Jewish Philosophy

The Jewish Philosophie is a form of Jewish Pensée, born from the meeting of the Judaism with Greek, then gréco-Moslem woman, and finally modern philosophy.

The subjects which it covers can relate to:

  • of the general philosophical questions, as the direction of the life, the place of the man compared to itself;
  • of the questions common to all religious philosophies, like the report/ratio of others with God, the nature of God, the " démonstrations" of Its existence, but also of concerns more specifically Jewish, like the direction of the mitzvot (biblical to a lesser extent, rabbinical regulations), the place of the dogma, belief or of the certainty, the nature of the Times Messianic, or related to the Judéité.

This entity is discussed as well by the traditional Jewish mediums, of many Masters récriant it and showing it to lead to the heresy, as in the philosophical mediums, of the philosophers like Leo Strauss trying to show in what the " classiques" Jewish philosophy like the Guide of Stray the or the Kuzari are not philosophical works.

Ancient Jewish philosophy

Historical, talmudic and midrashic antecedents

At the time of the conquest of Persia by Alexandre, the province of Yehoud, Persian province enjoying the right of self-determination, becomes, without blow to férir, the province of Judaea, under domination Greek and enjoying the right of self-determination.

According to the tradition judéenne, Alexandre held Judéens and their values in high regard. At the time of his meeting with Siméon the Juste, it would respectfully have inclined himself in front of the Wise one It is in the center many accounts, where the respect is dyed of an ironic liveliness against its ambition.

Alexandre introduced the hellenism in Judaea, and his doctrinal component, philosophy.
Selon of the Jewish thinkers, like Leon Askénazi, the phenomenon religious , Jew gets along, i.e. the design of the " legislation mosaïque" in term of religion, and the philosophical phenomenon was more or less concomitant, Ezra being contemporary of Socrate. In a diagrammatic way, " the first philosopher speaks when the last prophet tait". Each one has with its credit of the achievements, material or spiritual, which will contribute to model humanity, the Occident in particular. However, these two modes of existence rest on opposite designs of the world:

  • the Judaism is based on a law, dictation with Moïse by YHWH, Elohim with the unutterable Nom, not being able to be represented, Créateur of the world and Libérateur of the Enfants of Israel of the country of Egypt. This Law is an at the same time ethical and ritual code, from which no one cannot withdraw, under penalty of being cut off from the people with which YHWH contracted a Alliance and selected.
  • the hellenism was released from the the Greek Pantheon and preaches a company based on the human achievement and the reason.
Judéens admire their life highly organized of the Greeks, their arts, and their achievements. However, obligatory nudity at the time of the sporting plays, the Pederasty set up in theory, the worship with the idols seem as much d'" abominations in front of YHWH" , and their agnostic beliefs and increationnists aggravate the doctors of the Law which, resting on a tradition of oral interpretation of which they make go up the origin with Moïse itself, affirm the creation of the world, justice and the divine remuneration.

Undoubtedly, the best formulation of the problem is that given by André Néher: the Greek question is par excellence that of the knowledge whereas the Jewish one is that of the responsibility . These two points of view mark until our days Jewish philosophy and its glance.

The relationship between Wise judéens and " Wise of the nations" were thus impressed of ambivalence, their ideas being known, and their recognized intellectual value, without granting however no credit to it. Rabban Gamliel curses a philosopher at the time of a debate on the creation of the world, of Elisha Ben Avouya, the heretic par excellence, Talmud known as qu'" a Greek melody never left its lips and from the Greek books fell from sound sein". The festival of Hanoukka does not commemorate as well the military victory of the Stiffs as the victory of the Judaism over the hellenism and the first act of revolt of Matthatias is the setting with died of hellenized Judéen ready to sacrifice to the Greek idols at the request of ceux-ci.
Cependant, of the considerations as the nature of the Métempsycose, if important in the Judaism, since the Messie will ressuscitera deaths, become their extensive only at that time. Certain critical historians of the Judaism think that it is in contact with Hellènes, and in answer to their philosophy, that the Judaism, originally Monolâtre (or henotheist), savagely became monotheist.

A legend apocryphal book probably born at the tenth century will reconcile the followers of Helene philosophy with Jewish wisdom: Alexandre, disciple of Aristote, would have brought back Jerusalem to him the writings of the King Solomon. Thus Joseph ibn Caspi will say: " How can I know God, and know that It is One, unless knowing what means to know, and what constitutes the unit? Why that should it be abandoned to the philosophers of the Nations? Why Aristote should it keep in its only possession the treasures which it has stolen in Solomon? " Another legend goes until saying that Aristote would be converted with the Judaism and would have enjoint a disciple to disavow his lesson.

Hellenistic Jewish philosophy

However, in the Jewish Diaspora, where the Hellenic culture are prominent, Juifs and Hellènes is interested more particularly in Egypt of the Ptolémée. One of Ptolémée itself is credited by the tradition to have financed the translation of the Seventy, which comprised already philosophical influences. It radiates among these communities, of the second century before the common era (or perhaps earlier, cf the Seventy) and continues until first century EC.

Its goal is before very apologetic: she wants to show the validity and the universality of the Judaism, to provide of it a philosophical interpretation, which designs God in a spiritual way (contrary to the deifications of material occurrences, which gave the Polythéisme) and ethics in a rational way.

Occurring at one time when as well the Jews Babylon as of Israel expressed a mistrust increasingly marked towards this one, his influence will be weak in the Jewish thought, although Harry Austryn Wolfson makes go up all the forms of religious philosophy with Philon, but dominating in primitive Christianity.

It is by the means of the Pères of the Church that one knows Aristobule de Panéas, whose certain fragments of the comment which it made of the Bible were preserved by them. According to Aristobule, the philosophers and poets learned their lessons from the wisdom of Moïse. Some of its ideas penetrated in-depth later interpretation: he refuses to give a literal interpretation of the anthropomorphic expressions of the Bible concerning God, and makes preexist Wisdom (i.e. the Torah) to the skies and the ground, initially like divine attribute, then like creation (by emanation) of God, and finally like immanente in the world. He proposes also an interpretation symbolic system of the Shabbat, and figure 7 in general.

More known is Philon of Alexandria (-20 EC. 40 EC.). Typical representative of the Judaism hellenized of Alexandria, Philon probably does not speak Hebrew, as seems to attest his use of whimsical etymologies of it, and although expert of many Jewish traditions, does not include/understand them the made-to-order of the rabbis. Estimating that the reason (philosophy) and the revelation are not incompatible, the first must defend and to justify the truths of the second. In order to render comprehensible Brace, Philon makes of it a precursor of Solon or Lycurgue. In the same way, the divine commands most obscure, like the one day institution of weekly abstention, the food laws, are used to inculcate in the man the bases Stoïcisme, and grant its rate/rhythm to the cosmic and universal rates/rhythms. Philon regarded however the Judaism as superior with philosophy, and draws aside the contrary doctrines auix biblical lesson, like the eternity of the world.
Classé among the fathers of the Church, Philon is not studied, nor even really not regarded as a Jewish thinker in spite of his indisputable judeity. It was undoubtedly too " grec" for the rabbis, i.e. too near to metaphysics and less rabbinical step. It would seem on the other hand to have received a certain posterity in the Karaïsme.

