LEVI BEN GERSON
Among the men who devoted themselves to philosophical investigation in
the century and a half after Maimonides's death, the greatest and most
independent was without doubt Levi ben Gerson or Gersonides, as he is
also called. There were others who were active as commentators,
translators and original writers, and who achieved a certain fame, but
their work was too little original to merit more than very brief notice
in these pages. Isaac Albalag[331a] (second half of thirteenth century)
owes what reputation he enjoys to the boldness with which he enunciated
certain doctrines, such as the eternity of the world and particularly
the notion, well enough known among the Averroists of the University of
Paris at that time and condemned by the Church, but never before
announced or defended in Jewish philosophy--the so-called doctrine of
the twofold truth. This was an attitude assumed in self-defence,
sincerely or not as the case may be, by a number of scholastic writers,
who advanced philosophic views at variance with the dogma of the Church.
They maintained that a given thesis might be true and false at the same
time, true for philosophy and false for theology, or vice versa.[332]
Shem Tob Falaquera (1225-1290) is a more important man than Albalag. He
was a thorough student of the Aristotelian and other philosophy that was
accessible to him through his knowledge of Arabic. Munk's success in
identifying Avicebron with Gabirol (p. 63) was made possible by
Falaquera's translation into Hebrew of extracts from the "Fons Vitæ." Of
great importance also is Falaquera's commentary of Maimonides's "Guide,"
which, with that of Moses of Narbonne (d. after 1362), is based upon a
knowledge of Arabic and a thorough familiarity with the Aristotelian
philosophy of the Arabs, and is superior to the better known
commentaries of Shemtob, Ephodi, and Abarbanel. Falaquera also wrote
original works of an ethical and philosophical character.
Joseph Ibn Caspi (1297-1340) is likewise a meritorious figure as a
commentator of Maimonides and as a philosophical exegete of Scripture.
But none of these men stands out as an independent thinker with a strong
individuality, carrying forward in any important and authoritative
degree the work of the great Maimonides. Great Talmudic knowledge, which
was a necessary qualification for national recognition, these men seem
not to have had; and on the other hand none of them felt called upon or
able to make a systematic synthesis of philosophy and Judaism in a large
way.
Levi ben Gerson (1288-1344) was the first after Maimonides who can at
all be compared with the great sage of Fostat. He was a great
mathematician and astronomer; he wrote supercommentaries on the
Aristotelian commentaries of Averroes, who in his day had become the
source of philosophical knowledge for the Hebrew student; he was
thoroughly versed in the Talmud as his commentary on the Pentateuch
shows; and he is one of the recognized Biblical exegetes of the middle
ages. Finally in his philosophical masterpiece "Milhamot Adonai" (The
Wars of the Lord),[333] he undertakes to solve in a thoroughly
scholastic manner those problems in philosophy and theology which
Maimonides had either not treated adequately or had not solved to
Gersonides's satisfaction. That despite the technical character and
style of the "Milhamot," Gersonides achieved such great reputation shows
in what esteem his learning and critical power were held by his
contemporaries. His works were all written in Hebrew, and if he had any
knowledge of Arabic and Latin it was very limited, too limited to enable
him to make use of the important works written in those languages.[334]
His fame extended beyond the limits of Jewish thought, as is shown by
the fact that his scientific treatise dealing with the astronomical
instrument he had discovered was translated into Latin in 1377 by order
of Pope Clement VI, and his supercommentaries on the early books of the
Aristotelian logic were incorporated, in Latin translation, in the Latin
editions of Aristotle and Averroes of the 16th century.[335]
Levi ben Gerson's general attitude to philosophical study and its
relation to the content of Scripture is the same as had become common
property through Maimonides and his predecessors. The happiness and
perfection of man are the purpose of religion and knowledge. This
perfection of man, or which is the same thing, the perfection of the
human soul, is brought about through perfection in morals and in
theoretical speculation, as will appear more clearly when we discuss the
nature of the human intellect and its immortality. Hence the purpose of
the Bible is to lead man to perfect himself in these two
elements--morals and science. For this reason the Law consists of three
parts. The first is the legal portion of the Law containing the 613
commandments, mandatory and prohibitive, concerning belief and practice.
This is preparatory to the second and third divisions of the Pentateuch,
which deal respectively with social and ethical conduct, and the science
of existence. As far as ethics is concerned it was not practicable to
lay down definite commandments and prohibitions because it is so
extremely difficult to reach perfection in this aspect of life. Thus if
the Torah gave definite prescriptions for exercising and controlling our
anger, our joy, our courage, and so on, the results would be very
discouraging, for the majority of men would be constantly disobeying
them. And this would lead to the neglect of the other commandments
likewise. Hence the principles of social and ethical conduct are
inculcated indirectly by means of narratives exemplifying certain types
of character in action and the consequences flowing from their conduct.
The third division, as was said before, contains certain teachings of a
metaphysical character respecting the nature of existence. This is the
most important of all, and hence forms the beginning of the Pentateuch.
The account of creation is a study in the principles of philosophical
physics.[336]
As to the relations of reason and belief or authority, Levi ben Gerson
shares in the optimism of the Maimonidean school and the philosophic
middle age generally, that there is no opposition between them. The
priority should be given to reason where its demands are unequivocal,
for the meaning of the Scriptures is not always clear and is subject to
interpretation.[337] On the other hand, after having devoted an entire
book of his "Milhamot" to a minute investigation of the nature of the
human intellect and the conditions of its immortality, he disarms in
advance all possible criticism of his position from the religious point
of view by saying that he is ready to abandon his doctrine if it is
shown that it is in disagreement with religious dogma. He developed his
views, he tells us, because he believes that they are in agreement with
the words of the Torah.[338] This apparent contradiction is to be
explained by making a distinction between the abstract statement of the
principle and the concrete application thereof. In general Levi ben
Gerson is so convinced of man's prerogative as a rational being that he
cannot believe the Bible meant to force upon him the belief in things
which are opposed to reason. Hence, since the Bible is subject to
interpretation, the demands of the reason are paramount where they do
not admit of doubt. On the other hand, where the traditional dogma of
Judaism is clear and outspoken, it is incumbent upon man to be modest
and not to claim the infallibility of direct revelation for the limited
powers of logical inference and deduction.
We must now give a brief account of the questions discussed in the
"Milhamot Adonai." And first a word about Gersonides's style and method.
One is reminded, in reading the Milhamot, of Aristotle as well as Thomas
Aquinas. There is no rhetoric and there are no superfluous words. All is
precise and technical, and the vocabulary is small. One is surprised to
see how in a brief century or so the Hebrew language has become so
flexible an instrument in the expression of Aristotelian ideas. Levi ben
Gerson does not labor in the expression of his thought. His linguistic
instrument is quite adequate and yields naturally to the manipulation of
the author. Gersonides, the minute logician and analyst, has no use for
rhetorical flourishes and figures of speech. The subject, he says, is
difficult enough as it is, without being made more so by rhetorical
obscuration, unless one intends to hide the confusion of one's thought
under the mask of fine writing.[339] Like Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas,
he gives a history of the opinions of others in the topic under
discussion, and enumerates long lists of arguments _pro_ and _con_ with
rigorous logical precision. The effect upon the reader is monotonous and
wearisome. Aristotle escapes this by the fact that he is groping his way
before us. He has not all his ideas formulated in proper order and form
ready to deliver. He is primarily the investigator, not the pedagogue,
and the brevity and obscurity of his style pique the ambitious reader
and spur him on to puzzle out the meaning. Not so Thomas Aquinas and the
scholastics generally. As the term scholastic indicates, they developed
their method in the schools. They were expositors of what was ready
made, rather than searchers for the new. Hence the question of form was
an important one and was determined by the purpose of presenting one's
ideas as clearly as may be to the student. Add to this that the logic of
Aristotle and the syllogism was the universal method of presentation and
the monotony and wearisomeness becomes evident. Levi ben Gerson is in
this respect like Aquinas rather than like Aristotle. And he is the
first of his kind in Jewish literature. Since the larger views and
problems were already common property, the efforts of Gersonides were
directed to a more minute discussion of the more technical details of
such problems as the human intellect, prophecy, Providence, creation,
and so on. For this reason, too, it will not be necessary for us to do
more than give a brief résumé of the results of Gersonides's
lucubrations without entering into the really bewildering and
hair-splitting arguments and distinctions which make the book so hard on
the reader.
