Pearson Edexcel Level 3 Advanced GCE in Religious Studies – Anthology
256Today, Maimonides is the one exponent of medieval Jewish philosophers whose
works are widely taught outside the Jewish world; his attempts to unite Aristotle
and Torah had a profound influenc e on his Christian c ontemporaries. Within the
Jewish world, Maimonides is st ill among t he most frequent ly c it ed authorit ies on
halakhic matters, even by those who would never consider reading The Guide for
the Perplexed, and his ethic al writings inform Jewish thought to this day.
(N.B.: The quotations that follow are taken from T he Et hic al Writ ings of
Maimonides.)
FROM THE WRITINGS OF MAIMONIDES
The numerous evils to whic h an individual person is exposed are due to the defec ts
existing in the person themselves. We c omplain and seek relief in our own fault s;
we suffer from t he evils whic h we, by our own free will, inflict on ourselves. Why
then asc ribe them to God, who has no part in them?
It is improper to consider personal danger when the public welfare is at stake.
If you build a synagogue, let it be more beautiful than your house. When you feel
hungry, c lothe the naked, or devote anything to a holy purpose, it must be from
your finest.
Free will is granted to every man. If he wishes to direct himself toward the good
way and bec ame righteous, the will to do so is in his hand; and if he wishes to
direc t himself t oward t he bad way and bec ome wic ked, t he will t o do so is likewise
in his hand. Thus it is written in the Torah, “Behold, the man is bec ome as one of
us, knowing good and evil” (Gen. 3.22) – that is to say, the human spec ies has
bec ome unique in the world in that it c an know of it self, by it s own wit and
reflec t ion, what is good and what is evil, and in t hat it c an do what ever it wishes.
MOSES MENDELSSOHN (1729 C.E. – 1786 C.E.)
If we ac c ept the rule of sc ienc e, as Spinoza urged, what happens to
Revelat ion? Moses Mendelssohn is a pivotal figure in the history of Jewish thought
because he was the first to face that and related questions. He is also t he first
signific ant post-Spinoza Jewish philosopher, an Orthodox Jew who extolled the
Haskalah/Jewish Enlightenment, a friend of Christians who remained an observant
traditional Jew, yet whose thought undermined the foundations of Orthodoxy as
surely as Kant would undermine the foundations of Mendelssohn’s thought. He was
also the first Jewish thinker of note to emerge from Germany, the c ulture that
played a signific ant role in the thought of virtually every subsequent Jewish
philosopher of importance.
Mosel Mendelssohn was born in Dessau, the son of a Torah sc ribe. He received
a traditional Orthodox upbringing and educat ion, st udying wit h Rabbi David Frankel.
When Frankel was named c hief rabbi of Berlin in 1743, his st ar pupil followed him
to the capital. There, the fourteen-year-old boy eked out a meagre living working
as a copyist and private tutor. T he boy’s physic al limit at ions were numerous. He
suffered from a nervous disorder, was a st ut t erer, and had a severe c urvat ure of
the spine that resulted in a hunc hed bac k. He was exceedingly short, and to be