is true conceptually and theoretically only. It cannot bethat the primary qualities really existed in the simple state _extraanimam_, and then all existing things were made out of them. How can thephilosophers maintain such a thing, since they believe in the eternityof the world, that it always existed as it does now?

These are the criticisms of their theory of the elements. According tothe Torah God created the world just as it is, with its animals andplants already formed. There is no need of assuming intermediate powersor compositions. The moment we admit that the world was created out ofnothing by the will of God in the manner in which he desired, alldifficulties vanish about the origin of bodies and their associationwith souls. And there is no reason why we should not accept thefirmament, and the waters above the heaven, and the demons mentioned bythe Rabbis, and the account of the days of the Messiah and theresurrection and the world to come. [206]

Another theory he criticizes is that developed by Alfarabi and Avicenna, the chief Aristotelians of the Arabs before Averroes. It is acombination of Aristotelianism with the Neo-Platonic doctrine ofemanation, though it was credited as a whole to Aristotle in the middleages. We have already seen in the Introduction (p. Xxxiv) that Aristotleconceived the world as a series of concentric spheres with the earth inthe centre. The principal spheres are eight in number, and they carry inorder, beginning with the external sphere, (1) the fixed stars, (2)Saturn, (3) Jupiter, (4) Mars, (5) Mercury, (6) Venus, (7) Sun, (8)Moon. To account for the various motions of the sun and the planetsadditional spheres had to be introduced amounting in all to fifty-six. But the principal spheres remained those mentioned. Each sphere or groupof spheres with the star it carries is moved by an incorporeal mover, aspirit or Intelligence, and over them all is the first unmoved mover, God. He sets in motion the outer sphere of the fixed stars, and so thewhole world moves. There is nothing said in this of the origin of thesespheres and their intelligible movers. On the other hand, in theNeo-Platonic system of Plotinus all existence and particularly that ofthe intelligible or spiritual world issues or emanates from the One orthe Good. Intellect is the first emanation, Soul the second, Nature thethird and Matter the last. 

On account of the confusion which arose in the middle ages, as a resultof which Neo-Platonic writings and doctrines were attributed toAristotle, Alfarabi and Avicenna worked out a scheme which combined themotion theory of Aristotle with the doctrine of emanation of Plotinus. The theory is based upon a principle alleged to be Aristotle's that froma unitary cause nothing but a unitary effect can follow. Hence, saidAvicenna, God cannot have produced directly all the world we see in itscomplexity. He is the direct cause of the first Intelligence only, orfirst angel as Judah Halevi calls him. This Intelligence contemplatesitself and it contemplates its cause. The effect of the latter act isthe emanation of a second intelligence or angel; the effect of theformer is a sphere--that of the fixed stars, of which the firstIntelligence is the mover. The second Intelligence again produces athird Intelligence by its contemplation of the First Cause, and by itsself-contemplation it creates the second sphere, the sphere of Saturn, which is moved by it. So the process continues until we reach the sphereof the moon, which is the last of the celestial spheres, and the ActiveIntellect, the last of the Intelligences, having in charge the sublunarworld. 

This fanciful and purely mythological scheme arouses the antagonism ofJudah Halevi. It is all pure conjecture, he says, and there is not aniota of proof in it. People believe it and think it is convincing, simply because it bears the name of a Greek philosopher. As a matter offact this theory is less plausible than those of the "Sefer Yezirah";and there is no agreement even among the philosophers themselves exceptfor those who are the followers of the same Greek authority, Empedocles, or Pythagoras, or Aristotle, or Plato. These agree not because theproofs are convincing, but simply because they are members of a givensect or school. The objections to the theory just outlined are manifold. In the first place why should the series of emanations stop with themoon? Is it because the power of the First Cause has given out? Besideswhy should self-contemplation result in a sphere and contemplation ofthe First Cause in an Intelligence or angel? It should follow that whenAristotle contemplates himself he produces a sphere, and when hecontemplates the First Cause he gives rise to an angel. Granting thetruth of the process, one does not see why the mover of Saturn shouldnot produce two more emanations, one by contemplating the Intelligenceimmediately above it, and the other by contemplating the firstIntelligence, thus making four emanations instead of two. [207]

In his outline of the philosophers' psychology, which as we have seen(p. 175) is borrowed verbally from Avicenna, what is new to us is theexposition of the inner senses and the account of the rational faculty. We must therefore reproduce it here in outline together with JudahHalevi's criticism. 

The three kinds of soul, vegetative, animal and rational, we havealready met before. We have also referred to the fact that Judah Halevianalyzes correctly the well-known Aristotelian definition of the soul. We must now give a brief account of the inner senses as Judah Halevitook it from Avicenna. The five external senses, seeing, hearing, touching, smelling and tasting, give us merely colors, sounds, touchsensations, odors and tastes. These are combined into an object by the_common sense_, known also as the _forming power_. Thus when we seehoney we associate with its yellow color a sweet taste. This could notbe done unless we had a power which combines in it all the five senses. For the sense of sight cannot perceive taste, nor can color beapprehended by the gustatory sense. There is need therefore of a commonsense which comprehends all the five external senses. This is the firstinternal sense. This retains the forms of sensible objects just as theexternal senses present them. Then comes the _composing power_ or powerof imagination. This composes and divides the material of the commonsense. It may be true or false, whereas the common sense is always true. Both of these give us merely forms; they do not exercise any judgment. The latter function belongs to the third internal sense, the _power ofjudgment_. Through this an animal is enabled to decide that a givenobject is to be sought or avoided. It also serves to rectify the errorsof reproduction that may be found in the preceding faculty ofimagination. Love, injury, belief, denial, belong likewise to thejudging faculty together with such judgments as that the wolf is anenemy, the child a friend. The last of the internal senses is that of_factual memory_, the power which retains the judgments made by thefaculty preceding. 

In addition to these sensory powers the animal possesses motorfaculties. These are two, the _power of desire_, which moves the animalto seek the agreeable; and the _power of anger_, which causes it toreject or avoid the disagreeable. All these powers are dependent uponthe corporeal organs and disappear with the destruction of the latter. 

The highest power of the soul and the exclusive possession of man (thefaculties mentioned before are found also in animals) is the rationalsoul. This is at first simply a potentiality. Actually it is a _tabularasa_, an empty slate, a blank paper. But it has the power (or is thepower) of acquiring general ideas. Hence it is called hylic or materialintellect, because it is like matter which in itself is nothing actualbut is potentially everything, being capable of receiving any form andbecoming any real object. As matter receives sensible forms, so thematerial intellect acquires intelligible forms, _i. E. _, thoughts, ideas, concepts. When it has these ideas it is an _actual intellect_. Itis then identical with the ideas it has, _i. E. _, thinker and thoughtare the same, and hence the statement that the actual intellect is"intelligent" and "intelligible" at the same time. As matter is theprinciple of generation and destruction the rational soul, which is thusshown to be an immaterial substance, is indestructible, hence immortal. And it is the ideas it acquires which make it so. When the rational soulis concerned with pure knowledge it is called the _speculative_ or_theoretical intellect_. When it is engaged in controlling the animalpowers, its function is conduct, and is called the _practicalintellect_. The rational soul, _i. E. _, the speculative intellect, isseparable from the body and needs it not, though it uses it at first toacquire some of its knowledge. This is proved by the fact that whereasthe corporeal powers, like the senses, are weakened by strong stimuli, the reason is strengthened by hard subjects of thought. Old age weakensthe body, but strengthens the mind. The activities of the body arefinite; of the mind, infinite. 

We must also show that while the rational soul makes use of the data ofsense perception, which are corporeal, as the occasions for theformation of its general ideas, it is not wholly dependent upon them, and the sense data alone are inadequate to give the soul itsintellectual truths. Empirical knowledge is inductive, and no inductioncan be more general and more certain than the particular facts fromwhich it is derived. As all experience, however rich, is necessarilyfinite, empirical knowledge is never universally certain. But the souldoes possess universally certain knowledge, as for example the truths ofmathematics and logic; hence the origin of these truths can not beempirical. How does the soul come to have such knowledge? We must assumethat there is a divine emanation cleaving to the soul, which stands toit in the relation of light to the sense of sight. It is to theillumination of this intellectual substance and not to the data of senseperception that the soul owes the universal certainty of its knowledge. This divine substance is the _Active Intellect_. As long as the soul isunited with the body, perfect union with the Active Intellect isimpossible. But as the soul becomes more and more perfect through theacquisition of knowledge, it cleaves more and more to the ActiveIntellect, and this union becomes complete after death. Thus theimmortality of the soul is proved by reason. It is based upon theconviction that the soul is an immaterial substance and that itsperfection lies in its acquisition of intellectual ideas. [208]

Judah Halevi cannot help admitting the fascination such speculationexercises upon the mind of the student. But he must warn him againstbeing misled by the fame of such names as Plato and Aristotle, andsupposing that because in logic and mathematics the philosophers give usreal proofs, they are equally trustworthy in metaphysical speculation. If the soul is, as they say, an intellectual substance not limited inplace and for this reason not subject to genesis and decay, there is noway to distinguish one soul from another, since it is matter whichconstitutes individual existence. How then can my soul be distinguishedfrom yours, or from the Active Intellect and the other Intelligences, orfrom the First Cause itself? The souls of Plato and Aristotle shouldbecome one so that the one should know the secret thoughts of the other. If the soul gets its ideas through divine illumination from the ActiveIntellect, how is it that philosophers do not intuit their ideas at oncelike God and the Active Intellect, and how is it they forget?

Then as to their ideas about immortality. If immortality is a necessaryphenomenon due to the intellectual nature of the soul and dependent uponthe degree of intellectual knowledge it possesses, how much knowledgemust a man have to be immortal? If any amount is sufficient, then everyrational soul is immortal, for everybody knows at least the axioms oflogic and mathematics, such as that things equal to the same thing areequal to each other, that a thing cannot both be and not be, and so on. If a knowledge of the ten categories is necessary, and of the otheruniversal principles which embrace existence conceptually, though notpractically, this knowledge can be gotten in a day, and it is not likelythat a man can become an angel in a day. If on the other hand one mustknow everything not merely conceptually but in detail, no one can everacquire universal knowledge and no one is immortal The philosophers maybe excused because this is the best they can do with the help of purereason. We may commend them for their mode of life in accordance withthe moral law and in freedom from the world, since they were not boundto accept our traditions. But it is different with us. Why should weseek peculiar proofs and explanations for the immortality of the soul, since we have promises to that effect whether the soul be corporeal orspiritual? If we depend upon logical proof, our life will pass awaywithout our coming to any conclusion. [209]

Judah Halevi takes issue also with the Mutakallimun. These, as we know, were Mohammedan theologians who, unlike the philosophers, were notindifferent to religion. On the contrary their sole motive inphilosophizing was to prove the dogmas of their faith. They had nointerest in pure speculation as such. Judah Halevi has no more sympathywith them than with the philosophers. Owing to the fact that theKaraites were implicit followers of the Kalam and for other reasons, nodoubt, more objective, he thinks less of them than he does of thephilosophers. The only possible use, he tells us, of their methods is toafford exercise in dialectics so as to be able to answer the argumentsof unbelievers. To the superficial observer the Mutakallim may seem tobe superior to the prophet, because he argues, whereas the latteraffirms without proving. In reality, however, this is not so. The aim ofthe Mutakallim is to acquire the belief which the prophet has by nature. But his Kalam may injure his belief instead of confirming it, by reasonof the many difficulties and doubts it introduces. The prophet, who hasnatural belief, teaches not by means of dialectic discussion. If one hasa spark of the true belief in his nature, the prophet by his personalitywill benefit him by a slight hint. Only he who has nothing of truebelief in his nature must have recourse to Kalam, which may benefit himor injure. 

Judah Halevi follows up this general comment by a brief sketch of thesystem of the Kalam, but we need not enter into this matter as there islittle there that we do not already know, and there is no detailedcriticism on the part of Judah Halevi. [210]

The Rabbi concludes his discourse with the king of the Chazars bydeclaring his intention to leave the land in order to go to Jerusalem. Although the visible Shekinah is no longer in Palestine, the invisibleand spiritual presence is with every born Israelite of pure heart anddeed; and Palestine is the fittest land for this communion, beingconducive to purity of heart and mind. [211]

CHAPTER XI

MOSES AND ABRAHAM IBN EZRA

_1. Moses ibn Ezra_

Among the Jewish Neo-Platonists must be included the two Ibn Ezras, Moses and Abraham. They were contemporary and came from Spain. Moses, the older of the two, was born at Granada about 1070 and died after1138. Abraham, who travelled all over the world, was born at Toledo in1092 and died in 1167. Neither is particularly famous as a philosopher. Moses's celebrity rests on his poetic productions, secular as well asreligious, which are highly praised by Harizi, above even those ofHalevi. Abraham is best known as a grammarian and Biblical commentator, particularly the latter, though his versatility is remarkable. Besidesgrammar and exegesis he wrote on mathematics, astronomy and astrology, on religious philosophy, and was a poet of no mean order; though, asZunz says, [212] "flashes of thought spring from his words, but notpictures of the imagination. "

All that is accessible in print of Moses Ibn Ezra's philosophicaltreatise is a Hebrew translation of extracts under the title "Arugatha-Bosem" (Bed of Spices). [213] If we may judge of the rest of the workby these Hebrew fragments, we should say that philosophy was not IbnEzra's forte. He dabbled in it as any poet of that age did, but whatcaught his fancy was more the mysteriously sounding phrases ofcelebrated authorities like Pythagoras, Empedocles, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Hermes (whom he identifies with Enoch), than a strictlyreasoned out argument. Accordingly the Hebrew selections consist oflittle more than a string of quotations on the transcendence andunknowableness of God, on the meaning of philosophy, on the position ofman in the universe, on motion, on nature and on intellect. It is ofhistorical interest to us to know that Moses ibn Ezra, so famous as apoet, was interested in philosophy, and that the views which appealed tohim were those of Ibn Gabirol, whose "Fountain of Life" he knew, andfrom which he quotes a celebrated mystical passage. A few details willsuffice to make this clear. 

Man is a microcosm, a world in miniature, and there is nothing above orbelow, the counterpart of which is not found in man. There is no sphere, or star, or animal, or plant, or mineral, or power, or nature, butsomething similar, _mutatis mutandis_, is found in man. The tencategories, which according to the philosophers embrace all existence, are also found, all of them, in man. The perfection of man's creationpoints to a wise Creator. Man comes after multiplicity, God is beforemultiplicity. Man is like the great universe, and in both the spiritualcannot come in direct contact with the corporeal, but needsintermediating powers to bring the extremes together. In man soul andspirit stand between intellect and body. 

Hence a man must know himself before he can know the universe, else heis like a person who feeds other people while he is himself hungry. Toknow the Creator, the soul must first know herself, and this is one ofthe definitions of philosophy, to know one's own soul. He who can striphis soul of his corporeal senses and worldly desires, and rise to thesphere will find there his reward. Other similarly ascetic and mysticalexpressions are quoted from Aristotle(!), Pythagoras, and "one of themodern philosophers. " The last is none other than Ibn Gabirol, and thepassage quoted is the same as that cited above, (p. 69). 

Unity precedes the unitary object as heat comes before the hot object. Unity alone is self-subsistent. Numerical unity is prior to two, and isthe very root and essence of number. God's unity is above all otherunities, hence it cannot be described, because it has no cause, beingthe cause of everything else. As our eye cannot see the sun by reason ofits very brilliance, so our intellect cannot comprehend God because ofthe extreme perfection of his existence. The finite and imperfect cannotknow the infinite and perfect. Hence no names can apply to God exceptmetaphorically. When we say that God knows, we mean that he is knowledgeitself, not that knowledge is an attribute which he possesses. Socrates(!)said in his prayers, "Thou art not far from me so that I shouldraise my voice to thee, nor art Thou near unto me that I should contentmyself with a low whisper and the meditation of the heart; nor art Thouon any side of me so that I may turn toward Thee; for nearness anddistance have measure, but there is no measure between me and Thee. Thouart united with me and embracest me more closely than my intellect andsoul. "

He who knows most of the secret of the Creator, knows least; and he whoknows least, knows most. As the limbs of the body and the senses cannotknow the intelligible ideas because the latter are superior to them, sothe intellect cannot know the essence of the Creator because he is abovethe sphere of the intellect. Although the intellect is spiritual, itcannot comprehend the Creator because he is above all intellectualpowers, and is infinite. What is infinite has no division ormultiplication, or part or whole. 

The Gentiles make use of the anthropomorphic expressions in the Bible toannoy us, charging us with believing in a corporeal God. Would that wehad strength to silence their impudence by a crushing reply. But alas!their tyranny prevents us from raising our voice. But it is still moreaggravating to hear men of our own people, heretics, repeating the samecharge against the Bible and Talmud, when they ought to know better, since the expressions in question are metaphorical. Saadia has made thissufficiently clear. 

The Active Intellect is the first of God's creations. It is a poweremanating from the Will. It is a simple, pure and transparent substance, bearing in itself the forms of all existing things. The human intellectis known as the passive intellect. The rational soul is a pure substancegiving perfection to a natural body, etc. It is inferior to theintellect, and the animal soul is inferior to the rational. The soul isthe horseman, the body represents the soldiers and the arms. As thehorseman must take care of his arms that he may not be put to death, sothe soul must take care of the body that she may not perish. And thesenses must be taken into account, for the powers of the soul aredependent upon the powers of the body. If the food of the body is inproper proportion, the activity of the soul is proper and right. Similarly if one neglects moderation in food, he is bound to suffermorally and spiritually. 

The above selections, which are representative of the accessible portionof Moses ibn Ezra's philosophical treatise, except that such recurringphrases have been omitted as "And the philosopher said, " "And they say, "etc. , show that the work is nothing but a compilation of sayings onvarious philosophical topics, without any attempt on the author's partto think out the subject or any part thereof, for himself. 

_2. Abraham ibn Ezra_

Abraham Ibn Ezra did not write any special work on philosophy, and hisimportance lies chiefly in his Biblical commentary, which unlike that ofRashi, is based upon a scientific and philological foundation. Ibn Ezrawas thoroughly familiar with Arabic and well versed in the philological, scientific and philosophical studies cultivated by Arabs and Jews in hisnative land. For reasons not known to us--poverty was very likely one ofthem--he left his native Spain and wandered as far as Rome in the east, Egypt and Morocco in the south, and London in the north. Everywhere hewas busy with literary activity, and as he wrote in Hebrew his purposemust have been, as the result certainly proved to be, the enlightenmentof the non-Arabic speaking Jews of England, France and Italy, bybringing before them in a language that they knew the grammar of Hayyuj, the mathematics and astronomy of the Greeks and the Arabs, thephilosophy of Neo-Platonism, and the scientific and rationalistic spiritgenerally, as enlightened Spain had developed it in Jew and Arab alike. 

We are interested here more particularly in Ibn Ezra's philosophicalviews. These are scattered through his Biblical commentaries and in afew other small works devoted to an investigation of the laws of thePentateuch and the meaning of the names of God. [214] For though Ibn Ezrafavors the philological method as the best way to arrive at the truemeaning of Scripture, and decries allegory as well as Midrash whenpushed too far, and though his commentary is for the most part basedupon the philological method of interpretation, he was too much a childof his age to be able to refrain from finding in the Bible views akin tothose he learned from Gabirol, the Brethren of Purity and what otherphilosophical literature of the Arabs he read and was influenced by. Andso he, too, the grammarian and philologist, succumbed to the allegoricaland symbolical method he condemned. Without denying the historicalreality of the Garden of Eden, the Tree of Knowledge and the Tree ofLife, he also sees in these expressions symbols of cosmological, psychological and ethical ideas. In the fashion of Philo he sees in Edena representation of the higher world of the divinity, in the Garden theintermediate world of the spheres and Intelligences, in the riverissuing from the Garden the substance of the sublunar world, in the fourheads into which the river divides the four elements, and so on. Hespeaks of these symbolic meanings as the "secrets, " and so we have thesecret of the Garden, of the rivers, of the coats. And in the same wayhe speaks of the secret of the Cherubim, of the ark and the Tabernacle. These objects also symbolize metaphysical and cosmological truths. Hewas a believer in astrology, and laid this pseudo-science also undercontribution in the interpretation of Holy Writ. Here the variousnumbers found in the Bible in connection with ritual prescriptions, theconstruction of the Tabernacle, and so on, were of great service to IbnEzra in his symbolizations. Like Philo and the Neo-Pythagoreans heanalyzes the virtues and significances of the different numbers, andthus finds a symbol in every number found in the Bible. Writing as hedid for the Jews of central Europe, who were not trained in secularscience and philosophy, Ibn Ezra was not prepared to shock thesensibilities of his readers by his novel and, to them, heretical views;and hence he expressed himself in cryptic phrases and allusions, whichoften make his meaning difficult if not impossible to decipher. This, taken together with the fact that his views are not laid down anywheresystematically and in connected fashion, but are thrown out briefly, often enigmatically, in connection with the explanation of Biblicalverses and phrases, accounts for the difference among critics concerningthe precise doctrines of Abraham Ibn Ezra. 

Of his predecessors among the Jewish philosophers Ibn Ezra shows closestrelation to Solomon ibn Gabirol. He does not quote the "Fountain ofLife, " but he names its author as a great thinker and writer of poems, and shows familiarity with Gabirol's doctrines. Like Gabirol he saysthat all except God consists of substance (matter) and form. Not onlythe sublunar things, subject to generation and decay, but the higherincorporeal things, also, are in essence two, _i. E. _, are composed oftwo elements, subject and predicate. God alone is One; he is subjectonly and not predicate. And Ibn Ezra also has some allusion to thedivine Will as taught by Gabirol. 

In giving a connected sketch of Ibn Ezra's philosophical ideas, the mostone can do is to collect all the sayings bearing upon our subject whichare found scattered through Ibn Ezra's writings, and classify them andcombine them into a connected whole. This has been done before by NahmanKrochmal[215] and by David Rosin, [216] and we shall follow the latter inour exposition here. 

God is the One. He gives forms to all things, and is himself all things. God alone is the real existent, all else is an existent by virtue ofhim. Unity is the symbol of God because in number also the unit is thefoundation of all number, and yet is not itself number. It exists byvirtue of itself and needs not the numbers that come after. At the sametime the unit is also all number, because all number is made up of theunit. God alone is one, because he alone is not composed of matter andform, as everything else is. God has neither likeness nor form, for heis the creator of all things, _i. E. _, of all likeness and form. He istherefore incorporeal. In God the subject knowing and the object of hisknowledge are one and the same thing. Else he would not be one. Inknowing himself, therefore, he knows the universe. God as the cause andcreator of all things must know all things, the universal as well as theparticular, the world soul as well as the various species, and evenevery single creature, but he knows the particular in a general way. ForGod knows only what is permanent, whereas the particular is constantlychanging, hence he does not know the particular as such, but only asinvolved in the general and permanent. 

As God is incorporeal he is not subject to corporeal accidents or humanfeelings. Hence the many expressions in the Bible which ascribe suchaccidents and feelings to God must be understood as metaphors. It is apsychological necessity for man wishing to communicate his ideas toother men to speak in human terms, whether he speak of beings and thingsinferior or superior to him. The result is that the metaphor he finds itnecessary to employ either raises or lowers the object to which itrefers. It elevates the sub-human and lowers the superhuman to thehuman. This is the explanation of such phrases as "the mouth of theearth" the "hand of the Jordan, " the "head of the dust of the world, "and so on, in which the figure is that of personification. And thefundamental explanation is the same in such phrases as "The Lordrepented, " "The Lord rested, " "The Lord remembered, " "He that dwellethin heaven laughs, " and so on, where the process is the reverse ofpersonification. The motive common to both is to convey some idea to thereader. 

The Hebrew word "bara, " ordinarily translated "created, " which impliesto most people the idea of _creatio ex nihilo_, Ibn Ezra renders, inaccordance with its etymology, to limit, to define, by drawing orincising a line or boundary. Having said this, Ibn Ezra, in his wontedmysterious manner, stops short, refusing to say more and preferring tomystify the reader by adding the tantalizing phrase, "The intelligentwill understand. " He means apparently to indicate that an eternal matterwas endowed with form. In fact he seems to favor the idea of eternalcreation and maintenance of the universe, the relation of which to Godis as the relation of speech to the speaker, which exists only so longas the speaker speaks. The moment he ceases speaking the sounds cease toexist. 

The two ideas of eternal emanation of the world from God after themanner of the Neo-Platonists and of an eternal matter which God endowswith forms, are not really quite consistent, for the latter implies thatmatter is independent of God, whereas according to the former everythingowes its existence and continuance to God, from whom it emanates. But itis difficult from the fragmentary and laconic sayings of Ibn Ezra toextract a consistent and certain system. 

The world consists of three parts, three worlds Ibn Ezra calls them. Thehighest world consists of the separate Intelligences or angels, including the world-soul of which the human soul is a part. Theintermediate world consists of the spheres, planets and fixed stars. Finally the lower world contains the four elements and the product oftheir various mixtures, minerals, plants, animals, man. These threeworlds, Ibn Ezra appears to intimate in his oracular manner, aresymbolized by the three divisions of the Tabernacle, the holy of holiestypifying the world of spirits, the holy pointing to the spheres, whilethe outer court represents the sublunar world. 

The highest world, the world of Intelligences and angels, is eternal, though it too is dependent upon God for its existence. The angels, too, are composed of matter and form, and their function is to move thebodies of the intermediate world, the spheres and their stars. Throughthe instrumentality of the heavenly bodies, the angels form the lowerworld. This amounts to saying that the corporeal world is the last stagein the descending series of emanations from the One, and is preceded bythe heavenly bodies and the Intelligences. The angels are also theimmediate agents in prophetic inspiration. 

Not all mention of angels in the Bible, however, must be identified witha separate Intelligence or a spheral soul (for the latter too is calledangel by Ibn Ezra). There are instances of the expression angel whichrefer to a momentary, special creation of a light or air for the specialbenefit of the people. This explains a number of theophanies in theBible, such as the burning bush, "the glory of the Lord, " the cloud inthe wilderness, and so on. 

The intermediate world of spheres is also eternal and consists of ninespheres, that of the Intelligences making up the perfect number ten. Thenine spheres are arranged as follows, the spheres of the seven planets, the sphere of the fixed stars, and the diurnal sphere without stars, which gives the motion from east to west to the whole heaven. 

The lower world, the sublunar and corporeal world of generation anddecay, was created in time. This, however, does not mean that there wastime before this creation, for time exists only with motion and change. Creation here signifies the formation of the chaotic matter. As Godcannot come in contact with the material and changeable (we have alreadyseen that he cannot know it as such), it follows that this lower worldwas not made directly by him, but by the angels, hence the word "Elohim"is used in the first chapter of Genesis, which means primarily theangels, and secondarily God as acting through the angels. 

In this lower world man is the noblest creature. By means of his soul hemay attain eternal life as an individual like God and the angels (_i. E. _, the Intelligences), whereas all other creatures of the lower worldare permanent in species only but not as individuals. This is themeaning of the expression in Genesis, "Let us make man in our image, " inthe image, that is, of God and the angels. Man is a microcosm, auniverse in little, for like the great universe he consists of a bodyanimated by a soul. 

As the noblest part of man is his soul, it becomes his duty to know it. He must know whether it is substance or accident, whether it will diewhen it is separated from the body, and for what purpose it was broughtinto union with the body. In order to learn all this one must firststudy the preparatory branches, grammar, logic, mathematics and physics. In the study of psychology we learn that man has three souls, vegetative, animal and rational, and the latter alone is immortal. It isa part of the world soul, having existed before it came into the body, and under favorable conditions will return again to the world soul whenseparated from the body. The condition which must be fulfilled by thesoul before it can return to the world soul is the acquisition ofwisdom, for this is the purpose for which it was put into the body, namely, in order that it may learn the work of its master and observehis commandments. There are many sciences, but they are related to eachother, all leading up to the one highest science, the knowledge of Godand his goodness. A person must advance gradually in studying the workof God from the knowledge of minerals, plants, animals, the human body, to the knowledge of the spheres and heavenly bodies, the causes ofeclipses, etc. , and from this he will gradually come to know God. Thecommandments of the Bible are also of importance for this purpose. Tounderstand the secret of the commandments is to gain eternal life. Forwisdom is the form of the soul, and hence the soul does not die like abody. 

The reward of the soul is re-absorption in the world soul of which it isa part, and the punishment of the unworthy soul that neglected toacquire knowledge is destruction. What Ibn Ezra means by the Hebrew word"abad" (ordinarily rendered to perish, to be destroyed) is not clear. Itis hard to see how a pre-existing soul can perish utterly. Rosinsuggests that Ibn Ezra is alluding to transmigration, [217] but it is notclear. 

We have seen that Ibn Ezra holds that the events of the sublunar worldand the destinies of men are governed by the positions and motions ofthe heavenly bodies, which in turn are determined by the Intelligencesor angels. The heavenly bodies, he tells us, follow necessary lawsimposed upon them, and are not responsible for any good or evil whichresults to mankind from them, since the effects are not of theirintention, and they cannot change them if they would. Accordingly it isfoolish to pray to the heavenly bodies in order to appease them andprevent evil, as some of the heathen are accustomed to do. The motionsof the heavenly bodies are determined and invariable, and no prayer willchange them. This, however, does not mean to say that no one can escapethe evil which is destined for him in the stars. Ordinarily, it is true, God does not know the particular individual as such. He knows him onlyas implied in the whole, and his destiny is determined accordingly. Butthere are exceptions when a person by developing his soul and intellect, as we saw above, succeeds in his lifetime in separating his soul fromthe corporeal and particular, and brings it into contact with thespiritual and universal. In that case he attracts to himself the specialprovidence of God, which enables him to evade the evil threatened by hisstar, without in any way changing the star's natural course or ordinaryeffects. How this is done, Ibn Ezra illustrates by an example. [218]Suppose, he says, that it is fated according to the stars that a givencity shall be flooded by a river and its inhabitants drowned. A prophetcomes and warns them, urging them to repent of their evil ways beforetheir fate is sealed. They obey him, return to God with all their heartand leave the city to offer prayer to God. The river rises in theirabsence, as often happens, and floods the city. The wolf is satisfiedand the lamb is whole. The decree of the stars is not interfered with, and the good man is delivered from evil. In this way Ibn Ezra endeavorsto reconcile natural law (or astrological fatalism) with the ethicalpurpose of divine providence. And he also vindicates free will andresponsibility. The rational soul of man has power, he says, tocounteract in part the indications of the stars, though it cannot annulthem entirely. The punishment of the wicked is that they are leftentirely to the fates determined for them by their constellations. 

The highest good of man, we have seen, is the knowledge of God and hiswork. There are two ways of knowing God. One is through a study ofnature, the work of God. This is described in the first part of thenineteenth Psalm, "The Heavens declare the glory of God; and thefirmament showeth his handiwork. " But there is a second and, in a sense, a better way of knowing God. This is derived from his revelation in theLaw. As we are told in the second part of the above Psalm (_v. _ 7), "Thelaw of the Lord is perfect, restoring the soul. " The law of the Lordrestores the soul, Ibn Ezra says, by removing doubt from it. For thefirst method of knowing God, with all its importance for the man ofwisdom and reason, is not fit for all persons; and not everything can beproved by reason. Revelation in the Law is necessary for the simpleminded. "I am the Lord thy God" (Exod. 20, 2) is a hint to thephilosopher, who need not depend on hearsay, for real knowledge isproved knowledge. But as not everyone is in a position to have suchknowledge, the Bible adds, "which brought thee out of the land ofEgypt. " This all can understand, the simple minded as well as thephilosopher. The Law has also a practical purpose, to strengthen therational soul so as to prevent the body from gaining the upper hand. 

God's messenger, through whom his will is made known, is the prophet. Heseeks retirement so as to get in communion with God, and receives suchinfluence as he is capable of getting. Moses was the greatest of theprophets. He was able to communicate with God whenever he chose, whereasthe others had to wait until the inspiration came. The revelation of Godto Moses was without an intermediary, and without visions andlikenesses. Moses saw the things presented to him in their true form. 

The laws may be divided into 1. Innate or rational laws, _i. E. _, lawsplanted by God in the mind of every rational being. There are many suchin the Torah. All the laws of the Ten Commandments belong to this class, with the exception of the Sabbath. Hence all mankind believe in them, and Abraham observed them all before ever the Law was given on Sinai. 2. Hidden laws, _i. E. _, laws, the reason of which is not given. We mustnot suppose for a moment that there is any law which is against reason, Heaven forbid! We must observe them all, whether we understand thereason or not. If we find a law that apparently is unreasonable, we mustassume that it has some hidden meaning and is not to be taken in itsliteral sense. It is our duty, then, to look for this hidden meaning, and if we cannot find it, we must admit that we do not understand it. 

The laws may also be classified as 1. Commandments of the heart, 2. Commandments of the tongue, and 3. Commandments of action. An example ofcommandments of the heart is, "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God, " "Thoushalt not hate thy brother in thy heart, " and so on. To the commandmentsof the tongue belong the reading of the _Shema_, grace after meals, thepriestly benediction, and so on. The laws of the third class are sonumerous that there is no need of mentioning them. The laws of the heartare the most important of all. The reader will recognize in thistwo-fold classification Saadia's division of the laws into rational andtraditional, and Bahya's classification of duties of the heart andduties of the limbs. This second class includes Ibn Ezra's second andthird classes, tongue and action. [219]

The problem of evil Ibn Ezra solves by saying that from God comes goodonly. The world as a whole is good; evil is due to the defect of theobject receiving higher influence. To argue that because of the smallpart of evil the whole world, which is good, should not have beencreated, is foolish. 

The highest good of man is to develop his reason. As the traveller andthe captive long to return to the land of their birth and be with theirfamily, so the rational soul is eager to rise to the upper world whichis not made of clay. This it can do only if it purifies itself from theuncleanness of corporeal desire which drags it down, and takes pains toknow its own nature and origin, with the help of Wisdom whose eyes areundimmed. Then she will know the truth, which will remain indeliblyimpressed upon her when she separates from the body, where she was putfor her own good. The suffering she underwent here for a time will giveplace to everlasting rest and joy. All man's work is vain, for man canneither create nor annihilate a substance. All his corporeal activityconsists in combination and separation of accidents. The only thing ofvalue is the fear of God. But no man can rise to this stage until he hasascended the ladder of wisdom, and has acquired understanding. [220]

More concretely the way to purify the soul from the body is by unitingthe rational and spirited soul, as Plato has it, against the appetitive, and giving the reason the mastery over the spirited soul as well. Amoderate degree of asceticism is to be recommended as favoring theemancipation of the soul from the tyranny of the body. This is themeaning of the institution of the Nazirite; and the offering he mustbring after the expiration of his period is to atone for the sin ofreturning to a life of indulgence. But one should not go to extremes. Too much praying and fasting results in stupefaction. It is a mistake todevelop one side of one's nature at the expense of another. Every oneof the three souls (the rational, the spirited and the appetitive) mustbe given its due. 

But the most important activity of man, which leads to eternal life andhappiness, is the knowledge of God. This knowledge cannot be attained atonce. It must be preceded by a study of one's own soul and of thenatural sciences. Through a knowledge of oneself and nature, one arrivesfinally at a knowledge of God. The soul, originally a _tabula rasa_, isgradually perfected by the ideas which theoretical speculation acquires. These ideas are identified with the rational soul, and there results theacquired Intellect, which, as absolutely immaterial, is immortal andbecomes one with the world soul of which it is a part. During lifecomplete union with the spiritual world is impossible. Even Moses couldonly see the "rear part" of God. But when one has during life kept asfar as possible away from the sensuous and corporeal, then at the timeof death, when the soul is separated from the body, he will becompletely absorbed in the world soul and possess the knowledge of God. 

CHAPTER XII

ABRAHAM IBN DAUD

What was poison to Judah Halevi is meat to Abraham Ibn Daud. We must, hesays, investigate the principles of the Jewish religion and seek toharmonize them with true philosophy. And in order to do these thingsproperly a preliminary study of science is necessary. Nowadays all thisis neglected and the result is confusion in fundamental principles, fora superficial and literal reading of the Bible leads to contradictoryviews, not to speak of anthropomorphic conceptions of God which cannotbe the truth. Many of our day think that the study of philosophy isinjurious. This is because it frequently happens in our time that aperson who takes up the study of philosophy neglects religion. Inancient times also this happened in the person of Elisha ben Abuya, known by the name of Aher. Nevertheless science was diligently studiedin Rabbinic times. Witness what was said concerning Rabbi Yohanan benZakkai, Samuel and the Synhedrin. [221] It cannot be that God meant us toabstain from philosophical study, for many statements in the Bible, suchas those relating to freedom of the will, to the nature of God and thedivine attributes, to the creation of the world, and so on, are a directstimulus to such investigation. Surely mental confusion cannot be thepurpose God had in mind for us. If he preferred our ignorance he wouldnot have called our attention to these matters at all. [222]

This, as we see, is decidedly a different point of view from that ofJudah Halevi. The difference between them is not due to a difference intheir age and environment, but solely to personal taste and temperament. Toledo was the birthplace of Ibn Daud as it was of Halevi. And theperiod in which they lived was practically the same. Judah Halevi'sbirth took place in the last quarter of the eleventh century, whereasIbn Daud is supposed to have been born about 1110, a difference of sometwenty-five or thirty years. The philosopher whom Judah Halevi presentsto us as the typical representative of his time is an Aristotelian ofthe type of Alfarabi and Avicenna. And it is the same type of philosophythat we meet in the pages of the "Emunah Ramah" (Exalted Faith), IbnDaud's philosophical work. [223] Whereas, however, Judah Halevi was apoet by the grace of God, glowing with love for his people, theirreligion, their language and their historic land, Ibn Daud leaves uponus the impression of a precise thinker, cold and analytical. He exhibitsno graces of style, eloquence of diction or depths of enthusiasm andemotion. He passes systematically from one point to the next, uses fewwords and technical, and moves wholly in the Peripatetic philosophy ofthe day. In 1161, the same year in which the Emunah Ramah was composed, he also wrote a historical work, "Sefer Hakabala" (Book of Tradition), which we have; and in 1180, regarded by some as the year of his death, he published an astronomical work, which is lost. This gives an index ofhis interests which were scientific and philosophic. Mysticism, whetherof the poetic or the philosophic kind, was far from his nature; and thistoo may account for the intense opposition he shows to Solomon IbnGabirol. On more than one occasion he gives vent to his impatience withthat poetic philosopher, and he blames him principally for two faults. Choosing to devote a whole book to one purely metaphysical topic, initself not related to Judaism, Gabirol, we are told by Ibn Daud, gaveexpression to doctrines extremely dangerous to the Jewish religion. Andapart from his heterodoxy, he is philosophically incompetent and hismethod is abominable. His style is profuse to the point of weariness, and his logic carries no conviction. [224]

While Abraham Ibn Daud is thus expressly unsympathetic to Gabirol andtacitly in disagreement with Halevi (he does not mention him), he showsthe closest relation to Maimonides, whose forerunner he is. We feeltempted to say that if not for Ibn Daud there would have been noMaimonides. And yet the irony of history has willed that the fame ofbeing the greatest Jewish philosopher shall be Maimonides's own, whilehis nearest predecessor, to whose influence he owed most, should be allbut completely forgotten. The Arabic original of Ibn Daud's treatise islost, and the Hebrew translations (there are two) lay buried inmanuscript in the European libraries until one of them was published bySimson Weil in 1852. [225]

Abraham Ibn Daud is the first Jewish philosopher who shows an intimateknowledge of the works of Aristotle and makes a deliberate effort toharmonize the Aristotelian system with Judaism. To be sure, he too oweshis Aristotelian knowledge to the Arabian exponents of the Stagirite, Alfarabi and Avicenna, rather than to the works of Aristotle himself. But this peculiarity was rooted in the intellectual conditions of histime, and must not be charged to his personal neglect of the sources. And Maimonides does nothing more than repeat the effort of Ibn Daud in amore brilliant and masterly fashion. 

The development of the three religious philosophies in the middle ages, Jewish, Christian and Mohammedan, followed a similar line ofprogression. In all of them it was not so much a development fromwithin, the unfolding of what was implicit and potential in the originalgerm of the three respective religions, as a stimulus from without, which then combined, as an integral factor, with the original mass, andthe final outcome was a resultant of the two originally disparateelements. We know by this time what these two elements were in eachcase, Hellenic speculation, and Semitic religion in the shape of sacredand revealed documents. The second factor was in every case completewhen the process of fusion began. Not so the first. What I mean is thatnot all of the writings of Greek antiquity were known to Jew, Christianand Mohammedan at the beginning of their philosophizing career. And theprogress in their philosophical development kept equal step with thesuccessive accretion of Greek philosophical literature, in particularAristotle's physical, psychological and metaphysical treatises, andtheir gradual purgation of Neo-Platonic adhesions. 

The Syrian Christians, who were the first to adopt Greek teachings, seemnever to have gone beyond the mathematical and medical works of theGreeks and the logic of Aristotle. The Arabs began where their Syrianteachers ended, and went beyond them. The Mutakallimun were indebted tothe Stoics, [226] the Pure Brethren to the Neo-Platonists; and it wasonly gradually that Aristotle became the sole master not merely inlogic, which he always had been, but also in physics, metaphysics andpsychology. Alfarabi, Avicenna and Averroes represent so many steps inthe Aristotelization of Arabic philosophy. 

Christian mediæval thought, which was really a continuation of thePatristic period, likewise began with Eriugena in the ninth centuryunder Platonic and Neo-Platonic influences. Of Aristotle the logic alonewas known, and that too only in small part. Here also progress was dueto the increase of Aristotelian knowledge; though in this case it wasnot gradual as with the Arabs before them, but sudden. In the latterpart of the twelfth and the early part of the thirteenth century, through the Crusades, through the Moorish civilization in Spain, throughthe Saracens in Sicily, through the Jews as translators and mediators, Aristotle invaded Christian Europe and transformed Christian philosophy. Albertus Magnus, Thomas Aquinas, Duns Scotus, William of Occam are theresults of this transformation. 

The same thing holds true of the Jews. Their philosophizing careerstands chronologically between that of their Arab teachers and theirChristian disciples. And the line of their development was similar. Itwas parallel to that of the Arabs. First came Kalam in Saadia, Mukammas, the Karaites Al Basir and Jeshua ben Judah. Then Neo-Platonism and Kalamcombined, or pure Neo-Platonism, in Bahya, Gabirol, Ibn Zaddik and thetwo Ibn Ezras, Abraham and Moses. In Judah Halevi, so far as philosophyis represented, we have Neo-Platonism and Aristotelianism. Finally inIbn Daud and Maimonides, Neo-Platonism is reduced to the vanishingpoint, and Aristotelianism is in full view and in possession of thefield. After Maimonides the only philosopher who deviates from theprescribed path and endeavors to uproot Aristotelian authority inJudaism is Crescas. All the rest stand by Aristotle and his major domo, Maimonides. 

This may seem like a purely formal and external mode of characterizingthe development of philosophical thought. But the character of mediævalphilosophy is responsible for this. Their ideal of truth as well asgoodness was in the past. Knowledge was thought to have been discoveredor revealed in the past, [227] and the task of the philosopher was toacquire what was already there and to harmonize contradictoryauthorities. Thus the more of the past literature that came to them, thegreater the transformation in their own philosophy. 

The above digression will make clear to us the position of Ibn Daud andhis relation to Maimonides. Ibn Daud began what Maimonides finished--thelast stage in the Aristotelization of Jewish thought. Why is it thenthat so little was known about him, and that his important treatise wasneglected and practically forgotten? The answer is to be found partly inthe nature of the work itself and partly in historical circumstances. 

The greatest and most abiding interest in intellectual Jewry was afterall the Bible and the Talmud. This interest never flagged throughadversity or through success. The devotion paid to these Jewish classicsand sacred books may have been fruitful in original research andintelligent application at one time and place and relatively barren atanother. Great men devoted to their study abounded in one country andwere relatively few in another. The nature of the study applied to thesebooks was affected variously by historical conditions, political andeconomic; and the cultivation or neglect of the sciences and philosophywas reflected in the style of Biblical and Talmudical interpretation. But at all times and in all countries, under conditions of comparativefreedom as well as in the midst of persecution, the sacred heritage ofIsrael was studied and its precepts observed and practiced. In thisfield alone fame was sure and permanent. All other study was honoredaccording to the greater or less proximity to this paramount interest. In times of freedom and of great philosophic and scientific interestlike that of the golden era in Spain, philosophical studies almostacquired independent value. But this independence, never quite absolute, waned and waxed with external conditions, and at last disappearedentirely. If Ibn Daud had made himself famous by a Biblical commentaryor a halakic work, or if his philosophic treatise had the distinction ofbeing written in popular and attractive style, like Bahya's "Duties ofthe Hearts, " or Halevi's "Cusari, " it might have fared better. As it is, it suffers from its conciseness and technical terminology. Add to thisthat it was superseded by the "Guide of the Perplexed" of Maimonides, published not many years after the "Emunah Ramah, " and the neglect ofthe latter is completely explained. 

Abraham ibn Daud tells us in the introduction to his book that it waswritten in response to the question of a friend concerning the problemof free will. The dilemma is this. If human action is determined by God, why does he punish, why does he admonish, and why does he send prophets?If man is free, then there is something in the world over which God hasno control. The problem is made more difficult by the fact that Biblicalstatements are inconsistent, and passages may be cited in favor ofeither of the theories in question. This inconsistency is to beexplained, however, by the circumstance that not all Biblical phrasesare to be taken literally--their very contradiction is a proof of this. Now the passages which require exegetic manipulation are in generalthose which seem opposed to reason. Many statements in the Bible are infact intended for the common people, and are expressed with a view totheir comprehension, and without reference to philosophic truth. In thepresent instance the objections to determinism are much greater and moreserious than those to freedom. In order to realize this, however, it isnecessary to investigate the principles of the Jewish religion and seekto harmonize them with true philosophy. This in turn cannot be donewithout a preliminary study of science. A question like that ofdeterminism and freedom cannot be decided without a knowledge of thedivine attributes and the consequences flowing from them. But tounderstand these we must have a knowledge of the principles of physicsand metaphysics. [228] Accordingly Abraham Ibn Daud devotes the entirefirst part of the "Emunah Ramah" to general physics and metaphysics inthe Aristotelian conception of these terms. 

Concerning the kind of persons for whom he wrote his book, he says, Iadvise everyone who is perfectly innocent, who is not interested inphilosophical and ethical questions like that of determinism and freedomon the ground that man cannot grasp them; and is entirely unconcernedabout his ignorance--I advise such a person to refrain from opening thisbook or any other of a similar nature. His ignorance is his bliss, forafter all the purpose of philosophy is conduct. On the other hand, thosewho are learned in the principles of religion and are also familiar withphilosophy need not my book, for they know more than I can teach themhere. It is the beginner in speculation who can benefit from this work, the man who has not yet been able to see the rational necessity ofbeliefs and practices which he knows from tradition. 

That the principles of the Jewish religion are based upon philosophicfoundations is shown in Deuteronomy 4, 6: "Keep therefore and do them;for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of thepeoples, which shall hear all these statutes, and say, surely this greatnation is a wise and understanding people. " This cannot refer to theceremonial precepts, the so-called "traditional" commandments; for thereis nothing in them to excite the admiration of a non-Jew. Nor can itrefer to the political and moral regulations, for one need not professthe Jewish or any other religion in order to practice them; they are amatter of reason pure and simple. The verse quoted can only mean thatthe other nations will be seized with admiration and wonder when theyfind that the fundamental principles of the Jewish religion, which wereceived by tradition and without effort, are identical with thosephilosophical principles at which they arrived after a great deal oflabor extending over thousands of years. [229]

Ibn Daud is not consistent in his idea of the highest aim of man. Wehave just heard him say that the purpose of philosophy is conduct. Thisis true to the spirit of Judaism which, despite all the efforts of theJewish philosophers to the contrary, is not a speculative theology but apractical religion, in which works stand above faith. But as anAristotelian, Ibn Daud could not consistently stand by the abovestandpoint as the last word in this question. Accordingly we find himelsewhere in true Aristotelian fashion give priority to theoreticalknowledge. 

Judging from the position of man among the other creatures of thesublunar world, we come to the conclusion, he tells us, that that whichdistinguishes him above his surroundings, namely, his rational soul, isthe aim of all the rest; and they are means and preparations for it. Therational soul has two forms of activity. It may face upward and receivewisdom from the angels (theoretical knowledge). Or it may direct itsattention downwards and judge the other corporeal powers (practicalreason). But it must not devote itself unduly or without system to anyone occupation. The aim of man is wisdom, science. Of the sciences thehighest and the aim of all the rest is the knowledge of God. The body ofman is his animal, which leads him to God. Some spend all their time infeeding the animal, some in clothing it, and some in curing it of itsills. The latter is not a bad occupation, as it saves the body fromdisease and death, and so helps it to attain the higher life. But tothink of the study of medicine as the aim of life and devote all one'stime to it is doing injury to one's soul. Some spend their time inmatters even less significant than this, _viz. _, in studying grammar andlanguage; others again in mathematics and in solving curious problemswhich are never likely to happen. The only valuable part here is thatwhich has relation to astronomy. Some are exclusively occupied in"twisting threads. " This is an expression used by an Arabianphilosopher, [230] who compares man's condition in the world to that of aslave who was promised freedom and royalty besides if he made thepilgrimage to Mecca and celebrated there. If he made the journey and wasprevented from reaching the holy city, he would get freedom only; but ifhe did not undertake the trip he would get nothing. The three steps inthe realization of the purpose are thus: making the preparations for thejourney, getting on the road and passing from station to station, andfinally wandering about in the place of destination. One small elementin the preparation for the journey is twisting the threads for the waterbottle. Medicine and law as means of gaining a livelihood and areputation represent the stage of preparing for the journey. They areboth intended to improve the ills of life, whether in the relations ofman to man as in law; or in the treatment of the internal humors as inmedicine. Medicine seems more important, for on the assumption ofmankind being just, there would be no need of law, whereas the need formedicine would remain. To spend one's whole life in legal casuistry andthe working out of hypothetical cases on the pretext of sharpening one'swits, is like being engaged in twisting threads continually--a little isnecessary, but a great deal is a waste of time. It would be best if thereligious man would first learn how to prove the existence of God, themeaning of prophecy, the nature of reward and punishment and the futureworld, and how to defend these matters before an unbeliever. Then if hehas time left, he may devote it to legalistic discussions, and therewould be no harm. 

Self-examination, in order to purify oneself from vices great and small, represents the second stage of getting on the road and travelling fromstation to station. The final stage, arriving in the holy city andcelebrating there, is to have a perfect knowledge of God. He who attainsthis is the best of wise men, having the best of knowledge, which dealswith the noblest subject. The reader must not expect to find it all inthis book. If he reads this and does not study the subject for himself, he is like a man who spent his time in reading about medicine and cannotcure the simplest ailment. The knowledge of God is a form that isbestowed from on high upon the rational soul when she is prepared bymeans of moral perfection and scientific study. The prophet puts allthree functions of the soul on the same level, and gives preference toknowledge of God. "Thus saith the Lord, " says Jeremiah (9, 22), "Let notthe wise man glory in his wisdom [rational soul], neither let the mightyman glory in his might [spirited soul], let not the rich man glory inhis riches [nutritive soul]: but let him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth, and knoweth me.... " Jeremiah also recommends(_ib. _) knowing God through his deeds--"That I am the Lord whichexercise loving-kindness"--in order that man may imitate him. [231]

We have now a general idea of Ibn Daud's attitude and point of view; andin passing to the details of his system it will not be necessary torehearse all the particulars of his thought, much of it being common toall mediæval writers on Jewish philosophy. We shall confine ourselves tothose matters in which Ibn Daud contributed something new, not containedin the writings of his predecessors. 

Following the Aristotelian system, he begins by describing substance andaccident and gives a list and characterization of the ten categories. This he follows up by showing that the classification of the tencategories lies at the basis of the 139th Psalm. It needs not our sayingthat it must be an extraordinary mode of exegesis that can find suchthings in such unusual places. But the very strangeness of thephenomenon bears witness to the remarkable influence exerted by theAristotelian philosophy upon the thinking of the Spanish Jews at thattime. [232]

From the categories he passes to a discussion of the most fundamentalconcepts in the Aristotelian philosophy, matter and form. And here hismethod of proving the existence of matter is Aristotelian and new. It isbased upon the discussion in Aristotle's Physics, though not necessarilyderived from there directly. Primary matter, he says, is free from allform. There must be such, for in the change of one thing to another, ofwater to air for example, it cannot be the _form_ of water that receivesthe form of air; for the form of water disappears, whereas that whichreceives the new form must be there. Reason therefore leads us to assumea common substrate of all things that are subject to change. This isprimary matter, free from all form. This matter being at the basis ofall change and becoming, could not itself have come to be through asimilar process, or we should require another matter prior to it, and itwould not be the prime matter we supposed it to be. This last argumentled Aristotle to the concept of an eternal matter, the basis of becomingfor all else besides, itself not subject to any such process. It is anultimate, to ask for the origin of which would signify to misunderstandthe meaning of origin. All things of the sublunar world originate inmatter, hence matter itself is the unoriginated, the eternal. 

Ibn Daud as a Jew could not accept this solution, and so he cut the knotby saying that while it is true that matter cannot originate in the wayin which the composite objects of the sublunar world come to be, it doesnot yet follow that it is absolutely ultimate and eternal. God alone isthe ultimate and eternal; nothing else is. Matter is a relativeultimate; relative, that is, to the composite and changeable objects ofour world; but it is itself an effect of God as the universal cause. Godcreated it outright. 

Prime matter, therefore, represents the first stage in creation. Thenext stage is the endowment of this formless matter with corporeality inthe abstract, _i. E. _, with extension. Then come the specific forms ofthe four elements, then their compounds through mineral, plant andanimal to man. This is not new; we have already met with it in Gabiroland Ibn Zaddik. Nor is the following significant statement altogethernew, though no one before Ibn Daud expressed it so clearly and sodefinitely. It is that the above analysis of natural objects intomatter, universal body, the elements, and so on, is not a physicaldivision but a logical. It does not mean that there was a time whenprime matter actually existed as such before it received the form ofcorporeality, and then there existed actually an absolute body of pureextension until it received the four elements. No, nothing has existence_in actu_ which has not individuality, including not only form, but alsoaccidents. The above analysis is theoretical, and the order of priorityis logical not real. In reality only the complete compound of matter andform (the individual) exists. 

Allusion to matter and form is also found in the Bible in Jeremiah (18, 1ff. ), "Arise and go down to the potter's house.... Then I went down tothe potter's house, and, behold, he wrought his work on the wheels.... Behold as the clay in the potter's hand.... "[233]

The next important topic analyzed by Ibn Daud is that of motion. This isof especial importance to Ibn Daud because upon it he bases a new proofof the existence of God, not heretofore found in the works of any of hispredecessors. It is taken from Aristotle's Physics, probably fromAvicenna's treatises on the subject, is then adopted by Maimonides, andthrough his example no doubt is made use of by Thomas Aquinas, the greatChristian Scholastic of the thirteenth century, who gives it the mostprominent place in his "Summa Contra Gentiles. "

Ibn Daud does not give Aristotle's general definition of motion as the"actualization of the potential qua potential" (_cf. _ above, p. Xxxii), but his other remarks concerning it imply it. Motion, he says, isapplied first to movement in place, and is then transferred to anychange which is gradual, such as quantitative or qualitative change. Sudden change is not called motion. As the four elements have all thesame matter and yet possess different motions--earth and water movingdownward, fire and air upward--it cannot be the matter which is thecause of their motions. It must therefore be the forms, which aredifferent in different things. 

Nothing can move itself. While it is true that the form of a thingdetermines the kind of motion it shall have, it cannot in itself producethat motion, which can be caused only by an efficient cause fromwithout. The case of animal motions may seem like a refutation of thisview, but it is not really so. The soul and the body are two distinctprinciples in the animal; and it is the soul that moves the body. Thereason why a thing cannot move itself is because the thing which ismoved is potential with reference to that which the motion is intendedto realize, whereas the thing causing the motion is actual with respectto the relation in question. If then a thing moved itself, it would beactual and potential at the same time and in the same relation, which isa contradiction. The Bible, too, hints at the idea that every motionmust have a mover by the recurring questions concerning the origin ofprophetic visions, of the existence of the earth, and so on. Such arethe expressions in Job (38, 36, 37): "Who hath put wisdom in the inwardparts?" "Who can number the clouds by wisdom?" In Proverbs (30, 4): "Whohath established all the ends of the earth?" and in many passagesbesides. [234]

The question of infinity is another topic of importance for provingthe existence of God. We proceed as follows: An infinite line is animpossibility. For let the lines _a_------------_b_ be infinite in the _c_------|-----_d_ _e_directions _b_, _d_. Take away from _cd_ a finite length = _ce_, and pullup the line _ed_ so that _e_ coincides with _c_. Now if _ed_ is equal to_ab_, and _cd_ was also equal to _ab_ by hypothesis, it follows that_ed_ = _cd_, which is impossible, for _ed_ is a part of _cd_. If it isshorter than _cd_ and yet is infinite, one infinite is shorter thananother infinite, which is also impossible. The only alternative left isthen that _ed_ is finite. If then we add to it the finite part _ce_, thesum, _ce_ + _ed_ = _cd_, will be finite, and _cd_ being equal to _ab_ byhypothesis, _ab_ is also finite. Hence there is no infinite line. Ifthere is no infinite line, there is no infinite surface or infinitesolid, for we could in that case draw in them infinite lines. Besides wecan prove directly the impossibility of infinite surface and solid bythe same methods we employed in line. 

We can prove similarly that an infinite series of objects is also animpossibility. In other words, infinite number as an actuality isimpossible because it is a contradiction in terms. A number of thingsmeans a known number; infinite means having no known number. A series issomething that has beginning, middle and end. Infinite means being allmiddle. We have thus proved that an actual infinite is impossible, whether as extension or number. And the Bible also alludes to thefiniteness of the universe in the words of Isaiah (40, 12): "Who hathmeasured the waters in the hollow of his hand... , " intimating that theuniverse is capable of being measured. 

We must prove next that no finite body can have an infinite power. For let the line _ae_ ------------- be a finite line having an infinite _a_ _b_ _c_ _d_ _e_power. Divide into the several parts _ab_, _be_, _cd_, _de_, etc. Ifevery one of the parts has an infinite power, _ab_ has an infinitepower, _ac_ a greater infinite power, _ad_ a still greater, _ae_ a stillgreater, and so on. But this is absurd, for there cannot be anythinggreater than the infinite. It follows then that each of the parts has afinite power; and as the sum of finites is finite, the line _ae_ alsohas a finite power. All these principles we must keep in mind, for weshall by means of them prove later the existence and incorporeality ofGod. [235]

As the concepts of physics are essential for proving the existence ofGod, so are the principles of psychology of importance in showing thatthere are intermediate beings between God and the corporeal substancesof the world. These are called in the Bible angels. The philosopherscall them secondary causes. 

Accordingly Ibn Daud follows his physical doctrines with a discussion ofthe soul. There is nothing new in his proof that such a thing as soulexists. It is identical with the deduction of Joseph Ibn Zaddik(_supra_, p. 134). Stone and tree and horse and man are all bodies andyet the last three have powers and functions which the stone has not, _viz. _, nutrition, growth and reproduction. Horse and man have inaddition to the three powers above mentioned, which they have in commonwith tree, the powers of sensation and motion and imagination, whichplants have not. Finally man is distinguished above all the rest ofanimal creation in possessing the faculty of intelligence, and theknowledge of art and of ethical discrimination. All these functionscannot be body or the result of body, for in that case all corporealobjects should have all of them, as they are all bodies. We musttherefore attribute them to an extra-corporeal principle; and this wecall soul. As an incorporeal thing the soul cannot be strictly defined, not being composed of genus and species; but we can describe it in aroundabout way in its relation to the body. He then gives theAristotelian definition of the soul as "the [first] entelechy of anatural body having life potentially" (_cf. _ above, p. Xxxv). 

Like many of his predecessors who treated of the soul, Ibn Daud alsofinds it necessary to guard against the materialistic theory of the soulwhich would make it the product of the elemental mixture in the body, ifnot itself body. This would reduce the soul to a phenomenon of the body, or in Aristotelian terminology, an accident of the body, and woulddeprive it of all substantiality and independence, not to speak ofimmortality. How can that which is purely a resultant of a combinationof elements remain when its basis is gone? Accordingly Ibn Daud takespains to refute the most important of these phenomenalistic theories, that of Hippocrates and Galen. Their theory in brief is that thefunctions which we attribute to the soul are in reality the results ofthe various combinations of the four elementary qualities, hot, cold, moist, dry. The more harmonious and equable the proportion of theirunion, the higher is the function resulting therefrom. The differencebetween man and beast, and between animal and plant is then thedifference in the proportionality of the elemental mixture. They provethis theory of theirs by the observation that as long as the mixture isperfect the activities above mentioned proceed properly; whereas as soonas there is a disturbance in the mixture, the animal becomes sick andcannot perform his activities, or dies altogether if the disturbance isvery great. The idea is very plausible and a great many believe it, butit is mistaken as we shall prove. 

His refutation of the "accident" or "mixture" theory of the soul, aswell as the subsequent discussion of the various functions, sensuous andrational, of the tripartite soul, are based upon Ibn Sina's treatment ofthe same topic, and we have already reproduced some of it in ourexposition of Judah Halevi. We shall therefore be brief here and referonly to such aspects as are new in Ibn Daud, or such as we found itadvisable to omit in our previous expositions. 

His main argument against the materialistic or mechanistic theory of thesoul is that while a number of phenomena of the growing animal body canbe explained by reference to the form of the mixture in the elementaryqualities, not all aspects can be thus explained. Its growth and generalformation may be the result of material and mechanical causes, but notso the design and purpose evident in the similarity, to the smallestdetail, of the individuals of a species, even when the mixture is notidentical. There is no doubt that there is wisdom here working with apurpose. This is soul. There is another argument based upon the visibleresults of other mixtures which exhibit properties that cannot beremotely compared with the functions we attribute to the soul. Theanimal and the plant exhibit activities far beyond anything present inthe simple elements of the mixture. There must therefore be in animalsand plants something additional to the elements of the mixture. Thisextra thing resides in the composite of which it forms a part, forwithout it the animal or plant is no longer what it is. Hence as thelatter is substance, that which forms a part of it is also substance;for accident, as Aristotle says, is that which resides _in_ a thing butnot as forming a part of it. 

We have now shown that the soul is substance and not accident. We muststill make clear in which of the four senses of the Aristoteliansubstance the soul is to be regarded. By the theory of exclusion IbnDaud decides that the soul is substance in the sense in which we applythat term to "form. " The form appears upon the common matter and"specifies" it, and makes it what it is, bringing it from potentialityto actuality. It is also the efficient and final cause of the body. Thebody exists for the sake of the soul, in order that the soul may attainits perfection through the body. As the most perfect body in the lowerworld is the human body, and it is for the sake of the soul, it followsthat the existence of the sublunar world is for the sake of the humansoul, that it may be purified and made perfect by science and moralconduct. 

While we have proved that soul is not mixture nor anything like it, itis nevertheless true that the kind of soul bestowed upon a given bodydepends upon the state of the mixture in the elementary qualities ofthat body. Thus we have the three kinds of soul, vegetative, animal andhuman or rational. We need not follow Ibn Daud in his detaileddescriptions of the functions of the several kinds of soul, as there islittle that is new and that we have not already met in Joseph Ibn Zaddikand Judah Halevi. Avicenna (Ibn Sina) is the common source for Haleviand Ibn Daud, and the description of the inner senses is practicallyidentical in the two, with the slight difference that Halevi attributesto the "common sense" the two functions which are divided in Ibn Daudbetween the common sense and the power of representation. 

The soul is not eternal. It was created and bestowed upon body. When abody comes into being, the character of its mixture determines that asoul of a certain kind shall be connected with it. The otheralternatives are (1) that the soul existed independently before thebody, is then connected with the body and dies with the death of thelatter; or (2) it remains after the death of the body. The firstalternative is impossible; because if the soul is connected with thebody in order to die with it, its union is an injury to the soul, for inits separate existence it was free from the defects of matter. Thesecond alternative is equally impossible; for if the soul was able toexist without the body before the appearance of the latter and after itsextinction, of what use is its connection with the body? Far from beingof any benefit, its union with the body is harmful to the soul, for itis obliged to share in the corporeal accidents. Divine wisdom never doesanything without a purpose. 

The truth is that the soul does not exist before the body. It arises atthe same time as, and in connection with body, realizing and actualizingthe latter. Seed and sperm have in them the possibility of becomingplant and animal respectively. But they need an agent to bring toactuality what is in them potentially. This agent--an angel or a sphere, or an angel using a sphere as its instrument--bestows forms upon bodies, which take the places of the previous forms the bodies had. The sphereor star produces these forms (or souls) by means of its motions, whichmotions ultimately go back to the first incorporeal mover, by whosewisdom forms are connected with bodies in order to perfect the former bymeans of the latter. 

Now the human soul has the most important power of all other animals, that of grasping intelligibles or universals. It is also able todiscriminate between good and evil in conduct, moral, political andeconomic. The human soul, therefore, has, it seems, two powers, _theoretical_ and _practical_. With the former it understands the simplesubstances, known as angels in the Bible and as "secondary causes" and"separate intelligences" among the philosophers. By this means the soulrises gradually to its perfection. With the practical reason it attendsto noble and worthy conduct. All the other powers of the soul must beobedient to the behests of the practical reason. This in turn issubservient to the theoretical, putting its good qualities at thedisposition of the speculative reason, and thus helping it to come intocloser communion with the simple substances, the angels and God. This isthe highest power there is in the _world of nature_. 

We must now show that the rational power in man is neither itself bodynor is it a power residing in a corporeal subject. That it is not itselfbody is quite evident, for we have proved that the lower souls too, those of animals and plants, are not corporeal. But we must showconcerning the rational power that it is independent of body in itsactivity. This we can prove in various ways. One is by considering theobject and content of the reason. Man has general ideas or universalpropositions. These are not divisible. An idea cannot be divided intotwo halves or into parts. Reason in action consists of ideas. Now ifreason is a power residing in a corporeal subject, it would be divisiblelike the latter. Take heat as an example. Heat is a corporeal power, _i. E. _, a power residing in a body. It extends through the dimensions ofthe body, and as the latter is divided so is the former. But this isevidently not true of general ideas, such as that a thing cannot both beand not be, that the whole is greater than its part, and so on. Hencethe rational power is independent of body. 

Ibn Daud gives several other proofs, taken from Aristotle and Avicenna, to show that reason is independent, but we cannot reproduce them allhere. We shall, however, name one more which is found in the "De Anima"of Aristotle and is based on experience. If the reason performed itsthinking by means of a corporeal organ like the external senses, thepower of knowing would be weakened when confronted with a difficultsubject, and would thereby be incapacitated from exercising its powersas before. This is the case with the eye, which is dazzled by a brightlight and cannot see at all, or the ear, which cannot hear at all whendeafened by a loud noise. But the case of knowledge is clearlydifferent. The more difficult the subject the more is the power of thereason developed in exercising itself therein. And in old age, when thecorporeal organs are weakened, the power of reason is strongest. 

Although it is thus true that the rational soul is independent of thebody, nevertheless it did not exist before the body any more than thelower souls. For if it did, it was either one soul for all men, or therewere as many souls as there are individual men. The first is impossible;for the same soul would then be wise and ignorant, good and bad, whichis impossible. Nor could the separate souls be different, for being allhuman souls they cannot differ in essence, which is their commonhumanity. But neither can they differ in accidental qualities, forsimple substances have no accidents. They cannot therefore be either oneor many, _i. E. _, they cannot be at all before body. 

Nor must we suppose because the reason exercises its thought functionswithout the use of a corporeal organ that it appears full fledged inactual perfection in the person of the infant. Experience teachesotherwise. The perfections of the human soul are in the child potential. Later on by divine assistance he acquires the first principles ofknowledge about which there is no dispute, such as that two things equalto the same thing are equal to each other, that two contrary predicatescannot apply to the same subject at the same time in the same relation, and so on. Some of these are the fundamental principles of mathematics, others of other sciences. Then he progresses further and learns to makepremises and construct syllogisms and argue from the known to theunknown. We have thus three stages in the development of the reason. Thefirst potential stage is known as the _hylic_ or _potential intellect_. The second is known as the _actual intellect_, and the third is the_acquired intellect_. If not for the body the person could not make thisprogress. For without body there are no senses, and without senses hewould not see how the wine in the barrel ferments and increases involume, which suggests that quantity is accident and body is substance. Nor would he learn the distinction between quality and substance if hedid not observe a white garment turning black, or a hot body becomingcold. There is need therefore of the body with its senses to lead to aknowledge of the universals. But this knowledge once acquired, the soulneeds not the body for its subsequent existence; and as the soul is nota corporeal power, the death of the body does not cause the extinctionof the soul. 

Some think that because the soul is the form of the body it is dependentupon it and cannot survive it, as no other form survives its substance. But this inference is not valid. For if the human soul is included inthe statement that no form survives its matter, we assume what we wantto prove, and there is no need of the argument. If it is not as a matterof fact included, because it is the question at issue, its comparisonwith the other observed cases is simply a matter of opinion and notdecisive. 

The reader will see that the problem of the rational soul gave Ibn Daudmuch concern and trouble. The pre-existence of the soul as Plato teachesit did not appeal to him for many reasons, not the least among thembeing the statement in Genesis (2, 7), "And God breathed into hisnostrils the breath of life, " which seems to favor the idea of the souloriginating with the body; though, to be sure, a harmless verse of thiskind would not have stood in his way, had he had reason to favor thedoctrine of pre-existence. Immortality was also a dogma which he darednot deny. The arguments against it seemed rather strong. From thedoctrine of the soul's origin with the body and its being fitted to thematerial composition of the latter, would seem to follow the soul'sextinction with the death of the body. The same result was apparentlydemanded by the observation that the intellect develops as the bodymatures, and that without the senses and their data there would be nointellect at all. The fluctuation of intellectual strength with thestate of bodily health would seem to tend to the same end, against thedoctrine of immortality. Moreover, the Aristotelian definition of thesoul as the entelechy or form of the body, if it applies to the rationalfaculty as well as to the lower powers, implies necessarily that it is aform like other forms and disappears with the dissolution of itssubstance. To avoid all these pitfalls Ibn Daud insists upon theincorporeal character of the reason's activity, _i. E. _, its independenceof any corporeal organ, and its increasing power in old age despite thegradual weakening of the body. He admits that its development isdependent on the data of sense perception, but insists that this is notincompatible with its freedom from the body when fully developed andperfected. As for its being a form of body, not all forms are alike; andit is not so certain that the rational power is a form of body. Neitherthe difficulties nor the solution are of Ibn Daud's making. They are asold as Aristotle, and his successors grappled with them as best theycould. 