We have already had occasion in the Introduction (p. xxxvi) to refer
briefly to Aristotle's theory of the intellect and the distinction
between the passive and the active intellects in man. The ideas of the
Arabs were also referred to in our treatment of Judah Halevi, Ibn Daud
and Maimonides (pp. 180 f., 213 f., 282). Hillel ben Samuel, as we saw
(p. 317 ff.), was the first among the Jews who undertook to discuss in
greater detail the essence of the three kinds of intellect, material,
acquired and active, as taught by the Mohammedan and Christian
Scholastics, and devoted some space to the question of the unity of the
material intellect. Levi ben Gerson takes up the same question of the
nature of the material intellect and discusses the various views with
more rigor and minuteness than any of his Jewish predecessors. His chief
source was Averroes. The principal views concerning the nature of the
possible or material intellect in man were those attributed to Alexander
of Aphrodisias, the most important Greek commentator of Aristotle (lived
about 200 of the Christian Era), Themistius, another Aristotelian Greek
commentator who lived in the time of Emperor Julian, and Averroes, the
famous Arabian philosopher and contemporary of Maimonides. All these
three writers pretended to expound Aristotle's views of the passive
intellect rather than propound their own. And Levi ben Gerson discusses
their ideas before giving his own.
Alexander's idea of the passive intellect in man is that it is simply a
capacity residing in the soul for receiving the universal forms of
material things. It has no substantiality of its own, and hence does not
survive the lower functions of the soul, namely, sensation and
imagination, which die with the body. This passive intellect is
actualized through the Active Intellect, which is not a part of man at
all, but is identified by Alexander with God. The Active Intellect is
thus pure form and actuality, and enables the material or possible
intellect in man, originally a mere potentiality, to acquire general
ideas, and thus to become an intellect with a content. This is called
the actual or acquired intellect, which though at first dependent on the
data of sense, may succeed later in continuing its activity unaided by
sense perception. And in so far as the acquired intellect thinks of the
purely immaterial ideas and things which make up the content of the
divine intellect (the Active Intellect), it becomes identified with the
latter and is immortal. The reason for supposing that the material
intellect in man is a mere capacity residing in the soul and not an
independent substance is because as having the capacity to receive all
kinds of forms it must itself not be of any form. Thus in order that the
sense of sight may receive all colors as they are, it must itself be
free from color. If the sight had a color of its own, this would prevent
it from receiving other colors. Applying this principle to the intellect
we make the same inference that it must in itself be neutral, not
identified with any one idea or form, else this would color all else
knocking for admission, and the mind would not know things as they are.
Now a faculty which has no form of its own, but is a mere mirror so to
speak of all that may be reflected in it, cannot be a substance, and
must be simply a power inherent in a substance and subject to the same
fate as that in which it inheres. This explains the motive of
Alexander's view and is at the same time a criticism of the doctrine of
Themistius.
This commentator is of the opinion that the passive intellect of which
Aristotle speaks is not a mere capacity inherent in something else, but
a real spiritual entity or substance independent of the lower parts of
the soul, though associated with them during the life of the body, and
hence is not subject to generation and destruction, but is eternal. In
support of this view may be urged that if the passive intellect were
merely a capacity of the lower parts of the soul, we should expect it to
grow weaker as the person grows older and his sensitive and imaginative
powers are beginning to decline; whereas the contrary is the case. The
older the person the keener is his intellect. The difficulty, however,
remains that if the human intellect is a real substance independent of
the rest of the soul, why is it that at its first appearance in the
human being it is extremely poor in content, being all but empty, and
grows as the rest of the body and the soul is developed?
To obviate these difficulties, Averroes in his commentary on the _De
Anima_ of Aristotle practically identifies (according to Levi ben
Gerson's view of Averroes) the material intellect with the Active
Intellect. The Active Intellect according to him is neither identical
with the divine, as Alexander maintains, nor is it a part of man, as
Themistius and others think, but is the last of the separate
Intelligences, next to the spiritual mover of the lunar sphere. It is a
pure actuality, absolutely free from matter, and hence eternal. This
Active Intellect in some mysterious manner becomes associated with man,
and this association results in a temporary phase represented by the
material intellect. As a result of the sense perceptions, images of the
external objects remain in the imagination, and the Active Intellect
takes hold of these images, which are potentially universal ideas, and
by its illumination produces out of them actual ideas and an intellect
in which they reside, the material intellect. The material intellect is
therefore the result of the combination of the Active Intellect with the
memory images, known as _phantasmata_ ([Greek: phantasmata]), in the
human faculty of imagination. So long as this association exists, the
material intellect receives the intelligible forms as derived from the
_phantasmata_, and these forms are represented by such ideas as "all
animal is sensitive," "all man is rational," _i. e._, ideas concerning
the objects of this world. This phase of man's mind ceases when the body
dies, and the Active Intellect alone remains, whose content is free from
material forms. The Active Intellect contemplates itself, a pure
intelligence. At the same time it is possible for man to identify
himself with the Active Intellect as he acquires knowledge in the
material intellect, for the Active Intellect is like light which makes
the eye see. In seeing, the eye not merely perceives the form of the
external object, but indirectly also receives the light which made the
object visible. In the same way the human soul in acquiring knowledge as
implicit in its _phantasmata_, at the same time gets a glimpse of the
spiritual light which converted the _phantasma_ into an explicit idea
(_cf._ above, p. 320). When the soul in man perfects itself with all the
knowledge of this world it becomes identified with the Active Intellect,
which may be likened to the intellect or soul of the corporeal world.
In this combination of the views of Alexander and Themistius Averroes
succeeds in obviating the criticisms levelled at the two former. That
the power of the material intellect grows keener with age though the
corporeal organs are weaker, supports Averroes's doctrine as against
Alexander, to whom it is a mere capacity dependent upon the mixture of
the elements in the human body. But neither is he subject to the
objection applying to Themistius's view, that a real independent entity
could scarcely be void of all forms and a mere receptacle. For the
material intellect as it really is in itself when not in combination
with the human body is not a mere receptacle or empty potentiality. It
is the Active Intellect, which combines in itself all immaterial forms
and thinks them as it thinks itself. It is only in its individualized
aspect that it becomes a potential intellect ready to receive all
material forms.
But what Averroes gains here he loses elsewhere. There are certain
considerations which are fatal to his doctrine. Thus it would follow
that theoretical studies which have no practical aim are useless. But
this is impossible. Nature has put in us the ability as well as the
desire to speculate without reference to practical results. The pleasure
we derive from theoretical studies is much greater than that afforded by
the practical arts and trades. And nature does nothing in vain.
Theoretical studies must therefore have some value. But in Averroes's
theory of the material intellect they have none. For all values may be
divided into those which promote the life of the body and those which
lead to the final happiness of man. The former is clearly not served by
those theoretical speculations which have no practical aim. On the
contrary, they hinder it. Deep students of the theoretical sciences
forego all bodily pleasures, and often do without necessities. But
neither can there be any advantage in theoretical speculation for
ultimate human happiness. For human happiness according to Averroes (and
he is in a sense right, as we shall see later) consists in union with
the Active Intellect. But this union takes place as a matter of course
according to his theory at the time of death, whether a man be wise or a
fool. For the Active Intellect then absorbs the material.
