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Maimonides

January 31, 2023

For other uses, see Maimonides (disambiguation).
For the Haifa hospital, see Rambam Health Care Campus.

Moses ben Maimon[a] (1138–1204), commonly known as Maimonides (/maɪˈmɒnɪdiːz/)[b] and also referred to by the acronym Rambam (Hebrew: רמב״ם),[c] was a Sephardic Jewish philosopher who became one of the most prolific and influential Torah scholars of the Middle Ages. In his time, he was also a preeminent astronomer and physician, serving as the personal physician of Saladin. Born in Córdoba, Almoravid Empire (present-day Spain), on Passover eve, 1138 (or 1135),[d][8][9][10] he worked as a rabbi, physician and philosopher in Morocco and Egypt. He died in Egypt on 12 December 1204, when his body was taken to the lower Galilee and buried in Tiberias.[11][12]

  • Maimonides
  • (Moshe ben Maimon)
Imaginative 18th-century depiction of Maimonides
Born30 March[1] or 6 April[2] 1135
Possibly born 28 March or 4 April[3] 1138
Córdoba, Almoravid Empire
Died12 December 1204 (66-69 years old)
Fostat, Ayyubid Sultanate
Notable work
Spouse(1) daughter of Nathaniel Baruch (2) daughter of Mishael Halevi
EraMedieval philosophy
RegionMiddle Eastern philosophy
SchoolAristotelianism
Main interests
Religious law, Halakha
Notable ideas
Oath of Maimonides, Maimonides' rule, Golden mean, 13 principles of faith
Influences
Influenced
Signature

During his lifetime, most Jews greeted Maimonides' writings on Jewish law and ethics with acclaim and gratitude, even as far away as Iraq and Yemen. Yet, while Maimonides rose to become the revered head of the Jewish community in Egypt, his writings also had vociferous critics, particularly in Spain. Nonetheless, he was posthumously acknowledged as one of the foremost rabbinic decisors and philosophers in Jewish history, and his copious work comprises a cornerstone of Jewish scholarship. His fourteen-volume Mishneh Torah still carries significant canonical authority as a codification of Halacha. He is sometimes known as הנשר הגדול ("haNesher haGadol" The Great Eagle)[13] in recognition of his outstanding status as a bona fide exponent of the Oral Torah.

Aside from being revered by Jewish historians, Maimonides also figures very prominently in the history of Islamic and Arab sciences and he is mentioned extensively in studies. Influenced by Aristotle, Al-Farabi, Ibn Sina, and his contemporary Ibn Rushd, he became a prominent philosopher and polymath in both the Jewish and Islamic worlds.

Name

Maimonides referred to himself as משה בירבי מימון הספרדי, Hebrew for "Moshe son of Rabbi Maimon, the Spaniard".[e] In Medieval Hebrew he was usually called ר"ם, short for "our Rabbi Moshe" and in Modern Hebrew he is called רמב"ם, short for "our Rabbi Moshe the son of Maimon" and pronounced Rambam.

In Arabic, he is sometimes called "'Father of Amram', Moses son of Maimon son of Obadiah, the Cordoban" (أَبُو عَمْرَان مُوسَى بْن مَيْمُون بْن عُبَيْد ٱللّٰه ٱلْقُرْطُبِيّ, Abū ʿImrān Mūsā bin Maimūn bin ʿUbaidallāh al-Qurṭabī), or more often Mūsā bin Maymūn (موسى بن ميمون). Bin ʿUbaidallāh is to be treated as Maimonides' surname, as Obadiah was the name of his earliest direct ancestor, not his grandfather, who was named Joseph.

In Greek, the Hebrew ben ('son of') becomes the patronymic suffix -ides, forming Μωησής Μαϊμονίδης "Moses Maimonides".[citation needed]

Biography

Further information: History of the Jews in Egypt § Arab rule (641 to 1250)

Early years

 
The dominion of the Almohad Caliphate at its greatest extent, c. 1200

Maimonides was born 1138 (or 1135) in Córdoba, Andalusia, in the Muslim-ruled Almoravid Empire, during what some scholars consider to be the end of the golden age of Jewish culture in the Iberian Peninsula, after the first centuries of the Moorish rule. His father Maimon ben Joseph, was a Spanish dayyan (Jewish judge), whose family claimed direct paternal descent from Simeon ben Judah ha-Nasi, and thus from the Davidic line. Maimonides later stated that there are 38 generations between him and Judah ha-Nasi.[14][15][better source needed] His ancestry, going back four generations, is given in his Iggeret Teiman (Epistle to Yemen), as Moses son of Maimon the Judge (hadayan), son of Joseph the Wise (Hebrew: הֶחָכָם, romanized: he-chakham), son of Isaac the Rabbi (Hebrew: הָרָב, romanized: harav), son of Obadiah the Judge.[16] At the end of his commentary on the Mishna, however, a slightly different genealogy is presented: Moses son of Maimon the Judge, son of Joseph the Wise, son of Rabbi Isaac the Judge, son of Joseph the Judge, son of Obadiah the Judge, son of Solomon the Teacher, son of Obadiah the Judge.[e] At an early age, Maimonides developed an interest in sciences and philosophy. He read those Greek philosophers accessible in Arabic translations, and was deeply immersed in the sciences and learning of Islamic culture.[17]

Maimonides was not known as a supporter of Kabbalah, although a strong intellectual type of mysticism has been discerned in his philosophy.[18] He expressed disapproval of poetry, the best of which he declared to be false, since it was founded on pure invention. This sage, who was revered for his personality as well as for his writings, led a busy life, and wrote many of his works while travelling or in temporary accommodation.[19] Maimonides studied Torah under his father, who had in turn studied under Rabbi Joseph ibn Migash, a student of Isaac Alfasi.

Exile

 
Maimonides' house in Fez, Morocco

A Berber dynasty, the Almohads, conquered Córdoba in 1148 and abolished dhimmi status (i.e., state protection of non-Muslims ensured through payment of a tax, the jizya) in some[which?] of their territories. The loss of this status left the Jewish and Christian communities with conversion to Islam, death, or exile.[19] Many Jews were forced to convert, but due to suspicion by the authorities of fake conversions, the new converts had to wear identifying clothing that set them apart and made them subject to public scrutiny.[20]

Maimonides's family, along with most other Jews,[dubious – discuss] chose exile. The question whether Maimonides himself was among those who had to convert to Islam in order to save his life prior to fleeing the area, has been the subject of scholarly debate.[21] This forced conversion was ruled legally invalid under Islamic law when brought up by a rival in Egypt.[22] For the next ten years, Maimonides moved about in southern Spain, eventually settling in Fez in Morocco. During this time, he composed his acclaimed commentary on the Mishnah, during the years 1166–1168.[f] Some say that his teacher in Fez was Rabbi Yehuda Ha-Cohen Ibn Susan, until he was killed in 1165.[23]

Following this sojourn in Morocco, together with two sons,[24] he sojourned in Palestine before settling in Fustat in Fatimid Caliphate-controlled Egypt around 1168. There is mention that Maimonides first settled in Alexandria, and moved to Fustat only in 1171. While in Cairo, he studied in a yeshiva attached to a small synagogue, which now bears his name.[25] In Palestine, he prayed at the Temple Mount. He wrote that this day of visiting the Temple Mount was a day of holiness for him and his descendants.[26]

Maimonides shortly thereafter was instrumental in helping rescue Jews taken captive during the Christian Amalric of Jerusalem's siege of the southeastern Nile Delta town of Bilbeis. He sent five letters to the Jewish communities of Lower Egypt asking them to pool money together to pay the ransom. The money was collected and then given to two judges sent to Palestine to negotiate with the Crusaders. The captives were eventually released.[27]

Death of his brother

 
Monument in Córdoba

Following this triumph, the Maimonides family, hoping to increase their wealth, gave their savings to his brother, the youngest son David ben Maimon, a merchant. Maimonides directed his brother to procure goods only at the Sudanese port of ʽAydhab. After a long arduous trip through the desert, however, David was unimpressed by the goods on offer there. Against his brother's wishes, David boarded a ship for India, since great wealth was to be found in the East.[g] Before he could reach his destination, David drowned at sea sometime between 1169 and 1177. The death of his brother caused Maimonides to become sick with grief.

In a letter discovered in the Cairo Geniza, he wrote:

The greatest misfortune that has befallen me during my entire life—worse than anything else—was the demise of the saint, may his memory be blessed, who drowned in the Indian sea, carrying much money belonging to me, to him, and to others, and left with me a little daughter and a widow. On the day I received that terrible news I fell ill and remained in bed for about a year, suffering from a sore boil, fever, and depression, and was almost given up. About eight years have passed, but I am still mourning and unable to accept consolation. And how should I console myself? He grew up on my knees, he was my brother, [and] he was my student.[28]

Nagid

Around 1171, Maimonides was appointed the Nagid of the Egyptian Jewish community.[25] Arabist Shelomo Dov Goitein believes the leadership he displayed during the ransoming of the Crusader captives led to this appointment.[29] However he was replaced by Sar Shalom ben Moses in 1173. Over the controversial course of Sar Shalom's appointment, during which Sar Shalom was accused of tax farming, Maimonides excommunicated and fought with him for several years until Maimonides was appointed Nagid in 1195. A work known as "Megillat Zutta" was written by Abraham ben Hillel, who writes a scathing description of Sar Shalom while praising Maimonides as "the light of east and west and unique master and marvel of the generation."[30][31]

Physician

With the loss of the family funds tied up in David's business venture, Maimonides assumed the vocation of physician, for which he was to become famous. He had trained in medicine in both Córdoba and in Fez. Gaining widespread recognition, he was appointed court physician to al-Qadi al-Fadil, the chief secretary to Sultan Saladin, then to Saladin himself; after whose death he remained a physician to the Ayyubid dynasty.[32]

In his medical writings, Maimonides described many conditions, including asthma, diabetes, hepatitis, and pneumonia, and he emphasized moderation and a healthy lifestyle.[33] His treatises became influential for generations of physicians. He was knowledgeable about Greek and Arabic medicine, and followed the principles of humorism in the tradition of Galen. He did not blindly accept authority but used his own observation and experience.[33] Julia Bess Frank indicates that Maimonides in his medical writings sought to interpret works of authorities so that they could become acceptable.[32] Maimonides displayed in his interactions with patients attributes that today would be called intercultural awareness and respect for the patient's autonomy.[34] Although he frequently wrote of his longing for solitude in order to come closer to God and to extend his reflections – elements considered essential in his philosophy to the prophetic experience – he gave over most of his time to caring for others.[35] In a famous letter, Maimonides describes his daily routine. After visiting the Sultan's palace, he would arrive home exhausted and hungry, where "I would find the antechambers filled with gentiles and Jews […] I would go to heal them, and write prescriptions for their illnesses […] until the evening […] and I would be extremely weak."[36]

As he goes on to say in this letter, even on Shabbat he would receive members of the community. It is remarkable that he managed to write extended treatises, including not only medical and other scientific studies but some of the most systematically thought-through and influential treatises on halakha (rabbinic law) and Jewish philosophy of the Middle Ages.[h]

Joseph Karo later praised Maimonides, writing of him, "Maimonides is the greatest of the decisors [of Jewish law], and all communities of the Land of Israel and of Arabia and of the Maghreb base their practices after him, and have taken him upon themselves as their rabbi."[37]

In 1172–74, Maimonides wrote his famous Epistle to Yemen.[38] It has been suggested that his "incessant travail" undermined his own health and brought about his death at 69 (although this is a normal lifespan).[39]

Death

See also: Tomb of Maimonides

Maimonides died on 12 December 1204 (20th of Tevet 4965) in Fustat. A variety of medieval sources beginning with Al-Qifti maintain that his body was interred near Lake Tiberias, though there is no contemporary evidence for his removal from Egypt. Today, Tiberias hosts the Tomb of Maimonides, on which is inscribed "From Moses to Moses arose none like Moses."[40]

Maimonides and his wife, the daughter of Mishael ben Yeshayahu Halevi, had one child who survived into adulthood,[41] Abraham Maimonides, who became recognized as a great scholar. He succeeded Maimonides as Nagid and as court physician at the age of eighteen. Throughout his career, he defended his father's writings against all critics. The office of Nagid was held by the Maimonides family for four successive generations until the end of the 14th century.

A statue of Maimonides was erected near the Córdoba Synagogue.

Maimonides is sometimes said to be a descendant of King David, although he never made such a claim.[42][43]

Legal works

Main article: Mishneh Torah

With Mishneh Torah, Maimonides composed a code of Jewish law with the widest-possible scope and depth. The work gathers all the binding laws from the Talmud, and incorporates the positions of the Geonim (post-Talmudic early Medieval scholars, mainly from Mesopotamia).

Later codes of Jewish law, e.g. Arba'ah Turim by Rabbi Jacob ben Asher and Shulchan Aruch by Rabbi Yosef Karo, draw heavily on Mishneh Torah: both often quote whole sections verbatim. However, it met initially with much opposition.[44] There were two main reasons for this opposition. First, Maimonides had refrained from adding references to his work for the sake of brevity; second, in the introduction, he gave the impression of wanting to "cut out" study of the Talmud,[45] to arrive at a conclusion in Jewish law, although Maimonides later wrote that this was not his intent. His most forceful opponents were the rabbis of Provence (Southern France), and a running critique by Rabbi Abraham ben David (Raavad III) is printed in virtually all editions of Mishneh Torah. It was still recognized as a monumental contribution to the systemized writing of halakha. Throughout the centuries, it has been widely studied and its halakhic decisions have weighed heavily in later rulings.