There is still the question of the manner of the soul's survival. Thesame reasons which Ibn Daud brings forward against the possibility ofthe existence of many souls before the body, apply with equal cogency totheir survival after death. If simple substances having a common essencecannot differ either in essence or in accident, the human souls afterthe death of the body must exist as one soul, and what becomes of_individual_ immortality, which religion promises? Ibn Daud has not aword to say about this, and it is one of the weak points religiously inhis system as well as in that of Maimonides, which the critics andopponents of the latter did not fail to observe. 

Before leaving the problem of the soul Ibn Daud devotes a word toshowing that metempsychosis is impossible. The soul of man is suited tothe character of his elemental mixture, which constitutes theindividuality of his body. Hence every individual's body has its ownpeculiar soul. A living person cannot therefore have in him a soulwhich formerly resided in a different body unless the two bodies areidentical in all respects. But in that case it is not transmigration butthe re-appearance of the same person after he has ceased to be. But thishas never yet happened. 

Finally Ibn Daud finds it necessary to defend the Bible against thosewho criticize the Jews on the ground that there is no mention of thefuture world and the existence of the soul after death in the Biblicalwritings. All the rewards and punishments spoken of in the Bible, theysay, refer to this world. His answer offers nothing new. Judah Halevihad already tried to account for this phenomenon, besides insisting thataltogether devoid of allusion to the future world the Bible is not. IbnDaud follows in Halevi's footsteps (_cf. _ above, p. 170). [236]

Abraham Ibn Daud closes the first, the purely scientific part of histreatise, by a discussion of the heavenly spheres and their motions. Inaccordance with the view of Aristotle, which was shared by the majorityof writers throughout the middle ages, he regards the spheres with theirstars as living beings, and their motions as voluntary, the result ofwill and purpose, and not simply "natural, " _i. E. _, due to anunconscious force within them called nature. One of his arguments toprove this is derived from the superiority of the heavenly bodies to ourown. Their size, their brightness and their continued duration are allevidence of corporeal superiority. And it stands to reason that as thehuman body, which is the highest in the sublunar world, has a soul thatis nobler than that of plant or animal, so the heavenly bodies must beendowed with souls as much superior to the human intellect as theirbodies are to the human body. The Bible alludes to this truth in thenineteenth Psalm, "The heavens declare the glory of God.... There is nospeech nor language.... " The last expression signifies that they praiseGod with the intellect. There are other passages in the Bible besides, and particularly the first chapter of Ezekiel, which make it clear thatthe heavenly bodies are living and intelligent beings; not, to be sure, in the sense of taking nourishment and growing and reproducing theirkind and making use of five senses, but in the sense of performingvoluntary motions and being endowed with intellect. [237]

We have now concluded our preliminary discussion of the scientificprinciples lying at the basis of Judaism. And our next task is to studythe fundamental doctrines of Jewish theology which form the highestobject of knowledge, dealing as they do with God and his attributes andhis revelation. The first thing to prove then is the existence of God, since we cannot define him. For definition means the designation of thegenus or class to which the thing defined belongs, whereas God cannot beput in a class. As the essence of a thing is revealed by its definition, we cannot know God's essence and are limited to a knowledge of hisexistence. 

The principles for this proof we have already given. They are that athing cannot move itself, and that an actual infinite series isimpossible. The argument then proceeds as follows: Nothing can moveitself, hence everything that moves is moved by something other thanitself. If this is also moving, it must be moved by a third, and so on_ad infinitum_. But an actual infinite series of things moving and beingmoved is impossible, and unless we ultimately arrive at a first link inthis chain, all motion is impossible. Hence there must be a first toaccount for the motion we observe in the world. This first must notitself be subject to motion, for it would then have to have anotherbefore it to make it move, and it would not be the first we supposed itto be. We have thus proved, therefore, the existence of a _primum movensimmobile_, a first unmoved mover. 

We must now show that this unmoved mover is incorporeal. This we canprove by means of another principle of physics, made clear in the firstpart. We showed there that a finite body cannot have an infinite power. But God is infinite. For, being immovable, his power is not affected bytime. Hence God cannot be body. 

This proof, as we said before, is new in Jewish philosophy. In Bahya wefound a proof which bears a close resemblance to this one (_cf. _ above, p. 87); but the difference is that Bahya argues from being, Ibn Daudfrom motion. Bahya says if a thing is, some cause must have made it tobe, for a thing cannot make itself. As we cannot proceed _ad infinitum_, there must be a first which is the cause of the existence of everythingelse. The objection here, of course, is that if a thing cannot makeitself, how did the first come to be. 

The Aristotelian proof of Ibn Daud knows nothing about the origin ofbeing. As far as Aristotle's own view is concerned there is no_temporal_ beginning either of being or of motion. Both are eternal, andso is matter, the basis of all genesis and change. God is the eternalcause of the eternal motion of the world, and hence of the eternalgenesis and dissolution, which constitutes the life of the sublunarworld. How to reconcile the idea of eternal time and eternal motion withthe doctrine that an actual infinite is impossible we shall see when wetreat Maimondes (p. 251). Ibn Daud does not adopt eternity of motioneven hypothetically, as Maimonides does. But this merely removes thedifficulty one step. For the infinity which is regarded impossible inphenomena is placed in God. But another more serious objection is theadoption of an Aristotelian argument where it does not suit. For theargument from motion does not give us a creator but a first mover. ForAristotle there is no creator, and his proof is adequate. But for IbnDaud it is decidedly inadequate. We are so far minus a proof that God isa creator _ex nihilo_. Ibn Daud simply asserts that God created matter, but this argument does not prove it. As to the incorporeality of GodAristotle can prove it adequately from the eternity of motion. If afinite body (and there is no such thing as an infinite body) cannot havean infinite power, God, whose causing eternal motion argues infinitepower, is not a body. Ibn Daud's attempt to prove God's infinity withoutthe theory of infinite motion on the ground that time cannot affect whatis immovable, is decidedly less satisfactory. On the whole then thisadoption of Aristotle's argument from motion is not helpful, as it leadsto eternity of matter, and God as the mover rather than the Creator. Gersonides was frank enough and bold enough to recognize thisconsequence and to adopt it. We shall see Maimonides's attitude when wecome to treat of his philosophy. 

Ibn Daud may have been aware of the inadequacy of his argument frommotion, and therefore he adds another, based upon the distinctionbetween the "possible existent" and the "necessary existent"--adistinction and an argument due to Alfarabi and Avicenna. A possibleexistent is a thing whose existence depends upon another, and waspreceded by non-existence. It may exist or not, depending upon itscause; hence the name _possible_ existent. A necessary existent is onewhose existence is in itself and not derived from elsewhere. It is anecessary existent because its own essence cannot be thought withoutinvolving existence. Now the question is, Is there such a thing as anecessary existent, or are all existents merely possible? If allexistents are possible, we have an infinite series, every link of whichis dependent for its existence upon the link preceding it; and so longas there is no first there is nothing to explain the existence of anylink in the chain. We must therefore assume a first, which is itself notagain dependent upon a cause prior to it. This is by definition anecessary existent, which is the cause of the existence of everythingelse. This proof is compatible with God as a Creator. 

Having shown the existence and incorporeality of God we must now provehis unity. We shall base this proof upon the idea of the necessaryexistent. Such an existent cannot have in it any multiplicity; for if ithas, its own essence would not be able to keep the elements together, and there would be need of an external agent to do this. But in thiscase the object would be dependent upon something else, which isincompatible with the idea of a necessary existent. 

Nor is it possible there should be two necessary existents; for thenecessary existent, we have just shown, must be of the utmostsimplicity, and hence cannot have any attribute added to its essence. Now if there is a second, there must be something by which the firstdiffers from the second, or they are identical. Either the first or thesecond therefore would not be completely simple, and hence not anecessary existent. 

We have thus shown that God is one both in the sense of simple and inthe sense of unique. To have a clear insight into the nature of hisunity, we must now show that nothing else outside of God is really one, though we apply the term one to many things. No one will claim that acollective is one; but neither is an individual really one, for anindividual man, for example, consists of many organs. You might thinkthat a homogeneous and continuous elementary mass like air or water isone. But this is not true either, for everything that is corporeal iscomposed of matter and form. If then we set aside corporeal objects andaim to find real unity in mathematical entities like line and surface, which are not corporeal, we are met with the difficulty that line andsurface are divisible, and hence potentially multiple. But neither arethe simple intellectual substances, like the angels, true ones; for theyare composed of their own possible existence and the necessaryexistence they acquire from another. The only being therefore that maybe a true one is that which is not corporeal and not dependent uponanother for its existence. 

Considering the question of unity from a different aspect, in itsrelation, namely, to the thing designated as one, we find that unitynever forms the essence of anything called by that name; but is in everycase an accident. Thus if it were the essence of man as man that he isone, there could not on the one hand be many men, and on the other therecould not also at the same time be one horse, one tree, one stone. InGod his unity cannot be an accident, since as simple he has noaccidents. Hence his unity is his essence. And if we examine the mattercarefully we find that it is a negative concept. It involves two things. First, that every other unity involves plurality in some form oranother. And second that being unlike anything else, he cannot bearhaving other things associated with him to make the result many, as wecan in the case of man. A, for example, is one; and with B, C, and D hebecomes many. This is not applicable to God. [238]

The divine attributes form the next topic we must consider. Here IbnDaud offers little or nothing that is essentially new. He admits neitheressential nor accidental attributes, for either would bring pluralityand composition in the nature of God. The only attributes he admits arenegative and relative. When we speak of God as cause we do not place anyspecial entity in his essence, but merely indicate the dependence ofthings upon him. The truest attributes are the negative, such as that heis not body, that his existence is not dependent upon another, and soon; the only difficulty being that negative attributes, though removingmany doubts, do not give us any positive information. All theanthropomorphic attributes in the Bible endowing God with humanfunctions like sleeping and waking, or ascribing to him human limbs, eyes, ears, hands, feet, etc. , must be understood metaphorically. Forthe Bible itself warns us against corporealizing God, "Take ye thereforegood heed unto yourselves; for ye saw no manner of form on the day thatthe Lord spake unto you in Horeb" (Deut. 4, 15). When the Bible speaksof God's anger and favor, the meaning is that good deeds bring man nearto God and cause happiness which is known as paradise ("Gan Eden"), andbad deeds remove far away from God and lead to misfortune, calledGehenna. It is like the apparent motion of the trees and the mountainsto the traveller, when in reality it is he that is moving. So here Godis said to approach and depart, to be angry with and favor, when inreality it is man who by his deeds comes near to God or departs far fromhim. When we assign many attributes to God we do not mean that there isany multiplicity in his nature. This cannot be. It is like the case of aman whose eyes are not properly co-ordinated. He sees double when thereis only one. So we too suffer from intellectual squinting, when we seemto see many attributes in the one God. 

The most common and most important attributes are the following eight:One, existent, true, eternal, living, knowing, willing, able. It can beeasily shown (and Ibn Daud does proceed to show, though we shall notfollow him in his details) that all these are at bottom negative. Unitymeans that there is nothing like him and that he is indivisible. Eternalmeans he is not subject to change or motion. True means he will nevercease existing and that his existence does not come from another, and soon with the rest. 

He closes his discussion of the attributes by intimating that he hasmore to say on this topic, but had better be content with what has beensaid so far, for a more thorough discussion of these matters in a bookmight do harm to those who do not understand and interpret the author'swords incorrectly. This reminds us of Maimonides's adjuration of thereader to keep what he finds in the "Guide of the Perplexed" to himselfand not to spread it abroad. Philosophy clearly was a delicate subjectand not meant for intellectual babes, whose intellectual digestion mightbe seriously disturbed. [239]

We have now concluded our theory of God and his attributes; and in doingso we made use of principles of physics, such as matter and form, potentiality and actuality, motion and infinity. The next step is toprove the existence and nature of intermediate spiritual beings betweenGod and the corporeal objects of the superlunar and sublunar worlds, called angels in the Bible, and secondary causes by the philosophers. For this purpose we shall have to apply the principles we have provedconcerning the soul and the motions of the heavenly bodies. We haveproved above that the human soul is at first in the child intelligentpotentially and then becomes intelligent actually. This requires anagent, in whom the end to which the potential is proceeding is alwaysactual. As the rational soul is neither body nor a corporeal power, thisactual agent cannot be either of these, hence it is neither a sphere northe soul of a sphere, but it must be a simple substance called _ActiveIntellect_. The prophets call it "Holy Spirit" ("Ruah Ha-Kodesh"). Wethus have a proof of the existence of at least one such simpleintellectual substance, or angel, the relation of which to the humansoul is as that of light to vision. Without light vision is potential, light makes it actual. So the active intellect makes the potential soulactual and gives it first the axioms, which are universally certain, andhence could not have originated by induction from experience. 

Similarly we can prove the existence of other simple substances from themotions of the heavenly spheres. We have already shown that the spheresare living beings and endowed with souls. But souls, while causingmotion in their bodies are at the same time themselves in a sort ofpsychic motion. This must be caused by unmoved movers, or intellects, who are also the causes of the souls. To make this difficult mattersomewhat clearer and more plausible, we may instance an analogy fromfamiliar experience. A ship is made by the shipbuilder, who is itscorporeal cause. But there is also an incorporeal cause, likewise aship, _viz. _, the ship in the mind of the shipbuilder. The analogy isimperfect, because the incorporeal ship in the mind of the buildercannot produce an actual corporeal ship without the builder employingmaterial, such as wood, iron, etc. , and in addition to that expendingtime and physical exertion on the material. But if he had the power togive the form of a ship to the material as soon as the latter wasprepared for it without time and physical manipulation, we should havean instance of what we want to prove, namely, the existence of simpleimmaterial substances causing forms to emanate upon corporealexistences. This is the nature of the active intellect in its relationto the soul of man, and it is in the same way that the philosophersconceive of the motions of the heavenly spheres. God is the firstunmoved mover. The angels or simple substances stand next to him; andthey, too, are always actual intelligences, and move the heavenly bodiesas the object of love and desire moves the object loving it withoutitself being moved. The heavenly bodies move therefore because of adesire to perfect themselves, or to become like unto their movers. 

So far Ibn Daud agrees with the philosophers, because the doctrines sofar expounded are not incompatible with the Bible. But when thephilosophers raise the question, How can the many originate from theOne, the manifold universe from the one God, and attempt to answer it bytheir theory of successive emanations, Ibn Daud calls a halt. The humanmind is not really so all-competent as to be able to answer allquestions of the most difficult nature. The doctrine of successiveemanations is that elaborated by Alfarabi and Avicenna, which we havealready seen quoted and criticized by Judah Halevi (_cf. _ above, p. 178f. ). It is slightly more complicated in Ibn Daud, who speaks of thetreble nature of the emanations after the first Intelligence--anintelligence, a soul and a sphere--whereas in Halevi's account therewere only two elements, the soul not being mentioned. [240]

We have so far dealt with the more theoretical part of theology andreligion, so much of it as may be and is accepted by nations andreligions other than Jews. It remains now to approach the more practicaland the more specifically Jewish phases of religion; though in thepurely ethical discussions and those relating to Providence we have oncemore a subject of general application, and not exclusively Jewish. 

As the introduction to this second part of the subject, Abraham Ibn Dauddevotes a few words to the theoretical defence of tradition, or ratherof mediate knowledge. He does so by analyzing the various kinds ofknowledge. Knowledge, he says, is either intelligible or sensible. Sensible knowledge is either directly perceived by the subject orreceived by him from another who perceived it directly, and whom hebelieves or not as the case may be. That is why some things believed bysome people are not believed by others. The ignorant may think that thisweakness is inherent in matters received from others. As a matter offact such indirect knowledge is at the basis of civilization and makesit possible. If every man were to judge only by what he sees with hisown eyes, society could never get along; there would be no way ofobtaining justice in court, for the judge would not put credence inwitnesses, and the parties would have to fight out their differences, which would lead to bloodshed and the disruption of social life. Thedifferent attitude of different persons to a given matter of belief isdue not necessarily to the uncertainty of the thing itself, but to themanner in which the object of the belief came down to us. If a thingrests upon the testimony of one man, its warrant is not very strong. Butif a whole nation witnessed an event, it is no longer doubtful, unlesswe suppose that the account itself is due to one writer, and the eventnever happened. We shall discuss these matters in the sequel. [241]

Having justified in a general way the knowledge derived from thetestimony of others by showing that society could not exist withoutdepending upon such knowledge; though admitting at the same time thatcaution should be exercised and criticism in determining whattraditional testimony is valid or not, we now take up one of thesetraditional phenomena which plays perhaps the most important rôle inJewish theology, namely, the phenomenon of prophecy. Before discussingthe traditional aspect of this institution and its purpose in thehistory of religion we must consider it from its natural andpsychological aspect. 

The explanation of Ibn Daud--it was not original with him, as we havealready seen the non-religious philosopher in Halevi's Cusari givingutterance to the same idea, and in Jewish philosophy Israeli touches onit--the explanation of Ibn Daud is grounded in his psychology, theAristotelian psychology of Avicenna. The first degree of prophecy, hesays, is found in true dreams, which happen to many people. Just aswaking is a state of the body in which it uses the external as well asthe internal senses, so sleeping is a state of the body in which thesoul suppresses the external senses by putting them to sleep, andexercises its "natural" powers only, such as the beating of the heartpulse, respiration, and so on. The internal senses are also at workduring sleep, or at least some of them. In particular the power ofimagination is active when the external senses are at rest. It thenmakes various combinations and separations and brings them to the commonsense. The result is a dream, true or false. When the senses are weakfor one reason or another this power becomes active and, when notcontrolled by the reason, produces a great many erroneous visions andideas, as in the delusions of the sick. 

The Deity and the angels and the Active Intellect have a knowledge ofthe past, present and future, and we already know that the soul, _i. E. _, the rational soul, receives influence from the Active Intellect asa natural thing in every person. Now just as it gets from it science andgeneral ideas, so it may receive a knowledge of hidden things if thesoul is adequately prepared. The reason it cannot receive information ofhidden things from the Active Intellect in its waking state, is becausethe soul is then busy in acquiring knowledge through the senses. Insleep, too, it may be prevented by the thick vapors rising from the foodconsumed during the day, or by anxiety due to want of food or drink. Theimagination also sometimes hinders this process by the constantpresentation of its foolish combinations to the common sense. Butsometimes this power comes under the control of the reason, and then therational soul is prepared to receive hidden things from the ActiveIntellect. In those cases the imagination transforms these facts intoimages, which are true dreams. If they concern an individual or aparticular event, we do not call them prophecy, or at least the share ofprophecy they may have is very small. We call them prophetic dreams whenthey concern important matters and have reference to a whole nation ornations, and come to pass in the distant future. An example of such adream is that recorded in Daniel 7, 1. 

Sometimes the information comes to the prophet without the aid of animage, when the reason prevails over the imagination, like the dream ofAbraham at the "covenant of the pieces" (Gen. 15, 12ff. ). Sometimes, also, the activity of the senses does not prevent the prophet fromseeing the hidden things of the future, and he receives propheticinspirations while awake. The prophet sometimes faints as he is overcomeby the unusual phenomenon, at other times he succeeds in enduring itwithout swooning. All these cases can be illustrated from the Bible, andexamples will readily occur to the reader who is familiar with thevarious instances and descriptions of prophetic visions and activitiesin Scripture. 

The purpose of prophecy is to guide the people in the right way. Withthis end in view God inspires a proper man as a prophet and gives himsuperior powers to perform miracles. Not every man is capable ofprophecy, only one who has a pure soul. For the most part the propheticgift is innate, at the same time study and good associations help todevelop this power in him who has it. Witness the "company of prophets, "whose example inspired Saul (1 Sam. 19, 20), and Elisha as the discipleof Elijah. 

While we thus see Ibn Daud, unlike Halevi, adopting the philosophicalexplanation of prophecy, which tries to bring it within the class ofnatural psychological phenomena and relates it to dreams, he could nothelp recognizing that one cannot ignore the supernatural character ofBiblical prophecy without being untrue to the Bible. He accordingly addsto the above naturalistic explanation a number of conditions whichpractically have the effect of taking the bottom out of thepsychological theory. If Judah Halevi insists that only Israelites inthe land of Palestine and at the time of their political independencehad the privilege of the prophetic gift, we realize that such a beliefis of the warp and woof of Halevi's innermost sentiment and thinking, which is radically opposed to the shallow rationalism and superficialcosmopolitanism of the "philosophers" of his day. But when the championof Peripateticism, Abraham Ibn Daud, after explaining that prophecy isof the nature of true dreams, and though in most cases innate, may becultivated by a pure soul through study and proper associations--repeatswith Judah Halevi that the time and the place are essential conditionsand that Israelites alone are privileged in this respect, he is givingup, it seems to us, all that he previously attempted to explain. This isonly one of the many indications which point to the essentialartificiality of all the mediæval attempts to harmonize a given systemof philosophy with a supernaturalistic standpoint, such as is that ofthe Bible. It is not in this way that the Bible is to be saved if itneeds saving. [242]

The next practical question Ibn Daud felt called upon to discuss wasthat of the possibility of the Law being repealed, abrogated or altered. This he found it necessary to do in order to defend the Jewishstandpoint against that of Christianity in particular. How he willanswer this question is of course a foregone conclusion. We are onlyinterested in his manner of argument. He adopts a classification of longstanding of the Biblical laws into rational and traditional. The first, he says, are accepted by all nations and can never be changed. Even aband of thieves, who disregard all laws of right and wrong as theyrelate to outsiders, must observe them in their own midst or theycannot exist. These laws bring people of different nationalities andbeliefs together, and hence there can be no change in these. Nor canthere be any alteration in that part of the Law which is historical incontent. An event of the past cannot be repealed. 

It only remains therefore to see whether abrogation may possibly becompatible with the nature of the traditional or ceremonial laws. Without arguing like the philosophers that change of a divine law isincompatible with the nature of God, which is unchangeable, our sagesnevertheless have a method of explaining such phrases as, "And itrepented the Lord that he had made man" (Gen. 6, 6), so as to reconcilethe demands of reason with those of tradition. Now if there were laws ofthe traditional kind stated in the Bible without any indication of timeand without the statement that they are eternal, and afterwards otherlaws came to change them, we should say that the Lord has a certainpurpose in his laws which we do not know, but which is revealed in thenew law taking the place of the old. But as a matter of fact the Biblestates explicitly in many cases that the laws are not to be changed, "Astatute for ever throughout your generations" (Num. 10, 8, and_passim_). Arguments from phrases like, "Your new moons and yourappointed feasts my soul hateth, etc. " (Is. 1, 14), have no validity, for there is no indication here that sacrifices are abolished. Themeaning of Isaiah is that sacrifices in conjunction with wrong livingare undesirable. 

Our opponents also argue that Biblical expressions to the effect thatthe laws are eternal prove nothing, for we know of similar instances inwhich promises have been withdrawn as in the priesthood of Eli's familyand the royalty of the house of David, where likewise eternity ismentioned. We answer these by saying, first, that in David's case thepromise was withdrawn only temporarily, and will return again, as theProphets tell us. Besides the promise was made only conditionally, aswas that made to Eli. But there is no statement anywhere that the Law isgiven to Israel conditionally and that it will ever be taken away fromthem. 

The claim of those who say that the laws of the Old Testament were true, but that they were repealed and the New Testament took its place, wemeet by pointing to a continuous tradition against their view. We havean uninterrupted tradition during two thousand four hundred andseventy-two years that there was a man Moses who gave a Law accepted byhis people and held without any break for two thousand four hundred andseventy-two years. We do not have to prove he was a genuine prophetsince they do not deny it. 

Some of them say that in the captivity in Babylon the old Law wasforgotten and Ezra made a new law, the one we have now. This is absurd. The law could not have been forgotten, for the people did not all gointo captivity at one time. They were not all put to death; they wereled into exile in a quiet fashion, and there were great men among themlike Hananiah, Mishael, Azariah, Daniel and others who surely could nothave forgotten the Law. Besides Ezra could never have had the consent ofall the people scattered everywhere if he had made a law of his own. Asa matter of fact the Law as we have it is the same in all detailsthroughout the world. [243]

The next problem we must consider is the perennial one--the problem ofevil and of freedom. It is the purpose of the entire book, as Ibn Daudtells us in his introduction. 

The further a thing is removed from matter the more perfect is itsknowledge. For, as we have already said, it is matter that hindersknowledge. All defect and evil is the result of the potential. Hence thefarther a thing is removed from potentiality the more perfect it is andthe freer it is from defect. God's essence is the most perfect thingthere is; and as he knows his essence, his is the most perfectknowledge. God knows, too, that his perfection is not stationary in him, but that it extends and communicates itself to all other things inorder. And the further a thing is from him the less is its perfectionand the greater is its imperfection. We have thus a graduated series, atone end the most perfect being, at the other the least perfect, _viz. _, matter. 

Now it is impossible from any point of view, either according to reasonor Bible or tradition, that evil or defect should come from God. Not byreason, for two contradictories in the same subject are impossible. Nowif good and evil both came from God, he would have to be composite justlike man, who can be the cause of good and evil, the one coming from hisrational power, the other from the spirited or appetitive. But God issimple and if evil comes from him, good cannot do so, which is absurd. Besides, the majority of defects are privational in character and notpositive, like for example darkness, poverty, ignorance, and so on, which are not things, but the negations of light, wealth, wisdom, respectively. Being negative, not positive, they are not _made_ by anybody. 

One may argue that it is in the nature of man that he should haveunderstanding and perfection; and if God deprives him of it, he doesevil. The answer is that the evil in the world is very small incomparison with the good. For evil and defect are found only in thingscomposed of the elements, which have a common matter, receiving forms inaccordance with the mixture of the elementary qualities in the matter. Here an external cause sometimes prevents the form from coming to thematter in its perfection. The seed, for example, depends upon thecharacter of the soil which it finds for its growth. Now it does notfollow that God was bound to give things the highest perfectionpossible. For in that case all minerals would be plants, all plantsanimals, all animals men, all men angels; and there would be no world, but only God and a few of the highest angels. In order that there shallbe a world, it was necessary to make a graduated series as we actuallyhave it. And as a matter of fact the very defects in the materialcomposites are a good when we have in view not the particular thing butthe whole. Thus if all men were of a highly intellectual type, therewould be no agriculture or manual labor. 

Now there are men whose temperament is such that they cannot distinguishbetween right and wrong, and they follow their inclinations. Tocounteract these bad qualities God gave his commandments and warnings. This shows that it is not impossible to oppose these evil tendencies, for in that case the commandments would be useless. The acts of man comeneither under the category of the _necessary_, nor under that of the_impossible_, but under the category of the _possible_. 

There are two senses in which we may understand the term possible. Athing may be possible subjectively, _i. E. _, in relation to ourignorance, though objectively it may be necessary and determined. Thuswe in Spain do not know whether the king of Babylon died to-day or not;and so far as we are concerned, it is possible that he is dead or thathe is alive. In reality it is not a question of possibility but ofnecessity. God knows which is true. The same thing applies to theoccurrence of an eclipse in the future for the man who is ignorant ofastronomy. Such possibility due to ignorance does not exist in God. 

But there is another sense of the word possible; the sense in which anevent is objectively undetermined. An event is possible if there isnothing in the previous chain of causation to determine the thing'shappening in one way rather than another. The result is then a matter ofpure chance or of absolute free will. Now God may make a thing possiblein this objective sense, and then it is possible for him also. If youask, but is God then ignorant of the result? We say, this is notignorance. For to assume that it is, and that everything should bedetermined like eclipses, and that God cannot create things _possible_, means to destroy the order of the world, of this world as well as thenext. For why shall man engage in various occupations or pursue definitelines of conduct since his destiny is already fixed?

The truth of the matter is that there are several orders of causes. Someare directly determined by God, and there is no way of evading them;others are entrusted to nature, and man is able to enjoy its benefitsand avoid its injuries by proper management. A third class contains thethings of chance, and one may guard against these also. So we are biddenin the Bible to make a parapet on the roofs of our houses to guardagainst the possibility of falling down. Finally there is the fourthclass, those things which depend upon the free choice of the individual. Right and wrong conduct are matters of choice, else there would be nouse in prophets, and no reward and punishment. When a person makes aneffort to be good, his desire increases, and he obtains assistance fromthe angels. 

Since freedom is supported by reason, Scripture and tradition, thepassages in the Bible which are in favor of it should be takenliterally, and those against it should be interpreted figuratively. Whenthe Bible says that God hardened Pharaoh's heart, it means simply thatPharaoh was allowed to proceed as he began. All the ancient sages of ournation were in favor of freedom. [244]

If we compare the above discussion of the problem of freedom with thatof Judah Halevi (above, p. 171), we see that Ibn Daud is moreconsistent, whatever we may think of his success in solving theinsoluble problem. He frankly insists on the absolute freedom of thewill and on the reality of the objectively contingent, not shrinkingbefore the unavoidable conclusion that the events which are the resultsof such freedom or chance are no more known beforehand to God than theyare to man. And he tries to avoid the criticism of attributingimperfection to God by insisting that not to be able to foretell thecontingent is not ignorance, and hence not an imperfection. The readermay think what he pleases of this defence, but there seems to be a moreserious difficulty in what this idea implies than in what it explicitlysays. 

If the contingent exists for God also, it follows that he is not thecomplete master of nature and the world. To say as Ibn Daud does thatGod made the contingent, _i. E. _, made it to be contingent, sounds likea contradiction, and reminds one of the question whether God can make astone so big that he cannot lift it himself. 

His proofs in favor of freedom and the contingent are partiallyidentical with those of Judah Halevi, but in so far as he does notexplicitly admit that the will may itself be influenced by prior causeshe evades, to be sure, the strongest argument against him, but he doesso at the expense of completeness in his analysis. Halevi is lessconsistent and more thorough, Ibn Daud is more consistent, because hefails to take account of real difficulties. 

In the final outcome of their respective analyses, Halevi maintainsGod's foreknowledge at the expense of absolute freedom, or rather hedoes not see that his admissions are fatal to the cause he endeavors todefend. Ibn Daud maintains absolute freedom and frankly sacrificesforeknowledge; though his defence of freedom is secured by blindinghimself to the argument most dangerous to that doctrine. 

Abraham Ibn Daud concludes his "Emunah Ramah" by a discussion of ethicsand the application of the principles thus discovered to the laws of theBible. He entitles this final division of his treatise, "Medicine of theSoul, " on the ground that virtue is the health of the soul as vice isits disease. In his fundamental ethical distinctions, definitions andclassifications he combines Plato's psychology and the virtues basedthereon with the Aristotelian doctrine of the mean, which he alsoapplies in detail. He omits wisdom as one of the Platonic virtues and, unlike Plato for whom justice consists in a harmony of the other threevirtues and has no psychological seat peculiar to it, Ibn Daud makesjustice the virtue of the rational soul. 

The end of practical philosophy is, he says, happiness. This isattained, first, by good morals; second, by proper family life; andthird, by means of correct social and political conduct. 

The human soul consists of three principal faculties, vegetative, animal, rational. Corresponding to these the principal virtues and vicesare also three. The vegetative power, whose functions are nourishment, growth and reproduction, is related to appetite, and is called theappetitive soul. The animal power as being the cause of sensation, voluntary motion, cruelty, revenge, mercy and kindness, is called thespirited soul, because these qualities are dependent upon the energy orweakness of the spirit. The rational power has two aspects. One isdirected upwards and is the means of our learning the sciences and thearts. The other aspect is directed downwards, and endeavors to control(successfully or not as the case may be), the two lower powers of thesoul, guarding them against excess and defect. This function we callconduct, and virtue is the mean between the two extremes of too much andtoo little. The mean of the appetitive power is temperance; of thespirited power, bravery and gentleness; of the rational soul, justice. [245]

Justice consists in giving everything its due without excess or defect. Justice is therefore the highest of all qualities, and is of value notmerely in a person's relations to his family and country, but also inthe relations of his powers one to another. The rational power must seeto it that the two lower faculties of the soul get what is their due, nomore and no less. This quality has an important application also in therelations of a man to his maker. It is just that a person should requitehis benefactor as much as he received from him, if possible. If hecannot do this, he should at least thank him. Hence the reason fordivine worship, the first of commandments. This quality, the greatest ofmen possessed in the highest degree. Moses "said to him that did thewrong, wherefore smitest thou thy fellow?" (Ex. 2, 13). And when theshepherds came and drove away the daughters of the priest of Midian, "Moses stood up and helped them, and watered their flock" (_ib. _ 17). This is the reason why God sent him to deliver Israel. 

God showed the care he had of his nation by revealing himself to them, and thus showing them the error of those who think that God gave overthe rule of this world to the stars, and that he and the angels have nofurther interest in it. Hence the first commandment is "I am the Lordthy God, " which is followed by "You shall have no other gods, " "Thoushalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain" (Ex. 20, 2ff. ). "Remember the Sabbath day" is for the purpose of condemning the beliefin the eternity of the world, as is evident from the conclusion, "For insix days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in themis.... " (_ib. _ 11). "Honor thy father and thy mother" (_ib. _ 12) isintended to inculcate the duty of honoring the cause of one's being, including God. Thus the first five commandments all aim to teach therevelation and Providence of God. The rest deal with social andpolitical conduct, especially the last one, "Thou shalt not covet, "which is important in the preservation of society. 

The commandment to love God involves the knowledge of God, for onecannot love what one does not know. A man must know therefore God'sattributes and actions. He must be convinced likewise that no evil comesfrom God, or he cannot love him as he should. He may fear him but notwith the proper fear. For there are two kinds of fear, and the one thatis commanded is fear of majesty and awe, not fear of punishment. 

Divine service means not merely prayer three times a day, but constantthought of God. To develop and train this thought of God in us we arecommanded to put on phylacteries and fringes, and to fasten the"mezuzah" to our door posts. For the same reason we celebrate thefestivals of Passover, Tabernacles, Hanukkah and Purim, as a remembranceof God's benefits to our people. All these observances are ultimatelybased upon the duty of thanking our benefactor, which is part ofjustice, the highest of the virtues. 

Among moral virtues we are also commanded to practice suppression ofanger, and its inculcation is emphasized by making it a divineattribute, "The Lord, the Lord, a God full of compassion andgracious.... " (Ex. 34, 6). Other virtues of the same kind are, not torepay evil for evil, not to be jealous, to practice humility like Moses, and so on. In fact all the virtues laid down by ethical philosophers arefound better expressed in the Bible. 

In respect to family virtues, we are bidden to care for and protect themembers of our family, wife, children and slaves. Of social virtues wehave love of our neighbor, honesty in dealing, just weights andmeasures, prohibition of interest and of taking a pledge from the poor, returning a find to the loser, and a host of other teachings. 

There are, however, some of the traditional laws, the purpose of whichis not known, especially the details of sacrifices and the like. Inexplanation of these we must say that the law consists of a rule of lifecomposed of several parts. First is belief; second, moral qualities;third, family life; fourth, social and political life; fifth, thecommandments above referred to, which we shall characterize as dictatedby divine wisdom, though we do not understand them. Not all the parts ofthe Law are of the same order of value. The fundamental portion and themost important is that dealing with belief. Next in importance are thelaws governing social and moral conduct, without which society isimpossible. That is why all nations agree about these; and there ishonesty even among thieves. The last class of commandments, whosepurpose is not known, are the least in importance, as is clear also fromstatements in the Bible, such as, "I spake not unto your fathers, norcommanded them in the day that I brought them out of the land of Egypt, concerning burnt offerings or sacrifices.... " (Jer. 7, 22). At the sametime we cannot deny that there are some reasons for their observance. Thus sacrifice leads to repentance as a result of reflection, even ifthe person does not confess his sin, as he is bidden to do in certaincases. 

In fact there is one aspect which gives this class of commandments evengreater importance than the social duties. It is the principle ofimplicit obedience even when we do not see the value of the commandment. I do not mean that a man should not study science, particularly whatconcerns the knowledge of God. This is not to be recommended. But when aman is convinced that there is such a thing as genuine prophecy, showingGod's providence, as we see in the case of Moses who delivered hisnation, performed wonders for them and was always honored andbelieved--he should not balk at the acceptance of some laws given bysuch a divine man simply because he does not understand them. Abraham isa good example. For when God promised him that Isaac would become agreat nation, and then commanded him to sacrifice his only child, he didnot ask any questions and was ready to do God's behest. His example ismeant to be followed by all. This is the purpose of these subtlecommandments, which are made with wisdom. Through them we may see thedifference between belief and unbelief. [246]

The above discussion is extremely typical of the rationalistic attitudeof Ibn Daud and his school, which includes such men as Maimonides, Gersonides and others. Reason, theory, science, explanation--these arethe important considerations in things philosophical, as well as thingsreligious. Theory is more important than practice, and belief standshigher than mere conduct. No wonder that Maimonides was not satisfieduntil he elaborated a creed with a definite number of dogmas. Dogmas andfaith in reason go together. It is the mystic who is impatient ofprescribed generalities, for he is constantly refreshed by the livingand ever flowing stream of individual experience. The rationalist has afixed unchangeable Idea or reason or method, whose reality and valueconsists in its unity, permanence and immutability. In favor of thishypostatised reason, the rationalist Ibn Daud is ready to sacrifice sofundamental an institution as sacrifice in the face of the entire bookof Leviticus, pretending that a single verse of Jeremiah entitles him todo so. But the Jew Ibn Daud in the end asserted himself, and he finds itnecessary to admit that in a sense these non-rational laws may be ofeven greater importance than the rational; not, however, as a simplebeliever might say, because we must not search the wisdom of God, butfor the reason that unreasoned obedience is itself a virtue. 

In conclusion we remind the reader that Ibn Daud was the precursor ofMaimonides, touching upon, and for the most part answering everyquestion treated by his more famous successor. Ibn Daud was the first toadopt Aristotelianism for the purpose of welding it with Judaism. Heshowed the way to follow. Maimonides took his cue from Ibn Daud andsucceeded in putting the latter in the shade. Historic justice demandsthat Ibn Daud be brought forward into the light and given the creditwhich is deservedly his due. 

CHAPTER XIII

MOSES MAIMONIDES

With Maimonides we reach the high water mark of mediæval Jewishphilosophy. He was by far the most comprehensive mind of mediæval Jewry, and his philosophy was the coping stone of a complete system of Judaism. In his training and education he embraced all Jewish literature, Biblical and Rabbinic, as well as all the science and philosophy of hisday. And his literary activity was fruitful in every important branch ofstudy. He was well known as a practicing physician, having been in theemploy of the Caliph's visier at Cairo (Fostat), and he wrote on medicaltheory and practice. He was versed in mathematics and astronomy, and hisknowledge of these subjects served him in good stead not merely as anintroduction to theology and metaphysics, but was of direct service inhis studies and writings on the Jewish calendar. It goes without sayingthat he knew logic, for this was the basis of all learning in mediævaltimes; but in this branch, too, Maimonides has left us a youthfultreatise, [247] which bears witness to his early interest in science andhis efforts to recommend its study as helpful to a better understandingof Jewish literature. 

But all these activities and productions were more or less side issues, or preparations for a _magnum opus_, or rather _magna opera_. From hisyouth we can trace the evident purpose, not finally completed untiltoward the end of his brilliant and useful career, --the purpose toharmonize Judaism with philosophy, to reconcile the Bible and Talmudwith Aristotle. He was ambitious to do this for the good of Judaism, andin the interest of a rational and enlightened faith. Thus in hiscommentary on the Mishna, [248] the earliest of his larger works, he hadalready conceived the idea of writing a composition of a harmonizingnature, _viz. _, to gather all the homiletical disquisitions of theTalmud (the "derashot") and explain them in a rationalistic manner so asto remove what appears on the surface to be offensive to sound reason. But instead of proceeding at once to the performance of this cherishedobject of his philosophic ambition, he kept it in his bosom, broodingover it during a life of intense literary and practical activity, untilit was in the end matured and brought to fruition in a manner quitedifferent from that at first intended. The book explanatory of theRabbinic legends was given up for reasons which will appear later. Butthe object that work was to realize was carried out in a much moreeffective manner because it was delayed, and was published toward theend of his life as the systematic and authoritative pronouncement of thegreatest Jew of his time. The "Guide of the Perplexed" would not haveattracted the attention it did, it would not have raised the storm whichdivided Jewry into two opposed camps, if it had not come as the maturework of the man whom all Jewry recognized as the greatest Rabbinicauthority of his time. Others had written on philosophy beforeMaimonides. We have in these pages followed their ideas--Saadia, Gabirol, Ibn Zaddik, Abraham Ibn Daud. The latter in particularanticipated Maimonides in almost all his ideas. None had the effect ofupsetting the theological equilibrium of Jewry. Everyone had hisadmirers, no doubt, as well as his opponents. Gabirol was forgotten, IbnZaddik and Ibn Daud were neglected, and Jewish learning continued theeven tenor of its course. Maimonides was the first to make a profoundimpression, the first who succeeded in stirring to their depths thesmooth, though here and there somewhat turbid, Rabbinic waters, as theyflowed not merely in scientific Spain and Provence, or in the Orient, but also in the strictly Talmudic communities of northern France. It wasthe Commentary on the Mishna and the Talmudic code known as the "Yadha-Hazaka" that was responsible for the tremendous effect of the "MoreNebukim" ("Guide of the Perplexed"). 

In these two Rabbinical treatises, and particularly in the "Yadha-Hazaka, " the Rabbinic Code, Maimonides showed himself the master ofRabbinic literature. And all recognized in him the master mind. Havingbeen written in Hebrew the Code soon penetrated all Jewish communitieseverywhere, and Maimonides's fame spread wherever there were Jewsengaged in the study of the Talmud. His fame as a court physician inEgypt and as the official head of Oriental Jewry enhanced the influenceof his name and his work. Jealousy no doubt had its share in startingopposition to the Code itself even before the publication of the"Guide, " and during the lifetime of its author. When the "More Nebukim"was translated from the original Arabic into Hebrew, so that all couldread it, and Maimonides was no longer among the living, the zealotsbecame emboldened and the storm broke, the details of which, however, itis not our province to relate. 

For completeness' sake let us set down the facts of his life. Moses benMaimon was born in the city of Cordova on the fourteenth of Nissan (30thof March) at one o'clock in the afternoon, on a Sabbath which was theday before Passover, in the year 1135. It is not often that the birth ofa mediæval Jewish writer is handed down with such minute detail. Usuallywe do not even know the year, to say nothing of the day and the hour. Cordova had long fallen from its high estate. It was no longer theglorious city of the days before the Almoravid conquest. And it wasdestined to descend lower still when the fanatical hordes of theAlmohades renewed the ancient motto of the early Mohammedan conquerors, "The Koran or the Sword. "

Maimonides was barely thirteen when his native city fell into the handsof the zealots from Morocco, and henceforth neither Jew nor Christiandared avow his faith openly in Cordova. Adoption of Islam, emigration ordeath were the choices held out to the infidel. Many Jews adopted thedominant faith outwardly--that was all that was demanded of them--whilein the secret of their homes they observed Judaism. Some emigrated, andamong them was the family of Moses' father. For a time they wanderedabout from city to city in Spain, and then crossed over to Fez inMorocco. This seems to us like going from the frying pan into the fire, for Fez was the lion's den itself. The conquerors of Cordova came fromMorocco. And there seems to be some evidence too that the Maimon familyhad to appear outwardly as Mohammedans. Be that as it may, Maimonidesdid not stay long in Fez. On the 18th of April, 1165, the family setsail for Palestine, and after a month's stormy voyage they arrived inAcco. He visited Jerusalem and Hebron, but did not find Palestine apromising place for permanent residence and decided to go to Egypt. Hesettled in Old Cairo (Fostat), and with his brother David engaged in thejewel trade. His father died soon after, and later his brother met anuntimely death when the ship on which he was a passenger on one of hisbusiness trips was wrecked in the Indian Ocean. Thereafter Maimonidesgave up the jewel business and began to practice medicine, which atfirst did not offer him more than the barest necessities. But in thecourse of time his fame spread and he was appointed physician toSaladin's grand visier Alfadhil. He was also made spiritual head[C] ofthe Jews of Egypt, and what with his official duties as court physician, leader of the Jewish community, practicing physician among the people, and his literary activities, Jewish and secular, Rabbinical andscientific, he was a busy man indeed; so much so that he dissuadesSamuel Ibn Tibbon, the translator of the "Guide, " from paying him avisit on the ground that he would scarcely have time to spare to seehim, much less to enter into scientific discussions with him. [249]Maimonides died on Monday, December 13 (20 Tebeth), 1204. 

[C] Not a paid post. 

The philosophy of Maimonides is contained in the "Guide of thePerplexed, " his last great work, which was published in Arabic in1190. [250] Some philosophic and ethical material is also found in theintroductory chapters of his commentary on the Mishnaic treatise "Abot"(the so-called "Eight Chapters"--"Shemonah Perakim"), [251] in theintroduction to the eleventh chapter (Helek) of the Talmudic treatise"Sanhedrin, " and in the introductory sections of the Code ("HilkotYesode ha-Torah" and "Hilkot Deot"). Here, however, the treatment ispopular and elementary, and is intended for popular consumption. He laysdown results in their simplest form without discussing their origin orthe arguments _pro_ and _con_. The "Guide of the Perplexed, " on theother hand, is intended for a special class of persons, for thesophisticated; for those who are well trained in science and philosophy, not to speak of Bible and Talmud, and are as a result made uneasy by theapparent disagreement of philosophical teaching with the ideas expressedin the Biblical and Rabbinic writings. His purpose is deliberatelyapologetic and concordistic. The work is not a treatise of science orphilosophy. The latter are presupposed. He introduces philosophicprinciples, Aristotelian or Kalamistic, only with a view to theirrelation to Jewish theology. And he either accepts them, provisionallyor absolutely, if he regards them as proven, as true and useful; or herefutes and rejects them if untenable. In the former case he shows byproper interpretation that similar principles are taught in Bible andTalmud; in the latter he contents himself by proving that Aristotle orthe Mutakallimun, as the case may be, did not prove their point. 

His method, in general, of quieting the doubts of the "perplexed" is theold one--as old as Philo and beyond--of regarding Biblical phrases asmetaphors and allegories, containing an esoteric meaning beside oropposed to the literal. Accordingly he lays the greatest stress on theexplanation of Scriptural "homonyms, " as he calls them, borrowing anAristotelian term. A homonym is a word which has more than one meaning;a word which denotes several things having nothing in common. Thus whenI apply the word dog to the domestic animal we know by that name, aswell as to Sirius, known as the dog-star, I use dog as a homonym. Thestar and the animal have nothing in common. So the word "merciful, " oneof the attributes of God in the Bible, is a homonym. That is, we denoteby the same word also a quality in a human being; but this quality andthat which is denoted by the same word when applied to God have nothingin common. They are not merely different in degree but in kind. In fact, as Maimonides insists, there is really nothing _in_ God corresponding tothe word merciful. 

There are besides certain passages in the Bible which while having anacceptable meaning when taken literally, contain besides a deepersignification which the practiced eye can detect. Thus in thedescription of the harlot in the seventh chapter of Proverbs there isbeside the plain meaning of the text, the doctrine of matter as thecause of corporeal desires. The harlot, never faithful to one man, leaving one and taking up with another, represents matter which, asAristotle conceives it, never is without form and constantly changes oneform for another. 

There is really nothing new in this, and Philo apart, whom Maimonidesdid not know, Ibn Daud anticipated Maimonides here also in making use ofthe term "homonym" as the basis of this method of interpretation. [252]But whereas Ibn Daud relegates the chapter treating of this principle toa subordinate place, his interest being as he tells us primarilyethical--to solve the problem of free will; Maimonides places it in thevery centre of his system. The doctrine of attributes as leading to atrue conception of God, --of God as absolutely incorporeal and withoutany resemblance or relation whatsoever to anything else--is the verykeystone of Maimonides's philosophical structure. His purpose is toteach a spiritual conception of God. Anything short of this is worsethan idolatry. He cannot reconcile the Bible to such a view without this"homonymic" tool. Hence the great importance of this in his system; andhe actually devotes the greater part of the first book of the "Guide" toa systematic and exhaustive survey of all terms in the Bible used ashomonyms. [253] All this is preparatory to his discussion of the divineattributes. 

This consideration will account also for the fact that, systematic andlogical thinker as he was, he perpetrates what might appear at firstsight as a logical blunder. Instead of first proving the existence ofGod and then discussing his nature and attributes, as Saadia, Bahya, IbnDaud and others did before him, he treats exhaustively of the divineattributes in the first book, whereas the proof of the existence of Goddoes not appear until the second book. This inversion of the logicalorder is deliberate. Maimonides's method is directed _ad hominem_. TheJews for whom he wrote his "Guide" did not doubt the existence of God. But a great many of them had an inadequate idea of his spiritual nature. And apparently the Bible countenanced their anthropomorphism. HenceMaimonides cast logical considerations to the wind, and dealt first withthat which was nearest to his heart. The rest could wait, this couldnot. 

I promised in my commentary on the Mishna, he tells us in theintroduction to the "Guide, " to explain the allegories and "Midrashim"in two works to be entitled "The Book of Reconciliation" and "The Bookof Prophecy. " But after reflecting on the matter a number of years Idecided to desist from the attempt. The reasons are these. If Iexpressed my explanations obscurely, I should have accomplished nothingby substituting one unintelligible statement for another. If, on theother hand, I were really to make clear the matters that requireexplanation, the result would not be suitable for the masses, for whomthose treatises were intended. Besides, those Midrashim when read by anignorant man are harmless because to such a person nothing isimpossible. And if they are read by a person who is learned and worthy, one of two things is likely to happen. Either he will take themliterally and suspect the author of ignorance, which is not a seriousoffence; or he will regard the legendary statements as containing anesoteric meaning and think well of the author--which is a good thing, whether he catch the meaning intended or not. Accordingly I gave up theidea of writing the books mentioned. In this work I am addressing myselfto those who have been philosophizing; who are believers in the Bibleand at the same time know science; and are perplexed in their ideas onaccount of the homonymous terms. 

Having made clear Maimonides's chief interest and purpose in hismasterpiece we need not follow his own method of treatment, which oftengives the impression of a studied attempt to conceal his innermost ideasfrom all but the initiated. At least he is not willing that anyone whohas not taken the trouble carefully to study and scrutinize everychapter and compare it with what precedes and follows, should by asuperficial browsing here and there arrive at an understanding of theprofound problems treated in the work. He believes that the mysteriousdoctrines passing by the name of "Maase Bereshit" and "Maase Merkaba" inthe Talmud (_cf. _ Introduction, p. Xvi) denote respectively Physics andMetaphysics--the very sciences of which he treats in the "Guide. "Accordingly he tells us that following the instructions of the Rabbis hemust not be expected to give more than bare allusions. And even theseare not arranged in order in the book, but scattered and mixed up withother subjects which he desires to explain. For, as he says, "I do notwant to oppose the divine intention, which concealed the truths of hisbeing from the masses. "

"You must not suppose, " he continues, "that these mysteries are known toanybody completely. By no means. But sometimes the truth flashes upon usand it is day; and then again our natural constitution and habits shutthem out, and we are again in darkness. The relative proportion of lightand darkness which a person enjoys in these matters, makes thedifference in the grade of perfection of great men and prophets. Thegreatest of the prophets had comparatively little if any darkness. Withthose who never see light at all, namely the masses of the people, wehave nothing to do in this book. "

Finally he adjures the reader not to explain to anyone else the novelideas found in his work, which are not contained in the writings of hispredecessors. Heaven knows, he exclaims, I hesitated long before writingthis book, because it contains unknown matters, never before treated byany Jewish writer in the "Galut. " But I relied on two Rabbinicprinciples. One is that when it is a question of doing something for agreat cause in a critical time, it is permitted to transgress a law. Theother is the consciousness that my motives are pure and unselfish. Inshort, he concludes, I am the man who, when he finds himself in acritical position and cannot teach truth except by suiting one worthyperson and scandalizing ten thousand fools, chooses to say the truth forthe benefit of the one without regard for the abuse of the greatmajority. 

As we are not bound by Maimonides's principle of esoterism and mystery, nor are we in fear of being an offence and a stumbling block to thefools, we shall proceed more directly in our exposition of hisphilosophy; and shall begin with Maimonides's general ideas on the needof science for intelligent faith and the relation thereto of Jewishhistory and literature. 

The highest subject of study is metaphysics or theology, the knowledgeof God (_cf. _ below, p. 285). This is not merely not forbidden in theBible, but it is directly commanded. When Moses says, "That I may knowthee, to the end that I may find grace in thy sight" (Exod. 33, 13), heintimates that only he finds favor with God who knows him, and notmerely who fasts and prays. [254] Besides, the commandment, "Thou shaltlove the Lord thy God, " cannot be fulfilled without a study andunderstanding of the whole of nature. [255] Thus, as we shall see, it isonly by a study of physics that we come to understand that affection isa defect and must therefore be removed from the conception of God. Thesame thing applies to the ideas of potentiality and actuality. We shouldnot know what they signify without a study of physics, nor should weunderstand that potentiality is a defect and hence not to be found inGod. It is therefore a duty to study both physics and metaphysics for atrue knowledge of God. [256] At the same time we must recognize thathuman reason has a limit and that there are matters which are beyond itsken. Not to realize this and to deny what has not been proved impossibleis dangerous, and may lead a man astray after the imagination and theevil desires which quench the light of the intellect. And it is this theBible and the Rabbis had in mind in such passages as, "Hast thou foundhoney? eat so much as is sufficient for thee; lest thou be filledtherewith, and vomit it" (Prov. 25, 16); or in the following from theMishna, "Whoever pries into four things, had better not come into theworld, _viz. _, what is above and what is below, what was before and whatwill be after" (Hagigah, ch. 2). The meaning is not, as some foolsthink, that the Rabbis forbid the use of the reason entirely to reachwhat is in its power. It is _abuse_ of the reason that they prohibit, and neglect of the truth that the human reason has a limit. [257]

Accordingly while the study of metaphysics and the explanation of theallegories of Scripture are thus shown to be a necessity of intelligentbelief, it is not proper to begin with these difficult subjects. Onemust first be mature intellectually and possessed of the preliminarysciences. Otherwise the study of metaphysics is likely not merely toconfuse the mind in its belief, but to destroy belief entirely. It islike feeding an infant on wheat bread and meat and wine. These are notbad in themselves, but the infant is not prepared to digest them. Thatis why these matters are given in the Bible in the form of allegories, because the Bible is intended for all--men, women and children--notbecause metaphysical ideas are injurious in themselves, as some foolsimagine, who believe they are wise men. For beginners it is sufficientthat they have the right view by tradition and know the existence ofcertain beings, without being able to prove the opinions they hold, orto understand the essence of the being in the existence of which theybelieve. This they will acquire gradually if they are capable. [258]

There are five causes preventing the study of metaphysics on the part ofthe general masses. First, the difficulty of the subject itself. Second, the limitations of all people's minds at the beginning. Third, the greatamount of preparatory training that is necessary, and which everybody isnot ready to undertake, however eager he may be to know the results. Andto study metaphysics without preliminary training is worse than not tostudy it at all. For there is nothing in existence except God and hiscreation. To know God's existence and what is and is not proper toascribe to him we must examine his creation; and thus arithmetic, thenature of number, and the properties of geometrical figures help us agreat deal in determining what attributes are inapplicable to God. Evenmuch more important for metaphysics is the study of spherical astronomyand physics, which throw light on the relation of God to the world. Thenthere are some theoretical topics which, while not directly of help inmetaphysics, are useful in training the mind and enabling it to knowwhat is true demonstration. One who wishes therefore to undertake thestudy of metaphysics, must first study logic, then the mathematicalsciences in order, then physics, and not until he has mastered all theseintroductory branches should he take up metaphysics. This is too muchfor most people, who would die in the midst of their preparatorystudies, and if not for tradition would never know whether there is aGod or not, not to speak of knowing what attributes are applicable tohim and what are not. 

The fourth cause which keeps people away from the study of metaphysicsis their natural disposition. For it has been shown that intellectualqualities are dependent upon moral; and the former cannot be perfectunless the latter are. Now some persons are temperamentally incapable ofright thinking by reason of their passionate nature; and it is foolishto attempt to teach them, for it is not medicine or geometry, and noteverybody is prepared for it. This is the reason, too, why young mencannot study it, because of the passions which are still strong in them. Finally as a fifth reason, the necessities of the body and its luxuries, too, stand in the way of a person's devoting enough time and attentionto this subject. [259]

Like many others before him, Christians as well as Jews, Maimonides alsobelieved that in ancient times the Jews diligently cultivated thesciences, which were gradually forgotten on account of foreigndomination. Maimonides adds another reason for their disappearance, namely, that they were not disseminated abroad. They were confined to aselect few and were not put down in writing but handed down by word ofmouth. As a result only a few hints are found in the Talmud andMidrashim, where the kernel is small and the husk large, so that peoplemistake the husk for the kernel. [260]

He then traces the history of philosophical thinking in Jewish mediævalliterature from the time of the Geonim, and tells us that the littlethat is found of the Kalam concerning the Unity of God and relatedtopics in the works of some of the Geonim and the Karaites in the Eastis borrowed from the Mutakallimun of the Mohammedans and constitutes asmall fraction of the writings of the latter on this subject. The firstattempt in this direction among the Moslems was that of the party knownas the Muʿtazila, whom our people followed. Later came the party of theAshariya with different opinions which, however, were not adopted by anyof our people. This was not due, he tells us, to a deliberate decisionin favor of the Muʿtazila, but solely to the historical accident oftheir chronological priority. On the other hand, the Spanish Jews ofAndalusia adopted the views of the philosophers, _i. E. _, theAristotelians, so far as they are not in conflict with our religion. They do not follow the Mutakallimun, and hence what little of thesubject is found in the works of the later writers of this classresembles our own method and views. [261]

There seems no doubt that whatever other Spanish writers Maimonides hadin mind, whose works are not extant, his characterization fits admirablythe "Emunah Ramah" of Abraham Ibn Daud (_cf. _ above, p. 217), and in aless degree it is also true of Ibn Gabirol, Bahya, Judah Halevi, Mosesand Abraham Ibn Ezra. Bahya as we saw above (p. 86) still retains a gooddeal of Kalamistic material and so does Ibn Zaddik (p. 126). As forMukammas, Saadia and the two Karaites Al Basir and Jeshua ben Judah, wehave seen (pp. 17, 24, 48, 56) that they move wholly in the ideas of theMutakallimun. It becomes of great interest for us therefore to see whatMaimonides thinks of these Islamic theologians, of their origins, oftheir methods and of their philosophical value. Maimonides's expositionand criticism of the principles of the Mutakallimun is of especialinterest, too, because up to recent times his sketch of the tenets ofthis school was the only extensive account known; and it has not lostits value even yet. We shall, however, be obliged to abridge hisdetailed exposition in order not to enlarge our volume beyond duelimits. Besides, there is no occasion for repeating what we have alreadysaid of the Kalam in our Introduction (p. Xxi ff. ); though the accountthere given was not taken from Maimonides and does not follow his order. 

Maimonides is aware that the Arabs are indebted to the Christians, Greeks as well as Syrians. The Muʿtazila and Ashariya, he says, basetheir opinions upon premises and principles borrowed from Greek andSyrian Christians, who endeavored to refute the opinions of thephilosophers as dangerous to the Christian religion. There was thus aChristian Kalam prior to the Mohammedan. [262] Their method was to laydown premises favorable to their religion, and by means of these torefute the opinions opposed to them. When the Mohammedans came upon thescene and translated the works of the philosophers, they included intheir work of translation the refutations composed by the Christians. Inthis way they found the works of Philoponus, Yahya ben Adi and others;and adopted also the opinions of the pre-Socratic philosophers, whichthey thought would be of help to them, though these had already beenrefuted by Aristotle, who came after. Such are the atomic theory ofmatter and the belief in the existence of a vacuum. These opinions theycarried to consequences not at all contemplated by their authorities, who were closer to the philosophers. 

To characterize briefly the methods of the Mutakallimun, Maimonidescontinues, I would say that the first among them, the Greeks and theMohammedans, did not follow reality, but adopted principles which werecalculated to help them in defending their religious theses, and theninterpreted reality to suit their preconceived notions. The latermembers of the school no longer saw through the motives of theirpredecessors and imagined their principles and arguments were _bonafide_ refutations of philosophical opinions. 

On examination of their works I found, he continues, that with slightdifferences they are all alike. They do not put any trust in reality andnature. For, they say, the so-called laws of nature are nothing morethan the order of events to which we are accustomed. There is no kind ofnecessity in them, and it is conceivable they might be different. Inmany cases the Mutakallimun follow the imagination and call it reason. Their method of procedure is as follows. They first state theirpreliminary principles, then they prove that the world is "new, " _i. E. _, created in time. Then they argue that the world must have had anoriginator, and that he is one and incorporeal. All the Mutakallimunfollow this method, and they are imitated by those of our own people whofollow in their footsteps. 

To this method I have serious objections, continues Maimonides, fortheir arguments in favor of the creation of the world are not convincingunless one does not know a real demonstration from a dialectical orsophistic. The most one can do in this line is to invalidate thearguments for eternity. But the decision of the question is by no meanseasy, as is shown by the fact that the controversy is three thousandyears old and not yet settled. Hence it is a risky policy to build theargument for the existence of God on so shaky a foundation as the"newness" of the world. The best way then, it seems to me, is to proveGod's existence, unity and incorporeality by the methods of thephilosophers, which are based upon the eternity of the world. Not that Ibelieve in eternity or that I accept it, but because on this hypothesisthe three fundamental doctrines are validly demonstrated. Having provedthese doctrines we will then return to the problem of the origin of theworld and say what can be said in favor of creation. [263]

This is a new contribution of Maimonides. All the Jewish writers beforeHalevi followed in their proofs of the existence of God the methoddesignated by Maimonides as that of the Kalam. Judah Halevi criticisedthe Mutakallimun as well as the philosophers in the interest of a pointof view all his own (pp. 176 ff. , 182). Ibn Daud tacitly ignored theKalam and based his proof of the existence of God upon the principles ofmotion as exhibited in the Aristotelian Physics, without, however, finding it necessary to assume even provisionally the eternity of motionand the world (p. 217 ff. ). His proof of the incorporeality of God is, as we have seen (_ibid. _), weak, just because he does not admit theeternity of motion, which alone implies infinity of power in God andhence incorporeality. Maimonides is the first who takes deliberateaccount of the Mutakallimun, gives an adequate outline of the essentialsof their teaching and administers a crushing blow to their principles aswell as their method. He then follows up his destructive criticism witha constructive method, in which he frankly admits that in order toestablish the existence, unity and incorporeality of God--the threefundamental dogmas of Judaism--beyond the possibility of cavil, we mustmake common cause with the philosophers even though it be only for amoment, until they have done our work for us, and then we may fairlyturn on our benefactors and taking advantage of their weakness, strikethem down, and upon their lifeless arguments for the eternity of theworld establish our own more plausible theory of creation. The attitudeof Maimonides is in brief this. If we were certain of creation, weshould not have to bother with the philosophers. Creation implies theexistence of God. But the question cannot be strictly demonstratedeither way. Hence let us prove the existence of God on the leastpromising hypothesis, namely, that of eternity, and we are quite secureagainst all possible criticism. 

Of the twelve propositions of the Mutakallimun enumerated by Maimonidesas the basis of their doctrine of God, we shall select a few of the mostimportant. [264]

1. _The Theory of Atoms. _ The entire universe is made up of indivisiblebodies having no magnitude. Their combination produces magnitude andcorporeality. They are all alike. Genesis and dissolution means simplythe combination or rather aggregation of atoms and their separation. These atoms are not eternal, as Epicurus believed them to be, butcreated. 

2. This atomic theory they extend from magnitude to time. Time alsoaccording to them is composed of moments or atomic units of time. Neither magnitude, nor matter, nor time is continuous or infinitelydivisible. 

3. Applying these ideas to motion they say that motion is the passage ofan atom of matter from one atom of place to the next in an atom of time. It follows from this that one motion is as fast as another; and theyexplain the apparent variation in speed of different motions, as forexample when two bodies cover unequal distances in the same time, bysaying that the body covering the smaller distance had more rests in theintervals between the motions. The same thing is true in the flight ofan arrow, that there are rests even though the senses do not revealthem. For the senses cannot be trusted. We must follow the reason. 

Maimonides's criticism of the atomic theory of matter and motion justdescribed is that it undermines the bases of geometry. The diagonal of asquare would be the same length as its side. The properties ofcommensurability and incommensurability in lines and surfaces, ofrational and irrational lines would cease to have any meaning. In factall that is contained in the tenth book of Euclid would lose itsfoundation. 

4. The atom is made complete by the accidents, without which it cannotbe. Every atom created by God, they say, must have accidents, such ascolor, odor, motion, and so on, except quantity or magnitude, whichaccording to them is not accident. If a substance has an accident, thelatter is not attributed to the body as a whole, but is ascribed toevery atom of which the body is composed. Thus in a white body everyatom is white, in a moving body every atom is in motion, in a livingbody every atom is alive, and every atom is possessed of senseperception; for life and sense and reason and wisdom are accidents intheir opinion like whiteness and blackness. 

6. Accident does not last more than one moment of time. When God createsan atom he creates at the same time an accident with it. Atom withoutaccident is impossible. The accident disappears at the end of the momentunless God creates another of the same kind, and then another, and soon, as long as he wants the accident of that kind to continue. If heceases to create another accident, the substance too disappears. 

Their motive in laying down this theory of accidents is in order todestroy the conception that everything has a peculiar nature, of whichits qualities and functions are the results. They attribute everythingdirectly to God. God created a particular accident at this moment, andthis is the explanation of its being. If God ceases to create it anewthe next moment, it will cease to be. 

7. All that is not atom is accident, and there is no difference betweenone kind of accident and another in reference to essentiality. Allbodies are composed of similar atoms, which differ only in accidents;and animality and humanity and sensation and reason are all accidents. Hence the difference between the individuals of the same species is thesame as that between individuals of different species. The philosophersdistinguish between essential forms of things and accidental properties. In this way they would explain, for example, why iron is hard and black, while butter is soft and white. The Mutakallimun deny any suchdistinction. All forms are accidents. Hence it would follow that thereis no intrinsic reason why man rather than the bat should be a rationalcreature. Everything that is conceivable is possible, except whatinvolves a logical contradiction; and God alone determines at everyinstant what accident shall combine with a given atom or group of atoms. 

8. It follows from the above also that man has no power of agency atall. When we think we are dyeing a garment red, it is not we who aredoing it at all. God creates the red color in the garment at the timewhen we apply the red dye to it. The red dye does not enter the garment, as we think, for an accident is only momentary, and cannot pass beyondthe substance in which it is. 

What appears to us as the constancy and regularity of nature is nothingmore than the will of God. Nor is our knowledge of to-day the same asthat of yesterday. Yesterday's is gone and to-day's is created anew. Sowhen a man moves a pen, it is not he who moves it. God creates motion inthe hand, and at the same time in the pen. The hand is not the cause ofthe motion of the pen. In short they deny causation. God is the solecause. 

In respect to human conduct they are divided. The majority, and theAshariya among them, say that when a person moves a pen, God createsfour accidents, no one of which is the cause of the other. They merelyexist in succession, but no more. The first accident is the man's willto move the pen; the second, his ability to move it; the third, themotion of the hand; the fourth, the motion of the pen. It follows fromthis that when a person does anything, God creates in him a will, theability and the act itself, but the act is not the effect of theability. The Muʿtazila hold that the ability is the cause of the effect. 

9. _Impossibility of the Infinite. _ They hold that the infinite isimpossible in any sense, whether actual or potential or accidental. Thatan actual infinite is impossible is a matter of proof. So it can be andhas been proved that the potential infinite is possible. For exampleextension is infinitely divisible, _i. E. _, potentially. As to theaccidental infinite, _i. E. _, an infinity of parts of which each ceasesto be as soon as the next appears, this is doubtful. Those who boast ofhaving proved the eternity of the world say that time is infinite, anddefend their view against criticism by the claim that the successiveparts of time disappear. In the same way these people regard it aspossible that an infinite number of accidents have succeeded each otheron the universal matter, because here too they are not all present now, the previous having disappeared before the succeeding ones came. TheMutakallimun do not admit of any kind of infinite. They prove it in thisway. If past time and the world are infinite, then the number of men whodied up to a given point in the past is infinite. The number of men whodied up to a point one thousand years before the former is alsoinfinite. But this number is less than the other by the number of menwho died during the thousand years between the two starting points. Hence the infinite is larger than the infinite, which is absurd. If theaccidental infinite were really impossible the theory of the eternity ofthe world would be refuted at once. But Alfarabi has shown that thearguments against accidental infinity are invalid. 

10. _Distrust of the Senses. _ The senses, they say, cannot be regardedas criteria of truth and falsehood; for many things the senses cannotsee at all, either because the objects are so fine, or because they arefar away. In other cases the senses are deceptive, as when the largeappears small at a distance, the small appears great in the water, andthe straight appears broken when partly in water and partly without. Soa man with the jaundice sees everything yellow, and one with red bile onhis tongue tastes everything bitter. There is method in their madness. The motive for this sceptical principle is to evade criticism. If thesenses testify in opposition to their theories, they reply that thesenses cannot be trusted, as they did in their explanation of motion andin their theory of the succession of created accidents. These are allancient theories of the Sophists, as is clear from Galen. [265]

Having given an outline of the fundamental principles of theMutakallimun and criticised them, Maimonides next gives their argumentsbased upon these principles in favor of creation in time and againsteternity. It will not be worth our while to reproduce them here as theyare not adopted by Maimonides, and we have already met some of themthough in a somewhat modified form before (_cf. _ above, pp. 29 ff. ). [266]

The Kalamistic proofs for the unity of God are similarly identical forthe most part with those found in Saadia, Bahya and others, and we needonly mention Maimonides's criticism that they are inadequate unless weassume with the Mutakallimun that all atoms in the universe are of thesame kind. If, however, we adopt Aristotle's theory, which is moreplausible, that the matter of the heavenly bodies is different from thatof the sublunar world, we may defend dualism by supposing that one Godcontrols the heavens and the other the earth. The inability of the oneto govern the domain of the other would not necessarily argueimperfection, any more than we who believe in the unity of God regard itas a defect in God that he cannot make a thing both be and not be. Thisbelongs to the category of the impossible; and we should likewise classin the same category the control of a sphere that is independent of oneand belongs to another. This is purely an _argumentum ad hominem_, forMaimonides does not regard the sublunar and superlunar worlds asindependent of each other. He recognizes the unity of the universe. [267]

Maimonides closes his discussion of the Kalamistic system by citingtheir arguments for incorporeality, which he likewise finds inadequate, both because they are based upon God's unity, which they did not succeedin proving (Saadia, in so far as he relates the two, bases unity uponincorporeality), and because of inherent weakness. [268]

Having disposed of the arguments of the Mutakallimun, Maimonidesproceeds to prove the existence, unity and incorporeality of God by themethods of the philosophers, _i. E. _, those who, like Alfarabi andAvicenna, take their arguments from Aristotle. The chief proof[269] isbased upon the Aristotelian principles of motion and is found in theeighth book of Aristotle's Physics. We have already met this proof inIbn Daud (_cf. _ above, p. 217), and the method in Maimonides differsonly in form and completeness, but not in essence. There is, however, this very important difference that Ibn Daud fights shy of Aristotle'stheory of the eternity of motion and time, thus losing his strongestargument for God's infinite power and incorporeality (_cf. _ p. 218);whereas Maimonides frankly bases his entire argument from motion(provisionally to be sure) upon the Aristotelian theory, includingeternity of motion. With this important deviation there is not much inthis part of the Maimonidean discussion which is not already contained, though less completely, in the "Emunah Ramah" of Abraham Ibn Daud. Weshould be tempted to omit these technical arguments entirely if it werenot for the fact that it is in the form which Maimonides gave them thatthey became classic in Jewish philosophy, and not in that of Ibn Daud. 

