CHAPTER XIII

MOSES MAIMONIDES

With Maimonides we reach the high water mark of mediæval Jewish

philosophy. 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 his

day. And his literary activity was fruitful in every important branch of

study. He was well known as a practicing physician, having been in the

employ of the Caliph's visier at Cairo (Fostat), and he wrote on medical

theory and practice. He was versed in mathematics and astronomy, and his

knowledge of these subjects served him in good stead not merely as an

introduction to theology and metaphysics, but was of direct service in

his studies and writings on the Jewish calendar. It goes without saying

that he knew logic, for this was the basis of all learning in mediæval

times; but in this branch, too, Maimonides has left us a youthful

treatise,[247] which bears witness to his early interest in science and

his efforts to recommend its study as helpful to a better understanding

of 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 his

youth we can trace the evident purpose, not finally completed until

toward the end of his brilliant and useful career,--the purpose to

harmonize Judaism with philosophy, to reconcile the Bible and Talmud

with Aristotle. He was ambitious to do this for the good of Judaism, and

in the interest of a rational and enlightened faith. Thus in his

commentary on the Mishna,[248] the earliest of his larger works, he had

already conceived the idea of writing a composition of a harmonizing

nature, _viz._, to gather all the homiletical disquisitions of the

Talmud (the "derashot") and explain them in a rationalistic manner so as

to remove what appears on the surface to be offensive to sound reason.

But instead of proceeding at once to the performance of this cherished

object of his philosophic ambition, he kept it in his bosom, brooding

over it during a life of intense literary and practical activity, until

it was in the end matured and brought to fruition in a manner quite

different from that at first intended. The book explanatory of the

Rabbinic legends was given up for reasons which will appear later. But

the object that work was to realize was carried out in a much more

effective manner because it was delayed, and was published toward the

end of his life as the systematic and authoritative pronouncement of the

greatest Jew of his time. The "Guide of the Perplexed" would not have

attracted the attention it did, it would not have raised the storm which

divided Jewry into two opposed camps, if it had not come as the mature

work of the man whom all Jewry recognized as the greatest Rabbinic

authority of his time. Others had written on philosophy before

Maimonides. We have in these pages followed their ideas--Saadia,

Gabirol, Ibn Zaddik, Abraham Ibn Daud. The latter in particular

anticipated Maimonides in almost all his ideas. None had the effect of

upsetting the theological equilibrium of Jewry. Everyone had his

admirers, no doubt, as well as his opponents. Gabirol was forgotten, Ibn

Zaddik and Ibn Daud were neglected, and Jewish learning continued the

even tenor of its course. Maimonides was the first to make a profound

impression, the first who succeeded in stirring to their depths the

smooth, though here and there somewhat turbid, Rabbinic waters, as they

flowed not merely in scientific Spain and Provence, or in the Orient,

but also in the strictly Talmudic communities of northern France. It was

the Commentary on the Mishna and the Talmudic code known as the "Yad

ha-Hazaka" that was responsible for the tremendous effect of the "More

Nebukim" ("Guide of the Perplexed").

In these two Rabbinical treatises, and particularly in the "Yad

ha-Hazaka," the Rabbinic Code, Maimonides showed himself the master of

Rabbinic literature. And all recognized in him the master mind. Having

been written in Hebrew the Code soon penetrated all Jewish communities

everywhere, and Maimonides's fame spread wherever there were Jews

engaged in the study of the Talmud. His fame as a court physician in

Egypt and as the official head of Oriental Jewry enhanced the influence

of his name and his work. Jealousy no doubt had its share in starting

opposition 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 could

read it, and Maimonides was no longer among the living, the zealots

became emboldened and the storm broke, the details of which, however, it

is not our province to relate.

For completeness' sake let us set down the facts of his life. Moses ben

Maimon was born in the city of Cordova on the fourteenth of Nissan (30th

of March) at one o'clock in the afternoon, on a Sabbath which was the

day before Passover, in the year 1135. It is not often that the birth of

a mediæval Jewish writer is handed down with such minute detail. Usually

we 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 the

glorious city of the days before the Almoravid conquest. And it was

destined to descend lower still when the fanatical hordes of the

Almohades 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 hands

of the zealots from Morocco, and henceforth neither Jew nor Christian

dared avow his faith openly in Cordova. Adoption of Islam, emigration or

death were the choices held out to the infidel. Many Jews adopted the

dominant faith outwardly--that was all that was demanded of them--while

in the secret of their homes they observed Judaism. Some emigrated, and

among them was the family of Moses' father. For a time they wandered

about from city to city in Spain, and then crossed over to Fez in

Morocco. 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 from

Morocco. And there seems to be some evidence too that the Maimon family

had to appear outwardly as Mohammedans. Be that as it may, Maimonides

did not stay long in Fez. On the 18th of April, 1165, the family set

sail for Palestine, and after a month's stormy voyage they arrived in

Acco. He visited Jerusalem and Hebron, but did not find Palestine a

promising place for permanent residence and decided to go to Egypt. He

settled in Old Cairo (Fostat), and with his brother David engaged in the

jewel trade. His father died soon after, and later his brother met an

untimely death when the ship on which he was a passenger on one of his

business trips was wrecked in the Indian Ocean. Thereafter Maimonides

gave up the jewel business and began to practice medicine, which at

first did not offer him more than the barest necessities. But in the

course of time his fame spread and he was appointed physician to

Saladin's grand visier Alfadhil. He was also made spiritual head[C] of

the 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 and

scientific, he was a busy man indeed; so much so that he dissuades

Samuel Ibn Tibbon, the translator of the "Guide," from paying him a

visit on the ground that he would scarcely have time to spare to see

him, 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 the

Perplexed," his last great work, which was published in Arabic in

1190.[250] Some philosophic and ethical material is also found in the

introductory chapters of his commentary on the Mishnaic treatise "Abot"

(the so-called "Eight Chapters"--"Shemonah Perakim"),[251] in the

introduction to the eleventh chapter (Helek) of the Talmudic treatise

"Sanhedrin," and in the introductory sections of the Code ("Hilkot

Yesode ha-Torah" and "Hilkot Deot"). Here, however, the treatment is

popular and elementary, and is intended for popular consumption. He lays

down results in their simplest form without discussing their origin or

the arguments _pro_ and _con_. The "Guide of the Perplexed," on the

other hand, is intended for a special class of persons, for the

sophisticated; 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 the

apparent disagreement of philosophical teaching with the ideas expressed

in the Biblical and Rabbinic writings. His purpose is deliberately

apologetic and concordistic. The work is not a treatise of science or

philosophy. The latter are presupposed. He introduces philosophic

principles, Aristotelian or Kalamistic, only with a view to their

relation to Jewish theology. And he either accepts them, provisionally

or absolutely, if he regards them as proven, as true and useful; or he

refutes and rejects them if untenable. In the former case he shows by

proper interpretation that similar principles are taught in Bible and

Talmud; in the latter he contents himself by proving that Aristotle or

the Mutakallimun, as the case may be, did not prove their point.

His method, in general, of quieting the doubts of the "perplexed" is the

old one--as old as Philo and beyond--of regarding Biblical phrases as

metaphors and allegories, containing an esoteric meaning beside or

opposed to the literal. Accordingly he lays the greatest stress on the

explanation of Scriptural "homonyms," as he calls them, borrowing an

Aristotelian term. A homonym is a word which has more than one meaning;

a word which denotes several things having nothing in common. Thus when

I apply the word dog to the domestic animal we know by that name, as

well as to Sirius, known as the dog-star, I use dog as a homonym. The

star and the animal have nothing in common. So the word "merciful," one

of the attributes of God in the Bible, is a homonym. That is, we denote

by the same word also a quality in a human being; but this quality and

that which is denoted by the same word when applied to God have nothing

in common. They are not merely different in degree but in kind. In fact,

as Maimonides insists, there is really nothing _in_ God corresponding to

the word merciful.