Another objection to Averroes's theory is the following. If the material
intellect is in essence the same as the Active Intellect, it is a
separate, immaterial substance, and hence is, like the Active Intellect,
one. For only that which has matter as its substratum can be
_quantitatively_ differentiated. Thus A is numerically different from B,
though A and B are both men (_i. e._, _qualitatively_ the same), because
they are corporeal beings. Forms as such can be differentiated
qualitatively only. Horse is different from ass in quality. Horse as
such and horse as such are the same. It follows from this that the
material intellect, being like the Active Intellect an immaterial form,
cannot be numerically multiplied, and therefore is one only. But if so,
no end of absurdities follows. For it means that all men have the same
intellect, hence the latter is wise and ignorant at the same time in
reference to the same thing, in so far as A knows a given thing and B
does not know it. It would also follow that A can make use of B's sense
experience and build his knowledge upon it. All these inferences are
absurd, and they all follow from the assumption that the material
intellect is in essence the same as the Active Intellect. Hence
Averroes's position is untenable.[340]
Gersonides then gives his own view of the material intellect, which is
similar to that of Alexander. The material intellect is a capacity, and
the prime matter is the ultimate subject in which it inheres. But there
are other powers or forms inhering in matter prior to the material
intellect. Prime matter as such is not endowed with intellect, or all
things would have human reason. Prime matter when it reaches the stage
of development of the imaginative faculty is then ready to receive the
material intellect. We may say then that the sensitive soul, of which
the imaginative faculty is a part, is the subject in which the material
intellect inheres. The criticism directed against Alexander, which
applies here also, may be answered as follows. The material intellect is
dependent upon its subject, the sensitive soul, for its existence only,
not for the manner of receiving its knowledge. Hence the weakening or
strengthening of its subject cannot affect it directly at all.
Indirectly there is a relation between the two, and it works in the
reverse direction. When the sensitive powers are weakened and their
activities diminish, there is more opportunity for the intellect to
monopolize the one soul for itself and increase its own activity, which
the other powers have a tendency to hinder, since the soul is one for
all these contending powers. It follows of course that the material
intellect in man is not immortal. As a capacity of the sensitive soul,
it dies with the latter. What part of the human soul it is that enjoys
immortality and on what conditions we shall see later. But before we do
this, we must try to understand the nature of the Active Intellect.[341]
We know now that the function of the Active Intellect is to actualize
the material intellect, _i. e._, to develop the capacity which the
latter has of extracting general ideas from the particular memory images
(phantasmata) in the faculty of imagination, so that this capacity,
originally empty of any content, receives the ideas thus produced, and
is thus constituted into an _actual_ intellect. From this it follows
that the Active Intellect, which enables the material intellect to form
ideas, must itself have the ideas it induces in the latter, though not
necessarily in the same form. Thus an artisan, who imposes the form of
chair upon a piece of wood, must have the form of chair in his mind,
though not the same sort as he realizes in the wood. Now as all the
ideas acquired by the material intellect constitute one single activity
so far as the end and purpose is concerned (for it all leads to the
perfection of the person), the agent which is the cause of it all must
also be one. Hence there are not many Active Intellects, each
responsible for certain ideas, but one Intellect is the cause of all the
ideas realized in the material intellect. Moreover, as this Active
Intellect gives the material intellect not merely a knowledge of
separate ideas, but also an understanding of their relations to each
other, in other words of the systematic unity connecting all ideas into
one whole, it follows that the Active Intellect has a knowledge of the
ideas from their unitary aspect. In other words, the unity of purpose
and aim which is evident in the development of nature from the prime
matter through the forms of the elements, the plant soul, the animal
soul and up to the human reason, where the lower is for the sake of the
higher, must reside as a unitary conception in the Active Intellect.
For the Active Intellect has another function besides developing the
rational capacity in man. We can arrive at this insight by a
consideration undertaken from a different point of view. If we consider
the wonderful and mysterious development of a seed, which is only a
piece of matter, in a purposive manner, passing through various stages
and producing a highly complicated organism with psychic powers, we must
come to the conclusion, as Aristotle does, that there is an intellect
operating in this development. As all sublunar nature shows a unity of
purpose, this intellect must be one. And as it cannot be like one of its
products, it must be eternal and not subject to generation and decay.
But these are the attributes which, on grounds taken from the
consideration of the intellectual activity in man, we ascribed to the
Active Intellect. Hence it _is_ the Active Intellect. And we have thus
shown that it has two functions. One is to endow sublunar nature with
the intelligence and purpose visible in its processes and evolutions;
the other is to enable the rational power in man to rise from a _tabula
rasa_ to an actual intellect with a content. From both these activities
it is evident that the Active Intellect has a knowledge of sublunar
creation as a systematic unity.
This conception of the Active Intellect, Levi ben Gerson says, will also
answer all the difficulties by which other philosophers are troubled
concerning the possibility of knowledge and the nature of definition.
The problems are briefly these. Knowledge concerns itself with the
permanent and universal. There can be no real knowledge of the
particular, for the particular is never the same, it is constantly
changing and in the end disappears altogether. On the other hand, the
universal has no real existence outside of the mind, for the objectively
real is the particular thing. The only really existing man is A or B or
C; man in general, man that is not a particular individual man, has no
objective extra-mental existence. Here is a dilemma. The only thing we
can really know is the thing that is not real, and the only real thing
is that which we cannot know. The Platonists solve this difficulty by
boldly declaring that the universal ideas or forms are the real
existents and the models of the things of sense. This is absurd.
Aristotle's solution in the Metaphysics is likewise unsatisfactory. Our
conception, however, of the Active Intellect enables us to solve this
problem satisfactorily. The object of knowledge is not the particular
thing which is constantly changing; nor yet the logical abstraction
which is only in the mind. It is the real unity of sublunar nature as it
exists in the Active Intellect.
The problem of the definition is closely related to that of knowledge.
The definition denotes the essence of every individual of a given
species. As the individuals of a given species have all the same
definition, and hence the same essence, they are all one. For what is
not in the definition is not real. Our answer is that the definition
represents that unitary aspect of the sublunar individuals which is in
the Active Intellect. This aspect is also in a certain sense present in
every one of the individual objects of nature, but not in the same
manner as in the Active Intellect.[342]
We are now ready to take up the question of human immortality. The
material intellect as a capacity for acquiring knowledge is not
immortal. Being inherent in the sensitive soul and dependent for its
acquisition of knowledge upon the memory images (phantasmata) which
appear in the imagination, the power to acquire knowledge ceases with
the cessation of sense and imagination. But the knowledge already
acquired, which, we have shown above, is identical with the conceptions
of sublunar nature in the Active Intellect, is indestructible. For these
conceptions are absolutely immaterial; they are really the Active
Intellect in a sense, and only the material is subject to destruction.
The sum of acquisition of immaterial ideas constitutes the _acquired_ or
_actual intellect_, and this is the immortal part of man.
Further than this man cannot go. The idea adopted by some that the human
intellect may become identified completely with the Active Intellect,
Levi ben Gerson rejects. In order to accomplish this, he says, it would
be necessary to have a complete and perfect knowledge of all nature, and
that too a completely unified and wholly immaterial knowledge just as it
is in the Active Intellect. This is clearly impossible. But it is true
that a man's happiness after death is dependent upon the amount and
perfection of his knowledge. For even in this life the pleasure we
derive from intellectual contemplation is greater the more nearly we
succeed in completely concentrating our mind on the subject of study.
Now after death there will be no disturbing factors such as are supplied
in this world by the sensitive and emotional powers. To be sure this
lack will also prevent the acquisition of new knowledge, as was said
before, but the amount acquired will be there in the soul's power all
at once and all the time. The more knowledge one has succeeded in
obtaining during life, the more nearly he will resemble the Active
Intellect and the greater will be his happiness.[343]
The next topic Levi ben Gerson takes up is that of prognostication.
There are three ways in which certain persons come to know the future,
_dreams_, _divination_ and _prophecy_. What we wish to do is to
determine the kind of future events that may be thus known beforehand,
the agency which produces in us this power, and the bearing this
phenomenon has on the nature of events generally, and particularly as
concerns the question of chance and free will.