The second proof of God's existence, unity and incorporeality, thatbased upon the distinction between "possible" and "necessary"existent, [270] which has its origin in Alfarabi and Avicenna, is alsofound in Ibn Daud. [271] The other two proofs[272] are Maimonides's own, _i. E. _, they are not found in the works of his Jewish predecessors. 

As in the exposition of the theory of the Mutakallimun Maimonides beganwith their fundamental principles, so here he lays down twenty-sixpropositions culled from the Physics and Metaphysics of Aristotle andhis Arabian commentators, and applies them later to prove his points. Hedoes not attempt to demonstrate them, expecting the reader to take themfor granted, or to be familiar with them from a study of thephilosophical sources. Ibn Daud presupposed less from his readers, having written as he said, for beginners; hence he proves many of thepropositions which Maimonides lays down dogmatically. PossiblyMaimonides expected his readers to be familiar with the work of hisimmediate Jewish predecessor. 

The twenty-six propositions of the philosophers are as follows:

1. There can be no infinite object possessing magnitude. 

2. There cannot be an infinite number of bodies possessing magnitude, all at the same time. 

3. There cannot be an infinite chain of cause and effect, even if theselinks are not possessed of magnitude, for example, intellects. 

4. Change is found in four categories. In substance--genesis and decay. In quantity--growth and diminution. In quality--qualitative change. Inplace--motion of translation. 

5. All motion is change, and is the realization of the potential. 

6. Motion may be _per se_, _per accidens_, forcible, partial, the lattercoming under _per accidens_. An example of motion _per se_ is the motionof a body from one place to the next; of motion _per accidens_, when theblackness of an object is said to move from one place to another. Forcible motion is that of the stone when it is forced upward. Partialmotion is that of a nail of a ship when the ship moves. 

7. Every changeable thing is divisible; hence every movable thing isdivisible, _i. E. _, every body is divisible. What is not divisible isnot movable, and hence cannot be body. 

8. That which is moved _per accidens_ is necessarily at rest because itsmotion is not in itself. Hence it cannot have that accidental motionforever. 

9. A body moving another must itself be in motion at the same time. 

10. Being in a body means one of two things: being in it as an accident, or as constituting the essence of the body, like a natural form. Bothare corporeal powers. 

11. Some things which are in a body are divided with the division of thebody. They are then divided _per accidens_, like colors and other powersextending throughout the body. Some of the things which constitute thebody are not divisible at all, like soul and intellect. 

12. Every power which extends throughout a body is finite, because allbody is finite. 

13. None of the kinds of change mentioned in 4 is continuous exceptmotion of translation; and of this only circular motion. 

14. Motion of translation is the first by nature of the motions. Forgenesis and decay presuppose qualitative change; and qualitative changepresupposes the approach of the agent causing the change to the thingundergoing the change. And there is no growth or diminution withoutantecedent genesis and decay. 

15. Time is an accident following motion and connected with it. The onecannot exist without the other. No motion except in time, and timecannot be conceived except with motion. Whatever has no motion does notcome under time. 

16. Whatever is incorporeal cannot be subject to number, unless it is acorporeal power; in which case the individual powers are numbered withtheir matters or bearers. Hence the separate forms or Intelligences, which are neither bodies nor corporeal powers, cannot have theconception of number connected with them, except when they are relatedto one another as cause and effect. 

17. Everything that moves, necessarily has a mover, either outside, likethe hand moving the stone, or inside like the animal body, whichconsists of a mover, the soul, and a moved, the body proper. Every_mobile_ of the last kind is called a self-moving thing. This means thatthe motor element in the thing is part of the whole thing in motion. 

18. If anything passes from potentiality to actuality, the agent thatcaused this must be outside the thing. For if it were inside and therewas no obstruction, the thing would never be potential, but alwaysactual; and if there was an obstruction, which was removed, the agencywhich removed the obstruction is the cause which caused the thing topass from potentiality to actuality. 

19. Whatever has a cause for its existence is a "possible" existent inso far as itself is concerned. If the cause is there, the thing exists;if not, it does not. Possible here means not necessary. 

20. Whatever is a necessary existent in itself, has no cause for itsexistence. 

21. Every composite has the cause of its existence in the composition. Hence it is not in itself a necessary existent; for its existence isdependent upon the existence of its constituent parts and upon theircomposition. 

22. All body is composed necessarily of two things, matter and form; andit necessarily has accidents, _viz. _, quantity, figure, situation. 

23. Whatever is potential and has in it a possibility may at some timenot exist as an actuality. 

24. Whatever is potential is necessarily possessed of matter, forpossibility is always in matter. 

25. The principles of an individual compound substance are matter andform; and there must be an agent, _i. E. _, a mover which moves theobject or the underlying matter until it prepares it to receive theform. This need not be the ultimate mover, but a proximate one having aparticular function. The idea of Aristotle is that matter cannot moveitself. This is the great principle which leads us to investigate intothe existence of the first mover. 

Of these twenty-five propositions, Maimonides continues, some are clearafter a little reflection, some again require many premises and proofs, but they are all proved in the Physics and Metaphysics of Aristotle andhis commentators. My purpose here is, as I said, not to reproduce thewritings of the philosophers. I will simply mention those principleswhich we must have for our purpose. I must add, however, one moreproposition, which Aristotle thinks is true and more deserving of beliefthan anything else. We will grant him this by way of hypothesis until weexplain what we intend to prove. The proposition is:

26. Time and motion are eternal and actual. Hence there must be a bodymoving eternally and existing actually. This is the matter constitutingthe substance of the heavenly bodies. Hence the heavens are not subjectto genesis and decay, for their motion is eternal. This presupposes thepossibility of accidental infinity (_cf. _ above, p. 251). Aristotleregards this as true, though it does not seem to me that he claims hehas proved it. His followers and commentators maintain that it is anecessary proposition and demonstrated. The Mutakallimun, on the otherhand, think it is impossible that there should be an infinite number ofstates in succession (_cf. _ _ibid. _). It seems to me it is neithernecessary nor impossible, but possible. This is, however, not the placeto discuss it. [273]

Now follows the classical proof of the existence of God from motion. Itis in essence the same as that given by Ibn Daud, but much moreelaborate. We shall try to simplify it as much as possible. The numbersin parentheses in the sequel refer to the preliminary propositions abovegiven. 

We start with something that is known, namely, the motion we see in thesublunar world, the motion which is involved in all the processes ofgenesis and decay and change generally. This motion must have a mover(25). This mover must have another mover to move it, and this would leadus to infinity, which is impossible (3). We find, however, that allmotion here below ends with the motion of the heaven. Let us take anexample. The wind is blowing through an opening in the wall. I take astone and stop up the hole. Here the stone is moved by the hand, thehand by the tendons, the tendons by the nerves, the nerves by the veins, the veins by the natural heat, the natural heat by the animal soul, theanimal soul by a purpose, namely, to stop the hole from which the windcomes, the purpose by the wind, the wind by the motion of the heavenlysphere. But this is not the end. The sphere must also have a mover (17). This mover is either outside the sphere it moves or within it. If it issomething outside, it is either again a body like the sphere, or anincorporeal thing, a "Separate Intelligence. " If the mover of the sphereis something within the sphere, two alternatives are again possible. Theinternal moving power of the sphere may be a corporeal force extendedthroughout the body of the sphere and divisible with it like heat, or anindivisible power like soul or intellect (10, 11). We thus have fourpossibilities in all. The mover of the heavenly sphere may be (a) a bodyexternal to the sphere; (b) a separate incorporeal substance; (c) aninternal corporeal power divisible with the division of the sphere; (d)an internal indivisible power. Of these four, (a) is impossible. For ifthe mover of the sphere is another body, it is likewise in motion (9)and must have another to move it, which, if a body, must have another, and so on _ad infinitum_, which is impossible (2). The third hypothesis, (c), is likewise impossible. For as the sphere is a body it is finite(1), and its power is also finite (12), since it is divisible with thebody of the sphere (11). Hence it cannot move infinitely (26). Nor canwe adopt the last alternative, (d). For a soul residing within thesphere could not alone be the cause of continuous motion. For a soulthat moves its body is itself in motion _per accidens_ (6); and whatevermoves _per accidens_ must necessarily sometime stop (8), and with it thething set in motion by it will stop also. There is thus only onealternative left, (b), _viz. _, that the cause of the motion of thesphere is a "separate" (_i. E. _, incorporeal) power, which is itself notsubject to motion either _per se_ or _per accidens_; hence it isindivisible and unchangeable (7, 5). This is God. He cannot be two ormore, for "separate" essences which are not body are not subject tonumber unless one is cause and the other effect (16). It follows, too, that he is not subject to time, for there is no time without motion(15). 

We have thus proved with one stroke God's existence as well as his unityand incorporeality. But, it will be observed, if not for thetwenty-sixth proposition concerning the eternity of motion, whichimplies an infinite power, we should not have been forced to thealternative (b), and could have adopted (c) as well as (d). That is, wemight have concluded that God is the soul of the heavenly sphereresident within it, or even that he is a corporeal force pervading theextension of the sphere as heat pervades an ordinary body. But we mustadmit that in this way we prove only the existence of a God who is thecause of the heavenly motions, and through these of the processes ofgenesis and decay, hence of all the life of our sublunar world. This isnot the God of Jewish tradition, who creates out of nothing, who is thecause of the being of the universe as well as of its life processes. Maimonides was aware of this defect in the Aristotelian view, and helater repudiates the Stagirite's theory of eternal motion onphilosophical as well as religious grounds. Before, however, we speak ofMaimonides's attitude in this matter, we must for completeness' sakebriefly mention three other proofs for the existence of God as given byMaimonides. They are not strictly Aristotelian, though they are basedupon Peripatetic principles cited above and due to the Arabiancommentators of Aristotle. 

The second proof is as follows. If we find a thing composed of twoelements, and one of these elements is also found separately, it followsthat the other element is found separately also. Now we frequently findthe two elements of _causing motion_ and _being moved_ combined in thesame object. And we also find things which are moved only, but do notcause motion, as for example matter, or the stone in the last proof. Itstands to reason therefore that there is something that causes motionwithout being itself subject to motion. Not being subject to motion, itis indivisible, incorporeal and not subject to time, as above. 

The third proof is based upon the idea of necessary existence. There isno doubt that there are existing things, for example the things weperceive with our senses. Now either all things are incapable of decay, or all are subject to genesis and decay, or some are and some are not. The first is evidently untrue for we see things coming into, and passingout, of being. The second hypothesis is likewise untrue. For if allthings are subject to genesis and decay, there is a possibility that atsome time all things might cease to be and nothing should exist at all. But as the coming and going of individuals in the various species in theworld has been going on from eternity, the possibility just spoken ofmust have been realized--a possibility that is never realized is not apossibility--and nothing existed at all at that moment. But in that casehow could they ever have come into being, since there was nothing tobring them into being? And yet they do exist, as ourselves for exampleand everything else. There is only one alternative left, therefore, andthat is that beside the great majority of things subject to genesis anddecay, there is a being not subject to change, a necessary existent, andultimately one that exists by virtue of its own necessity (19). 

Whatever is necessary _per se_ can have no cause for its existence (20)and can have no multiplicity in itself (21); hence it is neither a bodynor a corporeal power (12). 

We can also prove easily that there cannot be two necessary existents_per se_. For in that case the element of necessary existence would besomething added to the essence of each, and neither would then benecessary _per se_, but _per_ that element of necessary existence whichis common to both. 

The last argument against dualism may also be formulated as follows. Ifthere are two Gods, they must have something in common--that in virtueof which they are Gods--and something in which they differ, which makesthem two and not one. If each of them has in addition to divinity adifferential element, they are both composite, and neither is the firstcause or the necessary existent (19). If one of them only has thisdifferentia, then this one is composite and is not the first cause. 

The fourth proof is very much like the first, but is based upon theideas of potentiality and actuality instead of motion. But when weconsider that Aristotle defines motion in terms of potentiality andactuality, the fourth proof is identical with the first. It reads inMaimonides as follows: We see constantly things existing potentially andcoming into actuality. Every such thing must have an agent outside (18). It is clear, too, that this agent was first an agent potentially andthen became one actually. This potentiality was due either to anobstacle in the agent himself or to the absence of a certain relationbetween the agent and its effect. In order that the potential agent maybecome an actual agent, there is need of another agent to remove theobstacle or to bring about the needed relation between the agent and thething to be acted upon. This agent requires another agent, and so itgoes _ad infinitum_. As this is impossible, we must stop somewhere withan agent that is always actual and in one condition. This agent cannotbe material, but must be a "separate" (24). But the _separate_ in whichthere is no kind of potentiality and which exists _per se_, is God. Aswe have already proved him incorporeal, he is one (16). [274]

We must now analyze the expressions _incorporeal_ and _one_, and seewhat in strictness they imply, and how our logical deductions agree withScripture. Many persons, misled by the metaphorical expressions in theBible, think of God as having a body with organs and senses on theanalogy of ours. Others are not so crude as to think of God inanthropomorphic terms, nor are they polytheists, and yet for the samereason, namely, misunderstanding of Scriptural expressions, ascribe aplurality of essential attributes to God. We must therefore insist onthe absolute incorporeality of God and explain the purpose of Scripturein expressing itself in anthropomorphic terms, and on the other handemphasize the absolute unity of God against the believers in essentialattributes. 

Belief in God as body or as liable to suffer affection is worse thanidolatry. For the idolater does not deny the existence of God; he merelymakes the mistake of supposing that the image of his own constructionresembles a being which mediates between him and God. And yet becausethis leads to erroneous belief on the part of the people, who areinclined to worship the image itself instead of God (for the peoplecannot discriminate between the outward act and its idea), the Biblepunishes idolatry with death, and calls the idolater a man who angersGod. How much more serious is the error of him who thinks God is body!He entertains an error regarding the nature of God directly, and surelycauses the anger of God to burn. Habit and custom and the evidence ofthe literal understanding of the Biblical text are no more an excuse forthis erroneous belief than they are for idolatry; for the idolater, too, has been brought up in his wrong ideas and is confirmed in them by somefalse notions. If a man is not himself able to reason out the truth, there is no excuse for his refusing to listen to one who has reasoned itout. A person is not an unbeliever for not being able to _prove_ theincorporeality of God. He _is_ an unbeliever if he thinks God iscorporeal. [275]

The expressions in the Bible which have led many to err so grievously intheir conceptions of God are due to a desire on the part of theirauthors to show all people, the masses including women and children, that God exists and is possessed of all perfection, that he is existent, living, wise, powerful, and active. Hence it was necessary to speak ofhim as body, for this is the only thing that suggests real existence tothe masses. It was necessary to endow him with motion, as this alonedenotes life; to ascribe to him seeing, hearing, and so on, in order toindicate that he understands; to represent him as speaking, in order toshow that he communicates with prophets, because to the minds of commonpeople this is the only way in which ideas are communicated from oneperson to another. As we are active by our sense of touch, God, too, isdescribed as doing. He is given a soul, to denote that he is alive. Thenas all these activities are among us done by means of organs, these alsoare ascribed to God, as feet, hands, ear, eye, nose, mouth, tongue, voice, fingers, palm, arm. In other words, to show that God has allperfections, certain senses are ascribed to him; and to indicate thesesenses the respective organs are related to them, organs of motion todenote life, of sensation to denote understanding, of touch to denoteactivity, of speech to denote revelation. As a matter of fact, however, since all these organs and perceptions and powers in man and animals aredue to imperfection and are for the purpose of satisfying various wantsfor the preservation of the individual or the species, and God has nowants of any kind, he has no such powers or organs. [276]

Having disposed of crude anthropomorphism we must now take up theproblem of attributes, which endangers the unity. It is a self-evidenttruth that an attribute is something different from the essence of athing. It is an accident added to the essence. Otherwise it is the thingover again, or it is the definition of the thing and the explanation ofthe name, and signifies that the thing is composed of these elements. Ifwe say God has many attributes, it will follow that there are manyeternals. The only belief in true unity is to think that God is onesimple substance without composition or multiplicity of elements, butone in all respects and aspects. Some go so far as to say that thedivine attributes are neither God's essence nor anything outside of hisessence. This is absurd. It is saying words which have nothingcorresponding to them in fact. A thing is either the same as another, orit is not the same. There is no other alternative. The imagination isresponsible for this error. Because bodies as we know them always haveattributes, they thought that God, too, is made up of many essentialelements or attributes. 

Attributes may be of five kinds:

1. The attributes of a thing may be its definition, which denotes itsessence as determined by its causes. This everyone will admit cannot bein God, for God has no cause, hence cannot be defined. 

2. An attribute may consist of a part of a definition, as when we say, "man is rational, " where the attribute rational is part of thedefinition of man, "rational animal" being the whole definition. Thiscan apply to God no more than the first; for if there is a part in God'sessence, he is composite. 

3. An attribute may be an expression which characterizes not the essenceof the thing but its quality. Quality is one of the nine categories ofaccident, and God has no accidents. 

4. An attribute may indicate relation, such as father, master, son, slave. At first sight it might seem as if this kind of attribute may beapplicable to God; but after reflection we find that it is not. Therecan be no relation of time between God and anything else; because timeis the measure of motion, and motion is an accident of body. God is notcorporeal. In the same way it is clear that there cannot be a relationof place between God and other things. But neither can there be anyother kind of relation between God and his creation. For God is anecessary existent, while everything else is a possible existent. Arelation exists only between things of the same proximate species, asbetween white and black. If the things have only a common genus, andstill more so if they belong to two different genera, there is norelation between them. If there were a relation between God and otherthings, he would have the accident of relation, though relation is theleast serious of attributes, since it does not necessitate amultiplicity of eternals, nor change in God's essence owing to change inthe related things. 

5. An attribute may characterize a thing by reference to its effects orworks, not in the sense that the thing or author of the effect hasacquired a character by reason of the product, like carpenter, painter, blacksmith, but merely in the sense that he is the one who made aparticular thing. An attribute of this kind is far removed from theessence of the thing so characterized by it; and hence we may apply itto God, provided we remember that the varied effects need not beproduced by different elements in the agent, but are all done by the oneessence. 

Those who believe in attributes divide them into two classes, and numberthe following four as _essential_ attributes, not derived from God'seffects like "creator, " which denotes God's relation to his work, sinceGod did not create himself. The four essential attributes about whichall agree are, living, powerful, wise, possessed of will. Now if by wiseis meant God's knowledge of himself, there might be some reason forcalling it an essential attribute; though in that case it implies"living, " and there is no need of two. But they refer the attribute wiseto God's knowledge of the world, and then there is no reason for callingit an essential attribute any more than the word "creator, " for example. In the same way "powerful" and "having will" cannot refer to himself, but to his actions. We therefore hold that just as we do not say thatthere is something additional in his essence by which he created theheavens, something else with which he created the elements, and a thirdwith which he created the Intelligences, so we do not say that he hasone attribute with which he exercises power, another with which hewills, a third with which he knows, and so on, but his essence is simpleand one. [277]

Four things must be removed from God: (1) corporeality, (2) affection, (3) potentiality, (4) resemblance to his creatures. The first we havealready proved. The second implies change, and the author of the changecannot be the same as he who suffers the change and feels the affection. If then God were subject to affection, there would be another who wouldcause the change in him. So all want must be removed from him; for hewho is in want of something is potential, and in order to pass intoactuality requires an agent having that quality _in actu_. The fourth isalso evident; for resemblance involves relation. As there is no relationbetween God and ourselves, there is no resemblance. Resemblance canexist only between things of the same species. All the expressionsincluding "existent" are applied to God and to ourselves in a homonymoussense (_cf. _ above, p. 240). The use is not even analogical; for inanalogy there must be some resemblance between the things having thesame name, but not so here. Existence in things which are determined bycauses (and this includes all that is not God), is not identical withthe essence of those things. The essence is that which is expressed inthe definition, whereas the existence or non-existence of the thing sodefined is not part of the definition. It is an accident added to theessence. In God the case is different. His existence has no cause, sincehe is a necessary existent; hence his existence is identical with hisessence. So we say God exists, but not with existence, as we do. Similarly he is living, but not with life; knowing, but not withknowledge; powerful, but not with power; wise, but not with wisdom. Unity and plurality are also accidents of things which are one or manyas the case may be. They are accidents of the category of quantity. God, who is a necessary existent and simple cannot be one any more than many. He is one, but not with unity. Language is inadequate to express ourideas of God. Wishing to say he is not many, we have to say he is one;though one as well as many pertains to the accidents of quantity. Tocorrect the inexactness of the expression, we add, "but not with unity. "So we say "eternal" to indicate that he is not "new, " though in realityeternal is an accident of time, which in turn is an accident of motion, the latter being dependent upon body. In reality neither "eternal" nor"new" is applicable to God. When we say one, we mean merely that thereis none other like him; and when Scripture speaks of him as the firstand the last, the meaning is that he does not change. 

The only true attributes of God are the negative ones. Negativeattributes, too, by excluding the part of the field in which the thingto be designated is not contained, bring us nearer to the thing itself;though unlike positive attributes they do not designate any part of thething itself. God cannot have positive attributes because he has noessence different from his existence for the attributes to designate, and surely no accidents. Negative attributes are of value in leading usto a knowledge of God, because in negation no plurality is involved. Sowhen we have proved that there is a being beside these sensible andintelligible things, and we say he is existent, we mean that hisnon-existence is unthinkable. In the same way living means not dead;incorporeal is negative; eternal signifies not caused; powerful meansnot weak; wise--not ignorant; willing denotes that creation proceedsfrom him not by natural necessity like heat from fire or light from thesun, but with purpose and design and method. All attributes thereforeare either derived from God's effects or, if they have reference tohimself, are meant to exclude their opposites, _i. E. _, are reallynegatives. This does not mean, however, that God is devoid of a qualitywhich he might have, but in the sense in which we say a stone does notsee, meaning that it does not pertain to the nature of the stone tosee. [278]

All the names of God except the tetragrammaton designate his activitiesin the world. Jhvh alone is the real name of God, which belongs to himalone and is not derived from anything else. Its meaning is unknown. Itdenotes perhaps the idea of necessary existence. All the other so-calleddivine names used by the writers of talismans and charms are quitemeaningless and absurd. The wonderful claims these people bespeak forthem are not to be believed by any intelligent man. [279]

The above account of Maimonides's doctrine of attributes shows us thathe followed the same line of thought as his predecessors. His treatmentis more thorough and elaborate, and his requirements of the religionistmore stringent. He does not even allow attributes of relation, whichwere admitted by Ibn Daud. Negative attributes and those taken fromGod's effects are the only expressions that may be applied to God. Thisis decidedly not a Jewish mode of conceiving of God, but it is not evenAristotelian. Aristotle has very little to say about God's attributes, it is true, but there seems no warrant in the little he does say forsuch an absolutely transcendental and agnostic conception as we find inMaimonides. To Aristotle God is pure form, thought thinking itself. Inso far as he is thought we may suppose him to be similar in kind, thoughnot in degree, to human thought. The only source of Maimonides's ideasis to be sought in Neo-Platonism, in the so-called Theology of Aristotlewhich, however, Maimonides never quotes. He need not have used ithimself. He was a descendant of a long line of thinkers, Christian, Mohammedan and Jewish, in which this problem was looked at from aNeo-Platonic point of view; and the Theology of Aristotle had its sharein forming the views of his predecessors. The idea of making Godtranscendent appealed to Maimonides, and he carried it to the limit. Howhe could combine such transcendence with Jewish prayer and ceremony itis hard to tell; but it would be a mistake to suppose that hisphilosophical deductions represented his last word on the subject. As inPhilo so in Maimonides, his negative theology was only a means to apositive. Its purpose was to emphasize God's perfection. And in theadmission, nay maintenance, of man's inability to understand God liesthe solution of the problem we raised above. Prayer _is_ answered, man_is_ protected by divine Providence; and if we cannot understand how, itis because the matter is beyond our limited intellect. 

Having discussed the existence and nature of God, our next problem isthe existence of angels and their relation to the "SeparateIntelligences" of the philosophers. In this matter, too, Ibn Daudanticipated Maimonides, though the latter is more elaborate in hisexposition as well as criticism of the extreme philosophic view. Headopts as much of Aristotelian (or what he thought was Aristotelian)doctrine as is compatible in his mind with the Bible and subject torigorous demonstration, and rejects the rest on philosophic as well asreligious grounds. 

The existence of separate intelligences he proves in the same way as IbnDaud from the motions of the celestial spheres. These motions cannot bepurely "natural, " _i. E. _, unconscious and involuntary like therectilinear motions of the elements, fire, air, water and earth, becausein that case they would stop as soon as they came to their naturalplace, as is true of the elements (_cf. _ above, p. Xxxiii); whereas thespheres actually move in a circle and never stop. We must thereforeassume that they are endowed with a soul, and their motions areconscious and voluntary. But it is not sufficient to regard them asirrational creatures, for on this hypothesis also their motions wouldhave to cease as soon as they attained the object of their desire, orescaped the thing they wish to avoid. Neither object can be accomplishedby circular motion, for one approaches in this way the thing from whichone flees, and flees the object which one approaches. The only way toaccount for continuous circular motion is by supposing that the sphereis endowed with reason or intellect, and that its motion is due to adesire on its part to attain a certain conception. God is the object ofthe conception of the sphere, and it is the love of God, to whom thesphere desires to become similar, that is the cause of the sphere'smotion. So far as the sphere is a body, it can accomplish this only bycircular motion; for this is the only continuous act possible for abody, and it is the simplest of bodily motions. 

Seeing, however, that there are many spheres having different kinds ofmotions, varying in speed and direction, Aristotle thought that thisdifference must be due to the difference in the objects of theirconceptions. Hence he posited as many separate Intelligences as thereare spheres. That is, he thought that intermediate between God and therational spheres there are pure incorporeal intelligences, each onemoving its own sphere as a loved object moves the thing that loves it. As the number of spheres were in his day thought to be fifty, he assumedthere were fifty separate Intelligences. The mathematical sciences inAristotle's day were imperfect, and the astronomers thought that forevery motion visible in the sky there must be a sphere, not knowing thatthe inclination of one sphere may be the cause of a number of apparentmotions. Later writers making use of the more advanced state ofastronomical science, reduced the number of Intelligences to ten, corresponding to the ten spheres as follows: the seven planetaryspheres, the sphere of the fixed stars, the diurnal sphere embracingthem all and giving all of them the motion from east to west, and thesphere of the elements surrounding the earth. Each one of these is incharge of an Intelligence. The last separate Intelligence is the ActiveIntellect, which is the cause of our mind's passing from potentiality toactuality, and of the various processes of sublunar life generally. 

These are the views of Aristotle and his followers concerning theseparate Intelligences. And in a general way his views, says Maimonides, are not incompatible with the Bible. What he calls Intelligences theScriptures call angels. Both are pure forms and incorporeal. Theirrationality is indicated in the nineteenth Psalm, "The heavens declarethe glory of God. " That God rules the world through them is evident froma number of passages in Bible and Talmud. The plural number in "Let _us_make man in our image" (Gen. 1, 26), "Come, let _us_ go down and confusetheir speech" (_ib. _ 11, 7) is explained by the Rabbis in the statementthat "God never does anything without first looking at the celestial'familia. '" (Bab. Talm. Sanhedrin 38b. ) The word "looking" ("Mistakkel")is striking;[280] for it is the very expression Plato uses when he saysthat God looks into the world of Ideas and produces the universe. [281]

For once Maimonides in the last Rabbinic quotation actually hit upon apassage which owes its content to Alexandrian and possibly Philonianinfluence. Having no idea of the Alexandrian School and of the works ofPhilo and his relation to some theosophic passages in the Haggadah, hemade no distinction between Midrash and Bible, and read Plato andAristotle in both alike, as we shall see more particularly later. 

Maimonides's detailed criticism of Aristotle we shall see later. For thepresent he agrees that the philosophic conception of separateIntelligences is the same as the Biblical idea of angels with thisexception that according to Aristotle these Intelligences and powers areall eternal and proceed from God by natural necessity, whereas theJewish view is that they are created. God created the separateIntelligences; he likewise created the spheres as rational beings andimplanted in them a desire for the Intelligences which accounts fortheir various motions. 

Now Maimonides has prepared the ground and is ready to take up thequestion of the origin of the world, which was left open above. Heenumerates three views concerning this important matter. 

1. _The Biblical View. _ God created everything out of nothing. Timeitself is a creation, which did not exist when there was no world. Fortime is a measure of motion, and motion cannot be without a movingthing. Hence no motion and no time without a world. 

2. _The Platonic View. _ The world as we see it now is subject to genesisand decay; hence it originated in time. But God did not make it out ofnothing. That a composite of matter and form should be made out ofnothing or should be reduced to nothing is to the Platonists animpossibility like that of a thing being and not being at the same time, or the diagonal of a square being equal to its side. Therefore to saythat God cannot do it argues no defect in him. They believe thereforethat there is an eternal matter, the effect of God to be sure, butco-eternal with him, which he uses as the potter does the clay. 

3. _The Aristotelian View. _ Time and motion are eternal. The heavens andthe spheres are not subject to genesis and decay, hence they were alwaysas they are now. And the processes of change in the lower world existedfrom eternity as they exist now. Matter is not subject to genesis anddecay; it simply takes on forms one after the other, and this has beengoing on from eternity. It results also from his statements, though hedoes not say it in so many words, that it is impossible there should bea change in God's will. He is the cause of the universe, which hebrought into being by his will, and as his will does not change, theuniverse has existed this way from eternity. 

The arguments of Aristotle and his followers by which they defend theirview of the eternity of the world are based partly upon the nature ofthe world, and partly upon the nature of God. Some of these argumentsare as follows:

Motion is not subject to beginning and end. For everything that comesinto being after a state of non-existence requires motion to precede it, namely, the actualization from non-being. Hence if motion came intobeing, there was motion before motion, which is a contradiction. Asmotion and time go together, time also is eternal. 

Again, the prime matter common to the four elements is not subject togenesis and decay. For all genesis is the combination of a pre-existingmatter with a new form, namely, the form of the generated thing. Iftherefore the prime matter itself came into being, there must be aprevious matter from which it came, and the thing that resulted must beendowed with form. But this is impossible, since the prime matter has nomatter before it and is not endowed with form. 

Among the proofs derived from the nature of God are the following:

If God brought forth the world from non-existence, then before hecreated it he was a creator potentially and then became a creatoractually. There is then potentiality in the creator, and there must be acause which changed him from a potential to an actual creator. 

Again, an agent acts at a particular time and not at another because ofreasons and circumstances preventing or inducing action. In God thereare no accidents or hindrances. Hence he acts always. 

Again, how is it possible that God was idle an eternity and onlyyesterday made the world? For thousands of years and thousands of worldsbefore this one are after all as yesterday in comparison with God'seternity. 

These arguments Maimonides answers first by maintaining that Aristotlehimself, as can be inferred from his manner, does not regard hisdiscussions favoring the eternity of the world as scientificdemonstrations. Besides, there is a fundamental flaw in Aristotle'sentire attitude to the question of the ultimate principles andbeginnings of things. All his arguments in favor of eternity of motionand of the world are based upon the erroneous assumption that the worldas a whole must have come into being in the same way as its parts appearnow after the world is here. According to this supposition it is easy toprove that motion must be eternal, that matter is not subject togenesis, and so on. Our contention is that at the beginning, when Godcreated the world, there were not these laws; that he created matter_out of nothing_, and then made it the basis of all generation anddestruction. 

We can also answer the arguments in favor of eternity taken from thenature of God. The first is that God would be passing from potentialityto actuality if he made the world at a particular time and not before, and there would be need of a cause producing this passage. Our answeris that this applies only to material things but not to immaterial, which are always active whether they produce visible results or not. Theterm action is a homonym (_cf. _ above, p. 240), and the conditionsapplying to it in the ordinary usage do not hold when we speak of God. 

Nor is the second argument conclusive. An agent whose will is determinedby a purpose external to himself is subject to influences positive andnegative, which now induce, now hinder his activity. A person desires tohave a house and does not build it by reason of obstacles of varioussorts. When these are removed, he builds the house. In the case of anagent whose will has no object external to itself this does not hold. Ifhe does not act always, it is because it is the nature of will sometimesto will and sometimes not. Hence this does not argue change. [282]

So far our results have been negative. We have not proved that God didcreate the world in time; we have only taken the edge off theAristotelian arguments and thereby shown that the doctrine of creationis not impossible. We must now proceed to show that there are positivereasons which make creation a more plausible theory than eternity. 

The gist of Maimonides's arguments here is that the difference betweeneternity and creation resolves itself into a more fundamental differencebetween an impersonal mechanical law as the explanation of the universeand an intelligent personality acting with will, purpose and design. Aristotle endeavors to explain all motions in the world above the moonas well as below in terms of mechanics. He succeeds pretty well as faras the sublunar world is concerned, and no one who is free fromprejudice can fail to see the cogency of his reasoning. If he were justas convincing in his explanation of celestial phenomena on themechanical principle as he is in his interpretation of sublunar events, eternity of the world would be a necessary consequence. Uniformity andabsolute necessity of natural law are more compatible with an eternalworld than with a created one. But Aristotle's method breaks down themoment he leaves the sublunar sphere. There are too many phenomenaunaccounted for in his system. 

Aristotle tries to find a reason why the heavens move from east to westand not in the opposite direction; and his explanation for thedifference in speed of the motions of the various spheres is that it isdue to their relative proximity to the outer sphere, which is the causeof this motion and which it communicates to all the other spheres underit. But his reasons are inadequate, for some of the swift moving spheresare below the slow moving and some are above. When he says that thereason the sphere of the fixed stars moves so slowly from west to eastis because it is so near to the diurnal sphere (the outer sphere), whichmoves from east to west, his explanation is wonderfully clever. [283] Butwhen he infers from this that the farther a sphere is from the fixedstars the more rapid is its motion from west to east, his conclusion isnot true to fact. Or let us consider the existence of the stars in thespheres. The matter of the stars must be different from that of thespheres, for the latter move, whereas the stars are always stationary. Now what has put these two different matters together? Stranger still isthe existence and distribution of the fixed stars in the eighth sphere. Some parts are thickly studded with stars, others are very thin. In theplanetary spheres what is the reason (since the sphere is simple anduniform throughout) that the star occupies the particular place that itdoes? This can scarcely be a matter of necessity. It will not do to saythat the differences in the motions of the spheres are due to theseparate Intelligences for which the respective spheres have a desire. For the Intelligences are not bodies, and hence do not occupy anyposition relative to the spheres. There must therefore be a being whodetermines their various motions. 

Further, it is argued on the philosophical side that from a simple causeonly a simple effect can follow; and that if the cause is composite, asmany effects will follow as there are simple elements in the cause. Hence from God directly can come only one simple Intelligence. Thisfirst Intelligence produces the second, the second produces the third, and so on (_cf. _ above, p. 178). Now according to this idea, no matterhow many Intelligences are produced in this successive manner, the last, even if he be the thousandth, would have to be simple. Where then doescomposition arise? Even if we grant that the farther the Intelligencesare removed from the first cause the more composite they become byreason of the composite nature of their ideas or thoughts, how can weexplain the emanation of a sphere from an Intelligence, seeing that theone is body, the other Intellect? Granting again this also on the groundthat the Intelligence producing the sphere is composite (since it thinksitself and another), and hence one of its parts produces the next lowerIntelligence and the other the sphere, there is still this difficultythat the part of the Intelligence producing the sphere is simple, whereas the sphere has four elements--the matter and the form of thesphere, and the matter and the form of the star fixed in the sphere. 

All these are difficulties arising from the Aristotelian theory ofmechanical causation, necessity of natural law and eternity of theworld. And they are all removed at a stroke when we substituteintelligent cause working with purpose, will and design. To be sure, byfinding difficulties attaching to a theory we do not disprove it, muchless do we prove our own. But we should follow the view of Alexander, who says that where a theory is not proved one should adopt the viewwhich has the least number of objections. This, we shall show, is thecase in the doctrine of creation. We have already pointed out a numberof difficulties attaching to the Aristotelian view, which are solved ifwe adopt creation. And there are others besides. It is impossible toexplain the heavenly motions as a necessary mechanical system. Thehypotheses made by Ptolemy to account for the apparent motions conflictwith the principles of the Aristotelian Physics. According to theseprinciples there is no motion of translation, _i. E. _, there is nochange of place, in the heavenly spheres. Also there are three kinds ofmotion in the world, toward the centre (water, earth), away from thecentre (air, fire) and around the centre (the celestial spheres). Alsomotion in a circle must be around a fixed centre. All these principlesare violated in the theories of the epicycle and eccentric, especiallythe first. For the epicycle is a sphere which changes place in thecircumference of the large sphere. 

Finally, an important objection to the doctrine of eternity as taught byAristotle, involving as it does necessity and absolute changelessness ofnatural phenomena, is that it subverts the foundations of religion, anddoes away with miracles and signs. The Platonic view (_cf. _ above, p. 269) is not so bad and does not necessitate the denial of miracles; butthere is no need of forcing the Biblical texts to that opinion so longas it has not been proved. As long as we believe in creation allpossible questions concerning the reasons for various phenomena such asprophecy, the various laws, the selection of Israel, and so on, can beanswered by reference to the will of God, which we do not understand. If, however, the world is a mechanical necessity, all these questionsarise and demand an answer. [284]

It will be seen that Maimonides's objections to eternity and mechanicalnecessity (for these two are necessarily connected in his mind), aretwofold, philosophic and religious. The latter objection we may conceiveMaimonides to insist upon if he were living to-day. Mechanical necessityas a universal explanation of phenomena would exclude free will and theefficacy of prayer as ordinarily understood, though not necessarilymiracles, if we mean by miracle simply an extraordinary phenomenon notexplicable by the laws of nature as we know them, and happening only onrare occasions. But in reality this is not what we mean by miracle. Amiracle is a discontinuity in the laws of nature brought to pass on aspecial occasion by a personal being in response to a prayer or in orderto realize a given purpose. In this sense miracles are incompatible withthe doctrine of necessity, and Maimonides's objections hold to-day, except for those to whom religion is independent of the Bible, traditionor any external authority. 

As concerns the scientific objections, the case is different. We mayallow Maimonides's negative criticism of the Aristotelian arguments, namely, that they are not convincing. His positive criticism thatAristotle's interpretation of phenomena on the mechanical principle doesnot explain all the facts is not valid. Aristotle may be wrong in hisactual explanations of particular phenomena and yet be correct in hismethod. Modern science, in fact, has adopted the mechanical method ofinterpreting phenomena, assuming that this is the only way in whichscience can exist at all. And if there is any domain in which mechanicalcausation is still denied, it is not the celestial regions about whichMaimonides was so much concerned--the motions of the heavenly bodieshave been reduced to uniformity in accordance with natural law quite asdefinitely as, and in some cases more definitely than, some terrestrialphenomena--but the regions of life, mind and will. In these domains thediscussion within the scientific and philosophic folds is still goingon. But in inanimate nature modern science has succeeded in justifyingits method by the ever increasing number of phenomena that yield to itstreatment. Maimonides fought an obsolete philosophy and obsoletescientific principles. It is possible that he might have found much toobject to in modern science as well, on the ground that much is yetunexplained. But an objection of this sort is captious, particularly ifwe consider what Maimonides desires to place in science's stead. Scienceis doing its best to classify all natural phenomena and to discover theuniformities underlying their behavior. It has succeeded admirably andis continually widening its sphere of activity. It has been able topredict as a result of its method. The principle of uniformity andmechanical necessity is becoming more and more generally verified withevery new scientific discovery and invention. 

And what does Maimonides offer us in its stead? The principle ofintelligent purpose and design. This, he says, is not open to theobjections which apply to the Aristotelian principles and methods. It isas if one said the coward is a better man than the brave warrior, because the latter is open to the danger of being captured, wounded orkilled, whereas the former is not so liable. The answer obviously wouldbe that the only way the coward escapes the dangers mentioned is byrunning away, by refusing to fight. Maimonides's substitution istantamount to a refusal to fight, it is equivalent to flight from thefield of battle. 

Aristotle tries to explain the variation in speed of the differentcelestial motions, and succeeds indifferently. Another man coming afterAristotle and following the same method may succeed better. This hasactually been the case. Leverrier without ever looking into a telescopediscovered Neptune, and told the observers in what part of the heavensthey should look for the new planet. Substitute Maimonides's principle, and death to science! Why do the heavenly bodies move as they do?Maimonides replies in effect, because so God's wisdom has determined andhis wisdom is transcendent. There is no further impulse to investigationin such an answer. It is the reply of the obscurantist, and it is verysurprising that Maimonides the rationalist should so far have forgottenhis own ideal of reason and enlightenment. He is here playing into thehands of those very Mutakallimun whom he so severely criticises. Theywere more consistent. Distrustful of the irreligious consequences of thephilosophical theories of Aristotle and his Arabian followers, theydeliberately denied causation and natural law, and substituted the willof God as interfering continuously in the phenomena of nature. A redobject continues red because and as long as God creates the "accident"red and attaches it to the atoms of which the object is composed. Firetaking hold of wood burns it and reduces it to ashes because God willsat the particular moment that this shall be the result. The next momentGod may will otherwise and the fire and the wood will lie down in peacetogether and no harm done. This makes miracles possible and easy. Maimonides would not think of going so far; he has no names harsh enoughto describe this unscientific, unphilosophic, illogical, irrational, purely imaginary procedure. But we find that he is himself guilty of thesame lack of scientific insight when he rejects a method because it isnot completely successful, and substitutes something else which willalways be successful because it will never tell us anything at all andwill stifle all investigation. Were Maimonides living in our day, we maysuppose he would be more favorably inclined to the mechanical principleas a scientific method. 

Having laid the philosophical foundations of religion in proving theexistence, unity and incorporeality of God, and purposeful creation intime, Maimonides proceeds to the more properly religious doctrines ofJudaism, and begins with the phenomenon of prophecy. Here also hefollows Aristotelian ideas as expressed in the writings of the ArabsAlfarabi and Avicenna, and was anticipated among the Jews by Ibn Daud. His distinction here as elsewhere is that he went further than his modelin the manner of his elaboration of the doctrine. 

He cites three opinions concerning prophecy:

1. _The Opinion of the Masses. _ God chooses any person he desires, be heyoung or old, wise or ignorant, and inspires him with the propheticspirit. 

2. _The Opinion of the Philosophers. _ Prophecy is a human gift andrequires natural aptitude and hard preparation and study. But giventhese qualifications, and prophecy is sure to come. 

3. _The Opinion of Judaism. _ This is very much like that of thephilosophers, the only difference being that a man may have all thequalifications and yet be prevented from prophesying if God, by way ofpunishment, does not desire that he should. 

Prophecy is an inspiration from God, which passes through the mediationof the Active Intellect to the rational power first and then to thefaculty of the imagination. It is the highest stage a man can attain andis not open to everyone. It requires perfection in theoretical wisdomand in morals, and perfect development of the imaginative power. Thislatter does its work when the senses are at rest, giving rise to truedreams, and producing also prophetic visions. Dream and prophecy differin degree, not in kind. What a man thinks hard in his waking state, thatthe imagination works over in sleep. Now if a person has a perfectbrain; develops his mind as far as a man can; is pure morally; is eagerto know the mysteries of existence, its causes and the First Cause; isnot susceptible to the purely animal desires, or to those of thespirited soul ambitious for dominion and honor--if a man has all thesequalifications, he without doubt receives through his imagination fromthe Active Intellect divine ideas. The difference in the grade ofprophets is due to the difference in these three requirements--perfectionof the reason, perfection of the imagination and perfection of moralcharacter. 

According to the character and development of their reasons andimaginations men may be divided into three classes. 

1. Those whose rational faculties are highly developed and receiveinfluences from the Active Intellect, but whose imagination is defectiveconstitutionally, or is not under the influence of the Active Intellect. These are wise men and philosophers. 

2. When the imagination also is perfect in constitution and welldeveloped under the influence of the Active Intellect, we have the classof prophets. 

3. When the imagination alone is in good condition, but the intellect isdefective, we have statesmen, lawgivers, magicians, dreamers of truedreams and occult artists. These men are so confused sometimes byvisions and reveries that they think they have the gift of prophecy. 

Each of the first two classes may be further divided into two accordingas the influence from above is just sufficient for the perfection of theindividual himself, or is so abundant as to cause the recipient to seekto impart it to others. We have then authors and teachers in the firstclass, and preaching prophets in the second. 

Among the powers we have in varying degrees are those of courage anddivination. These are innate and can be perfected if one has them in anydegree. By means of the power of divination we sometimes guess what aperson said or did under certain conditions, and guess truly. The resultreally follows from a number of premises, but the mind passes over theseso rapidly that it seems the guess was made instantaneously. The prophetmust have these two faculties in a high degree. Witness Moses bravingthe wrath of a great king. Some prophets also have their rational powersmore highly developed than those of an ordinary person who perfects hisreason by theoretical study. The same inspiration which renders theactivity of the imagination so vivid that it seems to it its perceptionsare real and due to the external senses--this same inspiration acts alsoupon the rational power, and makes its ideas as certain as if they werederived by intellectual effort. 

The prophetic vision (Heb. Mar'ah) is a state of agitation coming uponthe prophet in his waking state, as is clear from the words of Daniel, "And I saw this great vision, and there remained no strength in me: formy comeliness was turned in me into corruption, and I retained nostrength" (Dan. 10, 8). In vision also the senses cease their functions, and the process is the same as in sleep. 

Whenever the Bible speaks of prophecy coming to anyone, it is alwaysthrough an angel and in a dream or vision, whether this is specificallystated or not. The expression, "And God came to ... In a dream of thenight, " does not denote prophecy at all. It is merely a dream that comesto a person warning him of danger. Laban and Abimelech had such dreams, but no one would credit these heathens with the prophetic power. 

Whenever an angel is met in Scripture speaking or communicating with aperson, it is always in a dream or vision. Examples are, Abraham and thethree men, Jacob wrestling with the angel, Balaam and the ass, Joshuaand the angel at Jericho;--all these were in a dream or vision. Sometimes there is no angel at all, but merely a voice that is heard bysuch as are not deserving of prophecy, for example Hagar, and Manoah andhis wife. 

The prophets see images in their visions. These images are sometimesinterpreted in the vision itself; sometimes the interpretation does notappear until the prophet wakes up. Sometimes the prophet sees alikeness, sometimes he sees God speaking to him, or an angel; or hehears an angel speaking to him, or sees a man speaking to him, or seesnothing at all but only hears a voice. 

In this way we distinguish eleven grades of prophecy. The first two areonly preparatory, not yet constituting one who has them a prophet. 

1. When one is endowed by God with a great desire to save a community ora famous individual, and he undertakes to bring it about, we have thefirst grade known as the "Spirit of God. " This was the position of theJudges. Moses always had this desire from the moment he could be calleda man, hence he killed the Egyptian and chided the two quarreling men, and delivered the daughters of Jethro from the shepherds, and so on. Thesame is true of David. Not everyone, however, who has this desire is aprophet until he succeeds in doing a very great thing. 

2. When a person feels something come upon him and begins tospeak--words of wisdom and praise or of warning, or relating to socialor religious conduct--all this while in a waking state and with fullconsciousness, we have the second stage called the "Holy Spirit. " Thisis the inspiration which dictated the Psalms, the Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, Daniel, Job, Chronicles and the othersacred writings (Hagiographa). Balaam's discourses also belong to thisclass. David, Solomon and Daniel belong here, and are not in the sameclass with Isaiah, Jeremiah, Nathan, Ahiah, and so on. God spoke toSolomon through Ahiah the Shilonite; at other times he spoke to him in adream, and when Solomon woke up, he knew it was a dream and not aprophecy. Daniel's visions were also in dreams. This is why his book isclassed in the third division of the Biblical writings (Hagiographa), and not in the second (Prophets). 

3. This is the first grade of real prophecy, _i. E. _, when a prophetsees a picture in a dream under the proper conditions, and the pictureis explained to him in the dream itself. Most of the dreams of Zechariahare of this nature. 

4. When he hears speech in a prophetic dream, but does not see thespeaker, as happened to Samuel in the beginning of his career. 

5. When a man speaks to him in a dream, as we find in some of theprophecies of Ezekiel, "And the man said unto me, son of man.... "

6. When an angel speaks to him in a dream. This is the condition of mostprophets, as is indicated in the expression, "And an angel of God saidto me in a dream. "

7. When it seems to him in a prophetic dream as if God is speaking tohim; as we find in Isaiah, "I saw the Lord ... And he said, whom shall Isend and who will go for us" (Isa. 6, 1, 8). 

8. When a _vision_ appears to him and he sees pictures, like Abraham atthe covenant of the pieces (Gen. 15). 

9. When he hears words in a vision, as in the case of Abraham, "And, behold, the word of the Lord came unto him saying, This man shall not bethine heir" (Gen. 15, 4). 

10. When he sees a man speaking to him in a prophetic vision. Examples, Abraham in the plain of Mamre, Joshua in Jericho. 

11. When he sees an angel speaking to him in a vision, like Abraham inthe sacrifice of Isaac. This is the highest degree of prophecy, excepting Moses. The next higher stage would be that a prophet shouldsee God speaking to him in a vision. But this seems impossible, as it istoo much for the imaginative faculty. In fact it is possible that in avision speech is never heard at all, but only likenesses are seen. Inthat case the eleven grades are reduced to eight. 

All the details of actions and travels that are described in propheticvisions must not be understood as having actually taken place, as forexample Hosea's marrying a harlot. They appear only in the prophet'svision or dream. Many expressions in the prophets are hyperbolical ormetaphorical, and must not be taken literally. 

Moses was the greatest of the prophets. He alone received hiscommunications direct from God. All the others got their divine messagesthrough an angel. Moses performed his miracles before the whole peopleas no one else did. The standing still of the sun produced by Joshua wasnot in the presence of _all_ the people. Besides it may be the meaningis that that day seemed to the people the longest of any theyexperienced in those regions. Moses alone, by reason of his superiorityto all other prophets before or after, called the people to the Law. Noone before him did this, though there were many prophets before Moses. Abraham taught a few people, and so did others. But no one like Mosessaid to the people, "The Lord sent me to you that you may do thus andso. " After Moses all the prophets urge upon the people obedience to thelaw of Moses. This shows that the law of Moses will never change. For itis perfect, and any change in any direction would be for the worse. [285]

From the theoretical part of philosophy we pass to the practical. Thisincludes ethics and other topics related thereto, theodicy, providence, free will and its compatibility with God's omniscience. To give hisethical doctrine a scientific character, Maimonides bases it upon ametaphysical and psychological foundation. The doctrine of matter andform gives him a convenient formula underlying his ethical discussion. Sin and vice are due to matter, virtue and goodness to form. Forsensuous desires, which are due to matter, are at the basis of vice;whereas intellectual pursuits, which constitute the noblest activity ofthe soul, the form of the living body, lead to virtue. We may thereforestate man's ethical duty in broad philosophical terms as follows:Despise matter, and have to do with it only so far as is absolutelynecessary. [286] This is too general to be enlightening, and it isnecessary to have recourse to psychology. Ethics has for itssubject-matter the improvement and perfection of character. Making useof a medical analogy we may say that as it is the business of thephysician to cure the body, so it is the aim of the moral teacher tocure the soul. We may carry this figure further and conclude that as thephysician must know the anatomy and physiology of the body before he canundertake to cure it of its ills, so the moralist must know the natureof the soul and its powers or faculties. 

In the details of his psychology Maimonides follows Alfarabi instead ofAvicenna who was the model of Judah Halevi and Ibn Daud (pp. 175, 211). 

The soul consists of five parts or faculties: the nutritive, thesensitive, the imaginative, the appetitive and the rational. The furtherdescription of the nutritive soul pertains to medicine and does notconcern us here. The sensitive soul contains the well known five senses. The imaginative faculty is the power which retains the forms of sensibleobjects when they are no longer present to the external senses. It alsohas the function of original combination of sense elements intocomposite objects having no real existence in the outside world. Thismakes the imagination an unreliable guide in matters intellectual. 

The appetitive faculty is the power of the soul by which a persondesires a thing or rejects it. Acts resulting from it are the pursuit ofan object and its avoidance; also the feelings of anger, favor, fear, courage, cruelty, pity, love, hate, and so on. The organs of thesepowers, feelings and activities are the members of the body, like thehand, which takes hold of an object; the foot, which goes toward a thingor away from it; the eye, which looks; the heart, which takes courage oris stricken with fear; and so with the rest. 

The rational faculty is the power of the soul by which a personreflects, acquires knowledge, discriminates between a praiseworthy actand a blameworthy. The functions of the rational soul are practical andtheoretical. The practical activity of the reason has to do with thearts directly, as in learning carpentry, agriculture, medicine, seamanship; or it is concerned with reflecting upon the methods andprinciples of a given art. The theoretical reason has for itssubject-matter the permanent and unchangeable, what is known as sciencein the true sense of the term. [287]

Now as far as the commandments, mandatory and prohibitive, of the Bibleare concerned, the only parts of the soul which are involved are thesensitive and the appetitive. For these are the only powers subject tocontrol. The nutritive and the imaginative powers function in sleep aswell in waking, hence a person cannot be held responsible for theiractivities, which are involuntary. There is some doubt about therational faculty, but it seems that here too a person is responsible forthe opinions he holds, though no practical acts are involved. 

Virtues are divided into ethical and intellectual (dianoetic); and soare the contrary vices. The intellectual virtues are the excellencies ofthe reason. Such are _science_, which consists in the knowledge ofproximate and remote causes of things; _pure reason_, having to do withsuch innate principles as the axioms; _the acquired reason_, which wecannot discuss here; _clearness of perception_ and _quick insight_. Theintellectual vices are the opposites or the contraries of these. 

The ethical virtues are resident in the appetitive faculty. Thesensitive soul is auxiliary to the appetitive. The number of thesevirtues is large. Examples are; temperance, generosity, justice, modesty, humility, contentment, courage, and so on. The vices of thisclass are the above qualities carried to excess, or not practiced to therequired extent. The faculties of nutrition and imagination have neithervirtues nor vices. We say a person's digestion is good or it is poor;his imagination is correct or it is defective, but we do not attach theidea of virtue or vice to these conditions. 

Virtue is a permanent and enduring quality of the soul occupying anintermediate position between the two opposite extremes each of which isa vice, sinning by exceeding the proper measure of the golden mean or byfalling short of it. A good act is that form of conduct which followsfrom a virtuous disposition as just defined. A bad act is the result ofa tendency of the soul to either of the two extremes, of excess ordefect. Thus temperance or moderation is a virtue. It is the meanbetween over-indulgence in the direction of excess, and insensibility orindifference in the direction of defect. The last two are vices. Similarly generosity is a mean between niggardliness and extravagance;courage is a mean between foolhardiness and cowardice; dignity is a meanbetween haughtiness and loutishness; humility is a mean betweenarrogance and self-abasement; contentment is a mean between avarice andslothful indifference; kindness is a mean between baseness and excessiveself-denial; gentleness is a mean between irascibility and insensibilityto insult; modesty is a mean between impudence and shamefacedness. People are often mistaken and regard one of the extremes as a virtue. Thus the reckless and the foolhardy is often praised as the brave; theman of no backbone is called gentle; the indolent is mistaken for thecontented; the insensible for the temperate, the extravagant for thegenerous. This is an error. The mean alone is worthy of commendation. 

The ethical virtues and vices are acquired as a result of repeatedpractice during a long time of the corresponding acts until they becomea confirmed habit and a second nature. A person is not born virtuous orvicious. What he will turn out to be depends upon the way he is trainedfrom childhood. If his training has been wrong and he has acquired avicious disposition in a particular tendency, he may be cured. And herewe may borrow a leaf from the book of medicine. As in bodily disease thephysician's endeavor is to restore the disturbed equilibrium in themixture of the humors by increasing the element that is deficient, so indiseases of the soul, if a person has a decided tendency to one of thevicious extremes, he must as a curative measure, for a certain length oftime, be directed to practice the opposite extreme until he has beencured. Then he may go back to the virtuous mean. Thus if a person hasthe vice of niggardliness, the practice of liberality is not sufficientto cure him. As a heroic measure he must practice extravagance until theformer tendency has left him. Then he may return to the liberal mean. The same thing applies to the other virtues, except that it is necessaryto use proper judgment in the amount of practice of a vicious extremenecessary to bring about a satisfactory result. Too great deviation andtoo long continued from the mean would in some cases be dangerous, aslikely to develop the opposite vice. Thus it is comparatively safe toindulge in extravagance as a cure for niggardliness; the reverse processmust be used with caution. Care should likewise be taken in trying towean a person away from a habit of insensibility to pleasure by means ofa régime of indulgence. If it is not discontinued in time, he may becomea pleasure seeker, which is even worse than total indifference. 

It is in this way that we must explain the conduct of certain pious menand saints who were not content with following the middle way, andinclined to one extreme, the extreme of asceticism and self-abasement. They did this as a measure of cure, or because of the wickedness oftheir generation, whose example they feared would contaminate them byits contagion. Hence they lived a retired and solitary life, the life ofa recluse. It was not meant as the normal mode of conduct, which wouldbe as unwholesome to the soul as an invalid's drugs would be dangerousif taken regularly by a person of sound health. 

The will of God is that we should follow the middle way and eat anddrink and enjoy ourselves in moderation. To be sure, we must be alwayson our guard against slipping into the forbidden extreme, but it is notnecessary for this purpose to inflict additional burdens upon ourselvesor to practice mortification of the flesh and abstention from food anddrink beyond what is prescribed in the Law. For many of the regulationsin the Pentateuch have been laid down for this very purpose. The dietarylaws, the laws of forbidden marriages, the laws of tithes, the lawsprescribing that the corner of the field, the dropped and forgottenears and the gleanings of the vintage should be left to the poor, thelaws of the sabbatical year, the Jubilee, and the regulations governingcharity--all these are intended to guard us against avarice andselfishness. Other laws and precepts are for the purpose of moderatingour tendency to anger and rage, and so with all the other virtues andvices. Hence it is folly and overscrupulousness to add restrictions ofone's own accord except in critical instances, as indicated above. 

The purpose of all human life and activity is to know God as far as itis possible for man. Hence all his activities should be directed to thatone end. His eating and drinking and sleeping and waking and motion andrest and pleasure should have for their object the maintenance of goodhealth and cheerful spirits, not as an end in themselves, but as a meansto intellectual peace and freedom from worry and care in order that hemay have leisure and ability to study and reflect upon the highesttruths of God. Good music, beautiful scenery, works of art, splendidarchitecture and fine clothing should not be pursued for their own sake, but only so far as they may be necessary to relieve the tedium andmonotony of toil and labor, or as a curative measure to dispel gloom andlow spirits or a tendency to melancholy. The same thing applies to thearts and sciences. Medicine is of assistance in maintaining bodilyhealth and curing it of its ills. The logical, mathematical and physicalsciences are either directly helpful to speculative theology, and theirvalue is evident; or they serve to train the mind in deduction andanalysis, and are thus indirectly of benefit for the knowledge ofGod. [288]

The ethical qualities similarly conduce to intellectual perfection, andthe difference between one prophet and another is in large measuredependent upon relative ethical superiority. Thus when the Rabbis saythat Moses saw God through a luminous mirror, and the other prophetsthrough a non-luminous, the meaning is that Moses had intellectual andmoral perfection, so far as a human being is capable of having them, andthe only partition separating him from a complete vision of God was hishumanity. The other prophets had other defects besides, constituting somany additional partitions obscuring the divine view. [289]

Some foolish astrologers are of the opinion that a man's character isdetermined in advance by the position of the stars at the time of hisbirth. This is a grave error, as can be shown from reason as well astradition. The Bible as well as the Greek philosophers are agreed that aman's acts are under his own control, and that he himself and no oneelse is responsible for his virtues as well as his vices. It is truethat a person's temperament, which is constitutional and over which hehas no control, plays an important rôle in his conduct. There is nodenying that men are born with certain tendencies. Some are bornphlegmatic, some are passionate and hot-blooded. One man has a tendencyto fearlessness and bravery, another is timid and backward. But while itis true that it is more difficult for the hot-blooded to develop thevirtue of temperance and moderation than it is for the phlegmatic, thatit is easier for the warm-tempered to learn courage than it is for thecold-tempered--these are not impossible. Virtue, we have seen before, isnot a natural state, but an acquired possession due to long continueddiscipline and practice. One man may require longer and more assiduouspractice than another to acquire a certain virtue, but no matter whathis inherited temperament, he can acquire it if he undertakes to do so, or if properly trained. If man's character and conduct were determined, all the commandments and prohibitions in the Bible would be in vain, forwithout freedom command has no effect. Similarly there would be no usein a person's endeavoring to learn any trade or profession; for if it isdetermined beforehand that a given individual shall be a physician or acarpenter, he is bound to be one whether he studies or not. This wouldmake all reward and punishment wrong and unjust whether administered byman or by God. For the person so rewarded or punished could not helpdoing what he did, and is therefore not responsible. All our plans andpreparations would on this supposition be useless and without meaning, such as building houses, acquiring food, avoiding danger, and so on. Allthis is absurd and opposed to reason as well as to sense. It underminesthe foundation of religion and imputes wrong to God. The Bible saysdistinctly, "See, I have set before thee this day life and the good, death and the evil ... Therefore choose thou life.... " (Deut. 30, 15, 19. )

There are some passages in the Bible which apparently lend color to theidea that a person's acts are determined from on high. Such are theexpressions used in relation to Pharaoh's conduct toward the Israelitesin refusing to let them go out of Egypt. We are told there that Godhardened the heart of Pharaoh that he should not let the Israelites go. And he did this in order to punish the Egyptians. The criticism here istwofold. First, these expressions indicate that a person is not alwaysfree; and second, it seems scarcely just to force a man to act in acertain way and then to punish him for it. 

The explanation Maimonides gives to this passage is as follows: Headmits that in Pharaoh's case there was a restriction of Pharaoh'sfreedom. But this was a penal measure and exceptional. Normally a man isfree, but he may forfeit this freedom if he abuses it. So Pharaoh'sprimary offence was not that he would not let the children of Israel goout of Egypt. His sin consisted in his tyrannical treatment of Israel inthe past, which he did of his own accord and as a result of free choice. His loss of freedom in complying with Moses's request to let theIsraelites go was already in the nature of a punishment, and its objectwas to let all the world know that a person may forfeit his freedom ofaction as a punishment for abusing his human privilege. To be sure Goddoes not always punish sin so severely, but it is not for us to searchhis motives and ask why he punishes one man in one way and another inanother. We must leave this to his wisdom. 

Another argument against free will is that it is incompatible with theknowledge of God. If God is omniscient and knows the future as well asthe past and the present, he knows how a given person will act at agiven moment. But since God's knowledge is certain and not liable toerror, the person in question cannot help acting as God long foreknew hewould act, and hence his act is not the result of his free will. Maimonides's answer to this objection is virtually an admission ofignorance. He takes refuge in the transcendence of God's knowledge, uponwhich he dwelt so insistently in the earlier part of his work (p. 260ff. ). God is not qualified by attributes as we his creatures are. As hedoes not live by means of life, so he does not know by means ofknowledge. He knows through his own essence. He and his existence andhis knowledge are identical. Hence as we cannot know his essence, wecannot have any conception of his knowledge. It is mistaken therefore toargue that because we cannot know a future event unless it is alreadydetermined in the present, God cannot do so. His knowledge is of adifferent kind from ours, and he can do what we cannot. [290]

The next problem Maimonides takes up is the doctrine of evil. Thepresence of evil in the world, physical as well as moral, was astumbling block to all religious thinkers in the middle ages. Thedifficulty seems to find its origin in Neo-Platonism, or, farther backstill, in Philo of Alexandria, who identified God with the Good. If heis the Good, evil cannot come from him. How then account for the evil inthe world? The answer that was given was extremely unsatisfactory. Itwas founded on a metaphysical distinction which is as old as Plato, namely, of matter as the non-existent. Matter was considered a principlewithout any definite nature or actual being, and this was made the basisof all imperfection, death, sin. Evil partakes of the non-existence ofmatter, it is nothing positive, but only a negation or privation of goodas darkness is the absence of light; hence it needs no creator, it hasno efficient cause, but only a deficient cause. In this way physicalevil was accounted for. Moral evil as the result of man's inhumanity toman could easily be explained by laying it to the charge of man's freewill or even to the free will of the fallen angels as Origen conceivesit. This removes from God all responsibility for evil. We shall findthat Maimonides has nothing essentially new to contribute to thesolution of the problem. 

Strictly speaking, he says, only a positive thing can be made, negationor privation cannot. We may speak loosely of the negative being producedwhen one removes the positive. So if a man puts out a light, we say hemade darkness, though darkness is a negation. 

Evil is nothing but the negation of the positive, which is good. Allpositive things are good. Hence God cannot be said to produce evil. Thepositive thing which he produces is good; the evil is due to defect inthe thing. Matter also is good so far as it is positive, _i. E. _, so faras it causes continued existence of one thing after another. The evil inmatter is due to its negative or privative aspect as the formless, whichmakes it the cause of defect and evil. All evil that men do to eachother is also due to negation, namely, absence of wisdom and knowledge. 

Many people think there is more evil in the world than good. Theirmistake is due to the fact that they make the experience of theindividual man the arbiter in this question, thinking that the universewas made for his sake. They forget that man is only a small fraction ofthe world, which is made by the will of God. Even so man should begrateful for the great amount of good he receives from God, for many ofthe evils of man are self-inflicted. In fact the evils befalling mancome under three categories. 

1. The evil that is incident to man's nature as subject to genesis anddecay, _i. E. _, as composed of matter. Hence arise the various accidentsto which man is liable on account of bad air and other natural causes. These are inevitable, and inseparable from matter, and from thegeneration of individuals in a species. To demand that a person of fleshand blood shall not be subject to impressions is a contradiction interms. And with all this the evils of this class are comparatively few. 

2. They are the evils inflicted by one man upon the other. These aremore frequent than the preceding. Their causes are various. And yetthese too are not very frequent. 

3. These are the most common. They are the evils man brings upon himselfby self-indulgence and the formation of bad habits. He injures the bodyby excess, and he injures the mind through the body by perverting andweakening it, and by enslaving it to luxuries to which there is no end. If a person is satisfied with that which is necessary, he will easilyhave what he needs; for the necessaries are not hard to get. God'sjustice is evident in affording the necessaries to all his creatures andin making all the individuals of the same species similar in power andability. [291]

The next problem Maimonides discusses is really theoretical and shouldhave its place in the discussion of the divine attributes, for it dealswith the character of God's knowledge. The reason for taking it up hereis because, according to Maimonides, it was an ethical question that wasthe motive for the formulation of the view of the opponents. Accordinglythe problem is semi-ethical, semi-metaphysical, and is closely relatedto the question of Providence. 

Observing that the good are often wretched and the bad prosperous, thephilosophers came to the conclusion that God does not know individualthings. For if he knows and does not order them as is proper, this mustbe due either to inability or to jealousy, both of which are impossiblein God. Having come to this conclusion in the way indicated, they thenbolstered it up with arguments to justify it positively. Such are thatthe individual is known through sense and God has no sensation; that thenumber of individual things is infinite, and the infinite cannot becomprehended, hence cannot be known; that knowledge of the particular issubject to change as the object changes, whereas God's knowledge isunchangeable. Against us Jews they argue that to suppose God knowsthings before they are connects knowledge with the non-existent; andbesides there would be two kinds of knowledge in God, one knowledge ofpotential things, and another of actual things. So they came to theconclusion that God knows only species but not individuals. Others saythat God knows nothing except his own essence, else there would bemultiplicity in his nature. As the entire difficulty, according toMaimonides, arose from the supposed impropriety in the government ofindividual destinies, he first discusses the question of Providence andcomes back later to the problem of God's knowledge. [292]

He enumerates five opinions concerning Providence. 

1. _The Opinion of Epicurus. _ There is no Providence at all; everythingis the result of accident and concurrence of atoms. Aristotle hasrefuted this idea. 

2. _The Opinion of Aristotle. _ Some things are subject to Providence, others are governed by accident. God provides for the celestial spheres, hence they are permanent individually; but, as Alexander says in hisname, Providence ceases with the sphere of the moon. Aristotle'sdoctrine concerning Providence is related to his belief in the eternityof the world. Providence corresponds to the nature of the object inquestion. As the individual spheres are permanent, it shows that thereis special Providence which preserves the spheres individually. As, again, there proceed from them other beings which are not permanentindividually but only as species, namely, the species of our world, itis clear that with reference to the sublunar world there is so muchProvidential influence as to bring about the permanence of the species, but not of the individual. To be sure, the individuals too are notcompletely neglected. There are various powers given to them inaccordance with the quality of their matters; which powers determine thelength of their duration, their motion, perception, purposive existence. But the other incidents and motions in individual human as well asanimal life are pure accident. When a storm scatters the leaves oftrees, casts down some trunks and drowns a ship with its passengers, theincident is as accidental with the men drowned as with the scatteredleaves. That which follows invariable laws Aristotle regards asProvidential, what happens rarely and without rule is accidental. 

3. _The View of the Ashariya. _ This is the very opposite of thepreceding opinion. The Ashariya deny all accident. Everything is done bythe will of God, whether it be the fall of a leaf or the death of a man. Everything is determined, and a person cannot of himself do or forbear. It follows from this view that the category of the possible is ruledout. Everything is either necessary or impossible. It follows also thatall laws are useless, for man is helpless, and reward and punishment aredetermined solely by the will of God, to whom the concepts of right andwrong do not apply. 