Jewish philosophy with the Middle Ages

One can divide medieval Jewish philosophy into two periods:

  • one period Islamic, of 8th at the 12th century EC., where the Jewish philosophers are strongly influenced by the Islamic Philosophie surrounding, which is strongly dependant on Greek philosophy, translated the syriaque one by Al-Farabi. Just as their fellow-members, the Jewish philosophers are interested particularly in four currents, the Motazilisme, the Néoplatonisme, the Aristotélisme and the critical of philosophy.
  • one period extending from the twelfth at the sixteenth century, where the Jews, being taken refuge in the Christian world and having forgotten Arabic, had to develop an own philosophy, which comprised Christian influences, mainly of the Scolastique. It is also during this period that the ideas of the Jews Conversos develop, which precede modern philosophy.

Judéo-Islamic philosophy

Motazilism

The philosophy of the Mutazilites is conceived by them as a means of solving the problems of the analysis scripturaire, mainly with regard to the divine Unit and Justice. It is not a question of a systematized philosophy, any philosophical argument is good to explain the Writing, which it comes from Plato, of Aristote or Epicure.

However, the analysis scripturaire characterizes the Karaïtes precisely, of the Jews which, having made secession of Talmud, defer their very whole worship on the '' Miqra ''. The mutazilism, whose birth at the end of the eighth century, coincides with the regrouping around Annan Ben David of all the Jewish currents opposed to the oral Law, thus finds on their premises a reception particularly favorable. It ensures to them a certain success in the propagation of their ideas, at the point to involve the vigorous answer of Saadia Gaon, Wise rabbinical formed at the school mutazilite of Al Dubai. Its Emounot veDeot ( Kitab Al-Amanat wal-l' tikadat , the " Deliver on the Articlees of faith and the Doctrines of Dogme"), first systematic presentation of the judaïque doctrines as well as its philosophical elements, is built in sections according to the structure mutazilite, with a section on the divine Unit, and one on the Théodicée. However, it deviates their lesson by declaring that the tradition (Jewish rabbinical gets along, i.e. the corpus of Talmuds and Midrash), although generally reconcilable with the reason, overrides it when they are in conflict. It is notably the case in the fields where only the speculation seems to be able to lead to the good comprehension of the things, like the debates on the eternity of the world or the immortality of the heart.

Contrary, Joseph Ben Abraham and his disciple Yeshoua Ben Yehouda, two eminent philosophers karaïtes of the 11th century, teach that the rational knowledge of God must precede the belief in the revelation: it is, according to them, only once the existence of God, Its wisdom and Its omnipotence established, that the truth of the Revelation is guaranteed. In the same way, certain moral principles are accessible by the only reflection, for example, which it is to better do it although the evil, that it is necessary to say the truth and to express recognition; these obviousnesses are independent of the Revelation, since even those which deny the existence of God and Its revelation adhere to these principles. The moral law is obligatory not only for the man but also for God. The two philosophers manage to show the creation of the world, however, unlike Saadia, they subscribe to the kalamic doctrines according to which all is composed of atoms.

Kalâm will remain the school of predilection of the Hakham im karaïtes, even when with the fourteenth century, Aaron Ben Elya de Nicomède, will show aristotelicians influences, especially maïmonidiennes.

On the other hand, at Rabbanites, Kalam will be in competition with the Neo-Platonism, and will be supplanted later by the doctrines of Aristote.

Mutakallamin karaïtes eminent
  • Joseph Ben Abraham Al-Basir, author of the Sefer HaNe' imot and the Mahkimat Peti .
  • Yeshoua Ben Yehouda al' muallim.
  • Juda Hadassi, author of the Sefer Eshkol Hakofer , containing the principles of faith karaïtes

Notable philosophers rabbanites influenced by the mutazilism
  • Saadia Gaon
  • David ibn Marwan Al-Mukammi
  • Samuel Ben Hophni
  • Nissim Ben Jacob Ben Nissim ibn Shahin of Kairouan
  • Hai Gaon

Neoplatonism

The Néoplatonisme, although originally henotheist and pagan, was adapted then adopted by many Jewish thinkers, of which one of the most famous representatives is Solomon ibn Gabirol.

The emanationnism, the infinite perfection of the One, the rise of heart etc are indeed topics very close to the religious beliefs, being able to be approached under a rational, driving angle with the system of ibn Gabirol, or a " point of view; mystique" , driving with the doctrines of the sephirot of Isaac the Blind man, leader of the Cabal géronaise.
the Jewish philosophers neoplatonicians will often oscillate between these two poles, which can merge at some, like Bahya ibn Paquda, which the Jews know under the name of Rabbenou Behaye. Author of the first work of ethical Jewish ( Al Hidayah ila Faraid Al-hulub , " Guide with the duties of the cœur" , and translated into Hebrew by Juda Ben Saül ibn Tibbon under the title Hovot ha-Levavot , the Duties of the Heart), it was, under the inspiration of the " Brothers of Pureté", strongly inclined with contemplative mysticism and asceticism. However, wanting to present a religious system accessible, pure, and in complete agreement with the reason, it eliminated from this system the elements which seemed to him in contradiction with the monotheism or the Jewish Law.

Notable Jewish Neoplatonicians
  • Isaac Israeli (855 - 955), doctor and philosphe based with Kairouan, first representative of the neoplatonism in the Judaism,
  • Solomon ibn Gabirol (1021 - 1070), author of the Fons Vitae (" Meqor Hayim"), of the Keter Malkhout , work of poetry and the Tikkoun Middot HaNefesh (" Correction of the Attributes of Ame"), work of ethics.
  • Abraham bar Hiyya Hanassi (first half of the twelfth century), author of the Higayon HaNefesh and the Meguilat Hamegale
  • Moïse ibn Ezra (1055 - 1135)
  • Abraham ibn Ezra (1089 - 1164), cousin of the precedent, author of the Yessod will mora vessod ha-Torah (1158), on the division of the biblical commands and their gasoline, it is mainly in its biblical comment that its neoplatonicians influences are expressed.

The criticism of philosophy

Although each philosopher delivers to criticism ideas of his colleagues, none rises like Yehouda Halevi (1085 - 1140), against philosophy, which was worth its nickname of " to him; Al-Ghazali juif".

Its major work, the Kuzari ( Kitab alhuyya wa-l-dalil fi nusr Aldine Al-dalil , " the book of the argumentation for the defense of the religion méprisée"), composed on the model of the dialogs of the destruction of the philosophers (Tahafut Al-Falasifa) of Al-Ghazali, intends to defend the Judaism against the surrounding systems of thought, whose he deplore the influence on the Jews, namely the Christianisme, the Islam, the Karaïsme, and especially the philosophy, at the time mainly represented by the current neoplatonician.

Juda Halevi does not protest against the philosophical speculation itself, of which it does itself use, including dismounting philosophical arguments, but against the will to show an identity between shown truth and revealed truth. According to him, this one is let neither examine, nor to subject to the speculation, only God gives access to some elected officials to the field of divine ( Al 'amr Al-ilahi ). He then undertakes to show the Jewish doctrines based on the revelation and the tradition, which makes of this book a concise and complete talk of the Judaism.

This book was worth in Juda Halevi its notoriety in its time and nowadays, although he was already a famous poet.

Aristotelism

The ideas of Aristote had an important and durable repercussion in Jewish philosophy, because of spiritual stature of its principal representative, Moïse Maïmonide. However, Maïmonide had been preceded in this way by Abraham ibn Dawd Halevi 1110 - 1180)-->, whose principal philosophical work, Emouna Rowed ( Al-Aqida Al-Rafi' has ), written only " for those which doutent" , was a criticism in rule of Fons vitae of Solomon ibn Gabirol, written using arguments aristotelicians.

Of difficult reading, this book was very quickly outclassed by the " Guide of Egarés" of Maïmonide, published shortly after. Abraham ibn Dawd is not less the first Jew aristotelician, and its work counts among the traditional works of the Jewish philosophy of the Middle Ages.