That there is such knowledge of future events is a fact and not a
theory. Experience testifies to the fact that there are certain people
who are able to foretell the future, not as a matter of accident or
through a chance coincidence, but as a regular thing. Diviners these are
called, or fortune tellers. This power is even better authenticated in
prophecy, which no one denies. We can also cite many instances of
dreams, in which a person sees a future event with all its particulars,
and the dream comes true. All these cases are too common to be credited
to chance. Now what does this show as to the nature of the events thus
foreseen? Clearly it indicates that they cannot be chance happenings,
for what is by chance cannot be foreseen. The only conclusion then to be
drawn is that these events are determined by the order of nature. But
there is another implication in man's ability to foretell the future,
namely, that what is thus known to man is first known to a higher
intellect which communicates it to us.
The first of these two consequences leads us into difficulties. For if
we examine the data of prognostication, whether it be of dream,
divination or prophecy, we find that they concern almost exclusively
such particular human events as would be classed in the category of the
contingent rather than in that of the necessary. Fortune tellers
regularly tell people about the kind of children they will have, the
sort of things they will do, and so on. In prophecy similarly Sarah was
told she would have a son (Gen. 18, 10). We also have examples of
prognostication respecting the outcome of a battle, announcement of
coming rain,--events due to definite causes--as well as the prediction
of events which are the result of free choice or pure accident, as when
Samuel tells Elisha that he will meet three men on the way, who will
give him two loaves of bread, which he will accept; or when the prophet
in Samariah tells the prophet in Bethel that he will be killed by a
lion. The question now is, if these contingent things can be known in
advance, they are not contingent; and if these are not, none are. For
the uniform events in nature are surely not contingent. If then those
events usually classed as contingent and voluntary are not such, there
is no such thing as chance and free will at all, which is impossible.
Our answer is that as a matter of fact those contingent happenings we
call luck and ill luck do often come frequently to certain persons, whom
we call lucky or unlucky, which shows that they are not the result of
pure chance, and that there is some sort of order determining them.
Moreover, we know that the higher in the scale of being a thing is, the
more nature takes care to guard it. Hence as man is the highest being
here below, it stands to reason that the heavenly bodies order his
existence and his fortune. And so the science of astrology, with all its
mistakes on account of the imperfect state of our knowledge, does say a
great many things which are true. This, however, does not destroy
freedom and chance. For the horoscope represents only one side of the
question. Man was also endowed with reason and purpose, which enable him
whenever he chooses to counteract the order of the heavenly bodies. In
the main the heavenly bodies by their positions and motions and the
consequent predominance of certain elemental qualities in the sublunar
world over others affect the temperaments of man in a manner tending to
his welfare. The social order with its differentiation of labor and
occupation is worked out wonderfully well--better than the system of
Plato's Republic--by the positions and motions of the heavenly bodies.
If not for this, all men would choose the more honorable trades and
professions, there would be no one to do the menial work, and society
would be impossible. At the same time there are certain incidental evils
inherent in the rigid system which would tend to destroy certain
individuals. To counteract these unintended defects, God endowed man
with reason and choice enabling him to avoid the dangers threatening him
in the world of nature.
The solution of our problem then is this. These human events have a
twofold aspect. They are determined so far as they follow from the order
of the heavenly bodies; and in so far they can be foretold. They are
undetermined so far as they are the result of individual choice, and in
so far they cannot be known beforehand. There are also pure chance
events in inanimate nature, bearing no relation to human fortune. These
cannot be foretold.[344]
We said above that there must be an intellect which knows these
contingent events predicted in dreams, divination and prophecy and
imparts a knowledge of them to these men. This can be no other than the
Active Intellect, whose nature we discussed above. For the Active
Intellect knows the order of sublunar things, and gives us a knowledge
of them in the ideas of the material intellect. Moreover, he is the
agent producing them through the instrumentality of the heavenly bodies.
Hence the heavenly bodies are also his instrument in ordering those
contingent events which are predicted in dreams and prophetic visions.
The purpose of this information is to protect man against the evil
destined for him in the order of the heavenly bodies, or in order that
he may avail himself of the good in store for him if he knows of it.
There is a difference in kind between prophecy on the one hand and
divination and dream on the other. Prophecy comes from the Active
Intellect directly acting on the material intellect. Hence only
intelligent men can be prophets. Divination and dream come from the
Active Intellect indirectly. They are caused by the heavenly bodies, and
the action is on the imagination. The imagination is more easily
isolated from the other parts of the soul in young people and
simpletons. Hence we find examples of dreams and divination among
them.[345]
In discussing the problem of God's knowledge, Gersonides takes direct
issue with Maimonides. The reader will recall that the question turns
upon the knowledge of particulars. Some philosophers go so far as to
deny to God any knowledge of things other than his own essence; for the
known is in a sense identified with the knower, and to bring in a
multiplicity of ideas in God's knowledge would endanger his unity.
Others, however, fell short of this extreme opinion and admitted God's
knowledge of things other than himself, but maintained that God cannot
know particulars for various reasons. The particular is perceived by
sense, a material faculty, whereas God is immaterial. Particulars are
infinite and cannot be measured or embraced, whereas knowledge is a kind
of measuring or embracing. The particulars are not always existing, and
are subject to change. Hence God's knowledge would be subject to change
and disappearance, which is impossible. If God knows particulars how is
it that there is often a violation of right and justice in the destinies
of individual men? This would argue in God either inability or
indifference, both of which are impossible.
Maimonides insists on God's knowledge of all things of which he is the
creator, including particulars. And he answers the arguments of the
philosophers by saying that their objections are valid only if we assume
that God's knowledge is similar to ours, and since with us it is
impossible to know the material except through a material organ, it is
not possible in God. As we cannot comprehend the infinite; as we cannot
know the non-existent, nor the changing without a change in our
knowledge, God cannot do so. But it is wrong to assume this. God's
knowledge is identical with his essence, which these same philosophers
insist is unlike anything else, and unknowable. Surely it follows that
his knowledge is also without the least resemblance to our knowledge and
the name alone is what they have in common. Hence all the objections of
the philosophers fall away at one stroke. _We_ cannot in one act of
knowing embrace a number of things differing in species; God can,
because his knowledge is one. _We_ cannot know the non-existent, for our
knowledge depends upon the thing known. God can. _We_ cannot know the
infinite, for the infinite cannot be embraced; God can. _We_ cannot know
the outcome of a future event unless the event is necessary and
determined. If the event is contingent and undetermined we can only have
opinion concerning it, which may or may not be true; we are uncertain
and may be mistaken. God can know the outcome of a contingent event, and
yet the event is not determined, and may happen one way or the other.
Our knowledge of a given thing changes as the thing itself undergoes a
change, for if our knowledge should remain the same while the object
changes, it would not be knowledge but error. In God the two are
compatible. He knows in advance how a given thing will change, and his
knowledge never changes, even though that which was at one moment
potential and implicit becomes later actual and explicit.
At this point Gersonides steps in in defence of human logic and sanity.
He accuses Maimonides of not being quite honest with himself.
Maimonides, he intimates, did not choose this position of his own free
will--a position scientifically quite untenable--he was forced to it by
theological exigencies.[346] He felt that he must vindicate, by fair
means or foul, God's knowledge of particulars. And so Gersonides
proceeds to demolish Maimonides's position by reducing it _ad absurdum_.
What does Maimonides mean by saying that God knows the contingent? If he
means that God knows that the contingent may as contingent happen
otherwise than as he knows it will happen, we do not call this in us
knowledge, but opinion. If he means that God knows it will happen in a
certain way, and yet it may turn out that the reverse will actually take
place, then we call this in our case error, not knowledge. And if he
means that God merely knows that it may happen one way or the other
without knowing definitely which will happen, then we call this in our
experience uncertainty and perplexity, not knowledge. By insisting that
all this is in God knowledge because, forsooth, God's knowledge is not
like our knowledge, is tantamount to saying that what is in us opinion,
uncertainty, error, is in God knowledge--a solution far from
complimentary to God's knowledge.