4. _The Opinion of the Muʿtazila. _ They vindicate man's power to do andforbear, thus justifying the commands and prohibitions, and the rewardsand punishments of the laws. God does not do wrong. They also believethat God knows of the fall of a leaf, and provides for all things. Thisopinion, too, is open to criticism. If a person is born with a defect, they say this is due to God's wisdom, and it is better for the man to bethus. If a pious man is put to death, it is to increase his reward inthe next world. They extend this to lower animals also, and say that themouse killed by the cat will be rewarded in the next world. 

The last three opinions all have their motives. Aristotle followed thedata of nature. The Ashariya refused to impute ignorance to God. TheMuʿtazila object to imputing to him wrong, or to denying reason, whichholds that to cause a person pain for no offence is wrong. Their opinionleads to a contradiction, for they say God knows everything and at thesame time man is free. 

5. _The Opinion of our Law. _ A fundamental principle of the law of Mosesis that man has absolute freedom in his conduct, and so has anirrational animal. No one of our religion disputes this. Anotherfundamental principle is that God does no wrong, and hence all rewardand punishment is justly given. There is only one exception mentioned bythe Rabbis, what they call "suffering for love, " _i. E. _, misfortuneswhich are not in the nature of punishment for sins committed, but inorder to increase reward. There is no support, however, for this view inthe Bible. All this applies only to man. Nothing is said in the Bible orin the Talmud of reward and punishment of animals. It was adopted bysome of the later Geonim from the Muʿtazila. 

After citing these five opinions on the nature of Providence, Maimonidesformulates his own to the following effect:

My own belief in the matter, not as a result of demonstration, but basedupon what seems to me to be the meaning of Scripture is that in thesublunar world man alone enjoys individual Providence. All otherindividual things besides are ruled by chance, as Aristotle says. DivineProvidence corresponds to divine influence or emanation. The more onehas of divine influence, the more one has of Providence. Thus in plantsand animals divine Providence extends only to the species. When theRabbis tell us that cruelty to animals is forbidden in the Torah, themeaning is that we must not be cruel to animals for our own good, inorder not to develop habits of cruelty. To ask why God does not providefor the lower animals in the same way as he does for man, is the same asto ask why he did not endow the animals with reason. The answer wouldbe, so he willed, so his wisdom decreed. My opinion is not that God isignorant of anything or is incapable of doing certain things, but thatProvidence is closely related to reason. One has as much of Providenceas he has of the influence of the divine reason. It follows from thisthat Providence is not the same for all individuals of the humanspecies, but varies with the person's character and achievements. Theprophets enjoy a special Providence; the pious and wise men come next;whereas a person who is ignorant and disobedient is neglected andtreated like a lower animal, being left to the government ofchance. [293]

Having disposed of the question of Providence, we may now resume thediscussion undertaken above (p. 289) of the nature of God's knowledge. The idea that God does not know the particular things in our world belowis an old one and is referred to in the Bible often. Thus, to quote oneinstance from the Psalms, the idea is clearly enunciated in thefollowing passage, "And they say [sc. The wicked], How doth God know?And is there knowledge in the most High? Behold, these are the wicked;and, being alway at ease, they increase in riches. Surely in vain have Icleansed my heart, and washed my hands in innocency.... " (73, 11-13). The origin of this notion is in human experience, which sees theadversity of the good and the prosperity of the wicked, though many ofthe troubles are of a man's own doing, who is a free agent. But thisview is wrong. For ignorance of any kind is a defect, and God isperfect. David pointed out this when he said, "He that planted the earshall he not hear? He that formed the eye shall he not see?" (94, 9). This means that unless God knows what the senses are, he could not havemade the sense organs to perceive. 

We must now answer the other metaphysical arguments against God'sknowledge of particulars. It is agreed that no new knowledge can come toGod which he did not have before, nor can he have many knowledges. Wesay therefore (we who are believers in the Torah) that with oneknowledge God knows many things, and his knowledge does not change asthe objects change. We say also that he knows all things before theycome into being, and knows them always; hence his knowledge neverchanges as the objects appear and disappear. It follows from this thathis knowledge relates to the non-existent and embraces the infinite. Webelieve this and say that only the absolutely non-existent cannot beknown; but the non-existent whose existence is in God's knowledge andwhich he can bring into reality can be known. As to comprehending theinfinite, we say with some thinkers that knowledge relates primarily tothe species and extends indirectly to the individuals included in thespecies. And the species are finite. The philosophers, however, decidethat there cannot be knowledge of the non-existent, and the infinitecannot be comprehended. God, therefore, as he cannot have new andchanging knowledge knows only the permanent things, the species, and notthe changing and temporary individuals. Others go still further andmaintain that God cannot even know the permanent things, becauseknowledge of many things involves many knowledges, hence multiplicity inGod's essence. They insist therefore that God knows only himself. Myview is, says Maimonides, that the error of all these people is thatthey assume there is a relation of resemblance between our knowledge andGod's knowledge. And it is surprising that the philosophers should beguilty of such an error, the very men who proved that God's knowledge isidentical with his essence, and that our reason cannot know God'sessence. 

The difference between our knowledge and God's knowledge is that we getour knowledge from the data of experience, upon which it depends. Eachnew datum adds to our knowledge, which cannot run ahead of that whichproduces it. It is different in the case of God. He is the cause of thedata of experience. The latter follow his knowledge, and not _viceversa_. Hence by knowing himself he knows everything else before itcomes into being. We cannot conceive of his knowledge, for to do thiswould be to have it ourselves. [294]

The last topic Maimonides considers in his philosophical work is thereason and purpose of the commandments of the Bible, particularly theceremonial precepts which apparently have no rational meaning. In factthere are those who maintain that it is vain to search for reasons ofthe laws where none are given in the Bible itself; that the sole reasonin those cases is the will of God. These people labor under the absurdimpression that to discover a rational purpose in the ceremonial lawswould diminish their value and reduce them to human institutions. Theirdivine character and origin is attested in the minds of these people bytheir irrationality, by the fact that they have no human meaning. Thisis clearly absurd, says Maimonides the rationalist. It is tantamount tosaying that man is superior to God; and that whereas a man will commandonly that which is of benefit, God gives orders which have no earthlyuse. The truth is quite the reverse, and all the laws are for ourbenefit. [295]

Accordingly Maimonides undertakes to account for all the laws of theBible. The Law, he says, has two purposes, the improvement of the bodyand the improvement of the soul or the mind. The improvement of the soulis brought about by study and reflection, and the result of this istheoretical knowledge. But in order to be able to realize this perfectlya necessary prerequisite is the improvement of the body. This isinferior in value to perfection of the soul, but comes naturally andchronologically first as a means to an end. For bodily perfection onemust have health and strength as far as one's constitution permits, andfor this purpose a person must have his needs at all times. Social lifeis necessary for the supply of the individuals' needs, and to makesocial life possible there must be rules of right and wrong to beobserved. [296]

Applying what has just been said to the Law, we may divide its contentsbroadly into four classes, (1) Precepts inculcating true beliefs andideas, such as the existence of God, his unity, knowledge, power, will, eternity. (2) Legal and moral precepts, such as the inculcation ofjustice and a benevolent disposition for the good of society. (3) Thenarratives and genealogies of the Law. (4) The ceremonial prescriptions. 

Of these the purpose of the first two divisions is perfectly clear andadmitted by all. True beliefs and ideas regarding God and his governmentof the world are directly conducive to the highest end of man, knowledgeand perfection of the soul. Honorable and virtuous conduct is apreliminary requisite to intellectual perfection. The genealogies andnarratives of the Bible are also not without a purpose. They areintended to inculcate a theoretical doctrine or a moral, and toemphasize the one or the other, which cannot be done so well by a barestatement or commandment. Thus, to take a few examples, the creation ofthe world is impressed upon the reader beyond the possibility of a doubtby a circumstantial narrative of the various steps in the process, thegradual peopling of the earth by the multiplication of the human racedescended from the first pair, and so on. The story of the flood and ofthe destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah has for its purpose to emphasizethe truth that God is a just judge, who rewards the pious and punishesthe wicked. The genealogy of the kings of Edom in Genesis (36, 31) isintended as a warning to Israel in the appointment of kings. These kingsof the Edomites were all of them foreigners not of Edom, and it isprobable that the history of their tyrannical rule and oppression oftheir Edomite subjects was well known to the people in Moses's time. Hence the point of the enumeration of the list of kings and their originis to serve as a deterring example to the Israelites never to appoint asking of Israel a man who came from another nation, in accordance withthe precept in Deuteronomy (17, 15), "Thou mayest not put a foreignerover thee, which is not thy brother. "[297]

There remains the division of the ceremonial laws, which are the subjectof dispute. The purpose in these precepts is not evident, and opinionsare divided as to whether they have any purpose. I will endeavor toshow, says Maimonides, that these also have one or more of the followingobjects: to teach true beliefs and opinions, to remove injustice and toinculcate good qualities. 

Abraham grew up among the Sabeans, who were star worshippers andbelievers in the eternity of the world. The object of the law is to keepmen away from the erroneous views of the Sabeans, which were prevalentin those days. The Sabeans believed that the worship of the stars helpsin the cultivation of the ground to make it fruitful. For this reasonthey think highly of the husbandmen and laborers on the land. They alsorespect cattle and prohibit slaughtering them because they are ofbenefit in the cultivation of the land. In the interest of agriculturethey instituted the worship of the stars, which they believed wouldcause the rain to fall and the earth to yield its fertility. On thisaccount we find the reverse of this in the Bible, telling us thatworship of the stars will result in lack of rain and infertility. 

In the life of nature we see how one thing serves another, and certainobjects are not brought about except through certain others, anddevelopment is gradual. So, for example, a young infant cannot be fed onmeat and solid food, and nature provides milk in the mother's breast. Similarly in governing the people of Israel, who were living in acertain environment, God could not at once tear them away from thehabits of thought to which they were accustomed, but he led themgradually. Hence as they were accustomed to sacrificing to the stars, God ordered them to sacrifice to him, the object being to wean them awayfrom the idols in the easiest way possible. This is why the prophets donot lay stress on the sacrifices. To be sure, it was not impossible forGod to form their minds so that they would not require this form oftraining, and would see at once that God does not need sacrifices, butthis would have been a miracle. And while God does perform miraclessometimes for certain purposes, he does not change the nature of man;not because he cannot, but because he desires man to be free andresponsible. Otherwise there would be no sense in laws and prophets. 

Among the purposes of the law are abstention from self-indulgence in thephysical appetites, like eating and drinking and sensuous pleasure, because these things prevent the ultimate perfection of man, and arelikewise injurious to civil and social life, multiplying as they dosorrow and trouble and strife and jealousy and hate and warfare. 

Another purpose is to inculcate gentleness and politeness and docility. Another is purity and holiness. External cleanliness is alsorecommended, but not as a substitute for internal. The important thingis internal purity, external takes a secondary place. 

Maimonides ends the discussion of the Pentateuchal laws by dividing theminto fourteen classes (following in this the divisions in his greatlegal code, the "Yad Ha-Hazakah") and explaining the purposes of eachclass. It will be useful briefly to reproduce the division here. 

1. Those laws that concern fundamental ideas of religion and theology, including the duty of learning and teaching, and the institutions ofrepentance and fasting. The purpose here is clear. Intellectualperfection is the greatest good of man, and this cannot be attainedwithout learning and teaching; and without wisdom there is neither goodpractice nor true opinion. Similarly honoring the wise, swearing byGod's name, and not to swear falsely--all these lead to a firm belief inGod's greatness. Repentance is useful to guard against despair andcontinuance in evil doing on the part of the sinner. 

2. The precepts and prohibitions relating to idolatry. Here are includedalso the prohibition to mix divers kinds of seeds in planting, theprohibition against eating the fruit of a tree during the first threeyears of its growth, and against wearing a garment made of a mixture ofwool and flax. The prohibition of idolatry is evident in its purpose, which is to teach true ideas about God. The other matters abovementioned are connected with idolatry. Magic is a species of idolatrybecause it is based on a belief in the direct influence of the stars. All practices done to produce a certain effect, which are not justifiedby a reason or at least are not verified by experience, are forbidden asbeing superstitious and a species of magic. Cutting the beard and theearlocks is forbidden on a similar ground because it was a custom of theidolatrous priests. The same thing applies to mixing of cotton and flax, to men wearing women's garments and _vice versa_, though here there isthe additional reason, to prevent, namely, laxness in sexual morality. 

3. The precepts relating to ethical and moral conduct. Here the purposeis clear, namely, to improve social life. 

4. The rules relating to charity, loans, gifts, and so on. The purposeis to teach kindness to the poor, and the benefit is mutual, for therich man to-day may be poor to-morrow. 

5. Laws relating to injury and damages. The purpose is to remove wrongand injustice. 

6. Laws relating to theft, robbery, false witnesses. The purpose is toprevent injury by punishing the offender. 

7. The regulation of business intercourse, like loan, hire, deposits, buying and selling, inheritance, and so on. The purpose here is socialjustice to make life in society possible. 

8. Laws relating to special periods, such as the Sabbath and thefestivals. The purpose is stated in each case in the Law itself, and itis either to inculcate a true idea like the creation in the case of theSabbath, or to enable mankind to rest from their labors, or for bothcombined. 

9. The other practical observances like prayer, the reading of "Shema, "and so on. These are all modes of serving God, which lead to trueopinions concerning him, and to fear and love. 

10. The regulations bearing upon the temple and its service. The purposeof these was explained above in connection with the institution ofsacrifice, namely that it was a concession to the primitive ideas andcustoms of the people of those times for the purpose of graduallyweaning them away from idolatry. 

11. Laws relating to sacrifices. The purpose was stated above and under10. 

12. Laws of cleanness and uncleanness. The purpose is to guard againsttoo great familiarity with the Temple in order to maintain respect forit. Hence the regulations prescribing the times when one may, and theoccasions when one may not, approach or enter the Temple. 

13. The dietary laws. Unwholesome food is forbidden, also uncleananimals. The purpose in some cases is to guard against excess andself-indulgence. Some regulations like the laws of slaughter and othersare humanitarian in their nature. 

14. Forbidden marriages, and circumcision. The purpose is to guardagainst excess in sexual indulgence, and against making it an end initself. [298]

To sum up, there are four kinds of human accomplishments orexcellencies, (1) Acquisition of wealth, (2) Physical perfection, strength, beauty, etc. , (3) Moral perfection, (4) Intellectual andspiritual perfection. The last is the most important. The first ispurely external; the second is common to the lower animals; the third isfor the sake of one's fellowmen, in the interest of society, and wouldnot exist for a solitary person. The last alone concerns the individualhimself. Jeremiah expresses this truth in his statement, "Thus saith theLord, Let not the wise man glory in his wisdom, neither let the mightyman glory in his might, let not the rich man glory in his riches: butlet him that glorieth glory in this, that he understandeth, and knowethme, that I am the Lord which exercise loving kindness, judgment andrighteousness in the earth" (Jer. 9, 22). "Wise man" in the abovequotation means the man of good morals. The important thing, Jeremiahsays, is to know God through his actions and to imitate him. [299]

Maimonides's ethics as well as his interpretation of the Pentateuchallaws is intellectualistic, as the foregoing account shows. And it isnatural that it should be. The prevailing trend of thought in the middleages, alike among the Arabs, Jews and Christians, was of this character. Aristotle was the master of science, and to him intellectualcontemplation is the highest good of man. The distinction of man is hisrational faculty, hence the excellence and perfection of this faculty isthe proper function of man and the realization of his being. This aloneleads to that "eudaimonia" or happiness for which man strives. To besure complete happiness is impossible without the complete developmentof all one's powers, but this is because the reason in man is notisolated from the rest of his individual and social life; and perfectionof mind requires as its auxiliaries and preparation complete living infreedom and comfort. But the aim is after all the life of the intellect, and the "dianoetic" virtues are superior to the practical. Theoreticcontemplation stands far higher than practical activity. Add to thisthat Aristotle's God is pure thought thinking eternally itself, theuniversal mover, himself eternally unmoved, and attracting the celestialspheres as the object of love attracts the lover, without itselfnecessarily being affected, and the intellectualism of Aristotle standsout clearly. 

Maimonides is an Aristotelian, and he endeavors to harmonize theintellectualism and theorism of the Stagirite with the diametricallyopposed ethics and religion of the Hebrew Bible. And he is apparentlyunaware of the yawning gulf extending between them. The ethics of theBible is nothing if not practical. No stress is laid upon knowledge andtheoretical speculation as such. The wisdom and the wise man of the bookof Proverbs no more mean the theoretical philosopher than the fool andthe scorner in the same book denote the one ignorant in theoreticalspeculation. "The beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord. " This isthe keynote of the book of Proverbs, and its precepts and exhortationsare practical and nothing else. That the Pentateuchal law is solelyconcerned with practical conduct, religious, ceremonial and moral, needsnot saying. It is so absolutely clear and evident that one wonders howso clear-sighted a thinker like Maimonides could have been misled by theauthority of Aristotle and the intellectual atmosphere of the day toimagine otherwise. The very passage from Jeremiah which he quotes assumming up his idea of the _summum bonum_, speaks against him, and heonly succeeds in manipulating it in his favor by misinterpreting theword "wise. " Whatever the wise man may denote in the book of Proverbs, here in Jeremiah he is clearly contrasted with the person who inimitation of God practices kindness, judgment and righteousness. Theword does not denote the theoretical philosopher, to be sure, but itapproximates it more closely than the expression describing the idealman of Jeremiah's commendation. 

It is in line with Maimonides's general rationalistic andintellectualistic point of view when he undertakes to find a reason forevery commandment, where no reason is given in the Law. He shows himselfin this an opponent of all mysticism, sentimentality and arbitrariness. Reason is paramount. The intellect determines the will, and not evenGod's will may be arbitrary. His will is identical with his reason, hence there is a reason in everything that he wills. We may not in everycase succeed in finding the reason where he himself did not choose totell us, but a reason there always is, and the endeavor on our part todiscover it should be commended rather than condemned. 

The details of his motivation of the ceremonial laws are veryinteresting, and in many cases they anticipated, though in a cruderform, the more scientific theories of modern critics. Take hisinterpretation of the institution of sacrifices. Take away the personalmanner of expression, which might seem to imply that God spoke to Mosesin some such fashion as this: You and I know that sacrifices have noinherent meaning or value. They rather smack of superstition andidolatry. But what can we do? We cannot, _i. E. _, we must not, changethe nature of these people. We must train them gradually to see thetruth for themselves. They are now on the level of their environment, and believe in the efficacy of killing sheep and oxen to the stars andthe gods. We will use a true pedagogical method if we humor them in thistheir crudity for the purpose of transferring their allegiance from thefalse gods to the one true God. Let us then institute a system ofsacrifices with all the details and minutiae of the sacrificial systemsof the heathens and star worshippers. We shall impose this system uponour people for the time being, and in the end as they grow wiser theywill outgrow it--take away this mode of expression in Maimonides'sinterpretation, which is not essential, and the essence may be renderedin more modern terms thus. Man's religion is subject to change anddevelopment and progress like all his other institutions. The forms theysuccessively take in the course of their development are determined bythe state of general intelligence and positive knowledge that the givenrace or nation possesses. The same thing holds of religious development. The institution of sacrifices is prevalent in all religious communitiesat a certain stage in their career. It starts with human sacrifice, which is later discarded and replaced by sacrifices of animals. And thisis again in the course of time discontinued, leaving its traces only inthe prayer book, which in Judaism has officially taken the place of theTemple service. 

While the merit of Maimonides in foreshadowing this modern understandingof ancient religion cannot be overestimated, it is clear that in some ofhis other interpretations of Jewish ceremonial, he is wide of the mark. His rationalism could not take the place of a knowledge of history. Hismotivation of the dietary laws on the score of hygiene or of moderationand self-restraint is probably not true. Nor is the prohibition againstmixing divers seeds, or wearing garments of wool and flax mixed, orshaving the corner of the beard, and so on, due to the fact that thesewere the customs of the idolaters and their priests. If Maimonides wasbold enough to pull the sacrificial system down from its gloriouspedestal in Jewish tradition and admit that being inherently nothing buta superstition, it was nevertheless instituted with such great pomp andceremony, with a priestly family, a levitical tribe and a host ofprescriptions and regulations, merely as a concession to the habits andprejudices of the people, why could he not apply the same method ofexplanation to the few prohibitions mentioned above? Why not say theancient Hebrews were forbidden to mix divers seeds because they had beenfrom time immemorial taught to believe that there was something sinfulin joining together what God has kept asunder; and in order not to shocktheir sensibilities too rudely the new religion let them have theseharmless notions in order by means of these to inculcate real truths?

Before concluding our sketch of Maimonides we must say a word about hisBible exegesis. Though the tendency to read philosophy into the Bible isas old as Philo, from whom it was borrowed by Clement of Alexandria andOrigen and by them handed down to the other Patristic writers, andthough in the Jewish middle ages too, from Saadia down, the verses ofthe Bible were employed to confirm views adopted from otherconsiderations; though finally Abraham Ibn Daud in the matter ofexegesis, too, anticipated Maimonides in finding the Aristotelianmetaphysic in the sacred scriptures, still Maimonides as in everythingelse pertaining to Jewish belief and practice, so in the interpretationof the Bible also obtained the position of a leader, of the founder of aschool and the most brilliant and most authoritative exponent thereof, putting in the shade everyone who preceded him and every endeavor in thesame direction to which Maimonides himself owed his inspiration. Maimonides's treatment of the Bible texts and their application to hisphilosophical disquisitions is so much more comprehensive and masterlythan anything in the same line done before him, that it made everythingelse superfluous and set the pace for manifold imitation by thesuccessors of Maimonides, small and great. Reading the Bible throughAristotelian spectacles became the fashion of the day after Maimonides. Joseph Ibn Aknin, Samuel Ibn Tibbon, Jacob Anatoli, Joseph Ibn Caspi, Levi Ben Gerson and a host of others tried their hand at Biblicalexegesis, and the Maimonidean stamp is upon their work. 

We have already spoken of Maimonides's general attitude toward theanthropomorphisms in the Bible and the manner in which he accounts forthe style and mode of expression of the Biblical writers. He wrote nospecial exegetical work, he composed no commentaries on the Bible. Buthis "Guide of the Perplexed" is full of quotations from the Biblicalbooks, and certain sections in it are devoted to a systematicinterpretation of those Biblical chapters and books which lendthemselves most easily and, as Maimonides thought, imperatively tometaphysical interpretation. It is impossible here to enter intodetails, but it is proper briefly to point out his general method oftreating the Biblical passages in question, and to state what thesepassages are. 

We have already referred more than once to the Talmudic expressions"Maase Bereshit" (Work of Creation) and "Maase Merkaba" (Work of theChariot). Maimonides says definitely that the former denotes the scienceof physics, _i. E. _, the fundamental notions of nature as treated inAristotle's Physics, and the latter signifies metaphysics or theology, as represented in Aristotle's Metaphysics. The creation chapters inGenesis contain beneath their simple exterior of a generallyintelligible narrative, appealing to young and old alike, women as wellas children, a treatment of philosophical physics. And similarly in theobscure phraseology of the vision of Ezekiel in the first and tenthchapters of that prophet's book, are contained allusions to the mostprofound ideas of metaphysics and theology, concerning God and theseparate Intelligences and the celestial spheres. As the Rabbis forbidteaching these profound doctrines except to one or two worthy persons ata time, and as the authors of those chapters in the Bible clearlyintended to conceal the esoteric contents from the gaze of the vulgar, Maimonides with all his eagerness to spread abroad the light of reasonand knowledge hesitates to violate the spirit of Bible and Talmud. Hisinterpretations of these mystic passages are therefore expressed inallusions and half-concealed revelations. The diligent student of the"Guide, " who is familiar with the philosophy of Aristotle as taught bythe Arabs Alfarabi and Avicenna will be able without much difficulty tosolve Maimonides's allusions, the casual reader will not. Without goinginto details it will suffice for our purpose to say that in the creationstory Maimonides finds the Aristotelian doctrines of matter and form, of the four elements, of potentiality and actuality, of the differentpowers of the soul, of logical and ethical distinctions (the true andthe false on one hand, the good and the bad on the other), and soon. [300] In the Vision of Ezekiel he sees the Peripatetic ideas of thecelestial spheres, of their various motions, of their souls, theirintellects and the separate Intelligences, of the Active Intellect, ofthe influence of the heavenly bodies on the changes in the sublunarworld, of the fifth element (the ether) and so on. [301] Don IsaacAbarbanel has already criticized this attempt of Maimonides by justlyarguing that if the meaning of the mysterious vision of Ezekiel is whatMaimonides thinks it is, there was no occasion to wrap it in suchobscurity, since the matter is plainly taught in all schools ofphilosophy. [302] We might, however, reply that no less a man than Platoexpresses himself in the Timæus in similarly obscure terms concerningthe origin and formation of the world. Be this as it may, Munk iscertainly right when he says that if, as is not improbable, Ezekiel'svision does contain cosmological speculations, they have nothing to dowith the Aristotelian cosmology, but must be related to Babyloniantheories. [303]

Another favorite book of the Bible for the exegesis of philosophers wasthe book of Job. In this Maimonides sees reflected the several viewsconcerning Providence, divine knowledge and human freedom, which heenumerates (p. 290 ff. ). [304]

The influence of Maimonides upon his contemporaries and immediatesuccessors was indeed very great, and it was not confined to Judaism. Christian Scholastics and Mohammedan theologians studied and used theGuide of the Perplexed. Maimonides himself, it seems, though he wrotehis "Guide" in the Arabic language, did not desire to make it accessibleto the Mohammedans, fearing possibly that some of his doctrinesconcerning prophecy might be offensive to them. Hence he is said to haveinstructed his friends and disciples not to transliterate the Hebrewcharacters, which he in accordance with general Jewish usage employed inwriting Arabic, into Arabic characters. But he was powerless to enforcehis desire and there is no doubt that such transcriptions were in use. Samuel Tibbon himself, the Hebrew translator of the "Guide, " made use ofmanuscript copies written in Arabic letters. We are told that in theMohammedan schools in the city of Fez in Morocco, Jews were appointedto teach Maimonides's philosophy, and there is extant in Hebrewtranslation a commentary by a Mohammedan theologian on the twenty-fivephilosophical propositions laid down by Maimonides as the basis of hisproof of the existence of God (p. 254). [305]

The influence of Maimonides on Christian scholasticism is still greater. We have already said (p. 199 f. ) that the philosophical renaissance inLatin Europe during the thirteenth century was due to the introductionof the complete works of Aristotle in Latin translation. Thesetranslations were made partly from the Arabic versions of theMohammedans, partly from the Greek originals, which became accessibleafter the capture of Constantinople by the Crusaders in 1207. [306]Before this time the scope of philosophical research and investigationin Christian Europe was limited, and its basis was the Platonism of St. Augustine and fragments of Aristotle's logic. In general Platonism wasfavorable to Christian dogma. Plato according to Augustine came nearestto Christianity of all the ancient Greek philosophers. [307] And thedangers to Church doctrine which lurked in philosophical discussionbefore the thirteenth century were a tendency to Pantheism on the partof thinkers imbued with the Neo-Platonic mode of thought, and an undueemphasis either on the unity of God as opposed to the Trinity (Abélard), or on the Trinity at the expense of the unity (Roscellinus ofCompiègne)--conclusions resulting from the attitudes of the thinkers inquestion on the nature of universals. 

In the early part of the thirteenth century for the first time, thehorizon of the Latin schoolmen was suddenly enlarged and brilliantlyillumined by the advent of the complete Aristotle in his severe, exacting and rigorous panoply. All science and philosophy opened beforethe impoverished schoolmen, famished for want of new ideas. And theythrew themselves with zeal and enthusiasm into the study of the newphilosophy. The Church took alarm because the new Aristotle constituteda danger to accepted dogma. He taught the eternity of the world, theuniformity of natural law, the unity of the human intellect, denying byimplication Providence and freedom and individual immortality. Some ofthese doctrines were not precisely those of Aristotle but they could bederived from Aristotelian principles if interpreted in a certain way;and the Arab intermediators between Aristotle and his Christian studentshad so interpreted him. Averroes in particular, who gained thedistinction of being the commentator _par excellence_ of Aristotle, wasresponsible for this mode of interpretation; and he had his followersamong the Masters of Arts in the University of Paris. These and similartendencies the Church was striving to prevent, and it attempted to dothis at first crudely by prohibiting the study and teaching of thePhysical and Metaphysical works of Aristotle. Failing in this the Papacycommissioned three representatives of the Dominican order to expurgateAristotle in order to render him harmless. You might as well think ofexpurgating a book on geometry! The task was never carried out. Butinstead something more valuable for the welfare of the Church wasaccomplished in a different way. Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinasundertook the study of Aristotle and the interpretation of his workswith a view to harmonizing his teachings with the dogmas ofChristianity. Albertus Magnus began the task, Thomas Aquinas, hisgreater disciple, the Maimonides of Christian philosophy, completed it. And in this undertaking Maimonides was Thomas Aquinas's model. [308]

The Guide of the Perplexed was translated into Latin not long after itscomposition. [309] Before Albertus Magnus, Alexander of Hales, theFranciscan leader, and William of Auvergne, the Bishop of Paris, hadread and made use of Maimonides's philosophical masterpiece. AlbertusMagnus was still more diligent in his adoption of Maimonidean views, orin taking account of them, where he is opposed to their adoption. But itremained for Thomas Aquinas, who made the most systematic attempt in themediæval schools to harmonize the philosophy of Aristotle with thedoctrine of the Church, to use Maimonides as his guide and model. LikeMaimonides he employs Aristotelian proofs for the existence of God, proofs based on the eternity of motion; and like him Aquinas argues thatif motion is not eternal and the world was made in time, the existenceof God is still more readily evident. In his discussion of the divineattributes, of angels, of Providence, of Prophecy, of free will, of theceremonial laws in the Pentateuch, Thomas Aquinas constantly takesaccount of Maimonides's views, whether he agrees with them or not. It isno doubt an exaggeration to say that there would have been no Aquinas ifMaimonides had not preceded him. For Aquinas had access to the works ofAristotle and his Arabian commentators, the former of whom he studiedmore diligently than Maimonides himself. But there is no doubt that themethod of harmonizing Aristotelian doctrine with traditional teaching sofar as the common elements of Judaism and Christianity were concernedwas suggested to Aquinas by his Jewish predecessor. It is not ourprovince here to go into details of the system of Aquinas to showwherein he agrees or disagrees with Maimonides, nor is it possible to domore than mention the fact that after Aquinas also, Duns Scotus, thehead of the Franciscan school, had the "Guide" before him, and incomparatively modern times, such celebrities as Scaliger and Leibnitzspeak of the Jewish philosopher with admiration and respect. [310]

That Maimonides's influence upon Jewish theology and thought was deepand lasting is a truism. The attitude of the prominent theologians andphilosophers who succeeded him will appear in the sequel in connectionwith our treatment of the post-Maimonidean writers. Here a word must besaid of the general effect of Maimonides's teaching upon Jews andJudaism throughout the dispersion. His fame as the greatest Jew of histime--great as a Talmudical authority, which appealed to all classes ofJewish students, great as a physician with the added glory of being afavorite at court, great as the head of the Jewish community in theEast, and finally great as a philosopher and scientist--all thesequalifications, never before or after united in the same way in anyother man, served to make him the cynosure of all eyes and to make hisword an object of notice and attention throughout the Jewish diaspora. What he said or wrote could not be ignored whether people liked it ornot. They could afford to ignore a Gabirol even, or an Ibn Daud. ButMaimonides must be reckoned with. The greater the man, the greater thealertness of lesser, though not less independent, spirits, to guardagainst the enslavement of all Judaism to one authority, no matter howgreat. And in particular where this authority erred in boldly adoptingviews in disagreement with Jewish tradition, as it seemed to many, andin setting up a new source of truth alongside of, or even above, therevelation of the Torah and the authority of tradition, to which theselatter must be bent whether they will or no--his errors must bestrenuously opposed and condemned without fear or favor. This was theview of the traditionalists, whose sole authorities in all matters oftheology and related topics were the words of Scripture and Rabbinicliterature as tradition had interpreted them. On the other hand, therationalistic development during the past three centuries, which we havetraced thus far, and the climax of that progress as capped by Maimonideswas not without its influence on another class of the Jewish community, particularly in Spain and southern France; and these regarded Maimonidesas the greatest teacher that ever lived. Their admiration was unboundedfor his personality as well as his method and his conclusions. Hisopponents were regarded as obscurantists, who, rather than the object oftheir attack, were endangering Judaism. All Jewry was divided into twocamps, the Maimunists and the anti-Maimunists; and the polemic and thestruggle between them was long and bitter. Anathema and counteranathema, excommunication and counter excommunication was the least ofthe matter. The arm of the Church Inquisition was invoked, and the altarof a Parisian Church furnished the torch which set on flame the pages ofMaimonides's "Guide" in the French capital. More tragic even was thepunishment meted out to the Jewish informers who betrayed their peopleto the enemy. The men responsible had their tongues cut out. 

The details of the Maimunist controversy belong to the generalhistorian. [311] Our purpose here is to indicate in brief outline thegeneral effect which the teaching of Maimonides had upon his andsubsequent ages. The thirteenth century produced no great men inphilosophy at all comparable to Moses Ben Maimon or his famouspredecessors. The persecutions of the Jews in Spain led many of them toemigrate to neighboring countries, which put an end to the glorious erainaugurated three centuries before by Hasdai Ibn Shaprut. The centre ofJewish liberal studies was transferred to south France, but the literaryactivities there were a pale shadow compared with those which madeJewish Spain famous. Philosophical thought had reached its perigee inMaimonides, and what followed after was an attempt on the part of hislesser disciples and successors to follow in the steps of their master, to extend his teachings, to make them more widespread and more popular. With the transference of the literary centre from Spain to Provence wentthe gradual disuse of Arabic as the medium of philosophic and scientificculture, and the age of translation made its appearance. Prior to, andincluding, Maimonides all the Jewish thinkers whom we have considered, with the exception of Abraham Bar Hiyya and Abraham Ibn Ezra, wrotetheir works in Arabic. After Maimonides Hebrew takes the place ofArabic, and in addition to the new works composed, the commentarieson the "Guide" which were now written in plenty and thephilosophico-exegetical works on the Bible in the Maimonidean spirit, the ancient classics of Saadia, Bahya, Gabirol, Halevi, Ibn Zaddik, IbnDaud and Maimonides himself had to be translated from Arabic intoHebrew. In addition to these religio-philosophical works, it wasnecessary to translate those writings which contained the purelyscientific and philosophical branches that were preliminary to the studyof religious philosophy. This included logic, the various branches ofmathematics and astronomy, medical treatises and some of the books ofthe Aristotelian corpus with the Arabic compendia and commentariesthereon. The grammatical and lexical treatises of Hayyuj and Ibn Janahwere also translated. The most famous of the host of translators, whichthe need of the times brought forth, were the three Tibbonides, Judah(1120-1190), Samuel (1150-1230) and Moses (fl. 1240-1283), Jacob Anatoli(fl. 1194-1256), Shemtob Falaquera (1225-1290), Jacob Ben Machir(1236-1304), Moses of Narbonne (d. After 1362), and others. Some ofthese wrote original works besides. Samuel Ibn Tibbon wrote aphilosophical treatise, "Ma'amar Yikkawu ha-Mayim, "[312] andcommentaries in the Maimonidean vein on Ecclesiastes and the Song ofSongs. His greater fame rests on his translation of the "Guide of thePerplexed. " He translated besides Maimonides's "Letter on Resurrection, "the "Eight Chapters, " and other Arabic writings on science andphilosophy. Moses Ibn Tibbon was prolific as an original writer as wellas a translator. Joseph Ibn Aknin (1160-1226), the favorite pupil ofMaimonides, for whom the latter wrote his "Guide, " is the author oftreatises on philosophical topics, and of exegetical works on certainbooks of the Bible and on the Mishnic treatise, the "Ethics of theFathers. "[312a] Jacob Anatoli, in addition to translating Ptolemy'sAlmagest and Averroes's commentaries on Aristotle's logic, wrote a work, "Malmad ha-Talmidim, " on philosophical homiletics in the form of acommentary on the Pentateuch. [313] Shemtob Falaquera, the translator ofportions of Gabirol's "Fons Vitæ, "[314] is the author of a commentaryon the "Guide, " entitled "Moreh ha-Moreh, "[315] and of a number ofethical and psychological works. [316] Jacob Ben Machir translated anumber of scientific and philosophical works, particularly on astronomy, and is likewise the author of two original works on astronomy. JosephIbn Caspi (1297-1340) was a very prolific writer, having twenty-nineworks to his credit, most of them exegetical, and among them acommentary on the "Guide. "[317] Moses of Narbonne wrote an importantcommentary on the "Guide, "[318] and is likewise the author of a numberof works on the philosophy of Averroes, of whom he was a great admirer. The translations of Judah Ibn Tibbon, the father of translators as hehas been called, go back indeed to the latter half of the twelfthcentury, and Abraham Ibn Ezra translated an astronomical work as earlyas 1160. But the bulk of the work of translation is the product of thethirteenth and fourteenth centuries. The result of these translationswas that scientific and philosophical works became accessible to allthose who knew Hebrew instead of being confined to the lands of Arabianculture. Another effect was the enlargement of the Hebrew language andthe development of a new Hebrew dialect with a philosophical andscientific terminology. These translations so far as they relate to purescience and philosophy were neglected in the closing centuries of themiddle ages, when conditions among the Jews were such as precluded themfrom taking an interest in any but purely religious studies. Continuouspersecutions, the establishment of the Ghettoes, the rise of the Kabbalaand the opposition of the pietists and mystics to the rationalism of thephilosophers all tended to the neglect of scientific study and to theconcentration of all attention upon the Biblical, Rabbinic and mysticalliterature. The Jews at the close of the middle ages and the beginningof modern times withdrew into their shell, and the science and learningof the outside had little effect on them. Hence, and also for the reasonthat with the beginning of modern times all that was mediæval was, inthe secular world, relegated, figuratively speaking, to the ash-heap, orliterally speaking to the mouldering dust of the library shelves--forboth of these reasons the very large number of the translations abovementioned were never printed, and they are still buried on the shelvesof the great European libraries, notably of the British Museum, thenational library of Paris, the Bodleian of Oxford, the royal library ofMunich, and others. The reader who wishes to have an idea of thetranslating and commenting activity of the Jews in the thirteenth andfollowing centuries in the domains of logic, philosophy, mathematics, astronomy, medicine and folklore is referred to the monumental work ofthe late Moritz Steinschneider, the prince of Hebrew Bibliographers, "Die Hebräischen Uebersetzungen des Mittelalters und die Juden alsDolmetscher, " (The Hebrew translations of the middle ages, and the Jewsas dragomen) Berlin, 1893, containing 1077 pages of lexicon octavo sizedevoted to brief enumerations and descriptions of extant editions andmanuscripts of the translations referred to. [319]

CHAPTER XIV

HILLEL BEN SAMUEL

In the post-Maimonidean age all philosophical thinking is in the natureof a commentary on Maimonides whether avowedly or not. The circle ofspeculation and reflection is complete. It is fixed by the "Guide of thePerplexed, " and the efforts of those who followed Maimonides are toelaborate in his spirit certain special topics which are treated in hismasterpiece in a summary way. In the case of the more independentthinkers like Levi ben Gerson we find the further attempt to carry outmore boldly the implications of the philosophical point of view, which, as the latter thought, Maimonides left implicit by reason of hispredisposition in favor of tradition. Hasdai Crescas went still fartherand entirely repudiated the authority of Aristotle, substituting willand emotion for rationalism and logical inference. Not knowledge of Godas logically demonstrated is the highest aim of man, but love of God. But even in his opposition Crescas leans on Maimonides's principles, which he takes up one by one and refutes. Maimonides was thus the pointof departure for his more rigorous followers as well as for hisopponents. In the matter of external sources philosophical reflectionafter Maimonides was enriched in respect to details by the works ofAverroes on the Arabic side and those of the chief Christian scholasticsamong the Latin writers. Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinas furnishedsome material to men like Hillel of Verona in the thirteenth century andDon Isaac Abarbanel in the fifteenth. Maimonides was limited to theAristotelian expositions of Alfarabi and Avicenna. The works ofAverroes, his contemporary, he did not read until toward the end of hislife. After his death Averroes gained in prestige and influence until hesucceeded in putting into the shade his Arabian predecessors and wasregarded by Jew and Christian alike as the Commentator of Aristotle _parexcellence_. His works were rapidly translated into Hebrew and Latin, and the Jewish writers learned their Aristotle from Averroes. Theknowledge of the Arabic language was gradually disappearing among theJews of Europe, and they were indebted for their knowledge of scienceand philosophy to the works translated. Philosophy was declining amongthe Arabs themselves owing to the disfavor of the powers that be, andmany of the scientific writings of the Arabs owe their survival to theHebrew translations or transcriptions in Hebrew characters which escapedthe proscription of the Mohammedan authorities. 

The one problem that came to the front as a result of Averroes'steaching, and which by the solution he gave it formed an importantsubject of debate in the Parisian schools of the thirteenth century, wasthat of the intellect in man, whether every individual had his ownimmortal mind which would continue as an individual entity after thedeath of the body, or whether a person's individuality lasted only aslong as he was alive, and with his death the one human intellect alonesurvived. This was discussed in connection with the general theory ofthe intellect and the three kinds of intellect that were distinguishedby the Arabian Aristotelians, the material, the acquired and the active. The problem goes back to Aristotle's psychology, who distinguishes twointellects in man, passive and active (above, p. Xxxvi). But thetreatment there is so fragmentary and vague that it gave rise to widelyvarying interpretations by the Greek commentators of Aristotle, Alexander of Aphrodisias and Themistius, as well as among the Arabs, Alfarabi, Avicenna and Averroes. The latter insisted on the unity of theintellect for the human race, thereby destroying individual immortality, and this Averroistic doctrine, adopted by some Masters of Arts at theUniversity of Paris, was condemned among other heresies, and refuted inthe writings of Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinas. Maimonides does notdiscuss these problems in detail in his "Guide. " He drops a remarkincidentally here and there, and it would appear that for him too, asfor Averroes, the intellect when in separation from the body is notsubject to individual distinction, that there cannot be several humanintellects, since matter is the principle of individuation and theimmaterial cannot embrace a number of individuals of the samespecies. [320] The problem of immortality he does not treat _ex professo_in the "Guide. " Hence this was a matter taken up by his successors. Hillel ben Samuel as well as Levi ben Gerson discuss this question indetail. 

Hillel ben Samuel does not tower as a giant in mediæval Jewishliterature. His importance is local, as being the first devotee ofJewish learning and philosophy in Italy in the middle of the thirteenthcentury, at the close of a period of comparative ignorance. The ItalianJews before his time contributed little to knowledge and learningdespite their external circumstances, which were more favorable than insome other countries. Hillel ben Samuel (1220-1295) was a strong admirerof Maimonides and undertook to comment on the "Guide of the Perplexed. "He defended Maimonides against the aspersions of his opponents, and wasso confident in the truth of his master's teachings that he proposed aconference of the learned men of Jewry to judge the works and doctrinesof Maimonides and to decide whether the "Guide" should be allowed tolive or should be destroyed. Another interest attaching to Hillel benSamuel is that he was among the first, if not the first Jew who by hisknowledge of Latin had access to the writings of the scholastics, towhom he refers in his "Tagmule ha-Nefesh" (The Rewards of the Soul) asthe "wise men of the nations. " He was also active as a translator fromthe Latin. 

His chief work, which entitles him to brief notice here, is the "Tagmuleha-Nefesh" just mentioned. [321] He does not offer us a system ofphilosophy, but only a treatment of certain questions relating to thenature of the soul, its immortality and the manner of its existenceafter the death of the body, questions which Maimonides passes overlightly. With the exception of the discussion relating to the threekinds of intellect and the question of the unity of the acquiredintellect for all mankind, there is not much that is new or remarkablein the discussion, and we can afford to pass it by with a brief notice. 

Men of science know, he tells us in the introduction, that the valuablepossession of man is the soul, and the happiness thereof is the finalpurpose of man's existence. And yet the number of those who take painsto investigate the nature of the soul is very small, not even one in ahundred. And even the few who do undertake to examine this subject arehindered by various circumstances from arriving at the truth. The matteritself is difficult and requires long preparation and preliminaryknowledge. Then the vicissitudes of life and the shortness of itsduration, coupled with the natural indolence of man when it comes tostudy, completely account for the lack of true knowledge on this mostimportant topic. 

Induced by these considerations Hillel ben Samuel undertook to collectthe scattered notices in the extensive works of the philosophers andarranged and expounded them briefly so as not to discourage those whoare in search of wisdom. His purpose is the knowledge of truth, which isan end in itself. He desires to explain the existence of the soul, itsnature and reward. The soul is that which makes man man, hence we shouldknow the nature of that which makes us intelligent creatures, else we donot deserve the name. 

Another reason for the importance of knowing the nature of the soul isthat error in this matter may lead to more serious mistakes in otherdepartments of knowledge and belief. Thus if a man who calls himselfpious assumes that the soul after parting from the body is subject tocorporeal reward and punishment, as appears from a literal rendering ofpassages in Bible and Talmud, he will be led to think that the soulitself is corporeal. And since the soul, it is believed, comes from onhigh, the upper world must have bodies and definite places, and hencethe angels too are bodies. But since the angels are emanations from thedivine splendor, God too is body! Thus you see how serious are theconsequences of a belief, in itself perhaps not so dangerous, as that ofthe corporeality of the soul. [322]

We must first prove the existence of the soul. This can be shown invarious ways. We see that of natural bodies some take food, grow, propagate their like, while others, like stones, do not do these things. This shows that the powers and functions mentioned cannot be due to thecorporeal part of the objects performing them, else stones, too, wouldhave those powers, as they are also corporeal like the rest. There musttherefore be a different principle, not body, which is responsible forthose activities. We call it soul. 

As all existents are divided into substance and accident, the soul mustbe either the one or the other. Now an accident, according to Aristotle, is that which may be or not be without causing the being or destructionof the object in which it is. But the body cannot be a living bodywithout the soul. Hence the soul is not an accident; it is therefore asubstance. Substance may be corporeal or incorporeal. The soul cannot bea corporeal substance, for all body is divisible, and subject to motionand change, whereas the soul, as will be shown later, is not movable, not changeable and not divisible. It might seem that the soul is subjectto motion, since it descends into the body and rises again when itleaves the body. But this is not so. Descent and ascent when thusapplied to the soul are metaphorical. The union of soul and body is nota spatial relation. The upper world from which the soul comes is notcorporeal, hence there is no such thing as place there, nor anythinglimited by space. Hence the coming of the soul from the spiritual worldand its return thither are not motions at all. The relation of the soulto the body is as that of form to matter, as Aristotle says. 

Granted that the soul's union with and separation from the body are notmotions, is not the soul subject to motion while in the body? Hillel'sanswer is that it is not, and he proves his point in the prescribedfashion by making use of Aristotle's classification of motion into (1)genesis and (2) decay, (3) increase and (4) diminution, (5) qualitativechange and (6) motion proper, or motion of translation. He thenundertakes to show that the soul can have none of the kinds of motionhere enumerated. The arguments offer nothing striking or interesting, and we can afford to omit them. It is worth while, however, to refer tohis interpretation of emotion. The passage of the soul from joy togrief, from anger to favor, might seem to be a kind of motion. Hillelanswers this objection by saying that these emotions do not pertain tothe soul as such. Their primary cause is the state of mixture of thehumors in the body, which affects certain corporeal powers in certainways; and the soul shares in these affections only so far as it isunited with the body. In its own nature the soul has no emotions. 

We can also prove that the soul is not divisible. For a divisible thingmust have parts. Now if the soul is divided or divisible, this meanseither that every part of the soul, no matter how small, has the samepowers as the whole, or that the powers of the soul are the resultant ofthe union of the parts. The first alternative is impossible, for itleads us to the absurd conclusion that instead of one soul every personhas an infinite number of souls, or at least a great number of souls. The second alternative implies that while the soul is not actuallydivided, since its powers are the summation of the parts, which form aunit, it is potentially divisible. But this signifies that at some timethis potential divisibility will be realized (or potentiality would bevain and meaningless) and we are brought back to the absurdity of amultiplicity of souls in the human body. 

Having shown that the soul is not movable, changeable or divisible, weare certain of its incorporeality, and we are ready to give a definitionof the soul. Hillel accordingly defines the soul as "a stage ofemanation, consisting of a formal substance, which subsists through itsown perfection, and occupies the fourth place in the emanatory process, next to the Active Intellect. Its ultimate source is God himself, who isthe ultimate perfection and the Good, and it emanates from himindirectly through the mediation of the separate Powers standing aboveit in the scale of emanation. The soul constitutes the first entelechyof a natural body. "[323]

The above definition is interesting. It shows that Hillel did notclearly distinguish the Aristotelian standpoint from the Neo-Platonic, for in the definition just quoted, the two points of view are combined. That all mediæval Aristotelianism was tinged with Neo-Platonism, especially in the doctrine of the Active Intellect, is well known. Butin Hillel's definition of the soul we have an extreme form of thispeculiar combination, and it represents a step backward to thestandpoint of Pseudo-Bahya and Ibn Zaddik. The work of Ibn Daud andMaimonides in the interest of a purer Aristotelianism seems not to haveenlightened Hillel. The Neo-Platonic emanation theory is clearlyenunciated in Hillel's definition. The soul stands fourth in the series. The order he has in mind is probably (1) God, (2) SeparateIntelligences, (3) Active Intellect, (4) Soul. We know that Hillel was astudent of the Neo-Platonic "Liber de Causis" (_cf. _ above, p. Xx), having translated some of it into Hebrew, and he might have imbibed hisNeo-Platonism from that Proclean book. 

Continuing the description of the soul in man, he says that the noblestpart of matter, _viz. _, the human body, is endowed with the rationalsoul, and becomes the subject of the powers of the latter. Thereby itbecomes a man, _i. E. _, a rational animal, distinguished from all otheranimals, and similar to the nature of the angels. 

The Active Intellect causes its light to emanate upon the rational soul, thus bringing its powers out into actuality. The Active Intellect, which is one of the ten degrees of angels, is related to the rationalpower in man as the sun to the power of sight. The sun gives light, which changes the _potentially_ seeing power into _actually_ seeing, andthe potentially visible object into the actually visible. Moreover, thissame light enables the sight to see the sun itself, which is the causeof the actualization in the sight. So the Active Intellect givessomething to the rational power which is related to it as light to thesight; and by means of this something the rational soul can see orunderstand the Active Intellect itself. Also the potentiallyintelligible objects become through this influence actuallyintelligible, and the man who was potentially intelligent becomesthereby actually intelligent. 

_Intellect_ ("sekel") in man is distinguished from _wisdom_ ("hokmah"). By the former power is meant an immediate understanding of abstractprinciples. The latter is _mediate_ understanding. Wisdom denotesspeculation about universals through inference from particulars. Intellect applies directly to the universals and to their influence uponthe particulars. [324]

Hillel next discusses the live topic of the day, made popular byAverroes, namely, whether there are in essence as many individual soulsas there are human bodies, or, as Averroes thought, there is only oneuniversal soul, and that its individualizations in different men areonly passing incidents, due to the association of the universal soulwith the human body, and disappear when the body dies. The "sages of theGentiles, " Hillel tells us, regard Averroes's notion as heretical, andleading besides to the absurd conclusion that the same soul is bothrewarded and punished; a view which upsets all religion. Averroesemploys a number of arguments to prove his point, among them being thefollowing. If there are many souls, they are either all existing frometernity or they are created with the body. The first is impossible, forsince the soul is a form of the body, we should have actually aninfinite number of forms, and this would necessitate the actualexistence of an infinite number of bodies also; else the existence ofthese souls for the purpose of joining the bodies would be in vain. Butit is absurd to suppose that there has been from eternity an infinitenumber of bodies created like the number of souls, and yet they have notbecome real bodies with souls until now. 

The second alternative is also impossible. For if there are many soulswhich came into being with the bodies, they either came from nothing orfrom something. From nothing is impossible, for nothing comes fromnothing except by way of creation, which is a miracle; and we do notbelieve in miracles unless we have to. That they came from something isalso impossible; for this something can be neither matter nor form. Itcannot be matter, for form, the actual and superior, cannot come fromthe potential and inferior. It cannot be form, for then form wouldproceed from form by way of genesis and dissolution, which is not true. Matter is the cause of generation and dissolution, not form. We are thusforced to the conclusion that the soul is one and eternal, one insubstance and number; and that it becomes many only _per accidens_, byvirtue of the multiplicity of its receiving subjects, comparable to thelight of the one sun, which divides into many rays. 

The Bible cannot help us to decide this question, for its expressionscan be interpreted either way. Hillel then undertakes to adjudicatebetween the contending views by striking a compromise. He feels that heis contributing to the solution of an important problem by an originalsuggestion, which he says is to be found nowhere else expressed withsuch clearness and brevity. 

Here again Hillel's Neo-Platonic tendencies are in evidence. For heassumes both a universal soul and a great number of individual soulsemanating from it in a descending series. The objection that formscannot come from other forms by way of generation and dissolution, Hillel says, is not valid, for no such process is here involved. Generation and dissolution is peculiar to the action of body upon body, which is by contact. A _spiritual_ form acts upon other forms notthrough contact, because it is not limited by time or place. We knowconcerning the Intelligences that each comes from the one previous to itby way of emanation, and the same thing applies to the issue of manyhuman souls from the one universal soul. After death the rational partof every soul remains; that part which every soul receives from theActive Intellect through the help of the _possible_ or _materialintellect_, and which becomes identified with the Active and separateIntellect. This is the part which receives reward and punishment, whereas the one universal soul from which they all emanate is a divineemanation, and is not rewarded or punished. [325]

We must now discuss further the nature of the three grades of intellect. For this it will be necessary to lay down three preliminarypropositions. 

1. There must be an intellect whose relation to the material intellectis the same as that of the object of sense perception is to the sense. This means that just as there must be a real and actual object to arousethe sense faculty to perceive, so there must be an actual intelligibleobject to stir the rational power to comprehend. 

2. It follows from 1 that as the material sense has the power ofperceiving the sensible object, so the material intellect has the powerof perceiving this other intellect. 

3. If it has this power, this must at some time be realized _in actu_. Therefore at some time the material intellect is identified with theother intellect, which is the Active Intellect. 

We must now prove 1. This is done as follows: We all know that we arepotentially intelligent, and it takes effort and pains and study tobecome actually intelligent. In fact the process of intellection has topass several stages from sense perception through imagination. Now ourintellect cannot make itself pass from potentiality to actuality. Hencethere must be something else as agent producing this change; and thisagent must be actually what it induces in us. Hence it is an activeintellect. 

The material intellect has certain aspects in common with the sensefaculty, and in certain aspects it differs. It is similar to it in beingreceptive and not active. But the mode of receptivity is different inthe two. As the intellect understands all forms, it cannot be a powerresiding in a body in the sense of extending through it and beingdivided with the division of the body, as we see in some of the powersof sense. This we can prove as follows:

1. If the intellect were receptive in the same manner as the senses, itwould receive only a definite kind of form, as for example the sense ofsight does not receive taste. 

2. If the intellect were a power in body and had a special form, itcould not receive that form, just as for example if the eye werecolored, it could not perceive colors. 

3. If the intellect were a corporeal power, it would be affected by itsobject and injured by a powerful stimulus, as is the case in the sensesof sight and hearing. A dazzling light injures the eye, a deafeningnoise injures the ear, so that thereafter neither sense can perform itsnormal function properly. This is not true with the intellect. Anunusually difficult subject of thought does not injure the intellect. 

4. If the intellect were similar in its activity to sense perception, itwould not be self-conscious, as the sense faculties cannot perceivethemselves. 

5. The intellect, if it were like sense, would not be able to comprehenda thing and its opposite at the same time, or it would do so in aconfused manner, as is the case in the powers of sense. 

6. The intellect perceives universals; the sense, particulars. 

This being the case, there is a difference of opinion as to the natureof the material intellect. Some say that it has no definite nature initself except that of possibility and capacity, though it is differentfrom other possibilities in this respect that it is not resident in, anddependent upon a material subject like the others. That is why Aristotlesays that the material intellect is not anything before it intellects;that it is in its essence potential with reference to the_intelligibilia_, and becomes actual when it understands them actually. 

Themistius says it is not any of the existents actually, but a potentialessence receiving material forms. Its nature is analogous to that ofprime matter; hence it is called _material_ intellect. It is best tocall it possible intellect. Being a potential existent it is not subjectto generation and dissolution any more than prime matter. 

Alexander of Aphrodisias thinks the material intellect is only acapacity, _i. E. _, a power in the soul, and appears when the soul entersthe body, hence is not eternal _a parte ante_. 

Averroes holds that the possible intellect is a separate substance, andthat the capacity is something it has by virtue of its being connectedwith the body as its subject. Hence this capacity is neither entirelydistinct from it nor is it identical with it. According to him thepossible intellect is not a part of the soul. 

Which of these views is correct, says Hillel, requires discussion, butit is clear that whichever of these we adopt there is no reason opposingthe conjunction of the possible intellect with the Active. For if it isan eternal substance, potential in its nature, like primary matter, then it becomes actual when it understands the intelligible objects. Thesame is true if it is a capacity residing in the soul. 

Hillel is thus of the opinion in this other question debated in thosedays, whether the intellect of man is capable of conjunction during lifewith the angelic Active Intellect, that it is. The Active Intellect, hesays, in actualizing the material intellect influences it not in themanner of one body acting upon another, _i. E. _, in the manner of anefficient or material cause, but rather as its formal or final cause, leading it to perfection. It is like the influence which the separateIntelligences receive from one another, the influence of emanation, andnot a material influence comparable to generation. This reception ofinfluence from the Active Intellect on the part of the potential isitself conjunction. It means that the agent and the thing acted uponbecome one, and the same substance and species. The material intellectbecomes a separate substance when it can understand itself. [326]

Before taking up the more theological problem of reward and punishment, he devotes the last section of the theoretical part of his book to adiscussion of the relation of the possible or material intellect to therest of the human soul. This problem also arose from Averroes'sinterpretation of the Aristotelian psychology, and is closely related tothe other one of the unity of the human intellect. It is needless for usto enter into the technical details which are a weariness to the fleshof the modern student, but it is worth while to state briefly themotives underlying the opposing views. Averroes, who had no theologicalscruples, interpreted Aristotle to mean that the part of the soul whichwas intimately associated with the body as its form, constituting anindissoluble organism in conjunction with it, embraced its lowerfaculties of sense, imagination and the more concrete types of judgment. These are so intimately bound up with the life of the body that they diewith its death. The reason on the other hand, which has to do withimmaterial ideas, or intelligibles as they called them, is eternal andis not the form of the body. It is a unitary immaterial substance and isnot affected by the life or death of the body. To be sure it comes incontact with the human soul during the life of the body, thus bringinginto existence an individualized human reason as a passing episode. Butthis individualized phase of the intellect's life is dependent upon thebody and ceases when the body dies, or is reabsorbed in the universalintellect. 

The theological implications of this view were that if there is anyreward and punishment after death, it would either have to beadministered to the lower faculties of the soul, which would have to bemade immortal for the purpose, or if the rational soul is the subject ofretribution, this cannot affect the individual, as there is noindividual rational soul. Hence the Christian opponents of Averroes, like Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinas (Hillel speaks of them here asthe "Religionists, " or the "Sages who believe in religion"), endeavoredto vindicate for the Aristotelian definition of the soul as the form ofthe body, also the rational part, thus maintaining the view that thereason too has an individual existence both during life and after death. Thomas Aquinas, as a truer interpreter of Aristotle, goes so far as tomaintain that the Active Intellect itself is also a part of the humansoul, and not one of the angelic separate Intelligences. NeitherMaimonides nor Hillel ben Samuel, nor any other Jewish philosopher wasable to depart so widely from their Arabian masters or to undertake anindependent study of Aristotle's text, as to come to a similarconclusion. Hence the Active Intellect in Jewish Philosophy isunanimously held to be the last of the Angelic substances, and theproximate inspirer of the prophet. The discussion therefore in Hillel'swork concerns the possible intellect, and here he ventures to disagreewith Averroes and decides in favor of the possible intellect as a partof the soul and the subject of reward and punishment. [327]

Concerning the nature of reward and punishment after death opinions aredivided. Some think that both reward and punishment are corporeal. Somesay reward is spiritual, punishment is corporeal; while a small numberare of the opinion that both are spiritual. Hillel naturally agrees withthe latter and gives reasons for his opinion. If the soul, as was shownbefore, is incorporeal, immaterial and a _formal_ substance, it cannotbe influenced by corporeal treatment. For corporeal influence impliesmotion on the part of agent and patient, and the pervasion of theinfluence of the former through the parts of the latter; whereas aspiritual substance has no parts. Besides, if reward and punishment arecorporeal, and Paradise is to be taken literally, then why separate thesoul from the body, why not reward the living person with eternal lifeand give him the enjoyment of paradise while on earth? The effect wouldbe much greater upon the rest of mankind, who would see how therighteous fare and the wicked. The objection that this would make peoplemercenary does not hold, for they are mercenary in any case, since theyexpect reward; whether in this life or in the next makes no difference. Reward must therefore be spiritual, and so must punishment, since thetwo go together. [328]

When God in his kindness favored the human race by giving them a soul, which he united with the body, he also gave them the possibility ofattaining eternal happiness. For this purpose he arranged three gradesof ascent, _viz. _, the three intellects spoken of above, the material orpossible intellect, the acquired intellect (this is the actualfunctioning of the possible intellect and the result thereof) and theactive intellect. The second intellect is partly speculative ortheoretical and partly practical. The theoretical intellect studies andcontemplates all intelligible existents which are separate from matter. There is nothing practical in this contemplation, it is just theknowledge of existents and their causes. This is called the science oftruth, and is the most important part of philosophy. 

The practical intellect is again divided into the _cogitative_ and the_technological_. The former decides whether a thing should be done ornot, and discriminates between the proper and the improper in humanactions and qualities. It is important as a guide to the happiness ofthe soul because it instructs the appetitive power in reference to thosethings which are subject to the will, and directs it to aim at the goodand to reject the evil. 

The technological intellect is that by which man learns arts and trades. The practical intellect is also theoretical in the sense that it has tothink in order to discriminate between the proper and the improper, andbetween the beneficial and injurious in all things pertaining topractice. The difference between the speculative and practicalintellects is in the respective objects of their comprehension, andhence is accidental and not essential. The objects of the theoreticalintellect are the true and the false; of the practical, the good and thebad. The acquired intellect gives these intelligibles to the soulthrough the possible intellect, and is intermediate between the latterand the Active Intellect, which is one of the separate Intelligencesabove soul. The Active Intellect watches over the rational animal thathe may attain to the happiness which his nature permits. 

Men differ according to their temperamental composition and their humanconduct. This leads to differences in the power of understanding and inthe amount of influence received from the Active Intellect. Hillelquotes Maimonides in support of his view that the prophetic stage is anemanation of glory from God through the medium of the Active Intellect, which exerts its influence upon the rational power and upon theimagination, so that the prophet sees his vision objectified _extraanimam_. The three conditions requisite for prophecy are perfection intheory, perfection in imagination and perfection in morals. The firstwithout the second and third produces a philosopher; the second withoutthe first and third gives rise to a statesman or magician. 

It is important to know, he tells us, that the cultivation of the reasonand imagination alone is not sufficient. Practice of the commandments isvery important. Hence a man must guide properly the two powers of senseperception and desire, which are instruments of the rational power. For, as Maimonides says in his commentary on Aboth (_cf. _ p. 282), allobservance and violation of the commandments, good and bad qualitiesdepend upon those two powers. Without a proper training of these theinfluence of the active intellect upon the reason and imagination maylead to evil. 

Beginning with sense perception a man must train all his five senses toattend only to what is good and to turn away from evil. When hesatisfies his sensuous desires, he must do this in order to preserve hisbody that he may be enabled to serve God in the best possible way. 

The same applies to the power of desire. This is the power which directsone to pursue the agreeable and shun the disagreeable. From it proceedalso courage, confidence, anger, good will, joy, sorrow, humility, pride. All these qualities must be used in the service of God. If a mando this, he will attain the grade of an angelic being even during life, and will be able to perform miracles like the prophets and the sages ofthe Talmud. 

After death the souls of such men reach even a higher degree than theyhad before entering the body, as a reward for not allowing themselvesto be degraded by their corporeal desires, but on the contrary directingthese to higher aims. [329]

As for the nature of reward and punishment more particularly, we may saythat the soul of the wicked loses all the glory promised to her anddescends to a position lower than was hers originally. She is expelledfrom the land of life and remains in darkness forever, without returningto her original station. Knowing what she has lost, she will feelcontinuous distress, sorrow and fear, for the power of imaginationremains with the soul after death. But there is no physical burning withfire. On the other hand, the soul of the righteous will return to God. 

The doctrine of the resurrection and the explanation for it are afurther proof that the soul after death is not punished corporeally. Themotive of the resurrection is that the soul and body may receive theircompensation together as in life. If then the retribution of the soul iscorporeal, there is no need of resurrection. [330]

Hillel then proceeds to show that the words of the Rabbis which seem tospeak for corporeal retribution are not to be taken literally. In thisconnection it is worth while to reproduce his classification of thecontents of the Talmud and his attitude toward them. He enumerates sixclasses. 

1. Passages in the Talmudic and Midrashic literature which must be takenliterally. These are the discussions of the _Halaka_ (the legal andceremonial portions). To pervert these from their literal meaning, or tomaintain that the _intention_ of the law is the important thing and notthe practice of the ceremony, is heresy and infidelity; though it ismeritorious to seek for an explanation of every law, as the Rabbisthemselves do in many instances. 

2. Passages which should be understood as parables and allegories with adeeper meaning. These are the peculiar _Haggadahs_, or the strangeinterpretations of Biblical verses where no ceremonial precept isinvolved. 

3. Statements similar to those of the Prophetical books of the Bible, which were the result of the influence of the Active Intellect and cameto the sages in a dream or in the waking state, speaking of the futurein an allegorical manner. These are the extraordinary tales found in theTalmud, which cannot be understood literally, as they involve aviolation of the order of nature; and no miracle must be believed unlessfor a very important reason. 

4. The homilies addressed to the people on the occasion of holidays forthe purpose of exhorting them to divine worship and observance of theLaw. Many of these are hyperbolical in their expression, especially inthe promises concerning the future blessings in store for the people. These were in the nature of encouragement to the people to make theirburdens easier to bear. Here belong also unusual interpretations ofBiblical verses, explanations which do not give the original meaning ofthe verse in question, but are suggested in order to interest thepeople. We must add, too, stories of the good things that came to piouspeople in return for their piety. These must be taken for the most partliterally, unless they are clearly improbable. 

5. Jokes and jests by way of relief from the strain of study. Hyperbolesbelong here. 

6. Narratives of miracles done for pious people, such as reviving thedead, punishing with death by means of a word, bringing down rain, andso on. All these must be taken literally. To disbelieve is heresy. Thisis true only where the alleged miracles were done for a high purpose, otherwise we need not believe them. 

The reason the Bible and the Talmud express themselves in corporealterms concerning reward and punishment is in order to frighten thepeople and to impress them with the terrible punishment consequent uponwrongdoing. The people do not understand any reward and punishmentunless it is physical and corporeal. In reality spiritual existence ismore real than physical. [331]

CHAPTER XV

LEVI BEN GERSON

Among the men who devoted themselves to philosophical investigation inthe century and a half after Maimonides's death, the greatest and mostindependent was without doubt Levi ben Gerson or Gersonides, as he isalso called. There were others who were active as commentators, translators and original writers, and who achieved a certain fame, buttheir work was too little original to merit more than very brief noticein these pages. Isaac Albalag[331a] (second half of thirteenth century)owes what reputation he enjoys to the boldness with which he enunciatedcertain doctrines, such as the eternity of the world and particularlythe notion, well enough known among the Averroists of the University ofParis at that time and condemned by the Church, but never beforeannounced or defended in Jewish philosophy--the so-called doctrine ofthe twofold truth. This was an attitude assumed in self-defence, sincerely or not as the case may be, by a number of scholastic writers, who advanced philosophic views at variance with the dogma of the Church. They maintained that a given thesis might be true and false at the sametime, true for philosophy and false for theology, or vice versa. [332]Shem Tob Falaquera (1225-1290) is a more important man than Albalag. Hewas a thorough student of the Aristotelian and other philosophy that wasaccessible to him through his knowledge of Arabic. Munk's success inidentifying Avicebron with Gabirol (p. 63) was made possible byFalaquera's translation into Hebrew of extracts from the "Fons Vitæ. " Ofgreat importance also is Falaquera's commentary of Maimonides's "Guide, "which, with that of Moses of Narbonne (d. After 1362), is based upon aknowledge of Arabic and a thorough familiarity with the Aristotelianphilosophy of the Arabs, and is superior to the better knowncommentaries of Shemtob, Ephodi, and Abarbanel. Falaquera also wroteoriginal works of an ethical and philosophical character. 

Joseph Ibn Caspi (1297-1340) is likewise a meritorious figure as acommentator of Maimonides and as a philosophical exegete of Scripture. But none of these men stands out as an independent thinker with a strongindividuality, carrying forward in any important and authoritativedegree the work of the great Maimonides. Great Talmudic knowledge, whichwas a necessary qualification for national recognition, these men seemnot to have had; and on the other hand none of them felt called upon orable to make a systematic synthesis of philosophy and Judaism in a largeway. 