Brace Maïmonide (1135 - 1204)
Rabbi, commentator of the Mishna, legalist, codifying, décisionnaire, and Doctor, Moshe Ben Maïmon HaDayan, known under the name of Moyses Maïmonide for the Christians, Foamed bin Maïmoun ibn Abdallah Al-Kurtubi Al-Israili for the Moslems, was l'" Eagle of Synagog" according to Thomas d' Aquin, the writer of the Guide of Stray the Maïmonide, according to the word of Maurice-Ruben Hayoun, spoke in Arabic, requested in Hebrew and thought in Greek.

Trained in Talmud by his father, reader set on Aristote and Hippocrates (as well as large Arab philosophers of its time), Maïmonide reconciled the first with the seconds.

Placing Aristote just below the prophets, he was convinced, like Scholastiques, which there could not be contradiction between the Torah, true since revealed, and human lucky finds, some since shown, except however points where Aristote contradicted the Torah, in particular about the eternity of the world, or the distance from God with respect to humanity.

He preceded, and surely influenced, in that the Scolastique S. Cependant, he was influenced by the neo-platonist commentators , although he does not share of them necessarily the ideas, and by his own ideas, which emanated undoubtedly from a deeply Jewish heart, not on which the Scholastics did not follow it obviously.

They more did not follow it on the negative Théologie, Maïmonide estimating that one can describe God only by what It Is not. Maïmonide estimated that no positive attribute was appropriate for God.
Le many Its attributes pouurait to seem to carry damage to the Unit of God: how to conceive that It can be at the same time Juste, and Parking laws of the universe, the Great architect of Voltaire, Bon, Parking Providence and of the free-referee (whereas one has just said that all is under Its control) and Miséricordieux?

For memory, according to the Talmud, all is between the " mains" of God, except the fear of Dieu")

In addition, between the attributes of God and those of the man exists of similarity only in the choice of the words ( homonymy -- cf Guide Stray I 35,56).

Nothing can thus be known " genuine gasoline divine". Just as Kant will say as Thing-in-it-even is " insachable" , Maïmonide declares that one can know of God only what It Is not

  • Exemple: God is not " vivant" , within the meaning of the term. The only reason for which one calls It Alive God is to stress that It cannot be dead.
  • Rather than to say that God Is wise, should say to us that It Is not ignorant
The Scholastics thought as him that no assertion is adequate to describe God, but they could not accept that no positive term describes God.
  • If one can admit qu'" éternel" , " omnipotent" does not describe adequately God, it is useless to say that It Is " not non-éternel" , etc

Lastly, he writes in answer to the philosophers of his time 13 articlees of faith in which the Jews according to him were obliged to believe (whoever transgress the commands but adhere to these principles is still of Israel. Whoever disavows some only one is a apostate)

  1. God Is
  2. God is One; there is not of another unit that His
  3. God is incorporeal
  4. God is Eternel (and former to the world)
  5. Seul God must be honoured
  6. the Révélation took place through the Prophète S of God.
  7. the preeminence of Moïse within the prophets
  8. the Loi of God was given on the mount the Sinai
  9. the Loi of God is immutable
  10. God with the prescience of all the human actions
  11. Récompense of the good deeds and punishment of bad the
  12. the arrival of the Messie
  13. the Résurrection of dead the

There exists all the same a controversy, some supporting that Rambam subscribed to the theses aristotelicians on the eternity of the world, and did not believe in the resurrection of deaths.

Its philosophy -->

Medieval Jewish philosophy after Maïmonide

Just as all biblical comment written after that of Rachi can be regarded as a comment of his, the philosophy of Maïmonide feeds Jewish philosophy until the modern era, even modern philosophy itself, Baruch Spinoza, Moïse Mendelssohn, Leo Strauss or Hermann Cohen there being referred.

Controversies around the philosophy of Maïmonide

The philosophy of Maïmonide was, of sound living even, the object of measurements and countermeasures of excommuniation for whoever would be devoted to it, and of impassioned controversies, whose report even provides the matter of the Minhat Kenaot of Abba Mari, written in 1306, more than one century after death of the Master. It often happened that the actors of these controversies adopt a shared position. Solomon Ben Aderet, for example, defended the work of Maïmonide, but was opposed to its diffusion in mass, and ends up writing a herem towards whoever would study philosophy below the thirty years age.

Abraham Ben David de Posquières, burning of the contemporary critics of Maïmonide, undertook to show that, very admirable which was its work, other opinions that his could and were exist, as regards halakha as as regards philosophy. He was opposed particularly to the tendency of Maïmonide to make pass from the doctrines aristotelicians for articlees of faith, even from the Jewish dogmas, like his sights on the immortlity of the heart and resurrection of deaths.

Shem Tov Ben Joseph Falaquera wrote the Moreh ha Moreh (Guide of the Guide), and the Iggeret ha-Vikou' ah (Epistle of the disputation), apologetic work reproducing a dialog between a partisan and an opponent of the study of philosophy, slicing in favor of the first.

Brace Nahmanide, as versed in philosophy as in the Cabal, the way moderated in the controversies around Maïmonide represented, proposer to break the bearing banishment on Maïmonide, but to maintain, even reinforce that on its works. This opinion was rejected, as well by holding as by the opponents in Maïmonide. Itself criticized strongly certain ideas of Maïmonide in its comment, but it in addition tried to reconcile them with the Jewish tradition: concerning the resurrection of deaths, it suggested that with the Messianic Temps, the physical bodies would rise by the means of the heart to a pure gasoline, so near to the spirit, that they would become eternal about it.

Averroïstes

Isaac Albalag, second half of the 13th century

Resolutely philosopher, resolutely rationalist, resolutely averroïste, Albalag crosses the limit which Maïmonide had traced: its interpretation of the account of creation follows of so close the thesis of Aristote on the eternity of the world which it is treated of heretic.

Its most known work is the translation which it made of the Mahahid Al-Falasifa (tendencies of the philosophers) of Al-Ghazali. It actually translated of them only the chapters concerning the Logique and the Métaphysique. However, it also made work of commentator, correcting the sights of the philosophers like had made Al-Ghazali in its Tahafut Al-Falasifa (Destruction of the Philosophers, already mentioned).

Albalag notices that Al Ghazali does not refute the philosophers but its own errors, that it had made while being based not on the original texts of Aristote, but on these commentators, like Avicenne. Besides Albalag addresses this same reproach to Maïmonide, when this one does not follow Aristote, in particular on the eternity of the world

By composing its work, Albalag works with a principal goal: to dismount the popular idea that philosophy tends to sap the bases of the religion. On the contrary, they agree (according to him) in the basic principles of any positive religion, namely:

  • the belief in the remuneration, rewards or punishment
  • the belief in immortality for God
  • the belief in God right
  • the belief in Providential God
and they share the same goal: the happiness of humanity.

Philosophy addressing itself to the individual, whereas the religion is addressed to the masses, which explains their differences in the establishment of the truths: philosophy shows, whereas the religion teaches .

However, Albalag, inspired by Averroès, does not claim that the philosophical doctrines must entirely coincide with the religious doctrines: the naked philosophical truth is noxious for the masses, obliging the Scriptures to adapt their language.

  • This is why it is doubly in the error, that which rejects a philosophical truth because she seems to enter in contradiction with the Writing: firstly, because it did not include/understand the true direction of the Writing; secondly, because it draws some that the true arguments of the philososphie cannot be conclusive.

Whenever the adequacy between reason and revelation seems really impossible, Albalag proposes a rather unusual solution, the Double truth , found at Solastiques Latin, which teaches that philosophical truth and prophetic truth are two truths which can be contradicted, although not mutually exclusive.