There are besides certain passages in the Bible which while having an

acceptable meaning when taken literally, contain besides a deeper

signification which the practiced eye can detect. Thus in the

description of the harlot in the seventh chapter of Proverbs there is

beside the plain meaning of the text, the doctrine of matter as the

cause of corporeal desires. The harlot, never faithful to one man,

leaving one and taking up with another, represents matter which, as

Aristotle conceives it, never is without form and constantly changes one

form for another.

There is really nothing new in this, and Philo apart, whom Maimonides

did not know, Ibn Daud anticipated Maimonides here also in making use of

the term "homonym" as the basis of this method of interpretation.[252]

But whereas Ibn Daud relegates the chapter treating of this principle to

a subordinate place, his interest being as he tells us primarily

ethical--to solve the problem of free will; Maimonides places it in the

very centre of his system. The doctrine of attributes as leading to a

true conception of God,--of God as absolutely incorporeal and without

any resemblance or relation whatsoever to anything else--is the very

keystone of Maimonides's philosophical structure. His purpose is to

teach a spiritual conception of God. Anything short of this is worse

than idolatry. He cannot reconcile the Bible to such a view without this

"homonymic" tool. Hence the great importance of this in his system; and

he actually devotes the greater part of the first book of the "Guide" to

a systematic and exhaustive survey of all terms in the Bible used as

homonyms.[253] All this is preparatory to his discussion of the divine

attributes.

This consideration will account also for the fact that, systematic and

logical thinker as he was, he perpetrates what might appear at first

sight as a logical blunder. Instead of first proving the existence of

God and then discussing his nature and attributes, as Saadia, Bahya, Ibn

Daud and others did before him, he treats exhaustively of the divine

attributes in the first book, whereas the proof of the existence of God

does not appear until the second book. This inversion of the logical

order is deliberate. Maimonides's method is directed _ad hominem_. The

Jews 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. Hence

Maimonides cast logical considerations to the wind, and dealt first with

that which was nearest to his heart. The rest could wait, this could

not.

I promised in my commentary on the Mishna, he tells us in the

introduction to the "Guide," to explain the allegories and "Midrashim"

in two works to be entitled "The Book of Reconciliation" and "The Book

of Prophecy." But after reflecting on the matter a number of years I

decided to desist from the attempt. The reasons are these. If I

expressed my explanations obscurely, I should have accomplished nothing

by substituting one unintelligible statement for another. If, on the

other hand, I were really to make clear the matters that require

explanation, the result would not be suitable for the masses, for whom

those treatises were intended. Besides, those Midrashim when read by an

ignorant man are harmless because to such a person nothing is

impossible. 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 them

literally and suspect the author of ignorance, which is not a serious

offence; or he will regard the legendary statements as containing an

esoteric meaning and think well of the author--which is a good thing,

whether he catch the meaning intended or not. Accordingly I gave up the

idea of writing the books mentioned. In this work I am addressing myself

to those who have been philosophizing; who are believers in the Bible

and at the same time know science; and are perplexed in their ideas on

account of the homonymous terms.

Having made clear Maimonides's chief interest and purpose in his

masterpiece we need not follow his own method of treatment, which often

gives the impression of a studied attempt to conceal his innermost ideas

from all but the initiated. At least he is not willing that anyone who

has not taken the trouble carefully to study and scrutinize every

chapter and compare it with what precedes and follows, should by a

superficial browsing here and there arrive at an understanding of the

profound problems treated in the work. He believes that the mysterious

doctrines passing by the name of "Maase Bereshit" and "Maase Merkaba" in

the Talmud (_cf._ Introduction, p. xvi) denote respectively Physics and

Metaphysics--the very sciences of which he treats in the "Guide."

Accordingly he tells us that following the instructions of the Rabbis he

must not be expected to give more than bare allusions. And even these

are not arranged in order in the book, but scattered and mixed up with

other subjects which he desires to explain. For, as he says, "I do not

want to oppose the divine intention, which concealed the truths of his

being from the masses."

"You must not suppose," he continues, "that these mysteries are known to

anybody completely. By no means. But sometimes the truth flashes upon us

and it is day; and then again our natural constitution and habits shut

them out, and we are again in darkness. The relative proportion of light

and darkness which a person enjoys in these matters, makes the

difference in the grade of perfection of great men and prophets. The

greatest of the prophets had comparatively little if any darkness. With

those who never see light at all, namely the masses of the people, we

have nothing to do in this book."

Finally he adjures the reader not to explain to anyone else the novel

ideas found in his work, which are not contained in the writings of his

predecessors. Heaven knows, he exclaims, I hesitated long before writing

this book, because it contains unknown matters, never before treated by

any Jewish writer in the "Galut." But I relied on two Rabbinic

principles. One is that when it is a question of doing something for a

great cause in a critical time, it is permitted to transgress a law. The

other is the consciousness that my motives are pure and unselfish. In

short, he concludes, I am the man who, when he finds himself in a

critical position and cannot teach truth except by suiting one worthy

person and scandalizing ten thousand fools, chooses to say the truth for

the benefit of the one without regard for the abuse of the great

majority.

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 the

fools, we shall proceed more directly in our exposition of his

philosophy; and shall begin with Maimonides's general ideas on the need

of science for intelligent faith and the relation thereto of Jewish

history and literature.

The highest subject of study is metaphysics or theology, the knowledge

of God (_cf._ below, p. 285). This is not merely not forbidden in the

Bible, but it is directly commanded. When Moses says, "That I may know

thee, to the end that I may find grace in thy sight" (Exod. 33, 13), he

intimates that only he finds favor with God who knows him, and not

merely who fasts and prays.[254] Besides, the commandment, "Thou shalt

love the Lord thy God," cannot be fulfilled without a study and

understanding of the whole of nature.[255] Thus, as we shall see, it is

only by a study of physics that we come to understand that affection is

a defect and must therefore be removed from the conception of God. The

same thing applies to the ideas of potentiality and actuality. We should

not know what they signify without a study of physics, nor should we

understand that potentiality is a defect and hence not to be found in

God. It is therefore a duty to study both physics and metaphysics for a

true knowledge of God.[256] At the same time we must recognize that

human reason has a limit and that there are matters which are beyond its

ken. Not to realize this and to deny what has not been proved impossible

is dangerous, and may lead a man astray after the imagination and the

evil desires which quench the light of the intellect. And it is this the

Bible and the Rabbis had in mind in such passages as, "Hast thou found

honey? eat so much as is sufficient for thee; lest thou be filled

therewith, and vomit it" (Prov. 25, 16); or in the following from the

Mishna, "Whoever pries into four things, had better not come into the

world, _viz._, what is above and what is below, what was before and what

will be after" (Hagigah, ch. 2). The meaning is not, as some fools

think, that the Rabbis forbid the use of the reason entirely to reach

what 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 the

allegories of Scripture are thus shown to be a necessity of intelligent

belief, it is not proper to begin with these difficult subjects. One

must first be mature intellectually and possessed of the preliminary

sciences. Otherwise the study of metaphysics is likely not merely to

confuse the mind in its belief, but to destroy belief entirely. It is

like feeding an infant on wheat bread and meat and wine. These are not

bad in themselves, but the infant is not prepared to digest them. That

is why these matters are given in the Bible in the form of allegories,

because the Bible is intended for all--men, women and children--not

because metaphysical ideas are injurious in themselves, as some fools

imagine, who believe they are wise men. For beginners it is sufficient

that they have the right view by tradition and know the existence of

certain beings, without being able to prove the opinions they hold, or

to understand the essence of the being in the existence of which they

believe. This they will acquire gradually if they are capable.[258]

There are five causes preventing the study of metaphysics on the part of

the general masses. First, the difficulty of the subject itself. Second,

the limitations of all people's minds at the beginning. Third, the great

amount of preparatory training that is necessary, and which everybody is

not ready to undertake, however eager he may be to know the results. And

to study metaphysics without preliminary training is worse than not to

study it at all. For there is nothing in existence except God and his

creation. To know God's existence and what is and is not proper to

ascribe to him we must examine his creation; and thus arithmetic, the

nature of number, and the properties of geometrical figures help us a

great deal in determining what attributes are inapplicable to God. Even

much more important for metaphysics is the study of spherical astronomy

and physics, which throw light on the relation of God to the world. Then

there are some theoretical topics which, while not directly of help in

metaphysics, are useful in training the mind and enabling it to know

what is true demonstration. One who wishes therefore to undertake the

study of metaphysics, must first study logic, then the mathematical

sciences in order, then physics, and not until he has mastered all these

introductory branches should he take up metaphysics. This is too much

for most people, who would die in the midst of their preparatory

studies, and if not for tradition would never know whether there is a

God or not, not to speak of knowing what attributes are applicable to

him and what are not.

