JOSEPH AL-BASIR AND JESHUA BEN JUDAH
I. _Joseph Al-Basir (11th century)_[80]
Joseph ben Abraham, euphemistically surnamed on account of his
blindness, al-Basir (the seer), was a Karaite and lived in Babylonia or
Persia in the beginning of the eleventh century. His philosophical work
is closely modelled on the writings of the Arabian Mutakallimun, the
Mu`tazilites. Unlike Saadia, who tacitly accepts some of their methods
and views, al-Basir is an avowed follower of the Kalam and treats only
of those questions which are common to Jew and Mohammedan, avoiding, for
example, so important an issue as whether it is possible that the law of
God may be abrogated--a question which meant so much to Saadia. The
division of his investigation into the two parts, Unity and Justice, is
a serious matter with him; and he finds it necessary to tell us in
several instances why he chose to treat a given topic under the one or
the other heading. In spirit and temperament he is a thoroughgoing
rationalist. Brief and succinct to the point of obscurity, he betrays
neither partiality nor emotion, but fearlessly pushes the argument to
its last conclusion and reduces it to its lowest terms.
Saadia (above p. 28) puts revelation as a fourth source of truth
parallel to sense, judgment and logical inference. To be sure he, in one
instance (p. 35), speaks of the reason as preceding the Bible even as
tradition follows it, but this is only a passing observation, and is
properly corrected by the view expressed elsewhere (p. 28) that while a
Jew is not forbidden to speculate, he must not set the Bible aside and
adopt opinions as they occur to him. Al-Basir does not leave the matter
in this unsettled condition. He definitely gives priority--logical
priority, to reason. Knowledge, he says, must precede revelation. The
prophet as the messenger of God cannot be believed on his word, for the
opponent may have the same claim. Not only must the prophet
authenticate his mission by the performance of a miracle which cannot be
explained by natural means, but we must know besides that he who sent
him has our good at heart and would not deceive us. A knowledge of the
existence, power and wisdom of the creator must therefore precede our
belief in the prophet's mission. To take these truths from the words of
the prophet and then give him credence because God sent him would be
reasoning in a circle. The minimum of knowledge therefore which is
indispensable before we can make any appeal to the words of the prophet
is rational proof of the existence, power and wisdom of God. Having this
minimum the person who is not practiced in speculative investigation may
rely for the rest of the creed, for example, the unity of God and his
other attributes, upon the words of the Bible. For if we know
independently that God is Omnipotent and Omniscient, and the prophet can
substantiate his claim to be a divine messenger by the performance of
genuine miracles, his reliability is established and we are safe in
accepting all that he has to say without proof; but the fundamental
thing to do is to establish the prophet's reliability, and for this an
independent source of evidence is necessary. This is the reason.
Our problem therefore is to prove the power and wisdom of God, which
will imply his existence. We cannot do this directly, for we cannot see
God. Hence the only method is to prove the existence of a powerful and
wise creator through his creation. We must prove his power in doing
things which we cannot do, such as the ability to create our bodies. But
for this it is necessary to show that our bodies--and the same will
apply to the other bodies of the world, and hence to the world as a
whole--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 bodies
consist of atoms and their "accidents," or conditions and qualities. The
primary accidents, which are presupposed by all the rest, are the
following four, combination, separation, motion and rest. Without these
no body can exist, for body is the result of a combination and
separation of atoms at rest or in motion. But combination and separation
are the acts of a combiner and separater, as we can infer from the
analogy of our own acts. Our acts have ourselves as their creators,
hence the acts visible in the combinations and separations of atoms to
form bodies must also have their creator.
The attributes of the creator we infer from the nature of his work. So
we call God "Powerful," meaning that he had the power to create the
world. As creation denotes power, so the success and harmony of the
product argues wisdom; and this power and wisdom thus established are
not disproved by an occasional production or event which is not perfect,
a monstrosity for example, or disease and suffering. We say in reference
to these that God must have a deeper object in view, to inspire mankind
with the fear of God, and in order to increase their reward in the next
world.
The attribute of Life follows from the other two, for life denotes the
possession or capacity of power and knowledge.
Thus al-Basir has the same three essential attributes as Saadia. His
proof of the existence of God is also identical with one of the proofs
of Saadia. But he shows himself a more loyal follower of the Kalam by
frankly adopting the atomic theory, whereas Saadia opposes it (p. 25).
Other predicates of God are perception, will, unity, incorporeality and
eternity.