Levi ben Gerson (1288-1344) was the first after Maimonides who can atall be compared with the great sage of Fostat. He was a greatmathematician and astronomer; he wrote supercommentaries on theAristotelian commentaries of Averroes, who in his day had become thesource of philosophical knowledge for the Hebrew student; he wasthoroughly versed in the Talmud as his commentary on the Pentateuchshows; and he is one of the recognized Biblical exegetes of the middleages. Finally in his philosophical masterpiece "Milhamot Adonai" (TheWars of the Lord), [333] he undertakes to solve in a thoroughlyscholastic manner those problems in philosophy and theology whichMaimonides had either not treated adequately or had not solved toGersonides's satisfaction. That despite the technical character andstyle of the "Milhamot, " Gersonides achieved such great reputation showsin what esteem his learning and critical power were held by hiscontemporaries. His works were all written in Hebrew, and if he had anyknowledge of Arabic and Latin it was very limited, too limited to enablehim to make use of the important works written in those languages. [334]His fame extended beyond the limits of Jewish thought, as is shown bythe fact that his scientific treatise dealing with the astronomicalinstrument he had discovered was translated into Latin in 1377 by orderof Pope Clement VI, and his supercommentaries on the early books of theAristotelian logic were incorporated, in Latin translation, in the Latineditions of Aristotle and Averroes of the 16th century. [335]

Levi ben Gerson's general attitude to philosophical study and itsrelation to the content of Scripture is the same as had become commonproperty through Maimonides and his predecessors. The happiness andperfection of man are the purpose of religion and knowledge. Thisperfection of man, or which is the same thing, the perfection of thehuman soul, is brought about through perfection in morals and intheoretical speculation, as will appear more clearly when we discuss thenature of the human intellect and its immortality. Hence the purpose ofthe Bible is to lead man to perfect himself in these twoelements--morals and science. For this reason the Law consists of threeparts. The first is the legal portion of the Law containing the 613commandments, mandatory and prohibitive, concerning belief and practice. This is preparatory to the second and third divisions of the Pentateuch, which deal respectively with social and ethical conduct, and the scienceof existence. As far as ethics is concerned it was not practicable tolay down definite commandments and prohibitions because it is soextremely difficult to reach perfection in this aspect of life. Thus ifthe Torah gave definite prescriptions for exercising and controlling ouranger, our joy, our courage, and so on, the results would be verydiscouraging, for the majority of men would be constantly disobeyingthem. And this would lead to the neglect of the other commandmentslikewise. Hence the principles of social and ethical conduct areinculcated indirectly by means of narratives exemplifying certain typesof character in action and the consequences flowing from their conduct. The third division, as was said before, contains certain teachings of ametaphysical character respecting the nature of existence. This is themost important of all, and hence forms the beginning of the Pentateuch. The account of creation is a study in the principles of philosophicalphysics. [336]

As to the relations of reason and belief or authority, Levi ben Gersonshares in the optimism of the Maimonidean school and the philosophicmiddle age generally, that there is no opposition between them. Thepriority should be given to reason where its demands are unequivocal, for the meaning of the Scriptures is not always clear and is subject tointerpretation. [337] On the other hand, after having devoted an entirebook of his "Milhamot" to a minute investigation of the nature of thehuman intellect and the conditions of its immortality, he disarms inadvance all possible criticism of his position from the religious pointof view by saying that he is ready to abandon his doctrine if it isshown that it is in disagreement with religious dogma. He developed hisviews, he tells us, because he believes that they are in agreement withthe words of the Torah. [338] This apparent contradiction is to beexplained by making a distinction between the abstract statement of theprinciple and the concrete application thereof. In general Levi benGerson is so convinced of man's prerogative as a rational being that hecannot believe the Bible meant to force upon him the belief in thingswhich are opposed to reason. Hence, since the Bible is subject tointerpretation, the demands of the reason are paramount where they donot admit of doubt. On the other hand, where the traditional dogma ofJudaism is clear and outspoken, it is incumbent upon man to be modestand not to claim the infallibility of direct revelation for the limitedpowers of logical inference and deduction. 

We must now give a brief account of the questions discussed in the"Milhamot Adonai. " And first a word about Gersonides's style and method. One is reminded, in reading the Milhamot, of Aristotle as well as ThomasAquinas. There is no rhetoric and there are no superfluous words. All isprecise and technical, and the vocabulary is small. One is surprised tosee how in a brief century or so the Hebrew language has become soflexible an instrument in the expression of Aristotelian ideas. Levi benGerson does not labor in the expression of his thought. His linguisticinstrument is quite adequate and yields naturally to the manipulation ofthe author. Gersonides, the minute logician and analyst, has no use forrhetorical flourishes and figures of speech. The subject, he says, isdifficult enough as it is, without being made more so by rhetoricalobscuration, unless one intends to hide the confusion of one's thoughtunder the mask of fine writing. [339] Like Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas, he gives a history of the opinions of others in the topic underdiscussion, and enumerates long lists of arguments _pro_ and _con_ withrigorous logical precision. The effect upon the reader is monotonous andwearisome. Aristotle escapes this by the fact that he is groping his waybefore us. He has not all his ideas formulated in proper order and formready to deliver. He is primarily the investigator, not the pedagogue, and the brevity and obscurity of his style pique the ambitious readerand spur him on to puzzle out the meaning. Not so Thomas Aquinas and thescholastics generally. As the term scholastic indicates, they developedtheir method in the schools. They were expositors of what was readymade, rather than searchers for the new. Hence the question of form wasan important one and was determined by the purpose of presenting one'sideas as clearly as may be to the student. Add to this that the logic ofAristotle and the syllogism was the universal method of presentation andthe monotony and wearisomeness becomes evident. Levi ben Gerson is inthis respect like Aquinas rather than like Aristotle. And he is thefirst of his kind in Jewish literature. Since the larger views andproblems were already common property, the efforts of Gersonides weredirected to a more minute discussion of the more technical details ofsuch problems as the human intellect, prophecy, Providence, creation, and so on. For this reason, too, it will not be necessary for us to domore than give a brief résumé of the results of Gersonides'slucubrations without entering into the really bewildering andhair-splitting arguments and distinctions which make the book so hard onthe reader. 

We have already had occasion in the Introduction (p. Xxxvi) to referbriefly to Aristotle's theory of the intellect and the distinctionbetween the passive and the active intellects in man. The ideas of theArabs were also referred to in our treatment of Judah Halevi, Ibn Daudand Maimonides (pp. 180 f. , 213 f. , 282). Hillel ben Samuel, as we saw(p. 317 ff. ), was the first among the Jews who undertook to discuss ingreater detail the essence of the three kinds of intellect, material, acquired and active, as taught by the Mohammedan and ChristianScholastics, and devoted some space to the question of the unity of thematerial intellect. Levi ben Gerson takes up the same question of thenature of the material intellect and discusses the various views withmore rigor and minuteness than any of his Jewish predecessors. His chiefsource was Averroes. The principal views concerning the nature of thepossible or material intellect in man were those attributed to Alexanderof Aphrodisias, the most important Greek commentator of Aristotle (livedabout 200 of the Christian Era), Themistius, another Aristotelian Greekcommentator who lived in the time of Emperor Julian, and Averroes, thefamous Arabian philosopher and contemporary of Maimonides. All thesethree writers pretended to expound Aristotle's views of the passiveintellect rather than propound their own. And Levi ben Gerson discussestheir ideas before giving his own. 

Alexander's idea of the passive intellect in man is that it is simply acapacity residing in the soul for receiving the universal forms ofmaterial things. It has no substantiality of its own, and hence does notsurvive the lower functions of the soul, namely, sensation andimagination, which die with the body. This passive intellect isactualized through the Active Intellect, which is not a part of man atall, but is identified by Alexander with God. The Active Intellect isthus pure form and actuality, and enables the material or possibleintellect in man, originally a mere potentiality, to acquire generalideas, and thus to become an intellect with a content. This is calledthe actual or acquired intellect, which though at first dependent on thedata of sense, may succeed later in continuing its activity unaided bysense perception. And in so far as the acquired intellect thinks of thepurely immaterial ideas and things which make up the content of thedivine intellect (the Active Intellect), it becomes identified with thelatter and is immortal. The reason for supposing that the materialintellect in man is a mere capacity residing in the soul and not anindependent substance is because as having the capacity to receive allkinds of forms it must itself not be of any form. Thus in order that thesense of sight may receive all colors as they are, it must itself befree from color. If the sight had a color of its own, this would preventit from receiving other colors. Applying this principle to the intellectwe make the same inference that it must in itself be neutral, notidentified with any one idea or form, else this would color all elseknocking for admission, and the mind would not know things as they are. Now a faculty which has no form of its own, but is a mere mirror so tospeak of all that may be reflected in it, cannot be a substance, andmust be simply a power inherent in a substance and subject to the samefate as that in which it inheres. This explains the motive ofAlexander's view and is at the same time a criticism of the doctrine ofThemistius. 

This commentator is of the opinion that the passive intellect of whichAristotle speaks is not a mere capacity inherent in something else, buta real spiritual entity or substance independent of the lower parts ofthe soul, though associated with them during the life of the body, andhence is not subject to generation and destruction, but is eternal. Insupport of this view may be urged that if the passive intellect weremerely a capacity of the lower parts of the soul, we should expect it togrow weaker as the person grows older and his sensitive and imaginativepowers are beginning to decline; whereas the contrary is the case. Theolder the person the keener is his intellect. The difficulty, however, remains that if the human intellect is a real substance independent ofthe rest of the soul, why is it that at its first appearance in thehuman being it is extremely poor in content, being all but empty, andgrows as the rest of the body and the soul is developed?

To obviate these difficulties, Averroes in his commentary on the _DeAnima_ of Aristotle practically identifies (according to Levi benGerson's view of Averroes) the material intellect with the ActiveIntellect. The Active Intellect according to him is neither identicalwith the divine, as Alexander maintains, nor is it a part of man, asThemistius and others think, but is the last of the separateIntelligences, next to the spiritual mover of the lunar sphere. It is apure actuality, absolutely free from matter, and hence eternal. ThisActive Intellect in some mysterious manner becomes associated with man, and this association results in a temporary phase represented by thematerial intellect. As a result of the sense perceptions, images of theexternal objects remain in the imagination, and the Active Intellecttakes hold of these images, which are potentially universal ideas, andby its illumination produces out of them actual ideas and an intellectin which they reside, the material intellect. The material intellect istherefore the result of the combination of the Active Intellect with thememory images, known as _phantasmata_ (φαντάσματα), in the human facultyof imagination. So long as this association exists, the materialintellect receives the intelligible forms as derived from the_phantasmata_, and these forms are represented by such ideas as "allanimal is sensitive, " "all man is rational, " _i. E. _, ideas concerningthe objects of this world. This phase of man's mind ceases when the bodydies, and the Active Intellect alone remains, whose content is free frommaterial forms. The Active Intellect contemplates itself, a pureintelligence. At the same time it is possible for man to identifyhimself with the Active Intellect as he acquires knowledge in thematerial intellect, for the Active Intellect is like light which makesthe eye see. In seeing, the eye not merely perceives the form of theexternal object, but indirectly also receives the light which made theobject visible. In the same way the human soul in acquiring knowledge asimplicit in its _phantasmata_, at the same time gets a glimpse of thespiritual light which converted the _phantasma_ into an explicit idea(_cf. _ above, p. 320). When the soul in man perfects itself with all theknowledge of this world it becomes identified with the Active Intellect, which may be likened to the intellect or soul of the corporeal world. 

In this combination of the views of Alexander and Themistius Averroessucceeds in obviating the criticisms levelled at the two former. Thatthe power of the material intellect grows keener with age though thecorporeal organs are weaker, supports Averroes's doctrine as againstAlexander, to whom it is a mere capacity dependent upon the mixture ofthe elements in the human body. But neither is he subject to theobjection applying to Themistius's view, that a real independent entitycould scarcely be void of all forms and a mere receptacle. For thematerial intellect as it really is in itself when not in combinationwith the human body is not a mere receptacle or empty potentiality. Itis the Active Intellect, which combines in itself all immaterial formsand thinks them as it thinks itself. It is only in its individualizedaspect that it becomes a potential intellect ready to receive allmaterial forms. 

But what Averroes gains here he loses elsewhere. There are certainconsiderations which are fatal to his doctrine. Thus it would followthat theoretical studies which have no practical aim are useless. Butthis is impossible. Nature has put in us the ability as well as thedesire to speculate without reference to practical results. The pleasurewe derive from theoretical studies is much greater than that afforded bythe practical arts and trades. And nature does nothing in vain. Theoretical studies must therefore have some value. But in Averroes'stheory of the material intellect they have none. For all values may bedivided into those which promote the life of the body and those whichlead to the final happiness of man. The former is clearly not served bythose theoretical speculations which have no practical aim. On thecontrary, they hinder it. Deep students of the theoretical sciencesforego all bodily pleasures, and often do without necessities. Butneither can there be any advantage in theoretical speculation forultimate human happiness. For human happiness according to Averroes (andhe is in a sense right, as we shall see later) consists in union withthe Active Intellect. But this union takes place as a matter of courseaccording to his theory at the time of death, whether a man be wise or afool. For the Active Intellect then absorbs the material. 

Another objection to Averroes's theory is the following. If the materialintellect is in essence the same as the Active Intellect, it is aseparate, immaterial substance, and hence is, like the Active Intellect, one. For only that which has matter as its substratum can be_quantitatively_ differentiated. Thus A is numerically different from B, though A and B are both men (_i. E. _, _qualitatively_ the same), becausethey are corporeal beings. Forms as such can be differentiatedqualitatively only. Horse is different from ass in quality. Horse assuch and horse as such are the same. It follows from this that thematerial intellect, being like the Active Intellect an immaterial form, cannot be numerically multiplied, and therefore is one only. But if so, no end of absurdities follows. For it means that all men have the sameintellect, hence the latter is wise and ignorant at the same time inreference to the same thing, in so far as A knows a given thing and Bdoes not know it. It would also follow that A can make use of B's senseexperience and build his knowledge upon it. All these inferences areabsurd, and they all follow from the assumption that the materialintellect is in essence the same as the Active Intellect. HenceAverroes's position is untenable. [340]

Gersonides then gives his own view of the material intellect, which issimilar to that of Alexander. The material intellect is a capacity, andthe prime matter is the ultimate subject in which it inheres. But thereare other powers or forms inhering in matter prior to the materialintellect. Prime matter as such is not endowed with intellect, or allthings would have human reason. Prime matter when it reaches the stageof development of the imaginative faculty is then ready to receive thematerial intellect. We may say then that the sensitive soul, of whichthe imaginative faculty is a part, is the subject in which the materialintellect inheres. The criticism directed against Alexander, whichapplies here also, may be answered as follows. The material intellect isdependent upon its subject, the sensitive soul, for its existence only, not for the manner of receiving its knowledge. Hence the weakening orstrengthening of its subject cannot affect it directly at all. Indirectly there is a relation between the two, and it works in thereverse direction. When the sensitive powers are weakened and theiractivities diminish, there is more opportunity for the intellect tomonopolize the one soul for itself and increase its own activity, whichthe other powers have a tendency to hinder, since the soul is one forall these contending powers. It follows of course that the materialintellect in man is not immortal. As a capacity of the sensitive soul, it dies with the latter. What part of the human soul it is that enjoysimmortality and on what conditions we shall see later. But before we dothis, we must try to understand the nature of the Active Intellect. [341]

We know now that the function of the Active Intellect is to actualizethe material intellect, _i. E. _, to develop the capacity which thelatter has of extracting general ideas from the particular memory images(phantasmata) in the faculty of imagination, so that this capacity, originally empty of any content, receives the ideas thus produced, andis thus constituted into an _actual_ intellect. From this it followsthat the Active Intellect, which enables the material intellect to formideas, must itself have the ideas it induces in the latter, though notnecessarily in the same form. Thus an artisan, who imposes the form ofchair upon a piece of wood, must have the form of chair in his mind, though not the same sort as he realizes in the wood. Now as all theideas acquired by the material intellect constitute one single activityso far as the end and purpose is concerned (for it all leads to theperfection of the person), the agent which is the cause of it all mustalso be one. Hence there are not many Active Intellects, eachresponsible for certain ideas, but one Intellect is the cause of all theideas realized in the material intellect. Moreover, as this ActiveIntellect gives the material intellect not merely a knowledge ofseparate ideas, but also an understanding of their relations to eachother, in other words of the systematic unity connecting all ideas intoone whole, it follows that the Active Intellect has a knowledge of theideas from their unitary aspect. In other words, the unity of purposeand aim which is evident in the development of nature from the primematter through the forms of the elements, the plant soul, the animalsoul and up to the human reason, where the lower is for the sake of thehigher, must reside as a unitary conception in the Active Intellect. 

For the Active Intellect has another function besides developing therational capacity in man. We can arrive at this insight by aconsideration undertaken from a different point of view. If we considerthe wonderful and mysterious development of a seed, which is only apiece of matter, in a purposive manner, passing through various stagesand producing a highly complicated organism with psychic powers, we mustcome to the conclusion, as Aristotle does, that there is an intellectoperating in this development. As all sublunar nature shows a unity ofpurpose, this intellect must be one. And as it cannot be like one of itsproducts, it must be eternal and not subject to generation and decay. But these are the attributes which, on grounds taken from theconsideration of the intellectual activity in man, we ascribed to theActive Intellect. Hence it _is_ the Active Intellect. And we have thusshown that it has two functions. One is to endow sublunar nature withthe intelligence and purpose visible in its processes and evolutions;the other is to enable the rational power in man to rise from a _tabularasa_ to an actual intellect with a content. From both these activitiesit is evident that the Active Intellect has a knowledge of sublunarcreation as a systematic unity. 

This conception of the Active Intellect, Levi ben Gerson says, will alsoanswer all the difficulties by which other philosophers are troubledconcerning the possibility of knowledge and the nature of definition. The problems are briefly these. Knowledge concerns itself with thepermanent and universal. There can be no real knowledge of theparticular, for the particular is never the same, it is constantlychanging and in the end disappears altogether. On the other hand, theuniversal has no real existence outside of the mind, for the objectivelyreal is the particular thing. The only really existing man is A or B orC; man in general, man that is not a particular individual man, has noobjective extra-mental existence. Here is a dilemma. The only thing wecan really know is the thing that is not real, and the only real thingis that which we cannot know. The Platonists solve this difficulty byboldly declaring that the universal ideas or forms are the realexistents and the models of the things of sense. This is absurd. Aristotle's solution in the Metaphysics is likewise unsatisfactory. Ourconception, however, of the Active Intellect enables us to solve thisproblem satisfactorily. The object of knowledge is not the particularthing which is constantly changing; nor yet the logical abstractionwhich is only in the mind. It is the real unity of sublunar nature as itexists in the Active Intellect. 

The problem of the definition is closely related to that of knowledge. The definition denotes the essence of every individual of a givenspecies. As the individuals of a given species have all the samedefinition, and hence the same essence, they are all one. For what isnot in the definition is not real. Our answer is that the definitionrepresents that unitary aspect of the sublunar individuals which is inthe Active Intellect. This aspect is also in a certain sense present inevery one of the individual objects of nature, but not in the samemanner as in the Active Intellect. [342]

We are now ready to take up the question of human immortality. Thematerial intellect as a capacity for acquiring knowledge is notimmortal. Being inherent in the sensitive soul and dependent for itsacquisition of knowledge upon the memory images (phantasmata) whichappear in the imagination, the power to acquire knowledge ceases withthe cessation of sense and imagination. But the knowledge alreadyacquired, which, we have shown above, is identical with the conceptionsof sublunar nature in the Active Intellect, is indestructible. For theseconceptions are absolutely immaterial; they are really the ActiveIntellect in a sense, and only the material is subject to destruction. The sum of acquisition of immaterial ideas constitutes the _acquired_ or_actual intellect_, and this is the immortal part of man. 

Further than this man cannot go. The idea adopted by some that the humanintellect may become identified completely with the Active Intellect, Levi ben Gerson rejects. In order to accomplish this, he says, it wouldbe necessary to have a complete and perfect knowledge of all nature, andthat too a completely unified and wholly immaterial knowledge just as itis in the Active Intellect. This is clearly impossible. But it is truethat a man's happiness after death is dependent upon the amount andperfection of his knowledge. For even in this life the pleasure wederive from intellectual contemplation is greater the more nearly wesucceed in completely concentrating our mind on the subject of study. Now after death there will be no disturbing factors such as are suppliedin this world by the sensitive and emotional powers. To be sure thislack will also prevent the acquisition of new knowledge, as was saidbefore, but the amount acquired will be there in the soul's power allat once and all the time. The more knowledge one has succeeded inobtaining during life, the more nearly he will resemble the ActiveIntellect and the greater will be his happiness. [343]

The next topic Levi ben Gerson takes up is that of prognostication. There are three ways in which certain persons come to know the future, _dreams_, _divination_ and _prophecy_. What we wish to do is todetermine the kind of future events that may be thus known beforehand, the agency which produces in us this power, and the bearing thisphenomenon has on the nature of events generally, and particularly asconcerns the question of chance and free will. 

That there is such knowledge of future events is a fact and not atheory. Experience testifies to the fact that there are certain peoplewho are able to foretell the future, not as a matter of accident orthrough a chance coincidence, but as a regular thing. Diviners these arecalled, or fortune tellers. This power is even better authenticated inprophecy, which no one denies. We can also cite many instances ofdreams, in which a person sees a future event with all its particulars, and the dream comes true. All these cases are too common to be creditedto chance. Now what does this show as to the nature of the events thusforeseen? Clearly it indicates that they cannot be chance happenings, for what is by chance cannot be foreseen. The only conclusion then to bedrawn is that these events are determined by the order of nature. Butthere is another implication in man's ability to foretell the future, namely, that what is thus known to man is first known to a higherintellect which communicates it to us. 

The first of these two consequences leads us into difficulties. For ifwe examine the data of prognostication, whether it be of dream, divination or prophecy, we find that they concern almost exclusivelysuch particular human events as would be classed in the category of thecontingent rather than in that of the necessary. Fortune tellersregularly tell people about the kind of children they will have, thesort of things they will do, and so on. In prophecy similarly Sarah wastold she would have a son (Gen. 18, 10). We also have examples ofprognostication respecting the outcome of a battle, announcement ofcoming rain, --events due to definite causes--as well as the predictionof events which are the result of free choice or pure accident, as whenSamuel tells Elisha that he will meet three men on the way, who willgive him two loaves of bread, which he will accept; or when the prophetin Samariah tells the prophet in Bethel that he will be killed by alion. The question now is, if these contingent things can be known inadvance, they are not contingent; and if these are not, none are. Forthe uniform events in nature are surely not contingent. If then thoseevents usually classed as contingent and voluntary are not such, thereis no such thing as chance and free will at all, which is impossible. 

Our answer is that as a matter of fact those contingent happenings wecall luck and ill luck do often come frequently to certain persons, whomwe call lucky or unlucky, which shows that they are not the result ofpure chance, and that there is some sort of order determining them. Moreover, we know that the higher in the scale of being a thing is, themore nature takes care to guard it. Hence as man is the highest beinghere below, it stands to reason that the heavenly bodies order hisexistence and his fortune. And so the science of astrology, with all itsmistakes on account of the imperfect state of our knowledge, does say agreat many things which are true. This, however, does not destroyfreedom and chance. For the horoscope represents only one side of thequestion. Man was also endowed with reason and purpose, which enable himwhenever he chooses to counteract the order of the heavenly bodies. Inthe main the heavenly bodies by their positions and motions and theconsequent predominance of certain elemental qualities in the sublunarworld over others affect the temperaments of man in a manner tending tohis welfare. The social order with its differentiation of labor andoccupation is worked out wonderfully well--better than the system ofPlato's Republic--by the positions and motions of the heavenly bodies. If not for this, all men would choose the more honorable trades andprofessions, there would be no one to do the menial work, and societywould be impossible. At the same time there are certain incidental evilsinherent in the rigid system which would tend to destroy certainindividuals. To counteract these unintended defects, God endowed manwith reason and choice enabling him to avoid the dangers threatening himin the world of nature. 

The solution of our problem then is this. These human events have atwofold aspect. They are determined so far as they follow from the orderof the heavenly bodies; and in so far they can be foretold. They areundetermined so far as they are the result of individual choice, and inso far they cannot be known beforehand. There are also pure chanceevents in inanimate nature, bearing no relation to human fortune. Thesecannot be foretold. [344]

We said above that there must be an intellect which knows thesecontingent events predicted in dreams, divination and prophecy andimparts a knowledge of them to these men. This can be no other than theActive Intellect, whose nature we discussed above. For the ActiveIntellect knows the order of sublunar things, and gives us a knowledgeof them in the ideas of the material intellect. Moreover, he is theagent producing them through the instrumentality of the heavenly bodies. Hence the heavenly bodies are also his instrument in ordering thosecontingent events which are predicted in dreams and prophetic visions. 

The purpose of this information is to protect man against the evildestined for him in the order of the heavenly bodies, or in order thathe may avail himself of the good in store for him if he knows of it. 

There is a difference in kind between prophecy on the one hand anddivination and dream on the other. Prophecy comes from the ActiveIntellect directly acting on the material intellect. Hence onlyintelligent men can be prophets. Divination and dream come from theActive Intellect indirectly. They are caused by the heavenly bodies, andthe action is on the imagination. The imagination is more easilyisolated from the other parts of the soul in young people andsimpletons. Hence we find examples of dreams and divination amongthem. [345]

In discussing the problem of God's knowledge, Gersonides takes directissue with Maimonides. The reader will recall that the question turnsupon the knowledge of particulars. Some philosophers go so far as todeny to God any knowledge of things other than his own essence; for theknown is in a sense identified with the knower, and to bring in amultiplicity of ideas in God's knowledge would endanger his unity. Others, however, fell short of this extreme opinion and admitted God'sknowledge of things other than himself, but maintained that God cannotknow particulars for various reasons. The particular is perceived bysense, a material faculty, whereas God is immaterial. Particulars areinfinite and cannot be measured or embraced, whereas knowledge is a kindof measuring or embracing. The particulars are not always existing, andare subject to change. Hence God's knowledge would be subject to changeand disappearance, which is impossible. If God knows particulars how isit that there is often a violation of right and justice in the destiniesof individual men? This would argue in God either inability orindifference, both of which are impossible. 

Maimonides insists on God's knowledge of all things of which he is thecreator, including particulars. And he answers the arguments of thephilosophers by saying that their objections are valid only if we assumethat God's knowledge is similar to ours, and since with us it isimpossible to know the material except through a material organ, it isnot possible in God. As we cannot comprehend the infinite; as we cannotknow the non-existent, nor the changing without a change in ourknowledge, God cannot do so. But it is wrong to assume this. God'sknowledge is identical with his essence, which these same philosophersinsist is unlike anything else, and unknowable. Surely it follows thathis knowledge is also without the least resemblance to our knowledge andthe name alone is what they have in common. Hence all the objections ofthe philosophers fall away at one stroke. _We_ cannot in one act ofknowing embrace a number of things differing in species; God can, because his knowledge is one. _We_ cannot know the non-existent, for ourknowledge depends upon the thing known. God can. _We_ cannot know theinfinite, for the infinite cannot be embraced; God can. _We_ cannot knowthe outcome of a future event unless the event is necessary anddetermined. If the event is contingent and undetermined we can only haveopinion concerning it, which may or may not be true; we are uncertainand may be mistaken. God can know the outcome of a contingent event, andyet the event is not determined, and may happen one way or the other. Our knowledge of a given thing changes as the thing itself undergoes achange, for if our knowledge should remain the same while the objectchanges, it would not be knowledge but error. In God the two arecompatible. He knows in advance how a given thing will change, and hisknowledge never changes, even though that which was at one momentpotential and implicit becomes later actual and explicit. 

At this point Gersonides steps in in defence of human logic and sanity. He accuses Maimonides of not being quite honest with himself. Maimonides, he intimates, did not choose this position of his own freewill--a position scientifically quite untenable--he was forced to it bytheological exigencies. [346] He felt that he must vindicate, by fairmeans or foul, God's knowledge of particulars. And so Gersonidesproceeds to demolish Maimonides's position by reducing it _ad absurdum_. 

What does Maimonides mean by saying that God knows the contingent? If hemeans that God knows that the contingent may as contingent happenotherwise than as he knows it will happen, we do not call this in usknowledge, but opinion. If he means that God knows it will happen in acertain way, and yet it may turn out that the reverse will actually takeplace, then we call this in our case error, not knowledge. And if hemeans that God merely knows that it may happen one way or the otherwithout knowing definitely which will happen, then we call this in ourexperience uncertainty and perplexity, not knowledge. By insisting thatall this is in God knowledge because, forsooth, God's knowledge is notlike our knowledge, is tantamount to saying that what is in us opinion, uncertainty, error, is in God knowledge--a solution far fromcomplimentary to God's knowledge. 

Besides, the entire principle of Maimonides that there is no relation ofresemblance between God's attributes and ours, that the terms wise, just, and so on, are pure homonyms, is fundamentally wrong. We attributeknowledge to God because we know in our own case that an intellect isperfected by knowledge. And since we have come to the conclusion onother grounds that God is a perfect intellect, we say he must haveknowledge. Now if this knowledge that we ascribe to God has noresemblance whatsoever to what we understand by knowledge in our owncase, the ground is removed from our feet. We might as well argue thatman is rational because solid is continuous. If the word knowledge meansa totally different thing in God from what it means in us, how do weknow that it is to be found in God? If we have absolutely no idea whatthe term means when applied to God, what reason have we for preferringknowledge as a divine attribute to its opposite or negative? Ifknowledge does not mean knowledge, ignorance does not mean ignorance, and it is just the same whether we ascribe to God the one or the other. 

The truth is that the attributes we ascribe to God do have a resemblanceto the same attributes in ourselves; only they are primary in God, secondary in ourselves, _i. E. _, they exist in God in a more perfectmanner than in us. Hence it is absurd to say that what would be in userror or uncertainty is in God knowledge. Our problem must be solvedmore candidly and differently. There are arguments in favor of God'sknowing particulars (Maimonides gives some), and there are the argumentsof the philosophers against the thesis. The truth must be between thetwo, that God knows them from one aspect and does not know them fromanother. Having shown above that human events are in part ordered anddetermined by the heavenly bodies, and in part undetermined anddependent upon the individual's choice, we can now make use of thisdistinction for the solution of our problem. God knows particulars in sofar as they are ordered, he does not know them in so far as they arecontingent. He knows that they are contingent, and hence it follows thathe does not know which of the two possibilities will happen, else theywould not be contingent. This is no defect in God's nature, for to knowa thing as it is is no imperfection. In general God does not knowparticulars as particulars but as ordered by the universal laws ofnature. He knows the universal order, and he knows the particulars in sofar as they are united in the universal order. 

This theory meets all objections, and moreover it is in agreement withthe views of the Bible. It is the only one by which we can harmonize theapparent contradictions in the Scriptures. Thus on the one hand we aretold that God sends Prophets and commands people to do and forbear. Thisimplies that a person has freedom to choose, and that the contingent isa real category. On the other hand, we find that God foretells thecoming of future events respecting human destiny, which signifiesdetermination. And yet again we find that God repents, and that he doesnot repent. All these apparent contradictions can be harmonized on ourtheory. God foretells the coming of events in so far as they aredetermined in the universal order of nature. But man's freedom maysucceed in counteracting this order, and the events predicted may notcome. This is signified by the expression that God repents. [347]

Levi ben Gerson's solution, whatever we may think of its scientific orphilosophic value, is surely very bold as theology, we might almost sayit is a theological monstrosity. It practically removes from God thedefinite knowledge of the outcome of a given event so far as thatoutcome is contingent. Gersonides will not give up the contingent, forthat would destroy freedom. He therefore accepts free will with itsconsequences, at the risk of limiting God's knowledge to events whichare determined by the laws of nature. Maimonides was less consistent, but had the truer theological sense, namely, he kept to both horns ofthe dilemma. God is omniscient and man is free. He gave up the solutionby seeking refuge in the mysteriousness of God's knowledge. This is thetrue religious attitude. 

The question of Providence is closely related to that of God'sknowledge. For it is clear that one cannot provide for those things ofwhich he does not know. Gersonides's view in this problem is verysimilar to that of Maimonides, and like him he sees in the discussionsbetween Job and his friends the representative opinions held byphilosophers in this important problem. 

There are three views, he says, concerning the nature of Providence. Oneis that God's providence extends only to species and not to individuals. The second opinion is that God provides for every individual of thehuman race. The third view is that some individuals are speciallyprovided for, but not all. Job held the first view, which is that ofAristotle. The arguments in favor of this opinion are that God does notknow particulars, hence cannot provide for them. Besides, there would bemore justice in the distribution of goods and evils in the world if Godconcerned himself about every individual. Then again man is tooinsignificant for God's special care. 

The second view is that of the majority of our people. They argue thatas God is the author of all, he surely provides for them. And as amatter of fact experience shows it; else there would be much moreviolence and bloodshed than there is. The wicked are actually punishedand the good rewarded. This class is divided into two parts. Some thinkthat while God provides for all men, not all that happens to a man isdue to God; there are also other causes. The others think that everyhappening is due to God. This second class may again be dividedaccording to the manner in which they account for those facts inexperience which seem to militate against their view. Maintaining thatevery incident is due to God, they have to explain the apparentdeviation from justice in the prosperity of the wicked and the adversityof the righteous. One party explains the phenomenon by saying that theprosperity and the adversity in these cases are only seeming and notreal; that they in fact are the opposite of what they seem, or at leastlead to the opposite. The second party answers the objection on theground that those we think good may not really be such, and similarlythose we think bad may not really be bad. For the way to judge aperson's character is not merely by his deeds alone, but by his deeds asrelated to his temperament and disposition, which God alone knows. Eliphaz the Temanite belonged to those who think that not all whichhappens is due to God; that folly is responsible for a man's misfortune. Bildad the Shuchite believed that all things are from God, but not allthat seems good and evil is really so. Zophar the Naamathite thought wedo not always judge character correctly; that temperament anddisposition must be taken into account. 

Of these various opinions the first one, that of Aristotle, cannot betrue. Dreams, divination, and especially prophecy contradict it flatly. All these are given to the individual for his protection (_cf. _ above, p. 342). The second opinion, namely, that God's providence extends toevery individual, is likewise disproved by reason, by experience and bythe Bible. We have already proved (p. 345) that God's knowledge does notextend to particulars as such. He only knows things as ordered by theheavenly bodies; and knows at the same time that they may fail to happenbecause of man's free will. Now if God punishes and rewards every manaccording to his deeds, one of two things necessarily follows. Either herewards and punishes according to those deeds which the individual isdetermined to do by the order of the heavenly bodies, or according tothe deeds the individual actually does. In the first case there would beoften injustice, for the person might not have acted as the order of theheavenly bodies indicated he would act, for he is free to act as hewill. The second case is impossible, for it would mean that God knowsparticulars as particulars--a thesis we have already disproved. Besides, evil does not come from God directly, since he is pure form and evilcomes only from matter. Hence it cannot be said that he punishes theevil doer for his sin. 

Experience also testifies against this view, for we see the just sufferand the wicked prosper. The manner in which Eliphaz, Bildad and Zopharwish to defend God's justice will not hold water. Man's own folly willaccount perhaps for some evils befalling the righteous and some goodcoming to the wicked. But it will not account for the failure of thegood man to get the reward he deserves, and of the wicked to receive thepunishment which is his due. The righteous man often has troubles allhis life no matter how careful he is to avoid them, and correspondinglythe same is true of the wicked, that he is prosperous, despite his lackof caution and good sense. To avoid these objections as Eliphaz does bysaying that if the wicked man himself is not punished, his children willbe, is to go from the frying pan into the fire. For it is not justeither to omit to punish the one deserving it, or to punish anotherinnocent man for him. Nor is Zophar's defence any better. For the sameman, with the same temperament and disposition, often suffers more whenhe is inclined to do good, and is prosperous when he is not soscrupulous. Bildad is no more successful than the other two. The evilscoming to the righteous are often real and permanent. But neither doesthe Bible compel us to believe that God looks out for all individuals. This is especially true in reference to punishment, as can be gatheredfrom such expressions as "I will hide my face from them, and they shallbe given to be devoured" (Deut. 31, 17), or "As thou hast forgotten thelaw of thy God, so will I myself also forget thy children" (Hosea 4, 6). These expressions indicate that God does not punish the individualsdirectly, but that he leaves them to the fate that is destined for themby the order of the heavenly bodies. True there are other passages inScripture speaking of direct punishment, but they may be interpreted soas not to conflict with our conclusions. 

Having seen that neither of the two extreme views is correct, it remainsto adopt the middle course, namely, that some individuals are providedfor specially, and others not. The nearer a person is to the ActiveIntellect, the more he receives divine providence and care. Those peoplewho do not improve their capabilities, which they possess as members ofthe species, are provided for only as members of the species. Thematter may be put in another way also. God knows all ideas. Man ispotentially capable of receiving them in a certain manner. God, who isactual, leads man from his potentiality to actuality. When a man'spotentialities are thus realized, he becomes similar to God, becausewhen ideas are actualized the agent and the thing acted upon are one. Hence the person enjoys divine providence at that time. The way in whichGod provides for such men is by giving them knowledge through dream, divination or prophecy or intuition or in some other unconscious manneron the individual's part, which knowledge protects him from harm. Thisview is not in conflict with the truth that God does not knowparticulars as such. For it is not to the individual person as such thatprovidence extends as a conscious act of God. The individualization isdue to the recipient and not to the dispenser. One may object that afterall since it is possible that bad men may have goods as ordered by theheavenly bodies, and good men may have misfortune as thus ordered, whentheir attachment to God is loosened somewhat, there is _injustice_ inGod if he could have arranged the heavenly spheres differently and didnot, or _incapacity_ if he could not. The answer is briefly that theorder of the spheres does a great deal of good in maintaining theexistence of things. And if some little evil comes also incidentally, this does not condemn the whole arrangement. In fact the evils come fromthe very agencies which are the authors of good. The view of providencehere adopted is that of Elihu the son of Barachel the Buzite in the bookof Job (ch. 32), and it agrees also with the opinion of Maimonides inthe "Guide of the Perplexed" (_cf. _ above, p. 292). [348]

Instead of placing his cosmology at the beginning of his system andproceeding from that as a basis to the other parts of his work, thepsychology and the ethics, Levi ben Gerson, whose "Milhamot Hashem" isnot so much a systematic work as an aggregation of discussions, reversedthe process. He begins as we have seen with a purely psychologicalanalysis concerning the nature of the human reason and its relation tothe Active Intellect. He follows up this discussion with a treatment ofprognostication as exhibiting some of the effects of the ActiveIntellect upon the reason and imagination of man. This is again followedby a discussion of God's knowledge and providence. And not until allthese psychological (and in part ethical) questions have been decided, does Levi ben Gerson undertake to give us his views of the constitutionof the universe and the nature and attributes of God. In this discussionhe takes occasion to express his dissatisfaction with Aristotle's proofsof the existence of the spheral movers and of the unmoved mover or God, as inadequate to bear the structure which it is intended to erect uponthem. It will be remembered that the innovation of Abraham Ibn Daud andMaimonides in making Jewish philosophy more strictly Aristotelian thanit had been consisted in a great measure in just this introduction ofthe Aristotelian proof of the existence of God as derived from themotions of the heavenly bodies. Levi ben Gerson's proofs areteleological rather than mechanical. Aristotle said a moving body musthave a mover outside of it, which if it is again a body is itself inmotion and must have a mover in turn. And as this process cannot go on_ad infinitum_, there must be at the end of the series an unmoved mover. As unmoved this mover cannot be body; and as producing motion eternally, it cannot be a power residing in a body, a physical or material power, for no such power can be infinite. Gersonides is not satisfied with thisproof. He argues that so far as the motions of the heavenly bodies areconcerned there is no reason why a physical power cannot keep on movingthem eternally. The reason that motions caused by finite forces in ourworld come to a stop is because the thing moved is subject to change, which alters its relation to its mover; and secondly because the forceendeavors to move the object in opposition to its own tendency, inopposition to gravity. In the case of the heavenly bodies neither ofthese conditions is present. The relation of the mover to the moved isalways the same, since the heavenly bodies are not subject to change;and as they are not made of the four terrestrial elements they have noinherent tendency to move in any direction, hence they offer noopposition to the force exerted upon them by the mover. A finite powermight therefore quite conceivably cause eternal motion. Similarly anunmoved mover cannot be body, to be sure, but it may be a physical powerlike a soul, which in moving the body is not itself moved by thatmotion. Aristotle's proofs therefore are not sufficient to produce theconviction that the movers of the spheres and God himself are separateIntelligences. [349]

Gersonides accordingly follows a different method. He argues that if asystem of things and events exhibits perfection not here and there andat rare intervals but regularly, the inference is justified that thereis an intelligent agent who had a definite purpose and design inestablishing the system. The world below is such a system. Hence it hasan intelligent agent as its author. This agent may be a separate andimmaterial intelligence, or a corporeal power like a soul. He then showsthat it cannot be a corporeal power, for it would have to reside in theanimal sperm which exhibits such wonderful and purposive development, orin the parent animal from which the sperm came, both of which, heargues, are impossible. It remains then that the cause of theteleological life of the sublunar world is an immaterial power, aseparate intellect. This intellect, he argues further, acts upon matterand endows it with forms, the only mediating power being the naturalheat which is found in the seed and sperm of plants and animals. Moreover, it is aware of the order of what it produces. It is the ActiveIntellect of which we spoke above (p. 337). The forms of terrestrialthings come from it directly, the heat residing in the seed comes fromthe motions of the spheres. This shows that the permanent motions of theheavenly bodies are also intelligent motions, for they tend to produceperfection in the terrestrial world and never come to a standstill, which would be the case if the motions were "natural" like those of theelements, or induced against their nature like that of a stone movingupward. We are justified in saying then that the heavenly bodies areendowed with intellects and have no material soul. Hence their moversare pure Intelligences, and there are as many of them as there arespheres, _i. E. _, forty-eight, or fifty-eight or sixty-four according toone's opinion on the astronomical question of the number of spheres. 

Now as the Active Intellect knows the order of sublunar existence in itsunity, and the movers of the respective spheres know the order of theireffects through the motions of the heavenly bodies, it follows that asall things in heaven above and on the earth beneath are related in aunitary system, there is a highest agent who is the cause of allexistence absolutely and has a knowledge of all existence as a unitarysystem. [350]

The divine attributes are derived by us from his actions, and hence theyare not pure homonyms (_cf. _, p. 240). God has a knowledge of thecomplete order of sublunar things, of which the several movers have onlya part. He _knows_ it as _one_, and knows it eternally without change. His _joy_ and _gladness_ are beyond conception, for our joy also is verygreat in understanding. His is also the perfect _Life_, forunderstanding is life. He is the most real _Substance_ and _Existent_, and he is _One_. God is also the most real _Agent_, as making the othermovers do their work, and producing a complete and perfect whole out oftheir parts. He is also properly called _Bestower_, _Beneficent_, _Gracious_, _Strong_, _Mighty_, _Upright_, _Just_, _Eternal_, _Permanent_. All these attributes, however, do not denotemultiplicity. [351]

From God we now pass again to his creation, and take up the problemwhich caused Maimonides so much trouble, namely, the question of theorigin of the world. It will be remembered that dissatisfied with theproofs for the existence of God advanced by the Mutakallimun, Maimonides, in order to have a firm foundation for the central idea ofreligion, tentatively adopted the Aristotelian notion of the eternity ofmotion and the world. But no sooner does Maimonides establish his proofof the existence, unity and incorporeality of God than he returns to theattack of the Aristotelian view and points out that the problem isinsoluble in a strictly scientific manner; that Aristotle himself neverintended his arguments in favor of eternity to be regarded asphilosophically demonstrated, and that they all labor under the fatalfallacy that because certain laws hold of the world's phenomena once itis in existence, these same laws must have governed the establishment ofthe world itself in its origin. Besides, the assumption of the world'seternity with its corollary of the necessity and immutability of itsphenomena saps the foundation of all religion, makes miraclesimpossible, and reduces the world to a machine. Gersonides is on thewhole agreed with Maimonides. He admits that Aristotle's arguments arethe best yet advanced in the problem, but that they are not convincing. He also agrees with Maimonides in his general stricture on Aristotle'smethod, only modifying and restricting its generality and sweepingnature. With all this, however, he finds it necessary to take up theentire question anew and treats it in his characteristic manner, withdetail and rigor, and finally comes to a conclusion different from thatof Maimonides, namely, that the world had an origin in time, to be sure, but that it came not _ex nihilo_ in the absolute sense of the word_nihil_, but developed from an eternal formless matter, which Godendowed with form. This is the so-called Platonic view. 

We cannot enter into all his details which are technical and fatiguingin the extreme, but we must give a general idea of his procedure in theinvestigation of this important topic. 

The problem of the origin of the world, he says, is very difficult. First, because in order to learn from the nature of existing thingswhether they were created out of a state of non-existence or not, wemust know the essence of existing things, which is not easy. Secondly, we must know the nature of God in order to determine whether he couldhave existed first without the world and then have created it, orwhether he had to have the world with him from eternity. The fact of thegreat difference of opinion on this question among thinkers, and thetestimony of Maimonides that Aristotle himself had no valid proof inthis matter are additional indications of the great difficulty of thesubject. 

Some think the world was made and destroyed an infinite number of times. Others say it was made once. Of these some maintain it was made out ofsomething (Plato); others, that it was made out of absolute nothing(Philoponus, the Mutakallimun, Maimonides and many of our Jewishwriters). Some on the other hand, namely, Aristotle and his followers, hold the world to be eternal. They all have their defenders, and thereis no need to refute the others since Aristotle has already done this. His arguments are the best so far, and deserve investigation. Thefundamental fallacy in all his proofs is that he argues from the laws ofgenesis and decay in the parts of the world to the laws of theseprocesses in the world as a whole. This might seem to be the samecriticism which Maimonides advances, but it is not really quite thesame, Maimonides's assertion being more general and sweeping. Maimonidessays that the origin of the world as a whole need not be in any respectlike the processes going on within its parts; whereas Gersonides baseshis argument on the observed difference in the world between wholes andparts, admitting that the two may be alike in many respects. 

In order to determine whether the world is created or not, it is best toinvestigate first those things in the world which have the appearanceof being eternal, such as the heavenly bodies, time, motion, the form ofthe earth, and so on. If these are proven to be eternal, the world iseternal; if not, it is not. A general principle to help us distinguish athing having an origin from one that has not is the following: A thingwhich came into being in time has a purpose. An eternal thing has nopurpose. Applying this principle to the heavens we find that all aboutthem is with a purpose to ordering the sublunar world in the best waypossible. Their motions, their distances, their positions, theirnumbers, and so on are all for this purpose. Hence they had a beginning. Aristotle's attempts to explain these conditions from the nature of theheavens themselves are not successful, and he knew it. Again, as theheavenly bodies are all made of the same fifth element (the Aristotelianether), the many varieties in their forms and motions require specialexplanation. The only satisfactory explanation is that the origin of theheavenly bodies is not due to nature and necessity, which would favoreternity, but to will and freedom, and the many varieties are for adefinite purpose. Hence they are not eternal. [352]

Gersonides then analyzes time and motion and proves that Aristotle tothe contrary notwithstanding, they are both finite and not infinite. Time belongs to the category of quantity, and there is no infinitequantity. As time is dependent on motion, motion too is finite, henceneither is eternal. Another argument for creation in time is that if theworld is eternal and governed altogether by necessity, the earth shouldbe surrounded on all sides by water according to the nature of thelighter element to be above the heavier. Hence the appearance of partsof the earth's surface above the water is an indication of a break ofnatural law for a special purpose, namely, in order to produce thevarious mineral, plant and animal species. Hence once more purposeargues design and origin in time. 

Finally if the world were eternal, the state of the sciences would bemore advanced than it is. A similar argument may be drawn from language. Language is conventional; which means that the people existed before thelanguage they agreed to speak. But man being a social animal they couldnot have existed an infinite time without language. Hence mankind is noteternal. [353]

We have just proved that the world came into being, but it does notnecessarily follow that it will be destroyed. Nay, there are reasons toshow that it will not be destroyed. For there is no destruction exceptthrough matter and the predominance of the passive powers over theactive. Hence the being that is subject to destruction must consist ofopposites. But the heavenly bodies have no opposites, not beingcomposite; hence they cannot be destroyed. And if so, neither can thesublunar order be destroyed, which is the work of the heavenly bodies. There is of course the abstract possibility of their being destroyed bytheir maker, not naturally, but by his will, as they were made; but wecan find no reason in God for wishing to destroy them, all reasonsexisting in man for destroying things being inapplicable to God. [354]

That the world began in time is now established. The question stillremains, was the world made out of something or out of nothing? Both areimpossible. The first is impossible, for that something out of which theworld was made must have had some form, for matter never is withoutform, and if so, it must have had some motion, and we have a kind ofworld already, albeit an imperfect one. The second supposition is alsoimpossible; for while form may come out of nothing, body cannot comefrom not-body. We never see the matter of any object arise out ofnothing, though the form may. Nature as well as art produces onecorporeal thing out of another. Hence the generally accepted principle, "_ex nihilo nihil fit_. " Besides it would follow on this suppositionthat before the world came into existence there was a vacuum in itsplace, whereas it is proved in the Physics that a vacuum is impossible. The only thing remaining therefore is to say that the world was madepartly out of something, partly out of nothing, _i. E. _, out of anabsolutely formless matter. 

It may be objected that to assume the existence of a second eternalthing beside God is equivalent to a belief in dualism, in two gods. Butthis objection may be easily answered. Eternity as such does notconstitute divinity. If all the world were eternal, God would still beGod because he controls everything and is the author of the orderobtaining in the world. In general it is the qualitative essence thatmakes the divine character of God, his wisdom and power as the source ofgoodness and right order in nature. The eternal matter of which we arespeaking is the opposite of all this. As God is the extreme ofperfection so is matter the extreme of imperfection and defect. As Godis the source of good, so is matter the source of evil. How then cananyone suppose for a moment that an eternal formless matter can in anyway be identified with a divine being?

Another objection that may be offered to our theory is that it is anestablished fact that matter cannot exist at all without any form, whereas our view assumes that an absolutely formless matter existed aninfinite length of time before the world was made from it. This may beanswered by saying that the impossibility of matter existing withoutform applies only to the actual objects of nature. God put in sublunarmatter the nature and capacity of receiving all forms in a certainorder. The primary qualities, the hot and the cold and the wet and thedry, as the forms of the elements, enable this matter to receive otherhigher forms. The very capacity of receiving a given form argues acertain form on the part of the matter having this capacity; for if ithad no form there would be no reason why it should receive one formrather than another; whereas we find that the reception of forms is notat random, but that a given form comes from a definite other form. Mancomes only from man. But this does not apply to the prime matter ofwhich we are speaking. It may have been without form. Nay, it isreasonable to suppose that as we find matter and form combined, and wealso find pure forms without matter, _viz. _, in the separateIntelligences, --it is reasonable to suppose that there is also matterwithout form. 

Finally one may ask if the world has not existed from eternity, whatdetermined the author to will its existence at the time he did and notat another? We cannot say that he acquired new knowledge which he hadnot before, or that he needed the world then and not before, or thatthere was some obstacle which was removed. The answer to this would bethat the sole cause of the creation was the will of God to benefit hiscreatures. Their existence is therefore due to the divine causality, which never changes. Their origin in time is due to the nature of amaterial object as such. A material object as being caused by anexternal agent is incompatible with eternity. It must have a beginning, and there is no sense in asking why at this time and not before orafter, for the same question would apply to any other time. Gersonidescites other objections which he answers, and then he takes up one byone the Aristotelian arguments in favor of eternity and refutes them indetail. We cannot afford to reproduce them here as the discussions aretechnical, lengthy and intricate. [355]

Having given his philosophical cosmology, Gersonides then undertakes toshow in detail that the Biblical story of creation teaches the samedoctrine. Nay, he goes so far as to say that it was the Biblical accountthat suggested to him his philosophical theory. It would be truer to saythat having approached the Bible with Aristotelian spectacles, andhaving no suspicion that the two attitudes are as far apart as thepoles, he did not scruple to twist the expressions in Genesis out of allsemblance to their natural meaning. The Biblical text had been twistedand turned ever since the days of Philo, and of the Mishna and Talmudand Midrash, in the interest of various schools and sects. Motivesspeculative, religious, theological, legal and ethical were at the basisof Biblical interpretation throughout its long history of two millenniaand more--the end is not yet--and Gersonides was swimming with thecurrent. The Bible is not a law, he says, which forces us to believeabsurdities and to practice useless things, as some people think. On thecontrary it is a law which leads us to our perfection. Hence what isproved by reason must be found in the Law, by interpretation ifnecessary. This is why Maimonides took pains to interpret all Biblicalpassages in which God is spoken of as if he were corporeal. Hence alsohis statement that if the eternity of the world were strictlydemonstrated, it would not be difficult to interpret the Bible so as toagree. But in the matter of the origin of the world, Gersonidescontinues, it was not necessary for me to force the Biblical account. Quite the contrary, the expressions in the Bible guided me to myview. [356]

Accordingly he finds support for his doctrine that the world was notcreated _ex nihilo_, in the fact that there is not one miracle in theBible in which anything comes out of nothing. They are all instances ofsomething out of a pre-existent something. The miracle of the oil in thecase of Elisha is no exception. The air changed into oil as it enteredthe partly depleted vessel. The six days of creation must not be takenliterally. God's creation is timeless, and the six days indicate thenatural order and rank in existing things proceeding from the cause tothe effect and from the lower to the higher. Thus the movers of theheavenly bodies come before the spheres which they move as their causes. The spheres come before the terrestrial elements for the same reason. The elements are followed by the things composed of them. And amongthese too there is a certain order. Plants come before animals, aquaticanimals before aerial, aerial before terrestrial, and the last of all isman, as the most perfect of sublunar creatures. All this he reads intothe account of creation in Genesis. Thus the _light_ spoken of in thefirst day represents the angels or separate Intelligences or movers ofthe spheres, and they are distinguished from the _darkness_ there, whichstands for the heavenly bodies as the matters of their movers, though atthe same time they are grouped together as one day, because the form andits matter constitute a unit. The _water_, which was divided by thefirmament, denotes the prime formless matter, part of which was changedinto the matter of the heavenly bodies, and part into the fourterrestrial elements. Form and matter are also designated by the terms"Tohu" and "Bohu" in the second verse in Genesis, rendered in theRevised Version by "without form" and "void. " And so Gersonidescontinues throughout the story of creation, into the details of which weneed not follow him. [357]

The concluding discussion in the Milhamot is devoted to the problem ofmiracles and its relation to prophecy. Maimonides had said that onereason for opposing the Aristotelian theory of the eternity of the worldis that miracles would be an impossibility on that assumption. HenceMaimonides insists on creation _ex nihilo_, though he admits that thePlatonic view of a pre-existent matter may be reconciled with the Torah. Gersonides, who adopted the doctrine of an eternal matter, finds itnecessary to say by way of introduction to his treatment of miraclesthat they do not prove creation _ex nihilo_. For as was said before allmiracles exhibit a production of something out of something and not outof nothing. 

To explain the nature of miracles, he says, and their authors, it isnecessary to know what miracles are. For this we must take the Biblicalrecords as our data, just as we take the data of our senses indetermining other matters. On examining the miracles of the Bible wefind that they may be classified into those which involve a change ofsubstance and those in which the substance remains the same and thechange is one of quality or quantity. An example of the former is thechange of Moses's rod into a serpent and of the water of Egypt intoblood; of the latter, Moses's hand becoming leprous, and the witheringof the hand of Jeroboam. We may further divide the miracles into thosein which the prophet was told in advance, as Moses was of the tenplagues, and those in which he was not, as for example the reviving ofthe dead by Elijah and many other cases. Our examination also shows usthat all miracles are performed by prophets or in relation to them. Alsothat they are done with some good and useful purpose, namely, toinculcate belief or to save from evil. 

These data will help us to decide who is the author of miracles. Miracles cannot be accidental, as they are performed with a purpose; andas they involve a knowledge of the sublunar order, they must have astheir author one who has this knowledge, hence either God or the ActiveIntellect or man, _i. E. _, the prophet himself. Now it is not reasonableto suppose that God is the author of miracles, for miracles come onlyrarely and are of no value in themselves but only as a means to aspecial end, as we said before. The laws of nature, however, whichcontrol all regular events all the time, are essentially good andpermanent. Hence it is not reasonable to suppose that the ActiveIntellect who, as we know, orders the sublunar world, has more importantwork to do than God. Besides if God were the author of miracles, theprophet would not know about them, for prophetic inspiration, as we know(p. 342), is due to the Active Intellect and not directly to God. 

Nor do we need waste words in proving that man cannot be the author ofmiracles, for in that case the knowledge of them would not come to himthrough prophetic inspiration, since they are due to his own will. Besides man, as we have seen, cannot have a complete knowledge of thesublunar order, and hence it is not likely that he can control its lawsto the extent of changing them. 

There is therefore only one alternative left, namely, that the author ofmiracles is the same as the inspirer of the prophets, the controllingspirit of the sublunar world, whose intellect has as its content theunified system of sublunar creation as an immaterial idea, namely, theActive Intellect, of whom we have spoken so often. The prophet knows ofthe miracles because the Active Intellect, who is the author of them, isalso the cause of the prophetic inspiration. This will account too forthe fact that all miracles have to do with events in the sublunar worldand are not found in the relations and motions of the heavenly bodies. The case of Joshua causing the sun and moon to stand still is noexception. There was no standing still of the sun and moon in that case. What is meant by the expressions in Joshua 10 is that the Israelitesconquered the enemy in the short time that the sun occupied the zenith, while its motion was not noticeable for about an hour, as is usually thecase about noon. In the case of Isaiah moving the sun ten degrees backfor Hezekiah (Isai. 38, 8), there was likewise no change in the motionof the sun, but only in that of the cloud causing the shadow. 

Miracles cannot be of regular occurrence, for if natural phenomena andlaws were changed by miracle as a regular thing, it would signify adefect in the original order. Miracles cannot take place to violate theprinciple of contradiction, hence there can be no miracles in referenceto mathematical truths, nor in matters relating to the past. Thus amiracle cannot make a thing black and white at the same time; nor aplane triangle whose angles are less than two right angles; nor is itpossible by miracle now to make it not to have rained in Jerusalemyesterday, when as a matter of fact it did rain. For all these involve adenial of the logical law of contradiction that a thing cannot be andnot be at the same time. [358]

A prophet is tested (1) by being able to foretell miracles before theycome, and (2) by the realization of his prophetic messages. The questionis raised concerning the statement of Jeremiah that one may be a trueprophet and yet an evil prophecy may remain unfulfilled if the peoplerepent. Does this mean that a good prophecy must always come true? Inthat case a good deal of what comes within the category of the possibleand contingent becomes determined and necessary! The answer is that agood prophecy too sometimes fails of realization, as is illustrated inJacob's fear of Esau after he was promised protection by God. But thishappens more rarely on account of the fact that a man endeavorsnaturally to see a good prophecy realized, whereas he does his best tocounteract an evil prophecy. [359]

Gersonides's entire discussion of miracles shows a deep seated motive tominimize their extent and influence. The study of science and philosophyhad the effect of planting in the minds of the mediæval philosophers agreat respect for reason on the one hand and natural law on the other. Astudy of history, archæology and literary criticism has developed inmodern times a spirit of scepticism regarding written records ofantiquity. This was foreign to mediæval theologians generally. No onedoubted for a moment the accuracy of the Biblical records as well astheir inspiration in every detail. Hence prophecy and miracles had to beexplained or explained away. Interpretation held the place ofcriticism. 

CHAPTER XVI

AARON BEN ELIJAH OF NICOMEDIA

The chronological treatment of Jewish philosophy which we have followedmakes it necessary at this point to take up a Karaite work of thefourteenth century that is closely modelled upon the "Guide of thePerplexed. " In doing this we necessarily take a step backward as far asthe philosophical development is concerned. For while it is true thatthe early Rabbanite thinkers like Saadia, Bahya, Ibn Zaddik and othersmoved in the circle of ideas of the Mohammedan Mutakallimun, that periodhad long since been passed. Judah Halevi criticized the Kalam, Ibn Daudis a thorough Aristotelian, and Maimonides gave the Kalam in Jewishliterature its deathblow. No Rabbanite after Maimonides would think ofgoing back to the old arguments made popular by the Mutakallimun--thetheory of atoms, of substance and accident in the Kalamistic sense ofaccident as a quality which needs continuous creation to exist anylength of time, the denial of law and natural causation, the argumentsin favor of creation and the existence of God based upon creation, thedoctrine of the divine will as eternal or created, residing in a subjector existing without a subject, the world as due to God's will or to hiswisdom, the nature of right and wrong as determined by the character andpurpose of the act or solely by the arbitrary will of God--these andother topics, which formed the main ground of discussion between theMuʿtazilites and the Ashariya, and were taken over by the Karaites andto a less extent by the early Rabbanites in the tenth and eleventhcenturies, had long lost their significance and their interest among theRabbanite followers of Maimonides. Aristotelianism, introduced byAlfarabi, Avicenna and Averroes among the Arabs, and Ibn Daud andMaimonides among the Jews, dominated all speculative thought, and theold Kalam was obsolete and forgotten. Gersonides no longer regards theKalamistic point of view as a living issue. He ignores it entirely. Hisproblems as we have seen are those raised by the Averroistic system. Inthis respect then a reading of Aaron ben Elijah's "Ez Hayim" (Tree ofLife)[360] affects us like a breath from a foreign clime, like the odorof a thing long buried. And yet Aaron ben Elijah was a contemporary ofLevi ben Gerson. He was born about 1300, and died in 1369. He lived inNicomedia, Cairo, Constantinople. The reason for the antiquatedappearance of his work lies in the fact that he was a Karaite, and theKaraites never got beyond the Muʿtazilite point of view. Karaism wasonly a sect and never showed after the days of Saadia anything like thelife and enthusiastic activity of the great body of Rabbanite Judaism, which formed the great majority of the Jewish people. The Karaites hadtheir important men in Halaka as well as in religious philosophy andBiblical exegesis. Solomon ben Yeroham, Joseph Ha-Maor (Al-Kirkisani), Joseph Al Basir (p. 48 ff. ), Jeshua ben Judah (p. 55 ff. ), YefetHa-Levi, Judah Hadassi, Aaron ben Joseph--all these were prominent inKaraitic literature. But they cannot be compared to the great men amongthe Rabbanites. There was no Maimonides among them. And Aaron ben Elijahcherished the ambition of being to the Karaites what Maimonides was tothe Rabbanites. Accordingly he undertook to compose three worksrepresenting the three great divisions of Karaitic Judaism--a book ofLaws, a work on Biblical exegesis and a treatise on religiousphilosophy. The last was written first, having been composed in 1346. The "Sefer Ha-Mizvot, " on the religious commandments, was written in1354, and his exegetical work, known as "Keter Torah" (The Crown of theLaw) was published in 1362. It is the first that interests us, the "EzHayim. " As was said before, this book is closely modelled upon the "MoreNebukim, " though the arrangement is different, being more logical thanthat of the "Guide. " Instead of beginning, as Maimonides does, withinterpreting the anthropomorphic expressions in the Bible, which isfollowed by a treatment of the divine attributes, long before theexistence of God has been proved or even the fundamental principles laiddown upon which are based the proofs of the existence of God, Aaron benElijah more naturally begins with the basal doctrines of physics andmetaphysics, which he then utilizes in discussing the existence of God. As Maimonides brought to a focus all the speculation on philosophy andreligion as it was handed down to him by Arab and Jew, and gave it aharmonious and systematic form in his masterpiece; so did Aaron benElijah endeavor to sum up all Karaitic discussion in his work, and inaddition declare his attitude to Maimonides. The success with which hecarried out this plan is not equal. As a source of information onschools and opinions of Arabs and Karaites, the "Ez Hayim" is of greatimportance and interest. But it cannot in the least compare with the"Guide" as a constructive work of religious philosophy. It has not thesame originality or any degree remotely approaching it. The greater partof the Aristotelian material seems bodily taken from Maimonides, and sois the part dealing with the anthropomorphic expressions in the Bible. There is a different point of view in his exposition of the Muʿtazilitephysics, which he presents in a more systematic and favorable light thanMaimonides, defending it against the strictures of the latter. Buteverywhere Aaron ben Elijah lacks the positiveness and commandingmastery of Maimonides. He is not clear what side of a question toespouse. For the most part he places side by side the opposed points ofview and only barely intimates his own attitude or preference. Underthese circumstances it will not be necessary for us to reproduce hisideas _in extenso_. It will be sufficient if we indicate his relation toMaimonides in the problems common to both, adding a brief statement ofthose topics which Aaron ben Elijah owes to his Karaite predecessors, and which Maimonides omits. 

His general attitude on the relation of religion or revelation to reasonand philosophy is somewhat inconsistent. For while he endeavors torationalize Jewish dogma and Scriptural teaching like Maimonides, and indoing so utilizes Aristotelian terminology in matters physical, metaphysical, psychological, ethical and logical, he nevertheless in thebeginning of his work condemns philosophy as well as philosophers, meaning of course the Aristotelians. [361] He nowhere expressly indicatesthe manner of reconciling this apparent contradiction. But it would seemas if he intended to distinguish between the philosophical method andthe actual teachings of the Aristotelians. Their method he approves, their results he condemns. The Aristotelians taught the eternity of theworld, the immutability of natural law, God's ignorance of particularsand the absence of special Providence. These doctrines must becondemned. Maimonides too rejects these extreme teachings whilepraising Aristotle and maintaining that philosophy was originally apossession of the Israelitish people, which they lost in the exile. Aaron ben Elijah is not willing to follow the philosophers as far asMaimonides. He admits positive attributes in God, which Maimonidesrejects; he admits an absolute will in God and not merely a relativelike Maimonides; he extends God's providence to all individualsincluding irrational creatures, whereas Maimonides limits specialprovidence to the individuals of the human species, and so on. And so hecondemns the philosophers, though he cannot help using their method andeven their fundamental doctrines, so far as they are purely theoreticaland scientific. He is willing to go the full length of the Aristoteliansonly in the unity and incorporeality of God, though here too hevindicates sense perception to God, _i. E. _, the knowledge of that whichwe get through our sense organs. He too like the philosophers insists onthe importance of the reason as the instrument of truth and knowledge. Abraham was the first, he tells us, who proved the existence of God withhis intellect. Then came the law of Moses, which strengthened the sameidea. The Gentiles hated and envied Israel for their superiority andtheir true opinions; hence they endeavored to refute their ideas andestablish others in their stead. This was the work of the ancient Greekphilosophers, who are called enemies in the Bible (Psalms 139, 21). Atthe time of the second Temple, seeing that the Jewish religion and itsteachings were true, they took advantage of the advent of Jesus to adopthis false teachings, thus showing their hatred and envy of Israel. Atthe same time, however, they were obliged to borrow some views andmethods of proof from Israel, for religion as such is opposed tophilosophy. Still the true nature of God was unknown to them. Then camethe Arabs, who imitated the Christians in adopting a belief differentfrom Judaism, at the same time borrowing views from the Bible. These arethe _Muʿtazila_ and the _Ashariya_. Later when on account of the exiledifferences arose among the Jews, there were formed the two parties ofthe Karaites and the Rabbanites. The Karaites followed the Muʿtazila, and so did some of the Rabbanites, because their views coincided withthose of the Bible, from which they were borrowed. The views of thephilosophers as being opposed to the Bible they naturally rejected. Nevertheless some Rabbanites adopted the views of the philosophers, though believing in the Bible. This is a mistake, for even theChristians rejected the views of the philosophers. [362]

Here we see clearly the difference in general attitude between Aaron benElijah and Maimonides. The latter has no use whatsoever for theMuʿtazila. He realizes the immeasurable superiority of the Aristotelians(this is the meaning of the word philosophers in mediæval Jewish andArabic literature). His task is therefore to harmonize the Bible withAristotelian doctrine wherever possible. Aaron ben Elijah is still, inthe fourteenth century, a follower of the Kalam, and believes theMuʿtazila are closer to Scripture than Aristotle. He is two centuriesbehind Maimonides philosophically, and yet he has the truer insightbecause less debauched by Aristotelian learning. 

As was said before, Aaron ben Elijah follows a more logical arrangementin the disposition of his work than Maimonides. In reality it is the oldarrangement of the Kalamistic works (_cf. _ p. 24). The purpose of allJewish investigators, he says, is the same, namely, to prove theexistence and nature of God, but there is a difference among them in themethod of proving God's existence. Some base their proofs on theassumption of the creation of the world, others on that of the world'seternity. The Mutakallimun follow the former method, the philosophers, the latter. Their respective views of the origin of the world aredetermined by their opinions concerning the principles of existence andthe existent, that is, the fundamental principles of physics andmetaphysics. Accordingly Aaron ben Elijah finds it necessary to give apreliminary account of the Kalamistic as well as the philosophictheories, as Maimonides did before him (p. 249 ff. ). It is not necessaryfor us to reproduce here his sketch of the philosophical views, as weknow them sufficiently from our studies of Ibn Daud and Maimonides. Butit will be of value to refer to his account of the Kalamisticprinciples, though we have already discussed them in the introduction(p. Xxi) and in our study of Maimonides (p. 249 ff. ). This is dueprincipally to the fact that Aaron ben Elijah endeavors to defend theMutakallimun against Maimonides's charge that they were influenced bypreconceived notions and allowed their religious views to dictate tothem their interpretation of nature, instead of letting the latter speakfor itself. Thus Maimonides specifically accuses them of having adoptedthe atomic theory of the pre-Aristotelian philosophers not because theywere really and independently convinced of its scientific truth--howcould that be since Aristotle proved it impossible?--but because on thistheory they could prove the creation of the world, which they must atall hazards maintain as a religious dogma fundamental in its nature, since upon it is based the proof of the existence of God. 

Aaron ben Elijah denies this charge, maintaining the philosophicalhonesty of the Mutakallimun. Epicurus too, he says, believed in theatomic theory, though he regarded the world as eternal. Hence there isno necessary connection between atoms and creation. [363] The atomictheory is defensible on its own merits, and the motives of theMutakallimun in adopting it are purely scientific, as follows: Accordingto the Mutakallimun there are only body or substance and its accidentsor qualities. This is the constitution of material objects. There are, however, two kinds of qualities or attributes, _viz. _, "characters, " andaccidents. Characters are such attributes as are essential to body andwithout which it cannot exist. Accidents may disappear, while bodycontinues. Since, then, body may exist with or without accidents, theremust be a cause which is responsible for the attachment of accidents tobody when they are so attached. This cause we call "union. " When a bodyis "united" with accidents it owes this to the existence of a certainsomething, a certain property, let us say, in it which we have called"union. " Hence when the body is "separated" from accidents, when it iswithout accidents, it is because there is no "union. " Further, everybody possessed of magnitude or extension is divisible, hence it musthave "union" to hold its parts together. But this "union" is notessential to all existents; for we have seen that its function is tounite accidents with body. And as accidents are separable while body maycontinue to exist without them, "union" disappears together with theaccidents. Bodies without "union" are therefore possible and real. Butwe have just seen that all bodies possessing magnitude have "union. " Itfollows therefore that if there are "union"-less bodies, they arewithout magnitude, and hence atoms. This is the proof of the atomictheory and it has nothing to do with the matter of the origin of theworld. [364] As a matter of fact the Mutakallimun believe that the atomswere created _ex nihilo_. But the creation of the world can be provedwhichever view we adopt concerning the nature of the existent, whetherit be the atomic theory of the Mutakallimun or the principles of matterand form of the Aristotelians. The important principle at the basis ofthis proof is the well-known Kalamistic one that if an object cannot dowithout an attribute originating in time, the object itself has itsorigin in time. Now on either view of the constitution of the existent, body must have form or accidents respectively, and as the latter areconstantly changing, body or matter has its origin in time, hence theworld is not eternal. 