In response to those who would attempt to force followers of Maimonides and his Mishneh Torah to abide by the rulings of his own Shulchan Aruch or other later works, Rabbi Yosef Karo wrote: "Who would dare force communities who follow the Rambam to follow any other decisor, early or late? […] The Rambam is the greatest of the decisors, and all the communities of the Land of Israel and the Arabistan and the Maghreb practice according to his word, and accepted him as their rabbi."[46]

An oft-cited legal maxim from his pen is: "It is better and more satisfactory to acquit a thousand guilty persons than to put a single innocent one to death." He argued that executing a defendant on anything less than absolute certainty would lead to a slippery slope of decreasing burdens of proof, until defendants would be convicted merely according to the judge's caprice.[47]

Scholars specializing in the study of the history and subculture of Judaism in premodern China (Sino-Judaica) have noted surprising similarities between this work and the liturgy of the Kaifeng Jews, descendants of Persian Jewish merchants who settled in the Middle Kingdom during the early Song dynasty.[48] Beyond scriptural similarities, Michael Pollak comments the Jews' Pentateuch was divided into 53 sections according to the Persian style.[49] He also points out:

There is no proof, to be sure, that Kaifeng Jewry ever had direct access to the works of "the Great Eagle," but it would have had ample time and opportunity to acquire or become acquainted with them well before its reservoir of Jewish learning began to run out. Nor do the Maimonidean leanings of the kehillah contradict the historical evidence that has the Jews arriving in Kaifeng no later than 1126, the year in which the Sung fled the city—and nine years before Maimonides was born. In 1163, when the kehillah built the first of its synagogues, Maimonides was only twenty-eight years old, so that it is highly unlikely that even his earliest authoritative teachings could by then have reached China.[50]

Tzedakah (charity)

One of the sections of the Mishneh Torah is the section dealing with tzedakah. In Hilkhot Matanot Aniyim (Laws about Giving to Poor People), chapter 10:7–14, Maimonides lists his famous Eight Levels of Giving (where the first level is most preferable, and the eighth the least):[51]

  1. Giving an interest-free loan to a person in need; forming a partnership with a person in need; giving a grant to a person in need; finding a job for a person in need; so long as that loan, grant, partnership, or job results in the person no longer living by relying upon others.
  2. Giving tzedakah anonymously to an unknown recipient via a person (or public fund) which is trustworthy, wise, and can perform acts of tzedakah with your money in a most impeccable fashion.
  3. Giving tzedakah anonymously to a known recipient.
  4. Giving tzedakah publicly to an unknown recipient.
  5. Giving tzedakah before being asked.
  6. Giving adequately after being asked.
  7. Giving willingly, but inadequately.
  8. Giving "in sadness" (giving out of pity): It is thought that Maimonides was referring to giving because of the sad feelings one might have in seeing people in need (as opposed to giving because it is a religious obligation). Other translations say "Giving unwillingly."

Philosophy

Through The Guide for the Perplexed (which was initially written in Arabic as Dalālat al-ḥāʾirīn) and the philosophical introductions to sections of his commentaries on the Mishna, Maimonides exerted an important influence on the Scholastic philosophers, especially on Albertus Magnus, Thomas Aquinas and Duns Scotus. He was a Jewish Scholastic. Educated more by reading the works of Arab Muslim philosophers than by personal contact with Arabian teachers, he acquired an intimate acquaintance not only with Arab Muslim philosophy, but with the doctrines of Aristotle. Maimonides strove to reconcile Aristotelianism and science with the teachings of the Torah.[52] In his Guide for the Perplexed, he often explains the function and purpose of the statutory provisions contained in the Torah against the backdrop of the historical conditions. Maimonides is said to have been influenced by Asaph the Jew, who was the first Hebrew medical writer, and has been under major influence by Al-Ghazali, a prominent Persian philosopher.[53]The book was highly controversial in its day, and was banned by French rabbis, who burnt copies of the work in Montpellier.[54]

Thirteen principles of faith

Main article: Jewish principles of faith

In his commentary on the Mishnah (tractate Sanhedrin, chapter 10), Maimonides formulates his "13 principles of faith"; and that these principles summarized what he viewed as the required beliefs of Judaism:

  1. The existence of God.
  2. God's unity and indivisibility into elements.
  3. God's spirituality and incorporeality.
  4. God's eternity.
  5. God alone should be the object of worship.
  6. Revelation through God's prophets.
  7. The preeminence of Moses among the prophets.
  8. That the entire Torah (both the Written and Oral law) are of Divine origin and were dictated to Moses by God on Mt. Sinai.
  9. The Torah given by Moses is permanent and will not be replaced or changed.
  10. God's awareness of all human actions and thoughts.
  11. Reward of righteousness and punishment of evil.
  12. The coming of the Jewish Messiah.
  13. The resurrection of the dead.

Maimonides is said to have compiled the principles from various Talmudic sources. These principles were controversial when first proposed, evoking criticism by Rabbis Hasdai Crescas and Joseph Albo, and were effectively ignored by much of the Jewish community for the next few centuries.[55] However, these principles have become widely held and are considered to be the cardinal principles of faith for Orthodox Jews.[56] Two poetic restatements of these principles (Ani Ma'amin and Yigdal) eventually became canonized in many editions of the Siddur (Jewish prayer book).

The principles can be seen listed in the Siddur Edot HaMizrach, Additions for Shacharit[57] The omission of a list of these principles as such within his later works, the Mishneh Torah and The Guide for the Perplexed, has led some to suggest that either he retracted his earlier position, or that these principles are descriptive rather than prescriptive.[58][59][60][61][62]

Theology

 
Depiction of Maimonides teaching students about the 'measure of man' in an illuminated manuscript

Maimonides equated the God of Abraham to what philosophers refer to as the Necessary Being. God is unique in the universe, and the Torah commands that one love and fear God (Deut 10:12) on account of that uniqueness. To Maimonides, this meant that one ought to contemplate God's works and to marvel at the order and wisdom that went into their creation. When one does this, one inevitably comes to love God and to sense how insignificant one is in comparison to God. This is the basis of the Torah.[63]

The principle that inspired his philosophical activity was identical to a fundamental tenet of scholasticism: there can be no contradiction between the truths which God has revealed and the findings of the human mind in science and philosophy. Maimonides primarily relied upon the science of Aristotle and the teachings of the Talmud, commonly claiming to find a basis for the latter in the former.[64]

Maimonides' admiration for the Neoplatonic commentators led him to doctrines which the later Scholastics did not accept. For instance, Maimonides was an adherent of apophatic theology. In this theology, one attempts to describe God through negative attributes. For instance, one should not say that God exists in the usual sense of the term; it can be said that God is not non-existent. One should not say that "God is wise"; but it can be said that "God is not ignorant," i.e., in some way, God has some properties of knowledge. One should not say that "God is One," but it can be stated that "there is no multiplicity in God's being." In brief, the attempt is to gain and express knowledge of God by describing what God is not, rather than by describing what God "is."[65]

Maimonides argued adamantly that God is not corporeal. This was central to his thinking about the sin of idolatry. Maimonides insisted that all of the anthropomorphic phrases pertaining to God in sacred texts are to be interpreted metaphorically.[65] A related tenet of Maimonidean theology is the notion that the commandments (especially those relates sacrifices) are intend to help wean the Israelites away from idolatry.[66]

Character development

See also: Golden mean (Judaism)

Maimonides taught about the developing of one's moral character. Although his life predated the modern concept of a personality, Maimonides believed that each person has an innate disposition along an ethical and emotional spectrum. Although one's disposition is often determined by factors outside of one's control, human beings have free will to choose to behave in ways that build character.[67] He wrote, "One is obligated to conduct his affairs with others in a gentle and pleasing manner."[68] Maimonides advised those with anti-social character traits ought to identify those traits and then make a conscious effort to behave in the opposite way. For example, an arrogant person should practice humility.[69] If the circumstances of one's environment are such that it is impossible to behave ethically, one must move to a new location.[70]

Prophecy

Maimonides agreed with "the Philosopher" (Aristotle) that the use of logic is the "right" way of thinking. He claimed that in order to understand how to know God, every human being must, by study, and meditation attain the degree of perfection required to reach the prophetic state. Despite his rationalistic approach, he does not explicitly reject the previous ideas (as portrayed, for example, by Rabbi Yehuda Halevi in Hakuzari) that in order to become a prophet, God must intervene. Maimonides teaches that prophecy is the highest purpose of the most learned and refined individuals.

The problem of evil

Maimonides wrote on theodicy (the philosophical attempt to reconcile the existence of a God with the existence of evil). He took the premise that an omnipotent and good God exists.[71][72][73][74] In The Guide for the Perplexed, Maimonides writes that all the evil that exists within human beings stems from their individual attributes, while all good comes from a universally shared humanity (Guide 3:8). He says that there are people who are guided by higher purpose, and there are those who are guided by physicality and must strive to find the higher purpose with which to guide their actions.

To justify the existence of evil, assuming God is both omnipotent and omnibenevolent, Maimonides postulates that one who created something by causing its opposite not to exist is not the same as creating something that exists; so evil is merely the absence of good. God did not create evil, rather God created good, and evil exists where good is absent (Guide 3:10). Therefore, all good is divine invention, and evil both is not and comes secondarily.

Maimonides contests the common view that evil outweighs good in the world. He says that if one were to examine existence only in terms of humanity, then that person may observe evil to dominate good, but if one looks at the whole of the universe, then he sees good is significantly more common than evil (Guide 3:12). Man, he reasons, is too insignificant a figure in God's myriad works to be their primary characterizing force, and so when people see mostly evil in their lives, they are not taking into account the extent of positive Creation outside of themselves.

Maimonides believes that there are three types of evil in the world: evil caused by nature, evil that people bring upon others, and evil man brings upon himself (Guide 3:12). The first type of evil Maimonides states is the rarest form, but arguably of the most necessary—the balance of life and death in both the human and animal worlds itself, he recognizes, is essential to God's plan. Maimonides writes that the second type of evil is relatively rare, and that humanity brings it upon itself. The third type of evil humans bring upon themselves and is the source of most of the ills of the world. These are the result of people's falling victim to their physical desires. To prevent the majority of evil which stems from harm one does to oneself, one must learn how to respond to one's bodily urges.

Skepticism of astrology

Further information: Jewish views on astrology

Maimonides answered an inquiry concerning astrology, addressed to him from Marseille.[75] He responded that man should believe only what can be supported either by rational proof, by the evidence of the senses, or by trustworthy authority. He affirms that he had studied astrology, and that it does not deserve to be described as a science. He ridicules the concept that the fate of a man could be dependent upon the constellations; he argues that such a theory would rob life of purpose, and would make man a slave of destiny.[76]

True beliefs versus necessary beliefs

In The Guide for the Perplexed Book III, Chapter 28,[77] Maimonides draws a distinction between "true beliefs," which were beliefs about God that produced intellectual perfection, and "necessary beliefs," which were conducive to improving social order. Maimonides places anthropomorphic personification statements about God in the latter class. He uses as an example the notion that God becomes "angry" with people who do wrong. In the view of Maimonides (taken from Avicenna), God does not become angry with people, as God has no human passions; but it is important for them to believe God does, so that they desist from doing wrong.

Eschatology

See also: Jewish eschatology

The Messianic era

Perhaps one of Maimonides's most highly acclaimed and renowned writings is his treatise on the Messianic era, written originally in Judeo-Arabic and which he elaborates on in great detail in his Commentary on the Mishnah (Introduction to the 10th chapter of tractate Sanhedrin, also known as Pereḳ Ḥeleḳ).

Resurrection

Religious Jews believed in immortality in a spiritual sense, and most believed that the future would include a messianic era and a resurrection of the dead. This is the subject of Jewish eschatology. Maimonides wrote much on this topic, but in most cases he wrote about the immortality of the soul for people of perfected intellect; his writings were usually not about the resurrection of dead bodies. Rabbis of his day were critical of this aspect of this thought, and there was controversy over his true views.[i]

Eventually, Maimonides felt pressured to write a treatise on the subject, known as "The Treatise on Resurrection." In it, he wrote that those who claimed that he believed the verses of the Hebrew Bible referring to the resurrection were only allegorical were spreading falsehoods. Maimonides asserts that belief in resurrection is a fundamental truth of Judaism about which there is no disagreement.[78]

While his position on the World to Come (non-corporeal eternal life as described above) may be seen as being in contradiction with his position on bodily resurrection, Maimonides resolved them with a then unique solution: Maimonides believed that the resurrection was not permanent or general. In his view, God never violates the laws of nature. Rather, divine interaction is by way of angels, whom Maimonides often regards to be metaphors for the laws of nature, the principles by which the physical universe operates, or Platonic eternal forms.[j] Thus, if a unique event actually occurs, even if it is perceived as a miracle, it is not a violation of the world's order.[79]

In this view, any dead who are resurrected must eventually die again. In his discussion of the 13 principles of faith, the first five deal with knowledge of God, the next four deal with prophecy and the Torah, while the last four deal with reward, punishment and the ultimate redemption. In this discussion Maimonides says nothing of a universal resurrection. All he says it is that whatever resurrection does take place, it will occur at an indeterminate time before the world to come, which he repeatedly states will be purely spiritual.