The fourth cause which keeps people away from the study of metaphysics

is their natural disposition. For it has been shown that intellectual

qualities are dependent upon moral; and the former cannot be perfect

unless the latter are. Now some persons are temperamentally incapable of

right thinking by reason of their passionate nature; and it is foolish

to attempt to teach them, for it is not medicine or geometry, and not

everybody is prepared for it. This is the reason, too, why young men

cannot 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 attention

to this subject.[259]

Like many others before him, Christians as well as Jews, Maimonides also

believed that in ancient times the Jews diligently cultivated the

sciences, which were gradually forgotten on account of foreign

domination. Maimonides adds another reason for their disappearance,

namely, that they were not disseminated abroad. They were confined to a

select few and were not put down in writing but handed down by word of

mouth. As a result only a few hints are found in the Talmud and

Midrashim, where the kernel is small and the husk large, so that people

mistake the husk for the kernel.[260]

He then traces the history of philosophical thinking in Jewish mediæval

literature from the time of the Geonim, and tells us that the little

that is found of the Kalam concerning the Unity of God and related

topics in the works of some of the Geonim and the Karaites in the East

is borrowed from the Mutakallimun of the Mohammedans and constitutes a

small fraction of the writings of the latter on this subject. The first

attempt in this direction among the Moslems was that of the party known

as the Mu`tazila, whom our people followed. Later came the party of the

Ashariya with different opinions which, however, were not adopted by any

of our people. This was not due, he tells us, to a deliberate decision

in favor of the Mu`tazila, but solely to the historical accident of

their chronological priority. On the other hand, the Spanish Jews of

Andalusia adopted the views of the philosophers, _i. e._, the

Aristotelians, so far as they are not in conflict with our religion.

They do not follow the Mutakallimun, and hence what little of the

subject is found in the works of the later writers of this class

resembles our own method and views.[261]

There seems no doubt that whatever other Spanish writers Maimonides had

in mind, whose works are not extant, his characterization fits admirably

the "Emunah Ramah" of Abraham Ibn Daud (_cf._ above, p. 217), and in a

less degree it is also true of Ibn Gabirol, Bahya, Judah Halevi, Moses

and Abraham Ibn Ezra. Bahya as we saw above (p. 86) still retains a good

deal of Kalamistic material and so does Ibn Zaddik (p. 126). As for

Mukammas, Saadia and the two Karaites Al Basir and Jeshua ben Judah, we

have seen (pp. 17, 24, 48, 56) that they move wholly in the ideas of the

Mutakallimun. It becomes of great interest for us therefore to see what

Maimonides thinks of these Islamic theologians, of their origins, of

their methods and of their philosophical value. Maimonides's exposition

and criticism of the principles of the Mutakallimun is of especial

interest, too, because up to recent times his sketch of the tenets of

this school was the only extensive account known; and it has not lost

its value even yet. We shall, however, be obliged to abridge his

detailed exposition in order not to enlarge our volume beyond due

limits. Besides, there is no occasion for repeating what we have already

said of the Kalam in our Introduction (p. xxi ff.); though the account

there 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 Mu`tazila and Ashariya, he says, base

their opinions upon premises and principles borrowed from Greek and

Syrian Christians, who endeavored to refute the opinions of the

philosophers as dangerous to the Christian religion. There was thus a

Christian Kalam prior to the Mohammedan.[262] Their method was to lay

down premises favorable to their religion, and by means of these to

refute the opinions opposed to them. When the Mohammedans came upon the

scene and translated the works of the philosophers, they included in

their work of translation the refutations composed by the Christians. In

this way they found the works of Philoponus, Yahya ben Adi and others;

and adopted also the opinions of the pre-Socratic philosophers, which

they thought would be of help to them, though these had already been

refuted by Aristotle, who came after. Such are the atomic theory of

matter and the belief in the existence of a vacuum. These opinions they

carried to consequences not at all contemplated by their authorities,

who were closer to the philosophers.

To characterize briefly the methods of the Mutakallimun, Maimonides

continues, I would say that the first among them, the Greeks and the

Mohammedans, did not follow reality, but adopted principles which were

calculated to help them in defending their religious theses, and then

interpreted reality to suit their preconceived notions. The later

members of the school no longer saw through the motives of their

predecessors and imagined their principles and arguments were _bona

fide_ refutations of philosophical opinions.

On examination of their works I found, he continues, that with slight

differences they are all alike. They do not put any trust in reality and

nature. For, they say, the so-called laws of nature are nothing more

than the order of events to which we are accustomed. There is no kind of

necessity in them, and it is conceivable they might be different. In

many cases the Mutakallimun follow the imagination and call it reason.

Their method of procedure is as follows. They first state their

preliminary principles, then they prove that the world is "new," _i. e._,

created in time. Then they argue that the world must have had an

originator, and that he is one and incorporeal. All the Mutakallimun

follow this method, and they are imitated by those of our own people who

follow in their footsteps.

To this method I have serious objections, continues Maimonides, for

their arguments in favor of the creation of the world are not convincing

unless one does not know a real demonstration from a dialectical or

sophistic. The most one can do in this line is to invalidate the

arguments for eternity. But the decision of the question is by no means

easy, as is shown by the fact that the controversy is three thousand

years old and not yet settled. Hence it is a risky policy to build the

argument 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 prove

God's existence, unity and incorporeality by the methods of the

philosophers, which are based upon the eternity of the world. Not that I

believe in eternity or that I accept it, but because on this hypothesis

the three fundamental doctrines are validly demonstrated. Having proved

these doctrines we will then return to the problem of the origin of the

world and say what can be said in favor of creation.[263]

This is a new contribution of Maimonides. All the Jewish writers before

Halevi followed in their proofs of the existence of God the method

designated by Maimonides as that of the Kalam. Judah Halevi criticised

the Mutakallimun as well as the philosophers in the interest of a point

of view all his own (pp. 176 ff., 182). Ibn Daud tacitly ignored the

Kalam and based his proof of the existence of God upon the principles of

motion as exhibited in the Aristotelian Physics, without, however,

finding it necessary to assume even provisionally the eternity of motion

and 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 the

eternity of motion, which alone implies infinity of power in God and

hence incorporeality. Maimonides is the first who takes deliberate

account of the Mutakallimun, gives an adequate outline of the essentials

of their teaching and administers a crushing blow to their principles as

well as their method. He then follows up his destructive criticism with

a constructive method, in which he frankly admits that in order to

establish the existence, unity and incorporeality of God--the three

fundamental dogmas of Judaism--beyond the possibility of cavil, we must

make common cause with the philosophers even though it be only for a

moment, until they have done our work for us, and then we may fairly

turn on our benefactors and taking advantage of their weakness, strike

them down, and upon their lifeless arguments for the eternity of the

world establish our own more plausible theory of creation. The attitude

of Maimonides is in brief this. If we were certain of creation, we

should not have to bother with the philosophers. Creation implies the

existence of God. But the question cannot be strictly demonstrated

either way. Hence let us prove the existence of God on the least

promising hypothesis, namely, that of eternity, and we are quite secure

against all possible criticism.

Of the twelve propositions of the Mutakallimun enumerated by Maimonides

as the basis of their doctrine of God, we shall select a few of the most

important.[264]

1. _The Theory of Atoms._ The entire universe is made up of indivisible

bodies having no magnitude. Their combination produces magnitude and

corporeality. They are all alike. Genesis and dissolution means simply

the combination or rather aggregation of atoms and their separation.