Perception is one of the most important expressions of life, but it must
not be confused with knowledge or wisdom. The latter embraces the
non-existent as well as the existent, the former the existent only. It
is 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 identify
God's will with his knowledge, and define God's willing to mean that his
works take place in accordance with his knowledge. God's will must be a
special attribute since we see in creation traces of free will. To be
the will of God it must not reside in anything different from God, and
yet it cannot inhere in God as the subject, for only body is capable of
being the subject of accidents. The only solution, therefore, is that
God exercises his voluntary activity through a will which he creates, a
will not residing in any subject.
This discussion of the nature of God's will seems a case of hair
splitting with a vengeance, and al-Basir is not the author of it. As in
his other doctrines so in this also he is a faithful follower of the
Mu`tazila, and we shall see more of this method in his discussion of the
unity of God despite the plurality of his attributes.
But we shall first take up the attributes of incorporeality and
eternity, 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, he
must likewise have a creator, and so we are led to infinity, which
cannot be, the infinite regress being in all cases an impossibility
according to an axiom of the Kalam. We must, therefore, have an eternal
creator somewhere, and he is God.
From God's eternity follows his incorporeality, for we have shown before
that all body is created, since it presupposes combination and
separation, and the latter a combiner and separater.
When we speak of the unity of God we mean first that there is no second
God, and then that his own essence has no composition or plurality in
it. Two Gods is an absurdity, for the one might desire what the other
does not, and he whose will predominates is the real God. It is no
objection to say that in their wisdom they would never disagree, because
the _possibility_ is there, and this makes the above argument valid.
Again, if there were two Gods they would have to be completely alike in
their essential attributes, and as space cannot hold them apart, since
they are not bodies, what is there to constitute them two?
The other problem, of God's simplicity, is more difficult. Does not the
multiplicity of attributes make God's essence multiple and composite?
The form which this question took was this. Shall we say that God is
omnipotent through Power, omniscient through Knowledge, and so on? If
so, 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 have
more than one God, and "Power" as an eternal would also be Wise and
Living, etc.; Wisdom would also be powerful, living, etc., and so on
with the other attributes, a doctrine closely bordering on Christianity
and reminding one of Augustine. The principle of monotheism could not
allow such a conception as this. If Power is neither created nor
eternal, it follows that God is omnipotent not through Power as an
external cause or a distinct entity, but through his own essence. The
attributes Power, Wisdom, Life, are not anything distinguishable from
each other and from God's essence. They are modes or conditions of
God's essence, and are known along with it.
The same considerations which prompted us to conceive God as one and
simple, make impossible the belief in the eternity of God's word. This
was a point much discussed in the Mohammedan schools, and was evidently
directed against Christianity, where the Word or Logos was identified
with the second person in the Trinity. Eternity, Al-Basir says, is
incompatible with the idea and purpose of speech. God speaks with a word
which he creates. This adds no new predicate to God, but is implied in
his Power. The attribute omnipotent implies that when he wills he can
make himself understood by us as we do through speech.
We notice that Al-Basir is more elaborate in his discussion of the
attributes than Saadia, and like Al-Mukammas he makes use of the formulæ
of the Kalam, "omnipotent not with Power, omniscient not with Wisdom."
Saadia does not follow the Kalam so closely, but is just as emphatic in
his endeavor to show that the three essential attributes are only
verbally 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 and
Fairness. The main problems here are the nature of good and evil and the
relation of God to them, the question of free will and other subordinate
topics, 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 is
that nothing is good or bad in itself, our reason not recognizing it as
such; that the divine command or prohibition makes the thing good or
bad. Hence, the representatives of this opinion say, God, who stands
above his commands and prohibitions, is not bound by them. Good and bad
hold for the subject, not for the author. The acts of God do not come
within the classification, and hence it is possible that God may do what
we regard as injustice. Some, in their endeavor to be consistent and to
carry 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 no
worse than if I beat him.
For this school there is no problem of evil, because ethical
distinctions do not apply to God's doings. Whatever God does is good.
The other school came under the influence of Greek thought and
identified the idea of God with the idea of the Good. They maintained
that from the nature of God's essence it was not only his duty to do the
good, but that it was impossible for him to do anything else. Doing good
is a necessity of his nature, and our good and evil are also his good
and evil. Ethical values are absolute and not relative.