The World to Come

Maimonides distinguishes two kinds of intelligence in man, the one material in the sense of being dependent on, and influenced by, the body, and the other immaterial, that is, independent of the bodily organism. The latter is a direct emanation from the universal active intellect; this is his interpretation of the noûs poietikós of Aristotelian philosophy. It is acquired as the result of the efforts of the soul to attain a correct knowledge of the absolute, pure intelligence of God.[citation needed]

The knowledge of God is a form of knowledge which develops in us the immaterial intelligence, and thus confers on man an immaterial, spiritual nature. This confers on the soul that perfection in which human happiness consists, and endows the soul with immortality. One who has attained a correct knowledge of God has reached a condition of existence, which renders him immune from all the accidents of fortune, from all the allurements of sin, and from death itself. Man is in a position to work out his own salvation and his immortality.[citation needed]

Baruch Spinoza's doctrine of immortality was strikingly similar. However, Spinoza teaches that the way to attain the knowledge which confers immortality is the progress from sense-knowledge through scientific knowledge to philosophical intuition of all things sub specie æternitatis, while Maimonides holds that the road to perfection and immortality is the path of duty as described in the Torah and the rabbinic understanding of the oral law.[citation needed]

Maimonides describes the world to come as the stage after a person lives their life in this world as well as the final state of existence after the Messianic Era. Some time after the resurrection of the dead, souls will live forever without bodies. They will enjoy the radiance of the Divine Presence without the need for food, drink or sexual pleasures.[80]

Maimonides and Kabbalah

In The Guide for the Perplexed, Maimonides declares his intention to conceal from the average reader his explanations of Sod[k] esoteric meanings of Torah. The nature of these "secrets" is debated. Religious Jewish rationalists, and the mainstream academic view, read Maimonides' Aristotelianism as a mutually-exclusive alternative metaphysics to Kabbalah.[81] Some academics hold that Maimonides' project fought against the Proto-Kabbalah of his time.[82] However, many Kabbalists and their heirs read Maimonides according to Kabbalah or as an actual covert subscriber to Kabbalah,[83][better source needed] due to the similarities between the Kabbalistic approach and Maimonides' approach toward interpreting the Bible with metaphor, Maimonides' understanding of God through attributes of action, thought and negative attributes, Maimonides' description of the roles of the imagination and intellect in life, sin, and prophesy, Maimonides' assertion that the commandments have a function that can be understood, and Maimonides' description of a 3-tiered cosmic order whereby God's will is implemented through a system of angels.[citation needed] According to this, he employed rationalism to defend Judaism rather than limit inquiry of Sod only to rationalism. His rationalism, if not taken as an opposition,[l] also assisted the Kabbalists, purifying their transmitted teaching from mistaken corporeal interpretations that could have been made from Hekhalot literature,[m] though Kabbalists held that their theosophy alone allowed human access to Divine mysteries.[84]

The Oath of Maimonides

The Oath of Maimonides is a document about the medical calling and recited as a substitute for the Hippocratic Oath. It is not to be confused with a more lengthy Prayer of Maimonides. These documents may not have been written by Maimonides, but later.[32] The Prayer appeared first in print in 1793 and has been attributed to Markus Herz, a German physician, pupil of Immanuel Kant.[85]

Views on circumcision

In The Guide for the Perplexed, Maimonides proposes that two important purposes of circumcision (brit milah) are to temper sexual desire and to join in an affirmation of faith and the covenant of Abraham:[86][87]

As regards circumcision, I think that one of its objects is to limit sexual intercourse, and to weaken the organ of generation as far as possible, and thus cause man to be moderate. Some people believe that circumcision is to remove a defect in man's formation; but every one can easily reply: How can products of nature be deficient so as to require external completion, especially as the use of the fore-skin to that organ is evident. This commandment has not been enjoined as a complement to a deficient physical creation, but as a means for perfecting man's moral shortcomings. The bodily injury caused to that organ is exactly that which is desired; it does not interrupt any vital function, nor does it destroy the power of generation. Circumcision simply counteracts excessive lust; for there is no doubt that circumcision weakens the power of sexual excitement, and sometimes lessens the natural enjoyment: the organ necessarily becomes weak when it loses blood and is deprived of its covering from the beginning. Our Sages (Beresh. Rabba, c. 80) say distinctly: It is hard for a woman, with whom an uncircumcised had sexual intercourse, to separate from him. This is, as I believe, the best reason for the commandment concerning circumcision. And who was the first to perform this commandment? Abraham, our father! of whom it is well known how he feared sin; it is described by our Sages in reference to the words, "Behold, now I know that thou art a fair woman to look upon" (Gen. xii. 11). There is, however, another important object in this commandment. It gives to all members of the same faith, i.e., to all believers in the Unity of God, a common bodily sign, so that it is impossible for any one that is a stranger, to say that he belongs to them. For sometimes people say so for the purpose of obtaining some advantage, or in order to make some attack upon the Jews. No one, however, should circumcise himself or his son for any other reason but pure faith; for circumcision is not like an incision on the leg, or a burning in the arm, but a very difficult operation. It is also a fact that there is much mutual love and assistance among people that are united by the same sign when they consider it as [the symbol of] a covenant. Circumcision is likewise the [symbol of the] covenant which Abraham made in connection with the belief in God's Unity. So also every one that is circumcised enters the covenant of Abraham to believe in the unity of God, in accordance with the words of the Law, "To be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee" (Gen. xvii. 7). This purpose of the circumcision is as important as the first, and perhaps more important.

— Maimonides, The Guide to the Perplexed (1190)

Influence and legacy

 
The title page of The Guide for the Perplexed

Maimonides' Mishneh Torah is considered by Jews even today as one of the chief authoritative codifications of Jewish law and ethics. It is exceptional for its logical construction, concise and clear expression and extraordinary learning, so that it became a standard against which other later codifications were often measured.[88] It is still closely studied in rabbinic yeshivot (seminaries). The first to compile a comprehensive lexicon containing an alphabetically arranged list of difficult words found in Maimonides' Mishneh Torah was Tanḥum ha-Yerushalmi (1220–1291).[89] A popular medieval saying that also served as his epitaph states, "From Mosheh [of the Torah] to Mosheh [Maimonides] there was none like Mosheh." It chiefly referred to his rabbinic writings.

However, Maimonides was also one of the most influential figures in medieval Jewish philosophy. His adaptation of Aristotelian thought to Biblical faith deeply impressed later Jewish thinkers, and had an unexpected immediate historical impact.[90] Some more acculturated Jews in the century that followed his death, particularly in Spain, sought to apply Maimonides's Aristotelianism in ways that undercut traditionalist belief and observance, giving rise to an intellectual controversy in Spanish and southern French Jewish circles.[91] The intensity of debate spurred Catholic Church interventions against "heresy" and a general confiscation of rabbinic texts. In reaction, the more radical interpretations of Maimonides were defeated. At least amongst Ashkenazi Jews, there was a tendency to ignore his specifically philosophical writings and to stress instead the rabbinic and halakhic writings. These writings often included considerable philosophical chapters or discussions in support of halakhic observance; David Hartman observes that Maimonides clearly expressed "the traditional support for a philosophical understanding of God both in the Aggadah of Talmud and in the behavior of the hasid [the pious Jew]."[92] Maimonidean thought continues to influence traditionally observant Jews.[93][94]

The most rigorous medieval critique of Maimonides is Hasdai Crescas's Or Adonai. Crescas bucked the eclectic trend, by demolishing the certainty of the Aristotelian world-view, not only in religious matters but also in the most basic areas of medieval science (such as physics and geometry). Crescas's critique provoked a number of 15th-century scholars to write defenses of Maimonides. A partial translation of Crescas was produced by Harry Austryn Wolfson of Harvard University in 1929.

Because of his path-finding synthesis of Aristotle and Biblical faith, Maimonides had an influence on the great Christian theologian Saint Thomas Aquinas who refers to Maimonides in several of his works, including the Commentary on the Sentences.[95]

Maimonides's combined abilities in the fields of theology, philosophy and medicine make his work attractive today as a source during discussions of evolving norms in these fields, particularly medicine. An example is the modern citation of his method of determining death of the body in the controversy regarding declaration of death to permit organ donation for transplantation.[96]

Maimonides and the Modernists

Maimonides remains one of the most widely debated Jewish thinkers among modern scholars. He has been adopted as a symbol and an intellectual hero by almost all major movements in modern Judaism, and has proven important to philosophers such as Leo Strauss; and his views on the importance of humility have been taken up by modern humanist philosophers.

In academia, particularly within the area of Jewish Studies, the teaching of Maimonides has been dominated by traditional scholars, generally Orthodox, who place a very strong emphasis on Maimonides as a rationalist; one result is that certain sides of Maimonides's thought, including his opposition to anthropocentrism, have been obviated.[citation needed] There are movements in some postmodern circles to claim Maimonides for other purposes, as within the discourse of ecotheology.[97] Maimonides's reconciliation of the philosophical and the traditional has given his legacy an extremely diverse and dynamic quality.

Tributes and memorials

 
Plaque of Maimonides at Rambam Medical Center, Haifa

Maimonides has been memorialized in numerous ways. For example, one of the Learning Communities at the Tufts University School of Medicine bears his name. There is also Maimonides School in Brookline, Massachusetts, Maimonides Academy School in Los Angeles, California, Lycée Maïmonide in Casablanca, the Brauser Maimonides Academy in Hollywood, Florida,[98] and Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, New York. Beit Harambam Congregation, a Sephardi synagogue in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, is named after him.[99]

Issued from 8 May 1986 to 1995,[100] the Series A of the Israeli New Shekel featured an illustration of Maimonides on the obverse and the place of his burial in Tiberias on the reverse on its 1-shekel bill.[101]

In 2004, conferences were held at Yale, Florida International University, Penn State, and the Rambam Hospital in Haifa, Israel, which is named after him. To commemorate the 800th anniversary of his death, Harvard University issued a memorial volume.[102] In 1953, the Israel Postal Authority issued a postage stamp of Maimonides, pictured.

In March 2008, during the Euromed Conference of Ministers of Tourism, The Tourism Ministries of Israel, Morocco and Spain agreed to work together on a joint project that will trace the footsteps of the Rambam and thus boost religious tourism in the cities of Córdoba, Fes and Tiberias.[103]

Between December 2018 and January 2019 the Israel Museum held a special exhibit dedicated to the writings of Maimonides.[104]

Works and bibliography

Judaic and philosophical works

 
An autograph fragment of Maimonides' Guide for the Perplexed (Judeo-Arabic).
 
Autograph manuscript of Maimonides' Commentary to Nezikin and Kodashim, written in Judeo-Arabic solitreo.

Maimonides composed works of Jewish scholarship, rabbinic law, philosophy, and medical texts. Most of Maimonides's works were written in Judeo-Arabic. However, the Mishneh Torah was written in Hebrew. His Jewish texts were:

  • Commentary on the Mishna (Arabic Kitab al-Siraj, translated into Hebrew as Pirush Hamishnayot), written in Classical Arabic using the Hebrew alphabet. This was the first full commentary ever written on the entire Mishnah, which took Maimonides seven years to complete, and it enjoyed great popularity both in its Arabic original and its medieval Hebrew translation. The commentary includes three philosophical introductions which were also highly influential:
    • The Introduction to the Mishnah deals with the nature of the oral law, the distinction between the prophet and the sage, and the organizational structure of the Mishnah.
    • The Introduction to Mishnah Sanhedrin, chapter ten (Pereḳ Ḥeleḳ), is an eschatological essay that concludes with Maimonides's famous creed ("the thirteen principles of faith").
    • The Introduction to Tractate Avot (popularly called The Eight Chapters) is an ethical treatise.
  • Sefer Hamitzvot (The Book of Commandments). In this work, Maimonides lists all the 613 mitzvot traditionally contained in the Torah (Pentateuch). He describes fourteen shorashim (roots or principles) to guide his selection.
  • Sefer Ha'shamad (Letter of Martydom)
  • Mishneh Torah, a comprehensive code of Jewish law. It is also known as Yad ha-Chazaka or simply Yad (יד) which has the numerical value 14, representing the 14 books of the work.
  • The Guide for the Perplexed, a philosophical work harmonising and differentiating Aristotle's philosophy and Jewish theology. Written in Judeo-Arabic, and completed between 1186 and 1190.[105][better source needed] The first translation of this work into Hebrew was done by Samuel ibn Tibbon in 1204.[52]
  • Teshuvot, collected correspondence and responsa, including a number of public letters (on resurrection and the afterlife, on conversion to other faiths, and Iggereth Teiman – addressed to the oppressed Jewry of Yemen).
  • Hilkhot ha-Yerushalmi, a fragment of a commentary on the Jerusalem Talmud, identified and published by Saul Lieberman in 1947.

Medical works

Maimonides' achievements in the medical field are well known, and are cited by many medieval authors. One of his more important medical works is his Guide to Good Health (Regimen Sanitis), which he composed in Arabic for the Sultan al-Afdal, son of Saladin, who suffered from depression.[106] The work was translated into Latin, and published in Florence in 1477, becoming the first medical book to appear in print there.[107] While his prescriptions may have become obsolete, "his ideas about preventive medicine, public hygiene, approach to the suffering patient, and the preservation of the health of the soul have not become obsolete."[108] Maimonides wrote ten known medical works in Arabic that have been translated by the Jewish medical ethicist Fred Rosner into contemporary English.[33][109] Lectures, conferences and research on Maimonides, even recently in the 21st century, have been done at medical universities in Morocco.

  • Regimen Sanitatis, Suessmann Muntner (ed.), Mossad Harav Kook: Jerusalem 1963 (translated into Hebrew by Moshe Ibn Tibbon) (OCLC 729184001)
  • The Art of Cure – Extracts from Galen (Barzel, 1992, Vol. 5)[110] is essentially an extract of Galen's extensive writings.
  • Commentary on the Aphorisms of Hippocrates (Rosner, 1987, Vol. 2; Hebrew:[111] פירוש לפרקי אבוקראט) is interspersed with his own views.
  • Medical Aphorisms[112] of Moses (Rosner, 1989, Vol. 3) titled Fusul Musa in Arabic ("Chapters of Moses," Hebrew:[113] פרקי משה) contains 1500 aphorisms and many medical conditions are described.
  • Treatise on Hemorrhoids (in Rosner, 1984, Vol. 1; Hebrew:[114] ברפואת הטחורים) discusses also digestion and food.
  • Treatise on Cohabitation (in Rosner, 1984, Vol. 1) contains recipes as aphrodisiacs and anti-aphrodisiacs.
  • Treatise on Asthma (Rosner, 1994, Vol. 6)[115] discusses climates and diets and their effect on asthma and emphasizes the need for clean air.
  • Treatise on Poisons and Their Antidotes (in Rosner, 1984, Vol. 1) is an early toxicology textbook that remained popular for centuries.
  • Regimen of Health (in Rosner, 1990, Vol. 4; Hebrew:[116] הנהגת הבריאות) is a discourse on healthy living and the mind-body connection.
  • Discourse on the Explanation of Fits advocates healthy living and the avoidance of overabundance.
  • Glossary of Drug Names (Rosner, 1992, Vol. 7)[117] represents a pharmacopeia with 405 paragraphs with the names of drugs in Arabic, Greek, Syrian, Persian, Berber, and Spanish.