These atoms are not eternal, as Epicurus believed them to be, but

created.

2. This atomic theory they extend from magnitude to time. Time also

according to them is composed of moments or atomic units of time.

Neither magnitude, nor matter, nor time is continuous or infinitely

divisible.

3. Applying these ideas to motion they say that motion is the passage of

an 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 they

explain the apparent variation in speed of different motions, as for

example when two bodies cover unequal distances in the same time, by

saying that the body covering the smaller distance had more rests in the

intervals between the motions. The same thing is true in the flight of

an arrow, that there are rests even though the senses do not reveal

them. For the senses cannot be trusted. We must follow the reason.

Maimonides's criticism of the atomic theory of matter and motion just

described is that it undermines the bases of geometry. The diagonal of a

square would be the same length as its side. The properties of

commensurability and incommensurability in lines and surfaces, of

rational and irrational lines would cease to have any meaning. In fact

all that is contained in the tenth book of Euclid would lose its

foundation.

4. The atom is made complete by the accidents, without which it cannot

be. Every atom created by God, they say, must have accidents, such as

color, odor, motion, and so on, except quantity or magnitude, which

according to them is not accident. If a substance has an accident, the

latter is not attributed to the body as a whole, but is ascribed to

every atom of which the body is composed. Thus in a white body every

atom is white, in a moving body every atom is in motion, in a living

body every atom is alive, and every atom is possessed of sense

perception; for life and sense and reason and wisdom are accidents in

their opinion like whiteness and blackness.

6. Accident does not last more than one moment of time. When God creates

an atom he creates at the same time an accident with it. Atom without

accident is impossible. The accident disappears at the end of the moment

unless God creates another of the same kind, and then another, and so

on, as long as he wants the accident of that kind to continue. If he

ceases to create another accident, the substance too disappears.

Their motive in laying down this theory of accidents is in order to

destroy the conception that everything has a peculiar nature, of which

its qualities and functions are the results. They attribute everything

directly to God. God created a particular accident at this moment, and

this is the explanation of its being. If God ceases to create it anew

the next moment, it will cease to be.

7. All that is not atom is accident, and there is no difference between

one kind of accident and another in reference to essentiality. All

bodies 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 the

same as that between individuals of different species. The philosophers

distinguish 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 such

distinction. All forms are accidents. Hence it would follow that there

is no intrinsic reason why man rather than the bat should be a rational

creature. Everything that is conceivable is possible, except what

involves a logical contradiction; and God alone determines at every

instant 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 at

all. When we think we are dyeing a garment red, it is not we who are

doing it at all. God creates the red color in the garment at the time

when 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 beyond

the substance in which it is.

What appears to us as the constancy and regularity of nature is nothing

more than the will of God. Nor is our knowledge of to-day the same as

that of yesterday. Yesterday's is gone and to-day's is created anew. So

when a man moves a pen, it is not he who moves it. God creates motion in

the hand, and at the same time in the pen. The hand is not the cause of

the motion of the pen. In short they deny causation. God is the sole

cause.

In respect to human conduct they are divided. The majority, and the

Ashariya among them, say that when a person moves a pen, God creates

four accidents, no one of which is the cause of the other. They merely

exist in succession, but no more. The first accident is the man's will

to move the pen; the second, his ability to move it; the third, the

motion of the hand; the fourth, the motion of the pen. It follows from

this that when a person does anything, God creates in him a will, the

ability and the act itself, but the act is not the effect of the

ability. The Mu`tazila hold that the ability is the cause of the effect.

9. _Impossibility of the Infinite._ They hold that the infinite is

impossible in any sense, whether actual or potential or accidental. That

an actual infinite is impossible is a matter of proof. So it can be and

has been proved that the potential infinite is possible. For example

extension is infinitely divisible, _i. e._, potentially. As to the

accidental infinite, _i. e._, an infinity of parts of which each ceases

to be as soon as the next appears, this is doubtful. Those who boast of

having proved the eternity of the world say that time is infinite, and

defend their view against criticism by the claim that the successive

parts of time disappear. In the same way these people regard it as

possible that an infinite number of accidents have succeeded each other

on the universal matter, because here too they are not all present now,

the previous having disappeared before the succeeding ones came. The

Mutakallimun do not admit of any kind of infinite. They prove it in this

way. If past time and the world are infinite, then the number of men who

died up to a given point in the past is infinite. The number of men who

died up to a point one thousand years before the former is also

infinite. But this number is less than the other by the number of men

who died during the thousand years between the two starting points.

Hence the infinite is larger than the infinite, which is absurd. If the

accidental infinite were really impossible the theory of the eternity of

the world would be refuted at once. But Alfarabi has shown that the

arguments against accidental infinity are invalid.

10. _Distrust of the Senses._ The senses, they say, cannot be regarded

as criteria of truth and falsehood; for many things the senses cannot

see at all, either because the objects are so fine, or because they are

far away. In other cases the senses are deceptive, as when the large

appears small at a distance, the small appears great in the water, and

the straight appears broken when partly in water and partly without. So

a man with the jaundice sees everything yellow, and one with red bile on

his tongue tastes everything bitter. There is method in their madness.

The motive for this sceptical principle is to evade criticism. If the

senses testify in opposition to their theories, they reply that the

senses cannot be trusted, as they did in their explanation of motion and

in their theory of the succession of created accidents. These are all

ancient theories of the Sophists, as is clear from Galen.[265]

Having given an outline of the fundamental principles of the

Mutakallimun and criticised them, Maimonides next gives their arguments

based upon these principles in favor of creation in time and against

eternity. It will not be worth our while to reproduce them here as they

are not adopted by Maimonides, and we have already met some of them

though in a somewhat modified form before (_cf._ above, pp. 29 ff.).[266]

The Kalamistic proofs for the unity of God are similarly identical for

the most part with those found in Saadia, Bahya and others, and we need

only mention Maimonides's criticism that they are inadequate unless we

assume with the Mutakallimun that all atoms in the universe are of the

same kind. If, however, we adopt Aristotle's theory, which is more

plausible, that the matter of the heavenly bodies is different from that

of the sublunar world, we may defend dualism by supposing that one God

controls the heavens and the other the earth. The inability of the one

to govern the domain of the other would not necessarily argue

imperfection, any more than we who believe in the unity of God regard it

as a defect in God that he cannot make a thing both be and not be. This

belongs to the category of the impossible; and we should likewise class

in the same category the control of a sphere that is independent of one

and belongs to another. This is purely an _argumentum ad hominem_, for

Maimonides does not regard the sublunar and superlunar worlds as

independent of each other. He recognizes the unity of the universe.[267]

Maimonides closes his discussion of the Kalamistic system by citing

their arguments for incorporeality, which he likewise finds inadequate,

both because they are based upon God's unity, which they did not succeed

in proving (Saadia, in so far as he relates the two, bases unity upon

incorporeality), and because of inherent weakness.[268]

Having disposed of the arguments of the Mutakallimun, Maimonides

proceeds to prove the existence, unity and incorporeality of God by the

methods of the philosophers, _i. e._, those who, like Alfarabi and

Avicenna, take their arguments from Aristotle. The chief proof[269] is

based upon the Aristotelian principles of motion and is found in the

eighth book of Aristotle's Physics. We have already met this proof in

Ibn Daud (_cf._ above, p. 217), and the method in Maimonides differs

only in form and completeness, but not in essence. There is, however,

this very important difference that Ibn Daud fights shy of Aristotle's

theory of the eternity of motion and time, thus losing his strongest

argument 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, including

eternity of motion. With this important deviation there is not much in

this part of the Maimonidean discussion which is not already contained,

though less completely, in the "Emunah Ramah" of Abraham Ibn Daud. We

should be tempted to omit these technical arguments entirely if it were

not for the fact that it is in the form which Maimonides gave them that

they became classic in Jewish philosophy, and not in that of Ibn Daud.