Besides, the entire principle of Maimonides that there is no relation of
resemblance between God's attributes and ours, that the terms wise,
just, and so on, are pure homonyms, is fundamentally wrong. We attribute
knowledge to God because we know in our own case that an intellect is
perfected by knowledge. And since we have come to the conclusion on
other grounds that God is a perfect intellect, we say he must have
knowledge. Now if this knowledge that we ascribe to God has no
resemblance whatsoever to what we understand by knowledge in our own
case, the ground is removed from our feet. We might as well argue that
man is rational because solid is continuous. If the word knowledge means
a totally different thing in God from what it means in us, how do we
know that it is to be found in God? If we have absolutely no idea what
the term means when applied to God, what reason have we for preferring
knowledge as a divine attribute to its opposite or negative? If
knowledge does not mean knowledge, ignorance does not mean ignorance,
and it is just the same whether we ascribe to God the one or the other.
The truth is that the attributes we ascribe to God do have a resemblance
to the same attributes in ourselves; only they are primary in God,
secondary in ourselves, _i. e._, they exist in God in a more perfect
manner than in us. Hence it is absurd to say that what would be in us
error or uncertainty is in God knowledge. Our problem must be solved
more candidly and differently. There are arguments in favor of God's
knowing particulars (Maimonides gives some), and there are the arguments
of the philosophers against the thesis. The truth must be between the
two, that God knows them from one aspect and does not know them from
another. Having shown above that human events are in part ordered and
determined by the heavenly bodies, and in part undetermined and
dependent upon the individual's choice, we can now make use of this
distinction for the solution of our problem. God knows particulars in so
far as they are ordered, he does not know them in so far as they are
contingent. He knows that they are contingent, and hence it follows that
he does not know which of the two possibilities will happen, else they
would not be contingent. This is no defect in God's nature, for to know
a thing as it is is no imperfection. In general God does not know
particulars as particulars but as ordered by the universal laws of
nature. He knows the universal order, and he knows the particulars in so
far as they are united in the universal order.
This theory meets all objections, and moreover it is in agreement with
the views of the Bible. It is the only one by which we can harmonize the
apparent contradictions in the Scriptures. Thus on the one hand we are
told that God sends Prophets and commands people to do and forbear. This
implies that a person has freedom to choose, and that the contingent is
a real category. On the other hand, we find that God foretells the
coming of future events respecting human destiny, which signifies
determination. And yet again we find that God repents, and that he does
not repent. All these apparent contradictions can be harmonized on our
theory. God foretells the coming of events in so far as they are
determined in the universal order of nature. But man's freedom may
succeed in counteracting this order, and the events predicted may not
come. This is signified by the expression that God repents.[347]
Levi ben Gerson's solution, whatever we may think of its scientific or
philosophic value, is surely very bold as theology, we might almost say
it is a theological monstrosity. It practically removes from God the
definite knowledge of the outcome of a given event so far as that
outcome is contingent. Gersonides will not give up the contingent, for
that would destroy freedom. He therefore accepts free will with its
consequences, at the risk of limiting God's knowledge to events which
are determined by the laws of nature. Maimonides was less consistent,
but had the truer theological sense, namely, he kept to both horns of
the dilemma. God is omniscient and man is free. He gave up the solution
by seeking refuge in the mysteriousness of God's knowledge. This is the
true religious attitude.
The question of Providence is closely related to that of God's
knowledge. For it is clear that one cannot provide for those things of
which he does not know. Gersonides's view in this problem is very
similar to that of Maimonides, and like him he sees in the discussions
between Job and his friends the representative opinions held by
philosophers in this important problem.
There are three views, he says, concerning the nature of Providence. One
is that God's providence extends only to species and not to individuals.
The second opinion is that God provides for every individual of the
human race. The third view is that some individuals are specially
provided for, but not all. Job held the first view, which is that of
Aristotle. The arguments in favor of this opinion are that God does not
know particulars, hence cannot provide for them. Besides, there would be
more justice in the distribution of goods and evils in the world if God
concerned himself about every individual. Then again man is too
insignificant for God's special care.
The second view is that of the majority of our people. They argue that
as God is the author of all, he surely provides for them. And as a
matter of fact experience shows it; else there would be much more
violence and bloodshed than there is. The wicked are actually punished
and the good rewarded. This class is divided into two parts. Some think
that while God provides for all men, not all that happens to a man is
due to God; there are also other causes. The others think that every
happening is due to God. This second class may again be divided
according to the manner in which they account for those facts in
experience which seem to militate against their view. Maintaining that
every incident is due to God, they have to explain the apparent
deviation from justice in the prosperity of the wicked and the adversity
of the righteous. One party explains the phenomenon by saying that the
prosperity and the adversity in these cases are only seeming and not
real; that they in fact are the opposite of what they seem, or at least
lead to the opposite. The second party answers the objection on the
ground that those we think good may not really be such, and similarly
those we think bad may not really be bad. For the way to judge a
person's character is not merely by his deeds alone, but by his deeds as
related to his temperament and disposition, which God alone knows.
Eliphaz the Temanite belonged to those who think that not all which
happens is due to God; that folly is responsible for a man's misfortune.
Bildad the Shuchite believed that all things are from God, but not all
that seems good and evil is really so. Zophar the Naamathite thought we
do not always judge character correctly; that temperament and
disposition must be taken into account.
Of these various opinions the first one, that of Aristotle, cannot be
true. Dreams, divination, and especially prophecy contradict it flatly.
All these are given to the individual for his protection (_cf._ above,
p. 342). The second opinion, namely, that God's providence extends to
every individual, is likewise disproved by reason, by experience and by
the Bible. We have already proved (p. 345) that God's knowledge does not
extend to particulars as such. He only knows things as ordered by the
heavenly bodies; and knows at the same time that they may fail to happen
because of man's free will. Now if God punishes and rewards every man
according to his deeds, one of two things necessarily follows. Either he
rewards and punishes according to those deeds which the individual is
determined to do by the order of the heavenly bodies, or according to
the deeds the individual actually does. In the first case there would be
often injustice, for the person might not have acted as the order of the
heavenly bodies indicated he would act, for he is free to act as he
will. The second case is impossible, for it would mean that God knows
particulars as particulars--a thesis we have already disproved. Besides,
evil does not come from God directly, since he is pure form and evil
comes only from matter. Hence it cannot be said that he punishes the
evil doer for his sin.
Experience also testifies against this view, for we see the just suffer
and the wicked prosper. The manner in which Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar
wish to defend God's justice will not hold water. Man's own folly will
account perhaps for some evils befalling the righteous and some good
coming to the wicked. But it will not account for the failure of the
good man to get the reward he deserves, and of the wicked to receive the
punishment which is his due. The righteous man often has troubles all
his life no matter how careful he is to avoid them, and correspondingly
the same is true of the wicked, that he is prosperous, despite his lack
of caution and good sense. To avoid these objections as Eliphaz does by
saying that if the wicked man himself is not punished, his children will
be, is to go from the frying pan into the fire. For it is not just
either to omit to punish the one deserving it, or to punish another
innocent man for him. Nor is Zophar's defence any better. For the same
man, with the same temperament and disposition, often suffers more when
he is inclined to do good, and is prosperous when he is not so
scrupulous. Bildad is no more successful than the other two. The evils
coming to the righteous are often real and permanent. But neither does
the Bible compel us to believe that God looks out for all individuals.
This is especially true in reference to punishment, as can be gathered
from such expressions as "I will hide my face from them, and they shall
be given to be devoured" (Deut. 31, 17), or "As thou hast forgotten the
law of thy God, so will I myself also forget thy children" (Hosea 4, 6).
These expressions indicate that God does not punish the individuals
directly, but that he leaves them to the fate that is destined for them
by the order of the heavenly bodies. True there are other passages in
Scripture speaking of direct punishment, but they may be interpreted so
as not to conflict with our conclusions.