Treatise on logic

The Treatise on Logic (Arabic: Maqala Fi-Sinat Al-Mantiq) has been printed 17 times, including editions in Latin (1527), German (1805, 1822, 1833, 1828), French (1936) by Moïse Ventura and in 1996 by Rémi Brague, and English (1938) by Israel Efros, and in an abridged Hebrew form. The work illustrates the essentials of Aristotelian logic to be found in the teachings of the great Islamic philosophers such as Avicenna and, above all, Al-Farabi, "the Second Master," the "First Master" being Aristotle. In his work devoted to the Treatise, Rémi Brague stresses the fact that Al-Farabi is the only philosopher mentioned therein. This indicates a line of conduct for the reader, who must read the text keeping in mind Al-Farabi's works on logic. In the Hebrew versions, the Treatise is called The words of Logic which describes the bulk of the work. The author explains the technical meaning of the words used by logicians. The Treatise duly inventories the terms used by the logician and indicates what they refer to. The work proceeds rationally through a lexicon of philosophical terms to a summary of higher philosophical topics, in 14 chapters corresponding to Maimonides's birthdate of 14 Nissan. The number 14 recurs in many of Maimonides's works. Each chapter offers a cluster of associated notions. The meaning of the words is explained and illustrated with examples. At the end of each chapter, the author carefully draws up the list of words studied.

Until very recently, it was accepted that Maimonides wrote the Treatise on Logic in his twenties or even in his teen years.[118] Herbert Davidson has raised questions about Maimonides's authorship of this short work (and of other short works traditionally attributed to Maimonides). He maintains that Maimonides was not the author at all, based on a report of two Arabic-language manuscripts, unavailable to Western investigators in Asia Minor.[119] Rabbi Yosef Kafih maintained that it is by Maimonides and newly translated it to Hebrew (as Beiur M'lekhet HaHiggayon) from the Judeo-Arabic.[120]

Burial place

He is buried in HaRambam compound / complex in Tiberias / Tveria.

Other notable rabbis also buried in HaRambam compound / complex:

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Hebrew: מֹשֶׁה בֶּן־מַיְמוֹן, romanized: Mōše ben-Maymōn; Arabic: موسى بن ميمون, romanized: Mūsā bin Maymūn
  2. ^ Greek: Μωυσής Μαϊμωνίδης, translit. Mōusḗs Maïmōnídēs; Latin: Moses Maimonides
  3. ^ /ˌrɑːmˈbɑːm/, for Rabbeinu Mōše bēn Maimōn, "Our Rabbi Moses, son of Maimon"
  4. ^ The date of 1138 of the Common Era is the date of birth given by Maimonides himself, in the very last chapter and comment made by Maimonides in his Commentary of the Mishnah,[7] and where he writes: "I began to write this composition when I was twenty-three years old, and I completed it in Egypt while I was aged thirty, which year is the 1,479th year of the Seleucid era (1168 CE)."
  5. ^ a b He usually left off "the Spaniard" and he sometimes added זצ"ל, short for "[let] mention of the righteous one bring a blessing." At the end of his commentary to the Mishna he gives a fuller lineage: אני משה ברבי מימון הדיין ברבי יוסף החכם ברבי יצחק הדיין ברבי יוסף הדיין ברבי עובדיהו הדיין ברבי שלמה הרב ברבי עובדיהו הדיין זכר קדושים לברכה, "I am Moshe son of Rabbi Maimon the Judge, son of Rabbi Joseph the Wise, son of Rabbi Isaac the Judge, son of Rabbi Joseph the Judge, son of Rabbi Obadiah the Judge, son of Rabbi Solomon the Teacher, son of Rabbi Obadiah the Judge; [let] mention of the holy ones bring a blessing."
  6. ^ Seder HaDoros (year 4927) quotes Maimonides as saying that he began writing his commentary on the Mishna when he was 23 years old, and published it when he was 30. Because of the dispute about the date of Maimonides's birth, it is not clear which year the work was published.
  7. ^ The "India Trade" (a term devised by the Arabist S.D. Goitein) was a highly lucrative business venture in which Jewish merchants from Egypt, the Mediterranean, and the Middle East imported and exported goods ranging from pepper to brass from various ports along the Malabar Coast between the 11th–13th centuries. For more info, see the "India Traders" chapter in Goitein, Letters of Medieval Jewish Traders, 1973 or Goitein, India Traders of the Middle Ages, 2008.
  8. ^ Such views of his works are found in almost all scholarly studies of the man and his significance. See, for example, the "Introduction" sub-chapter by Howard Kreisel to his overview article "Moses Maimonides," in History of Jewish Philosophy, edited by Daniel H. Frank and Oliver Leaman, Second Edition (New York and London: Routledge, 2003), pp. 245–246.
  9. ^ According to Maimonides, certain Jews in Yemen had sent to him a letter in the year 1189, evidently irritated as to why he had not mentioned the physical resurrection of the dead in his Hil. Teshuvah, chapter 8, and how that some persons in Yemen had begun to instruct, based on Maimonides's teaching, that when the body dies it will disintegrate and the soul will never return to such bodies after death. Maimonides denied that he ever insinuated such things, and reiterated that the body would indeed resurrect, but that the "world to come" was something different in nature. See: Maimonides's Ma'amar Teḥayyath Hamethim (Treatise on the Resurrection of the Dead), published in Book of Letters and Responsa (ספר אגרות ותשובות), Jerusalem 1978, p. 9 (Hebrew).
  10. ^ This view is not always consistent throughout Maimonidee' work; in Hilchot Yesodei HaTorah, chapters 2–4, Maimonides describes angels that are actually created beings.
  11. ^ "Within [the Torah] there is also another part which is called 'hidden' (mutsnaʿ), and this [concerns] the secrets (sodot) which the human intellect cannot attain, like the meanings of the statutes (ḥukim) and other hidden secrets. They can neither be attained through the intellect nor through sheer volition, but they are revealed before Him who created [the Torah]". (Rabbi Abraham ben Asher, The Or ha-Sekhel)
  12. ^ Contemporary academic views in the study of Jewish mysticism, hold that 12–13th century Kabbalists wrote down and systemised their transmitted oral doctrines in oppositional response to Maimonidean rationalism. See e.g. Moshe Idel, Kabbalah: New Perspectives
  13. ^ The first comprehensive systemiser of Kabbalah, Moses ben Jacob Cordovero, for example, was influenced by Maimonides. One example is his instruction to undercut any conception of a Kabbalistic idea after grasping it in the mind. One's intellect runs to God in learning the idea, then returns in qualified rejection of false spatial/temporal conceptions of the idea's truth, as the human mind can only think in material references. Cited in Louis Jacobs, The Jewish Religion: A Companion, Oxford University Press, 1995, entry on Cordovero.