It seems however that he reached that point following his own speculations, by combining the irreconcilable theories of Averroès and Al Ghazali: philosophical teaching is true from a speculative point of view and revealed teaching is true on a higher level, that of prophecy, these two points not being the same ones. The prophet can be understood only by the prophet, and the philosopher that by the philosopher, as Al Ghazali in a later work professes it, the Munkid .

Source: Article of Jewish Encyclopedia on Isaac Albalag

Joseph ibn Caspi, 1279 - 1340

Comment can I know God, and know that It is One, unless knowing what means to know, and what constitutes the unit? Why that should it be abandoned to the philosophers of the Nations? Why Aristote should it keep in its only possession the treasures which it stole to Solomon?
Although influenced by Maïmonide and especially Averroès, Rav Joseph ibn Caspi is regarded rather as a continuator of Abraham ibn Ezra, in particular in its approach literalistic and rationalist of Écritures.
Il nevertheless the rationalizing attitude of Averroès towards the miracles divides, regarding them as natural phenomena whose physical causes are unknown for us, and whose context is too remote.
In the same way, prophecy must be understood by taking account of the fact that it was to produce an outstanding effect on crowd, and addressed itself to the men of his time. The " prescience" prophets is due to his perfect analysis of holding and outcomes of the present and their consequences.
Many religious assertions does not tend so much to deliver a message " vrai" , that to teach with crowd how to behave and justify them to do it.
Prophétie and philosophy can diverge, since they are not of comparable nature. However, if we knew why they said what they said, and why the miracles take the form which they take, perhaps would see us us that prophecy could be brought back, with few things close, with philosophical truths more easily comprehensible by the common run of people. However, our comprehension of the assertions not being, and not being able to be total, we must accept them, as aspects of our faith, although we can remain convinced that these assertions are rather equivalent to the philosophical truths.

Contrary to Maimonide and Averroès, Ibn Caspi did not think that the secrecies of interpretation were to be held for intelligentsia. Within sight of the differences between contexts, times, audiences, knowledge, languages, etc, it had inevitably dug a ditch which did not have to be tried to fill. Consequently, the secrecy remained secret.

Levi Ben Gershom, 1288 - 1345

More known under the name of Gersonide , or of Ralbag, author of Milhamot HaShem , it is located rather in mobility averroïste and Scolastique, not hesitating to place the reason above the tradition. Its principal work, Milhamot HaShem ( wars of God ), is built on the model of the Guide of Stray the. It is about a philosophical criticism (according to often the line of thought of Averroès) of the syncretism suggested by the work of the Master between philosophy aristotelician and Juive orthodoxy.

Brace of Narbonne, circa 1300 - 1362

Rank is reproduced of the Jewish Pensée post-maïmonidienne, Rav Moïse of Narbonne, author of a comment on the Guide of Mislaid, is initiated by his/her father with philosophy, in spite of the rabbinical anathema striking all those which would be devoted to it before the 30 years age.

It is him as strongly marked print of Averroès, as it adapts to the Jewish thought. It can thus only be opposed to the ideas Avicenne perspiring in the work of Maïmonide.

The prophet has a so high level of intellect which it ends up acting on the matter: it is about the Intellect Agent . However, the prophets adapt these ideas to the level of the audience to which they are addressed. The Torah is thus practically incomprehensible in its globality, if it is not by an individual whose intellect was melted in Intellect Agent. The philosopher approaches some more. Only the philosophers are thus capable capacity to try the company to include/understand the words of the prophets.

Hasdaï Crescas, 1340 - 1410

The " Rav de Saragosse" , author of Gold Hashem (" The Light of Dieu"), the yoke of the aristotelism regrets in which it estimates that the Judaism was locked up. It is made the adversary as declared of Avicenne and Maïmonide as of Averroès and Gersonide, whose works can carry out to scramble the specificity of the Judaism, and to bring back the contents of it to a whole of concepts aristotelicians, as well even it would not be the intention of the authors (it is true that the number of voluntary conversions to another confession beat full sound when the exchange of ideas was maximum between the three communities, because the certainty of the believer easily the doubts of the philosophers replaced. Conversions with the Judaism were rarer all the same than the reverse).

Its Or Hashem is divided into four sections ( ma' amarim ), subdivided in rules ( kelalim ) and chapters ( perakim ):

  • first draft of the bases of all the beliefs: the existence of God;
  • the second of the basic principles of the faith, that Rav of Saragossa limits to six :
  • #Croyance in divine omniscience
  • #Croyance in divine providence
  • #Croyance in divine omnipotence
  • #Croyance in prophecy
  • #Croyance with the free-referee
  • #Croyance that the world was created for a finality.
  • the third of other doctrines which, although nonfundamental, bind each member to the Judaism;
  • the fourth of doctrines which, although traditional, are absolutely not obligatory and are thus opened with the speculation.
The criticism which Hasdaï Crescas makes not only philosophical ideas, but also of the scientific postulates of Aristote, of which it shows the time limitation, within sight of the advances in knowledge made since, make a brilliant precursor of the scientific revolution of it.

Joseph Albo, 1380? - 1430 or 1444

Raise of Hasdaï Crescas, Joseph Albo, author of the Ikkarim ( Principes of the Faith ), was a rabbi and Spanish theologist of the fifteenth century. It is probable that its philosophy develop in answer to the disputations Judeo-Christians in which it had to take part, and which it wished to develop of the principles more easily justifiable than those of its predecessors, like the arrival of the Messiah.

There exist three kinds of laws; natural, conventional and divine. The natural law is the same one for all, in all places, all times; the conventional law is the fact of one or the several wise ones in agreement with the reason; the divine law can only be given by God to prophets. It only can lead the man to happiness and immortality.

Three religions are said divine. How to distinguish them? All three share necessarily three principles:

  1. Belief in the existence of God
  2. Belief in the revelation
  3. Belief in divine justice
However, only a truly revealed religion can deduce its other principles from them, like creation ex nihilo, the world to come, the arrival of the Messiah, etc without contradicting itself. However, these derived principles are not necessary to the belief: although a Jew must subscribe to it, and that the opposite returns it without any sinning doubt, he does not become heretic for all that about it.

Joseph Albo found matter to criticize his predecessors, as well Maïmonide as Crescas, but had extremely to make to avoid the charges of heresy.
Ses three principles authorize an enormous room for maneuver as for their interpretation, so that while being held with its theories, it would be difficult to call in question orthodoxy, even of particularly liberal Jews.

Isaac Abravanel 1437 - 1508

It can appear paradoxical that which one often presents like the last Jew aristotelician, the largest commentator of the Guide of Stray the, at the point to appear in certain editions near Maïmonide itself, was one of the largest adversaries of philosophy.

It is that, since Maïmonide, another school of thought flowered in the Iberian peninsula, which revealed with some initiates of the major biblical secrecies, and showed that, if the genius and the wisdom of Rambam are undeniable and uncontested, its opinions are not it.

Abravanel as well assimilated the rationalists like Maïmonide, Gersonide, and others that more mystical thinkers, like Juda Halevi and Nahmanide to quote only them. If it can illustrate the ideas of the Master, and restore clearness and the original direction of them, it is not unaware of these alternative opinions which can contradict it, and to recall, once more, that the opinion of our Master Brace is not that of Brace our Master.

Nevertheless, if Abravanel did not miss at the time of criticizing Maïmonide, hard than any of its predecessors, with regard to the designs rationalizing on prophecy and the Celestial Tank (comment of the Guide of Stray the, IIIe left: 71-74), it was not anti-maïmonidien for all that.