The second proof of God's existence, unity and incorporeality, that

based upon the distinction between "possible" and "necessary"

existent,[270] which has its origin in Alfarabi and Avicenna, is also

found 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 began

with their fundamental principles, so here he lays down twenty-six

propositions culled from the Physics and Metaphysics of Aristotle and

his Arabian commentators, and applies them later to prove his points. He

does not attempt to demonstrate them, expecting the reader to take them

for granted, or to be familiar with them from a study of the

philosophical sources. Ibn Daud presupposed less from his readers,

having written as he said, for beginners; hence he proves many of the

propositions which Maimonides lays down dogmatically. Possibly

Maimonides expected his readers to be familiar with the work of his

immediate 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 these

links 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. In

place--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 latter

coming under _per accidens_. An example of motion _per se_ is the motion

of a body from one place to the next; of motion _per accidens_, when the

blackness of an object is said to move from one place to another.

Forcible motion is that of the stone when it is forced upward. Partial

motion is that of a nail of a ship when the ship moves.

7. Every changeable thing is divisible; hence every movable thing is

divisible, _i. e._, every body is divisible. What is not divisible is

not movable, and hence cannot be body.

8. That which is moved _per accidens_ is necessarily at rest because its

motion is not in itself. Hence it cannot have that accidental motion

forever.

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. Both

are corporeal powers.

11. Some things which are in a body are divided with the division of the

body. They are then divided _per accidens_, like colors and other powers

extending throughout the body. Some of the things which constitute the

body are not divisible at all, like soul and intellect.

12. Every power which extends throughout a body is finite, because all

body is finite.

13. None of the kinds of change mentioned in 4 is continuous except

motion of translation; and of this only circular motion.

14. Motion of translation is the first by nature of the motions. For

genesis and decay presuppose qualitative change; and qualitative change

presupposes the approach of the agent causing the change to the thing

undergoing the change. And there is no growth or diminution without

antecedent genesis and decay.

15. Time is an accident following motion and connected with it. The one

cannot exist without the other. No motion except in time, and time

cannot be conceived except with motion. Whatever has no motion does not

come under time.

16. Whatever is incorporeal cannot be subject to number, unless it is a

corporeal power; in which case the individual powers are numbered with

their matters or bearers. Hence the separate forms or Intelligences,

which are neither bodies nor corporeal powers, cannot have the

conception of number connected with them, except when they are related

to one another as cause and effect.

17. Everything that moves, necessarily has a mover, either outside, like

the hand moving the stone, or inside like the animal body, which

consists 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 that

the motor element in the thing is part of the whole thing in motion.

18. If anything passes from potentiality to actuality, the agent that

caused this must be outside the thing. For if it were inside and there

was no obstruction, the thing would never be potential, but always

actual; and if there was an obstruction, which was removed, the agency

which removed the obstruction is the cause which caused the thing to

pass from potentiality to actuality.

19. Whatever has a cause for its existence is a "possible" existent in

so 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 its

existence.

21. Every composite has the cause of its existence in the composition.

Hence it is not in itself a necessary existent; for its existence is

dependent upon the existence of its constituent parts and upon their

composition.

22. All body is composed necessarily of two things, matter and form; and

it necessarily has accidents, _viz._, quantity, figure, situation.

23. Whatever is potential and has in it a possibility may at some time

not exist as an actuality.

24. Whatever is potential is necessarily possessed of matter, for

possibility is always in matter.

25. The principles of an individual compound substance are matter and

form; and there must be an agent, _i. e._, a mover which moves the

object or the underlying matter until it prepares it to receive the

form. This need not be the ultimate mover, but a proximate one having a

particular function. The idea of Aristotle is that matter cannot move

itself. This is the great principle which leads us to investigate into

the existence of the first mover.

Of these twenty-five propositions, Maimonides continues, some are clear

after a little reflection, some again require many premises and proofs,

but they are all proved in the Physics and Metaphysics of Aristotle and

his commentators. My purpose here is, as I said, not to reproduce the

writings of the philosophers. I will simply mention those principles

which we must have for our purpose. I must add, however, one more

proposition, which Aristotle thinks is true and more deserving of belief

than anything else. We will grant him this by way of hypothesis until we

explain what we intend to prove. The proposition is:

26. Time and motion are eternal and actual. Hence there must be a body

moving eternally and existing actually. This is the matter constituting

the substance of the heavenly bodies. Hence the heavens are not subject

to genesis and decay, for their motion is eternal. This presupposes the

possibility of accidental infinity (_cf._ above, p. 251). Aristotle

regards this as true, though it does not seem to me that he claims he

has proved it. His followers and commentators maintain that it is a

necessary proposition and demonstrated. The Mutakallimun, on the other

hand, think it is impossible that there should be an infinite number of

states in succession (_cf._ _ibid._). It seems to me it is neither

necessary nor impossible, but possible. This is, however, not the place

to discuss it.[273]

Now follows the classical proof of the existence of God from motion. It

is in essence the same as that given by Ibn Daud, but much more

elaborate. We shall try to simplify it as much as possible. The numbers

in parentheses in the sequel refer to the preliminary propositions above

given.

We start with something that is known, namely, the motion we see in the

sublunar world, the motion which is involved in all the processes of

genesis and decay and change generally. This motion must have a mover

(25). This mover must have another mover to move it, and this would lead

us to infinity, which is impossible (3). We find, however, that all

motion here below ends with the motion of the heaven. Let us take an

example. The wind is blowing through an opening in the wall. I take a

stone and stop up the hole. Here the stone is moved by the hand, the

hand 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, the

animal soul by a purpose, namely, to stop the hole from which the wind

comes, the purpose by the wind, the wind by the motion of the heavenly

sphere. 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 is

something outside, it is either again a body like the sphere, or an

incorporeal thing, a "Separate Intelligence." If the mover of the sphere

is something within the sphere, two alternatives are again possible. The

internal moving power of the sphere may be a corporeal force extended

throughout the body of the sphere and divisible with it like heat, or an

indivisible power like soul or intellect (10, 11). We thus have four

possibilities in all. The mover of the heavenly sphere may be (a) a body

external to the sphere; (b) a separate incorporeal substance; (c) an

internal corporeal power divisible with the division of the sphere; (d)

an internal indivisible power. Of these four, (a) is impossible. For if

the 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 the

body of the sphere (11). Hence it cannot move infinitely (26). Nor can

we adopt the last alternative, (d). For a soul residing within the

sphere could not alone be the cause of continuous motion. For a soul

that moves its body is itself in motion _per accidens_ (6); and whatever

moves _per accidens_ must necessarily sometime stop (8), and with it the

thing set in motion by it will stop also. There is thus only one

alternative left, (b), _viz._, that the cause of the motion of the

sphere is a "separate" (_i. e._, incorporeal) power, which is itself not

subject to motion either _per se_ or _per accidens_; hence it is

indivisible and unchangeable (7, 5). This is God. He cannot be two or

more, for "separate" essences which are not body are not subject to

number 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 unity

and incorporeality. But, it will be observed, if not for the

twenty-sixth proposition concerning the eternity of motion, which

implies an infinite power, we should not have been forced to the

alternative (b), and could have adopted (c) as well as (d). That is, we

might have concluded that God is the soul of the heavenly sphere

resident within it, or even that he is a corporeal force pervading the

extension of the sphere as heat pervades an ordinary body. But we must

admit that in this way we prove only the existence of a God who is the

cause of the heavenly motions, and through these of the processes of

genesis and decay, hence of all the life of our sublunar world. This is

not the God of Jewish tradition, who creates out of nothing, who is the

cause of the being of the universe as well as of its life processes.

Maimonides was aware of this defect in the Aristotelian view, and he

later repudiates the Stagirite's theory of eternal motion on

philosophical as well as religious grounds. Before, however, we speak of

Maimonides's attitude in this matter, we must for completeness' sake

briefly mention three other proofs for the existence of God as given by

Maimonides. They are not strictly Aristotelian, though they are based

upon Peripatetic principles cited above and due to the Arabian

commentators of Aristotle.