References

  1. ^ "Moses Maimonides | Biography, Philosophy, & Teachings". Encyclopedia Britannica. from the original on 20 December 2016. Retrieved 8 December 2016.
  2. ^ "Hebrew Date Converter – 14th of Nisan, 4895 | Hebcal Jewish Calendar". www.hebcal.com. from the original on 7 March 2021. Retrieved 31 March 2021.
  3. ^ "Hebrew Date Converter – 14th of Nisan, 4898 | Hebcal Jewish Calendar". www.hebcal.com. from the original on 7 March 2021. Retrieved 31 March 2021.
  4. ^ . Archived from the original on 9 October 2007. Retrieved 6 May 2007.
  5. ^ "The Influence of Islamic Thought on Maimonides". Maimonides Islamic Influences. Plato. Stanford. 2016. from the original on 9 December 2014. Retrieved 6 May 2007.
  6. ^ "Isaac Newton: "Judaic monotheist of the school of Maimonides"". Achgut.com. 19 June 2007. from the original on 28 April 2015. Retrieved 13 March 2010.
  7. ^ Commentary of the Mishnah, Maimonides (1967), s.v. Uktzin 3:12 (end)
  8. ^ Joel E. Kramer, "Moses Maimonides: An Intellectual Portrait," p. 47 note 1. In Kenneth Seeskin, ed. (September 2005). The Cambridge Companion to Maimonides. ISBN 9780521525787.
  9. ^ 1138 in Stroumsa, Maimonides in His World: Portrait of a Mediterranean Thinker, Princeton University Press, 2009, p. 8
  10. ^ Sherwin B. Nuland (2008), Maimonides, Random House LLC, p. 38
  11. ^ Gedaliah ibn Yahya ben Joseph, Shalshelet HaKabbalah 13 May 2021 at the Wayback Machine Jerusalem 1962, p. ק; but in PDF p. 109 (Hebrew)
  12. ^ Abraham Zacuto, Sefer Yuchasin 6 May 2021 at the Wayback Machine, Cracow 1580 (Hebrew), p. 261 in PDF, which reads: "… I saw in a booklet that the Ark of God, even Rabbi Moses b. Maimon, of blessed memory, had been taken up (i.e. euphemism for "had died"), in the year [4],965 anno mundi (= 1204/5 CE) in Egypt, and the Jews wept for him – as did [all] the Egyptians – three days, and they coined a name for that time of year, [saying], 'there was wailing,' and on the seventh day [of his passing], the news reached Alexandria, and on the eighth day, [the news reached] Jerusalem, and in Jerusalem they made a great public mourning [on his behalf] and called for a fast and public gathering, where it was that the prayer precentor read out the admonitions, 'If you shall walk in my statutes [etc.]' (Leviticus 26:3-ff.), as well as read the concluding verse [from the Prophets], 'And it came to pass that Samuel spoke to all of Israel [etc.],' and he then concluded by saying that the Ark of God had been taken away. Now after certain days they brought up his coffin to the Land of Israel, during which journey thieves encountered them, causing those who had gone up to flee, leaving there the coffin. Now the thieves, when they saw that they had all fled, they desired to have the coffin cast into the sea, but were unable with all their strength to uproot the coffin from the ground, even though they had been more than thirty men, and when they considered the matter, they then said to themselves that he was a godly and holy man, and so they went their way. However, they gave assurances to the Jews that they would escort them to their destination, and so it was that they also accompanied him and he was buried in Tiberias."
  13. ^ Marder, Michael (11 November 2014). The Philosopher's Plant: An Intellectual Herbarium. New York: Columbia University Press. p. 97. ISBN 978-0-231-53813-8. from the original on 17 July 2021. Retrieved 20 September 2020.
  14. ^ "Early Years". www.chabad.org. from the original on 16 July 2020. Retrieved 21 May 2020.
  15. ^ "Maimonides Ancestors". from the original on 25 December 2021. Retrieved 21 May 2020.
  16. ^ "Iggerot HaRambam, Iggeret Teiman". www.sefaria.org. from the original on 23 April 2021. Retrieved 31 March 2021.
  17. ^ Stroumsa, Maimonides in His World: Portrait of a Mediterranean Thinker, Princeton University Press, 2009, p.65
  18. ^ Abraham Heschel, Maimonides (New York: Farrar Straus, 1982), Chapter 15, "Meditation on God," pp. 157–162.
  19. ^ a b 1954 Encyclopedia Americana, vol. 18, p. 140.
  20. ^ Y. K. Stillman, ed. (1984). "Libās". Encyclopaedia of Islam. Vol. 5 (2nd ed.). Brill Academic Publishers. p. 744. ISBN 978-90-04-09419-2.
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  24. ^ Davidson, p. 29.
  25. ^ a b Goitein, S.D. Letters of Medieval Jewish Traders, Princeton University Press, 1973 (ISBN 0-691-05212-3), p. 208
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  27. ^ Cohen, Mark R. Poverty and Charity in the Jewish Community of Medieval Egypt. Princeton University Press, 2005 (ISBN 0-691-09272-9), pp. 115–116
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  29. ^ Cohen, Poverty and Charity in the Jewish Community of Medieval Egypt, p. 115
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  35. ^ Abraham Heschel, Maimonides (New York: Farrar Straus, 1982), Chapter 15, "Meditation on God," pp. 157–162, and also pp. 178–180, 184–185, 204, etc. Isadore Twersky, editor, A Maimonides Reader (New York: Behrman House, 1972), commences his "Introduction" with the following remarks, p. 1: "Maimonides's biography immediately suggests a profound paradox. A philosopher by temperament and ideology, a zealous devotee of the contemplative life who eloquently portrayed and yearned for the serenity of solitude and the spiritual exuberance of meditation, he nevertheless led a relentlessly active life that regularly brought him to the brink of exhaustion."
  36. ^ Responsa Pe'er HaDor, 143.
  37. ^ Karo, Joseph (2002). David Avitan (ed.). Questions & Responsa Avqat Rokhel (in Hebrew). Jerusalem: Siyach Yisrael. p. 139 (responsum # 32). (first printed in Saloniki 1791)
  38. ^ Click to see full English translation of Maimonides's "Epistle to Yemen"
  39. ^ The comment on the effect of his "incessant travail" on his health is by Salo Baron, "Moses Maimonides," in Great Jewish Personalities in Ancient and Medieval Time, edited by Simon Noveck (B'nai B'rith Department of Adult Jewish Education, 1959), p. 227, where Baron also quotes from Maimonides's letter to Ibn Tibbon regarding his daily regime.
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  41. ^ אגרות הרמב"ם מהדורת שילת
  42. ^ Sarah E. Karesh; Mitchell M. Hurvitz (2005). Encyclopedia of Judaism. Facts on File. p. 305. ISBN 978-0-8160-5457-2. from the original on 25 December 2021. Retrieved 20 September 2020.
  43. ^ H. J. Zimmels (1997). Ashkenazim and Sephardim: Their Relations, Differences, and Problems as Reflected in the Rabbinical Responsa (Revised ed.). Ktav Publishing House. p. 283. ISBN 978-0-88125-491-4. from the original on 25 December 2021. Retrieved 20 September 2020.
  44. ^ Siegelbaum, Chana Bracha (2010) Women at the crossroads : a woman's perspective on the weekly Torah portion 12 September 2015 at the Wayback Machine Gush Etzion: Midreshet B'erot Bat Ayin. ISBN 9781936068098 page 199
  45. ^ Last section of Maimonides's Introduction to Mishneh Torah
  46. ^ "אבקת רוכל – קרו, יוסף בן אפרים, 1488–1575 (page 70 of 417)". hebrewbooks.org (in Hebrew). from the original on 6 May 2021. Retrieved 31 March 2021.
  47. ^ Moses Maimonides, The Commandments, Neg. Comm. 290, at 269–71 (Charles B. Chavel trans., 1967).
  48. ^ Leslie, Donald. The Survival of the Chinese Jews; The Jewish Community of Kaifeng. Tʻoung pao, 10. Leiden: Brill, 1972, p. 157
  49. ^ Pollak, Michael. Mandarins, Jews, and Missionaries: The Jewish Experience in the Chinese Empire. The Jewish Publication Society of America, 1980, p. 413
  50. ^ Pollak, Mandarins, Jews, and Missionaries, pp. 297–298
  51. ^ "Hebrew Source of Maimonides's Levels of Giving with Danny Siegel's translation" (PDF). (PDF) from the original on 26 October 2012. Retrieved 19 September 2012.
  52. ^ a b "The Guide to the Perplexed". World Digital Library. from the original on 23 July 2013. Retrieved 22 January 2013.
  53. ^ "Unbreakable: How the Middle East is Tied to Western Gaming". London. Al Bawaba. 23 December 2020. Retrieved 14 November 2022.
  54. ^ Jonathan Klawans,Purity, Sacrifice, and the Temple: Symbolism and Supersessionism in the Study of Ancient Judaism, Oxford University Press, 2009 ISBN 978-0-195-39584-6 p.8.
  55. ^ Dogma in Medieval Jewish Thought, Menachem Kellner
  56. ^ See, for example: Marc B. Shapiro. The Limits of Orthodox Theology: Maimonides' Thirteen Principles Reappraised. Littman Library of Jewish Civilization (2011). pp. 1–14.
  57. ^ "Siddur Edot HaMizrach 2C, Additions for Shacharit: Thirteen Principles of Faith". www.sefaria.org. from the original on 28 November 2020. Retrieved 27 September 2020.
  58. ^ Landau, Rabbi Reuven (1884). Sefer Degel Mahaneh Reuven (in Hebrew). Chernovitsi. OCLC 233297464. from the original on 5 August 2021. Retrieved 27 September 2020.
  59. ^ Brown, Jeremy (2008). "Rabbi Reuven Landau and the Jewish Reaction to Copernican Thought in Nineteenth Century Europe". The Torah U-Madda Journal. Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary, an affiliate of Yeshiva University. 15 (2008): 112–142. JSTOR 40914730. from the original on 2 November 2020. Retrieved 27 September 2020.
  60. ^ Shapiro, Marc B. (1993). "Maimonides' Thirteen Principles: The Last Word in Jewish Theology?". The Torah U-Madda Journal. Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary, an affiliate of Yeshiva University. 4 (1993): 187–242. JSTOR 40914883. from the original on 4 October 2020. Retrieved 27 September 2020.
  61. ^ Levy, David B. "Book Review: New Heavens and a New Earth: The Jewish Reception of Copernican Thought". www.touroscholar.touro.edu. Journal of Jewish Identities. 8(1) (2015): 218–220. from the original on 11 July 2020. Retrieved 27 September 2020.
  62. ^ Brown, Jeremy (2013). New Heavens and a New Earth: The Jewish Reception of Copernican Thought. Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199754793.001.0001. ISBN 9780199754793.
  63. ^ Kraemer, 326-8
  64. ^ Kraemer, 66
  65. ^ a b Robinson, George. "Maimonides' Conception of God/" 1 May 2018 at the Wayback Machine My Jewish Learning. 30 April 2018.
  66. ^ Reuven Chaim Klein, "Weaning Away from Idolatry: Maimonides on the Purpose of Ritual Sacrifices 2021-10-29 at the Wayback Machine", Religions 12(5), 363.
  67. ^ Telushkin, 29
  68. ^ Commentary on The Ethics of the Fathers 1:15. Qtd. in Telushkin, 115
  69. ^ Kraemer, 332-4
  70. ^ MT De'ot 6:1
  71. ^ Moses Maimonides (2007). The Guide to the Perplexed. BN Publishers.
  72. ^ Joseph Jacobs. "Moses Ben Maimon". Jewish Encyclopedia. from the original on 23 May 2011. Retrieved 13 March 2011.
  73. ^ Shlomo Pines (2006). "Maimonides (1135–1204)". Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 5: 647–654.
  74. ^ Isadore Twersky (2005). "Maimonides, Moses". Encyclopedia of Religion. 8: 5613–5618.
  75. ^ Joel E. Kramer, "Moses Maimonides: An Intellectual Portrait," p. 45. In Kenneth Seeskin, ed. (September 2005). The Cambridge Companion to Maimonides. ISBN 9780521525787.
  76. ^ Rudavsky, T. (March 2010). Maimonidies. Singapore: Wiley-Blackwell. p. 10. ISBN 978-1-4051-4898-6.
  77. ^ "Guide for the Perplexed, on". Sacred-texts.com. from the original on 14 April 2010. Retrieved 13 March 2010.
  78. ^ Kraemer, 422
  79. ^ Commentary on the Mishna, Avot 5:6
  80. ^ "Mishneh Torah, Repentance 9:1". www.sefaria.org. from the original on 1 August 2021. Retrieved 2 August 2021.
  81. ^ Such as the first (religious) criticism of Kabbalah, Ari Nohem, by Leon Modena from 1639. In it, Modena urges a return to Maimonidean Aristotelianism. The Scandal of Kabbalah: Leon Modena, Jewish Mysticism, Early Modern Venice, Yaacob Dweck, Princeton University Press, 2011.
  82. ^ Menachem Kellner, Maimonides' Confrontation With Mysticism, Littman Library, 2006
  83. ^ Maimonides: Philosopher and Mystic 13 September 2018 at the Wayback Machine from Chabad.org
  84. ^ Norman Lamm, The Religious Thought of Hasidism: Text and Commentary, Ktav Pub, 1999: Introduction to chapter on Faith/Reason has historical overview of religious reasons for opposition to Jewish philosophy, including the Ontological reason, one Medieval Kabbalist holding that "we begin where they end".
  85. ^ . Library.dal.ca. Archived from the original on 29 June 2008. Retrieved 13 March 2010.
  86. ^ Friedländer, Michael (January 1956). Guide for the Perplexed. Dover Publications. ISBN 9780486203515. from the original on 20 October 2019. Retrieved 11 March 2020.
  87. ^ Maimonides, Moses (15 December 1974). The guide of the perplexed. Pines, Shlomo, 1908-1990,, Strauss, Leo, Bollingen Foundation Collection (Library of Congress). [Chicago]. ISBN 0226502309. OCLC 309924.
  88. ^ Isidore Twersky, Introduction to the Code of Maimonides (Mishneh Torah), Yale Judaica Series, vol. XII (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1980). passim, and especially Chapter VII, "Epilogue," pp. 515–538.
  89. ^ Reif, Stefan C. (1994). "Review of 'Sobre la Vida y Obra de Maimonides', ed. Jesus Pelaez del Rosal". Journal of Semitic Studies. 39 (1): 124. doi:10.1093/jss/XXXIX.1.123.
  90. ^ This is covered in all histories of the Jews. E.g., including such a brief overview as Cecil Roth, A History of the Jews, Revised Edition (New York: Schocken, 1970), pp. 175–179.
  91. ^ D.J. Silver, Maimonidean Criticism and the Maimonidean Controversy, 1180–1240 (Leiden: Brill, 1965), is still the most detailed account.
  92. ^ David Hartman, Maimonides: Torah and Philosophic Quest (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1976), p. 98.
  93. ^ On the extensive philosophical aspects of Maimonides's halakhic works, see in particular Isidore Twersky's Introduction to the Code of Maimonides (Mishneh Torah), Yale Judaica Series, vol. XII (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1980). Twersky devotes a major portion of this authoritative study to the philosophical aspects of the Mishneh Torah itself.
  94. ^ The Maimunist or Maimonidean controversy is covered in all histories of Jewish philosophy and general histories of the Jews. For an overview, with bibliographic references, see Idit Dobbs-Weinstein, "The Maimonidean Controversy," in History of Jewish Philosophy, Second Edition, edited by Daniel H. Frank and Oliver Leaman (London and New York: Routledge, 2003), pp. 331–349. Also see Colette Sirat, A History of Jewish Philosophy in the Middle Ages (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985), pp. 205–272.
  95. ^ Mercedes Rubio (2006). "Aquinas and Maimonides on the Divine Names". Aquinas and Maimonides on the possibility of the knowledge of god. Springer-Verlag. pp. 11, 65–126, 211, 218. doi:10.1007/1-4020-4747-9_2. ISBN 978-1-4020-4720-6.
  96. ^ Vivian McAlister, Maimonides's cooling period and organ retrieval (Canadian Journal of Surgery 2004; 47: 8 – 9)
  97. ^ "NeoHasid.org | Rambam and Gaia". neohasid.org. from the original on 8 December 2013. Retrieved 11 December 2013.
  98. ^ David Morris. . Florida Jewish Journal. Archived from the original on 30 July 2007. Retrieved 13 March 2010.
  99. ^ Eisner, Jane (1 June 2000). "Fear meets fellowship". The Philadelphia Inquirer. p. 25. from the original on 23 November 2020. Retrieved 29 August 2020 – via Newspapers.com. 
  100. ^ "1 Israeli New Shekel (Rabbi Moses Maimonides) - exchange yours".
  101. ^ Linzmayer, Owen (2012). "Israel". The Banknote Book. San Francisco, CA: www.BanknoteNews.com. from the original on 29 August 2012. Retrieved 25 December 2021.
  102. ^ "Harvard University Press: Maimonides after 800 Years : Essays on Maimonides and his Influence by Jay M. Harris". Hup.harvard.edu. from the original on 19 May 2009. Retrieved 13 March 2010.
  103. ^ Shelly Paz (8 May 2008) . The Jerusalem Post
  104. ^ "The Israel Museum, Jerusalem". www.imj.org.il. 2 October 2018. from the original on 20 May 2019. Retrieved 11 July 2019.
  105. ^ Kehot Publication Society, Chabad.org.
  106. ^ Maimonides (1963), Introduction, p. XIV
  107. ^ Maimonides (1963), Preface, p. VI
  108. ^ Maimonides (1963), Preface, p. VII
  109. ^ Volume 5 translated by Barzel (foreword by Rosner).
  110. ^ , .
  111. ^ "כתבים רפואיים – ג (פירוש לפרקי אבוקראט) / משה בן מימון (רמב"ם) / ת"ש-תש"ב – אוצר החכמה". from the original on 21 June 2016. Retrieved 19 July 2016.
  112. ^ Maimonides. Medical Aphorisms (Treatises 1–5 6–9 10–15 16–21 22–25), Brigham Young University, Provo – Utah
  113. ^ "כתבים רפואיים – ב (פרקי משה ברפואה) / משה בן מימון (רמב"ם) / ת"ש-תש"ב – אוצר החכמה". from the original on 21 June 2016. Retrieved 19 July 2016.
  114. ^ "כתבים רפואיים – ד (ברפואת הטחורים) / משה בן מימון (רמב"ם) / ת"ש-תש"ב – אוצר החכמה". from the original on 21 June 2016. Retrieved 19 July 2016.
  115. ^ , .
  116. ^ "כתבים רפואיים – א (הנהגת הבריאות) / משה בן מימון (רמב"ם) / ת"ש-תש"ב – אוצר החכמה". from the original on 29 June 2016. Retrieved 19 July 2016.
  117. ^ , .
  118. ^ Abraham Heschel, Maimonides. New York: Farrar Straus, 1982 p. 22 ("at sixteen")
  119. ^ Davidson, pp. 313 ff.
  120. ^ "באור מלאכת ההגיון / משה בן מימון (רמב"ם) / תשנ"ז – אוצר החכמה". from the original on 21 June 2016. Retrieved 19 July 2016.


Bibliography

  •   This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Joseph Jacobs; Isaac Broydé (1901–1906). "Moses Ben Maimon". In Singer, Isidore; et al. (eds.). The Jewish Encyclopedia. The Executive Committee of the Editorial Board, and Jacob Zallel Lauterbach. New York: Funk & Wagnalls.
  • Barzel, Uriel (1992). Maimonides's Medical Writings: The Art of Cure Extracts. Vol. 5. Galen: Maimonides Research Institute. from the original on 17 June 2016. Retrieved 14 November 2015.
  • Bos, Gerrit (2002). Maimonides. On Asthma (vol.1, vol.2). Provo, Utah: Brigham Young University Press.
  • Bos, Gerrit (2007). Maimonides. Medical Aphorisms Treatise 1–5 (6–9, 10–15, 16–21, 22–25). Provo, Utah: Brigham Young University Press.
  • Davidson, Herbert A. (2005). Moses Maimonides: The Man and his Works. Oxford University Press.
  • Feldman, Rabbi Yaakov (2008). Shemonah Perakim: The Eight Chapters of the Rambam. Targum Press.
  • Fox, Marvin (1990). Interpreting Maimonides. Univ. of Chicago Press.
  • Guttman, Julius (1964). David Silverman (ed.). Philosophies of Judaism. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America.
  • Halbertal, Moshe (2013). Maimonides: Life and Thought. Princeton University Press. ISBN 9780691158518. from the original on 5 September 2015. Retrieved 23 June 2015.
  • Hart Green, Kenneth (2013). Leo Strauss on Maimonides: The Complete Writings. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
  • Hartman, David (1976). Maimonides: Torah and Philosophic Quest. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America. ISBN 9780827600836.
  • Heschel, Abraham Joshua (1982). Maimonides: The Life and Times of a Medieval Jewish Thinker. New York: Farrar Straus.
  • Husik, Isaac (2002) [1941]. A History of Jewish Philosophy. Dover Publications, Inc. Originally published by the Jewish Publication of America, Philadelphia.
  • Kaplan, Aryeh (1994). "Maimonides Principles: The Fundamentals of Jewish Faith". The Aryeh Kaplan Anthology. I.
  • Kellner, Menachem (1986). Dogma in Medieval Jewish Thought. London: Oxford University press. ISBN 978-0-19-710044-8.
  • Kohler, George Y. (2012). "Reading Maimonides's Philosophy in 19th Century Germany". Amsterdam Studies in Jewish Philosophy. 15.
  • Kraemer, Joel L. (2008). Maimonides: The Life and World of One of Civilization's Greatest Minds. Doubleday.
  • Leaman, Daniel H.; Leaman, Frank; Leaman, Oliver (2003). History of Jewish Philosophy (Second ed.). London and New York: Routledge. See especially chapters 10 through 15.
  • Maimonides (1963). Suessmann Muntner (ed.). Moshe Ben Maimon (Maimonides) Medical Works (in Hebrew). Translated by Moshe Ibn Tibbon. Jerusalem: Mossad Harav Kook. OCLC 729184001.
  • Maimonides (1967). Mishnah, with Maimonides' Commentary (in Hebrew). Vol. 3. Translated by Yosef Qafih. Jerusalem: Mossad Harav Kook. OCLC 741081810.
  • Rosner, Fred (1984–1994). Maimonides's Medical Writings. Vol. 7 Vols. Maimonides Research Institute. (Volume 5 translated by Uriel Barzel; foreword by Fred Rosner.)
  • Seidenberg, David (2005). "Maimonides – His Thought Related to Ecology". The Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature. from the original on 8 December 2013. Retrieved 11 December 2013.
  • Shapiro, Marc B. (1993). "Maimonides Thirteen Principles: The Last Word in Jewish Theology?". The Torah U-Maddah Journal. 4.
  • Shapiro, Marc B. (2008). Studies in Maimonides and His Interpreters. Scranton (PA): University of Scranton Press.
  • Sirat, Colette (1985). A History of Jewish Philosophy in the Middle Ages. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. See chapters 5 through 8.
  • Strauss, Leo (1974). Shlomo Pines (ed.). How to Begin to Study the Guide: The Guide of the Perplexed – Maimonides (in Arabic). Vol. 1. University of Chicago Press.
  • Strauss, Leo (1988). Persecution and the Art of Writing. University of Chicago Press. ISBN 9780226777115. reprint
  • Stroumsa, Sarah (2009). Maimonides in His World: Portrait of a Mediterranean Thinker. Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-0-691-13763-6. from the original on 3 June 2016. Retrieved 19 January 2011.
  • Telushkin, Joseph (2006). A Code of Jewish Ethics. Vol. 1 (You Shall Be Holy). New York: Bell Tower. OCLC 460444264.
  • Twersky, Isadore (1972). I Twersky (ed.). A Maimonides Reader. New York: Behrman House.
  • Twersky, Isador (1980). "Introduction to the Code of Maimonides (Mishneh Torah)". Yale Judaica Series. New Haven and London. XII.