Thus in its Rosh Amana , it restores the validity of the thirteen basic principles of Maïmonide against criticisms of Hasdaï Crescas and Joseph Albo.
Il specifies however that the fact of wanting to establish principles is an inanity in oneself: Maïmonide, by compiling these articles, forever done nothing but reproduce the habits of the nations to state Axiom S, i.e. basic principles of their sciences. However, if it did it, it is only to mitigate the ignorance of some of its contemporaries as regards Torah; but the lesson of the Torah is the fruit of a divine revelation, whereas sciences are only human speculations; This lesson all is thus equivalent, and none of them can be regarded as principle or corollary of a principle.

In fact, Abravanel could represent a certain tendency to bring back the thought of Maïmonide in the bosom of the Jewish Pensée traditional. Thus, on the debate as for knowing if Maïmonide adhered or not to the idea eternity of the world, after having disputed, by requesting it to excuse it, the explanation which Rambam of the word Bereshit gives (Guide from stray II, chap 30), Abravanel adds: " And to explain the first word of the first verse in the direction of a temporal anteriority necessarily does not result in posing that creation took place in time, nor does not call into question the principle of creation ex nihilo, as Rambam fears it, because it is not impossible to say that the beginning of which it is question in this verse been part itself of time that he inaugurates and that the creation of the sky and the ground does not come to fall under a former time, but which it is the moment founder of time him-même."

Abravanel thus presents Maïmonide impotent to triumph over the reasoning aristotelician without calling into question the bases of its own system of belief, but convinced for itself of the revealed lesson.

In fact, the arguments of Abravanel itself, for right that they are, are not evidence and generally address only to that which reads its comment, therefore a believer.
As regards the scientific community, this dogma of the eternity of the world will be seriously called into question only to the twentieth century, with the theories of Georges Gamow.

For Abravanel, the controversies related to philosophy are thus not due to Maïmonide, but with its sectateurs, like Albalag, ibn Caspi, Falquera, Gersonide, Narboni,… It did not miss in their connection sour words, reproaching them for having perverted the beliefs of faithful authentic, to have even diverted them faith.

As for Abraham ibn Ezra, the Neo-Platonist, Abravanel was even more severe in its connection, treating its comments, where philology and philosophy intermingled, of “futile”, “contrary with the elementary principles of Tora”, obscure without anything bringing to the student.

Source: Isaac Abravanel, Comment of the account of creation, Genesis 1: 1 to 6: 8, translated by Yehouda Schiffers, collection the Ten Words, Verdier editions.

Jewish Philosophy with the Rebirth

After the expulsion of the Jews of Spain, the Italy becomes for a time the new center of Jewish philosophy. Actually, it is in Italy that Isaac Abravanel wrote large its works, and Italy of the twelfth century already saw rising a philosopher Juif, Hillel Ben Samuel, which combined neoplatonism, aristotelism, but also scholastic.

Nevertheless, the main tendencies of which will leave the revival Jewish philosophy on the one hand, and modern philosophy the other are elsewhere.

  • For the first, the face is in Safed. It started with Leon, and knows an enormous renewal after the expulsion of the Jews of Spain: it is not about the cabal, which is the subject of a separate entered , but of the subjacent philosophy, even peripheral, which culminates with works of Juda Löw Ben Bezalel of Prague and Moché Haïm Luzzatto of Padoue
  • For the second, it is about Amsterdam, sits of an intense emigration marrane , whose Baruch Spinoza is perhaps the most beautiful floret.

Italian neoplatonism

Juda Abravanel (1460 - 1530)

Wire of Isaac, it is also constrained with the exile. Its reputation of doctor is exceeded only by that of philosopher: it is one of the largest thinkers of this period hinge between Moyen-âge and Rebirth, and perhaps one of its craftsmen.

In its most known work, the Dialoghi d' Amore , it develops a theory, taking as a starting point the Symposium of Plato, and Bahya, explaining why love, with the platonic direction of the term, imbue Universe: the love emanates from God towards His creatures, which reverberate it to him, from where the dialog. The love is thus a cosmic, inseparable principle to be it. Work supports particularly on the spiritual dimension of the beauty (it makes pleasant, within the meaning of the word), and esthetics. True happiness is l'" union of human intellect with the Divine intelligence, " this being directly correlated with the esthetic pleasure.

Eliya Delmedigo (1460 - 1497)

Eliya Delmedigo, or Élie del Medigo, born in Crete, lived in Italy, where he discussed with Platonistes Christians. It represented some work of Averroès of the Hebrew to Latin, at the request of Pic of Mirandole, but wrote also independent philosophical works, like Be' hinat haDat (" Examination of Religion"), a work based on a treaty of Averroès, where it invests the relation between philosophy and religion.

Like Averroès, he thinks that the interpretation of the Writings should be the prerogative of the philosophers. Nevertheless, he denies with the philosophers the right to interpret the basic principles of the Judaism. He is in favor, like Averroïstes Christians of the principle of double truth, but contrary to them, or to Albalag, he gives the primacy to the tradition, although it is possible philosophically to interpret the doctrines which do not affect a principle of faith, or by affirming that the principles of faith are not in disagreement with the reason.

Joseph Delmedigo (1591 - 1655)

Going down from the precedent, Joseph Solomon Delmedigo was influenced by Galileo, although still attached to medieval beliefs. He was critical with respect to the ideas of Aristote, in particular of the concept of form of Aristote, estimating that the material substance and its qualities are enough to describe the world, and of the existence of incorporeal mobiles of the spheres. Its design of the heart holds of that of Plato, knowledge which the heart is a substance united with the body, and of Thomas d' Aquin, knowledge which active Intellect is intrinsic with the heart of the individual. In addition, it defended the ideas kabbalists, although it makes fun of their superstitions.

The revival kabbalistic

The Cabal is not a form of philosophy. It exists according to its members since the gift of the Torah on the mount the Sinai, and consists of oral lesson since then transmitted, some in large a secret.
Toutefois, it to a certain extent is strongly associated with Jewish philosophy. Initially because Maïmonide, the largest representative of this one, openly condemned the magic uses esoteric and practices. To be a kabbalist thus became for certain, like Shem Tov ibn Shem Tov (Hazaken), a profitable medium of expression the antione.
Cependant, much drew with the two sources.
  • Brace Narboni, before becoming the averroïste that one knows, had started by commenting on a mystical work, the Shiur Qomah .
  • Brace of Leon, the diffuser or author of the Zohar, was formed with philosophy before turning to the mystic.
  • Of large kabbalists, like Moshe Ben Nahman, Moshe Cordovero or Ugly Haïm Luzzatto, was amply formed with philosophy, and there drew with the need.
  • Later, from the large Masters of the Judaism like Isaac Abravanel or the Rav Yehouda Löw was distinguished in the two fields, like, nowadays, the Gdolei HaDor (Large of the generation).

the Cabal itself is treated front in its own entry and its place in the thought will be it also in the article Jewish Pensée.