Besides, not to speak of the inconclusive character of the philosophicalarguments in favor of eternity and the positive arguments for creation(all or most of which we have already met in our previous studies, andneed not therefore reproduce Aaron ben Elijah's version of them), thephilosophers themselves without knowing it are led to contradictthemselves in their very arguments from the assumption of eternity. Thedoctrine of creation follows as a consequence from their ownpresuppositions. Thus on the basis of eternity of motion they prove thatthe heavenly spheres are endowed with soul and intellect, and theirmotions are voluntary and due to conceptions which they endeavor torealize (_cf. _ p. 267). This makes the sphere a composite object, containing the elements, _sphericity_, _soul_, _intellect_. Everythingcomposite is a _possible_ existent, because its existence depends uponthe existence of its parts. What is a possible existent may also notexist. Moreover, that which is possible must at some time become actual. Hence the sphere must at some time have been non-existent, and itrequired an agent to bring it into being. We are thus led to contradictour hypothesis of eternity from which we started. [365]

Creation is thus established, and this is the best way to prove theexistence, unity and incorporeality of God. Maimonides attempts to provecreation from the peculiarities of the heavenly motions, which cannot bewell accounted for on the theory of natural causes. Adopting the latterin the main, he makes an exception in the case of the spherical motionsbecause the philosophers cannot adequately explain them, and jumps tothe conclusion that here the philosophical appeal to mechanicalcausation breaks down and we are dealing with teleology, withintelligent design and purpose on the part of an intelligent agent. This leads to belief in creation. But this argument of Maimonides isvery weak and inconclusive. Ignorance of causes in a special case, dueto the limitations of our reason, proves nothing. Mechanical causes maybe the sole determinants of the heavenly motions even though thephilosophers have not yet discovered what they are (_cf. _ above, p. 270ff. ). [366]

Nor is Maimonides to be imitated, who bases his proof of the existenceof God on the theory of eternity. The Bible is opposed to it. The Biblebegins with creation as an indication that this is the basis of ourknowledge of God's existence, revelation and providence. This is themethod Abraham followed and this is what he meant when he swore by the"most high God, the creator of heaven and earth" (Gen. 14, 22). Abrahamarrived at this belief through ratiocination and endeavored to convinceothers. The same thing is evident in the words of Isaiah (40, 26), "Liftup your eyes on high and see who created these. " He was arguing with thepeople who believed in eternity, and proved to them the existence of Godby showing that the world is created. All these indications in the Bibleshow that the doctrine of creation is capable of apodeictic proof. [367]

The reader will see that all this is directed against Maimonides, thoughhe is not mentioned by name. Maimonides claimed against the Mutakallimunthat it is not safe to base the existence of God upon the theory ofcreation, because the latter cannot be strictly demonstrated. And whilehe believed in it himself and gave reasons to show why it is moreplausible than eternity, he admitted that others might thinkdifferently; and hence based his proofs of God's existence on theAristotelian theory of eternity in order to be on the safe side. It isnever too late to prove God's existence if the world is created. We mustbe sure of his existence, no matter what the fate of our cosmologicaltheories might be. This did not appeal to the Karaite and Mutakallim, Aaron ben Elijah. His idea is that we must never for a moment doubt thecreation of the world. To follow the procedure of Maimonides would havethe tendency of making people believe that the world may be eternalafter all, as happened in fact in the case of Gersonides. Aaron benElijah will not leave a way open to such a heresy. 

In the doctrine of attributes Aaron ben Elijah likewise maintains theviews of the Muʿtazilite Karaites against the philosophers, andespecially against Maimonides. The general problem is sufficientlyfamiliar to us by this time, and we need only present the salient pointsin the controversy. The question is whether there are any positiveattributes which may be applied to God as actually denoting hisessence--hence _positive essential_ attributes. Maimonides denied it, the Karaites affirmed it. The arguments for Maimonides's denial we sawbefore (p. 262 f. ). And his conclusion is that the only attributes thatmay be applied to God are the negative, and those positive ones which donot denote any definite thing corresponding to them in God's essence, but are derived from the effects of God's unitary and simple being onthe life of man and nature. He is the author of these effects, and wecharacterize him in the way in which we would characterize a human beingwho would do similar things; but this must not be done. 

Aaron ben Elijah insists that there are positive essential attributes, which are the following five: Omnipotent, Omniscient, Acting with Will, Living, Existent. He agrees with Maimonides that these essentialattributes must be understood in a manner not to interfere with God'ssimplicity and unity, but is satisfied that this can be done. For wemust not conceive of them as additions to God's essence, nor as so manydistinct elements composing God's essence, but as representing themultiplicity of powers issuing from him without detriment to his unity. We call them essential attributes, meaning that they are the essence ofGod, but not that they are different from each other and each makes uppart of God's essence. We do not know God's essence, and these terms aresimply transferred from our human experience, and do not indicate thatGod's activity can be compared to ours in any sense. 

The five attributes above named are all identical with God's simpleessence. "Living" denotes ability to perceive, hence is identical with"Omniscient. " "Acting with will" likewise denotes just and properaction, which in turn involves true insight. Hence identity of will andknowledge. "Omnipotent" also in the case of an intellectual beingdenotes the act of the intellect _par excellence_, which is knowledge. And surely God's existence is not distinct from his essence, else hisexistence would be caused, and he would not be the necessary existentall agree him to be. It follows then that God is one, and his essence isnevertheless all these five attributes. 

There are all the reasons in the world why we should apply attributes toGod. The same reason as we have for applying names to anything elseexists for giving names to God. In fact it would be correct to say thatwe should have more names for God than for anything else, since in otherthings we can avoid naming them by pointing to them, as they can beperceived by the senses. Not so God. We are forced to use words intalking about him. God has given himself names in the Bible, hence wemay do the same. 

Maimonides and his school endeavor to obviate the criticisms of thephilosophers, who are opposed to all attributes, by excluding all butnegative terms. But this does not help the matter in the least. Anegative attribute is in reality no different from a positive, and inthe end leads to a positive. Thus if we say "not mineral, " "not plant, "we clearly say "animal. " The advocates of negative attributes answerthis criticism by saying that they understand pure negation without anypositive implications, just as when we say a stone is "not seeing, " wedo not imply that it is blind. But this cannot be, for when they say Godis "not ignorant, " they do not mean that he is not "knowing" either, forthey insist that he is power and knowledge and life, and so on. Thisbeing the case, it is much more proper to use positive attributes, seeing that the Prophets do so. When they say that the Prophets meantonly to exclude the negative; that by saying, "Able, " "Knowing, " theymeant to exclude "weak" "ignorant, " they _ipso facto_ admit that byexcluding the latter we posit the former. 

The arguments against positive essential attributes we can easilyanswer. By saying that certain attributes are essential we do not claimto know God's essence. All we know is God's existence, which we learnfrom his effects, and according to these same effects we characterizeGod's existence by means of attributes of which also we know only theexistence, not the essence. For we do not mean to indicate that theseterms denote the same thing in God as they denote in us. They arehomonyms, since in God they denote essence, whereas in us they areaccidents. The plurality of attributes does not argue plurality in God, for one essence may perform a great many acts, and hence we maycharacterize the essence in accordance with those acts. The error ofcomposition arises only if we suppose that the various acts point tovarious elements in their author. Of the various kinds of terms thoseonly are applicable to God which denote pure essence or substance likeknowledge, power; and those denoting activity like creating, doing, andso on. [368]

In reference to the will of God Aaron ben Elijah refuses to agree withthe peculiar view of the Mutakallimun; but unlike Maimonides, who canafford to ignore their discussions entirely and dismiss their fancifulnotion with a word ("Guide, " I. 75, proof 3), Aaron ben Elijah takes upthe discussion seriously. The Mutakallimun (or the Ashariya, accordingto Aaron ben Elijah) were in dread of anything that might lend somesemblance to eternity of the world. Hence they argued, If the will ofGod is identical with his essence like the other essential attributes, it follows that as his essence is eternal and unchangeable so is hiswill. And if we grant this, then the objects of his will too must beeternal and unchangeable, and we have the much abhorred doctrine of theeternity of the world. To avoid this objectionable conclusion theyconceived of God's voluntary acts as due to an external will. But thisexternal will also offered difficulties. It cannot be a power or qualityresiding in God as its subject, for God is not a material substancebearing accidents. It cannot be a quality inherent in another subject, for then it would not be God's will at all; it would be the will of thisother being, and God's acts would be determined by someone else. Theywere thus forced to assume a subject-less will newly created with everyact of God. This notion Aaron ben Elijah rejects on the ground that asubject-less will is an impossibility. An accident must have a subject, and will implies life as its subject. Besides, the relation between Godand this subject-less accident, will, would be the cause of much logicaldifficulty. Aaron ben Elijah therefore accepts the ordinary sane viewthat the will of God is identical with his essence; that God willsthrough his own essence. And he does not fear that this will lead toeternity of the world. He identifies God's will with his wisdom, andGod's wisdom with right action. As we do not know the essence of God'swisdom, so we do not know how it is that it prompts him to realize hiswill at one time and not at another, though his will is always thesame. [369]

Aaron ben Elijah also follows his party in attributing to God senseperception, not, to be sure, the same kind of perception as we have, acquired by means of corporeal organs; for this is impossible in God formany reasons. God is not corporeal, and he cannot be affected or changedby a corporeal stimulus. But it is clear beyond a doubt that nothing canbe more absurd than to suppose that the creator of the sense organs doesnot understand the purpose which they serve and the objects which theyperceive. What we mean then is that the objects which we perceive withour senses God also perceives, though in an incorporeal manner. Hence itdoes not follow that there is any change in God due to the externalobject he perceives, nor that the multiplicity of objects involvesplurality in God; for even our power of perception is one, though itperceives many things and opposite. We conclude then that God hasperception as well as intelligence, but they are not two distinct powersin him. It is the object perceived that determines the power percipient. Hence one and the same power may be called perception when we aredealing with a sensible object, and intelligence when it has anintelligible as its object. [370]

In his discussion of the nature of evil we once more are brought incontact with Kalamistic views recalling the old Karaite works of theeleventh century (_cf. _ pp. 52, 57). Thus the notion that good and badare adjectives applied to acts not in view of their inherent character, which is _per se_ neither good nor bad, but solely to indicate that theyhave been commanded or forbidden; the idea that only the dependentsubject can do wrong, but not the master, since his will is the sourceof all right and wrong--these views are frequently discussed in theMuʿtazilite works of Arabs and Karaites. The Rabbanites scarcely evermention them. Aaron ben Elijah enumerates six views on the nature ofevil, with all of which except the last he disagrees. The opinion namedabove that an act is made good or bad by being commanded or prohibited, he refutes as follows: Such a view removes the very foundation of goodand bad. For if the person in authority chooses to reverse his order, the good becomes bad, and the bad good, and the same thing is then goodand bad, which is absurd. Besides, if there are two authorities givingopposite orders, the same act is good and bad at the same time. To saythat God's command alone determines the character of an act isincorrect, because as long as commanding and prohibiting as suchdetermine the goodness or badness of an act, the person issuing thecommand is immaterial. We do say quite generally that an act which Godcommands is good, and one which he prohibits is bad; but we mean by thismerely that the command or prohibition is an indication to us, who areignorant of the true nature of acts. 

Again, on this theory of the value of acts, what will you do with suchan act as the investigation of the existence and nature of God? Surelysuch an important matter cannot be indifferent. It must be good or bad. And yet we cannot apply to it the above test of command and prohibition, for this test implies the existence of God, which the act endeavors toprove. It follows therefore that the value of an act is inherent in itand not determined and created by command and prohibition. 

Aaron ben Elijah is similarly dissatisfied with another view, whichregards evil as a negation. We have heard this opinion before and weknow that Maimonides adopted it (p. 288). Its motive as we know is toremove from God the responsibility for evil. If evil is nothing positiveit is not caused by the activity of an agent. All essential activity isgood, and all the acts of God are good. Evil consists in the absence ofgood; it is due to matter, and does not come from God. Aaron ben Elijahobjects properly that as good is a positive act, a doing of somethingpositive, so is evil, even on the theory of its negative character, aremoval of something positive, hence a positive act. Besides, grantingall that the opponent claims, the argument should work both ways, and ifGod is not held responsible for the evil in the world because it is mereprivation, why should man be held responsible for doing evil, _i. E. _, for removing the positive? He clinches his argument by quoting Isaiah(5, 20), "Woe unto those who say of evil it is good, and of good it isevil ... That put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter. " Good and evilare placed parallel with sweet and bitter, which are both positive. Hence the Bible is opposed to the negative conception of evil. 

His own view is that good and evil are qualities pertaining to an act byreason of its own nature, but these are not absolute conceptions liketrue and false. The good and the bad are conventional constructs, andthe value of an act is relative to the end or purpose it serves. Thepurpose of human convention in regarding certain acts as good andothers as bad is the protection of the human race. An act which conducesto human welfare is good, one that militates against it is bad. Stillthere are instances in which an act generally regarded as bad may assumea different character when in the given instance it serves a goodpurpose, as for example when pain is inflicted to obviate more seriousdanger. The surgeon, who amputates a leg to save the patient's life, does good, not evil. The judge, who punishes the criminal withimprisonment or death for the protection of society and to realizejustice, does good, not evil. In this way we must explain the evil whichGod brings upon man. God cannot be the cause of evil. For evil in man isdue to want or ignorance. Neither is found in God, hence he has nomotive to do wrong. All the evil of which we complain is only apparent. In reality it is good, because it is either brought upon us to preventstill greater evils, or it is in the nature of just punishment forwrongdoing. In either case it is a good. [371]

Aaron ben Elijah's discussion of Providence follows closely the plan ofthe corresponding arguments in Maimonides. The problem is treated byboth in connection with God's knowledge, and both maintain that the realmotive of those who denied God's knowledge of particulars is theirobservation of apparent injustice in the happenings of this world (_cf. _above, p. 289). Both again preface their own views of the question ofProvidence by a preliminary statement of the various opinions held byother sects. Here too the two accounts are in the main similar, exceptthat Aaron ben Elijah is somewhat more detailed and names a few sectsnot mentioned by Maimonides, among them being the Manicheans and thefollowers of the Syrian Gnostic Bardesanes. In their own views, however, Aaron ben Elijah and Maimonides differ; the latter approaching the viewof Aristotle, the former that of the Muʿtazila. 

Maimonides as we know (p. 292) denies special providence for theindividuals of the sublunar world with the exception of man. In the caseof the lower animals, the species alone are protected by divineprovidence, hence they will continue forever, whereas the individualanimals are subject to chance. Man, as a rational animal, is anexception. He is a free and responsible agent, hence he is under divineguidance and is rewarded and punished for his conduct. The extent ofthe divine care depends upon the degree to which the individual developshis reason, actualizing his potential intellect. 

Aaron ben Elijah argues that this view is erroneous, for it is notproper to make a distinction between God's knowledge and his providence. If it would argue imperfection in God not to _know_ certain things, thesame objection applies to limiting his providence, and the two should becoextensive. To say that God's providence extends to superior andimportant things and ignores the inferior is to make God guilty ofinjustice. Aaron ben Elijah believes therefore that Providence extendsto all individuals, including animals. And he quotes the Bible in hissupport, "The Lord is good to all, and his mercies are over all hisworks, " (Ps. 145, 9), and, "Thou shalt not plough with an ox and an asstogether" (Deut. 22, 10). Maimonides, he says, was led to his opinion byhis idea that death and suffering always involve sin; and not being ableto apply this dictum to the suffering of animals that are slaughtered, he removed Providence from their individuals entirely. When the Bibleorders us to consider the feelings of the animal, he says the object isto train our own faculties in mercy, and prevent the formation of habitsof cruelty, not for the sake of the animal. But he cannot remove alldifficulties in this way. What will he do with the case of a person borncrippled, and the sufferings of little children? The idea that death andsuffering in all cases involve sin must be given up. Maimonides is alsowrong when he says that reward is purely intellectual and is dependentupon the development of the "acquired intellect. " It would follow fromthis that right conduct as such is not rewarded; that it serves merelyas a help to realizing the acquired intellect. All this is opposed toBiblical teaching. [372]

The prosperity of the wicked and the adversity of the righteous Aaronben Elijah endeavors to explain as follows. The prosperity of the wickedmay be due to former good deeds; or by way of punishment, that he maycontinue in his evil deeds and be punished more severely. It may be inorder that he may use the good fortune he has in whatever way hepleases, for good or ill. Finally his good fortune may be given him as amatter of grace, like his creation. Correspondingly we may explain theadversity of the righteous in a similar manner. It may be due to formersins. If he has no sins, his sufferings may be intended to test him inorder to add to his reward. If he dies without having enjoyed life, hewill be rewarded in the next world. The pleasures of this world must notbe considered. For since they are given as a matter of grace, they maycome or not without involving any injustice. When a man has both gooddeeds and sins, he may be rewarded for his good deeds and punished forhis bad, or he may be paid according to the element which predominates. Those who are born crippled and the sufferings of children will berewarded later. In reference to the slaughter of animals, Aaron benElijah does not agree with the Muʿtazila that the animals will berecompensed for their undeserved sufferings. There is no immortal partin animals, hence no reward after death. He can assign no reason fortheir sufferings except that men need them for food, but he sees nothingwrong in taking an animal's life for food, for as the life of animalswas given to them as a matter of grace, there is no wrong in taking itaway. However, to inflict pain in a way different from the mannerpermitted by God is wrong. [373]

Aaron ben Elijah lays great stress upon what he considers an importantdifference of opinion between the Rabbanites and the Karaites concerningthe nature and purpose of divine punishment. The Rabbanites according tohim insist that "there is no death without sin, nor suffering withoutguilt, " whereas the Karaites admit that some of the sufferings of therighteous are not in the nature of punishment at all, but are what areknown as "chastisements of love. " Their purpose is to increase the man'sreward later in the future world, and at the same time they have apedagogical value in themselves in strengthening the person spiritually. Accordingly Aaron ben Elijah, who in the main follows the opinions ofthe Karaites, differs with the Rabbanites and particularly Maimonides inthe interpretation of the "trials" of Adam, Abraham, Job. 

So far as Job is concerned, we know the opinions of Maimonides on thesubject. In his "Guide of the Perplexed" he interprets the book of Jobin connection with his discussion of Providence (_cf. _ above, p. 304). In the general nature of suffering the idea of "chastisement of love" isquite familiar to the Rabbis, though Maimonides does not care to insiston it, claiming that there is no support for it in the Bible. The ideaof "trial" according to him is neither that God may know what he did notknow before; nor is it to make a man suffer that he may be rewardedlater. The purpose of trial is that mankind may know whatever it isdesired to teach them in a given case. In the trial of Abraham when hewas told to sacrifice Isaac, there was a two-fold reason; first, thatall may know to what extent the love of God may go in a pious man; andsecond to show that a prophet is convinced of the reality of his visionsas an ordinary person is of the data of his senses. [374]

The book of Job is to Maimonides a treatise on Providence, and the fivecharacters in the drama represent the various opinions on the nature ofProvidence as they were held by different schools of philosophy andtheology in Maimonides's day. Job has the Aristotelian view that Godcares nothing for man. Eliphaz represents the correct Jewish view thateverything is reward or punishment for merit and demerit. Bildadmaintains the Muʿtazilite opinion that many misfortunes are for thepurpose of increasing reward in the world to come. Zophar stands for theview of the Ashariya that all is to be explained by reference to thewill of God, and no questions should be asked. Elihu finally insiststhat the individual man is the object of the divine care, but that wemust not compare God's providence with our own interest in, and care forthings; that there is no relation at all between them except in name(_cf. _ above, p. 304). The Rabbis, who do not make of Job a philosopher, naturally do not understand the matter as Maimonides does, but theynevertheless agree with him that Job deserved the punishment hereceived. The Karaites on the other hand classed Job's sufferings with"chastisements of love, " which would mean that Job was a perfect man anddid not deserve any punishment. The sole motive for inflicting pain andtribulation upon him was to reward him the more later. 

Aaron ben Elijah agrees in the main with his Karaite predecessors thatJob was not punished for any fault he had committed. He does not see inthe arguments of Job's friends any difference of opinion on the generalquestion of Providence, and Job was not an Aristotelian. UnlikeAristotle, he did believe in God's care for man, as is evident from suchstatements as (Job 10, 10), "Behold like milk didst thou pour me out, and like cheese didst thou curdle me. " The Karaites, he holds, arecorrect in their main contention that Job's sufferings were not in thenature of punishment for previous guilt and wrongdoing, but they aremistaken in supposing that Job was altogether right in his conception ofthe meaning and reason of his sufferings; that they had no other purposeexcept to increase his reward in the future. Aaron ben Elijah thenexplains his own view of "trial. "

Man, he says, is composed of body and soul, and must therefore endeavorto gain this world and the next. If he is punished for guilt or offence, the punishment corresponds to the offence. Corporeal guilt is followedby corporeal punishment, spiritual guilt by spiritual punishment. Adamoffended spiritually and was punished spiritually by being driven fromthe Garden of Eden as will be explained later. Abraham endeavored to dojustice to both the constituent parts of his being; and hence God in hiskindness, wishing to strengthen Abraham spiritually, gave him theopportunity in the trial of Isaac. At the same time the physicalsuffering was compensated by the promise to Abraham of the continuity ofIsaac's descendants. Job's sufferings were of the same kind, except thatthey came to him without his knowledge and without his being told theirpurpose. And at first he thought they were in order to give him futurereward, but without any use in themselves. Later he discovered that theybenefited him directly by increasing his spiritual strength. [375]

Aaron ben Elijah differs also from Maimonides in reference to thepurpose of the world. Maimonides maintains that while there is sense ininquiring for the purpose of the parts of the world, the question of theultimate purpose of the world as a whole is meaningless. The purpose ofa given event or law of nature lies in its relation to the other eventsand laws, hence there is a relative purpose in particular things; thus, given the existence of animals they must have food, sense perception, and so on. But if we ask why the universe as a whole, the only answerthat can be given is God's wisdom, which we do not understand. Inparticular Maimonides will not admit that the world is for the sake ofman, as this view clashes with experience and makes it impossible toexplain a great many phenomena in nature, which are distinctly of nobenefit to man and take no cognizance of his interests. [376] Aaron benElijah agrees with Maimonides that God's wisdom rather than hisarbitrary will, as the Ashariya maintain, must be appealed to inanswering the question of the purpose of the world. But he is inclinedto regard man as the purpose of the lower world, admitting that wecannot know the purpose of the higher worlds of the spheres andIntelligences, as they transcend the powers of our comprehension. [377]

We can pass over Aaron ben Elijah's discussion of prophecy very brieflybecause there is no new attitude or contribution in his views. Withoutsaying it, he reluctantly perhaps, leans upon Maimonides, and withapparent variations in form really adopts the classification of the"Guide" (p. 277). He gives no psychological explanation of prophecybecause he disagrees with the philosophers, to whom prophecy is a purelynatural gift which cannot fail to manifest itself when the requisiteconditions are there, namely, perfection in intellect and imagination. In fact when he gives the different views on the nature of prophecy, herefuses to identify what seems to stand in his book for the view ofMaimonides (the fourth view) with that of the followers of the Mosaiclaw. Whereas Maimonides following the philosophers insists on the twoimportant elements in prophecy, namely, intellect and imagination, adding thereto also moral perfection, Aaron ben Elijah in giving theopinion of those who follow the law of Moses, says nothing of theimagination. He insists only on perfection in intellect and in ethicalcharacter. This difference is, however, only apparent; and further on herefers to the imagination as an important element, which determines, inits relation to the reason, the character of a man as a prophet or amere statesman or philosopher--all in the manner of Maimonides. 

His idea of the purpose of prophecy he develops, as it seems, with aneye to the criticism of the Brahmins of India, whom he quotes as denyingprophecy, though admitting Providence, on the ground that it can serveno purpose. The reason alone, they say, is sufficient to decide what isright and what is wrong. Accordingly Aaron ben Elijah meets theirobjection as follows: It is true that man might have gotten alongwithout prophecy through the laws which his own reason established forright and wrong, good and evil. Those who followed these rational lawswould have attained long life, and the others would have perished. But agood man living in a bad environment would have been involved in thedownfall of the majority, which would not be just. Hence it wasnecessary that God should warn the man, that he might save himself. Thisis the first beginning of prophecy. Witness Noah and Lot. Abraham was agreat advance on his predecessors. He endeavored to follow God's will inrespect to both body and soul. Hence God saved him from the danger towhich he was exposed in Ur of the Chaldees, and wanted to benefit hisdescendants also that they should perfect their bodies and their souls. This is impossible for a whole nation without special laws to guidethem. This is particularly true of the "traditional" laws (ceremonial), which are not in themselves good or bad, but are disciplinary in theirnature. 

A prophet must have both intellectual and ethical perfection. For hemust understand the nature of God in order to communicate his will; andthis cannot be had without previous ethical perfection. Hence thetwofold requirement. This is the reason, he says, why we do not believein the religions of Jesus and Mohammed, because they were not possessedof intellectual perfection. And besides they tend to the extinction ofthe human species by reason of their monastic and celibate ideal. Theywere misled by the asceticism of the prophets, who meant it merely as aprotest against the material self-indulgence of the time, and calledattention to the higher life. But those people in their endeavor toimitate the prophets mistook the means for the end, with the result thatthey missed both, perfection of soul as well as of body, and merelymortified the flesh, thinking it the will of God. Hence, Aaron benElijah continues, we shall never accept a religion which does not preachthe maintenance of this world as well as of the next. Not even miraclescan authenticate a religion which preaches monasticism and celibacy. 

Moses was superior to the other prophets. All the others received theirmessages in a vision or a dream, Moses had his inspiration while awake. The others were inspired through the medium of an angel, _i. E. _, through the imagination, hence their language abounds in allegories andparables. Moses did not use the imagination, hence the plain characterof his speech. The others were overcome by the vision and physicallyexhausted, as we read in Daniel (10, 17), "There remained no strength inme, and no breath was left in me. " Moses was free from thisweakness--"And the Lord spoke unto Moses face to face, as a man speakethunto his neighbor" (Exod. 33, 11). The others required preparation, Moses did not. Moses's testimony, too, was stronger than that of all therest. His authority in the end was made plain to all the peopledirectly and openly, so that there remained not a shred of a doubt. Thisis why we accept his law and no other, because none is so wellauthenticated. The Law cannot change without implying that the standardof perfection has changed, or the world has changed, or God's knowledgehas changed. All this is impossible. The Law says besides, "Thou shaltnot add thereto, and thou shalt not diminish therefrom" (Deut. 13, 1). Therefore, concludes Aaron ben Elijah the Karaite, we do not believe inthe oral or traditional law because of the additions to, andsubtractions from, the written law which it contains. [378]

Aaron ben Elijah agrees with Maimonides that all the commandments of theBible, including the ceremonial laws, have a purpose and are not due tothe arbitrary will of God. The ceremonial laws are for the sake of therational, serving a pedagogical and disciplinary purpose, and the Law asa whole is for the purpose of teaching the truth and inculcating thegood. He goes further than Maimonides in vindicating the rational andethical purpose of all the details of the various laws, and not merelyof the several commandments as a whole (_cf. _ above, p. 294). [379]

A problem that occupied the minds of the Mutakallimun, Arabs as well asKaraites, but which Maimonides does not discuss, is the purpose of God'sgiving commandments to those who he knew would remain unbelievers, andrefuse to obey. That God's knowledge and man's freedom co-exist andneither destroys the other, has already been shown. [380] If then Godknows, as we must assume, that a given person will refuse to obey thecommandments, what is the use of giving them to him? And granting thatfor some reason unknown to us they have been given, is it just to punishhim for disobedience when the latter might have been spared by notgiving the man in question any commandments?

Aaron ben Elijah answers these questions by citing the followingparallel. A man prepares a meal for two guests and one does not come. The absence of the guest does not make the preparation improper, for thecharacter of the act does not depend upon the choice of the guest to door not to do the desire of the host. The invitation was proper becausethe host meant the guest's benefit. To be sure, the case is not quiteparallel, and to make it so we must assume that the host expects thatthe guest will not come. His intention being good, the invitation isproper. In our problem knowledge takes the place of expectation. Goddoes not merely expect, he knows that the man will not obey. But asGod's desire is to benefit mankind and arouse them to higher things, thecommand is proper, no matter what the person chooses to do. 

To punish the man for disobedience is not unjust because God intended tobenefit him by the command. If he disobeyed, that is his lookout. If thebenefit could have been had without the command, then the punishmentwould be unjust, but not otherwise. 

If only good men were commanded and the rest ignored, the danger wouldbe that the former being thereby assured of reward, might be tempted todo wrong; and the others in despair might be worse than they would beunder ordinary circumstances. God saw that man has evil tendencies, andneeds warning and guidance from without. And just as he gave menunderstanding and ability to believe though he knew that a given personwould not avail himself thereof, so he gave all men commandments, thoughhe knew that some would not obey. [381]

The rest of the book is devoted to such questions as reward andpunishment after death, immortality of the soul, the problem of thesoul's pre-existence, the nature of the future life, repentance--questionswhich Maimonides left untouched in the "Guide" on the ground thatwhatever religion and tradition may say about them, they are not strictlyspeaking scientific questions, and are not susceptible to philosophicaldemonstration. 

Aaron ben Elijah proves that there must be reward and punishment afterdeath. For as man is composed of body and soul, there must be reward foreach according as man endeavors to maintain and perfect them. Thus if aman cares for his body alone, he will be rewarded in his body, _i. E. _, in this world. The other man who looks out for both body and soul musthave the same reward in this world as the other, since their physicalefforts were similar. At the same time he must have something over andabove the other in the nature of compensation for his soul, and thismust be in the next world. 

The prosperity of the wicked and the misery of the righteous are also tobe explained in part, as we have seen (p. 376), by reference to theirrespective destinies in the next world, where the inequalities of thisworld will be adjusted. 

Finally, material reward cannot be the consequence of intellectual andspiritual merit; it would mean doing the greater for the sake of thesmaller. And besides the soul is not benefited by physical goods andpleasures, and would remain without reward. Hence there must be anotherkind of reward after death. In order to deserve such reward the soulmust become wise. At the same time the common people, who observe theceremonial commandments, are not excluded from a share in the world tocome, because the purpose of these laws is also intellectual andspiritual, as we said before (p. 382), and hence their observance makesthe soul wise, and gives it immortality. This last comment is clearlydirected against the extreme intellectualism of Maimonides andGersonides, according to whom rational activity alone confersimmortality (p. 339). [382]

The considerations just adduced imply the immortality of the soul, towhich they lend indirect proof. But Aaron ben Elijah endeavors besidesto furnish direct proof of the soul's continuance after the death of thebody. And the first thing he does is to disarm the criticism of thephilosophers, who deny immortality on the ground that the soul being theform of the body, it must like other material forms cease with thedissolution of the things of which they are the forms. He answersthis by showing that the soul as the cause of knowledge andwisdom--immaterial faculties--is itself immaterial. Being also the causeof the body's motion, it is not itself subject to motion, hence not totime, and therefore not destructible like a natural form. Besides thecomposition of body and soul is different from that of matter and formin the ordinary sense. For in the former case each of the constituentparts is already a composite of matter and form. The body has bothmatter and form, and the soul has likewise. For the acquired intellectis the form of the soul, which is the matter. Other proofs are asfollows: The rational soul performs its functions without help from thebody, hence it is independent in its existence. The proof of the laststatement is that the power of the rational soul is not limited, anddoes not become weary, as a corporeal power does. Hence it can existwithout the body. Again, as the corporeal powers grow stronger, theintellectual powers grow weaker, and _vice versa_ as the corporealpowers grow weaker in old age, the intellect grows stronger. Hence thesoul is independent of the body, and when the physical powers ceaseentirely in death, the intellect is at its height. [383]

The question of the soul's pre-existence before coming in contact withthe body, Aaron ben Elijah answers in the affirmative, though hisarguments in favor of the opposite view are stronger. His sole argumentin favor of its pre-existence is that the soul, being a self-subsistingsubstance and not an accident, is not dependent upon the body, and musthave existed before the body. The consequence which some have drawn fromthis supposition combined with the soul's immortality, namely, that thesoul is eternal, he refuses to adopt. The soul existed before the body, but like all things which are not God it was created in time. 

Though we have thus seen that the soul existed before the body, it ismistaken to suppose that it was completely developed. For though thegradual progress in knowledge and understanding as the individualmatures proves nothing for the soul's original imperfection, as we mayaccount for this progress by the gradual adaptation of the physicalelements to the functions of the soul, there is a more valid objection. If the soul was perfectly developed before entering the body, all soulsshould be alike when they leave it, which is not the case. We come tothe conclusion therefore that the soul does acquire knowledge while incontact with the body. The human soul is a unit, and from its connectionwith the body arise the various powers, such as growth, life, reason. When the soul is separated from the body, those powers which functionedwith the aid of the body perish; the others remain. [384]

In the matter of eschatology Aaron ben Elijah gives a number of viewswithout declaring himself definitely for any of them. The maindifference among the three points of view quoted concerns thepossibility of the resurrection of the body, and the meaning of theterms "revival of the dead" ("Tehiyat ha-metim") and "the world to come"("Olam ha-ba"). Aaron ben Elijah seems to incline to the first, in favorof resurrection. 

We must endeavor, he says, to get some notion of final reward andpunishment. For without any idea of its nature a man's hope or fear istaken away from him, and he has no motive for right conduct. To be sureit is not possible to get a clear understanding of the matter, but someidea we must have. The first view which he seems to favor is that_revival of the dead_ and _world to come_ are the same thing; that theend of man is the resurrection of the body and its reunion with thesoul. This is the future life, and this is meant by reward andpunishment. There is Biblical support for this view in such expressionsas, "Thy dead shall live, thy dead bodies shall arise" (Isa. 26, 19). "The Lord killeth, and maketh alive; he bringeth down to the grave andbringeth up" (1 Sam. 2, 6). There is nothing to object in this, he says, for the same God who made man of the dust can revive him after death. Besides, there seems to be a logical propriety in bringing soul and bodytogether for reward and punishment just as they were during conduct inlife. When the soul is once reunited with the body in the resurrection, it is never separated again. The expression "_garden_ of Eden" forparadise is a figure of speech for eternal life free from pain. 

The second opinion is expressed by those who do not believe in bodilyresurrection. The end of man according to these is the return of thesoul to the world of souls. This is the meaning of "world to come"; and"revival of the dead" means the same thing. For it is not possible thatthe soul should be reunited with the body, which is temporary in itsnature and subject to dissolution. Besides, the body has organs, such asthose of food and reproduction, which would be useless in the futurelife. The advocates of this theory also believe in transmigration ofsouls as a punishment. Aaron ben Elijah rejects metempsychosis on theground that there is some relation between a soul and its body, and notevery body can receive every soul. 

Aaron ben Elijah also quotes without comment the classification, alreadyfamiliar to us (p. 119), of human souls into (1) dead, (2) alive, (3)healthy, and (4) sick. Death denotes evil deeds; life, good deeds;health, intellectual knowledge; disease, ignorance. This classificationis applied in determining the destiny of the soul after death. If one isalive and healthy, _i. E. _, has knowledge and good deeds, he has a sharein the world to come. If he is healthy and dead (knowledge + evildeeds), the soul is kept in an intermediate world forever. If he isalive and sick (good deeds + ignorance), the soul rises to the upperair, whence it returns again and again to the body until it acquireswisdom to be able to rise to the world of angels. If he is dead and sick(evil deeds + ignorance), the soul dies like an animal. 

Finally, the third opinion is a combination of resurrection and "futureworld. " Seeing that some of the functions of the soul are performed withthe help of the body, while others are not, the advocates of this viewmaintain that the soul will be rewarded in both conditions--with thebody, in resurrection, without the body, in the world to come. 

If a man has merits and demerits, his good and evil deeds are balancedagainst each other, and the surplus determines his reward or punishmentaccording to its nature. [385]

CHAPTER XVII

HASDAI BEN ABRAHAM CRESCAS (1340-1410)

The influence of Aristotle on Jewish thought, which began as early asSaadia and grew in intensity as the Aristotelian writings became betterknown, reached its high water mark in Ibn Daud, Maimonides andGersonides. To Maimonides Aristotle was the indisputable authority forall matters pertaining to sublunar existence, but he reserved the rightto differ with the Stagirite when the question concerned the heavenlyspheres and the influences derived from them. Hence he denied theeternity of motion and the fundamental principle at the basis of thisAristotelian idea, that necessity rules all natural phenomena. In hisdoctrine of creation in time, Maimonides endeavored to defend God'spersonality and voluntary and purposeful activity. For the same reasonhe defended the institution of miracles. Gersonides went further in hisrationalistic attitude, carried the Aristotelian principles to theirinevitable conclusions, and did not shrink from adopting to all intentsand purposes the eternity of the world (strictly speaking the eternityof matter), and the limitation of God's knowledge to universals. Aristotle's authority was now supreme, and the Bible had to yield toAristotelian interpretations, as we have seen abundantly. Maimonides andGersonides were the great peaks that stood out above the rest; but therewas any number of lesser lights, some who wrote books and still more whodid not write, taking the great men as their models and looking atJewish literature and belief through Aristotelian spectacles. Intellectualism is the term that best describes this attitude. It hadits basis in psychology, and from there succeeded in establishing itselfas the ruling principle in ethics and metaphysics. As reason andintellect is the distinguishing trait of man--the part of man whichraises him above the beast--and as the soul is the form of the livingbody, its essence and actuating principle, it was argued that the mostimportant part of man is his rational soul or intellect, and immortalitywas made dependent upon theoretical ideas. Speculative study made thesoul; and an intellect thus constituted was immortal, for it wasimmaterial. The heavenly world, consisting of the separate Intelligencesand culminating in God, was also in its essence reason and intellect. Hence thought and knowledge formed the essence of the universe. Bythought is man saved, and through thought is he united with the MostHigh. All else that is not pure thought acquires what value it has fromthe relation it bears to thought. In this way were judged thosedivisions of Judaism that concerned ceremony and ethical practice. Theirvalue consisted in their function of promoting the ends of the reason. 

Judah Halevi, influenced by Al Gazali, had already before Maimonidesprotested against this intellectualistic attitude in the name of a truerthough more naive understanding of the Bible and Jewish history. ButJudah Halevi's nationalism and the expression of his poetical andreligious feelings and ideas could not vie with the dominatingpersonality of Maimonides, whose rationalistic and intellectualisticattitude swept everything before it and became the dominant mode ofthinking for his own and succeeding ages. It remained for Hasdai Crescas(born in Barcelona, in 1340), who flourished in Christian Spain twocenturies after Maimonides and over a half century after Gersonides, totake up the cudgels again in behalf of a truer Judaism, a Judaismindependent of Aristotle, and one that is based more upon the spiritualand emotional sides of man and less upon the purely intellectual, theoretical and speculative. Himself devoid of the literary power andpoetic feeling of Judah Halevi, Crescas had this in common with themediæval national poet that he resented the domination of Jewish beliefand thought by the alien Greek speculation. In a style free fromrhetoric, and characterized rather by a severe brevity and precision, heundertakes to undermine the Aristotelian position by using theStagirite's own weapons, logical analysis and proof. His chief work isthe "Or Adonai, " Light of the Lord. [386]

Agreeing with all other Jewish writers that the existence of God is thebasis of Judaism, he sees in this very fact a reason why this principlecannot be regarded as one of the six hundred and thirteen commandments. For a commandment implies the existence of one who commands. Hence toregard the belief in the existence of God as a commandment implies thevery thing which the commandment expresses. The existence of Godtherefore as the basis of all commandments cannot itself be acommandment. Besides only those things can form the objects of a commandwhich can be controlled by the will. But a matter of belief like theexistence of God is not subject to will, it is a matter of fact and ofproof. [387]

Maimonides, as we know, based his proofs of the existence, unity andincorporeality of God upon twenty-six philosophical propositions takenfrom the works of Aristotle and his Arabian interpreters. As he was notwriting a book on general philosophy, Maimonides simply enumeratestwenty-five propositions, which he accepts as proved by Aristotle andhis followers. To these he adds provisionally another proposition, number twenty-six, concerning the eternity of motion, upon which hebases his proof of the existence of God in order to be safe from allcriticism. In the sequel he discusses this last proposition and showsthat unlike the other twenty-five, it is not susceptible of rigiddemonstration, and the arguments in favor of the origin of motion andthe world in time are more plausible. 

Crescas goes further than Maimonides, and controverts most of the otherpropositions as well, maintaining in particular against Aristotle andMaimonides that an infinite magnitude _is_ possible and exists actually;that there _is_ an infinite fulness or void outside of this world, andhence there _may_ be many worlds, and it need not follow that theelements would pour in from one world into the next, so that all earthshould be together in the centre, all fire together in the outercircumference, and the intermediate elements, air and water, betweenthese two. The elements may stay in their respective worlds in theplaces assigned to them. It will not be worth our while to wade throughall the technical and hair-splitting discussions of these points. Theresults will be sufficient for our purpose. 

The proof of the existence of an unmoved mover in Aristotle andMaimonides is based upon the impossibility of a regress to infinity. IfHasdai Crescas admits the infinite, the Aristotelian proof fails. Similarly God's unity in Maimonides is among other things based upon thefiniteness of the world and its unity. If infinite space is possibleoutside of this world, and there may be many worlds, this proof failsfor God's unity. So Crescas takes up in detail all the Maimonideanproofs of the existence, unity and incorporeality of God and points outthat they are not valid because in the first place they are based uponpremises which Crescas has refuted, and secondly were the premisesgranted Maimonides's results do not follow from them. [388] It remainsthen for Crescas to give his own views on this problem which, he says, the philosophers are unable to solve satisfactorily, and the Bible aloneis to be relied upon. At the same time he does give a logical proofwhich in reality is not different from one of the proofs given byMaimonides himself. It is based upon the distinction insisted upon byAlfarabi and Avicenna between the "possible existent" and the "necessaryexistent. " Whatever is an effect of a cause is in itself merelypossible, and owes the necessity of its existence to its cause. Now, argues Crescas, whether the number of causes and effects is finite orinfinite, there must be one cause of all of them which is not itself aneffect. For if all things are effects they are "possible existents" asregards their own nature, and require a cause which will make them existrather than not. This self-subsisting cause is God. [389]

He then endeavors to prove the unity of God in the two senses of theterm; unity in the sense of simplicity, and unity in the sense ofuniqueness. Unity as opposed to composition--the former sense of theterm--is neither the same as the essence of a thing, nor is it anaccident added to the essence. It cannot be essence, for in that caseall things called one would have the same essence. Nor is it accident, for that which defines and separates the existing thing is truly calledsubstance rather than accident; and this is what unity does. AccordinglyCrescas defines unity as something essential to everything actuallyexisting, denoting the absence of plurality. This being true, thatexistent which is before all others is most truly called one. Also thatbeing which is most separated from other things is best called one. [390]

Crescas disagrees with Maimonides's opinion that no positive attributescan be applied to God, such as indicate relation to his creatures, andso on. His arguments are that we cannot avoid relation to creatures evenin the term "cause, " which Maimonides admits; and in the attributes ofaction--the only kind of positive attributes allowed by Maimonides--itis implied that before a given time God did not do a particular thing, which he did later, a condition in God which Maimonides will not admit. Besides, if there are no positive attributes, what could be the meaningof the tetragrammaton, about which Maimonides has so much to say? If itexpressed a negative attribute, why was its meaning kept so secret?Crescas's own view is that there are positive attributes, and that thereis a relation between God and his creatures, though not a similarity, asthey are far apart, the one being a necessary existent, the other apossible existent; one being infinite, the other finite. [391]

We must now try to show that God is one in the sense that there are noother Gods besides. We may proceed as follows: If there are two Gods, one of them controls only part of the world or he does not control it atall. The first is impossible because the unitary world must be due toone agent. But there may be more than one world and hence more than oneagent. This is, however, answered by the thought that being infinite inpower one could control them all. There is still another alternative, _viz. _, that one agent controls the whole world and the other doesnothing. Here speculation can go no further, and we must have recourseto Scripture, which says, "Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord isOne. "[392] We see here that Crescas is interested in discrediting thelogic chopping of the philosophers. No merely logical argument, is hisidea, can give us absolute certainty even in so fundamental a doctrineas the unity of God. Like Judah Halevi, Crescas took his inspirationfrom Algazali, whose point of view appealed to him more than that ofMaimonides and Gersonides, who may be classed with Alfarabi, Avicennaand Averroes. 

Having discussed the fundamental principles of all religion andphilosophy, namely, the existence and nature of God, Crescas next takesup the following six fundamental dogmas of Judaism, God's knowledge ofexisting things, Providence, Power, Prophecy, Freedom, Purpose. 

There are three things to be remembered in the matter of God'sknowledge. He knows the infinite, for he knows particulars. He knows thenon-existent, as he knows the future; and his knowledge of thecontingent does not remove its contingent character. Maimonides andGersonides had difficulty with this problem and we know their respectivesolutions. Gersonides, for reasons metaphysical as well as ethical, doesnot scruple to limit God's knowledge to universals. Maimonides endeavorsto reconcile the dilemma by throwing the blame upon our limitedunderstanding. In God's knowledge which is _toto cœlo_ different fromours, and of which we have no conception, all oppositions andcontradictions find their ultimate harmony. Crescas, as we mightnaturally expect, agrees with Maimonides in this matter rather than withGersonides. To limit God's knowledge is opposed to the Bible, and wouldinvolve us in greater difficulties than those we endeavor toescape. [393]

Related to the question of God's knowledge is the problem of Providence. For God must know the individual or thing for which he provides, and ifGod has no knowledge of particulars, there can be no such thing asspecial providence. This latter as we know is virtually the opinion ofGersonides (_cf. _ p. 345). Crescas, we have seen, defends God'sknowledge of particulars, hence he sees no difficulty in specialprovidence on this score. He takes, however, the term in a broad sense. All evidence of design in nature, all powers in plant and animal whichguide their growth, reproduction and conservation are due to God'sprovidence. Providence, he says, is sometimes exercised by God directly, without an intermediate voluntary agent, sometimes with such mediation. God's relations to Moses and to the Israelites in Egypt at the time ofthe tenth plague were without intermediate agency. In all other casesthere is mediation of angels, or prophets, or wise men, or, according tosome, the heavenly bodies, which are living and intelligent beings. 

Providence itself is of different kinds. There is the most general andnatural exhibited in the equipment of the various species of plant andanimal life for their protection and growth and conservation. There arethe more special powers found in the human race. These forms ofprovidence have little to do with the person's deserts. They are purelydependent upon the constitution and influence of the stars. Then thereis the more special providence of the Jewish nation, then of the malemembers of this nation, and of the priests and the levites. Finallycomes the special providence of the individual, who is rewarded andpunished according to his conduct. The reward and punishment of thisworld are not strictly controlled by conduct, the reward and punishmentof the next world are. In this last remark Crescas cuts the knot whichhas been the cause of so much discussion in religious philosophy. If thereal reward and punishment are in the next world, the prosperity of thewicked and the adversity of the righteous in this world do not form sogreat a problem. At the same time an explanation of this peculiarphenomenon is still wanting. For surely the righteous man does notdeserve to _suffer_ for his righteousness, even though his good deedswill not go unrewarded in the next world. In this discussion alsoCrescas takes issue with the intellectualistic point of view ofMaimonides and particularly Gersonides. The solution of these men thatevil does not come from God directly but by accident and by reason ofmatter, and the corollary drawn therefrom that God does not punish thewicked directly, that he merely neglects them, leaving them to theaccidents of nature and chance, Crescas does not approve. Nor is he morefavorably inclined to the theory that the good man is provided forbecause the more he cultivates his mind, the more closely he comes incontact with God, in whom are contained actually all the ideas of whichman has some potentially. His main criticism is that the theory isopposed to clear statements in the Bible, which imply special andindividual reward and punishment in a miraculous and supernaturalmanner, which cannot be due to intellectual perfection, nor to the orderof the heavenly bodies. Besides, if a man who is highly intellectual didmuch wrong, he should be punished in his soul, but on theintellectualist theory such a soul is immortal and cannot be destroyed. 

Accordingly Crescas goes back to the religious doctrine of reward andpunishment as ordinarily understood. God rewards and punishes becauseman obeys or disobeys his will and command. The complaint raised onaccount of the misery of the good and the prosperity of the wicked heanswers by saying that real reward and punishment are in the next world. The goods and evils of this world are also to be considered, and hegives the ordinary excuses for the apparent deviation from what ought tobe, such as that evil is sometimes a good in disguise and _vice versa_;that one sometimes inherits evil and good from one's parents; that theindividual is sometimes involved in the destinies of the majority, andso on, and so on. Evil in the sense of moral evil, _i. E. _, wrong, doesnot come from God, it is true, but punishment does come from God, and asits aim is justice, it is a good, not an evil. The providence extendedto Israel is greatest. There is more Providence in Palestine thanelsewhere, not because there is any difference in the relation on God'sside, but there is on the side of the man enjoying this providence. Hischaracter and disposition change with the place, and similarly with thetime and the season. Hence certain seasons of the year, like that aboutthe time of the Day of Atonement, are more propitious for receivingGod's providence. [394]

Another fundamental doctrine of Judaism is God's omnipotence. Weaknesswould be a defect. Hence God can do everything except the contradictory. His power is infinite not merely in duration, but also in intensity. From Aristotle's proof of the necessity of an immovable mover as basedupon the eternity of motion (p. 256 f. ), we gather only that God's poweris infinite in duration; whereas our doctrine of creation _ex nihilo_shows that there is no relation at all between God's power and the workhe does; hence his power is infinite. This is shown also in themiracles, some of which took place instantaneously, as the destructionof the first born in Egypt at midnight precisely. Crescas insists thatthe ass of Balaam did speak, and refers with disapproval to those whodoubt it and say it was in a vision (Gersonides). [395]

In his discussion of Prophecy the interest lies once more in hisanti-intellectualistic attitude. Maimonides agrees with the philosophersthat the prophetic power is a psychological process attainable by theman who in addition to moral perfection possesses a highly developedintellect and power of imagination. To anticipate the objection that ifthis be so, why are there no prophets among the philosophers, Maimonidesadds that divine grace is necessary besides, and that if this islacking, one may have all the qualifications and yet not be a prophet. Crescas sees the forced nature of this explanation, and once morefrankly returns to the plain intent of Scripture and Jewish traditionthat the prophet is the man chosen by God because he is a student of theTorah and follows its commandments, and because he cleaves to God andloves him. The prophet receives his inspiration from God directly orthrough an intermediate agent, and the information received may concernany topic whatsoever. It is not to be limited to certain topics to theexclusion of others, as Gersonides tries to make out; and its purpose isto give guidance to the prophet himself or to others through him. [396]

The most original contribution of Crescas to philosophical theory ishis treatment of the ever living problem of freedom. So fundamental hasit seemed for Judaism to maintain the freedom of the will that no onehitherto had ventured to doubt it. Maimonides no less than Judah Halevi, and with equal emphasis Gersonides, insist that the individual is notdetermined in his conduct. This seemed to be the only way to vindicateGod's justice in reward and punishment. But the idea of man's freedomclashed with the doctrine of God's omniscience. If nothing in the pastdetermines a man's will in a given case, then up to the moment of theact it is undetermined, and no one can know whether a given act willtake place or its opposite. On the other hand, if God does knoweverything in the future as well as in the past, man is no longer freeto act in a manner contrary to God's foreknowledge. This difficulty wasrecognized by Maimonides as well as by Gersonides, and they solved it indifferent ways. Maimonides gives up neither God's omniscience nor man'sabsolute freedom, and escapes the dilemma by taking refuge in his ideaof God's transcendence. Human knowledge is incompatible with humanfreedom; God's knowledge is not like human knowledge, and we have noconception what it is. But it is consistent with human freedom. Gersonides, who objects to Maimonides's treatment of the divineattributes, and insists that they must resemble in kind though not indegree the corresponding human attributes, can avoid the difficulty onlyby a partial blunting of the sharp points of either horn of the dilemma. Accordingly he maintains freedom in all its rigor, and mitigates theconception of omniscience. God's omniscience extends only to theuniversal and its consequences; the contingent particular is bydefinition not subject to foreknowledge, and hence it argues no defectin God's knowledge if it does not extend to the undetermined decisionsof the will. 

Crescas embraces the other horn of the dilemma. God's omniscience mustbe maintained in all its rigor. It is absurd to suppose that the firstuniversal and absolute cause should be ignorant of anything pertainingto its effects. Is man then not free? Has he no choice at all, nofreedom in the determination of his conduct? If so how justify God'sreward and punishment, if reward and punishment are relative to conductand imply responsibility? Crescas's answer is a compromise. Determinismis not fatalism. It does not mean that a given person is preordainedfrom eternity to act in a given way, no matter what the circumstancesare. It does not mean that command and advice and warning and educationand effort and endeavor are useless and without effect. This iscontradicted by experience as well as by the testimony of Scripture. Butneither is it true on the other hand that a person's will and itsconduct are causeless and undetermined until the moment of action. Thisidea is equally untrue to reason and experience. We know that everyeffect has a cause and the cause has a cause, and this second cause hasagain a cause, until we reach the first necessary cause. Two individualssimilar in every respect would have the same will unless there is acause which makes them different. We have already intimated that God'sforeknowledge, which we cannot deny, is incompatible with absolutefreedom, and in the Bible we have instances of God's knowing futureevents which are the results of individual choice, as in the case ofPharaoh. The only solution then is that the act of will is in a sensecontingent, in a sense determined. It is contingent in respect toitself, it is determined by its cause, _i. E. _, the act is not fated totake place, cause or no cause. If it were possible to remove the cause, the act would not be; but given the cause, the effect is necessary. Effort is not in vain, for effort is itself a cause and determines aneffect. Commandments and prohibitions are not useless, for the samereason. Reward and punishment are not unjust, even though antecedentcauses over which man has no control determine his acts, any more thanit is unjust that fire burns the one who comes near it, though he did sowithout intention. Reward and punishment are a necessary consequence ofobedience and disobedience. 

This is a bold statement on the part of Crescas, and the analogy betweena man's voluntary act in ethical and religious conduct and the tendencyof fire to burn irrespective of the person's responsibility in thematter can be valid only if we reduce the ethical and religious world toan impersonal force on a plane with the mechanism of the physical worldorder. This seems a risky thing to do for a religionist. And Crescasfeels it, saying that to make this view public would be dangerous, asthe people would find in it an apology for evil doers, not understandingthat punishment is a natural consequence of evil. This latter statementCrescas does not wish to be taken in its literal strictness, nor shouldthe analogy with the burning fire be pressed too far. For it would thenfollow even if a person is physically compelled to do evil that he wouldbe punished, just as the fire would not refrain from burning a personwho was thrown into it by force. The determination of the will, he says, must not be felt by the agent as a constraint and compulsion, else theact is not free and no punishment should follow; for command andprohibition can have no effect on a will constrained. Reward andpunishment have a pedagogical value generally, even if in a given casethey are not deserved. Even though in reality every act is determined, still where there is no external compulsion the person is so identifiedwith the deed that it is in a real sense the product of his own soul, bringing about a union with, or separation from God; and hence rewardand punishment are necessarily connected with it. Where there isexternal compulsion, on the other hand, the act is not in reality hisown and hence no reward or punishment. 

The question arises, however, why should there be punishment forerroneous belief and opinion? These have nothing to do with the will, and are determined if anything is, _i. E. _, the person having them isconstrained to believe as he does by the arguments, over which he has nocontrol. This matter offers no difficulty to those who, like Maimonidesand Gersonides, regard intelligence as the essence of the soul, and makeimmortality dependent upon intellectual ideas. A soul acquiring trueideas, they say, becomes _ipso facto_ immortal. It is not a question ofright and wrong or of reward and punishment. But this is not theBiblical view, and if it were true, there would be no need of the manyceremonial regulations. Geometry would play a greater rôle inimmortality than the Torah. Crescas's answer is that reward andpunishment in this case are not for the belief itself, but rather forthe pleasure one finds in it and the pains one takes to examine itcarefully. Even in conduct one is not rewarded or punished for deedsdirectly, but for the intention and desire. Deed without intention isnot punished. Intention without deed is; though the two together callfor the greatest punishment or reward. "A burnt offering, " say theRabbis, "atones for sinful thoughts; sin committed through compulsion isnot punished. "[397]

It is of interest here to know that Spinoza, as has been shown byJoel, [398] owed his idea of man's freedom to Crescas. He also likeCrescas denies the absolute indeterminism of a person's conduct that isinsisted upon by the majority of the mediæval Jewish philosophers. AndJoel shows moreover that Spinoza's final attitude to this question asfound in his Ethics was the outcome of a gradual development, and theresult of reading Crescas. In some of his earlier writings he insiststhat anything short of absolute omniscience in God is unthinkable. Hesees the difficulty of reconciling this with man's freedom, but is notready to sacrifice either, and like Maimonides decides that we must notdeny it simply because we cannot understand it. Later, however, hemaintains that God's omniscience and man's freedom are absolutelyincompatible, and solves the difficulty in a manner similar to that ofCrescas by curtailing freedom as formerly understood. 

The next topic of which it is necessary to have a clear idea for acomplete understanding of Judaism, is the purpose of the Law, and ingeneral the purpose of man. Here also appears clearly theanti-intellectualism of Crescas and his disagreement with Maimonides andGersonides. The final purpose of the Law is of course, he says, a good. The Bible teaches us to perfect our morals; it inculcates true beliefsand opinions; and it promises by means of these happiness of body andhappiness of soul. Which of these four is the ultimate end? Clearly itmust be the best and most worthy. And it seems as if this qualitypertains to the eternal happiness of the soul, to which as an end theother three tend. Corporeal happiness is a means to the perfection ofthe soul since the latter acts through the means of bodily organs. Similarly moral perfection assists in purifying the soul. As forperfection in ideas, some think that it alone makes the soul immortal bycreating the acquired intellect, which is immaterial and separate, andenjoys happiness in the next world incomparably greater than the joy wefeel here below in the acquisition of knowledge. There is a differenceof opinion as to the subject-matter which bestows immortality. Accordingto some it is all knowledge, whether of sublunar things or of theseparate substances. According to others it is only the knowledge of Godand the angels that confers immortality. All these views are wrong fromthe Scriptural as well as the philosophical point of view. 

The Bible makes it clear repeatedly that eternal life is obtained byperformance of the commandments; whereas according to the otherspractical observance is only a means and a preparation to theory, without which practice alone is inadequate. According to Scripture andtradition certain offences are punished with exclusion from eternallife, and certain observances confer immortality, which have nothing todo with theoretical truths. 

But philosophically too their views are untenable. For it would followfrom their opinions that the purpose of the Law is for something otherthan man, for the acquired intellect is "separate, " and hence cannot bethe form of man. It is different in kind from man, for unlike him it iseternal as an individual. Besides it is not true that the acquiredintellect is made as a substance by its ideas, while being separate fromthe material intellect; for as immaterial it has no matter as itssubject from which it could come into being. It must therefore come intobeing _ex nihilo_, which is absurd. 

And there are other reasons against their view. For if all knowledgeconfers immortality, one may acquire it by studying geometry, which isabsurd. And if this privilege can be gained only by a knowledge of Godand the separate substances, the objection is still greater; for, asMaimonides has shown, the only knowledge that may be had of these isnegative; and it is not likely that such imperfect knowledge should makean eternal intellect. 

If then theoretical knowledge does not lead to immortality as theythought, and the other perfections are preparatory to theoretical, itfollows that the ultimate purpose of the Law and of man is attainedprimarily neither by theory alone nor by practice alone, but bysomething else, which is neither quite the one nor the other. It is thelove and fear of God. This is demanded alike by Scripture, tradition andphilosophy. That it is the view of religion is clear enough from themany passages in the Bible urging love of God. But it is also demandedby philosophy. For the soul is a spiritual substance, hence it iscapable of separation from the body and of existing by itself forever, whether it has theoretical knowledge or not; since it is not subject todecay, not being material. Further, the perfect loves the good and theperfect; and the greater the good and the perfection the greater thelove and the desire in the perfect being. Hence the perfect soul lovesGod with the greatest love of which it is capable. Similarly God's lovefor the perfect soul, though the object as compared with him is lowindeed, is great, because his essence and perfection are great. Now aslove is the cause of unity even in natural things, the love of God inthe soul brings about a unity between them; and unity with God surelyleads to happiness and immortality. As love is different fromintellectual apprehension, the essence of the soul is love rather thanintelligence. 

There are many Talmudical passages confirming this view logicallyderived. We are told that the souls of the righteous enjoy the splendorof the Shekinah, and the wicked suffer correspondingly. This agrees withour conception of immortality and not with theirs. For enjoyment isimpossible on their showing, though they try to make it plausible. Pleasure is different from apprehension; and as the essence of theacquired intellect is apprehension, there is no room for the pleasure, the intellect being simple. According to our view love is rewarded withpleasure. The pleasure we feel here below in intellectual work(Gersonides, p. 339) proves nothing, for it is due to the effort and thepassing from potential knowledge to actual knowledge, _i. E. _, to theprocess of learning. Proof of this is that we find no pleasure in axiomsand first principles, which we know without effort. But the acquiredintellect after the death of the body does not learn any new truths, hence can have no pleasure. 

The Rabbis also speak of definite places of reward and punishment, whichcannot apply to the acquired intellect, since it is a "separate"substance and can have no place. The soul as we understand it can have aplace, just as it is connected with the body during life. 

The Rabbis often speak of the great reward destined for school children. But surely the acquired intellect cannot amount to much in children. Thetruth is that the soul becomes mature and complete as soon as itacquires the rational faculty in the shape of the first principles oraxioms. Then it is prepared for immortality as a natural thing withoutregard to reward. 

The purpose of the soul as we showed is to love God. This object theBible attains by the commandments, which may be classified withreference to their significance in seven groups. They exalt God; theyshow his great kindness to us; they give us true ideas concerning thenature of God; they call our attention to his providence; they give uspromises of corporeal and spiritual reward; they call our attention toGod's miracles in order to keep our attention from flagging; and finallythey command love of God and union with him as the final aim ofman. [399]

In addition to the six fundamental doctrines of Judaism mentioned above(p. 392), there are true beliefs which are essential to Judaism, and thedenial of which constitutes heresy; though they are not as fundamentalas the other six, in the sense that the Law would continue to existwithout them. They are (1) Creation, (2) Immortality, (3) Reward andPunishment, (4) Resurrection, (5) Eternity of the Law, (6) Thesuperiority of Moses to the other prophets, (7) The priest's learningthe future through the Urim and Tumim, (8) Belief in the Messiah. Thelist of thirteen articles of the creed given by Maimonides (_cf. _ below, p. 409) is open to criticism. If he meant fundamental dogmas, there arenot as many as thirteen; there are no more than seven or eight--the sixmentioned before (p. 392), and, if one chooses, the existence of God, making seven, and revelation as the eighth. On the other hand, ifMaimonides meant to include "true beliefs, " there are more than fifteen, the six enumerated above (p. 392), existence of God and revelation, andthe eight "true beliefs" named at the head of this section, not countinga great many specific commandments. [400]

Having made this criticism of Maimonides's thirteen articles, Crescasproceeds to discuss every one of the eight true beliefs named at thebeginning of the last paragraph. For our purpose it will not benecessary to reproduce the minute arguments here. We will select a fewof the more important topics and state briefly Crescas's attitude. 

The doctrine of creation formed the central theme in Maimonides andGersonides. It was here, as we have seen, that Maimonides stopped shortin his devotion to Aristotle and took pains to show that the argumentsof the latter in favor of eternity are not valid, and that Aristotleknew it. He endeavored to show, moreover, that the doctrine of creationcan be made more plausible than its opposite, and hence since creationis essential to Judaism, it must be regarded as a fundamental dogma. Gersonides could not see his way clear to accepting creation _exnihilo_, among other things because as matter cannot come from form, thematerial world cannot come from God. Accordingly he compromised bysaying that while the present world as it is is not eternal, it camefrom a primitive "hyle" or matter, which was eternal. Thus our world isdependent for its forms upon God, for its matter upon the prime andeternal "hyle. "

Here Crescas takes up the problem and points out that whether we acceptor not an eternal "hyle, " everything that exists must be dependent uponGod as the only necessary existent. Everything outside of him, be iteternal matter or not, is only a possible existent and owes itsexistence to God. Creation _ex nihilo_ means no more. To be sure, if weassume that the existence of the world and its emanation from God iseternal, because his relation to his product is the same at all times, it will follow that the emanation of the world from God is a necessaryprocess. But necessity in this case does not exclude will, nay itimplies it. For the only way in which anything can come from a rationalcause is by way of conception. The rational cause forms a conception ofthe world order and of himself as giving existence to this world orderas a whole and in its parts. Will means no more than this. This willalso solve the old philosophic difficulty, how can the many come fromthe One. Our answer is that the good God created a good world. Thegoodness of the world is its unity, _i. E. _, the parts contribute tomaking a whole which is good. On the other hand, an agent is perfectlygood when he acts with will. God's will also makes miracles possible. Moreover, eternal creation is not inconsistent with continued creation, and we have creation _ex nihilo_ every moment. Maimonides is wrongtherefore when he thinks that eternity would upset Judaism and makemiracles impossible. Creation in time is therefore not a fundamentaldogma with which Judaism stands and falls. At the same time it is a truebelief as taught in the first verse of Genesis. [401]

Another of the true beliefs is reward and punishment. This consists oftwo kinds, corporeal and spiritual. Corporeal is spoken of in the Bibleand is not opposed to reason. For as the purpose of creation is to doman good and enable him to achieve perfection, it stands to reason thatGod would remove any obstacles in the way of man's perfecting himself, and this is the kind of reward mentioned first, "All the diseases whichI put upon the Egyptians I shall not put upon thee, for I the Lord amthy healer" (Exod. 15, 26). Punishment is primarily for the samepurpose. 

As for spiritual reward and punishment, they are not mentionedspecifically in the Bible, but the Talmud is full of it. Rationally theycan be explained as follows. As the soul is spiritual and intellectual, it enjoys great pleasure from being in contact with the world of spiritand apprehending of the nature of God what it could not apprehend whilein the body. On the other hand, being restrained from the world ofspirit and kept in darkness gives it pain; and this may lead to itsultimate destruction. The essence of the soul, as was said above, is notintellectuality, but love and desire; hence pain may destroy it. 

The reason spiritual reward and punishment, which is the more importantof the two, is not mentioned in the Bible, is because it was taken as amatter of fact. Corporeal reward and punishment was not so regarded, hence the need of specifying it. 

A difficulty that presents itself is, How is it consistent with justiceto punish the soul by itself, when it was the composite of body and soulthat sinned? This may be answered by saying that the soul is the form ofthe body and does not change when separated. Hence, being the moreimportant of the two elements composing man, it receives the moreimportant punishment, namely, spiritual. 

Besides, it is true that the composite also receives compensation. Andthis is the purpose of resurrection. [402]

Resurrection of the body is not universal, but is reserved only forsome, as is clear from the passage in Daniel (12, 2), "And many of thosethat sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlastinglife, and some to disgrace and everlasting abhorrence. " At the same timeit is difficult to know who these some are. It cannot be the perfect andthe good only, since some of those rising will go "to disgrace andeverlasting abhorrence. " We can decide this better later, when we havelearned more of resurrection. 

The variety of opinions concerning the time of the resurrection Crescasendeavors to reconcile by supposing that all agreed it would take placeas soon as the Temple was built, but that the Messiah would precede thebuilding of the Temple by some length of time. 

The purpose of the resurrection is to strengthen belief in those whohave it and to impress it upon those who have it not. At the time of theresurrection those who come back to life will tell the living how theyfared when their souls left their bodies. Another purpose ofresurrection is, as mentioned above, in order to reward and punish thecomposite of body and soul which acted during life. 

The dogma of resurrection is regarded so seriously by the Rabbis, whoexclude the unbeliever in it from a portion in the world to come, because in this act is completed the form of man; and because thereby isrealized the justice of God, and the faith is strengthened in the mindsof the believers. 

It seems at first sight impossible that the elements of the body, whichwere dispersed at the time of the body's death and formed part of othersubstances, can be gathered together again. But it is not really sostrange, for in the first place God may so arrange matters that theseelements may be in a position to return. Besides, this is not reallynecessary. It is quite sufficient that God create a body exactly likethe first in temperament and form, and endow it with the old soul, whichwill then behave like the old person; and being endowed with memorybesides, the identity of personality will be complete. 

For the purpose of showing God's justice and strengthening man's faithit is sufficient to resurrect the perfectly good and the completely bad. The intermediate classes do not deserve this extraordinary miracle, andtheir spiritual reward will be sufficient. [403]

CHAPTER XVIII

JOSEPH ALBO (1380-1444)

Of the post-Maimonidean philosophers Crescas is the last who contributesoriginal views of philosophical value. Joseph Albo, of Monreal inAragon, is of little importance as a philosopher. He rehashes theproblems which occupied a Maimonides, a Gersonides and a Crescas, andsides now with one, now with the other. He benefited by the writings ofhis predecessors, particularly Maimonides, Crescas, and SimonDuran;[403a] and the philosophical discussions in the last threesections of his "Book of Roots" ("Sefer Ikkarim") give the impression ofan eclectic compilation in the interest of a moderate conservatism. Thestyle is that of the popularizer and the homilist; and to this he oweshis popularity, which was denied his more original teacher, Crescas. 