Further reading

  • Maimonides: Abū ʿImrān Mūsā [Moses] ibn ʿUbayd Allāh [Maymūn] al‐Qurṭubī www.islamsci.mcgill.ca 27 August 2011 at the Wayback Machine
  • . AIME. Archived from the original on 24 May 2013.
  • S. R. Simon (1999). "Moses Maimonides: medieval physician and scholar". Arch Intern Med. 159 (16): 1841–5. doi:10.1001/archinte.159.16.1841. PMID 10493314.
  • Athar Yawar Email Address (2008). "Maimonides's medicine". The Lancet. 371 (9615): 804. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(08)60365-7. S2CID 54415482.
  • "Moses Maimonides | biography – Jewish philosopher, scholar, and physician". from the original on 30 April 2015. Retrieved 4 June 2015.

External links

 
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Moshe ben Maimon.
 
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Moshe ben Maimon
About Maimonides
  • Maimonides entry in the Jewish Encyclopedia (1906)
  • Maimonides entry in the Encyclopædia Britannica
  • Maimonides entry in the Encyclopaedia Judaica, 2nd edition (2007)
  • Seeskin, Kenneth. "Maimonides". In Zalta, Edward N. (ed.). Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
  • "Maimonides entry in the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy"
  • Video lecture on Maimonides by Dr. Henry Abramson
  • Maimonides, a biography — book by David Yellin and Israel Abrahams
  • Maimonides as a Philosopher
  • The Influence of Islamic Thought on Maimonides
  • Article from Policy Review
  • Rambam and the Earth: Maimonides as a Proto-Ecological Thinker – reprint on neohasid.org from The Encyclopedia of Religion and Ecology
  • Anti-Maimonidean Demons 20 July 2008 at the Wayback Machine by Jose Faur, describing the controversy surrounding Maimonides's works
  • David Yellin and Israel Abrahams, Maimonides (1903) (full text of a biography)
  • Y. Tzvi Langermann (2007). "Maimonides: Abū ʿImrān Mūsā [Moses] ibn ʿUbayd Allāh [Maymūn] al‐Qurṭubī". In Thomas Hockey; et al. (eds.). The Biographical Encyclopedia of Astronomers. New York: Springer. pp. 726–7. ISBN 978-0-387-31022-0. (PDF version)
  • Maimonides at intellectualencounters.org
  • Kriesel, Howard (2015). Judaism as Philosophy: Studies in Maimonides and the Medieval Jewish Philosophers of Provence. Boston: Academic Studies Press. doi:10.2307/j.ctt21h4xpc. ISBN 9781618117892. JSTOR j.ctt21h4xpc.
  • Friedberg, Albert (2013). Crafting the 613 Commandments: Maimonides on the Enumeration, Classification, and Formulation of the Scriptural Commandments. Boston: Academic Studies Press. doi:10.2307/j.ctt21h4wf8. ISBN 9781618118486. JSTOR j.ctt21h4wf8.
  • The Guide: An Explanatory Commentary on Each Chapter of Maimonides' Guide of The Perplexed by Scott Michael Alexander (covers all of Book I, currently)
Maimonides's works
  • Complete Mishneh Torah online, halakhic work of Maimonides
  • Sefer Hamitzvot, English translation
  • Oral Readings of Mishne Torah 13 October 2007 at the Wayback Machine — Free listening and Download, site also had classes in Maimonides's Iggereth Teiman
  • Maimonides 13 Principles 31 October 2016 at the Wayback Machine
  • Intellectual Encounters – Main Thinkers – Moses Maimonides, in
  • Maimonides, Mishneh Torah, Autograph Draft 29 January 2013 at the Wayback Machine, Egypt, c. 1180
  • British Library – Autograph responsum of Moses Maimonides, pre-eminent Jewish polymath and spiritual leader, Ilana Tahan
  • Digitized works by Maimonides at the Leo Baeck Institute
Texts by Maimonides
  • , a prayerbook based on the early Jewish liturgy as found in Maimonides's Mishne Tora
  • Rambam's introduction to the Mishneh Torah (English translation)
  • Rambam's introduction to the Commentary on the Mishnah (Hebrew language|Hebrew Fulltext)
  • The Guide For the Perplexed by Moses Maimonides translated into English by Michael Friedländer
  • Facsimile edition of Moreh Nevukhim/The Guide for the Perplexed (illuminated Hebrew manuscript, Barcelona, 1347–48). The Royal Library, Copenhagen 11 August 2021 at the Wayback Machine
  • University of Cambridge Library collection 29 January 2010 at the Wayback Machine of Judeo-Arabic letters and manuscripts written by or to Maimonides. It includes the last letter his brother David sent him before drowning at sea.
  • A. Ashur, A newly discovered medical recipe written by Maimonides 3 November 2018 at the Wayback Machine
  • M.A Friedman and A. Ashur, A newly-discovered autograph responsum of Maimonides 1 November 2018 at the Wayback Machine
  • Works by Maimonides at Post-Reformation Digital Library
  • Works by Maimonides at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)  