Neither of these radical views can be maintained. The first is refuted
by its own consequences which only very few of its advocates were bold
enough to adopt. The possibility of God telling a falsehood, which is
implied in the purely human validity of good and evil, is subversive of
all religion. God would then cease to be trustworthy, and there would be
no reason for giving him obedience. Besides, if revelation alone
determines right and wrong, it would follow that if God chose to reverse
his orders, our moral judgments would be turned the other way around,
good would be evil, and evil good. Finally, if good and bad are
determined by the will of God only, those who do not believe in
revelation would be without an idea of right and wrong, but this is
manifestly not true.
But the other opinion, that God is compelled by the necessity of his
nature to do the good, is also erroneous. In the first place it detracts
from God's omnipotence to say he cannot do wrong. Besides, if he is
compelled by an inner necessity to do the good, he must always have done
this, and the world would have existed from eternity. It is just as
wrong to say that it is the duty of God to do what is good and useful
for man. For this is due to a confusion of the good or generous with the
obligatory. Any deed to which no blame attaches may be called good. If
no praise attaches to it either, it is indifferent. If it is deserving
of praise and its omission does not call forth blame, it is a generous
act. A duty is an act the omission of which deserves blame.
Now the truth in the question under discussion is midway between the two
extremes. God is able to do good as well as evil, and is under no
necessity. The notions of right and wrong are absolute and not merely
relative. God never does wrong because evil has no attractive power _per
se_. Wrong is committed always as a means to an end, namely, to gain an
advantage or avoid an injury. God is not dependent upon anything; he
needs no advantages and fears no injuries. Hence there is nothing to
prompt him to do wrong. The good on the other hand attracts us by its
inherent goodness, not for an ulterior end. If the good were done only
for the sake of deriving some benefit external to the good itself, God,
who is self-sufficient, would not do anything either good or evil. God
does the good always and not the bad, because in his wisdom he sees the
difference between them. It was a deed of generosity in God to have
created the world and given life to his creatures, but it was not a
duty.
This conception of the nature of good and evil leaves on our hands the
problem of evil. Why does a good God permit disease and suffering to
exist in the world? In particular, how explain the suffering and death
of innocent children and harmless animals?
The answer of Al-Basir is that infliction of pain may under certain
circumstances be a good instead of an evil. In human relations a person
is permitted to inflict pain on another in self-defence, or to prevent
the pain from becoming worse, as, for example, when a finger is
amputated to save the hand. The infliction of pain is not only
permitted, it becomes a duty in case of retribution, as in a court of
justice; and finally it is permitted to inflict temporary pain if it
will result in a greater advantage in the future. The last two cases
apply also to God's treatment of his creatures. Disease and suffering
are either punishment for offences committed, or are imposed with a view
to later reward. In the case of children the last explanation alone is
applicable. They will be rewarded in the next world. At the same time
the parents are admonished to repentance and good conduct.
The most difficult question of the section on justice is that of free
will and foreknowledge. Is man master of his actions? If so, how can we
reconcile this with God's omniscience, who knows beforehand how the
person will act at a given moment? Is man free to decide at the last
moment in a manner contrary to God's knowledge? If so, we defend freedom
at the expense of God's omniscience. If man is bound to act as God
foreknew he would act, divine knowledge is saved, man's freedom lost.
Al-Basir has no doubt man is free. Our own consciousness testifies to
this. When we cut off our finger bitten by a snake, we know that we
ourselves did it for a purpose, and distinguish it from a case of our
finger being cut off by order of an official, before whom we have been
accused or maligned. One and the same act can have only one author and
not two, and we know that we are the authors of our acts. There is a
much closer connection between an agent and his act than between a
knower and his knowledge, which may be the common property of many, and
no one doubts that a man's knowledge is his own.
The dilemma above mentioned with its two horns, of which one denies
God's knowledge, the other man's freedom, is puzzling enough, to be
sure. 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 be
contrary to God's foreknowledge of its outcome. Just as we should refuse
to answer the question whether an actual case of injustice on the part
of God would prove his ignorance or dependence, because we know through
irrefutable proofs that God is wise and without need; so here we say man
has freedom though God knows he will act thus and so, and refuse to say
whether in case the unbeliever turned believer it would prove God's
ignorance or change in his knowledge.
God's creation was a pure act of grace. But once having done this and
communicated to us a knowledge of himself and his will, it is now his
duty to guide us in the right path, by sending us his prophets. The
commandments and prohibitions must never be contrary to the knowledge of
reason. We must see in the commandments means of guidance, in the
prohibitions a protection against destructive influences. If they had
not this rational basis, we do not see why God should have imposed them
upon us.