But philosophy as such was not Albo's forte, nor was it his chiefinterest. While it is true that all the Jewish thinkers of the middleages were for a great part apologetes, this did not prevent a Maimonidesor a Gersonides from making a really thorough and disinterested study ofscience and philosophy; and often their scientific and philosophicconviction was so strong that the _apologia_ was _pro philosophia sua_rather than _pro Judaismo_. The central theme therefore in the majorityof Albo's philosophical predecessors was the equally metaphysical andtheological, of God and his attributes. These were proved by reason andconfirmed by Scripture and tradition. Judaism had to be formulated anddefended with a view not so much to the dangers threatening fromChristianity and Mohammedanism as to those endangering all religionsalike, namely, the opinions of science and philosophy as taughtespecially by the Aristotelians. Hence Maimonides treated for the mostpart of the same problems as the Mohammedan Mutakallimun before him, andThomas Aquinas the Christian had no scruple in making the Jewishphilosopher's method his own when he undertook to defend the Catholicfaith "contra Gentiles. "

Different were the circumstances as well as the attitude of Joseph Albo. The purely philosophic interest was not strong in his day. He was notconfronted by the necessity of proving the existence and incorporealityof God by reason. No one doubted these things and they had beenabundantly written about in times gone by. In the interest ofcompleteness and for the benefit of those who were not trained intechnical philosophy, Albo found it desirable to restate the results ofprevious discussions of these topics in a style more accessible to thereaders of his day. But the central interest in his age was shifted. Itwas a time of religious disputations and forced conversions. Albohimself had taken part in such a disputation held at Tortosa in 1413-14, and he had to defend Judaism against Christianity. He had to show hisown people that Judaism was the true religion and Christianity spurious. Hence it was religion as such he had to investigate, in order to findwhat marks distinguished a divine law from a human, and a genuine divinelaw from one that pretended to be such. To make this investigationlogically complete he had to show that there must be such a thing as adivine law, and that no such law can be conceived without assumingcertain basal beliefs or dogmas. A discussion of religious dogma wasessential, for upon the nature of these fundamental beliefs dependedone's judgment of a given law and its character as divine or human, genuine or spurious. Hence the title of Albo's treatise, "Book of[religious] Roots [dogmas]. " And while it is true that Maimonides, thesystematizer and codifier, could not fail to put down in his commentaryon the Mishna a list of articles of the Jewish creed, nothing is said ofthis in his philosophical work, the "Guide of the Perplexed. " With Albothe establishment of the fundamental dogmas is the central theme. 

At the same time Albo was anticipated even in this, his more originalcontribution. Crescas, his teacher, had written, beside the "Or Adonai, "a work against Christianity. [404] And in the "Or Adonai" itself hedevotes considerable space to the question of the fundamental dogmas ofJudaism, and takes occasion to criticize Maimonides for his faultymethod in the selection of the thirteen articles, on the ground that hedid not distinguish between what was fundamental and what wasderivative. This suggestion gave Albo his cue, which he developed in hisown way. [404a]

Human happiness, Albo tells us, depends upon theory and practice, asAristotle says. But the human mind is inadequate to know by itself thetruth touching these two. Hence there is need of something superior tothe human mind which will define right practice and the true ideas. Thiscan be only by divine guidance. Hence everyone must be able to tell thedivine legislation from those which are not divine. For this it isnecessary to know what are the principles without which a divine lawcannot exist. This is the purpose of the book, to explain the essentialprinciples of a divine law. [405]

A knowledge of the principles of religion would seem easy, for allpeople profess some religion or other, and hence are presumed to knowupon what their religions are based. But this question has not beentreated adequately before, and there is no agreement among previouswriters about the number of the principles or their identity. Some saythere are thirteen (Maimonides), some say twenty-six, some six(Crescas), without investigating what are the principles of divinereligion generally. For we must distinguish between the generalprinciples which pertain to divine legislation as such and hence arecommon to all religions, and special principles which are peculiar to aparticular religion. 

Seeing the importance of this subject, Albo continues, I undertook thisinvestigation. I came to the conclusion that there are three generalprinciples of divine religion, existence of God, Revelation, and Rewardand Punishment after death. Then there are special principles peculiarto a particular religion. From the general principles ("Ikkarim") followparticular or derivative principles ("Shorashim. ")[406]

The investigation of the principles of religion is a delicate matterbecause one is in danger of being reckoned an infidel if he denies whatis considered by others a fundamental dogma. Thus according toMaimonides the belief in the Messiah is fundamental, and he who deniesit is a heretic and has no share in the world to come. And yet RabbiHillel in the Talmud (Sanhedrin, 99a) said, "Israel need expect noMessiah, for they had the benefit of one in the days of Hezekiah, Kingof Judah. " On the other hand, Maimonides does not regard creation _exnihilo_ as fundamental, whereas others do; and to their mind Maimonidesis open to the charge of unbelief. 

The truth is that only he is an unbeliever who deliberately andknowingly contradicts the Bible. A person who believes in the Bible butis led mistakenly to misinterpret it, and denies real principles becausehe thinks the Bible does not require us to believe them as principles, or does not require us to believe them at all, is guilty of error and inneed of forgiveness, but is not a heretic. [407]

Having thus defined his attitude and purpose, Albo proceeds to criticizethe list of dogmas laid down by Maimonides and modified by Crescas, andthen defends his own view. A fundamental principle ("Ikkar, " lit. Root)is one upon which something else depends and without which this lattercannot exist. Maimonides counts thirteen principles of Judaism asfollows: (1) Existence of God, (2) Unity, (3) Incorporeality, (4)Eternity, (5) He alone must be worshipped, (6) Prophecy, (7) Superiorityof the prophecy of Moses, (8) Revelation, (9) Immutability of the Law, (10) God's Omniscience, (11) Reward and Punishment, (12) Messiah, (13)Resurrection. [408] This list is open to criticism. If Maimonidesintended to admit strict principles only without which Judaism cannotexist, we understand why he named (1), (6), (8), (10), (11), which aregeneral principles of any divine religion, and (7) and (9) as specialprinciples of Judaism. But we cannot see why he included (2) and (3). For while they are true, and every Jew should believe them, Judaism canbe conceived as existing without them. It is still more strange that (5)should be counted as a principle. To be sure, it is one of the tencommandments, "Thou shalt have no other Gods before me.... Thou shaltnot bow thyself down to them, nor serve them" ... (Exod. 20, 35), butJudaism can be conceived to exist even with the belief in a mediator. Similarly it is not clear why (13) should be considered as a fundamentaldogma. On the other hand, he omitted Tradition and Free Will as beliefsessential to any divine religion. 

If, in defence of Maimonides, we say that he intended to name not onlyfundamental principles, but also true beliefs, whether fundamental orderivative, then there are many others he might have mentioned, such ascreation _ex nihilo_, belief in miracles, that God rests in Israelthrough the Torah, and so on. 

Another writer counts twenty-six principles, including everything thatoccurred to his mind, such as the attributes of eternity, wisdom, life, power, will and others, counting paradise and hell as two, and otherabsurd ideas. Others again, [409] criticizing Maimonides's principles, reduce them to six, viz. (1) God's knowledge, (2) Providence, (3) Power, (4) Prophecy, (5) Free Will, (6) Purpose, adding thereto the threeproved by Maimonides, God's existence, unity and incorporeality. Theobjection to this list is that it does not contain the special dogmas ofJudaism, and does not give us a principle by which we can distinguishbetween the genuine and spurious divine religion. For the dogmas namedin the above list give us the _necessary_ requirements for a divine law, but not the _sufficient_. We may have all these principles and yet nothave a divine religion. As to Free Will and Purpose, they are essentialto divine legislation to be sure, but not _qua_ divine; they are alsoessential to a conventional human law. Divine religion has a specialpurpose peculiar to it. [410]

Having laid bare the defects in the attempts at a list of fundamentaldogmas of Judaism made by his predecessors, Albo categorically lays downthe following three principles as fundamental to divine religion: (1)Existence of God, (2) Providence, and reward and punishment, (3)Revelation. 

To justify this statement Albo finds it necessary to make clear what ismeant by divine law or religion, and what relation it bears to otherlaws, not divine. This necessitates an explanation of existing laws andtheir motives and causes. 

Animal life, we are told, may be divided into three classes according tothe mode of living adopted by each. Beasts of prey live separately andnot in groups. Mankind must live in communities, as one individual isdependent upon the work of another, and social life is essential totheir existence. Intermediate between beast of prey and man are thegregarious animals, which keep together not as a matter of necessity, asis the case in man, but for convenience, for the sake of being together. Man is social by nature; and in order to make communal life possible, there must be some order in the community which prohibits violence, robbery, and so on. This is known as "natural law. " In addition to thisthere are in many places "conventional laws, " made by kings andemperors, regulating more carefully and with greater detail than thenatural law the affairs of the members of the community. 

But this is not all. There is still another kind of law due directly toGod's providence. The providence of God is seen even in the loweranimals, in the constitution of their bodies, not merely in mattersessential to the preservation of the animal, but also in the interest ofcomfort and convenience, as for example the duplication of the senseorgans. It stands to reason therefore that there is a divine influencewhich provides for man even to a greater degree. This providence mayextend only to one individual, but this person brings about theperfection of the race; just as in the individual man the heart isinstrumental in giving life to all the other limbs. The law which ispromulgated through this person is a "divine law. "

The term "law" ("Dat") applies to any system of directions embracing alarge aggregate of men, whether it contains many commands or one. Thereare thus three kinds of law, natural, conventional and divine. Naturallaw is the same for all persons, times and places. Conventional law isordered by a wise man or men in conformity with the necessity of thepersons, times and places, as the reason dictates, without specialdivine suggestion. Divine law is ordered by God through a prophet. Thepurpose of natural law is to remove wrong and promote right, keeping menfrom robbery and theft so that society may be able to exist. Conventional law goes further and tends to remove the unseemly and topromote the becoming. Divine law has for its purpose to guide men totrue happiness, which is the happiness of the soul and its eternal life. It points out the way to follow to reach this end, showing what is thetrue good for man to pursue, and what is the real evil which one mustshun; though it also lays down the law of right and wrong like the othertwo. [411]

The conventional law is inferior to the divine in a number of ways. 

The conventional law only orders human conduct for the purpose ofimproving social life, but does not concern itself with perfection intheoretical speculation and knowledge, which leads the soul to eternallife. The divine law embraces both the parts upon which human perfectiondepends, conduct and theory. It embraces the becoming and unbecoming(practice), and the true and untrue (theory). As the Psalmist has it, "The Law of the Lord is perfect, restoring the soul" (Psal. 19, 8). 

The conventional law, being human, cannot always decide with certaintywhat is becoming and what unbecoming. It is liable to error. This isparticularly the case in matters of theory, such as the creation oreternity of the world. The divine law gives us certainty in all things, "The testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple" (_ib. _). 

The person guided by the conventional law is not sure that he is alwaysguided aright; hence he cannot feel the satisfaction and the joy of theman whose guide is the divine law, making him certain of beingright--"The precepts of the Lord are upright, rejoicing the heart"(_ib. _ 9). 

The conventional law can give general rules only, but is unable toadvise in a particular case. So Aristotle in the Ethics points out thatvirtue is a mean, but he cannot determine exactly the proper measure ata given time. This is the function of the divine law--"The commandmentof the Lord is clear, enlightening the eyes" (_ib. _). 

The conventional law is subject to change in the course of time. Witnessthe marriage of sisters in the early period of Adam and Abel. The divinelaw alone does not change--"The fear of the Lord is pure, enduring forever" (_ib. _ 10). 

The conventional law cannot estimate exactly the merited amount and kindof reward and punishment; whereas, "The ordinances of the Lord are thetruth; they are just altogether" (_ib. _). [412]

Freedom and Purpose are principles of conventional law. Without freedomthere is no sense in giving orders. For this reason Freedom and Purposeare not correctly given as fundamental dogmas of divine law, for whilethe latter cannot get along without them, they are not peculiar todivine law as such, but are common also to conventional law. This is whyMaimonides omitted Freedom in his creed. The same is true of Purpose ingeneral. The divine law, however, has a special purpose, perfection andeternal life, hence Maimonides did include it in his list. [413]

The fundamental dogmas of divine law are, as we said before, Existenceof God, Revelation, Reward and Punishment. It is evident that therecannot be a divine law without the first two. The third is alsonecessary; for the purpose of divine law must be a perfection greaterthan the conventional law can accomplish. This is eternal life, and issignified by Reward and Punishment. 

As all agree that the Law of Moses is divine, it is proper to use it asa standard in order to discover what a divine law must have. Accordinglyif we examine the first four chapters of Genesis, we find the principleof the existence of God in chapter one, describing creation. The secondand third chapters give evidence of revelation, or communication of Godwith man for the purpose of directing his conduct. Finally in the Cainincident in chapter four is illustrated the third dogma of Reward andPunishment. [414]

Creation _ex nihilo_ is a true belief but not a fundamental principle. For though the Aristotelian view of eternity is heretical, as it takesaway the possibility of miracles, nay even the possibility of Moses andthe Messiah (for these could exist only after the lapse of an infinitenumber of individuals), one who believes like Plato in a primitivematter is not necessarily in contradiction with the Biblical miracles, for they were not _ex nihilo_[415] (_cf. _ above, p. 358). 

It is not sufficient to believe in the three principles mentioned to beconsidered a believer and to be entitled to a share in the world tocome. One must believe also in the derivative principles following fromthem. Thus from the existence of God follow his unity andincorporeality. And if a man does not believe in incorporeality, hedisbelieves in the real nature of God, and it is as if he denied theoriginal principle. 

The derivative principles ("Shorashim" = roots) are as follows. Fromexistence of God are derived four: (1) Unity, (2) Incorporeality, (3)Independence of time, (4) Freedom from defects. From Revelation arederived three: (1) God's knowledge, (2) Prophecy, (3) Authenticity ofGod's messenger. From Reward and Punishment is derived one--Providencein the sense of special Providence. In all there are eleven dogmas. [416]

A particular commandment of the Law is not reckoned either as afundamental principle or as a derivative. He who trangresses it is asinner and is punished for his misdeed, but is not a heretic who loseshis share in the world to come, unless he denies that the commandment inquestion is from God. In that case he comes in the category of those whodeny revelation. Similarly the belief in tradition is not a principlebecause it is a particular commandment. Unity of God is a principlethough it is apparently a special commandment, because the term unitycontains two concepts; first, that God is one and there is not anotherlike him; second, that being one and free from any multiplicity orcomposition, he is the cause of all the multiplicity in the world. Thelatter is not a particular commandment, but a principle derived from theexistence of God. The former is a particular commandment. If particularcommandments were regarded as principles, we should have as manyprinciples as there are commandments in the Bible. [417]

The above distinction between the two senses of the term unity, one ofwhich is rationally derived from the existence of God, whereas the othernot being so derivable is not a principle, and is given in the Bible asa special commandment, is clearly due to Crescas, who after a fewattempts at proving the unity of God in the sense of excluding dualism, gives it up as incapable of proof logically, and falls back upon thetestimony of Scripture, "Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord isOne. " The other sense of the word unity Crescas proves by reason. HenceAlbo counts it among the derivative principles (_cf. _ above, p. 392). 

If a particular commandment is not a principle, which means that afundamental or derivative dogma cannot itself be a commandment, but mustlie at the basis of all commandments, the question arises whence comethese principles, and who is to warrant their truth. In the sciences weknow that the basal principles of a given science are not proved in thatscience itself, but are borrowed from another science in which they areproved. Thus physics takes the concepts of substance and accident frommetaphysics. In turn the latter takes the idea of a first mover fromphysics. Among the laws, too, the conventional law takes its principles, freedom and purpose, from political philosophy. Whence does divine lawtake its principles? The existence of God can be demonstratedphilosophically from premises going back to axioms and first principles. But this is not true of Prophecy and Providence. 

The answer Albo gives to this question is that of Judah Halevi andCrescas. The principles of the divine law are known empirically, _i. E. _, by experience. Adam knew of the existence of God, of prophecy andreward and punishment from personal experience. Similarly Noah andAbraham. Nowadays we know the law by tradition, but the majority of theprinciples thus known are so certain that there is neither difference ofopinion nor doubt entertained by anyone concerning them. Such is thestatus for example of the principle of Revelation. Other principlesagain, like the existence of God, are, as was said before, known bytheoretical speculation. [418]

To find out whether a religion professing to be of divine origin isreally so or not, it must be examined first with reference to the threefundamental, and the other derivative principles. If it opposes them, itis spurious and not genuine. If it is not opposed to the principles inquestion, it must be further examined with a view to determining whetherthe promulgator is a genuine messenger of God or not. And the test heremust be a direct one. Miracles and signs are no conclusive proof ofprophecy, and still less do they prove that the person performing themis a messenger sent by God to announce a law. They merely show that theperson is considered worthy of having miracles performed through him, provided the miracles are genuine and not performed through magic. Thetest of the prophet and the messenger of God must be as direct as it wasin the case of Moses, where the people actually saw that he wasaddressed by God and commissioned with a message for them. [419]

This opinion of Albo is clearly intended as a defence of Judaism againstChristianity's claim that Jesus performed miracles, a claim which theRabbis of the middle ages were inclined to recognize. 

In addition to the three fundamental and eight derivative principles ofdivine legislation, there are six dogmas, which every follower of theMosaic law must believe. They are (1) Creation _ex nihilo_, (2)Superiority of Moses to other prophets, (3) Immutability of the Law, (4)That human perfection can be attained by any one of the commandments ofthe Law, (5) Resurrection, (6) Messiah. 

Creation _ex nihilo_ is neither a fundamental nor a derivative principleof religion generally or of Judaism specially because, as we saw before(p. 413), they can exist without this dogma. At the same time it is atruth which it behooves every religionist and particularly every Jew tobelieve. It follows from the principle of the existence of God. If Godcannot create _ex nihilo_, there is a defect in him. For creation _exnihilo_ is admitted in a certain sense even by those who hold that theworld is eternal. They admit that God is the cause of everything else;hence matter is his effect through the mediation of the separateIntellect. But how can a separate Intellect be the cause of matter ifthere is no creation _ex nihilo_. This is _ex nihilo_ as much asanything can be. To say that we can find no reason why he should createat a particular time rather than at another, and hence the world must beeternal, is no argument; for this reasoning can apply only to actionfrom necessity. Voluntary action is just of this kind, that it takesplace at a particular time. 

In the above argument for creation the reader will not fail to seereminiscences of Maimonides as well as Crescas (_cf. _ pp. 271 and 403). 

The superiority of Moses to other prophets is not essential to Judaism, nevertheless it behooves every Jew to believe it, as it is included inthe principle of Revelation, and the Bible tells us, "And there arosenot a prophet since then in Israel like unto Moses" (Deut. 34, 10). 

The Immutability of the Law will be treated in detail later. Here itwill suffice to say that while it is not a _sine qua non_ of Judaism, every Jew should believe it, as it is included in the derivativeprinciple of the Authenticity of God's messenger. 

It stands to reason that human perfection can be attained by theperformance of any one of the commandments of the Law. For if itrequires the performance of all the commandments for this purpose, thenthe Law of Moses makes it more difficult to reach perfection than theprevious laws, which is not in consonance with the statement of theRabbis that "God gave Israel so many laws and commandments because hewished to make them meritorious" (Tal. Bab. Makkot, 23 b). 

Resurrection will be treated more at length later. It must be believedbecause it has been accepted by Israel and has come down to us bytradition. The same thing applies to the belief in the Messiah. This isalso a traditional belief and is related to the principle of Reward andPunishment, though it is not like the latter indispensable either toreligion in general or to Judaism in particular. [420]

The difference, it will be seen, between Albo and Maimonides in thequestion of Jewish dogmas is simply one of classification and grading. Albo includes in his enumeration all the thirteen dogmas of Maimonideswith the exception of the fifth, namely, that God alone be worshipped, but instead of placing them all on the same level of importance asequally essential to the structure of Judaism, as Maimonides apparentlyintended, Albo divides them into three categories of descending rank asfollows: fundamental principles, derived principles, true beliefs. OfMaimonides's list the last two, Messiah and Resurrection, belong to thelast category. None the less Albo believed strictly in both and held itincumbent upon every Jew to believe in them. It was only a question ofthe status of a person who mistakenly denies these true beliefs. According to Maimonides, it would seem, he would be called a heretic andbe excluded from a share in the world to come equally with one whodenied the existence of God; whereas according to Albo a person soguilty is a sinner and needs forgiveness, but is not a heretic. Of theother eleven dogmas of Maimonides, (1), (8) and (11) are placed by Alboin his first class, (2), (3), (4), (6) and (10) belong to the secondclass, while (7) and (9) come under true beliefs along with Messiah andResurrection. The difference between the first and the second class ispurely logical and not practical. As we saw before (p. 413), one whodenies incorporeality (a principle of the second class) disbelieves inthe true nature of God, which is tantamount to denying the principle ofthe existence of God. 

Before concluding this general discussion of the fundamental dogmas ofreligion and Judaism, Albo undertakes to answer two questions which musthave been near his heart, and which were on the tongues no doubt of agreat many honest people in those days of religious challenge anddebate. The first question is, Is it proper, or perhaps obligatory, toanalyze the fundamental principles of one's religion, to see if they aretrue; and if one finds another religion which seems to him better, isone permitted to adopt it in place of his own? Albo sees argumentsagainst both sides of the dilemma. If a man is allowed to analyze hisreligion and to choose the one that seems best to him, it will followthat a person is never stable in his belief, since he is doubting it, asis shown by his examination. And if so, he does not deserve reward forbelief, since belief, as Albo defines it elsewhere (Pt. I, ch. 19), means that one cannot conceive of the opposite being true. Again, if hefinds another religion which he thinks better and is allowed to exchangehis own religion for the new one, he will never be sure of any religion;for he may find a third still better, and a fourth, and so on, and as hecannot examine all the possible religions, he will remain without anyreligious convictions. 

On the other hand, if he is not allowed to investigate the foundationsof his belief, it follows either that all religions alike bring theirbeliever happiness, no matter how contradictory they are, which isabsurd; or God would seem unfair if only one religion leads its devoteesto happiness and no one is allowed to change his religion for one thatseems to him the true one. 

The answer of Albo to this interesting question is characteristic. Itshows that he armored himself in advance, before he risked such adelicate question. He makes it clear that it really does not expose toany danger the religion of Judaism, the mother of the other two, whichthey came to supersede. If all religions in the world, Albo tells us, were opposed to one another, and regarded each other as untrue, theabove difficulty would be real. But it is not so. All religions agree inrespect to one of them that it is divine; but they say that it issuperseded. Hence every religionist who is not a Jew must investigatehis religion to see if it is justified in opposing the religion which isacknowledged to be divine. Similarly the professor of the admittedlydivine religion should investigate to see if his religion is temporaryor eternal. In this investigation he must first see if the religionconforms to the principles of divine religion above mentioned. If itdoes this and in addition endeavors to order human affairs in accordancewith justice, and leads its devotees to human perfection, it is divine. It is still, however, possible that it is the work of a wise man of goodcharacter. It is therefore necessary to investigate the character of thepromulgator, to find out whether he is a genuine divine messenger ornot. This test, as was said above (p. 415), must be a direct test andnot an indirect. [421]

The other question is whether there can be more than one divinereligion. Apparently there can be only one, since the giver is one, andthe recipients are of one species. But in reality the receivers vary intemperament according to difference in inheritance and environment. Hence there may be a difference in the law according to the character ofthe people for whom it is intended. Since, however, the difference isdue to the receiver and not to the giver, it must reside in thoseelements which are dependent upon the receiver, _i. E. _, in particularsand details, not in the principles, fundamental or derived. So theNoachite and the Mosaic laws differ only in details, not in fundamentalprinciples. [422]

We have now completed the exposition of the part of Albo's teaching thatmay be called distinctly his own. And it seems he was aware that he hadnothing further to teach that was new, and would have been content toend his book with the first part, of which we have just given anaccount. But his friends, he tells us in the concluding remarks to thefirst part of the "Ikkarim, "[423] urged him to proceed further anddiscuss in detail the principles, fundamental and derived, the truebeliefs and the so-called "branches, " which he barely enumerated in thefirst part. He was persuaded by their advice and added the other threesections, each devoted to one of the three fundamental dogmas and thecorollaries following from it. Here Albo has nothing new to teach. Hefollows the beaten track, reviews the classic views of Maimonides, takesadvantage of the criticisms of Gersonides and Crescas, and settles theproblems sometimes one way sometimes another, without ever suggestinganything new. Accordingly it will not be worth our while to reproducehis discussions here. It will suffice briefly to indicate his positionon the more important problems. 

The second section deals with the existence of God and the derivedprinciples and branches growing out from this root. In proving theexistence of God he refers to Maimonides's four proofs (_cf. _ p. 257 ff. ), and selects the third and fourth as really valid and beyonddispute. The first and second are not conclusive; the one because it isbased upon the eternity of motion, which no Jew accepts; the otherbecause the major premise is not true. It does not follow if one of thetwo elements _a_, _b_, of a composite _a + b_ is found separately, thatthe other must be found existing separately likewise. [424]

We have seen that from the principle of the existence of God follow fourderivative dogmas, unity, incorporeality, independence of time, freedomfrom defects. We are now told that from these secondary roots issue anumber of branches. From Unity it follows that no attributes eitheressential or accidental can be applied to God, such as wisdom, strength, generosity, and so on, for they would cause multiplicity. Fromincorporeality we infer that God is not subject to corporeal affectionslike fear, sorrow, joy, grudge, and so on. Independence of time impliesinfinite power and want of resemblance to other things. Freedom fromdefect implies absence of such qualities as ignorance, weakness, and soon. [425]

In the discussion of the divine attributes Albo has nothing new tooffer, but instead he argues forward and backward, now with Maimonides, now against him, reproducing a good deal of Maimonides's classification, embodying some material of Bahya on unity, and after this rambling andnot very consistent discussion, he comes to the conclusion that none butactive and negative attributes are applicable to God; and yet someessential attributes too must be his, but these must be understood asimplying only the aspect of perfection, and not that other aspect ofattribute which is responsible for multiplicity. [426]

He asks the question so often asked before, How can multiplicity comefrom unity? And after giving Ibn Sina's scheme of the emanation of theIntelligences one after the other, and criticizing it in the manner ofGazali and Maimonides, he gives his own solution that the variety andmultiplicity of the world tends to one end, which is the order of theworld. And thus are reconciled plurality and unity. (_cf. _ Gersonidesabove, p. 351). [427]

He discusses the question of angels or Intellects, gives the views ofthe philosophers concerning their nature and number, each being theeffect of the superior and the cause of the inferior, and objects totheir idea on the ground that these cannot be the same as the Biblicalangels, who are messengers of God to mankind. He then gives his own viewthat the number of angels is infinite, not as the philosophers say tenor fifty, and that they are not related to each other as cause andeffect, but that though they are immaterial Intellects they areindividuated and differentiated according to the degree of understandingthey have of God. [428]

In discussing the second fundamental principle, Revelation, Albo arguesin the good old fashion that man is the noblest creature of the sublunarworld, and the most distinctive and noblest part of man--his form andessence--is the theoretical reason. Hence the purpose of man must be therealization of the theoretical intellect. At the same time, and withlittle consistency, Albo takes the part of Judah Halevi and Crescas, employing their arguments, without naming them, that the philosophersand the philosophizing theologians are wrong who make human immortality, perfection and happiness depend solely upon intellectual activity. Hecomes to the conclusion, therefore, that spiritual understanding, whichgives perfection of soul when in combination with practice, is notacquisition of ideas but the intention of doing the will of God in theperformance of good deeds, and not that of pleasure or reward. [429]

This being so, it becomes an important question what are the practiceswhich tend to human perfection, and what are those which tend the otherway. In general we may conclude, as like desires and rejoices in like, that those deeds which give the soul pleasure before and afterperformance are good and helpful, while those which cause subsequentpain, regret and sorrow are bad, and tend away from the soul'sperfection. 

But the criterion of pleasure and pain just suggested is not sufficientas a guide in conduct, for a great deal depends upon a man'stemperament. What a hot-blooded man may commend and find pleasure in, the phlegmatic temperament will object to, and will feel discomfort indoing. Besides, as the good deed is always a mean between two extremes, which it is hard to measure precisely; and as the good deed is thatwhich pleases God, and beyond generalities we cannot tell what does, andwhat does not please God, since we do not know his essence, it wasnecessary for man's sake that God should reveal his will to mankindthrough a prophet. Thus Revelation is proved by reason. [430]

This leads to the problem of prophecy, one of the derivative principlesof Revelation. The divine influence from which man gets a knowledge ofthe things pleasing and displeasing to God, he cannot obtain without thedivine will. Instead of magic, divination, and communication with evilspirits and the dead, which the ancient heathen employed in order tolearn the future, God sent prophets to Israel, to tell the people of thewill of God. Foretelling the future was only secondary with them. Prophecy is a supernatural gift, whether it takes place with the help ofthe imagination or not. If it were a natural phenomenon dependent uponthe intellectual power of the individual and his faculty of imagination, as the philosophers and some Jewish theologians think, there should havebeen prophets among the philosophers. 

Here again we see Albo adopt the view of Halevi and Crescas against theintellectualism of Maimonides and Gersonides. His further classificationof the grades of prophecy is based upon Maimonides, though Albosimplifies it. Instead of eleven Albo recognizes four grades in all, including that of Moses. The great majority of mankind, he says, stopwith the ability to analyze, such as is exhibited in the analysis ofthings into matter and form, and so on, though not all of them go sofar. But there are some few who go farther and are enabled to speakwords of wisdom and to sing praises to God without being able to accountfor the power. This is the holy spirit ("Ruah ha-Kodesh"). Some go stillfarther, and through the strength of their reason and imagination theydream true dreams and receive prophecies; though, the imagination havingthe upper hand, they struggle very hard and tremble and faint, almostlosing their soul. This is the first stage of prophecy. The second stageis when the imagination and reason are equal. In that case there is nostruggle or fainting. Visions come to the prophet at night in dreams, orin a revery at daytime. The forms that appear are not real, but themeanings they convey are. Such are the figures of women, horses, basketof summer fruit, and so on, in the visions of Zechariah and Amos. Thethird stage is when the reason gets the better of the imagination andthere are no forms or images, but real essences and ideas, like thevisions of Ezekiel, which represent real things in the secrets of natureand divinity. The prophet in this stage also hears an angel speaking tohim and giving him information of importance to himself or others. Inall these cases the will of God is essential. No preparation can replaceit. Finally the fourth stage is reached when the imagination does notcome into play at all. In this stage there is no angel or form, and themessage comes to the prophet at daytime while he is awake. He hears avoice telling him what he desires to know; and whenever he chooses hecan summon this power. Moses alone attained to this final stage. Outsideof the prophets, the righteous and the pious have various degrees ofpower according to the degree of their union with God. Some can in thisway influence the powers of nature to obey them, as a person can, bythinking of food, make his mouth water. So they can by taking thoughtcause rain and storm. Others can bring down fire from above and revivethe dead. 

Through the influence of a prophet the gift of prophecy may sometimesrest upon individuals who are themselves unprepared and unworthy. Witness the revelation on Sinai where the entire people, six hundredthousand in number, were endowed with the spirit of prophecy, and thattoo of the highest degree, like Moses himself. The prophetic mediumreflects the spirit of prophecy on others as a smooth surface reflectsthe light of the sun upon dark bodies. This is why prophecy is foundonly in Israel and in Palestine, because the ark and the Tables ofStone, upon which the Shekinah rests, reflect the divine spirit uponthose who are worthy and have in them something resembling the contentsof the ark, namely, the Torah and the commandments. [431]

Among the true beliefs we have seen (p. 416) that Immutability of theLaw is related to the principle of Revelation. Hence this is the placeto discuss this question. Can a divine religion change with time or not?It would seem at first sight that it cannot. For the giver expresses hiswill in the Law, and his will never changes. The receivers are the same, _i. E. _, the same nation, and a nation does not change. Finally thepurpose of the Law or religion is to give people true opinions, andthese never change. 

And yet on further reflection there seems no reason why religion shouldnot change with the change of the recipient, as the physician changeshis prescription with the progress of the patient, and as a matter offact we find that the commandments given to Adam were different fromthose given to Noah and to Abraham and to Moses. Adam was not allowed toeat meat, Noah was. Abraham was commanded circumcision. High places wereat first permitted and later forbidden. Maimonides makes theimmutability of the Law a fundamental dogma, relying upon thecommandment, "Thou shalt not add thereto, and thou shalt not diminishtherefrom" (Deut. 13, 1). But in the first place the verse refers tochanges in the mode of observing the laws; and besides, it says nothingabout God himself changing the Law. 

The phrases "an eternal statute, " "throughout your generations, " "it isa sign for ever, " are no proof of the eternity of the Law; for not allcommandments have these expressions attached, and this shows rather thatthe others are subject to change. Besides, the expressions, "foreternity, " and so on, are not to be taken absolutely. They are oftenused to express finite periods of time. 

After the Babylonian Exile two changes were made. They changed thecharacters in which the Bible was written, and the order and names ofthe months, beginning with Tishri instead of Nisan. There is no reason, therefore, why other laws might not change, too. We need not, then, regard Immutability of the Law as a fundamental dogma with Maimonides. Hasdai Crescas also classes it with true beliefs and not withfundamental principles. 

Albo resolves the problem as follows: A matter that is revealed by Godhimself cannot be changed by a prophet unless it is changed by Godhimself. The first two commandments, "I am the Lord thy God, &c. , " and"Thou shalt not have other gods, &c. , " were heard by the people directlyfrom God without the intervention of Moses, hence they cannot be changedby any prophet. It follows therefore that the three fundamental dogmas, existence of God, Revelation and Reward and Punishment can never bechanged by a prophet, for they are implied in the first twocommandments, which were heard from God himself. The rest of thecommandments, as they were heard from God through the interpretation ofMoses, can be changed by a prophet as a temporary measure. The otherlaws which were given by Moses may be changed by a later prophet evenpermanently. But the prophet must be greater than Moses, and he mustshow this by the greatness, number, publicity and permanence of hismiracles, which must excel those of Moses. He must likewise show that hewas sent by God to change the Law, as clearly as Moses proved that hewas sent to give it. But it is unlikely that any such prophet will come, for the Torah says that there never was or will be any prophet likeMoses. [432]

Before discussing the third fundamental dogma, Albo finds it desirableto dispose first of a few other problems implied by this dogma, one ofwhich, God's knowledge, was postponed to this place, though it isconnected with Revelation, because it cannot well be separated indiscussion from the problem of Freedom. Providence is the other relatedproblem, which is derived from the dogma of Reward and Punishment. 

There is nothing that is new in Albo's treatment of knowledge andFreedom. He insists like Maimonides that God must be omniscient, and onthe other hand the contingent cannot be denied, and neither can freedom. He gives the stock arguments, which it is not necessary to reproduce atthis late hour. And his solution is that of Maimonides that in God humanfreedom and divine Omniscience are reconcilable because God's knowledgeis not our knowledge. [433]

Nor is there anything original in Albo's discussion of the problem ofProvidence. He recognizes with Maimonides and others that a strongargument against special Providence is the observed inequality betweenthe destinies of men and their apparent merits. And he endeavors in thewell worn method to give reasons and explanations for this inequalitywhich will not touch unfavorably God's justice or his specialProvidence. The reasons are such as we met before and we shall notrepeat them. Albo also gives a few positive arguments to prove thereality of special Providence for man. He sees in various natural andhuman phenomena evidence of deviation from the merely "natural" asdemanded by the principles of Aristotle's Physics or the laws ofuniformity. This shows special Providence. Thus the existence of dryearth, the heaviest element, above water, cannot be accounted for by thelaws of Physics. The phenomenon of rain cannot be reduced to law, henceit argues will and purpose and Providence. Admonition in dreams isdirect evidence of special Providence, and it is scarcely likely thatman, who has special equipment above the other animals in his reason, should not also receive special care above that which the lower animalshave. Now they are protected in the species, hence man is provided foras an individual. [434]

Having disposed of the auxiliary dogmas, Albo takes up the fundamentalprinciple of Reward and Punishment. He cites various opinions on thesubject, which are dependent upon the idea one entertains concerning thenature of the soul. Thus if one holds that the human soul is notdifferent in kind from the animal soul, it follows that as there is noreward and punishment for the animal, there is none for man. And if oneregards the human soul as merely a capacity or possibility ofintelligence he must necessarily conclude that the soul perishes withthe body and there is no spiritual reward and punishment after death. The only reward there is must therefore be corporeal, during life. Onthe other hand, our general experience, which brings before us manycases of good men suffering and bad men enjoying prosperity, would seemto argue against corporeal reward and punishment in this world. Thistaken together with the philosophical opinion that the soul is animmaterial and indestructible substance gives rise to the third viewthat the only recompense is spiritual after death. None of these viewsis satisfactory to Albo. The first two because they are based upon anerroneous notion of the soul. All agree, philosophers as well astheologians, that the human soul is different in kind from the soul ofthe animal; and it is likewise admitted that the human soul is immortal. His criticism of the third view so far as it is based upon theintellectualist idea that the thing of highest value is intellectualeffort, and the only reward is immortality which intellectual activityengenders, is similar to that of Halevi and Crescas in its endeavor torefute this notion and to substitute for it the religious view that thesoul is an independent substance having a capacity for intelligence _inGod's service_. The degree in which a person realizes this servicedetermines his reward and punishment. The argument from experience Albodoes not answer here, but we may suppose he regards it as answered bywhat he said in his discussion of Providence, where he tries to accountfor the prosperity of the wicked and the adversity of the righteous. 

Albo's own view accordingly is that which he also attributes to theBible that there is a twofold reward, in this world and in the next. There is still a difference of opinion concerning the nature of the trueand ultimate reward, whether it is given to the soul alone, or to bodyand soul combined in resurrection. He quotes Maimonides's opinion, withwhom he agrees, that the real reward is purely spiritual enjoyed by thesoul alone. To be sure, after the coming of the Messiah the bodies ofthe righteous will be resurrected to make known abroad God's wonders, orto give these people bodily pleasure for the pain they suffered duringlife, or to give them additional opportunity to acquire perfection sothat they may have a greater reward later. But this state of resurrectedlife will last only for a time, and then all will die again, and thesouls will enjoy spiritual life forever. 

The other opinion, held by Nachmanides, is that the real and ultimatereward is that of body and soul united to everlasting life. Albo is notsatisfied with this view, his objections being among others that if onlythe perfect are resurrected, the rest will remain without any reward atall, not to mention the difficulty that it is not likely that the humanbody--a perishable thing--will change into a matter that will lastforever. 

As to the nature of reward and punishment after death, Albo tells usthat reward will consist in the soul's realization that its endeavorsin this world were correct, and in the next world it will be prepared tojoin the spiritual beings, which will give it great joy. The erring soulwill find itself in a position where it will still desire the corporealpleasures of this world, but will not be able to have them for want ofcorporeal organs. At the same time it will also entertain the other morenatural desire of a spiritual substance to join the other spiritualbeings in the other world. This feeling too it will not be able tosatisfy because of its want of perfection. This division of desiresunsatisfied will cause the soul excruciating torture, and this is itspunishment. [435]

CONCLUSION

Our task is done. We have now reached the limit we have assignedourselves. We have traced objectively and with greater or less detailthe rationalistic movement in mediæval Jewry from its beginnings in theninth and tenth centuries in Babylon among the Karaites and Rabbanitesto its decline in Spain and south France in the fifteenth century. Wehave followed its ascending curve from Saadia through Gabirol, Bahya andIbn Daud to its highest point in Maimonides, and we likewise traced itsdescent through Gersonides, Crescas and Albo. We took account of itsessential nature as being a serious and conscientious attempt to definea Jewish _Weltanschauung_ in the midst of conflicting claims ofreligions and philosophies. The Jewish sacred writings had to be studiedand made consistent with themselves in regard to certain ethical andmetaphysical questions which forced themselves upon the minds ofthinking men. In this endeavor it was necessary to have regard to thesystem of doctrine that was growing up among their Mohammedan neighborsand masters--itself inherited from Greece--and adjust its teachings tothose of Judaism. The adjustment took various forms according to thetemperament of the adjuster. It embraced the extremes of all butsacrificing one of the two systems of doctrine to the other, and itcounted among its votaries those who honestly endeavored to give eachclaim its due. The system of Judaism was the same for all throughout theperiod of our investigation, excepting only the difference betweenKaraites and Rabbanites. This was not the case with the system ofphilosophic doctrine. There we can see a development from Kalam throughNeo-Platonism to Aristotelianism, and we accordingly classified theJewish thinkers as Mutakallimun, Neo-Platonists or Aristotelians, orcombinations in varying proportions of any two of the three systemsmentioned. 

It was not our province to treat of the mystic movement in mediævalJewry as it developed in the Kabbalistic works and gained the groundyielded in the course of time by the healthier rationalism. To completethe picture it will suffice to say that as the political and economicconditions of the Jews in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuriesdeteriorated, and freedom and toleration were succeeded by persecutionand expulsion, the Jews became more zealous for their own spiritualheritage as distinguished from foreign importations; philosophy andrationalism began to be regarded askance, particularly as experienceshowed that scientific training was not favorable to Jewishsteadfastness and loyalty. In suffering and persecution those who stuckto their posts were as a rule not the so-called enlightened who playedwith foreign learning, but the simple folk who believed in Torah andtradition in the good old style. The philosophical and the scientificdevotees were the first to yield, and many of them abandonedJudaism. [436] Thus it was that mysticism and obscurantism took the placeof enlightenment as a measure of self-defence. The material walls of theGhetto and the spiritual walls of the Talmud and the Kabbala kept theremnant from being overwhelmed and absorbed by the hostile environmentof Christian and Mohammedan. The second half of the fourteenth, and thefifteenth century were not favorable to philosophical studies among theJews, and the few here and there who still show an interest in scienceand philosophy combine with it a belief in Kabbala and are not of anygreat influence on the development of Judaism. 

Shemtob ben Joseph ibn Shemtob (ab. 1440) author of a work entitled"Emunot, "[437] is a strong opponent of Greek science and philosophy. Heis not content with attacking the lesser lights and extremists likeAlbalag or Gersonides or Abraham ibn Ezra. He goes to the veryfountain-head of Jewish Aristotelianism and holds Maimonides responsiblefor the heresies which invaded the Jewish camp. He takes up one doctrineafter another of the great Jewish philosopher and points out howdangerous it is to the true Jewish faith. Judah Halevi and Nachmanidesrepresent to him the true Jewish attitude. The mysteries of the Jewishfaith are revealed not in philosophy but in the Kabbala, whichMaimonides did not study, and which he would not have understood if hehad studied it, for he had no Kabbalistic tradition. 

Unlike Shemtob, his son Joseph ben Shemtob (d. 1480)[438] shows greatadmiration for Aristotle and Maimonides. But he is enabled to do so bylending credence to a legend that Aristotle in his old age recanted hisheretical doctrines, in particular that of the eternity of the world. Joseph ben Shemtob made a special study of Aristotle's Ethics, to whichhe wrote a commentary, and endeavored to show that the Stagirite'sethical doctrines had been misunderstood; that the highest good of manand his ultimate happiness are to be sought according to Aristotle notin this world but in the next. It was likewise a misunderstanding, hethinks, when Maimonides and others make Aristotle deny specialProvidence. True science is not really opposed to Judaism. At the sametime he too like his father realizes the danger of too much scientificstudy, and hence agrees with Solomon ben Adret that the study ofphilosophy should be postponed to the age of maturity when the studentis already imbued with Jewish learning and religious faith. 

The son of Joseph, bearing the name of his grandfather, Shemtob benJoseph (fl. Ab. 1461-89), followed in his father's footsteps, [439] andwrote a commentary on the "Guide of the Perplexed" of Maimonides, whomhe defends against the attacks of Crescas. 

Isaac ben Moses Arama (1420-1494)[440] is the author of aphilosophico-homiletical commentary on the Pentateuch entitled, "AkedatYizhak, " and a small treatise on the relations of philosophy andtheology. He was also interested in Kabbala and placed Jewish revelationabove philosophy. 

Don Isaac Abarbanel (1437-1508), [441] the distinguished Jewish statesmanwho went with his brethren into exile at the time of the expulsion ofthe Jews from Spain in 1492, was a prolific writer on Biblical exegesisand religious philosophy. Though a great admirer of Maimonides, on whose"Guide" he wrote a commentary, and whose thirteen articles of the creedhe defended against the strictures of Crescas and Albo, he wasnevertheless an outspoken opponent of the rationalistic attitude and hasno phrases strong enough for such men as Albalag, Gersonides, Moses ofNarbonne and others, whom he denounces as heretics and teachers ofdangerous doctrines. He does not even spare Maimonides himself when thelatter attempts to identify the traditional "Maase Bereshit" and "MaaseMerkaba" with the Aristotelian Physics and Metaphysics (_cf. _ above, p. 303 f. ), and adopts Kabbalistic views along with philosophic doctrines. He is neither original nor thoroughly consistent. 

His son Judah Leo Abarbanel (1470-1530)[442] is the author of aphilosophical work in Italian, "Dialoghi di Amore, " (Dialogues of Love), which breathes the spirit of the Renaissance of the fifteenth andsixteenth centuries in Italy. It is under the influence of Plato andPlotinus and identifies God with love, which is regarded as theessential principle of all life and activity in the world, includingeven the inorganic natural processes. There is no attempt made toconstruct a Jewish philosophy, and though all evidence is against it, some have made it out that Judah Abarbanel was a convert toChristianity. 

In the same country, in Italy, Judah ben Yechiel Messer Leon ofMantua[443] (1450-1490) made a name for himself as a student of Ciceroand of mediæval Latin scholasticism. He wrote a rhetoric in Hebrew basedupon Cicero and Lactantius, and composed logical works based uponAristotle's Latin text and Averroes. As an original student ofphilosophy he is of no importance. 

Two members of the Delmedigo family of Crete, Elijah (1460-1498) andJoseph Solomon, [444] are well known as students of philosophy andwriters on philosophical and scientific subjects. 

Thus the stream of philosophical thought which rose among the Jews inBabylonia and flowed on through the ages, ever widening and deepeningits channel, passing into Spain and reaching its high water mark in thelatter half of the twelfth century in Maimonides, began to narrow andthin out while spreading into France and Italy, until at last it driedup entirely in that very land which opened up a new world of thought, beauty and feeling in the fifteenth century, the land of theRenaissance. Jewish philosophy never passed beyond the scholastic stage, and the freedom and light which came to the rest of the world in therevival of ancient learning and the inventions and discoveries of themodern era found the Jews incapable of benefiting by the blessings theyafforded. Oppression and gloom caused the Jews to retire within theirshell and they sought consolation for the freedom denied them without inconcentrating their interests, ideals and hopes upon the Rabbinicwritings, legal as well as mystical. There have appeared philosophersamong the Jews in succeeding centuries, but they either philosophizedwithout regard to Judaism and in opposition to its fundamental dogmas, thus incurring the wrath and exclusion of the synagogue, or they soughtto dissociate Judaism from theoretical speculation on the ground thatthe Jewish religion is not a philosophy but a rule of conduct. In morerecent times Jewry has divided itself into sects and under the influenceof modern individualism has lost its central authority making everygroup the arbiter of its own belief and practice and narrowing thereligious influence to matters of ceremony and communal activity of apractical character. There are Jews now and there are philosophers, butthere are no Jewish philosophers and there is no Jewish philosophy. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY[D]

GENERAL WORKS

SOLOMON MUNK, Mélanges de Philosophie Juive et Arabe, Paris 1859, pp. 461-511. A brief historical résumé of philosophical authors and books. German translation by Beer, Philosophie und philosophischeSchriftsteller der Juden, Leipzig, 1852. English translation by IsidorKalisch, Philosophy and Philosophical Authors of the Jews, Cincinnati, 1881. 

A. SCHMIEDL, Studien über jüdische, insonders jüdisch-arabischeReligionsphilosophie, Wien, 1869. 

MORITZ EISLER, Vorlesungen über die jüdischen Philosophen desMittelalters (3 parts), Wien, 1870-84. 

DAVID KAUFMANN, Geschichte der Attributenlehre in der jüdischenReligionsphilosophie des Mittelalters von Saadia bis Maimuni, Gotha, 1877. 

SIMEON BERNFELD, דעת אלהים, תולדות הפלוסופיא הדתית בישראל, Warsaw, 1897. 

S. HOROVITZ, Die Psychologie bei den jüdischen Religions-Philosophen desMittelalters, von Saadia bis Maimuni, Breslau, 1898-1912 (includes sofar Saadia, Gabirol, Ibn Zaddik, Abraham ibn Daud). 

J. POLLAK, "Entwicklung der arabischen und jüdischen Philosophie imMittelalter" in _Archiv für Geschichte der Philosophie_, vol. XVII(1904), pp. 196-236, 433-459. 

UEBERWEG-BAUMGARTNER, Grundriss der Geschichte der Philosophie, vol. II, 10th ed. , Berlin, 1915, pp. 385-403. 

DAVID NEUMARK, Geschichte der jüdischen Philosophie des Mittelalters, nach Problemen dargestellt, vol. I, Berlin, 1907, vol. II, part I, Berlin, 1910. 

IGNAZ GOLDZIHER, Die jüdische Philosophie in _Allgemeine Geschichte derPhilosophie_, von W. Wundt, etc. (Die Kultur der Gegenwart I, 5), pp. 70-77 (2nd ed. , pp. 301-337). 

KALAM IN JEWISH PHILOSOPHY

MARTIN SCHREINER, Der Kalam in der jüdischen Literatur, Berlin, 1895. 

ISAAC ISRAELI

JACOB GUTTMANN, Die philosophischen Lehren des Isaak ben SalomonIsraeli, Münster i. W. 1911. 

AL MUKAMMAS

ABRAHAM HARKAVY, in Russian periodical _Woskhod_, Sept. 1898. 

SAADIA

JACOB GUTTMANN, Die Religionsphilosophie des Saadia, Göttingen, 1882. 

D. J. ENGELKEMPER, Saadja Gaon's religionsphilosophische Lehre über dieheilige Schrift, übersetzt und erklärt, Münster, 1903. 

JOSEPH AL BASIR

P. F. FRANKL, Ein Muʿtazilitischer Kalam aus dem 10. Jahrhundert, Wien, 1872. 

MIKSA KLEIN, Júszuf Al-Baszîr, Al-Kitâb Al-Muḥtavî, Budapest, 1913. 

ERNÖ MORGENSTERN, Júszuf Al-Baszîr, Al Kitâb Al Muḥtavî, Budapest, 1913. 

JESHUA BEN JUDAH

MARTIN SCHREINER, Studien über Jeschuʿa ben Jehuda, Berlin, 1900. 

SOLOMON IBN GABIROL

S. MUNK, Mélanges, etc. , Paris, 1859, pp. 151-306. 

SEYERLEN, in Zeller's Theologische Jahrbücher, vols. XV and XVI. 

JACOB GUTTMANN, Die Philosophie des Salomon ibn Gabirol, Göttingen, 1889. 

DAVID KAUFMANN, Studien über Salomon ibn Gabirol, Budapest, 1899. 

BAHYA IBN PAKUDA

DAVID KAUFMANN, "Die Theologie des Bachja Ibn Pakuda, " in "GesammelteSchriften von David Kaufmann" (ed. Brann), vol. II, Frankfurt a. M. , 1910, pp. 1-98. 

J. H. HERTZ, Bachya, The Jewish Thomas à Kempis, New York, 1898 (inSixth Biennial Report of the Jewish Theological Seminary Association). 

PSEUDO-BAHYA

JACOB GUTTMANN, "Eine bisher unbekannte, dem Bachja ibn Pakudazugeignete Schrift, " _Monatschrift f. G. U. W. D. J. _, vol. XLI (1897), p. 241 ff. 

ABRAHAM BAR HIYYA

JACOB GUTTMANN, in _Monatschrift f. G. U, W. D. J_. , 1900. 

JOSEPH IBN ZADDIK

MAX DOCTOR, Die Philosophie des Joseph Ibn Zaddik, nach ihren Quellen, insbesondere nach ihren Beziehungen zu den Lauteren Brüdern und zuGabirol untersucht, Münster, 1895. 

LEOPOLD WEINSBERG, Der Mikrokosmos, ein angeblich im 12. Jahrhundert vondem Cordubenser Joseph ibn Zaddik verfasstes philosophisches System, nach seiner Echtheit untersucht, Breslau, 1888. 

JUDAH HALEVI

AD. FRANKL-GRÜN, Die Ethik des Juda Halevi, Bilin, s. A. 

DAVID KAUFMANN, Jehuda Halewi, Versuch einer Charakteristik, Breslau, 1877; reprinted in "Gesammelte Schriften" (ed. Brann), Frankfurt a. M. , 1910, vol. II, pp. 99-151. 

DAVID NEUMARK, Jehuda Hallevi's Philosophy in its Principles, Cincinnati, 1908. 

JULIUS GUTTMANN, Das Verhältniss von Religion und Philosophie bei JehudaHalewi, in Israel Lewy's Festschrift (ed. Brann and Elbogen), Breslau, 1911, pp. 327-358. 

ABRAHAM IBN EZRA

NACHMAN KROCHMAL, מורה נבוכי הזמן, Warsaw, 1894, p. 266 ff. 

DAVID ROSIN, Die Religionsphilosophie Abraham ibn Esras, in_Monatschrift f. G. U. W. D. J. _ vols. XLII (1898) and XLIII (1899). 

G. ORSCHANSKY, Abraham ibn Esra als Philosoph, Breslau, 1900. 

ABRAHAM IBN DAUD

GUGENHEIMER, Die Religionsphilosophie des R. Abraham ben David ha-Levinach dessen noch ungedruckter Schrift Emuna Rama in ihrem inneren undhistorischen Zusammenhange entwickelt, Augsburg, 1850. 

JACOB GUTTMANN, Die Religionsphilosophie des Abraham ibn Daud ausToledo, Göttingen, 1879. 

MAIMONIDES

M. JOEL, Die Religionsphilosophie des Mose ben Maimon, Breslau, 1876. 

SIMON B. SCHEYER, Das Psychologische System des Maimonides, Frankfurta. M. , 1845. 

DAVID ROSIN, Die Ethik des Maimonides, Breslau, 1876. 

MOSES BEN MAIMON, sein Leben, seine Werke und sein Einfluss, heraus-gegeben von der Gesellschaft zur Förderung der Wissenschaft desJudenthums, Band I, Leipzig, 1908. 

LOUIS-GERMAIN LEVY, Maïmonide, Paris, 1911 (Les Grands Philosophes). 

J. MÜNZ, Moses ben Maimon, sein Leben und seine Werke, Frankfurt a. M. , 1912. 

M. JOEL, Verhältniss Albert des Grossen zu Moses Maimonides, Breslau, 1876. 

JACOB GUTTMANN, Der Einfluss der Maimonidischen Philosophie auf daschristliche Abendland, in _Moses ben Maimon_ (see above), pp. 135-230. 

DAVID KAUFMANN, Der "Führer" Maimûni's in der Weltliteratur, _Archiv fürGeschichte der Philosophie_, vol. XI (1898), pp. 335-376; reprinted in"Gesammelte Schriften" (ed. Brann), Frankfurt a. M. , 1910, vol. II, pp. 152-189. 

J. P. WICKERSHAM CRAWFORD, The _Vision Delectable_ of Alfonso de laTorre and Maimonides' _Guide of the Perplexed_, Publications of theModern Language Association of America, XXVIII, 2 (1913), pp. 188-212. 

ISAAC HUSIK, An Anonymous Medieval Christian Critic of Maimonides, Jewish Quarterly Review, New Series, vol. II, 1911, pp. 159-190. 

GERSONIDES

M. JOEL, Lewi ben Gerson als Religionsphilosoph, Breslau, 1862. 

_Isidore Weil_, Philosophie Religieuse de Levi ben Gerson, Paris, 1868. 

BENZION KELLERMANN, Die Kämpfe Gottes von Lewi ben Gerson, Uebersetzungund Erklärung des handschriftlich revidierten Textes, Erster Teil, Berlin, 1914. Contains the German translation of the first book of the"Milhamot Adonai. " The translation is faulty in many places, as thepresent writer has shown in an article entitled, "Studies inGersonides, " which will appear in the _Jewish Quarterly Review_, NewSeries, in the course of the year 1917. 

HASDAI CRESCAS

_M. Joel_, Don Chasdai Creskas' religionsphilosophische Lehren in ihremgeschichtlichen Einflusse dargestellt, Breslau, 1866. 

PHILIPP BLOCH, Die Willensfreiheit von Chasdai Kreskas, München, 1879. 

JULIUS WOLFSOHN, Der Einfluss Gazâlî's auf Chisdai Crescas, Frankfurta. M. , 1905. 

DAVID NEUMARK, "Crescas and Spinoza, " in Commemoration of the FifthCentenary of the Publication of the "Or Adonai"; in Year Book of theCentral Conference of American Rabbis, XVIII, 1908, pp. 277-318. 

JOSEPH ALBO

SAMUEL BACK, Joseph Albo's Bedeutung in der Geschichte der jüdischenReligionsphilosophie, Breslau, 1869. 

JAULUS, in _Monatschrift f. G. U. W. D. J. _, 1874, p. 462 ff. 

A. TÄNZER, Die Religionsphilosophie Joseph Albo's nach seinem Werke"Ikkarim" systematisch dargestellt und erläutert, Frankfurt a. M. , 1896. 

BIBLICAL EXEGESIS

W. BACKER, Die Bibelexegese der jüdischen Religionsphilosophen desMittelalters vor Maimûni, Budapest, 1892. 

ID. , Die Jüdische Bibelexegese vom Anfange des zehnten his zum Ende desfünfzehnten Jahrhunderts, Treves, 1892, reprinted from Winter undWünsche, Die Jüdische Literatur seit Abschluss des Kanons, II, 239-339, where a full bibliography is given. 

ID. , Jewish Encyclopedia, s. V. Bible Exegesis, §§ 14-16. 

INFLUENCE OF JEWISH PHILOSOPHY ON SCHOLASTICISM

The works of Joel, Guttmann, Kaufmann, Crawford and Husik mentionedabove under Maimonides; and besides

JACOB GUTTMANN, Das Verhältniss des Thomas von Aquino zum Judenthum undzur jüdischen Litteratur, Göttingen, 1891. 

ID. , Die Scholastik des dreizehnten Jahrhunderts in ihren Beziehungenzum Judenthum und zur jüdischen Literatur, Breslau, 1902. 

For further references see the notes. 

[D] This bibliography contains a selection of the more important worksof exposition. For original sources see the notes. 

NOTES

[Black figures denote the page, the light figures the notes]

=xv=, 1. See below, p. 395 ff. 

=xvi=, 2. Talm. Bab. Hagiga 11b. 

3. Ibid. 

4. See Zeller, Die Philosophie der Griechen, III, 2, 3d ed. P. 347;Maimonides, Guide of the Perplexed, I, ch. 71, beginning. 

=xvii=, 5. See Wenrich, De Auctorum Graecorum Versionibus etCommentariis Syriacis, Arabicis, Armeniacis Persicisque, Leipzig, 1842, p. 4 ff; De Boer, Geschichte der Philosophie im Islam, Stuttgart, 1901, p. 17 ff (English translation by Jones, London, 1903, pp. 11-30). Duval, La Littérature Syriaque 2nd ed. , Paris, 1900, ch. XIV, § 2, p. 253 ff. 

=xx=, 6. See Dieterici, Die Theologie des Aristotles (Arabic text), Leipzig, 1882; German translation by the same, Leipzig, 1883. 

7. See Bardenhewer, Die Pseudoaristotelische Schrift über das reineGute, bekannt unter dem Namen Liber de causis, Freiburg i. Br. , 1882. 

8. See Valentinus Rose, Deutsche Literaturzeitung, 1883, p. 843. 

9. See Husik, Judah Messer Leon's Commentary upon the "Vetus Logica, "Leyden, 1906, p. 11, 97 note. 

=xxi=, 10. For the following sketch of the Kalam see Goldziher, Vorlesungen über den Islam, Heidelberg, 1910, 100 ff, 127 f. 

=xxiv=, 11. See below, p. 247. 

=xxv=, 12. See Schreiner, Der Kalam in der jüdischen Literatur, Berlin, 1895, p. 3; ibid. , Studien über Jeschuʿa ben Jehuda, Berlin, 1900, p. 12ff. 

=xxvi=, 13. See L. Ginzberg, in Jewish Encyclopedia, s. V. "Anthropomorphism. "

14. See Talm. Bab. Berakot, 33b. מודים מודים משתקין אותו. 

15. See Talm. Bab. Megillah, 25b. הכל בידי שמים חוץ מיראת שמים. 

16. Schreiner, Studien über Jeschuʿa ben Jehudah, p. 15 note 2. 

17. See Bab. Talm. Pesakim, 54a, שבעה דברים נבראו קודם שנברא העולם ואלו. הן תורה.... תורה דכתיב (משלי ח׳) ה׳ קנני ראשית דרכו

18. Schreiner 1. C. P. 12. 

19. Ibid. 

20. Schreiner, Der Kalam in der jüdischen Literatur, p. 3, 4. 

=xxvii=, 21. Guide of the Perplexed, I, ch. 71. 

22. See below, p. 246 ff. 

23. See Goldziher, Vorlesungen über den Islam, p. 155 ff. 

=xxviii=, 24. See Yahuda, Al-Hidāja 'Ilā Farā'id Al-Qulūbdes Bachja ibn Joseph Ibn Paquda, Leyden, 1912, p. 53 ff. 

=xxxvii=, 25. Cf. Above, note 6. 

=1=, 26. See Steinschneider, Die Hebräischen Uebersetzungen desMittelalters und die Juden als Dolmetscher, Berlin, 1893, § 479 andnotes. 

=1=, 27. See Guttmann, Die Scholastik des dreizehnten Jahrhunderts inihren Beziehungen zum Judenthum und zur jüdischen Literatur, Breslau, 1902, P. 55 ff. 

28. Omnia Opera Ysaac, Lugduni, (Lyons), 1515. 

=2=, 29. See אגרותּ הרמב״ם, ed. Amsterdam, p. 14b. 

30. S. Fried, Das Buch über die Elemente (ספר היסודות), Drohobycz, 1900. 

31. Published by Hirschfeld in "Festschrift zum achtzigsten GeburtstagMoritz Steinschneiders, " Leipzig, 1896, PP. 131-141; cf. Also pp. 233-4. 

32. See note 28 and the two preceding notes. 

=5=, 33. ספר הרוח והנפש published by Steinschneider in the Hebrewperiodical הכרמל I, pp. 401-405. Cf. Guttmann, Die philosophischenLehren des Isaak ben Salomon Israeli, Münster i. W. , 1911, p. 31, note 1. 

=10=, 34. Fried, ספר היסודות, p. 12f. 

=17=, 35. Berlin, 1885, pp. 65, 77-83, 151-154. 

36. See the Russian paper Woskhod, September, 1898. 

=24=, 37. Arabic text edited by S. Landauer, Kitāb al-Amānātwa'l-Iʿtiqādāt, Leyden 1880. The Hebrew translation of Judah ibnTibbon has been published in many editions. The references in thefollowing notes are to the Yozefov edition. 

=25=, 38. Cf. Below, p. 249 ff. 

39. Pt. I, ch. 1, third argument, p. 58 of Yozefov edition. 

40. Ibid. , fourth argument, p. 59. 

=26=, 41. Ibid. , ch. 3, p. 63 ff. ; cf. Guttmann, DieReligionsphilosophie des Saadia, Göttingen, 1882, p. 45 f. 

42. Pt. II, chs. 9-12, pp. 95-101. 

43. Pt. VI, ch. 1, p. 149. 

44. Pt. II, ch. 2, pp. 88-9. 

=27=, 45. Introduction, pp. 38-39. 

46. Ibid. , p. 40. 

=28=, 47. Ibid. , pp. 43-48. 

48. Ibid. , p. 48. 

49. P. 49

50. P. 51. 

=29=, 51. Pt. I. Introduction, p. 54 f. 

52. Ibid. , ch. 1, p. 56. 

=30=, 53. Ibid. , p. 57. 

54. Ibid. , p. 58. 

55. Ibid. , p. 59. 

=31=, 56. Ch. 2, p. 60 ff. 

57. Ch. 3, third opinion, p. 66 ff. 

=32=, 58. Ch. 4, pp. 80-82. 

59. Pt. II, Introduction, p. 86. 

60. Ibid. , ch. 1, p. 88. 

=33=, 61. Pt. I, ch. 3, fifth opinion, p. 68. 

62. Pt. II, ch. 2, p. 89. 

=34=, 63. Ibid. , chs. 4-5, pp. 91-93. 

64. See Graf, Die Philosophie und Gotteslehre des Jahjā ibn ʿAdīund späteren Autoren, Münster, 1910, p. 32, note, p. 52. 

=35=, 65. III, ch. 10, p. 122; V, ch. 8, p. 147; VII, ch. 2, p. 165. 

66. II, chs. 9-12, pp. 95-102. 

=37=, 67. VI, chs. 1-4, pp. 148-156. 

=38=, 68. III chs. 1-3, pp. 104-110. 

=40=, 69. Ibid. , chs. 4-5, pp. 110-113. 

70. Ch. 6, pp. 113-114. 

71. Chs. 7-9, pp. 114-121. 

=41=, 72. IV, pp. 124-136. 

=42=, 73. V, chs. 1-3, pp. 136-140. 

=43=, 74. IX, chs. 1-4, pp. 185-190. 

=44=, 75. VI, ch. 8, pp. 160-162. 

=45=, 76. VII, chs. 1-9, pp. 162-174. 

77. VIII, pp. 175-185. 

78. IX, chs. 5-11, pp. 190-197. 

=46=, 79. X, pp. 197-215. 

=48=, 80. The following sketch is based upon Frankl, EinMuʿtazilitischer Kalam aus dem 10ten Jahrhundert, Wien, 1872. 

=55=, 81. The following sketch is based upon Schreiner, Studien überJeschuʿa ben Jehuda, Berlin, 1900. 

=60=, 82. אגרות הרמב״ם (Letters of Maimonides), ed. Amsterdam, p. 14b. 

=61=, 83. See Munk, Mélanges de Philosophie Juive et Arabe, Paris, 1859, p. 291 ff; Guttmann, Die Scholastik des Dreizehnten Jahrhunderts, Breslau, 1902, pp. 60-85. _Id. _, Die Philosophie des Salomon ibnGabirol, Göttingen, 1889, p. 54 ff. This last work and that of Munkrepresent the best exposition and criticism of Gabirol's philosophy andof his sources and influences. 

=62=, 84. Cf. Baeumker, Avencebrolis Fons Vitæ, Münister, 1892-95, Prolegomena. 

=63=, 85. Jourdain, A. , Recherches Critiques sur l'âge et l'origine destraductions Latines d' Aristote, 2 ed. Paris, 1843, p. 197 note. 

86. Munk, Mélanges, etc. (see note 83), contains the Hebrew extracts ofFalaquera. The Latin translation was published by Clemens Baeumker inthe Beiträge zur Geschichte der Philosophie des Mittelalters, vol. I, pts. 2-4 (cf. Above note 84). See also Seyerlen in TheologischeJahrbücher, edited by Zeller, XV and XVI. 

=64=, 87. Cf. Munk, Le Guide des Égarés, II, p. 25, note 1, end. 

88. See Kaufmann, Studien über Salomon ibn Gabirol, Budapest, 1899. 

89. Baeumker, Fons Vitæ, V, p. 313, 6. 

=65=, 90. F. V. V, 333-335, Falaquera in Munk's Mélanges, V, §§ 67-69. 

91. F. V. IV, 8 ff. , Falaquera IV, § 1. 

92. F. V. V, 296, 10. 

93. F. V. IV, 243, 10. 

94. F. V. III, p. 196, 5 ff. , Falaq. III, § 10. 

95. F. V. III, 208, 15; Falaq. III, § 44. 

=67=, 96. F. V. III, 175, 10 ff. ; Falaq. III § 27 ff. 

97. F. V. IV, 211, 9 ff. , 213, 17 ff. , 217, II ff. , 218, 18; Falaq. IV, §§ 1-4 and ff. 

98. F. V. V, 258, 19; 259, 1; 268, 8, 14, 15; 322, 12; Falaq. V, § 55. 

=68=, 99. F. V. V, 306, 7 ff. ; Falaq. V, § 34 ff. 

100. F. V. V, 330, 15 ff. ; Falaq. V, § 64 ff. 

101. F. V. V, 326, 3 ff. ; Falaq. V, § 60 ff. 

=70=, 102. F. V. III, 204, 13 ff. ; Falaq. III, § 37. 

=71=, 103. S. Wise, "Improvement of the Moral Qualities, " New York, 1901. (Columbia University Oriental Studies, vol. 1. )

=72=, 104. F. V. I, 4, 24 ff. ; Falaq. I, § 2. 

=78=, 105. See Munk, Mélanges, 166 ff. 

=80=, 106. Yahuda, Prolegomena zu einer erstmaligen Herausgabe desKitāb Al-Hidāja 'Ilā Farā'id Al-Qulūb, Frankfurt a. M. , 1904, 12 ff. ; _id. _, Al-Hidaja 'Ilā Faraid Al-Qulūb des Bachja ibnJoseph ibn Paqūda, Leyden, 1912, 63 f. 

107. Neumark, Geschichte der jüdischen Philosophie des Mittelalters, I, Berlin, 1907, 485-493. 

=81=, 108. In his commentary on Deut. 32, 39. Cf. Yahuda, Prolegomena, p. 12, note 2, where 35 should be corrected to 39. 

109. Yahuda, Al-Hidaja, etc. , p. 97. 

=85=, 110. ‮ חובת הלבבות‬ (Duties of the Hearts) ed. Warsaw, 1875, Introduction, pp. 9-28. 

=86=, 111. Ibid. , Introduction, 28-37. 

112. Yahuda, Al-Hidāja, pp. 53-112. 

=88=, 113. Duties of the Hearts, I, chs. 1-6, pp. 41-58. 

=89=, 114. Duties, I, ch. 6, pp. 57-8. 

=92=, 115. Ibid. , ch. 7, pp. 58-69. 

=93=, 116. Ch. 8, pp. 69-72. 

117. Ch. 9, pp. 72-76. 

=95=, 118. Ch. 10, pp. 76-84. 

=96=, 119. Guide of the Perplexed I, ch. 53. 

120. Duties, ch. 1, p. 44. 

121. Ibid. , ch. 10, end, p. 92 f. 

=97=, 122. Duties, II, pp. 95-137. 

=99=, 123. III, pp. 138-197. 

=101=, 124. IV, pp. 198-256. 

125. Duties, 2nd volume, part V, pp. 3-35. 

=102=, 126. VI, pp. 36-58. 

=103=, 127. VII, pp. 58-82. 

=104=, 128. VIII, pp. 82-126. 

=105=, 129. IX, pp. 126-150. 

130. X, pp. 151-168. 

=106=, 131. Broydé, Les Reflexions sur l'âme par Bahya ben Joseph ibnPakouda, Paris, 1896; Hebrew title, ספר תורות הנפש. 

132. Goldziher, Kitāb Ma'ānī al-Nafs, Berlin, 1907. 

133. See Guttmann in "Monatschrift für Geschichte und Wissenschaft desJudenthums, " XLI (1897), 241 ff. 

=107=, 134. Arabic text, p. 41, 12 and 46, 2; Hebrew, p. 55, 1 and 61, 5. 

135. Ch. 2, p. 4, 29 (Heb. P. 5, last line). 

136. Ibid. , p. 6, 1 (Heb. P. 7, 3). 

137. Ibid. , p. 5, 16 f. (Heb. 6, 16 f. ). 

138. Ibid. , ch. 9, p. 34, 13 ff. (Heb. P. 44, 10). 

139. Ch. 2, p. 6, 6 ff. (Heb. P. 7, 8 f. ). 

140. Ch. 12, p. 42, 23 (Heb. P. 56, 23). 

=108=, 141. Chs. 1-2. 