Having seen that neither of the two extreme views is correct, it remains
to adopt the middle course, namely, that some individuals are provided
for specially, and others not. The nearer a person is to the Active
Intellect, the more he receives divine providence and care. Those people
who do not improve their capabilities, which they possess as members of
the species, are provided for only as members of the species. The
matter may be put in another way also. God knows all ideas. Man is
potentially capable of receiving them in a certain manner. God, who is
actual, leads man from his potentiality to actuality. When a man's
potentialities are thus realized, he becomes similar to God, because
when ideas are actualized the agent and the thing acted upon are one.
Hence the person enjoys divine providence at that time. The way in which
God provides for such men is by giving them knowledge through dream,
divination or prophecy or intuition or in some other unconscious manner
on the individual's part, which knowledge protects him from harm. This
view is not in conflict with the truth that God does not know
particulars as such. For it is not to the individual person as such that
providence extends as a conscious act of God. The individualization is
due to the recipient and not to the dispenser. One may object that after
all since it is possible that bad men may have goods as ordered by the
heavenly bodies, and good men may have misfortune as thus ordered, when
their attachment to God is loosened somewhat, there is _injustice_ in
God if he could have arranged the heavenly spheres differently and did
not, or _incapacity_ if he could not. The answer is briefly that the
order of the spheres does a great deal of good in maintaining the
existence of things. And if some little evil comes also incidentally,
this does not condemn the whole arrangement. In fact the evils come from
the very agencies which are the authors of good. The view of providence
here adopted is that of Elihu the son of Barachel the Buzite in the book
of Job (ch. 32), and it agrees also with the opinion of Maimonides in
the "Guide of the Perplexed" (_cf._ above, p. 292).[348]
Instead of placing his cosmology at the beginning of his system and
proceeding from that as a basis to the other parts of his work, the
psychology and the ethics, Levi ben Gerson, whose "Milhamot Hashem" is
not so much a systematic work as an aggregation of discussions, reversed
the process. He begins as we have seen with a purely psychological
analysis concerning the nature of the human reason and its relation to
the Active Intellect. He follows up this discussion with a treatment of
prognostication as exhibiting some of the effects of the Active
Intellect upon the reason and imagination of man. This is again followed
by a discussion of God's knowledge and providence. And not until all
these psychological (and in part ethical) questions have been decided,
does Levi ben Gerson undertake to give us his views of the constitution
of the universe and the nature and attributes of God. In this discussion
he takes occasion to express his dissatisfaction with Aristotle's proofs
of the existence of the spheral movers and of the unmoved mover or God,
as inadequate to bear the structure which it is intended to erect upon
them. It will be remembered that the innovation of Abraham Ibn Daud and
Maimonides in making Jewish philosophy more strictly Aristotelian than
it had been consisted in a great measure in just this introduction of
the Aristotelian proof of the existence of God as derived from the
motions of the heavenly bodies. Levi ben Gerson's proofs are
teleological rather than mechanical. Aristotle said a moving body must
have a mover outside of it, which if it is again a body is itself in
motion and must have a mover in turn. And as this process cannot go on
_ad infinitum_, there must be at the end of the series an unmoved mover.
As unmoved this mover cannot be body; and as producing motion eternally,
it cannot be a power residing in a body, a physical or material power,
for no such power can be infinite. Gersonides is not satisfied with this
proof. He argues that so far as the motions of the heavenly bodies are
concerned there is no reason why a physical power cannot keep on moving
them eternally. The reason that motions caused by finite forces in our
world come to a stop is because the thing moved is subject to change,
which alters its relation to its mover; and secondly because the force
endeavors to move the object in opposition to its own tendency, in
opposition to gravity. In the case of the heavenly bodies neither of
these conditions is present. The relation of the mover to the moved is
always the same, since the heavenly bodies are not subject to change;
and as they are not made of the four terrestrial elements they have no
inherent tendency to move in any direction, hence they offer no
opposition to the force exerted upon them by the mover. A finite power
might therefore quite conceivably cause eternal motion. Similarly an
unmoved mover cannot be body, to be sure, but it may be a physical power
like a soul, which in moving the body is not itself moved by that
motion. Aristotle's proofs therefore are not sufficient to produce the
conviction that the movers of the spheres and God himself are separate
Intelligences.[349]
Gersonides accordingly follows a different method. He argues that if a
system of things and events exhibits perfection not here and there and
at rare intervals but regularly, the inference is justified that there
is an intelligent agent who had a definite purpose and design in
establishing the system. The world below is such a system. Hence it has
an intelligent agent as its author. This agent may be a separate and
immaterial intelligence, or a corporeal power like a soul. He then shows
that it cannot be a corporeal power, for it would have to reside in the
animal sperm which exhibits such wonderful and purposive development, or
in the parent animal from which the sperm came, both of which, he
argues, are impossible. It remains then that the cause of the
teleological life of the sublunar world is an immaterial power, a
separate intellect. This intellect, he argues further, acts upon matter
and endows it with forms, the only mediating power being the natural
heat which is found in the seed and sperm of plants and animals.
Moreover, it is aware of the order of what it produces. It is the Active
Intellect of which we spoke above (p. 337). The forms of terrestrial
things come from it directly, the heat residing in the seed comes from
the motions of the spheres. This shows that the permanent motions of the
heavenly bodies are also intelligent motions, for they tend to produce
perfection in the terrestrial world and never come to a standstill,
which would be the case if the motions were "natural" like those of the
elements, or induced against their nature like that of a stone moving
upward. We are justified in saying then that the heavenly bodies are
endowed with intellects and have no material soul. Hence their movers
are pure Intelligences, and there are as many of them as there are
spheres, _i. e._, forty-eight, or fifty-eight or sixty-four according to
one's opinion on the astronomical question of the number of spheres.
Now as the Active Intellect knows the order of sublunar existence in its
unity, and the movers of the respective spheres know the order of their
effects through the motions of the heavenly bodies, it follows that as
all things in heaven above and on the earth beneath are related in a
unitary system, there is a highest agent who is the cause of all
existence absolutely and has a knowledge of all existence as a unitary
system.[350]
The divine attributes are derived by us from his actions, and hence they
are not pure homonyms (_cf._, p. 240). God has a knowledge of the
complete order of sublunar things, of which the several movers have only
a part. He _knows_ it as _one_, and knows it eternally without change.
His _joy_ and _gladness_ are beyond conception, for our joy also is very
great in understanding. His is also the perfect _Life_, for
understanding is life. He is the most real _Substance_ and _Existent_,
and he is _One_. God is also the most real _Agent_, as making the other
movers do their work, and producing a complete and perfect whole out of
their parts. He is also properly called _Bestower_, _Beneficent_,
_Gracious_, _Strong_, _Mighty_, _Upright_, _Just_, _Eternal_,
_Permanent_. All these attributes, however, do not denote
multiplicity.[351]
From God we now pass again to his creation, and take up the problem
which caused Maimonides so much trouble, namely, the question of the
origin of the world. It will be remembered that dissatisfied with the
proofs for the existence of God advanced by the Mutakallimun,
Maimonides, in order to have a firm foundation for the central idea of
religion, tentatively adopted the Aristotelian notion of the eternity of
motion and the world. But no sooner does Maimonides establish his proof
of the existence, unity and incorporeality of God than he returns to the
attack of the Aristotelian view and points out that the problem is
insoluble in a strictly scientific manner; that Aristotle himself never
intended his arguments in favor of eternity to be regarded as
philosophically demonstrated, and that they all labor under the fatal
fallacy that because certain laws hold of the world's phenomena once it
is in existence, these same laws must have governed the establishment of
the world itself in its origin. Besides, the assumption of the world's
eternity with its corollary of the necessity and immutability of its
phenomena saps the foundation of all religion, makes miracles
impossible, and reduces the world to a machine. Gersonides is on the
whole agreed with Maimonides. He admits that Aristotle's arguments are
the best yet advanced in the problem, but that they are not convincing.