The second proof is as follows. If we find a thing composed of two

elements, and one of these elements is also found separately, it follows

that the other element is found separately also. Now we frequently find

the two elements of _causing motion_ and _being moved_ combined in the

same object. And we also find things which are moved only, but do not

cause motion, as for example matter, or the stone in the last proof. It

stands to reason therefore that there is something that causes motion

without being itself subject to motion. Not being subject to motion, it

is indivisible, incorporeal and not subject to time, as above.

The third proof is based upon the idea of necessary existence. There is

no doubt that there are existing things, for example the things we

perceive 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 passing

out, of being. The second hypothesis is likewise untrue. For if all

things are subject to genesis and decay, there is a possibility that at

some 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 the

world has been going on from eternity, the possibility just spoken of

must have been realized--a possibility that is never realized is not a

possibility--and nothing existed at all at that moment. But in that case

how could they ever have come into being, since there was nothing to

bring them into being? And yet they do exist, as ourselves for example

and everything else. There is only one alternative left, therefore, and

that is that beside the great majority of things subject to genesis and

decay, there is a being not subject to change, a necessary existent, and

ultimately 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 body

nor 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 be

something added to the essence of each, and neither would then be

necessary _per se_, but _per_ that element of necessary existence which

is common to both.

The last argument against dualism may also be formulated as follows. If

there are two Gods, they must have something in common--that in virtue

of which they are Gods--and something in which they differ, which makes

them two and not one. If each of them has in addition to divinity a

differential element, they are both composite, and neither is the first

cause or the necessary existent (19). If one of them only has this

differentia, then this one is composite and is not the first cause.

The fourth proof is very much like the first, but is based upon the

ideas of potentiality and actuality instead of motion. But when we

consider that Aristotle defines motion in terms of potentiality and

actuality, the fourth proof is identical with the first. It reads in

Maimonides as follows: We see constantly things existing potentially and

coming into actuality. Every such thing must have an agent outside (18).

It is clear, too, that this agent was first an agent potentially and

then became one actually. This potentiality was due either to an

obstacle in the agent himself or to the absence of a certain relation

between the agent and its effect. In order that the potential agent may

become an actual agent, there is need of another agent to remove the

obstacle or to bring about the needed relation between the agent and the

thing to be acted upon. This agent requires another agent, and so it

goes _ad infinitum_. As this is impossible, we must stop somewhere with

an agent that is always actual and in one condition. This agent cannot

be material, but must be a "separate" (24). But the _separate_ in which

there is no kind of potentiality and which exists _per se_, is God. As

we have already proved him incorporeal, he is one (16).[274]

We must now analyze the expressions _incorporeal_ and _one_, and see

what in strictness they imply, and how our logical deductions agree with

Scripture. Many persons, misled by the metaphorical expressions in the

Bible, think of God as having a body with organs and senses on the

analogy of ours. Others are not so crude as to think of God in

anthropomorphic terms, nor are they polytheists, and yet for the same

reason, namely, misunderstanding of Scriptural expressions, ascribe a

plurality of essential attributes to God. We must therefore insist on

the absolute incorporeality of God and explain the purpose of Scripture

in expressing itself in anthropomorphic terms, and on the other hand

emphasize the absolute unity of God against the believers in essential

attributes.

Belief in God as body or as liable to suffer affection is worse than

idolatry. For the idolater does not deny the existence of God; he merely

makes the mistake of supposing that the image of his own construction

resembles a being which mediates between him and God. And yet because

this leads to erroneous belief on the part of the people, who are

inclined to worship the image itself instead of God (for the people

cannot discriminate between the outward act and its idea), the Bible

punishes idolatry with death, and calls the idolater a man who angers

God. 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 surely

causes the anger of God to burn. Habit and custom and the evidence of

the literal understanding of the Biblical text are no more an excuse for

this 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 some

false 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 it

out. A person is not an unbeliever for not being able to _prove_ the

incorporeality of God. He _is_ an unbeliever if he thinks God is

corporeal.[275]

The expressions in the Bible which have led many to err so grievously in

their conceptions of God are due to a desire on the part of their

authors 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 of

him as body, for this is the only thing that suggests real existence to

the masses. It was necessary to endow him with motion, as this alone

denotes life; to ascribe to him seeing, hearing, and so on, in order to

indicate that he understands; to represent him as speaking, in order to

show that he communicates with prophets, because to the minds of common

people this is the only way in which ideas are communicated from one

person to another. As we are active by our sense of touch, God, too, is

described as doing. He is given a soul, to denote that he is alive. Then

as all these activities are among us done by means of organs, these also

are ascribed to God, as feet, hands, ear, eye, nose, mouth, tongue,

voice, fingers, palm, arm. In other words, to show that God has all

perfections, certain senses are ascribed to him; and to indicate these

senses the respective organs are related to them, organs of motion to

denote life, of sensation to denote understanding, of touch to denote

activity, of speech to denote revelation. As a matter of fact, however,

since all these organs and perceptions and powers in man and animals are

due to imperfection and are for the purpose of satisfying various wants

for the preservation of the individual or the species, and God has no

wants of any kind, he has no such powers or organs.[276]

Having disposed of crude anthropomorphism we must now take up the

problem of attributes, which endangers the unity. It is a self-evident

truth that an attribute is something different from the essence of a

thing. It is an accident added to the essence. Otherwise it is the thing

over again, or it is the definition of the thing and the explanation of

the name, and signifies that the thing is composed of these elements. If

we say God has many attributes, it will follow that there are many

eternals. The only belief in true unity is to think that God is one

simple substance without composition or multiplicity of elements, but

one in all respects and aspects. Some go so far as to say that the

divine attributes are neither God's essence nor anything outside of his

essence. This is absurd. It is saying words which have nothing

corresponding to them in fact. A thing is either the same as another, or

it is not the same. There is no other alternative. The imagination is

responsible for this error. Because bodies as we know them always have

attributes, they thought that God, too, is made up of many essential

elements or attributes.

Attributes may be of five kinds:

1. The attributes of a thing may be its definition, which denotes its

essence as determined by its causes. This everyone will admit cannot be

in 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 the

definition of man, "rational animal" being the whole definition. This

can apply to God no more than the first; for if there is a part in God's

essence, he is composite.

3. An attribute may be an expression which characterizes not the essence

of the thing but its quality. Quality is one of the nine categories of

accident, 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 be

applicable to God; but after reflection we find that it is not. There

can be no relation of time between God and anything else; because time

is the measure of motion, and motion is an accident of body. God is not

corporeal. In the same way it is clear that there cannot be a relation

of place between God and other things. But neither can there be any

other kind of relation between God and his creation. For God is a

necessary existent, while everything else is a possible existent. A

relation exists only between things of the same proximate species, as

between white and black. If the things have only a common genus, and

still more so if they belong to two different genera, there is no

relation between them. If there were a relation between God and other

things, he would have the accident of relation, though relation is the

least serious of attributes, since it does not necessitate a

multiplicity of eternals, nor change in God's essence owing to change in

the related things.

5. An attribute may characterize a thing by reference to its effects or

works, not in the sense that the thing or author of the effect has

acquired a character by reason of the product, like carpenter, painter,

blacksmith, but merely in the sense that he is the one who made a

particular thing. An attribute of this kind is far removed from the

essence of the thing so characterized by it; and hence we may apply it

to God, provided we remember that the varied effects need not be

produced by different elements in the agent, but are all done by the one

essence.