Having given us reason to know his being, and having announced his truth
through the prophets, it is his duty to reward those who knew him and
were obedient, eternally in the next world, and to punish eternally the
unbeliever. If one has merits and sins, they are balanced against each
other. If the sinner repents of his evil deeds, it is the duty of God to
accept 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-Faraj
Furkan 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 Mu`tazilite Kalam and as strong a
rationalist as his master. He agrees with Al-Basir that we cannot get
certain knowledge of the creation of the world and the existence of God
from the Bible. This information must come originally from rational
speculation. It should then be applied to the miracles of the prophets
so as to prove the authenticity of their mission and the truth of their
announcements.
He adopts the atomic theory, though he is opposed to the view that atoms
are created ever anew by God from moment to moment, and that there is no
natural and necessary sequence or continuity in the phenomena of the
world or qualities of bodies, all being due to habit, and custom induced
in us by God's uninterrupted creations. As in his philosophical
discussions he is a follower of the Kalam, so in his legalistic works he
is indebted to the Mohammedan schools of religious law.
Like Al-Basir, Jeshua ben Judah regards as the corner stone of his
religious philosophy the proof that the world was created, _i. e._, that
it is not eternal. His arguments are in essence the same, though
differently formulated. In their simplest form they are somewhat as
follows. The world and its bodies consist of atoms and their accidents.
Taking a given atom for the sake of argument we know that it is
immaterial to it, so far as its own essence is concerned, whether it
occupy one place or another. As a fact, however, it does occupy a
definite place at a given moment. This must be due to a cause. And as
the atom in question in the course of time changes its place, this shows
that the cause which kept it in the former place has disappeared and
given way to a new cause, and so on. In other words, the successive
causes which determine the positions and motions of the atoms are not
permanent, hence not eternal but created. The necessary inference is
that the atoms or the bodies, which cannot exist without these created
causes (else they could not occupy one place rather than another), must
also be created.
Another form of the argument for creation is this. The eternal has no
cause. It exists by virtue of its own essence, and is not dependent on
anything else. If now the atoms were eternal, they would have to persist
in the same condition all the time; for any change would imply a cause
upon which the atom is dependent, and this is fatal to its eternity. But
the atoms do constantly change their condition and place. Hence they are
created.
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 this
creative agency is a "_cause_," _i. e._, an impersonal entity, which by
necessity produces other things from itself. Hence we must hasten to say
that this conception of the Creator is impossible because incompatible
with our results so far. A necessarily producing cause cannot be without
creating, hence an eternal cause implies an eternal effect--which
contradicts our idea of a created world proved above. We say, therefore,
that the Creator is not a "cause" but an "agent," _i. e._, one acting
with will and choice.
God is incorporeal because body consists of atoms, and atoms, we have
shown, are created. Besides, if he were corporeal, he could not create
bodies any more than we can. He would furthermore be limited to a
definite place, and the same arguments cited above to prove that atoms
are dependent on a cause would apply to him. Finally we as corporeal
beings cannot exert an influence on objects except by coming in contact
with them. God causes the seed to grow without being in contact with it.
Hence he is not body, and the scriptural passages apparently teaching
the contrary must be explained otherwise.
Jeshua ben Judah likewise agrees with Al-Basir in regarding the nature
of good and evil as absolute, not relative. Like his master he opposes
those who make God's command and prohibition the sole creators of good
and evil respectively, as on the other hand he refuses to agree with the
view that God is bound by necessity to do the good. Our reason
distinguishes between good and evil as our senses between white and
black.
Among other arguments in favor of the absolute character of right and
wrong, which we have already found in Al-Basir, appears the following.
If good and evil mean simply that which God commands and prohibits
respectively, and the distinction holds only for us but not for God, it
follows that God may do what we think is evil. If this be so, we have no
ground for believing in the good faith of the prophet--God might have
sent him to deceive us--and the alleged basis of right and wrong is
removed.
We conclude therefore that good and evil are absolute and are binding
upon God as well. God can do evil as well as good, but being omnipotent
he can accomplish his purpose just as easily by doing good as by doing
evil, and hence surely prefers to do good. Besides, all evil doing is
the 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 cannot
have been egoistic, since God is without need, being above pleasure and
pain. The purpose must therefore have been the well-being of his
creatures.