He also agrees with Maimonides in his general stricture on Aristotle's
method, only modifying and restricting its generality and sweeping
nature. With all this, however, he finds it necessary to take up the
entire question anew and treats it in his characteristic manner, with
detail and rigor, and finally comes to a conclusion different from that
of Maimonides, namely, that the world had an origin in time, to be sure,
but that it came not _ex nihilo_ in the absolute sense of the word
_nihil_, but developed from an eternal formless matter, which God
endowed with form. This is the so-called Platonic view.
We cannot enter into all his details which are technical and fatiguing
in the extreme, but we must give a general idea of his procedure in the
investigation of this important topic.
The problem of the origin of the world, he says, is very difficult.
First, because in order to learn from the nature of existing things
whether they were created out of a state of non-existence or not, we
must know the essence of existing things, which is not easy. Secondly,
we must know the nature of God in order to determine whether he could
have existed first without the world and then have created it, or
whether he had to have the world with him from eternity. The fact of the
great difference of opinion on this question among thinkers, and the
testimony of Maimonides that Aristotle himself had no valid proof in
this matter are additional indications of the great difficulty of the
subject.
Some think the world was made and destroyed an infinite number of times.
Others say it was made once. Of these some maintain it was made out of
something (Plato); others, that it was made out of absolute nothing
(Philoponus, the Mutakallimun, Maimonides and many of our Jewish
writers). Some on the other hand, namely, Aristotle and his followers,
hold the world to be eternal. They all have their defenders, and there
is no need to refute the others since Aristotle has already done this.
His arguments are the best so far, and deserve investigation. The
fundamental fallacy in all his proofs is that he argues from the laws of
genesis and decay in the parts of the world to the laws of these
processes in the world as a whole. This might seem to be the same
criticism which Maimonides advances, but it is not really quite the
same, Maimonides's assertion being more general and sweeping. Maimonides
says that the origin of the world as a whole need not be in any respect
like the processes going on within its parts; whereas Gersonides bases
his argument on the observed difference in the world between wholes and
parts, admitting that the two may be alike in many respects.
In order to determine whether the world is created or not, it is best to
investigate first those things in the world which have the appearance
of being eternal, such as the heavenly bodies, time, motion, the form of
the earth, and so on. If these are proven to be eternal, the world is
eternal; if not, it is not. A general principle to help us distinguish a
thing having an origin from one that has not is the following: A thing
which came into being in time has a purpose. An eternal thing has no
purpose. Applying this principle to the heavens we find that all about
them is with a purpose to ordering the sublunar world in the best way
possible. Their motions, their distances, their positions, their
numbers, and so on are all for this purpose. Hence they had a beginning.
Aristotle's attempts to explain these conditions from the nature of the
heavens themselves are not successful, and he knew it. Again, as the
heavenly bodies are all made of the same fifth element (the Aristotelian
ether), the many varieties in their forms and motions require special
explanation. The only satisfactory explanation is that the origin of the
heavenly bodies is not due to nature and necessity, which would favor
eternity, but to will and freedom, and the many varieties are for a
definite purpose. Hence they are not eternal.[352]
Gersonides then analyzes time and motion and proves that Aristotle to
the contrary notwithstanding, they are both finite and not infinite.
Time belongs to the category of quantity, and there is no infinite
quantity. As time is dependent on motion, motion too is finite, hence
neither is eternal. Another argument for creation in time is that if the
world is eternal and governed altogether by necessity, the earth should
be surrounded on all sides by water according to the nature of the
lighter element to be above the heavier. Hence the appearance of parts
of the earth's surface above the water is an indication of a break of
natural law for a special purpose, namely, in order to produce the
various mineral, plant and animal species. Hence once more purpose
argues design and origin in time.
Finally if the world were eternal, the state of the sciences would be
more advanced than it is. A similar argument may be drawn from language.
Language is conventional; which means that the people existed before the
language they agreed to speak. But man being a social animal they could
not have existed an infinite time without language. Hence mankind is not
eternal.[353]
We have just proved that the world came into being, but it does not
necessarily follow that it will be destroyed. Nay, there are reasons to
show that it will not be destroyed. For there is no destruction except
through matter and the predominance of the passive powers over the
active. Hence the being that is subject to destruction must consist of
opposites. But the heavenly bodies have no opposites, not being
composite; hence they cannot be destroyed. And if so, neither can the
sublunar order be destroyed, which is the work of the heavenly bodies.
There is of course the abstract possibility of their being destroyed by
their maker, not naturally, but by his will, as they were made; but we
can find no reason in God for wishing to destroy them, all reasons
existing in man for destroying things being inapplicable to God.[354]
That the world began in time is now established. The question still
remains, was the world made out of something or out of nothing? Both are
impossible. The first is impossible, for that something out of which the
world was made must have had some form, for matter never is without
form, and if so, it must have had some motion, and we have a kind of
world already, albeit an imperfect one. The second supposition is also
impossible; for while form may come out of nothing, body cannot come
from not-body. We never see the matter of any object arise out of
nothing, though the form may. Nature as well as art produces one
corporeal thing out of another. Hence the generally accepted principle,
"_ex nihilo nihil fit_." Besides it would follow on this supposition
that before the world came into existence there was a vacuum in its
place, whereas it is proved in the Physics that a vacuum is impossible.
The only thing remaining therefore is to say that the world was made
partly out of something, partly out of nothing, _i. e._, out of an
absolutely formless matter.
It may be objected that to assume the existence of a second eternal
thing beside God is equivalent to a belief in dualism, in two gods. But
this objection may be easily answered. Eternity as such does not
constitute divinity. If all the world were eternal, God would still be
God because he controls everything and is the author of the order
obtaining in the world. In general it is the qualitative essence that
makes the divine character of God, his wisdom and power as the source of
goodness and right order in nature. The eternal matter of which we are
speaking is the opposite of all this. As God is the extreme of
perfection so is matter the extreme of imperfection and defect. As God
is the source of good, so is matter the source of evil. How then can
anyone suppose for a moment that an eternal formless matter can in any
way be identified with a divine being?
Another objection that may be offered to our theory is that it is an
established fact that matter cannot exist at all without any form,
whereas our view assumes that an absolutely formless matter existed an
infinite length of time before the world was made from it. This may be
answered by saying that the impossibility of matter existing without
form applies only to the actual objects of nature. God put in sublunar
matter the nature and capacity of receiving all forms in a certain
order. The primary qualities, the hot and the cold and the wet and the
dry, as the forms of the elements, enable this matter to receive other
higher forms. The very capacity of receiving a given form argues a
certain form on the part of the matter having this capacity; for if it
had no form there would be no reason why it should receive one form
rather than another; whereas we find that the reception of forms is not
at random, but that a given form comes from a definite other form. Man
comes only from man. But this does not apply to the prime matter of
which we are speaking. It may have been without form. Nay, it is
reasonable to suppose that as we find matter and form combined, and we
also find pure forms without matter, _viz._, in the separate
Intelligences,--it is reasonable to suppose that there is also matter
without form.