Those who believe in attributes divide them into two classes, and number

the following four as _essential_ attributes, not derived from God's

effects like "creator," which denotes God's relation to his work, since

God did not create himself. The four essential attributes about which

all agree are, living, powerful, wise, possessed of will. Now if by wise

is meant God's knowledge of himself, there might be some reason for

calling it an essential attribute; though in that case it implies

"living," and there is no need of two. But they refer the attribute wise

to God's knowledge of the world, and then there is no reason for calling

it 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 that

there is something additional in his essence by which he created the

heavens, something else with which he created the elements, and a third

with which he created the Intelligences, so we do not say that he has

one attribute with which he exercises power, another with which he

wills, a third with which he knows, and so on, but his essence is simple

and one.[277]

Four things must be removed from God: (1) corporeality, (2) affection,

(3) potentiality, (4) resemblance to his creatures. The first we have

already proved. The second implies change, and the author of the change

cannot 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 would

cause the change in him. So all want must be removed from him; for he

who is in want of something is potential, and in order to pass into

actuality requires an agent having that quality _in actu_. The fourth is

also evident; for resemblance involves relation. As there is no relation

between God and ourselves, there is no resemblance. Resemblance can

exist only between things of the same species. All the expressions

including "existent" are applied to God and to ourselves in a homonymous

sense (_cf._ above, p. 240). The use is not even analogical; for in

analogy there must be some resemblance between the things having the

same name, but not so here. Existence in things which are determined by

causes (and this includes all that is not God), is not identical with

the essence of those things. The essence is that which is expressed in

the definition, whereas the existence or non-existence of the thing so

defined is not part of the definition. It is an accident added to the

essence. In God the case is different. His existence has no cause, since

he is a necessary existent; hence his existence is identical with his

essence. So we say God exists, but not with existence, as we do.

Similarly he is living, but not with life; knowing, but not with

knowledge; powerful, but not with power; wise, but not with wisdom.

Unity and plurality are also accidents of things which are one or many

as 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 our

ideas 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. To

correct the inexactness of the expression, we add, "but not with unity."

So we say "eternal" to indicate that he is not "new," though in reality

eternal 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 there

is none other like him; and when Scripture speaks of him as the first

and the last, the meaning is that he does not change.

The only true attributes of God are the negative ones. Negative

attributes, too, by excluding the part of the field in which the thing

to be designated is not contained, bring us nearer to the thing itself;

though unlike positive attributes they do not designate any part of the

thing itself. God cannot have positive attributes because he has no

essence different from his existence for the attributes to designate,

and surely no accidents. Negative attributes are of value in leading us

to a knowledge of God, because in negation no plurality is involved. So

when we have proved that there is a being beside these sensible and

intelligible things, and we say he is existent, we mean that his

non-existence is unthinkable. In the same way living means not dead;

incorporeal is negative; eternal signifies not caused; powerful means

not weak; wise--not ignorant; willing denotes that creation proceeds

from him not by natural necessity like heat from fire or light from the

sun, but with purpose and design and method. All attributes therefore

are either derived from God's effects or, if they have reference to

himself, are meant to exclude their opposites, _i. e._, are really

negatives. This does not mean, however, that God is devoid of a quality

which he might have, but in the sense in which we say a stone does not

see, meaning that it does not pertain to the nature of the stone to

see.[278]

All the names of God except the tetragrammaton designate his activities

in the world. Jhvh alone is the real name of God, which belongs to him

alone and is not derived from anything else. Its meaning is unknown. It

denotes perhaps the idea of necessary existence. All the other so-called

divine names used by the writers of talismans and charms are quite

meaningless and absurd. The wonderful claims these people bespeak for

them are not to be believed by any intelligent man.[279]

The above account of Maimonides's doctrine of attributes shows us that

he followed the same line of thought as his predecessors. His treatment

is more thorough and elaborate, and his requirements of the religionist

more stringent. He does not even allow attributes of relation, which

were admitted by Ibn Daud. Negative attributes and those taken from

God's effects are the only expressions that may be applied to God. This

is decidedly not a Jewish mode of conceiving of God, but it is not even

Aristotelian. Aristotle has very little to say about God's attributes,

it is true, but there seems no warrant in the little he does say for

such an absolutely transcendental and agnostic conception as we find in

Maimonides. To Aristotle God is pure form, thought thinking itself. In

so far as he is thought we may suppose him to be similar in kind, though

not in degree, to human thought. The only source of Maimonides's ideas

is to be sought in Neo-Platonism, in the so-called Theology of Aristotle

which, however, Maimonides never quotes. He need not have used it

himself. He was a descendant of a long line of thinkers, Christian,

Mohammedan and Jewish, in which this problem was looked at from a

Neo-Platonic point of view; and the Theology of Aristotle had its share

in forming the views of his predecessors. The idea of making God

transcendent appealed to Maimonides, and he carried it to the limit. How

he could combine such transcendence with Jewish prayer and ceremony it

is hard to tell; but it would be a mistake to suppose that his

philosophical deductions represented his last word on the subject. As in

Philo so in Maimonides, his negative theology was only a means to a

positive. Its purpose was to emphasize God's perfection. And in the

admission, nay maintenance, of man's inability to understand God lies

the solution of the problem we raised above. Prayer _is_ answered, man

_is_ protected by divine Providence; and if we cannot understand how, it

is because the matter is beyond our limited intellect.

Having discussed the existence and nature of God, our next problem is

the existence of angels and their relation to the "Separate

Intelligences" of the philosophers. In this matter, too, Ibn Daud

anticipated Maimonides, though the latter is more elaborate in his

exposition as well as criticism of the extreme philosophic view. He

adopts as much of Aristotelian (or what he thought was Aristotelian)

doctrine as is compatible in his mind with the Bible and subject to

rigorous demonstration, and rejects the rest on philosophic as well as

religious grounds.

The existence of separate intelligences he proves in the same way as Ibn

Daud from the motions of the celestial spheres. These motions cannot be

purely "natural," _i. e._, unconscious and involuntary like the

rectilinear motions of the elements, fire, air, water and earth, because

in that case they would stop as soon as they came to their natural

place, as is true of the elements (_cf._ above, p. xxxiii); whereas the

spheres actually move in a circle and never stop. We must therefore

assume that they are endowed with a soul, and their motions are

conscious and voluntary. But it is not sufficient to regard them as

irrational creatures, for on this hypothesis also their motions would

have to cease as soon as they attained the object of their desire, or

escaped the thing they wish to avoid. Neither object can be accomplished

by circular motion, for one approaches in this way the thing from which

one flees, and flees the object which one approaches. The only way to

account for continuous circular motion is by supposing that the sphere

is endowed with reason or intellect, and that its motion is due to a

desire on its part to attain a certain conception. God is the object of

the conception of the sphere, and it is the love of God, to whom the

sphere desires to become similar, that is the cause of the sphere's

motion. So far as the sphere is a body, it can accomplish this only by

circular motion; for this is the only continuous act possible for a

body, and it is the simplest of bodily motions.

Seeing, however, that there are many spheres having different kinds of

motions, varying in speed and direction, Aristotle thought that this

difference must be due to the difference in the objects of their

conceptions. Hence he posited as many separate Intelligences as there

are spheres. That is, he thought that intermediate between God and the

rational spheres there are pure incorporeal intelligences, each one

moving 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 assumed

there were fifty separate Intelligences. The mathematical sciences in

Aristotle's day were imperfect, and the astronomers thought that for

every motion visible in the sky there must be a sphere, not knowing that

the inclination of one sphere may be the cause of a number of apparent

motions. Later writers making use of the more advanced state of

astronomical science, reduced the number of Intelligences to ten,

corresponding to the ten spheres as follows: the seven planetary

spheres, the sphere of the fixed stars, the diurnal sphere embracing

them all and giving all of them the motion from east to west, and the

sphere of the elements surrounding the earth. Each one of these is in

charge of an Intelligence. The last separate Intelligence is the Active

Intellect, which is the cause of our mind's passing from potentiality to

actuality, and of the various processes of sublunar life generally.

These are the views of Aristotle and his followers concerning the

separate Intelligences. And in a general way his views, says Maimonides,

are not incompatible with the Bible. What he calls Intelligences the

Scriptures call angels. Both are pure forms and incorporeal. Their

rationality is indicated in the nineteenth Psalm, "The heavens declare

the glory of God." That God rules the world through them is evident from

a 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 confuse

their speech" (_ib._ 11, 7) is explained by the Rabbis in the statement

that "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 says

that God looks into the world of Ideas and produces the universe.[281]

For once Maimonides in the last Rabbinic quotation actually hit upon a

passage which owes its content to Alexandrian and possibly Philonian

influence. Having no idea of the Alexandrian School and of the works of

Philo and his relation to some theosophic passages in the Haggadah, he

made no distinction between Midrash and Bible, and read Plato and

Aristotle in both alike, as we shall see more particularly later.