January 31, 2023
maimonides, other, uses, disambiguation, haifa, hospital, rambam, health, care, campus, moses, maimon, 1138, 1204, commonly, known, also, referred, acronym, rambam, hebrew, רמב, sephardic, jewish, philosopher, became, most, prolific, influential, torah, schola. For other uses see Maimonides disambiguation For the Haifa hospital see Rambam Health Care Campus Moses ben Maimon a 1138 1204 commonly known as Maimonides m aɪ ˈ m ɒ n ɪ d iː z b and also referred to by the acronym Rambam Hebrew רמב ם c was a Sephardic Jewish philosopher who became one of the most prolific and influential Torah scholars of the Middle Ages In his time he was also a preeminent astronomer and physician serving as the personal physician of Saladin Born in Cordoba Almoravid Empire present day Spain on Passover eve 1138 or 1135 d 8 9 10 he worked as a rabbi physician and philosopher in Morocco and Egypt He died in Egypt on 12 December 1204 when his body was taken to the lower Galilee and buried in Tiberias 11 12 Maimonides Moshe ben Maimon Imaginative 18th century depiction of MaimonidesBorn30 March 1 or 6 April 2 1135 Possibly born 28 March or 4 April 3 1138Cordoba Almoravid EmpireDied12 December 1204 66 69 years old Fostat Ayyubid SultanateNotable workMishneh TorahThe Guide for the PerplexedSpouse 1 daughter of Nathaniel Baruch 2 daughter of Mishael HaleviEraMedieval philosophy 12th century philosophyRegionMiddle Eastern philosophy Jewish philosophySchoolAristotelianismMain interestsReligious law HalakhaNotable ideasOath of Maimonides Maimonides rule Golden mean 13 principles of faithInfluences Talmud Plato Aristotle al Farabi Avicenna Avempace Averroes Al Ghazali 4 5 Influenced Virtually all subsequent Jewish philosophy as well as a significant amount of Catholic theology and especially Spinoza Albertus Magnus Aquinas Joyce Bodin Leibniz Newton 6 Strauss Buber Rosenzweig Friedlander Fackenheim LevinasSignatureDuring his lifetime most Jews greeted Maimonides writings on Jewish law and ethics with acclaim and gratitude even as far away as Iraq and Yemen Yet while Maimonides rose to become the revered head of the Jewish community in Egypt his writings also had vociferous critics particularly in Spain Nonetheless he was posthumously acknowledged as one of the foremost rabbinic decisors and philosophers in Jewish history and his copious work comprises a cornerstone of Jewish scholarship His fourteen volume Mishneh Torah still carries significant canonical authority as a codification of Halacha He is sometimes known as הנשר הגדול haNesher haGadol The Great Eagle 13 in recognition of his outstanding status as a bona fide exponent of the Oral Torah Aside from being revered by Jewish historians Maimonides also figures very prominently in the history of Islamic and Arab sciences and he is mentioned extensively in studies Influenced by Aristotle Al Farabi Ibn Sina and his contemporary Ibn Rushd he became a prominent philosopher and polymath in both the Jewish and Islamic worlds Contents 1 Name 2 Biography 2 1 Early years 2 2 Exile 2 3 Death of his brother 2 4 Nagid 2 5 Physician 2 6 Death 3 Legal works 3 1 Tzedakah charity 4 Philosophy 4 1 Thirteen principles of faith 4 2 Theology 4 3 Character development 4 4 Prophecy 4 5 The problem of evil 4 6 Skepticism of astrology 4 7 True beliefs versus necessary beliefs 4 8 Eschatology 4 8 1 The Messianic era 4 8 2 Resurrection 4 8 3 The World to Come 4 9 Maimonides and Kabbalah 4 10 The Oath of Maimonides 4 11 Views on circumcision 5 Influence and legacy 5 1 Maimonides and the Modernists 5 2 Tributes and memorials 6 Works and bibliography 6 1 Judaic and philosophical works 6 2 Medical works 6 3 Treatise on logic 7 Burial place 8 See also 9 Notes 10 References 11 Bibliography 12 Further reading 13 External linksName EditMaimonides referred to himself as משה בירבי מימון הספרדי Hebrew for Moshe son of Rabbi Maimon the Spaniard e In Medieval Hebrew he was usually called ר ם short for our Rabbi Moshe and in Modern Hebrew he is called רמב ם short for our Rabbi Moshe the son of Maimon and pronounced Rambam In Arabic he is sometimes called Father of Amram Moses son of Maimon son of Obadiah the Cordoban أ ب و ع م ر ان م وس ى ب ن م ي م ون ب ن ع ب ي د ٱلل ه ٱل ق ر ط ب ي Abu ʿImran Musa bin Maimun bin ʿUbaidallah al Qurṭabi or more often Musa bin Maymun موسى بن ميمون Bin ʿUbaidallah is to be treated as Maimonides surname as Obadiah was the name of his earliest direct ancestor not his grandfather who was named Joseph In Greek the Hebrew ben son of becomes the patronymic suffix ides forming Mwhshs Maimonidhs Moses Maimonides citation needed Biography EditFurther information History of the Jews in Egypt Arab rule 641 to 1250 Early years Edit The dominion of the Almohad Caliphate at its greatest extent c 1200 Maimonides was born 1138 or 1135 in Cordoba Andalusia in the Muslim ruled Almoravid Empire during what some scholars consider to be the end of the golden age of Jewish culture in the Iberian Peninsula after the first centuries of the Moorish rule His father Maimon ben Joseph was a Spanish dayyan Jewish judge whose family claimed direct paternal descent from Simeon ben Judah ha Nasi and thus from the Davidic line Maimonides later stated that there are 38 generations between him and Judah ha Nasi 14 15 better source needed His ancestry going back four generations is given in his Iggeret Teiman Epistle to Yemen as Moses son of Maimon the Judge hadayan son of Joseph the Wise Hebrew ה ח כ ם romanized he chakham son of Isaac the Rabbi Hebrew ה ר ב romanized harav son of Obadiah the Judge 16 At the end of his commentary on the Mishna however a slightly different genealogy is presented Moses son of Maimon the Judge son of Joseph the Wise son of Rabbi Isaac the Judge son of Joseph the Judge son of Obadiah the Judge son of Solomon the Teacher son of Obadiah the Judge e At an early age Maimonides developed an interest in sciences and philosophy He read those Greek philosophers accessible in Arabic translations and was deeply immersed in the sciences and learning of Islamic culture 17 Maimonides was not known as a supporter of Kabbalah although a strong intellectual type of mysticism has been discerned in his philosophy 18 He expressed disapproval of poetry the best of which he declared to be false since it was founded on pure invention This sage who was revered for his personality as well as for his writings led a busy life and wrote many of his works while travelling or in temporary accommodation 19 Maimonides studied Torah under his father who had in turn studied under Rabbi Joseph ibn Migash a student of Isaac Alfasi Exile Edit Maimonides house in Fez Morocco A Berber dynasty the Almohads conquered Cordoba in 1148 and abolished dhimmi status i e state protection of non Muslims ensured through payment of a tax the jizya in some which of their territories The loss of this status left the Jewish and Christian communities with conversion to Islam death or exile 19 Many Jews were forced to convert but due to suspicion by the authorities of fake conversions the new converts had to wear identifying clothing that set them apart and made them subject to public scrutiny 20 Maimonides s family along with most other Jews dubious discuss chose exile The question whether Maimonides himself was among those who had to convert to Islam in order to save his life prior to fleeing the area has been the subject of scholarly debate 21 This forced conversion was ruled legally invalid under Islamic law when brought up by a rival in Egypt 22 For the next ten years Maimonides moved about in southern Spain eventually settling in Fez in Morocco During this time he composed his acclaimed commentary on the Mishnah during the years 1166 1168 f Some say that his teacher in Fez was Rabbi Yehuda Ha Cohen Ibn Susan until he was killed in 1165 23 Following this sojourn in Morocco together with two sons 24 he sojourned in Palestine before settling in Fustat in Fatimid Caliphate controlled Egypt around 1168 There is mention that Maimonides first settled in Alexandria and moved to Fustat only in 1171 While in Cairo he studied in a yeshiva attached to a small synagogue which now bears his name 25 In Palestine he prayed at the Temple Mount He wrote that this day of visiting the Temple Mount was a day of holiness for him and his descendants 26 Maimonides shortly thereafter was instrumental in helping rescue Jews taken captive during the Christian Amalric of Jerusalem s siege of the southeastern Nile Delta town of Bilbeis He sent five letters to the Jewish communities of Lower Egypt asking them to pool money together to pay the ransom The money was collected and then given to two judges sent to Palestine to negotiate with the Crusaders The captives were eventually released 27 Death of his brother Edit Monument in Cordoba Following this triumph the Maimonides family hoping to increase their wealth gave their savings to his brother the youngest son David ben Maimon a merchant Maimonides directed his brother to procure goods only at the Sudanese port of ʽAydhab After a long arduous trip through the desert however David was unimpressed by the goods on offer there Against his brother s wishes David boarded a ship for India since great wealth was to be found in the East g Before he could reach his destination David drowned at sea sometime between 1169 and 1177 The death of his brother caused Maimonides to become sick with grief In a letter discovered in the Cairo Geniza he wrote The greatest misfortune that has befallen me during my entire life worse than anything else was the demise of the saint may his memory be blessed who drowned in the Indian sea carrying much money belonging to me to him and to others and left with me a little daughter and a widow On the day I received that terrible news I fell ill and remained in bed for about a year suffering from a sore boil fever and depression and was almost given up About eight years have passed but I am still mourning and unable to accept consolation And how should I console myself He grew up on my knees he was my brother and he was my student 28 Nagid Edit Bas relief of Maimonides in the United States House of Representatives Around 1171 Maimonides was appointed the Nagid of the Egyptian Jewish community 25 Arabist Shelomo Dov Goitein believes the leadership he displayed during the ransoming of the Crusader captives led to this appointment 29 However he was replaced by Sar Shalom ben Moses in 1173 Over the controversial course of Sar Shalom s appointment during which Sar Shalom was accused of tax farming Maimonides excommunicated and fought with him for several years until Maimonides was appointed Nagid in 1195 A work known as Megillat Zutta was written by Abraham ben Hillel who writes a scathing description of Sar Shalom while praising Maimonides as the light of east and west and unique master and marvel of the generation 30 31 Physician Edit With the loss of the family funds tied up in David s business venture Maimonides assumed the vocation of physician for which he was to become famous He had trained in medicine in both Cordoba and in Fez Gaining widespread recognition he was appointed court physician to al Qadi al Fadil the chief secretary to Sultan Saladin then to Saladin himself after whose death he remained a physician to the Ayyubid dynasty 32 In his medical writings Maimonides described many conditions including asthma diabetes hepatitis and pneumonia and he emphasized moderation and a healthy lifestyle 33 His treatises became influential for generations of physicians He was knowledgeable about Greek and Arabic medicine and followed the principles of humorism in the tradition of Galen He did not blindly accept authority but used his own observation and experience 33 Julia Bess Frank indicates that Maimonides in his medical writings sought to interpret works of authorities so that they could become acceptable 32 Maimonides displayed in his interactions with patients attributes that today would be called intercultural awareness and respect for the patient s autonomy 34 Although he frequently wrote of his longing for solitude in order to come closer to God and to extend his reflections elements considered essential in his philosophy to the prophetic experience he gave over most of his time to caring for others 35 In a famous letter Maimonides describes his daily routine After visiting the Sultan s palace he would arrive home exhausted and hungry where I would find the antechambers filled with gentiles and Jews I would go to heal them and write prescriptions for their illnesses until the evening and I would be extremely weak 36 As he goes on to say in this letter even on Shabbat he would receive members of the community It is remarkable that he managed to write extended treatises including not only medical and other scientific studies but some of the most systematically thought through and influential treatises on halakha rabbinic law and Jewish philosophy of the Middle Ages h Joseph Karo later praised Maimonides writing of him Maimonides is the greatest of the decisors of Jewish law and all communities of the Land of Israel and of Arabia and of the Maghreb base their practices after him and have taken him upon themselves as their rabbi 37 In 1172 74 Maimonides wrote his famous Epistle to Yemen 38 It has been suggested that his incessant travail undermined his own health and brought about his death at 69 although this is a normal lifespan 39 Death Edit See also Tomb of Maimonides The Tomb of Maimonides in Tiberias Maimonides died on 12 December 1204 20th of Tevet 4965 in Fustat A variety of medieval sources beginning with Al Qifti maintain that his body was interred near Lake Tiberias though there is no contemporary evidence for his removal from Egypt Today Tiberias hosts the Tomb of Maimonides on which is inscribed From Moses to Moses arose none like Moses 40 Maimonides and his wife the daughter of Mishael ben Yeshayahu Halevi had one child who survived into adulthood 41 Abraham Maimonides who became recognized as a great scholar He succeeded Maimonides as Nagid and as court physician at the age of eighteen Throughout his career he defended his father s writings against all critics The office of Nagid was held by the Maimonides family for four successive generations until the end of the 14th century A statue of Maimonides was erected near the Cordoba Synagogue Maimonides is sometimes said to be a descendant of King David although he never made such a claim 42 43 Legal works EditMain article Mishneh Torah With Mishneh Torah Maimonides composed a code of Jewish law with the widest possible scope and depth The work gathers all the binding laws from the Talmud and incorporates the positions of the Geonim post Talmudic early Medieval scholars mainly from Mesopotamia Later codes of Jewish law e g Arba ah Turim by Rabbi Jacob ben Asher and Shulchan Aruch by Rabbi Yosef Karo draw heavily on Mishneh Torah both often quote whole sections verbatim However it met initially with much opposition 44 There were two main reasons for this opposition First Maimonides had refrained from adding references to his work for the sake of brevity second in the introduction he gave the impression of wanting to cut out study of the Talmud 45 to arrive at a conclusion in Jewish law although Maimonides later wrote that this was not his intent His most forceful opponents were the rabbis of Provence Southern France and a running critique by Rabbi Abraham ben David Raavad III is printed in virtually all editions of Mishneh Torah It was still recognized as a monumental contribution to the systemized writing of halakha Throughout the centuries it has been widely studied and its halakhic decisions have weighed heavily in later rulings In response to those who would attempt to force followers of Maimonides and his Mishneh Torah to abide by the rulings of his own Shulchan Aruch or other later works Rabbi Yosef Karo wrote Who would dare force communities who follow the Rambam to follow any other decisor early or late The Rambam is the greatest of the decisors and all the communities of the Land of Israel and the Arabistan and the Maghreb practice according to his word and accepted him as their rabbi 46 An oft cited legal maxim from his pen is It is better and more satisfactory to acquit a thousand guilty persons than to put a single innocent one to death He argued that executing a defendant on anything less than absolute certainty would lead to a slippery slope of decreasing burdens of proof until defendants would be convicted merely according to the judge s caprice 47 Scholars specializing in the study of the history and subculture of Judaism in premodern China Sino Judaica have noted surprising similarities between this work and the liturgy of the Kaifeng Jews descendants of Persian Jewish merchants who settled in the Middle Kingdom during the early Song dynasty 48 Beyond scriptural similarities Michael Pollak comments the Jews Pentateuch was divided into 53 sections according to the Persian style 49 He also points out There is no proof to be sure that Kaifeng Jewry ever had direct access to the works of the Great Eagle but it would have had ample time and opportunity to acquire or become acquainted with them well before its reservoir of Jewish learning began to run out Nor do the Maimonidean leanings of the kehillah contradict the historical evidence that has the Jews arriving in Kaifeng no later than 1126 the year in which the Sung fled the city and nine years before Maimonides was born In 1163 when the kehillah built the first of its synagogues Maimonides was only twenty eight years old so that it is highly unlikely that even his earliest authoritative teachings could by then have reached China 50 Tzedakah charity Edit One of the sections of the Mishneh Torah is the section dealing with tzedakah In Hilkhot Matanot Aniyim Laws about Giving to Poor People chapter 10 7 14 Maimonides lists his famous Eight Levels of Giving where the first level is most preferable and the eighth the least 51 Giving an interest free loan to a person in need forming a partnership with a person in need giving a grant to a person in need finding a job for a person in need so long as that loan grant partnership or job results in the person no longer living by relying upon others Giving tzedakah anonymously to an unknown recipient via a person or public fund which is trustworthy wise and can perform acts of tzedakah with your money in a most impeccable fashion Giving tzedakah anonymously to a known recipient Giving tzedakah publicly to an unknown recipient Giving tzedakah before being asked Giving adequately after being asked Giving willingly but inadequately Giving in sadness giving out of pity It is thought that Maimonides was referring to giving because of the sad feelings one might have in seeing people in need as opposed to giving because it is a religious obligation Other translations say Giving unwillingly Philosophy EditThrough The Guide for the Perplexed which was initially written in Arabic as Dalalat al ḥaʾirin and the philosophical introductions to sections of his commentaries on the Mishna Maimonides exerted an important influence on the Scholastic philosophers especially on Albertus Magnus Thomas Aquinas and Duns Scotus He was a Jewish Scholastic Educated more by reading the works of Arab Muslim philosophers than by personal contact with Arabian teachers he acquired an intimate acquaintance not only with Arab Muslim philosophy but with the doctrines of Aristotle Maimonides strove to reconcile Aristotelianism and science with the teachings of the Torah 52 In his Guide for the Perplexed he often explains the function and purpose of the statutory provisions contained in the Torah against the backdrop of the historical conditions Maimonides is said to have been influenced by Asaph the Jew who was the first Hebrew medical writer and has been under major influence by Al Ghazali a prominent Persian philosopher 53 The book was highly controversial in its day and was banned by French rabbis who burnt copies of the work in Montpellier 54 Thirteen principles of faith Edit Main article Jewish principles of faith In his commentary on the Mishnah tractate Sanhedrin chapter 10 Maimonides formulates his 13 principles of faith and that these principles summarized what he viewed as the required beliefs of Judaism The existence of God God s unity and indivisibility into elements God s spirituality and incorporeality God s eternity God alone should be the object of worship Revelation through God s prophets The preeminence of Moses among the prophets That the entire Torah both the Written and Oral law are of Divine origin and were dictated to Moses by God on Mt Sinai The Torah given by Moses is permanent and will not be replaced or changed God s awareness of all human actions and thoughts Reward of righteousness and punishment of evil The coming of the Jewish Messiah The resurrection of the dead Maimonides is said to have compiled the principles from various Talmudic sources These principles were controversial when first proposed evoking criticism by Rabbis Hasdai Crescas and Joseph Albo and were effectively ignored by much of the Jewish community for the next few centuries 55 However these principles have become widely held and are considered to be the cardinal principles of faith for Orthodox Jews 56 Two poetic restatements of these principles Ani Ma amin and Yigdal eventually became canonized in many editions of the Siddur Jewish prayer book The principles can be seen listed in the Siddur Edot HaMizrach Additions for Shacharit 57 The omission of a list of these principles as such within his later works the Mishneh Torah and The Guide for the Perplexed has led some to suggest that either he retracted his earlier position or that these principles are descriptive rather than prescriptive 58 59 60 61 62 Theology