Finally one may ask if the world has not existed from eternity, what
determined the author to will its existence at the time he did and not
at another? We cannot say that he acquired new knowledge which he had
not before, or that he needed the world then and not before, or that
there was some obstacle which was removed. The answer to this would be
that the sole cause of the creation was the will of God to benefit his
creatures. Their existence is therefore due to the divine causality,
which never changes. Their origin in time is due to the nature of a
material object as such. A material object as being caused by an
external agent is incompatible with eternity. It must have a beginning,
and there is no sense in asking why at this time and not before or
after, for the same question would apply to any other time. Gersonides
cites other objections which he answers, and then he takes up one by
one the Aristotelian arguments in favor of eternity and refutes them in
detail. We cannot afford to reproduce them here as the discussions are
technical, lengthy and intricate.[355]
Having given his philosophical cosmology, Gersonides then undertakes to
show in detail that the Biblical story of creation teaches the same
doctrine. Nay, he goes so far as to say that it was the Biblical account
that suggested to him his philosophical theory. It would be truer to say
that having approached the Bible with Aristotelian spectacles, and
having no suspicion that the two attitudes are as far apart as the
poles, he did not scruple to twist the expressions in Genesis out of all
semblance to their natural meaning. The Biblical text had been twisted
and turned ever since the days of Philo, and of the Mishna and Talmud
and Midrash, in the interest of various schools and sects. Motives
speculative, religious, theological, legal and ethical were at the basis
of Biblical interpretation throughout its long history of two millennia
and more--the end is not yet--and Gersonides was swimming with the
current. The Bible is not a law, he says, which forces us to believe
absurdities and to practice useless things, as some people think. On the
contrary it is a law which leads us to our perfection. Hence what is
proved by reason must be found in the Law, by interpretation if
necessary. This is why Maimonides took pains to interpret all Biblical
passages in which God is spoken of as if he were corporeal. Hence also
his statement that if the eternity of the world were strictly
demonstrated, it would not be difficult to interpret the Bible so as to
agree. But in the matter of the origin of the world, Gersonides
continues, it was not necessary for me to force the Biblical account.
Quite the contrary, the expressions in the Bible guided me to my
view.[356]
Accordingly he finds support for his doctrine that the world was not
created _ex nihilo_, in the fact that there is not one miracle in the
Bible in which anything comes out of nothing. They are all instances of
something out of a pre-existent something. The miracle of the oil in the
case of Elisha is no exception. The air changed into oil as it entered
the partly depleted vessel. The six days of creation must not be taken
literally. God's creation is timeless, and the six days indicate the
natural order and rank in existing things proceeding from the cause to
the effect and from the lower to the higher. Thus the movers of the
heavenly bodies come before the spheres which they move as their causes.
The spheres come before the terrestrial elements for the same reason.
The elements are followed by the things composed of them. And among
these too there is a certain order. Plants come before animals, aquatic
animals before aerial, aerial before terrestrial, and the last of all is
man, as the most perfect of sublunar creatures. All this he reads into
the account of creation in Genesis. Thus the _light_ spoken of in the
first day represents the angels or separate Intelligences or movers of
the spheres, and they are distinguished from the _darkness_ there, which
stands for the heavenly bodies as the matters of their movers, though at
the same time they are grouped together as one day, because the form and
its matter constitute a unit. The _water_, which was divided by the
firmament, denotes the prime formless matter, part of which was changed
into the matter of the heavenly bodies, and part into the four
terrestrial elements. Form and matter are also designated by the terms
"Tohu" and "Bohu" in the second verse in Genesis, rendered in the
Revised Version by "without form" and "void." And so Gersonides
continues throughout the story of creation, into the details of which we
need not follow him.[357]
The concluding discussion in the Milhamot is devoted to the problem of
miracles and its relation to prophecy. Maimonides had said that one
reason for opposing the Aristotelian theory of the eternity of the world
is that miracles would be an impossibility on that assumption. Hence
Maimonides insists on creation _ex nihilo_, though he admits that the
Platonic view of a pre-existent matter may be reconciled with the Torah.
Gersonides, who adopted the doctrine of an eternal matter, finds it
necessary to say by way of introduction to his treatment of miracles
that they do not prove creation _ex nihilo_. For as was said before all
miracles exhibit a production of something out of something and not out
of nothing.
To explain the nature of miracles, he says, and their authors, it is
necessary to know what miracles are. For this we must take the Biblical
records as our data, just as we take the data of our senses in
determining other matters. On examining the miracles of the Bible we
find that they may be classified into those which involve a change of
substance and those in which the substance remains the same and the
change is one of quality or quantity. An example of the former is the
change of Moses's rod into a serpent and of the water of Egypt into
blood; of the latter, Moses's hand becoming leprous, and the withering
of the hand of Jeroboam. We may further divide the miracles into those
in which the prophet was told in advance, as Moses was of the ten
plagues, and those in which he was not, as for example the reviving of
the dead by Elijah and many other cases. Our examination also shows us
that all miracles are performed by prophets or in relation to them. Also
that they are done with some good and useful purpose, namely, to
inculcate belief or to save from evil.
These data will help us to decide who is the author of miracles.
Miracles cannot be accidental, as they are performed with a purpose; and
as they involve a knowledge of the sublunar order, they must have as
their author one who has this knowledge, hence either God or the Active
Intellect or man, _i. e._, the prophet himself. Now it is not reasonable
to suppose that God is the author of miracles, for miracles come only
rarely and are of no value in themselves but only as a means to a
special end, as we said before. The laws of nature, however, which
control all regular events all the time, are essentially good and
permanent. Hence it is not reasonable to suppose that the Active
Intellect who, as we know, orders the sublunar world, has more important
work to do than God. Besides if God were the author of miracles, the
prophet would not know about them, for prophetic inspiration, as we know
(p. 342), is due to the Active Intellect and not directly to God.
Nor do we need waste words in proving that man cannot be the author of
miracles, for in that case the knowledge of them would not come to him
through prophetic inspiration, since they are due to his own will.
Besides man, as we have seen, cannot have a complete knowledge of the
sublunar order, and hence it is not likely that he can control its laws
to the extent of changing them.
There is therefore only one alternative left, namely, that the author of
miracles is the same as the inspirer of the prophets, the controlling
spirit of the sublunar world, whose intellect has as its content the
unified system of sublunar creation as an immaterial idea, namely, the
Active Intellect, of whom we have spoken so often. The prophet knows of
the miracles because the Active Intellect, who is the author of them, is
also the cause of the prophetic inspiration. This will account too for
the fact that all miracles have to do with events in the sublunar world
and are not found in the relations and motions of the heavenly bodies.
The case of Joshua causing the sun and moon to stand still is no
exception. There was no standing still of the sun and moon in that case.
What is meant by the expressions in Joshua 10 is that the Israelites
conquered the enemy in the short time that the sun occupied the zenith,
while its motion was not noticeable for about an hour, as is usually the
case about noon. In the case of Isaiah moving the sun ten degrees back
for Hezekiah (Isai. 38, 8), there was likewise no change in the motion
of the sun, but only in that of the cloud causing the shadow.
Miracles cannot be of regular occurrence, for if natural phenomena and
laws were changed by miracle as a regular thing, it would signify a
defect in the original order. Miracles cannot take place to violate the
principle of contradiction, hence there can be no miracles in reference
to mathematical truths, nor in matters relating to the past. Thus a
miracle cannot make a thing black and white at the same time; nor a
plane triangle whose angles are less than two right angles; nor is it
possible by miracle now to make it not to have rained in Jerusalem
yesterday, when as a matter of fact it did rain. For all these involve a
denial of the logical law of contradiction that a thing cannot be and
not be at the same time.[358]
A prophet is tested (1) by being able to foretell miracles before they
come, and (2) by the realization of his prophetic messages. The question
is raised concerning the statement of Jeremiah that one may be a true
prophet and yet an evil prophecy may remain unfulfilled if the people
repent. Does this mean that a good prophecy must always come true? In
that case a good deal of what comes within the category of the possible
and contingent becomes determined and necessary! The answer is that a
good prophecy too sometimes fails of realization, as is illustrated in
Jacob's fear of Esau after he was promised protection by God. But this
happens more rarely on account of the fact that a man endeavors
naturally to see a good prophecy realized, whereas he does his best to
counteract an evil prophecy.[359]
Gersonides's entire discussion of miracles shows a deep seated motive to
minimize their extent and influence. The study of science and philosophy
had the effect of planting in the minds of the mediæval philosophers a
great respect for reason on the one hand and natural law on the other. A
study of history, archæology and literary criticism has developed in
modern times a spirit of scepticism regarding written records of
antiquity. This was foreign to mediæval theologians generally. No one
doubted for a moment the accuracy of the Biblical records as well as
their inspiration in every detail. Hence prophecy and miracles had to be
explained or explained away. Interpretation held the place of
criticism.