Maimonides's detailed criticism of Aristotle we shall see later. For the

present he agrees that the philosophic conception of separate

Intelligences is the same as the Biblical idea of angels with this

exception that according to Aristotle these Intelligences and powers are

all eternal and proceed from God by natural necessity, whereas the

Jewish view is that they are created. God created the separate

Intelligences; he likewise created the spheres as rational beings and

implanted in them a desire for the Intelligences which accounts for

their various motions.

Now Maimonides has prepared the ground and is ready to take up the

question of the origin of the world, which was left open above. He

enumerates three views concerning this important matter.

1. _The Biblical View._ God created everything out of nothing. Time

itself is a creation, which did not exist when there was no world. For

time is a measure of motion, and motion cannot be without a moving

thing. Hence no motion and no time without a world.

2. _The Platonic View._ The world as we see it now is subject to genesis

and decay; hence it originated in time. But God did not make it out of

nothing. That a composite of matter and form should be made out of

nothing or should be reduced to nothing is to the Platonists an

impossibility 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 say

that God cannot do it argues no defect in him. They believe therefore

that there is an eternal matter, the effect of God to be sure, but

co-eternal with him, which he uses as the potter does the clay.

3. _The Aristotelian View._ Time and motion are eternal. The heavens and

the spheres are not subject to genesis and decay, hence they were always

as they are now. And the processes of change in the lower world existed

from eternity as they exist now. Matter is not subject to genesis and

decay; it simply takes on forms one after the other, and this has been

going on from eternity. It results also from his statements, though he

does not say it in so many words, that it is impossible there should be

a change in God's will. He is the cause of the universe, which he

brought into being by his will, and as his will does not change, the

universe has existed this way from eternity.

The arguments of Aristotle and his followers by which they defend their

view of the eternity of the world are based partly upon the nature of

the world, and partly upon the nature of God. Some of these arguments

are as follows:

Motion is not subject to beginning and end. For everything that comes

into being after a state of non-existence requires motion to precede it,

namely, the actualization from non-being. Hence if motion came into

being, there was motion before motion, which is a contradiction. As

motion and time go together, time also is eternal.

Again, the prime matter common to the four elements is not subject to

genesis and decay. For all genesis is the combination of a pre-existing

matter with a new form, namely, the form of the generated thing. If

therefore the prime matter itself came into being, there must be a

previous matter from which it came, and the thing that resulted must be

endowed with form. But this is impossible, since the prime matter has no

matter 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 he

created it he was a creator potentially and then became a creator

actually. There is then potentiality in the creator, and there must be a

cause which changed him from a potential to an actual creator.

Again, an agent acts at a particular time and not at another because of

reasons and circumstances preventing or inducing action. In God there

are no accidents or hindrances. Hence he acts always.

Again, how is it possible that God was idle an eternity and only

yesterday made the world? For thousands of years and thousands of worlds

before this one are after all as yesterday in comparison with God's

eternity.

These arguments Maimonides answers first by maintaining that Aristotle

himself, as can be inferred from his manner, does not regard his

discussions favoring the eternity of the world as scientific

demonstrations. Besides, there is a fundamental flaw in Aristotle's

entire attitude to the question of the ultimate principles and

beginnings of things. All his arguments in favor of eternity of motion

and of the world are based upon the erroneous assumption that the world

as a whole must have come into being in the same way as its parts appear

now after the world is here. According to this supposition it is easy to

prove that motion must be eternal, that matter is not subject to

genesis, and so on. Our contention is that at the beginning, when God

created the world, there were not these laws; that he created matter

_out of nothing_, and then made it the basis of all generation and

destruction.

We can also answer the arguments in favor of eternity taken from the

nature of God. The first is that God would be passing from potentiality

to 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 answer

is that this applies only to material things but not to immaterial,

which are always active whether they produce visible results or not. The

term action is a homonym (_cf._ above, p. 240), and the conditions

applying 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 determined

by a purpose external to himself is subject to influences positive and

negative, which now induce, now hinder his activity. A person desires to

have a house and does not build it by reason of obstacles of various

sorts. When these are removed, he builds the house. In the case of an

agent whose will has no object external to itself this does not hold. If

he does not act always, it is because it is the nature of will sometimes

to will and sometimes not. Hence this does not argue change.[282]

So far our results have been negative. We have not proved that God did

create the world in time; we have only taken the edge off the

Aristotelian arguments and thereby shown that the doctrine of creation

is not impossible. We must now proceed to show that there are positive

reasons which make creation a more plausible theory than eternity.

The gist of Maimonides's arguments here is that the difference between

eternity and creation resolves itself into a more fundamental difference

between an impersonal mechanical law as the explanation of the universe

and an intelligent personality acting with will, purpose and design.

Aristotle endeavors to explain all motions in the world above the moon

as well as below in terms of mechanics. He succeeds pretty well as far

as the sublunar world is concerned, and no one who is free from

prejudice can fail to see the cogency of his reasoning. If he were just

as convincing in his explanation of celestial phenomena on the

mechanical principle as he is in his interpretation of sublunar events,

eternity of the world would be a necessary consequence. Uniformity and

absolute necessity of natural law are more compatible with an eternal

world than with a created one. But Aristotle's method breaks down the

moment he leaves the sublunar sphere. There are too many phenomena

unaccounted for in his system.

Aristotle tries to find a reason why the heavens move from east to west

and not in the opposite direction; and his explanation for the

difference in speed of the motions of the various spheres is that it is

due to their relative proximity to the outer sphere, which is the cause

of this motion and which it communicates to all the other spheres under

it. But his reasons are inadequate, for some of the swift moving spheres

are below the slow moving and some are above. When he says that the

reason the sphere of the fixed stars moves so slowly from west to east

is because it is so near to the diurnal sphere (the outer sphere), which

moves from east to west, his explanation is wonderfully clever.[283] But

when he infers from this that the farther a sphere is from the fixed

stars the more rapid is its motion from west to east, his conclusion is

not true to fact. Or let us consider the existence of the stars in the

spheres. The matter of the stars must be different from that of the

spheres, for the latter move, whereas the stars are always stationary.

Now what has put these two different matters together? Stranger still is

the existence and distribution of the fixed stars in the eighth sphere.

Some parts are thickly studded with stars, others are very thin. In the

planetary spheres what is the reason (since the sphere is simple and

uniform throughout) that the star occupies the particular place that it

does? This can scarcely be a matter of necessity. It will not do to say

that the differences in the motions of the spheres are due to the

separate Intelligences for which the respective spheres have a desire.

For the Intelligences are not bodies, and hence do not occupy any

position relative to the spheres. There must therefore be a being who

determines their various motions.

Further, it is argued on the philosophical side that from a simple cause

only a simple effect can follow; and that if the cause is composite, as

many effects will follow as there are simple elements in the cause.

Hence from God directly can come only one simple Intelligence. This

first Intelligence produces the second, the second produces the third,

and so on (_cf._ above, p. 178). Now according to this idea, no matter

how many Intelligences are produced in this successive manner, the last,

even if he be the thousandth, would have to be simple. Where then does

composition arise? Even if we grant that the farther the Intelligences

are removed from the first cause the more composite they become by

reason of the composite nature of their ideas or thoughts, how can we

explain the emanation of a sphere from an Intelligence, seeing that the

one is body, the other Intellect? Granting again this also on the ground

that the Intelligence producing the sphere is composite (since it thinks

itself and another), and hence one of its parts produces the next lower

Intelligence and the other the sphere, there is still this difficulty

that the part of the Intelligence producing the sphere is simple,

whereas the sphere has four elements--the matter and the form of the

sphere, and the matter and the form of the star fixed in the sphere.