Do not think that what we have laid down in the preceding chapters on
the importance, obscurity, and difficulty of the subject, and its
unsuitableness for communication to ordinary persons, includes the
doctrine of God’s incorporeality and His exemption from all affections
(πάθη). This is not the case. For in the same way as all people must be
informed, and even children must be trained in the belief that God is
One, and that none besides Him is to be worshipped, so must all be
taught by simple authority that God is incorporeal; that there is no
similarity in any way whatsoever between Him and His creatures; that
His existence is not like the existence of His creatures, His life not
like that of any living being, His wisdom not like the wisdom of the
wisest of men; and that the difference between Him and His creatures is
not merely quantitative, but absolute [as between two individuals of
two different classes]; I mean to say that all must understand that our
wisdom and His, or our power and His do not differ quantitatively or
qualitatively, or in a similar manner; for two things, of which the one
is strong and the other weak, are necessarily similar, belong to the
same class, and can be included in one definition. The same is the case
with all other comparisons; they can only be made between two things
belonging to the same class, as has been shown in works on Natural
Science. Anything predicated of God is totally different from our
attributes; no definition can comprehend both; therefore His existence
and that of any other being totally differ from each other, and the
term existence is applied to both homonymously, as I shall explain.
This suffices for the guidance of children and of ordinary persons who
must believe that there is a Being existing, perfect, incorporeal, not
inherent in a body as a force in it—God, who is above all kinds of
deficiency, above all affections. But the question concerning the
attributes of God, their inadmissibility, and the meaning of those
attributes which are ascribed to Him; concerning the Creation, His
Providence, in providing for everything; concerning His will, His
perception, His knowledge of everything; concerning prophecy and its
various degrees; concerning the meaning of His names which imply the
idea of unity, though they are more than one; all these things are very
difficult problems, the true “Secrets of the Law” the “secrets”
mentioned so frequently in the books of the Prophets, and in the words
of our Teachers, the subjects of which we should only mention the
headings of the chapters, as we have already stated, and only in the
presence of a person satisfying the above-named conditions.
That God is incorporeal, that He cannot be compared with His creatures,
that He is not subject to external influence; these are things which
must be explained to every one according to his capacity, and they must
be taught by way of tradition to children and women, to the stupid and
ignorant, as they are taught that God is One, that He is eternal, and
that He alone is to be worshipped. Without incorporeality there is no
unity, for a corporeal thing is in the first case not simple, but
composed of matter and form which are two separate things by
definition, and secondly, as it has extension it is also divisible.
When persons have received this doctrine, and have been trained in this
belief, and are in consequence at a loss to reconcile it with the
writings of the Prophets, the meaning of the latter must be made clear
and explained to them by pointing out the homonymity and the figurative
application of certain terms discussed in this part of the work. Their
belief in the unity of God and in the words of the Prophets will then
be a true and perfect belief.
Those who are not sufficiently intelligent to comprehend the true
interpretation of these passages in the Bible, or to understand that
the same term admits of two different interpretations, may simply be
told that the scriptural passage is clearly understood by the wise, but
that they should content themselves with knowing that God is
incorporeal, that He is never subject to external influence, as
passivity implies a change, while God is entirely free from all change,
that He cannot be compared to anything besides Himself, that no
definition includes Him together with any other being, that the words
of the Prophets are true, and that difficulties met with may be
explained on this principle. This may suffice for that class of
persons, and it is not proper to leave them in the belief that God is
corporeal, or that He has any of the properties of material objects,
just as there is no need to leave them in the belief that God does not
exist, that there are more Gods than one, or that any other being may
be worshipped.