=111=, 142. Chs. 16-17. 

143. Chs. 6 and 11-12. 

=112=, 144. Ch. 2. 

145. Ch. 9. 

=113=, 146. Ch. 7. 

147. Chs. 19 and 21. 

=114=, 148. ספר הגיון הנפש, edited by Freimann, Leipzig, 1860. Germantitle, Sefer Hegjon ha-Nefesch. 

=115=, 149. P. 2a. 

150. Ibid. , also 4b. 

151. See, however, below, p. 119. 

152. P. 2b. 

=116=, 153. P. 1. 

=117=, 154. Pp. 1-2. 

=118=, 155. Pp. 4b-5a. 

156. Pp. 2b-4a. 

=122=, 157. Pp. 5b-8a. 

158. P. 8b ff. 

=123= 159. P. 11a. 

160. Pp. 10-12. 

=124=, 161. P. 30b ff. 

=125=, 162. See Doctor, Die Philosophie des Joseph ibn Zaddik, Münster, 1895, pp. 1-3; Horovitz, Der Mikrokosmos des Joseph Ibn Saddik, Breslau, 1903, I-II. 

163. Horovitz, Mikrokosmos, XIII, ff. 

164. Letters of Maimonides, ed. Amsterdam, 14b. 

=126=, 165. Horovitz, Mikrokosmos, 7, 24-8, 2. 

=127=, 166. Ibid. , 44-46; 53-54; cf. Below, p. 145. 

167. Ibid. , p. 37, 2 ff. ; cf. Below, p. 138. 

=129=, 168. Pp. 1-2. 

=130=, 169. Pp. 3-6. 

=133=, 170. Pp. 7-19. 

=134=, 171. Pp. 19-25. 

=137=, 172. Pp. 25-33. 

=141=, 173. Pp. 33-43. 

=142=, 174. Pp. 43-47. 

=145=, 175. Pp. 47-57

=146=, 176. Pp. 57-58. 

=149=, 177. Pp. 59-79. 

=150=, 178. Al-Chazari, I, 67, ed. Hirschfeld, Leipzig, 1887, p. 29, 24. 

179. Ibid. , p. 29, 19-20. 

180. I, 63; II, 66; pp. 29 and 125. 

=151=, 181. See Kaufmann, Jehuda Halewi in "Gesammelte Schriften, "Frankfurt a. M. , 1910, vol. 2, pp. 99-151. 

=152=, 182. Al-Chazari IV, 13, 15; p. 253, 18 ff. , 257, 6 ff. 

=153=, 183. Kaufmann, Geschichte der Attributenlehre in der jüdischenReligionsphilosophie des Mittelalters, Gotha, 1877, pp. 119-140. 

=157=, 184. Al-Chazari I, 1-67, pp. 1-29. 

=158=, 185. Ibid. , 70 ff. , p. 31 ff. 

=159=, 186. II, 6; p. 75, 22 ff. 

187. IX, 13; p. 253, 18 ff. 

=160=, 188. IV, 3; p. 229, 10 ff. 

189, Ibid. , 15 ff. ; p. 257, 6 ff. 

=161=, 190. II, 2-4; pp. 71-75. 

=163=, 191. I, 87 ff. ; p. 39 ff. 

=164=, 192. I, 99 ff. ; p. 53 ff. 

193. II, 10 ff. ; p. 77 ff. 

194. Ibid. , 36 ff. ; p. 103 ff. 

=165=, 195. Ibid. , 68 f. ; p. 125 f. 

=167=, 196. IV, 3 ff. ; p. 237, 9 ff. 

=168=, 197. II, 26, p. 95; 48, p. 107 f. 

=169=, 198. Ibid. , 50, p. 109, 24 f. ; III, 1 ff. , p. 141 ff. 

=170=, 199. I, 109 ff. ; p. 59 ff. 

=173=, 200. V, 20 ff. , p. 337 ff. 

201. IV, 25, p. 267 ff. 

202. Ibid. , 27, p. 283 f. 

=174=, 203. Ibid. , 29 ff. , p. 285 ff. 

=175=, 204. See above, p. 8. 

205. Zeitschrift der ~deutschen~ morgenländischen Gesellschaft, XXIX(1875), pp. 335-418. 

=177=, 206. V, 1 ff. , p. 295 ff. 

=179=, 207. IV, 25, p. 281, 24 ff. 

=181=, 208. V, 12, p. 311 ff. 

=182=, 209. Ibid. , 14, p. 323 ff. 

=183=, 210. Ibid. , 16 ff. , p. 331 ff. 

211. Ibid. , 22 ff. , p. 357 ff. 

=184=, 212. Quoted by Bacher in Jewish Encyclopedia, s. V. Ibn Ezra, Abraham. 

213. Published by Dukes in "Zion, " II, Frankfurt a. M. , 1842, pp. 117-123, 134-137, 157-159, 175. Cf. Also Literaturblatt des Orients, X, 748, where Dukes publishes a brief passage from the "Arugat Habosem, "not found in "Zion. " He derived it from a different manuscript. 

=187=, 214. Jesod Mora, published with German translation by M. Creizenach, Frankfurt a. M. , and Leipzig, 1840. Hebrew title יסוד מורא. Sefer Ha-Schem, ed. Lippmann, 1834. Cf. , Bacher, Jewish Encyclopedia, s. V. 

=189=, 215. מורה נבוכי הזמן, Warsaw, 1894, ch. 17(חכמת המסכן), pp. 266 ff. 

216. Die Religionsphilosophie Abraham Ibn Esra's, in "Monatschrift fürGeschichte und Wissenschaft des Judenthums, " 42 and 43 (1898 and 1899). 

=192=, 217. Ibid. , 42 (1898), pp. 454-455. 

=193=, 218. Commentary on Exod. 33, 21, towards the end of the longexcursus. 

=195=, 219. Commentary on Exod. 20, 2. 

220. Introduction to his commentary on Ecclesiastes. 

=197=, 221. Emunah Ramah (Heb. Title אמונה רמה), publishedwith German translation by Simson Weil, Frankfurt a. M. , 1852, p. 2(Heb. ). 

222. Em. Ram. , p. 83. 

=198=, 223. See note 221. 

224. Em. Ram. , 2-3. 

225. See note 221. 

=199=, 226. See Horovitz, Ueber den Einfluss der griechischenPhilosophie auf die Entwicklung des Kalam, Breslau, 1909. 

=200=, 227. But see below, p. 354, l. 31. 

=202=, 228. Em. Ram. , p. 1 ff. 

=203=, 229. Ibid. , 4. 

=204=, 230. Al Gazali. Cf. Guttmann, Die Religionsphilosophie desAbraham ibn Daud aus Toledo, Göttingen, 1879, p. 117, note. 

=205=, 231. Em. Ram. , 44-46. 

232. Ibid. , 4-8. 

=207=, 233. Ibid. , 9-13. 

=208=, 234. Ibid. , 13-15. 

=209=, 235. Ibid. , 15-20. 

=216=, 236. Em. Ram. , 20-41. 

237. Ibid. , 41-43. 

=220=, 238. Em. Ram. , 44-51. 

=221=, 239. Ibid. , 51-57. 

=223=, 240. Ibid. , 57-69. 

=224=, 241. Ibid. , 69-70. 

=226=, 242. Ibid. , 70-75. 

=228=, 243. Ibid. , 75-81. 

=230=, 244. Ibid. , 93-98. 

=232=, 245. See Guttmann, Die Religionsphilosophie des Abraham Ibn Daud, p. 220, note 2. 

=235=, 246. Ibid. , 98-104. 

=236=, 247. באור מלות ההגיון, Breslau, 1828. For other editions andinteresting information concerning this treatise see Steinschneider, DieHebräischen Uebersetzungen des Mittelalters, Berlin, 1893, § 251, andDie Arabische Literatur der Juden, Frankfurt a. M. , 1902, p. 208, 5. 

248. Introduction to the eleventh chapter (ch. Helek) of the treatiseSanhedrin. 

=239=, 249. Letters of Maimonides, ed. Amsterdam, pp. 13b-14. 

250. The Arabic text was published with a French translation andextremely valuable notes by Solomon Munk, under the title, Le Guide desÉgarés, 3 volumes, Paris, 1856-66. English translation by M. Friedländerin 3 vols. , London, 1881-1885, re-issued in one volume, with omission ofnotes, London, 1910. For other translations, editions and commentariessee Kaufmann, "Der 'Führer' Maimûnis in der Weltliteratur, " Archiv fürGeschichte der Philosophie, XI (1898), pp. 335-376, republished inKaufmann's Gesammelte Schriften ed. Brann, vol. 2, Frankfurt a. M. , 1910, pp. 152-189. See also Friedländer's translation, London, 1910, p. XXVII ff. 

251. The Arabic text was published with a German translation by M. Wolffunder the title, Mûsâ Maimûni's Acht Kapitel, 2nd edition, Leyden, 1903. Hebrew text with English translation by Joseph I. Gorfinkle, The EightChapters of Maimonides on Ethics, New York, 1912 (Columbia UniversityOriental Studies, vol. VII). 

=240=, 252. Emunah Ramah, p. 81 ff. 

=241=, 253. Guide, I, chs. 1, 3-16, 18-30, 37-45, 64-67, 70. 

=243=, 254. Ibid. , ch. 54. 

255. III, 28. 

256. I, 55. 

=244=, 257. I, 32. 

258. Ibid. , ch. 33. 

=245=, 259. Ch. 34. 

260. Ch. 71. 

=246=, 261. Ibid. 

=247=, 262. Cf. , however, above, p. Xxv f. (the view that Kalamoriginated in Judaism). 

=248=, 263. Ch. 71. 

=249=, 264. The following numbers do not correspond to those ofMaimonides. 

=252=, 265. Guide, I, 73. 

266. Ibid. , 74. 

=253=, 267. Ibid. , 75. 

268. Ibid. , 76. 

269. See below, p. 257. 

270. Below, p. 259. 

271. Above, p. 218. 

272. Below, p. 258, last line, and 260. 

=257=, 273. Guide II, Introduction. 

=260=, 274. Ibid. , ch. 1. 

=261=, 275. Ch. 36. 

=262=, 276. Ch. 46. 

=264=, 277. Ibid. , chs. 51-53. 

=265=, 278. Chs. 55-58. 

279. Ch. 61. 

=268=, 280. See Munk, Guide des Égarés II, p. 69, note 1. 

281. Guide II, chs. 3-6. 

=271=, 282. Chs. 13-18. 

=272=, 283. Munk understands the preceding sentence differently. See hisedition, vol. II, p. 157, note 2. 

=274=, 284. Guide II, chs. 19-25. 

=281=, 285. Ibid. , chs. 32-48. 

286. III, ch. 8. 

=282=, 287. "Eight Chapters, " ch. 1. 

=285=, 288. Ibid. , chs. 2-5. 

289. Ch. 7. 

=288=, 290. Ch. 8. 

=289=, 291. Guide III, chs. 10-12. 

=290=, 292. Ibid. , ch. 16. 

=292=, 293. Ibid. , chs. 17-18. 

=294=, 294. Ibid. , chs. 19-21. 

295. Ibid. , chs. 26 and 31. 

=295=, 296. Ibid. , ch. 27. 

297, Ibid. , ch. 50. 

=298=, 298. Ibid. , chs. 29-50. 

=299=, 299. Ibid. , ch. 54. 

=304=, 300. Ibid. , II, ch. 30. 

301. Ibid. , III, chs. 1-7. 

302. See Munk, Le Guide des Égarés, III, p. 8, note. 

303. Ibid. 

304. Guide III, chs. 22-23. 

=305=, 305. See Kaufmann, Der Führer Maimûnis in der Weltliteratur inArchiv für Geschichte der Philosophie XI (1898) p. 314 f. ; reprinted inKaufmann's Gesammelte Schriften, ed. Brann, Frankfurt a. M. , 1910, p. 158 f. 

306. See Jourdain, Recherches critiques sur l'âge et l'origine destraductions Latines d'Aristote, 2nd ed. , Paris, 1843. German transl. ByStahr, Halle, 1831. 

=305=, 307. Augustine, De Civitate Dei, Book VIII, ch. 5, "Nulli nobisquam isti [sc. , Platonici] propius accesserunt"; ch. 9, "Platonem de Deoista sensisse, quae multum congruere veritati nostrae religionisagnoscunt. "

=306=, 308. See Mandonnet, Siger de Brabant et l'Averroïsme Latin auXIII^me Siècle, Louvain, 1911, chs. 1-2; Isaac Husik, An AnonymousMedieval Christian Critic of Maimonides, Jewish Quarterly Review, NewSeries, vol. II, Phila. 1911, p. 159 ff. 

309. See J. Perles, "Die in einer Münchener Handschrift aufgefundeneerste lateinische Uebersetzung des Maimonidischen Führers", inMonatschrift für Geschichte und Wissenschaft des Judenthums, XXIV(1875), p. 9 ff. 

=307=, 310. See M. Joel, Verhältniss Albert des Grossen zu MosesMaimonides, Breslau, 1876, in M. Joel, Beiträge zur Geschichte derPhilosophie, Breslau, 1876. J. Guttmann, Das Verhältniss des Thomas vonAquino zum Judenthum und zur jüdischen Literatur, Göttingen, 1891; id. , Die Scholastik des dreizehnten Jahrhunderts in ihren Beziehungen zumJudenthum und zur jüdischen Literatur, Breslau, 1902; id. , Der Einflussder Maimonidischen Philosophie auf das christliche Abendland, in "Mosesben Maimon, " vol. I, Leipzig, 1908. 

=308=, 311. See Graetz, History of the Jews, index volume, s. V. , "Maimunist Controversy. "

=309=, 312. Published by M. L. Bisliches, Pressburg, 1837. 

312a. Edited by W. Bacher under the title "Sefer Musar, " Berlin, 1910. 

313. Published by the "Mekize Nirdamim" Society, Lyck, 1866. 

=310=, 314. Published by Munk in Mélanges de Philosophie Juive et Arabe, Paris, 1859. 

315. Published by Bisliches, Pressburg, 1837. 

316. See Munk, Mélanges, p. 494, note 1; H. Malter, Shem Tob Palquera, in Jewish Quarterly Review, new series, vol. I, pp. 151-181, 451-501. 

317. Published by Werbluner, Josephi Kaspi ... Commentaria hebraica inR. Mosis Maimonides Tractatum Dalalat al Haiirin, Frankfurt a. M. , 1848. 

318. Edited by Goldenthal, Wien, 1852. 

=311=, 319. The English reader will also find a good deal of material inthe pages of the Jewish Encyclopedia under the names of the translatorsand writers above mentioned. 

=313=, 320. Guide I, ch. 74, 7th proof, end. 

=314=, 321. Published by the "Mekize Nirdamim, " Lyck, 1874. 

=315=, 322. Tagm. Hanef. 1. 

=317=, 323. Ibid. , 1b-7b. The definition occurs, p. 7b, ll. 28 ff. 

=318=, 324. Ibid. , 8a. 

=319=, 325. Ibid. , 8a-10a. 

=322=, 326. Ibid. , 10a-13b. 

=323=, 327. Ibid. , 13b-19b. 

=324=, 328. Ibid. , 20a-21b. 

=326=, 329. Ibid. , 21b-24b. 

330. Ibid. , 24. 

=327=, 331. Ibid. , 25a-32. 

=328=, 331a. See Heimann Auerbach, Albalag und seine Uebersetzung desMakâsid al-Gazzalis, Breslau, 1906, p. Vii f. ; Guttmann, Die Stellungdes Simon ben Zemach Duran in der Geschichte der jüdischenReligionsphilosophie in Monatschrift für Geschichte und Wissenschaft desJudenthums, vol. LVII (1913), p. 184 f. 

=328=, 332. See Maywald, Die Lehre von der zweifachen Wahrheit, Berlin, 1871; Mandonnet, Siger de Brabant et l'Averroïsme Latin au XIII^meSiècle, Louvain, 1911, vol. 1, p. 148 ff. 

=329=, 333. First edition, Riva di Trento, 1560; modern edition, Leipzig, 1866. The references in the sequel are to the Leipzig edition. 

334. See Husik, Judah Messer Leon's Commentary on the "Vetus Logica, "Leyden, 1906, p. 11. 

335. See Joel, Lewi ben Gerson als Religionsphilosoph, Breslau, 1862, p. 9f. (in M. Joel, Beiträge zur Geschichte der Philosophie, Breslau, 1876). 

=330=, 336. Introduction to Gersonides' commentary on the Pentateuch. 

337. Introduction to "Milhamot Adonai, " pp. 6-7. 

=331=, 338. Milhamot I, ch. 14, p. 91. 

339. Ibid. , Introduction, p. 8. 

=336=, 340. I, chs. 1-4, pp. 12-35. 

=337=, 341. Ibid. , ch. 5, pp. 35-36. 

=339=, 342. Ch. 6, pp. 36-48. 

=340=, 343. Ibid. , chs. 10-12, pp. 61-88. 

=342=, 344. Milhamot II, chs. 1-2, pp. 92-98. 

345. Ibid. , chs. 3, 5 and 6, pp. 98 f. , 104, 111 f. 

=344=, 346. Milhamot III, ch. 3, p. 132. 

=345=, 347. III, chs. 1-6, pp. 120-150. 

=349=, 348. IV, chs. 1-7, pp. 151-187. 

=350=, 349. V, 3, ch. 6, p. 264 f. 

=351=, 350. Ibid. , chs. 4-6, pp. 247-264. 

=352=, 351. Ch. 12, pp. 278-285. 

=354=, 352. VI, 1, chs. 1-9, pp. 293-328. 

353, Ibid. , chs. 10-13, pp. 328-353; ch. 15, p. 356 f. 

=355=, 354. Ch. 16, pp. 359-361. 

=357=, 355. Chs. 17-28, pp. 362-416. 

356, VI, 2, ch. 1, p. 419. 

=358=, 357. VI, 2, chs. 1-8, pp. 418-441. 

=360=, 358. Ibid. , chs. 9-12, pp. 441-460. 

359. Chs. 13-14, pp. 460-463. 

=363=, 360. Published by Delitzsch and Steinschneider, Leipzig, 1841. 

=364=, 361. Ez Hayim, p. 4. 

=366=, 362. E. H. , pp. 3-5. 

=367=, 363. P. 15, l. 6 f. , also p. 18, l. 10 f. 

364. Ch. 4, pp. 12-13, l. 24. 

=368=, 365. Ch. 9, pp. 26-27. 

=369=, 366. P. 17, l. 16. 

367. P. 33. 

=372=, 368. Chs. 66-72, pp. 80-89. 

369. Ch. 75, pp. 93-96. 

=373=, 370. Chs. 76-78, pp. 96-99. 

=375=, 371. Chs. 79-81, pp. 100-107. 

=376=, 372. Chs. 82-89, pp 107-133. 

=377=, 373. Ch. 89, pp. 133-136. 

=378=, 374. "Guide" III, 24. 

=379=, 375. Ez Hayim, ch. 90, pp. 136-144. 

376. "Guide" III, chs. 12, 13, 25 end. 

=380=, 377. Ez Hayim, ch. 94, pp. 149-154. 

=382=, 378. Chs. 96-100, pp. 160-176. 

379. Chs. 101-102, pp. 177-181. 

380. Ez Hayim, pp. 116-117. 

=383=, 381. Ch. 103, pp. 181-185. 

=384=, 382. Chs. 104-105, pp. 185-187. 

=385=, 383. Ch. 106, p. 187 ff. ; ch. 109, p. 194 ff. 

384. Chs. 107-108. 

=387=, 385. Chs. 110-112. 

=389=, 386. Ed. Ferara, 1556 (no pagination). 

=390=, 387. "Or Adonai, " Introduction, pp. 6-7 (not numbered). 

=391=, 388. Book I, sections 1-2. 

389. Ibid. , section 3, ch. 2. 

390. Ibid. , ch. 3. 

=392=, 391. Ibid. 

392. Ibid. , ch. 4. 

=393=, 393. Book II, section I. 

=395=, 394. Ibid. , section 2. 

395. Section 3. 

396. Section 4. 

=398=, 397. Section 5. 

398. See M. Joel, "Don Chasdai Creskas' religionsphilosophischeLehren, " Breslau, 1866 (in M. Joel, Beiträge zur Geschichte derPhilosophie, Breslau, 1876), p. 54 f. 

=402=, 399. Or Adonai, II, section 6. 

400. Ibid. , III, introduction. 

=403=, 401. Ibid. , section 1. 

=404=, 402. Section 3. 

=405=, 403. Section 4. 

=406=, 403a. Simon ben Zemach Duran (1361-1444). He was a relative ofGersonides, a Rabbinical authority, and the author of a scientific andphilosophical work, entitled "Magen Abot. " Unlike his more distinguishedrelative, Simon Duran was opposed to the extreme views adopted by suchmen as Albalag, Moses of Narbonne or Gersonides himself, and favored areturn to the more moderate standpoint of Maimonides. Without laying anyclaim to originality his work shows wide reading and familiarity withthe scientific and philosophic literature of the time. See Guttmann, "Die Stellung des Simon ben Zemach Duran in der Geschichte der jüdischenReligionsphilosophie, " in Monatschrift für Geschichte und Wissenschaftdes Judenthums, vol. 52 (1908), pp. 641-672, vol. 53 (1909), pp. 46-97, 199-228. From Guttmann's investigations it appears that Albo cannotclaim any originality even for the reduction of the fundamental dogmasof Judaism to three. The first part of the "Ikkarim" turns out to be acompilation from Crescas and Duran, and is no more original than therest of the book. When we consider that though he owes the central pointof his contribution to Duran, Albo never mentions him, the charge ofplagiarism brought against him is not far from justified. See below, p. 407. 

=407=, 404. ביטול עקרי הנוצרים, published by Ephraim Deinard, Carney, N. J. , 1904. The work was originally composed in Spanish, and wastranslated into Hebrew by Joseph Ibn Shemtob. 

404a. See also note 403a. 

=408=, 405. ספר העקרים, ed. Warsaw, 1877, pp. 13-14. 

406. Ibid. , pp. 14-17. 

=409=, 407. Pp. 21-25. 

408. In the introduction to his commentary on the eleventh chapter ofthe Mishnic treatise Sanhedrin (chapter Helek). 

=410=, 409. Crescas; cf. Above, p. 392. 

410. Ikkarim, I, ch. 3, pp. 25-31. 

=411=, 411. Chs. 4-7, pp. 31-39. 

=412=, 412. Ch. 8, pp. 39-46. 

413. Ch. 9, pp. 46-48. 

=413=, 414. Chs. 10-11, pp. 48-58. 

415. Ch. 12, pp. 58-60. 

416. Chs. 13 and 15, pp. 60-61 and 64-68. 

=414=, 417. Ch. 14, pp. 61-64. 

=415=, 418. Ch. 17, pp. 7-76. 

419. Ch. 18, pp. 76-78. 

=416=, 420. Ch. 23, pp. 84-86. 

=418=, 421. Ch. 24, pp. 87-90. 

422, Ch. 25, pp. 90-92. 

=419=, 423. Ch. 26, p. 93. 

424. Book II, chs. 4-5, pp. 107-114. 

425. Ibid. , ch. 7, pp. 117-118. 

=420=, 426. Chs. 8-10, pp. 118-125. 

427. Chs. 11-13, pp. 125-140. 

428. Ch. 12, pp. 129-133. 

=421=, 429. Book III, chs. 1-5, pp. 197-214. 

430. Chs. 6-7, pp. 214-218. 

=423=, 431. Chs. 8-11, pp. 218-228. 

=424=, 432. Chs. 13-20, pp. 229-246. 

433. Book IV, chs. 1-6, pp. 279-294. 

=425=, 434. Chs. 7-15, pp. 294-313. 

=427=, 435. Chs. 29-35, pp. 338-356. 

=429=, 436. See Guttmann "Die Familie Schemtob in ihren Beziehungen zurPhilosophie, " Monatschrift für Geschichte und Wissenschaft desJudenthums, vol. 57 (1913), p. 177 ff. 

437. See Guttmann as in preceding note. 

438. See preceding note. 

=430=, 439. See note 436. 

440. See Jewish Encyclopedia s. V. 

441. J. E. S. V. 

=431=, 442. See Zimmels, "Leo Hebraeus, ein jüdischer Philosoph derRenaissance, " Leipzig, 1886; Appel, "Leone Medigos Lehre vom Weltall undihr Verhältniss zu griechischen und zeitgenössischen Anschauungen, " inArchiv für Geschichte der Philosophie, vol. XX, pp. 387-400, 496-520;Munk, Mélanges, pp. 522-528. 

443. Husik, "Judah Messer Leon's Commentary on the Vetus Logica, "Leyden, 1906. 

444. Jewish Encyclopedia, s. V. 

LIST OF BIBLICAL AND RABBINIC QUOTATIONS

BIBLE

 GENESIS: 1, 1, p. 110; 1, 2, p. 118; 1, 3, p. 120; 1, 6, p. 118; 1, 9, p. 121; 1, 11, p. 121; 1, 21, p. 121; 1, 25, p. 121; 1, 26, pp. 121, 268; 1, 27, pp. 94, 121; 1, 28, p. 121; 2, 7, p. 121, 214; 2, 19, p. 121; 6, 6, p. 227; 8, 21, p. 102; 11, 7, p. 268; 14, 22, p. 369; ch. 15, p. 280; 15, 4, p. 280; 15, 12 ff. , p. 225; 18, 10, p. 340; 27, 34-41, p. 74; 28, 13, p. 94; 28, 20, p. 105; 36, 31, p. 295. 

 EXODUS: 2, 13, p. 232; 2, 17, p. 232; 3, 14, p. 95; 5, 2, p. 160; 7, 3, pp. Xiv, 42; 9, 12, p. 74; 15, 26, p. 403; 20, 2, pp. 194, 233; 20, 11-12, p. 233; 20, 17, p. 83; 20, 35, p. 409; 22, 26, p. 74; 23, 21, p. 109; 24, 10, p. 167; 33, 11, p. 381; 33, 13, p. 243; 33, 23, p. 37; 34, 6, p. 233. 

 LEVITICUS: 19, 17, p. 83; 19, 18, p. 83. 

 NUMBERS: 10, 8, p. 227; 12, 8, p. 167; 15, 39, p. 83; 23, 10, p. 170. 

 DEUTERONOMY: 2, 30, p. Xiv; 4, 15, pp. 35, 95; 4, 39, pp. 84, 115, 220; 6, 4, p. 74; 13, 1, pp. 382, 423; 15, 7, p. 83; 17, 15, p. 295; 30, 15, p. 286; 30, 19, pp. Xiv, 41, 286; 31, 17, p. 348; 33, 4, p. 41; 34, 10, p. 416. 

 JOSHUA: ch. 10, p. 360. 

 I. SAMUEL: 2, 6, p. 386; 19, 20, p. 226. 

 II. SAMUEL: 23, 2, p. 34. 

 I. KINGS: 22, 20, p. Xiv. 

 ISAIAH: 1, 14, p. 227; 1, 11-17, p. 82; 5, 20, p. 374; 6, 1, 8, p. 280; 11, 1-4, p. 112; 26, 19, p. 386; 40, 12, p. 208; 40, 26, p. 369; 43, 1, p. 122; 43, 7, p. 121; 45, 18, p. 104; 59, 19, p. 109. 

 JEREMIAH: 7, 22, p. 234; 9, 22-23, pp. 124, 148, 205, 299; 18, 1 ff. , p. 207; 31, 33, p. 141. 

 EZEKIEL: 8, 9, p. 109. 

 HOSEA: 4, 6, p. 348; 6, 3, p. 141. 

 AMOS: 3, 2, p. 164; 5, 6, p. 141. 

 MICAH: 6, 8, p. 168. 

 ZEPHANIAH: 2, 3, p. 148. 

 MALACHI: 1, 9, p. 41. 

 PSALMS: 19, p. 216; 19, 2, p. 193; 19, 7, p. 193; 19, 8, p. 411; 19, 9-10, p. 412; 73, 11-13, p. 293; 94, 9, p. 293; 136, 6, p. 176; 139, p. 205; 145, 9, p. 376. 

 PROVERBS: 8, 22, p. 109; 25, 16, p. 244; 30, 4, p. 208. 

 JOB: 10, 10, p. 378; 19, 26, p. 116; 23, 13, p. Xxvi; ch. 32, p. 349; 38, 36-37, p. 208. 

 ECCLESIASTES: 1, 14, p. 47; 2, 3, p. 47. 

 DANIEL: 7, 1, p. 225; 10, 8, p. 278; 10, 17, p. 381; 12, 2, p. 404. 

 NEHEMIAH: 9, 5, p. 95. 

 MISHNA AND TALMUD

 BERAKOT (Bab. Tal. ): 17 a, p. 44; 33 b, p. Xxvi, note 14, p. 41. 

 BERAKOT (Jer. Tal. ): I, p. 83. 

 PESAKIM: 54 a, p. Xxvi, note 17. 

 MEGILLAH: 25 b, p. Xxvi, note 15. 

 HAGIGAH: ch. 2, p. 244; 11 b, p. Xvi, notes 2 and 3. 

 SANHEDRIN: 38 b, p. 268; 99 a, p. 408; 106 b, p. 83. 

 MAKKOT: 23 b, p. 416. 

 ABOT: ch. 4, p. 44. 

INDEX

 Aaron ben Elijah, xli, 362-387; relation to Maimonides, 363 f. ; to the Muʿtazila, 364; reason and faith, 364 f. ; physics, 366 ff. ; defends atomic theory, 367 f. ; creation, ibid. ; existence of God, 368 f. ; unity, ibid. ; incorporeality, ibid. ; attributes, 369 f. ; will of God, 372; problem of evil, 373 f. , 376 f. ; Providence, 375 f. ; reward and punishment, 379, 383; purpose of the world and of man, 379 f. ; prophecy, 380 f. ; immutability of the Law, 382; reason of the commandments, ibid. ; immortality, 384; resurrection, 385 f. 

 Aaron ben Joseph, 363

 Abarbanel, Don Isaac, 304, 312, 328, 430

 Abarbanel, Judah Leo, 431

 Abd Al Rahman III, 59

 Abélard, 305

 Abraham bar Hiyya, xlvi, 114-124; standpoint, 115; physics, 116 f. ; matter, ibid. ; form, 117 ff. ; intellect, soul and nature, 119; ethics, 119, 122 f. ; reward and punishment, 119, 122 ff. ; immortality, 120 f. ; problem of evil, 123 f. , 128, 139, 175, 309, 435

 Æsculapius, 155

 Afer, Constantinus, 1

 Aher, 197

 Akiba, Rabbi, xxvi

 Al-Ashari, xxiii

 Albalag, Isaac, 328, 429, 430, 447, note 403a

 Albalia, Baruh, 151

 Al Basir, Joseph, xxv, xlvii, 48-55; priority of reason, 48; atomic theory, 49; existence of God, 49 f. ; creation, ibid. ; attributes, 50; divine will, ibid. ; eternity, 51; incorporeality, unity, simplicity, ibid, f. ; God's word, 52; ethics, ibid, f. ; problem of evil, 54; freedom, 54 f. ; and foreknowledge, ibid. ; reward and punishment, 55, 56, 57, 81, 126, 127, 128, 141, 146, 200, 246, 363, 434

 Albertus Magnus, 1, 200, 306, 312, 313, 323

 Albo, Joseph, I, 406-427; standpoint, 406 ff. ; purpose of his work, 408; principles of religion, ibid. ; criticism of Maimonides's 13 articles, 409 ff. ; Albo's own view, 410 f. ; divine law distinguished from natural and conventional, 408 ff. ; freedom, a principle, 412; creation, 413, 415; existence of God, 419 f. ; attributes, 420; angels, ibid. ; revelation, 420 f. ; prophecy, 421; immutability of the Law, 423; God's knowledge, 424; and human freedom, ibid. ; Providence, 425; reward and punishment, 425 f. ; 428, 430, 436, 447, note 403a

 Alexander of Aphrodisias, xviii, 7, 60, 290, 313, 321, 332, 334, 335, 336

 Alexander the Great, xvii

 Alexander of Hales, 306

 Alfadhil, 239

 Alfarabi, xx, xxi, xxxix, xlvi, 2, 26, 60, 177, 178, 198, 199, 218, 223, 252, 253, 276, 281, 302, 312, 313, 362, 391, 392

 Alfasi, 151

 Algazali, xxxix, 80, 152, 153, 389, 392, 420, 443, note 230

 Ali, 86

 Al-Kirkisani, Joseph Ha-Maor, 363

 Almohades, 238

 Alphonso VI, 151

 Al-Mansur, 1

 Almoravid, 151

 Anatoli, Jacob, 302, 309

 Angels, xlvi; in Abraham ibn Ezra, 190 f. ; in Ibn Daud, 221 f. ; in Maimonides, 266 f. ; in Albo, 420

 Anthropomorphism, xxii, xxvi, xlv, 35, 95, 186, 260 f. 

 Appel, 448, note 442

 Aquinas, Thomas, 1, 61, 63, 200, 207, 306, 307, 312, 313, 323, 331, 332, 406

 Arama, Isaac, 430

 Archimedes, xviii

 Aristotelians, xl, 150, 165, 246, 364, 365, 366, 368, 428

 Aristotle, xvi, xviii, xix, xx, xxi, xxix ff. , xxxvii, xxxix, xl, xli, xlii, xlv, xlvi, 7, 8, 9, 13, 20, 26, 60, 62, 64, 72, 89, 92, 107, 111, 126, 132, 138, 139, 155, 157, 173, 175, 177, 178, 179, 181, 182, 184, 185, 199, 200, 206, 207, 210, 213, 216, 217, 218, 236, 240, 247, 252, 253, 254, 256, 258, 266, 267, 268, 269, 270, 271, 273, 274, 275, 276, 290, 291, 299, 300, 303, 305, 306, 307, 309, 312, 313, 315, 316, 321, 329, 331, 332, 333, 334, 338, 346, 347, 350, 352, 353, 354, 366, 367, 375, 378, 388, 389, 390, 395, 402, 408, 412, 425, 429, 430, 431

 "Arugat Habosem, " 184

 Ashariya, xxiii, xxvii, xlvii, 23, 246, 251, 291, 362, 365, 372, 378, 379

 Atomic theory, in the Kalam, xxii, 249 f. ; in Saadia, 25; in Al Basir, 49; in Jeshua ben Judah, 56; in Aaron ben Elijah, 367 f. 

 Attributes, doctrine of, in the Kalam, xxiii, xxvii, xl, xliv; in Saadia, xliv, 33 f. ; in Mukammas, 18 ff. ; in Al Basir, 50; in Bahya, 93 f. ; in Ibn Zaddik, 145 f. ; in Judah Halevi, 161 ff. ; in Ibn Daud, 220 f. ; in Maimonides, xlv, 262 ff. ; in Levi ben Gerson, xlv, 344 f. , 351 f. ; in Aaron ben Elijah, 369 f. ; in Crescas, 391 f. ; in Albo, 420

 Auerbach, Heimann, 445, note 331a

 Augustine, xli, 51, 305, 445, note 307

 Averroes (Ibn Roshd), xx, xxi, xxxix, xli, xlvi, xlvii, 7, 60, 62, 125, 177, 199, 306, 309, 310, 312, 313, 318, 321, 322, 323, 329, 332, 334, 335, 336, 362, 392, 431

 Avicebron, see Gabirol, Solomon Ibn

 Avicenna (Ibn Sina), xx, xxi, xxxix, xlvi, 2, 26, 60, 62, 107, 108, 175, 177, 178, 179, 198, 199, 207, 210, 211, 213, 218, 223, 224, 253, 276, 281, 302, 312, 313, 362, 391, 392, 420

 Bacher, W. , 437, 443, notes 212 and 214; 445, note 312a

 Back, Samuel, 436

 Baeumker, Clemens, 440, note 84; 441, notes 86 and 89

 Bahya, Ibn Pakuda, xix, xxviii, xxxix, xlii, 1, 80-105; duties of the limbs and duties of the heart, 82 f. ; sources of knowledge, 83; creation, 86 ff. ; unity, 89 f. ; attributes, 93 f. ; study of nature, 96 f. ; gratitude to God, 97 f. ; submission to God, 98; freedom, ibid. ; the laws, 98 f. ; trust in God, 99 f. ; "unity of conduct, " 101 f. ; humility, ibid. ; repentance, 102; self-examination, 103; temperance, 104; asceticism, ibid. ; love of God, 105; 106, 126, 128, 146, 147, 162, 167, 168, 195, 200, 201, 217, 241, 246, 252, 309, 362, 428, 434

 Baradæus, Jacob, 34

 Bardenhewer, 439, note 7

 Bardesanes, 375

 Becker, C. H. , xxvi, xxvii

 Beer, 433

 Bernfeld, Simon, viii, 433

 Bisliches, M. L. , 445, notes 312 and 315

 Bloch, Philipp, 436

 Brahmins, 380

 Brethren of Purity, xxxix, 60, 107, 125, 126, 128, 139, 187, 199

 Broydé, Isaac, 106, 441, note 131

 Cicero, 431

 Clement VI, Pope, 329

 Clement of Alexandria, 302

 Chazars, 153

 Crawford, J. P. W. , 436

 Creation, in Kalam, xxii, xlii, 24, 247, 252; in Saadia, xlii, 24; in Israeli, 5 ff. ; in Al Basir, 49 f. ; in Jeshua ben Judah, 56; in Gabirol, 68; in Bahya, xlii, 86 ff. ; in Pseudo Bahya, 110; in Abraham bar Hiyya, 116 ff. ; in Ibn Zaddik, xlii, 143; in Judah Halevi, 157; in Abraham ibn Ezra, 190; in Maimonides, 269 ff. ; in Levi ben Gerson, 352 f. ; in Aaron ben Elijah, 367 f. ; in Albo, 413, 415

 Creed, articles of, l; in Maimonides, 409 f. ; in Crescas, 392 ff. ; in Albo, 410 f. 

 Creizenach, M. , 443, note 214

 Crescas, Hasdai, xv, xix, xxvii, xxxix, xl, xlii, xlix, l, 173, 200, 312, 388-405; standpoint, 389; existence of God, 389 f. ; unity, 391 f. ; attributes, ibid. ; fundamental dogmas of Judaism, 392 ff. ; God's knowledge, 392 f. ; Providence, 393 f. ; problem of evil, 394; prophecy, 395; freedom, 396 f. ; influence on Spinoza, 398 f. ; purpose of the Law, 399 f. ; immortality, 400; creation, 402; criticism of Maimonides's 13 articles of the creed, 402, 404; reward and punishment, 403 f. ; resurrection, 404 f. , 406, 407, 408, 409, 414, 416, 419, 420, 421, 424, 426, 428, 430, 436, 447, notes 403a and 409

 "Cusari, " see "Kusari"

 Daud, Abraham Ibn, xix, xx, xxvii, xxxix, xlii, xliii, xlv, xlvi, xlvii, xlviii, xlix, 61, 62, 63, 71, 79, 125, 166, 197-235; standpoint, 197 f. ; Ibn Daud neglected, 201; purpose of his book, 201 f. ; duty to study philosophy, 202; relative value of the sciences, 203 f. ; categories, 205; physics, 205 ff. ; matter and form, ibid. ; motion, 207; infinity, 208; psychology, 209 ff. ; rational soul, 212 ff. ; the three kinds of intellect, 214; immortality, 215; metempsychosis, 215 f. ; the heavenly spheres, 216; existence of God, 217 ff. ; incorporeality, 217; unity, 219 f. ; attributes, 220 f. ; angels, 221 f. ; active intellect, 222; emanation of Intelligences, 223; tradition, 223 f. ; prophecy, 224 f. ; abrogation of the Law, 226 f. ; freedom, 201 f. , 229 ff. ; problem of evil, 228 f. ; and foreknowledge, 229 f. ; ethics, 231 ff. ; virtues, 232; reason of commandments, 233 f. , 237, 240, 241, 246, 248, 253, 254, 257, 266, 267, 276, 281, 302, 307, 309, 317, 332, 350, 362, 366, 388, 428, 435

 De Boer, 439, note 5

 "Definitions, Book of, " 2, 4, 60

 Deinard, E. , 447, note 404

 Delitzsch, 446, note 360

 Delmedigo, Elijah, 431

 Delmedigo, Joseph Solomon, 431

 Democritus, xxii, 3

 Dieterici, 439, note 6

 Doctor, Max, 435, 442, note 162

 Dominicus Gundissalinus, 61, 63

 Dukes, 443, note 213

 Dunash ben Labrat, 59

 Duns Scotus, 61, 63, 200, 307

 Duran, Simon, 406, 447, note 403a

 "Duties of the Hearts, " 80, 81

 Duval, 439, note 5

 "Eight Chapters, " 239

 Eisler, Moritz, 433

 "Elements, Book of, " 2, 3, 4, 10, 60

 Elias of Nisibis, 34

 Elisha ben Abuya, 197

 Empedocles, 60, 61, 64, 126, 127, 145, 179, 184

 "Emunah Ramah, " 198

 "Emunot ve-Deot, " 24

 Engelkemper, D. J. , 434

 Entelechy, xxxv, 209

 Ephodi, 328

 Epicurus, 290, 367

 Eriugena, 200

 Ethics, in Jewish Philosophy, xlvii f. ; in Saadia, 46 f. ; in Al Basir, 52 f. ; in Jeshua ben Judah, 57; in Gabirol, 71 ff. ; in Abraham bar Hiyya, 119 ff. ; in Ibn Zaddik, 148; in Judah Halevi, 168; in Abraham ibn Ezra, 195; in Ibn Daud, 228 ff. , 231 ff. ; in Maimonides, 281 ff. ; in Hillel ben Samuel, 325. See also "Virtue. "

 Euclid, xviii, 90

 Evil, Problem of, in Al Basir, 54; in Abraham bar Hiyya, 123 f. ; in Ibn Zaddik, 148; in Abraham ibn Ezra, 195; in Ibn Daud, 228 f. ; in Maimonides, 288 f. ; in Aaron ben Elijah, 373 f. ; in Crescas, 394

 Exegesis, Biblical, xvi, xxxvii; in Saadia, 35; in Gabirol, 78 f. ; in Abraham ibn Ezra, 187 f. ; in Maimonides, 302 ff. ; in Levi ben Gerson, 357 f. , 437

 "Ez Hayim, " 363

 Ezekiel, Vision of divine chariot, xvii, 303

 Falaquera, Shem Tob, 61, 63, 64, 309, 328, 441, note 86

 "Fons Vitæ, " 60, 61, 72, 80, etc. 

 "Fountain of Life, " see "Fons Vitæ"

 Frankl, P. F. , 434, 440, note 80

 Frankl-Grün, Ad. , 435

 Freedom of the Will, xiv, xlvii; in Saadia, 41 f. ; in Al Basir, 54 f. ; in Bahya, 98; in Judah Halevi, xlviii, 171 ff. ; in Abraham ibn Ezra, 193; in Ibn Daud, xlviii, 229 f. ; in Maimonides, xlviii, 285 ff. ; in Crescas, xlviii, 396 ff. ; in Albo, 412, 424

 Freimann, 442, note 148

 Fried, S. , 439, note 30; 440, note 34

 Friedländer, M. , 444, note 250

 Gabirol, Solomon Ibn, xix, xxxix, xlvi, 59-79; fate of G. In Jewish Literature, 60 f. ; tendency of his work, 63 f. ; G. A Neo-Platonist, 64; his doctrine, 64 ff. ; emanation, 65; matter in spiritual substances, 65, 67; man typical of the universe, 65; Intelligence, Soul, Nature, 66; matter, 66 f. ; creation, 68; will, 68 f. , 70; mystic knowledge, 69 f. ; ethics, 71 ff. ; the virtues, 72 f. ; the "Royal Crown" (Keter Malkut), 75 f. ; Biblical exegesis, 78 f. ; influence on Jewish Philosophy, 79; on Kabbala, ibid. , 80, 81, 89, 91, 107, 126, 127, 131, 151, 184, 185, 187, 188, 198, 200, 206, 237, 246, 307, 309, 328, 428, 434

 Galen, xviii, 2, 3, 72, 209, 252

 Genesis, creation story, xvii, xxix, 303

 Gersonides, see Levi ben Gerson

 Ginzberg, L. , 439, note 13

 God, in Aristotle, xxxiii; existence of G. In Kalam, xlii, 24, 247; in Saadia, xlii, 28 ff. ; in Al Basir, 49 f. ; in Jeshua ben Judah, 57; in Bahya, xlii, 86 ff. ; in Ibn Zaddik, xlii, 143; in Ibn Daud, xlii f. , 217 ff. ; in Maimonides, xliii, 248, 257 ff. ; in Levi ben Gerson, 350 f. ; in Aaron ben Elijah, 368 f. ; in Crescas, 389 ff. ; in Albo, 419 f. 

 Goldenthal, 445, note 318

 Goldziher, Ignaz, 106, 433, 439, notes 10 and 23; 442, note 132

 Gorfinkle, Joseph I. , 444, note 251

 Graetz, H. , 445, note 311

 Graf, 440, note 64

 Gugenheimer, 435

 "Guide of the Perplexed, " 239

 Guttmann, Jacob, 434, 435, 436, 439, note 27; 440, notes 33, 41 and 83; 442, note 133; 443, notes 230 and 245; 445, notes 310 and 331a; 447, notes 403a, 436 and 437

 Guttmann, Julius, 435

 Halevi, Judah, xix, xxxix, xl, xlv, xlvi, xlviii, xlix, 125, 150-183; his standpoint, 150, 152, 157 f. ; his life, 151 f. ; philosophy and religion, 152; influence of Algazali, 152 f. ; the "Kusari, " 153 ff. ; the "philosopher's" creed, 154 f. ; the Christian's, 155 f. ; the Mohammedan's, 156; the Jew's, 156 ff. ; creation, 157; existence of God, 158; will, 159; motives of philosopher and believer, 159 f. ; meaning of the name of "Jhvh, " 159 f. , 165; of "Elohim, " 160, 165; mysticism in H. , 160; attributes, 161 ff. ; incorporeality, 162; superiority of Israel, 162 f. ; need of revelation, 163; superiority of Palestine, 164; Israel the heart among the nations, 164; superiority of the Hebrew language, 164 f. ; prophecy, 165 f. ; the active Intellect, 165 f. ; the ceremonial law, 167 f. ; ethics, 168 f. ; immortality, 169 f. , 181 f. ; future world and reward and punishment, 170; freedom, 171 ff. ; and foreknowledge, 172 f. ; interpretation of "Sefer Yezirah, " 173 f. ; the Rabbis knew the sciences, 174; exposition of the current philosophy, 174 ff. ; H. Understands Aristotle's definition of the soul, 175; physics, 175 ff. ; matter, 175; criticism, 176 f. ; emanation of Intelligences, 178; criticism, 178 f. ; psychology, 179 f. ; criticism, 181 f. , 197, 198, 200, 201, 210, 211, 216, 223, 224, 226, 230, 231, 246, 248, 281, 309, 332, 362, 389, 392, 396, 414, 420, 421, 426, 429, 435

 Harizi, Judah, 125, 184

 Harkavy, Abraham, 17, 433

 Hasdai Ibn Shaprut, 59, 153, 308

 Hayyuj, 187, 309

 Hefez ben Yazliah, 84

 "Hegyon ha-Nefesh, " 114

 Hermes, 60, 155, 184

 Hertz, J. H. , 434

 Hillel ben Samuel, xlvi, 312-327; standpoint, 314; the soul, 314 ff. ; definition of soul, 317; active intellect, 317 ff. ; reward and punishment, 323 ff. ; prophecy, 325; ethics, ibid. ; resurrection, 326; interpretation of Rabbinic writings, 326 f. , 332

 Hippocrates, xviii, 2, 3, 72, 209

 Hirschfeld, 440, note 31; 442, note 178

 "Hobot ha-Lebabot, " see "Duties of the Hearts"

 Homonym, 240, 351, 371

 Horovitz, S. , 433, 442, notes 162, 163 and 165; 443, note 226

 Husik, Isaac, 436, 439, note 9; 445, note 308; 446, note 334; 448, note 443

 Hypostasis, xxxviii, 6, 91, 115

 Ibn Aknin, Joseph, 302

 Ibn Badja, 60

 Ibn Caspi, Joseph, 302, 310, 329

 Ibn Daud (Aven Death), 61

 Ibn Daud, Abraham, see Daud, Abraham Ibn

 Ibn Ezra, Abraham, xxxix, 79, 80, 81, 114, 184, 187-196; Biblical exegesis, 187 f. ; unity of God, 189; incorporeality, ibid. ; creation, 190; matter, ibid. ; the universe, 190 f. ; Intelligences, ibid. ; angels, ibid. ; soul, 191 f. ; reward and punishment, 192; transmigration, 192; freedom, 193; and foreknowledge, ibid. ; knowledge of God, 193 f. ; prophecy, 194; classification of the laws, 194; problem of evil, 195; ethics, ibid. , 200, 246, 309, 310, 429, 435

 Ibn Ezra, Moses, xxxix, xlvi, 79, 125, 184-187; man a microcosm, 185; definition of philosophy, 185; unity of God, ibid. ; active intellect, 186, 200, 246

 Ibn Migash, Joseph, 151

 Ibn Janah, 84, 309

 Ibn Roshd, see Averroes

 Ibn Sina, see Avicenna

 Ibn Zaddik, Joseph, xix, xxxix, xlii, xlv, xlvi, xlix, 60, 79, 125-149; standpoint, 125 f. ; division of his book, 128; purpose, 129; definition of philosophy, 129; process and sources of knowledge, 129 f. ; physics, 130 ff. ; matter and form, ibid. ; substance, 131; the sphere, 131 f. ; the four elements, 132 f. ; the human body, 133 f. ; the soul, 134 f. ; the three souls, ibid. ; the emotions, ibid. ; life, 136; death, ibid. ; sleep and waking, ibid. ; the rational soul, 137; definition of soul, 138; intellect, 139; world soul, 140; duty to use the reason, ibid. ; criticism of the Kalam, 141 f. ; creation, 143; existence of God, ibid. ; unity, ibid. ; self-sufficiency, 144; will of God, ibid. ; attributes, 145 f. ; commandments, 147; rational and traditional, ibid. ; the virtues, 148; reward and punishment, 148; evil, 148 f. ; Messiah, 149, 162, 175, 184, 200, 206, 209; 211, 237, 246, 309, 317, 362, 435

 "Ikkarim, " 406

 Immortality, in Pseudo-Bahya, 112 f. ; in Abraham bar Hiyya, 120 f. ; in Judah Halevi, 169 f. , 181 f, ; in Ibn Daud, 215; in Levi ben Gerson, 339 ff. ; in Aaron ben Elijah, 384; in Crescas, 400

 Incorporeality, in Kalam, xliv, 253; in Saadia, 32; in Al Basir, 51; in Jeshua ben Judah, 57; in Judah Halevi, 162; in Abraham ibn Ezra, 189 f. ; in Ibn Daud, 217; in Maimonides, xliv, 257 ff. , 260 ff. ; in Aaron ben Elijah, 368 f. 

 Infinity, in Kalam, 251 f. ; in Saadia, 25, 30; in Bahya, 86, 87; in Ibn Daud, 208; in Maimonides, 251 f. , 254, 256 f. ; in Crescas, 390

 Intellect, active, xli; in Jewish Philosophy, xlvi f. ; acquired i. , xlvii; active i. In prophecy, xlix, 109; in Ibn Zaddik, 139; in Judah Halevi, 155, 162, 165, 181; in Moses ibn Ezra, 186; in Ibn Daud, 222; in Maimonides, 268, 277; in Hillel ben Samuel, 317 ff. ; in Levi ben Gerson, 337 ff. See also "Intelligence, " "Soul"

 Intelligence, xlvi; in Israeli, 6 f. ; in Gabirol, 65, 66; in Pseudo-Bahya, 109; in Abraham bar Hiyya, 119; in Abraham ibn Ezra, 190 f. ; in Maimonides, 266 f. 

 Israeli, Isaac, xix, xlvi, xlix, 1-16; Maimonides on I. , 1 f. ; his works, 2; his sources, ibid. ; theory of the elements, 3, 12; definition of philosophy, 4; creation, 5 ff. ; Intelligence, 6 f. ; Soul, 8 ff. ; three kinds of soul, 10 ff. ; element and principle, 12 f. ; prophecy, 15, 17, 24, 31, 60, 72, 91, 127, 175, 224, 434

 Jabariya, xxi, xlvii

 Jacob ben Machir, 309, 310

 Jacobites, xviii, 34

 Jaulus, 437

 Jeshua ben Judah, xxv, xlvii, 55-58; priority of reason, 56; atomic theory, ibid. ; creation, ibid. ; existence of God, 57; incorporeality, ibid. ; good and evil, ibid. ; 200, 246, 363, 434

 Jesus, xxvii, 86, 91

 Job, xv, xxvi, 304, 346, 377 f. 

 Joel, M. , 398, 435, 436, 445, note 310; 446, notes 335 and 398; 447, note 398 end

 Johannes Hispanus, 61

 Joseph ben Shemtob, 429, 430, 447, note 404

 Joseph ibn Zaddik, see Ibn Zaddik, Joseph

 Jourdain, A. , 63, 441, note 85; 445, note 306

 Judah ben Barzilai, 17

 Judah Hadassi, 363

 Judah Halevi, see Halevi, Judah

 Judah Messer Leon, 431

 Justinian, xvii

 Kabbala, 79, 429, 430

 Kadariya, xxi, xxii, xxiii, 23

 Kalam, xxiv, xxvii, 16, 17, 48, 50, 52, 55, 86, 106, 125, 128, 141 f. , 146, 154, 171, 183, 200, 245, 246 ff. , 362, 366, 428, 433, 439, note 10

 Kalisch, Isidor, 433

 Karaites, xiii, xxiv, xxv, xli, xlvii, 23, 24, 48, 55, 59, 108, 125, 126, 146, 154, 174, 183, 200, 245, 246, 362, 363, 364, 365, 370, 373, 377, 378, 428

 Kaufmann, David, 152, 153, 433, 434, 435, 436, 441, note 88; 442, note 181; 444, notes 250 and 305

 Kellermann, Benzion, 436

 "Keter Malkut, " see "Royal Crown"

 Kindi, Al, xxxix

 Klein, Miksa, 434

 Knowledge, sources of, xl; in Saadia, 27 f. ; in Bahya, 83; in Ibn Zaddik, 129 f. 

 Koran, xxi, xxii, xxiii, xxvi, xxvii, xxix, xliv, 34, 156

 Krochmal, Nahman, 189, 435

 "Kusari, " 153

 Lactantius, 431

 Landauer, S. , 175, 440, note 37

 Laws, rational and traditional, 1; in Saadia, 38 f. ; in Ibn Zaddik, 147; in Abraham ibn Ezra, 194; in Ibn Daud, 233 f. ; in Maimonides, 294 ff. ; in Aaron ben Elijah, 382

 Lebid-ibn Al-Aʿsam, xxvi

 Leibnitz, 307

 Leverrier, 275

 Levi ben Gerson, xix, xx, xxxix, xli, xliii, xlvii, xlix, 7, 16, 166, 217, 235, 302, 312, 313, 328-361; standpoint, 329 f. ; reason and authority, 330 f. ; his style and method, 331; the passive intellect, 332 ff. ; active intellect, 337 ff. ; problem of knowledge, 338; of definition, 339; immortality, 339 f. ; prognostication and prophecy, 340 ff. ; and the contingent, ibid. ; God's knowledge, 342 ff. ; attributes, 344 f. , 351 f. ; Providence, 346 ff. ; existence of God, 350 f. ; origin of the world, 352 f. ; eternal matter, 355 f. ; interpretation of creation story in Genesis, 357; miracles, 358 f. , 362, 363, 369, 384, 388, 392, 393, 394, 395, 396, 398, 399, 401, 402, 406, 419, 420, 421, 428, 429, 430, 436, 447, note 403a

 Levy, Louis-Germain, 436

 "Liber de Causis, " xx, 2, 64, 317

 Lippmann, 443, note 214

 Logos, xxvii, xli, 52, 71, 91

 "Ma'amar Yikkawu ha-Mayim, " 309

 "Maase Bereshit, " xvi, 242, 303, 430

 "Maase Merkaba, " xvi, 242, 303, 430

 Maimonides, Moses, xvi, xix, xx, xxiv, xxv, xxvii, xxxix, xli, xlii, xliii, xlv, xlvi, xlvii, xlix, l, 1, 2, 16, 25, 60, 62, 63, 79, 88, 95, 96, 114, 125, 126, 146, 153, 158, 166, 167, 198, 199, 200, 201, 207, 218, 221, 235, 236-311; his life, 238 f. ; his _chef d'œuvre_, 239 f. ; his method, 240; his standpoint, 240 ff. ; importance of science, 243 f. ; difficulty of metaphysics, 244 f. ; sketch of Jewish Philosophy, 245 f. ; exposition of the Kalam, 246 ff. ; propositions of the "philosophers, " 254 ff. ; existence of God, 257 ff. ; unity, ibid. ; incorporeality, ibid. , 260 ff. ; attributes, 262 ff. ; meaning of "Jhvh, " 265; angels, 266 f. ; origin of the world, 269 ff. ; emanation of Intelligences, 272 f. ; criticism of Aristotle, 271 ff. ; psychology, 281 ff. ; virtue, 282 ff. ; freedom, 285 ff. ; and foreknowledge, 287 f. ; problem of evil, 288 ff. ; God's knowledge, 289 ff. ; reason of the commandments, 294 ff. ; Bible exegesis, 302 ff. ; influence of M. , 305 ff. ; on Scholasticism, 305-307; on Judaism, 307-311, 312, 313, 314, 317, 323, 325, 329, 332, 342, 343, 344, 345, 346, 350, 352, 353, 357, 358, 362, 363, 364, 365, 366, 368, 369, 370, 371, 372, 374, 375, 376, 377, 378, 379, 380, 382, 383, 384, 388, 389, 390, 391, 392, 393, 394, 395, 396, 398, 399, 400, 402, 403, 406, 407, 408, 409, 410, 412, 416, 417, 419, 420, 421, 423, 424, 425, 426, 428, 429, 430, 431, 435, 447, note 403a

 "Malmad Hatalmidim, " 309

 Malter, H. , vii, 445, note 316

 Mandonnet, P. , 445, note 308; 446, note 332

 Manicheans, 375

 Matter, rejected by Mutakallimun, xxii; doctrine of, in Aristotle, xxix ff. ; in Plotinus, xxxviii; as source of evil, 38; in Gabirol, 66 f. ; in Pseudo-Bahya, 109; in Abraham bar Hiyya, 117; in Ibn Zaddik, 130 ff. ; in Judah Halevi, 175; in Abraham ibn Ezra, 190; in Ibn Daud, 205 f. ; in Maimonides, 256, 270; in Levi ben Gerson, 355 f. 

 Maywald, 446, note 332

 "Mekize Nirdamim, " 445, notes 313 and 321

 "Mekor Hayim, " see "Fons Vitæ"

 Menahem ben Saruk, 59

 Messiah, in Saadia, 45; in Ibn Zaddik, 149; in Crescas, 402, 404; in Albo, 408

 Metempsychosis, see Transmigration

 "Microcosmus, " 60, 125

 "Milhamot Adonai, " 329

 Miracles, in Levi ben Gerson, 358 f. 

 Mohammed, xxv, 86

 Monophysites, xviii, 34

 "More Ha-moreh, " 310

 "More Nebukim, " 238

 Morgenstern, Ernö, 434

 Moses ben Enoch, 59

 Moses ben Maimon, see Maimonides

 Moses of Narbonne, 309, 310, 328, 430, 447, note 403a

 Motion, in Aristotle, xxvi; in Ibn Daud, 207; in Maimonides, 254, 269

 Mukammas, David Al, 2, 17-22; definition of science and philosophy, 17 f. ; attributes, 18 ff. ; unity, 18; reward and punishment, 21 f. , 34, 52, 81, 84, 95, 200, 246, 434

 Munk, Solomon, 63, 304, 328, 433, 434, 440, note 83; 441, notes 86, 87 and 105; 444, notes 250, 280 and 302; 445, notes 314 and 316; 448, note 442

 Münz, J. , 436

 Mutakallimun, xxi f. , xl, xli, xlvii, 9, 11, 24, 25, 26, 48, 81, 88, 96, 106, 125, 126, 127, 128, 139, 142, 145, 149, 158, 182, 183, 199, 240, 246-253, 256, 275, 352, 353, 362, 366 f. , 369, 372, 382, 406, 428

 Muʿtazila, xxii ff. , xxvii, xlvii, 3, 17, 21, 23, 24, 26, 48, 108, 171, 246, 251, 291, 292, 362, 365, 366, 375, 377

 Nachmanides, 426, 429

 Nature, in Plotinus, xxxviii; in Gabirol, 65, 66; in Pseudo-Bahya, 109; in Abraham bar Hiyya, 119

 Neo-Platonic, xx, xxviii, xxxix, xlvi, 2, 6, 13, 24, 38, 64, 79, 81, 86, 89, 90, 92, 106, 107, 114, 115, 125, 126, 127, 129, 138, 139, 177, 178, 199, 200, 266, 305, 317, 319

 Neo-Platonism, xxix, 17, 64, 70, 79, 91, 114, 150, 187, 200, 266, 288, 317, 428

 Neo-Platonists, xl, 31, 64, 91, 106, 184, 199

 Neo-Pythagoreans, 188

 Nestorians, xviii, 34

 Neumark, David, viii, 433, 435, 436, 441, note 107

 "Nous, " xxxviii, 7, 91

 "Olam Katon, " see "Microcosmus"

 "Or Adonai, " 389

 Origen, 288, 302

 Orschansky, G. , 435

 Perles, J. , 445, note 309

 Philo, xvi, xxvii, xxxviii, xli, 23, 91, 95, 188, 240, 266, 268, 288, 302

 Philoponus, 247, 353

 Philosophy, and religion, xiii; content of Jewish P. , xl-l; defined by Israeli, 4; by Ibn Zaddik, 129; by Moses Ibn Ezra, 185

 Physics, in Kalam, xxii, xli; in Aristotle, xxx; in Israeli, 3, 5, 12; in Saadia, xli; in Ibn Zaddik, xlii, 130 ff. ; in Judah Halevi, 175 ff. ; in Ibn Daud, xlii, 205 ff. ; in Maimonides, xlii, 254 ff. , 269 ff. ; in Levi ben Gerson, 352 f. , 355 f. ; in Aaron ben Elijah, xli, 366 ff. ; in Crescas, xlii, 389

 Plato, xxix, xli, xlv, 5, 7, 8, 37, 47, 90, 91, 122, 138, 155, 179, 181, 182, 184, 195, 231, 268, 269, 288, 304, 305, 353, 413, 431

 Plato of Tivoli, 114

 Plotinus, xx, xxxvii f. , xxxix, 6, 64, 65, 91, 107, 115, 126, 139, 178, 431

 Pollak, J. , 433

 Porphyry, 60

 Proclus, xx, 3

 Prophecy, xlvi, xlix f. ; in Israeli, xlix, 15; in Saadia, 40; in Judah Halevi, xlix, 165; in Abraham ibn Ezra, 194; in Ibn Daud, xlix, 224 ff. ; in Maimonides, xlix, 276 ff. ; in Hillel ben Samuel, 325; in Levi ben Gerson, xlix, 340 ff. ; in Aaron ben Elijah, 380 f. ; in Crescas, 395; in Albo, 421

 Providence, xl; in Maimonides, 290 ff. ; in Levi ben Gerson, 346 ff. ; in Aaron ben Elijah, 375 f. ; in Crescas, 393 f. ; in Albo, 425

 Pseudo-Bahya, xlvi, xlix, 106-113; standpoint, 106 f. ; the soul, 108 ff. , 111 ff. ; Intelligence, Soul, Nature, 108 f. , 110; matter, 109; creation, 110; virtue, 112; immortality, 112 f. ; reward and punishment, 113, 122, 126, 139, 148, 317, 434

 Ptolemy, xviii, 273, 309

 Pythagoras, 60, 179, 184, 185

 Pythagoreans, 9

 Rashi, 187

 Raymond, Bishop of Toledo, 61

 Reason, and authority, xiii; r. In Aristotle, xxxvi; active and passive, xxxvi f. ; in Plotinus, xxxviii; r. As a source of knowledge, xl; r. And authority in Levi ben Gerson, 330 f. See also "Intellect, " "Soul"

 Resurrection, l; in Saadia, 44 f. ; in Hillel ben Samuel, 326; in Aaron ben Elijah, 385 f. ; in Crescas, 404

 Reward and Punishment, xlvii, xlviii, l; in Mukammas, 21 f. ; in Saadia, 42 f. ; in Al Basir, 55; in Pseudo-Bahya, 113; in Abraham bar Hiyya, 119 ff. ; in Ibn Zaddik, 148; in Judah Halevi, 170; in Abraham Ibn Ezra, 192; in Hillel ben Samuel, 323 ff. ; in Aaron ben Elijah, 379, 383; in Crescas, 403 f. ; in Albo, 425 f. 

 Roscellinus of Compiègne, 305

 Rose, Valentinus, 439, note 8

 Rosin, David, 189, 192, 435

 "Royal Crown, " the, 75 f. 

 Saadia, xix, xxv, xli, xlii, xlv, xlvi, xlix, 1, 17, 23-47; his "Emunot ve-Deot, " 24 f. ; modelled on the Kalam, ibid. ; atomic theory, 25; reason for writing, 26 f. ; sources of truth, 27 f. ; speculation not forbidden, 28; necessity of revelation, ibid. ; existence of God, 28 ff. ; incorporeality, 32; unity, 32 f. ; attributes, 33 f. ; categories inapplicable to God, 35 f. ; theophanies, 36; soul, 37 f. ; laws and commandments, 38 f. ; rational and traditional, ibid. ; prophecy, 40; written and oral law, 40; abrogation of Law, 40 f. ; freedom, 41 f. ; and foreknowledge, ibid. ; reward and punishment, 42 f. , 46; future world, 43 f. ; resurrection, 44 f. ; ethics, 46 f. , 48, 50, 52, 59, 81, 82, 83, 84, 87, 88, 89, 92, 94, 95, 96, 126, 127, 128, 146, 147, 167, 175, 186, 195, 200, 237, 241, 246, 252, 253, 302, 309, 362, 363, 388, 428, 434

 Sabeans, 296

 Saladin, 239

 Samuel, 197

 Scaliger, 307

 Scheyer, Simon B. , 435

 Schmiedl, A. , 433

 Schreiner, M. , xxv, xxvii, 433, 434, 439, notes 12, 16, 18 and 20; 440, note 81

 "Sefer Ha-Kabbala, " 198

 Seyerlen, 63, 434, 441, note 86

 Shemtob ben Joseph, 430

 Shemtob ben Joseph ibn Shemtob, 429

 Socrates, xxix, 155, 184, 185

 Solomon ben Adret, 430

 Solomon ben Yeroham, 363

 Sophists, xxix

 Soul, in Aristotle, xxxv; world soul in Plotinus, xxxviii; s. In Jewish philosophy, xlv f. ; world-soul in Jewish Neo-Platonists, xlvi; s. In Israeli, 5, 8 ff. ; in Saadia, 37 f. ; in Gabirol, 65, 66; in Pseudo-Bahya, 108 ff. ; in Abraham bar Hiyya, 119; in Ibn Zaddik, 134 f. , 137 f. ; world-soul in Ibn Zaddik, 140; s. In Judah Halevi, 179 ff. ; in Abraham Ibn Ezra, 191 f. ; in Ibn Daud, 209 ff. ; in Maimonides, 281 ff. ; in Hillel ben Samuel, 314 ff. ; in Crescas, 400. See also "Intellect, " "Reason"

 Spinoza, 398 f. 

 "Spirit and Soul, Book of, " 5

 Steinschneider, Moritz, 311, 439, note 26; 440, notes 31 and 33; 443, note 247; 446, note 360

 St. Ephrem of Nisibis, xviii

 Sufis, xxvii f. , 86, 153

 Syrians, xvii ff. , 199, 246

 "Tagmule ha-Nefesh, " 314

 Tänzer, A. , 437

 Themistius, 7, 60, 313, 321, 332, 333, 334, 335

 "Theology of Aristotle, " xx, xxxix, 64, 266

 Theophrastus, xviii

 Tibbon, Judah Ibn, 71, 309, 310

 Tibbon, Moses Ibn, 309, 440, note 37

 Tibbon, Samuel Ibn, 2, 60, 125, 239, 302, 309

 "Tikkun Midot ha-Nefesh, " 71

 "Torot ha-Nefesh, " 106

 Tradition, xiii, xli, 28, 223 f. 

 Transmigration, in Saadia, 44; in Abraham ibn Ezra, 192; in Ibn Daud, 215 f. 

 Trinity, xliv, 33, 34, 71, 91

 Truth, twofold, 328

 "Twenty Chapters, " 17

 Ueberweg-Baumgartner, 433

 Unity of God, in Kalam, xxii, xliii f. , 252; in Mukammas, 18; in Saadia, 32 f. ; in Al Basir, 51; in Bahya, 89 f. ; in Ibn Zaddik, 143; in Moses ibn Ezra, 185; in Abraham ibn Ezra, 189; in Ibn Daud, 219 f. ; in Maimonides, xliv, 257 ff. ; in Aaron ben Elijah, 368 f. ; in Crescas, 391 f. 

 Vincent of Beauvais, 1

 Virtue, xlix; in Gabirol, 72 f. ; in Pseudo-Bahya, 112; in Ibn Zaddik, 148; in Ibn Daud, 232; in Maimonides, 282 ff. 

 Weil, Isidore, 436

 Weil, Simson, 198, 443, note 221

 Weinsberg, Leopold, 435

 Wenrich, 439, note 5

 Werbluner, 445, note 317

 Will of God, in Al Basir, 50; in Gabirol, 68 f. ; in Bahya, 90; in Ibn Zaddik, 144; in Aaron ben Elijah, 372

 William of Auvergne, 71, 306

 William of Occam, 200

 Wise, Stephen S. , 71, 441, note 103

 Wolff, M. , 444, note 251

 Wolfsohn, Julius, 436

 Yahuda, 80, 86, 439, note 24; 441, notes 106, 108, 109 and 112

 Yahya ben Adi, 247

 Yefet Ha-Levi, 363

 "Yezirah, Sefer" 17, 94, 173, 179

 Yohanan ben Zakkai, 197

 Zeller, 439, note 4; 441, note 86

 Zeno, 25

 Zimmels, 448, note 442

 Zunz, Leopold, 184

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