The philosophy of Marranes

In addition to conversions with the Christianity of some individuals under the effect of aggressives preachings or in order to escape persecutions towards the Jews, had appeared in 1391 a new phenomenon, conversions forced into mass. However, these " new chrétiens" remained perpetually strokes of it, prohibited of return to the Judaism or " judaïser ", held in poor regard by the " old man chrétiens" when they wished to be integrated into their new business, considered with suspicion by the Jewish authorities when, finding a place more tolerant like Portugal in 1414 or Amsterdam after 1492, they wished to return to the Judaism. It is because of this state of permanent dispossession that, “seeking the nine in the vacuum between the two religions”, some conversos, that they become again Jewish or remain Christian, developed a philosophy based on the reason, rather critical towards the faith, and who would lead with Michel de Montaigne, Baruch Spinoza and others with the birth of modern philosophy, while others worked out a liberal theology. It is indeed with descendants of Conversos that one must:
  • the Spanish scolasticism, initiated by Francisco de Vitoria and developed by Bartolomé de Las Put and Alonso (Guttierez) of Veracruz, which puts the emphase on a universal law and natural rights, in opposition with the Limpieza of sangre invented by the order of the knights of Alcantara.
  • the Spanish Erasmianisme, which dreams of a liberal Christendom, removed from its theology, being based on éthico-moral lesson rather than of the doctrines
  • indicated by Ignace de Loyola to succeed to him the head of the Society of Jesus, Diego Lainez, who developed obedience of it, descended from converts (one century later, the Jesuits will hasten to make up the genealogy, in their obsession of purity, whereas the conversion of Lainez probably went back to four generations)

Among the conversos returned to the Judaism, Uriel da Costa and Juan de Prado, disappointed to not discover in the Judaism a released biblism of the Christian constraints, but a tradition dependant on an orally transmitted revelation, the bases of a rationalist Déisme formulate, which will influence the philosophy of Baruch Spinoza. Other old conversos, like Isaac Orobio of Castro, works out a philosophical defense of the Judaism to these attacks, like with the alternatives presenting itself to the rejudaïsés marranes, like the liberal Christianity of Limborch.

As these philosophers are driven all in a Christian mental universe, they will have a considerable posterity on the thought of the end of the 17th century, influencing philosophers like John Locke, Bayle, or Fénelon.

Christian philosophers marranes

  • Paul de Santa Maria, in the past Solomon Halevi
  • Alfonso de Valladolid, in the past Abner of Burgos
    • See also Isaac Pollegar, which shared the skepticism of Abner initially, but does not convert, and took its distances with respect to his/her former friend.

Rejudaïsés philosophers marranes

Critical rejudaïsés philosophers of the religion

Wire of notable of from Amsterdam Jewish community, Baruch Spinoza seems to have doubted as of its youth, in spite of its brilliant studies and a normal Community life seemingly. Influenced by the ideas deists of Juan de Prado, Spinoza rejects the model maïmonidien of a conciliation between religion and reason. Initiator of the textual criticism of the Bible, it concludes from it that the Bible is an assembly of texts written at various periods and in various contexts, that it is rather the fruit of imagination that reason, and that the superstition of the practitioners in is a foreseeable consequence. It contains an unquestionably pure core however, teaching obedience with God in the integrality of his heart, and the practice of justice and charity. In addition, one finds there seven principles of times universal, which allow an ethical and effective education masses (Spinoza shares with Maïmonide the vision of a philosophical elite côtoyant an ignorant mass):
  1. belief as a God
  2. His Unit
  3. His omnipresence
  4. Its Capacity and Its will
  5. obligation for the man to honor
  6. the redemption
  7. the salvation
Whereas it presents them in its Traité Théologico-Policy like a product of imagination, it describes ethical concepts strong close to these principles in its Ethique . With its Deus sive Natura , identification of God to nature by identity of " substance" , Spinoza develops a Panthéisme, as well as a Cartesian metaphysics, resolutely rationalist and deterministic by means of science. The free-referee is not the possibility of refusing what arrives, but that of accepting and perceiving clearly why the things must necessarily occur kind. The clearer this perception is, the more one can actively apply his free-referee, which makes at the same time freer and more similar to God. Stoicism in ace much ace both philosophies sought to fulfil has therapeutic role by instructing people how to attain happiness (gold eudaimonia, for the Stoics). However, Spinoza differed sharply from the Stoics in one important respect: He utterly rejected to their application that Reason could defeat Emotion. There the contrary, He contended, year emotion edge Be displaced gold overcome only by is stronger emotion. For him, the crucial distinction was between activates and passivates emotions, to form being those that are rationally understood and to lath those that are not. He also held that knowledge off true causes off passivates emotion edge transform it to year activates emotion, thus anticipating one off the key ideas off Sigmund Freud 'S Psychoanalysis.

Some element-keys of philosophy spinozienne:

  • God is the natural world and does not have personality.
  • the natural world is infinite.
  • It there not of true difference between the good and the evil.
  • All must necessarily arrive in the way that arrives. The free-referee thus does not exist.
  • All that is made by the human ones and the other animals is excellent and divine.
  • All the rights are derived from the State.
  • the animals can be used in all the possible ways by people for the benefit of the human race. -->
The naturalism spinozien became soon one of the fundamental presentations of the ideology of the modern man, influencing the materialism of the Lights, the German idealism, and other movements. However, and although having drawn to Jewish sources, Spinoza moves away from there completely. " I sought in what Spinoza was a “good” or “a bad” Jew. In fact, it is not Juif tout".

Modern Jewish philosophy

Brace Mendelsohn

Martin Buber

Hermann Cohen

neo-kantian Kant iens and

Solomon Maïmon

Born Solomon Cheiman, this scholar who gains his subsistence at 14 years by exempting courses of Talmud however leaves his native Bielorussia and the Jewish world with the call of the sirens of philosophy. Devoting itself to the study of Mendelssohn, he discovers Kant on late, in 1771. Nevertheless, it develops a criticism so astute of it that the philosopher himself exclaims that nobody among his criticisms as well included/understood his ideas.

Hermann Cohen (1842 - 1918)

The philosophical Eros of Hermann Cohen is that God makes the truth possible. Its system of idealism criticizes , inspired of the Kantian Criticisme, deals of logic of pure knowledge, ethics of the pure will, and esthetics of the pure feelings. It always put forward the fact that its ethical philosophy was enracinait in the lesson of the Judaism.

Hermann Cohen was the leader of the school of Marbourg, his interpretations of criticisms of the philosophy of Kant giving rise to the neo-kantian movement. He supported a transcendent pangolic version of the Kantian thought, forsaking some of his interpretations more speculative metaphysics, and pressing on the objective side of Kant. He also tried to identify the ethics of Kant with liberal socialism.

The idea of God occupies the central position of its critical idealistic philosophy. This idea returns to an essential harmony between the structure of the Universe and the aspirations of humanity. Its introduction of the idea of God into his philosophy is an attempt to satisfy the human need to believe that the ethical ideal is more " réel" that the esthetic ideal, with the direction " concret".

God, in this concept, neither alive nor is personified. One can discover It by the process of the reason itself. The religion, within the meaning of the term, is born with emergence from the ethical conscience. The " fonction" of God, if one can express oneself thus, is not to bring prosperity, nor even happiness, but to help well the men in their efforts of discrimination U and evil. The religion is able with it to only produce it the ideal with regard to individuality. The design of the sin is in theory applicable to the individual but not to the group. The cultivation of the gifts and intellectual faculties thus becomes a religious duty about it.

The religious Philosophie itself of Hermann Cohen contained elements of Idéalisme, Positivisme and Humanisme. Those came from its intuitions as for the objective validity of the ethical experiment.

Controversies around Jewish philosophy

Judaism and philosophy: history of an ambivalence

Jewish thinkers of the French school of the twentieth century (Jacob Gordin, Emmanuel Levinas, Andre Neher, Leon Askénazi…), which all was with the intersection of the religion and philosophy, agreed to think that the phenomenon religious (Jewish gets along) and the philosophical phenomenon were more or less or less in agreement. " doctrines mosaïques" were not thought in term of religion before Ezra, just like one generally agrees to recognize the beginning of philosophy at the time of Socrate, without calling in question the value of former philosophers like the Présocratiques.
Ces two phenomena did not present and do not present an interdependence. The Judaism was initially conceived not like a system of thought, but like a lifestyle to be implemented, just like the hellenism, whose philosophy was only the doctrinal aspect. The erudite controversies of the Talmud S had of another goal only to fix and teach the practice of the toranic or rabbinical regulations, without thinking that they can be “philosophized”, nor even discussed differently than to refine the discussed methods, or to apply them of them to a new situation. The philosophical speeches that will find the philosophers there result from their own interpretation, before being that of Wise, without however betraying them.
Il is significant that neither the Tanakh, nor the Talmud have term for philosophy -- a Greek word meaning " love of the sagesse" -- nor for Judaism -- a Latin term to designate the inhabitants of the Judaea, whereas those were indicated like the ''' people ''' of Israel and not the " members of the doctrines of Juda".

Nevertheless, these different systems of thought are not completely irreconcilable: one of the fundamental characteristics of the Judaism is to anchor very practical in a Text, divine expression, and its comments (it would be however erroneous to regard the Judaism as the religion of the Pentateuque, or even of the Hebraic Bible, because, since its beginnings, the Jewish practice did not cease evolving/moving and changing. This evolution was always done in accordance with a very strict and codified step, which starts in the Talmud and perdure today).
La step of the Judaism, in what she always wanted to think the act, the action, and to anchor them in the Transcendent one, divine the, present one of the analogies with the philosophical step. The Jewish tradition intends to think the world, the human one and the action from the divine one. God not having a form, of representation, body, and not being subjected to temporality, it is trying to do it parallel with the Idea within the meaning of Greek philosophy and, in particular, of the Metaphysics of Aristote. As well as the fact of noticing Emmanuel Levinas, Judaism and philosophy have in common, inter alia major values,

  • a predilection for the instruction, which must hold a major place in education. The ignoramus could not be pious, and vice versa.
  • a rejection of the numineux , crowned, which has the man and deprives it of its freedom to be, of its independence.
  • a rejection of the idolatry and myth, confining with atheism; however, and it is one already there their deep divergences, philosophy chooses atheism, while the Judaism exceeds it and includes it.
Such was, and such is still, to a certain extent, the main obstacle with the birth and the development of Jewish philosophy: affirmed wish of the Judaism be posed like a way of thinking different from philosophy, even in opposition with it, spite of their many analogies.
Il is significant with) this title that the heretics Juifs for the majority are named Apikoros , to bring closer to epicurean. Temptation for this form of philosophy which preaches, like the Judaism, the rejection of an unslung life and the pleasure of the study was large. However, the study for the Judaism is not an end in itself, death is not the result of all, and God is not indifferent. Accordingly, the Judaism confined with the faith, philosophy with the heresy and the apostasy.

Judaism and philosophy also diverge, and in-depth, in the report/ratio of the man in the world, and the man to the man. He is not innocent only the word " comprendre" ( cum prehendere , or " saisir") do not comprise the same concept as its Hebraic opposite course lehavin (built on the root bein , " entre" ; to make the share of the things entre").
Contrary to the Philosophy , contribution of Greek civilization, first system of thought to dissociate beliefs, triumphs over the reason over the myth, announcing progress of humanity, which is not often done without a certain contempt for the predecessors, proposing a legislation reasoned , the Judaïsme, fruit par excellence of the revelation, proposed in the world the Torah, legislation revealed proposing an ethical system of and morals, but also practices likely to be discussed to know the " of it; bonne" interpretation.

The problem is thus not only intellectual or, with the rigor, emotional: it has a strong political connotation. One remembers the Republic of Plato, one remembers the rules enacted by Moïse. These two systems of thought preach two forms of government.

Jewish philosophy could occur only with the intersection of these two worlds, in the hellenized Jewish communities of Alexandria and Elephantine, like an attempt at synthesis. The company, although having had little influence on the Jewish world, ensured the propagation of its ideas in the Greek world, then Roman. It is by the means of the Jews hellenes that YHWH Elohim " devint" Kurios Theos , the " Dieu" lord; , and that Moïse was known in its dimension of legislator, and compared with Lycurgue and Solon.

With the Middle Ages, Jewish philosophy was adopted without reserve by the ones, decried without reserve by the others. The traditional rabbinical mediums were wary of philosophy and condemned those which were devoted to it. They is that philosophies Greek, karaïte, or Moslem woman constituted a threat for the judaïsme.
Paradoxalement, the most eminent representatives of Jewish philosophy, until the time of the Lights, were famous rabbis. Large Wise the Moïse Maïmonide succeeds in imposing its version of philosophy aristotelician like a form of rationalization of the Judaism, which, without replacing the Talmud S, tended to perpetuate the infinite search for direction that the rabbis recommended. This philosophy became then comparable with certain lesson of the Talmud, in what it defended the validity of the Judaism against systems based either on the faith, like the primitive Christianisme, but on the raison.
Cependant, there still, some of these Wise which wanted to fight on the ground even of their adversaries and to show that the Jewish thought was based as much on the tradition that on the reason, were marked " to be itself taken with the jeu" , and to have disavowed the main part of the traditions and basic principles of the Judaism, like the creation of the world, the existence of a divine justice, etc Moreover, some of their disciples, often of less scale which their Masters, were tempted to substitute the philosophical thought for the Jewish thought, its way of putting the questions and of seeking the answers. By doing this, they also threatened to weaken the faith of some.

With the expulsion of the Jews of Spain, and especially the constitution of the class of Marranes, rejected as well by Christianity as by the Judaism, philosophy and Judaism seemed to divorce, the first éclosant in its modernity by decrying the second. In addition, with the assimilation of the Jews, little concerned with the Judaism but jealously attached, sometimes, with their " judéité" , a " appeared; philosophy of Juifs" who, although treating questions rather specific to the Jews and their history vis-a-vis the world, appreciably deviated from Jewish philosophy " traditionnelle". This one more than was ever fought by the traditional mediums, in spite of the presence of exceptional Masters, like the Maharal of Prague. Another large Master of the Jewish tradition, Rav Nahman de Breslav, although having studied itself philosophy, stated:

to philosophize, for a Jewish thinker, it is to put the questions which the Jews raise and to answer it like the Nice ones, and to cover subjects having milked with divine with human means, without the limits that the Jewish thought “traditional”
is essential

However, it is in the orthodoxe spheres, even ultra-orthodoxe, that Jewish philosophy tends to currently reappear, although the contributions of not-orthodoxe Jewish thinkers are also extremely important.

Approaches of different holding from the controversy

The synthesis of two systems of thought is seldom done without confrontation, with stronger reason between philosophy and religion; as such, they position in fundamental contradiction on several points, in particular:
  • the reason by report/ratio the faith
    • the philosopher wants to be free prejudices when it tackles a question, including as for the way which it will have to borrow, or rules that it will have to follow.
    • the believer (or the faithful one) is held with principles of faith for which it is necessary for him to adhere under penalty of apostasy. For this reason, it is regarded as aberrant that philosophy leads it to formulate them, or to refine them.
  • the reason compared to the tradition
    • Following the example mathematics, much of philosophical approaches are a language which wants to be universal to describe a reality which, very often, is specific to the philosopher. The goal of the philosopher is to find the way. He will thus not hesitate to dissociate his predecessors.
    • the Judaism believes in a revealed, universal, timeless and immutable truth. Moreover - and this is particularly true in the rabbinical Judaism -, it sticks to a tradition, i.e. with a transmission chain which goes back to Moïse and on which the value depends on transmitted teaching. To contradict is unthinkable. It is thus about " coller" with its predecessors, who were closer to the time of the Revelation.
      Ainsi, contrary to Démocrite, Plato or Aristote - as many names which constitute stakes so much in the history of the thought, that in the research of the reason -, when Wise is quoted by name, it is that its opinion, although of a great intellectual value, was generally not followed. Talmud consigns that such Wise simply “said” this. Conversely, when it brought back a teaching in the name of its Masters, such Wise “said”, teaching is irrefutable (unless finding an adverse opinion at the Wise former ones).

The conciliation can seem impossible, between the Judaism, when the Master hassidic Rabbi Nahman de Braslav issues that very seen philosophical is false and heretic, that philosophy, when Baruch Spinoza formula that the " religion" is lower than philosophy, and cannot thus regard traditional Jewish philosophy differently than as a failure.

Nevertheless, this synthesis was indeed tried by others:

  • those which, by the means of philosophy, tried to provide arguments and evidence in favor of the basic principles of a religion. This way, which is not specific to the Judaism, since it was borrowed by the thinkers of the Chrétienté and the Islam, was rejected like not being " vraie" philosophy by the " vrais" philosophes.
    Leo Strauss, for example, shows in what of traditional, like the Kuzari or the Guide of Stray the, were not philosophy.
  • those which, on the basis of a typically philosophical postulate, proposed to prove that no religious belief is true until proof of the opposite, by an independent philosophical analysis. This way, which was borrowed by Joseph Albo or Mordekhaï Kaplan, the founder of the Judaism reconstructionnist, nevertheless was abundantly criticized by the majority of the " vrais" members with the principles of a religion, and, in the case of Rav Kaplan, was worth to him to be unobtrusive projects and institutions which it had contributed to model.

The most traditional method consisted in applying the analytical methods of philosophy to the Judaism, but not the reasoning, in order to reinforce the bases of its faith by rational arguments. It was the point of view of the majority of the philosophers of the Judaism, like Saadia Gaon or Abraham ibn Daoud, although also carried out to him Masters like Gersonide or Albalag to profess ideas discussed as well by their contemporaries as by the following generations.

It was created at the twentieth century, particularly in France an attempt to reconcile philosophy and tradition. One of its more famous representatives was Emmanuel Levinas, figure of the phenomenology inspired of Hegel, like Jewish thought. As he said it: “I do not place my reflection under the authority of the Bible, I place it under the authority of phenomenology”, but its reflection did not cease being based on the Jewish tradition (of which he never claimed himself main).

the question was not solved to date, and it is not the claim of this article , which does not make that to expose the various philosophers during the histoire.
On can nevertheless point out that:

  • for those of the philosophers who want to exclude from the Judaism his revealed gasoline, the verdict is without call: they can be the largest philosophers with the eyes of the nations, the victorious of the religion (Hegel, in connection with Spinoza), from the point of view of the Judaism, they were mislaid.
  • for those of the Jews which never submit their beliefs in the questioning, the risk is large to integrate new habits without religious base. These Jews, although honoured for their piety, their scholarship, even their wisdom, are often perceived like obscurantists, even integrist or fanatic by the population in general, and the Jews themselves.

Jewish thinker or Jew who thinks?

This interrogation, formulated in connection with Emmanuel Levinas, could be posed in connection with all the figures of philosophy juive.
Generally, four types of interrogation are posed:

To think the Judaism is

  • Which the nature of God? How do we know that There exists? is
  • Which the nature of the Revelation? How do we know that God reveals His will with the men?
  • Among our traditions, which are they to take in the literal sense, which is to take with appeared?
    • prophecy and the miracles were held in " notre" world, such as we know it, " where the miracle do not see all the jours" and in this case, prophecy is allegorical, but what does she explain? or, did the era of prophecy see purely miraculous acts, of as much less apprehensible by intellect than they did not reproduce since, and prophecy would be it thus to literally accept? is
  • Which the basic principles of our faith, to which should believe all its members (included not-practitioners)?
  • How to reconcile the philosophical data (or scientists) with our faith?
In this direction, Jewish philosophy is a form of Jewish thought, like interpretation, poetry or the mystic, heiress of Talmud. One can even say that it is a Jewish form of the universal thought , which among Greeks, would lead to philosophy. It is thus not astonishing that the Juifs philosophers borrow the method and the language of it, in other words the form, since this one often is pushed of humanity. On the other hand, the tradition feels in danger when some among these philosophers draw not only from his form but also from its content.

The philosophers of the Judaism are Masters recognized in their tradition, although they can be strongly disputed, the following the example of Gersonide or Moïse Narboni. They control the bases, are often rabbis, but try of them, in addition to their role of judge as regards Jewish Loi and/or of teachers, to adopt, or at least to adapt, the processes, in the absence of the sights, philosophical with the Jewish traditional questions, in order to reinforce the faith.

Abraham ibn Dawd Halevi encourages the study of philosophy, because it wakes up the spirit as well in the layman as in the monk. These Masters be Judaism and thought are often much more known for their philosophical work than `religious', with notable exceptions, like Maïmonide, giant in the two fields, Nahmanide and ibn Ezra, whose philosophy is melted in religious work.

The goal of these Masters of philosophy and Judaism is to facilitate the practice of it, by expurgeant of the faith the aspects which they consider “irrational”, while bringing an answer, or an outline of answer, philosophical to questions like divine nature, the miracles or prophecy.

To think the thought of the Judaism

  • the faith is it compatible with the reason? is
  • which their respective place?

Thought and Judaism

It is a question of thinking the report/ratio of the philosopher of the Judaism, their contributions mutual or on the contrary their insoluble differences. It is on this level that are located Spinoza, Mendelssohn and good number of modern Juifs philosophers, like André Neher or Emmanuel Levinas.

To think its Judaism

The reflection strictly speaking any more does not relate to the Judaism, but Judéité, the Jewish identity, which is not posed any more in religious terms but existentialists, cultural, political.
  • What Judaism? How does influence the vision of the world of the Jews?
  • Comment a Jew see does the world, the history, including that of philosophy? And how the world see does the Judaism and the Jews?

They are for example the regrets of a Heinrich Heine growing old, about its conversion with Protestantism, of the discussions of Franz Rosenzweig or Martin Buber, confronting their Jewish identity with the large currents existentialists of the century, of the reflections on the anti-semitism of Hannah Arendt, which never goes into theological considerations, even ideological, of Hans Jonas raising multiple questions of a nature philosophical or theological which will be done day after the traumatism of the Shoah, of Benny Levy, of which the concepts speak less about the Jew in his spiritual stature than without its historico-political dimension, or civic.

As it is not a question here to confront two forms of thought but to develop phenomenology, the existentialism, etc in the dimension of a epiphenomene, the judeity, this particular identity which characterizes the Jews, which they or not, independently of their adherence to the faith developed by the Jewish people authorizes to it, the synthesis is much easier, while causing new intellectual horizons.

Philosophers of Jewish ascent

" philosophers généraux" who are Jewish only their ascent, like Karl Marx, Edmund Husserl or Henri Bergson, does not make Jewish philosophy.

Notes and references of the article

See too

Related articles

  • judéo-Islamic Philosophy

External bonds and documents

  • Institute of studies lévinasiennes
  • Discussion
    • Adventures in Philosophy - Jewish Philosophy Index (radicalacademy.com)
    • Survey off Jewish Philosophy (jct.ac.il)
    • Jewish Philosophy, The Dictionary off Philosophy (Dagobert D. Runes)
  • Sources
    • Material by topic, daat.ac.il (in Hebrew)
    • Primary Sources, Ben Gurion University (in Hebrew and English)
    • Online materials, Halacha Brura Institute (in Hebrew)
    • From the Israeli high-school syllabus, education.gov .il (in Hebrew)

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