Edit Depiction of Maimonides teaching students about the measure of man in an illuminated manuscript Maimonides equated the God of Abraham to what philosophers refer to as the Necessary Being God is unique in the universe and the Torah commands that one love and fear God Deut 10 12 on account of that uniqueness To Maimonides this meant that one ought to contemplate God s works and to marvel at the order and wisdom that went into their creation When one does this one inevitably comes to love God and to sense how insignificant one is in comparison to God This is the basis of the Torah 63 The principle that inspired his philosophical activity was identical to a fundamental tenet of scholasticism there can be no contradiction between the truths which God has revealed and the findings of the human mind in science and philosophy Maimonides primarily relied upon the science of Aristotle and the teachings of the Talmud commonly claiming to find a basis for the latter in the former 64 Maimonides admiration for the Neoplatonic commentators led him to doctrines which the later Scholastics did not accept For instance Maimonides was an adherent of apophatic theology In this theology one attempts to describe God through negative attributes For instance one should not say that God exists in the usual sense of the term it can be said that God is not non existent One should not say that God is wise but it can be said that God is not ignorant i e in some way God has some properties of knowledge One should not say that God is One but it can be stated that there is no multiplicity in God s being In brief the attempt is to gain and express knowledge of God by describing what God is not rather than by describing what God is 65 Maimonides argued adamantly that God is not corporeal This was central to his thinking about the sin of idolatry Maimonides insisted that all of the anthropomorphic phrases pertaining to God in sacred texts are to be interpreted metaphorically 65 A related tenet of Maimonidean theology is the notion that the commandments especially those relates sacrifices are intend to help wean the Israelites away from idolatry 66 Character development Edit See also Golden mean Judaism Maimonides taught about the developing of one s moral character Although his life predated the modern concept of a personality Maimonides believed that each person has an innate disposition along an ethical and emotional spectrum Although one s disposition is often determined by factors outside of one s control human beings have free will to choose to behave in ways that build character 67 He wrote One is obligated to conduct his affairs with others in a gentle and pleasing manner 68 Maimonides advised those with anti social character traits ought to identify those traits and then make a conscious effort to behave in the opposite way For example an arrogant person should practice humility 69 If the circumstances of one s environment are such that it is impossible to behave ethically one must move to a new location 70 Prophecy Edit Maimonides agreed with the Philosopher Aristotle that the use of logic is the right way of thinking He claimed that in order to understand how to know God every human being must by study and meditation attain the degree of perfection required to reach the prophetic state Despite his rationalistic approach he does not explicitly reject the previous ideas as portrayed for example by Rabbi Yehuda Halevi in Hakuzari that in order to become a prophet God must intervene Maimonides teaches that prophecy is the highest purpose of the most learned and refined individuals The problem of evil Edit Maimonides wrote on theodicy the philosophical attempt to reconcile the existence of a God with the existence of evil He took the premise that an omnipotent and good God exists 71 72 73 74 In The Guide for the Perplexed Maimonides writes that all the evil that exists within human beings stems from their individual attributes while all good comes from a universally shared humanity Guide 3 8 He says that there are people who are guided by higher purpose and there are those who are guided by physicality and must strive to find the higher purpose with which to guide their actions To justify the existence of evil assuming God is both omnipotent and omnibenevolent Maimonides postulates that one who created something by causing its opposite not to exist is not the same as creating something that exists so evil is merely the absence of good God did not create evil rather God created good and evil exists where good is absent Guide 3 10 Therefore all good is divine invention and evil both is not and comes secondarily Maimonides contests the common view that evil outweighs good in the world He says that if one were to examine existence only in terms of humanity then that person may observe evil to dominate good but if one looks at the whole of the universe then he sees good is significantly more common than evil Guide 3 12 Man he reasons is too insignificant a figure in God s myriad works to be their primary characterizing force and so when people see mostly evil in their lives they are not taking into account the extent of positive Creation outside of themselves Maimonides believes that there are three types of evil in the world evil caused by nature evil that people bring upon others and evil man brings upon himself Guide 3 12 The first type of evil Maimonides states is the rarest form but arguably of the most necessary the balance of life and death in both the human and animal worlds itself he recognizes is essential to God s plan Maimonides writes that the second type of evil is relatively rare and that humanity brings it upon itself The third type of evil humans bring upon themselves and is the source of most of the ills of the world These are the result of people s falling victim to their physical desires To prevent the majority of evil which stems from harm one does to oneself one must learn how to respond to one s bodily urges Skepticism of astrology Edit Further information Jewish views on astrology Maimonides answered an inquiry concerning astrology addressed to him from Marseille 75 He responded that man should believe only what can be supported either by rational proof by the evidence of the senses or by trustworthy authority He affirms that he had studied astrology and that it does not deserve to be described as a science He ridicules the concept that the fate of a man could be dependent upon the constellations he argues that such a theory would rob life of purpose and would make man a slave of destiny 76 True beliefs versus necessary beliefs Edit In The Guide for the Perplexed Book III Chapter 28 77 Maimonides draws a distinction between true beliefs which were beliefs about God that produced intellectual perfection and necessary beliefs which were conducive to improving social order Maimonides places anthropomorphic personification statements about God in the latter class He uses as an example the notion that God becomes angry with people who do wrong In the view of Maimonides taken from Avicenna God does not become angry with people as God has no human passions but it is important for them to believe God does so that they desist from doing wrong Eschatology Edit See also Jewish eschatology The Messianic era Edit Perhaps one of Maimonides s most highly acclaimed and renowned writings is his treatise on the Messianic era written originally in Judeo Arabic and which he elaborates on in great detail in his Commentary on the Mishnah Introduction to the 10th chapter of tractate Sanhedrin also known as Pereḳ Ḥeleḳ Resurrection Edit Religious Jews believed in immortality in a spiritual sense and most believed that the future would include a messianic era and a resurrection of the dead This is the subject of Jewish eschatology Maimonides wrote much on this topic but in most cases he wrote about the immortality of the soul for people of perfected intellect his writings were usually not about the resurrection of dead bodies Rabbis of his day were critical of this aspect of this thought and there was controversy over his true views i Eventually Maimonides felt pressured to write a treatise on the subject known as The Treatise on Resurrection In it he wrote that those who claimed that he believed the verses of the Hebrew Bible referring to the resurrection were only allegorical were spreading falsehoods Maimonides asserts that belief in resurrection is a fundamental truth of Judaism about which there is no disagreement 78 While his position on the World to Come non corporeal eternal life as described above may be seen as being in contradiction with his position on bodily resurrection Maimonides resolved them with a then unique solution Maimonides believed that the resurrection was not permanent or general In his view God never violates the laws of nature Rather divine interaction is by way of angels whom Maimonides often regards to be metaphors for the laws of nature the principles by which the physical universe operates or Platonic eternal forms j Thus if a unique event actually occurs even if it is perceived as a miracle it is not a violation of the world s order 79 In this view any dead who are resurrected must eventually die again In his discussion of the 13 principles of faith the first five deal with knowledge of God the next four deal with prophecy and the Torah while the last four deal with reward punishment and the ultimate redemption In this discussion Maimonides says nothing of a universal resurrection All he says it is that whatever resurrection does take place it will occur at an indeterminate time before the world to come which he repeatedly states will be purely spiritual The World to Come Edit Maimonides distinguishes two kinds of intelligence in man the one material in the sense of being dependent on and influenced by the body and the other immaterial that is independent of the bodily organism The latter is a direct emanation from the universal active intellect this is his interpretation of the nous poietikos of Aristotelian philosophy It is acquired as the result of the efforts of the soul to attain a correct knowledge of the absolute pure intelligence of God citation needed The knowledge of God is a form of knowledge which develops in us the immaterial intelligence and thus confers on man an immaterial spiritual nature This confers on the soul that perfection in which human happiness consists and endows the soul with immortality One who has attained a correct knowledge of God has reached a condition of existence which renders him immune from all the accidents of fortune from all the allurements of sin and from death itself Man is in a position to work out his own salvation and his immortality citation needed Baruch Spinoza s doctrine of immortality was strikingly similar However Spinoza teaches that the way to attain the knowledge which confers immortality is the progress from sense knowledge through scientific knowledge to philosophical intuition of all things sub specie aeternitatis while Maimonides holds that the road to perfection and immortality is the path of duty as described in the Torah and the rabbinic understanding of the oral law citation needed Maimonides describes the world to come as the stage after a person lives their life in this world as well as the final state of existence after the Messianic Era Some time after the resurrection of the dead souls will live forever without bodies They will enjoy the radiance of the Divine Presence without the need for food drink or sexual pleasures 80 Maimonides and Kabbalah Edit In The Guide for the Perplexed Maimonides declares his intention to conceal from the average reader his explanations of Sod k esoteric meanings of Torah The nature of these secrets is debated Religious Jewish rationalists and the mainstream academic view read Maimonides Aristotelianism as a mutually exclusive alternative metaphysics to Kabbalah 81 Some academics hold that Maimonides project fought against the Proto Kabbalah of his time 82 However many Kabbalists and their heirs read Maimonides according to Kabbalah or as an actual covert subscriber to Kabbalah 83 better source needed due to the similarities between the Kabbalistic approach and Maimonides approach toward interpreting the Bible with metaphor Maimonides understanding of God through attributes of action thought and negative attributes Maimonides description of the roles of the imagination and intellect in life sin and prophesy Maimonides assertion that the commandments have a function that can be understood and Maimonides description of a 3 tiered cosmic order whereby God s will is implemented through a system of angels citation needed According to this he employed rationalism to defend Judaism rather than limit inquiry of Sod only to rationalism His rationalism if not taken as an opposition l also assisted the Kabbalists purifying their transmitted teaching from mistaken corporeal interpretations that could have been made from Hekhalot literature m though Kabbalists held that their theosophy alone allowed human access to Divine mysteries 84 The Oath of Maimonides Edit The Oath of Maimonides is a document about the medical calling and recited as a substitute for the Hippocratic Oath It is not to be confused with a more lengthy Prayer of Maimonides These documents may not have been written by Maimonides but later 32 The Prayer appeared first in print in 1793 and has been attributed to Markus Herz a German physician pupil of Immanuel Kant 85 Views on circumcision Edit In The Guide for the Perplexed Maimonides proposes that two important purposes of circumcision brit milah are to temper sexual desire and to join in an affirmation of faith and the covenant of Abraham 86 87 As regards circumcision I think that one of its objects is to limit sexual intercourse and to weaken the organ of generation as far as possible and thus cause man to be moderate Some people believe that circumcision is to remove a defect in man s formation but every one can easily reply How can products of nature be deficient so as to require external completion especially as the use of the fore skin to that organ is evident This commandment has not been enjoined as a complement to a deficient physical creation but as a means for perfecting man s moral shortcomings The bodily injury caused to that organ is exactly that which is desired it does not interrupt any vital function nor does it destroy the power of generation Circumcision simply counteracts excessive lust for there is no doubt that circumcision weakens the power of sexual excitement and sometimes lessens the natural enjoyment the organ necessarily becomes weak when it loses blood and is deprived of its covering from the beginning Our Sages Beresh Rabba c 80 say distinctly It is hard for a woman with whom an uncircumcised had sexual intercourse to separate from him This is as I believe the best reason for the commandment concerning circumcision And who was the first to perform this commandment Abraham our father of whom it is well known how he feared sin it is described by our Sages in reference to the words Behold now I know that thou art a fair woman to look upon Gen xii 11 There is however another important object in this commandment It gives to all members of the same faith i e to all believers in the Unity of God a common bodily sign so that it is impossible for any one that is a stranger to say that he belongs to them For sometimes people say so for the purpose of obtaining some advantage or in order to make some attack upon the Jews No one however should circumcise himself or his son for any other reason but pure faith for circumcision is not like an incision on the leg or a burning in the arm but a very difficult operation It is also a fact that there is much mutual love and assistance among people that are united by the same sign when they consider it as the symbol of a covenant Circumcision is likewise the symbol of the covenant which Abraham made in connection with the belief in God s Unity So also every one that is circumcised enters the covenant of Abraham to believe in the unity of God in accordance with the words of the Law To be a God unto thee and to thy seed after thee Gen xvii 7 This purpose of the circumcision is as important as the first and perhaps more important Maimonides The Guide to the Perplexed 1190 Influence and legacy Edit The title page of The Guide for the Perplexed Maimonides Mishneh Torah is considered by Jews even today as one of the chief authoritative codifications of Jewish law and ethics It is exceptional for its logical construction concise and clear expression and extraordinary learning so that it became a standard against which other later codifications were often measured 88 It is still closely studied in rabbinic yeshivot seminaries The first to compile a comprehensive lexicon containing an alphabetically arranged list of difficult words found in Maimonides Mishneh Torah was Tanḥum ha Yerushalmi 1220 1291 89 A popular medieval saying that also served as his epitaph states From Mosheh of the Torah to Mosheh Maimonides there was none like Mosheh It chiefly referred to his rabbinic writings However Maimonides was also one of the most influential figures in medieval Jewish philosophy His adaptation of Aristotelian thought to Biblical faith deeply impressed later Jewish thinkers and had an unexpected immediate historical impact 90 Some more acculturated Jews in the century that followed his death particularly in Spain sought to apply Maimonides s Aristotelianism in ways that undercut traditionalist belief and observance giving rise to an intellectual controversy in Spanish and southern French Jewish circles 91 The intensity of debate spurred Catholic Church interventions against heresy and a general confiscation of rabbinic texts In reaction the more radical interpretations of Maimonides were defeated At least amongst Ashkenazi Jews there was a tendency to ignore his specifically philosophical writings and to stress instead the rabbinic and halakhic writings These writings often included considerable philosophical chapters or discussions in support of halakhic observance David Hartman observes that Maimonides clearly expressed the traditional support for a philosophical understanding of God both in the Aggadah of Talmud and in the behavior of the hasid the pious Jew 92 Maimonidean thought continues to influence traditionally observant Jews 93 94 The most rigorous medieval critique of Maimonides is Hasdai Crescas s Or Adonai Crescas bucked the eclectic trend by demolishing the certainty of the Aristotelian world view not only in religious matters but also in the most basic areas of medieval science such as physics and geometry Crescas s critique provoked a number of 15th century scholars to write defenses of Maimonides A partial translation of Crescas was produced by Harry Austryn Wolfson of Harvard University in 1929 Because of his path finding synthesis of Aristotle and Biblical faith Maimonides had an influence on the great Christian theologian Saint Thomas Aquinas who refers to Maimonides in several of his works including the Commentary on the Sentences 95 Maimonides s combined abilities in the fields of theology philosophy and medicine make his work attractive today as a source during discussions of evolving norms in these fields particularly medicine An example is the modern citation of his method of determining death of the body in the controversy regarding declaration of death to permit organ donation for transplantation 96 Maimonides and the Modernists Edit Maimonides remains one of the most widely debated Jewish thinkers among modern scholars He has been adopted as a symbol and an intellectual hero by almost all major movements in modern Judaism and has proven important to philosophers such as Leo Strauss and his views on the importance of humility have been taken up by modern humanist philosophers In academia particularly within the area of Jewish Studies the teaching of Maimonides has been dominated by traditional scholars generally Orthodox who place a very strong emphasis on Maimonides as a rationalist one result is that certain sides of Maimonides s thought including his opposition to anthropocentrism have been obviated citation needed There are movements in some postmodern circles to claim Maimonides for other purposes as within the discourse of ecotheology 97 Maimonides s reconciliation of the philosophical and the traditional has given his legacy an extremely diverse and dynamic quality Tributes and memorials Edit Plaque of Maimonides at Rambam Medical Center Haifa Maimonides has been memorialized in numerous ways For example one of the Learning Communities at the Tufts University School of Medicine bears his name There is also Maimonides School in Brookline Massachusetts Maimonides Academy School in Los Angeles California Lycee Maimonide in Casablanca the Brauser Maimonides Academy in Hollywood Florida 98 and Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn New York Beit Harambam Congregation a Sephardi synagogue in Philadelphia Pennsylvania is named after him 99 Issued from 8 May 1986 to 1995 100 the Series A of the Israeli New Shekel featured an illustration of Maimonides on the obverse and the place of his burial in Tiberias on the reverse on its 1 shekel bill 101 In 2004 conferences were held at Yale Florida International University Penn State and the Rambam Hospital in Haifa Israel which is named after him To commemorate the 800th anniversary of his death Harvard University issued a memorial volume 102 In 1953 the Israel Postal Authority issued a postage stamp of Maimonides pictured In March 2008 during the Euromed Conference of Ministers of Tourism The Tourism Ministries of Israel Morocco and Spain agreed to work together on a joint project that will trace the footsteps of the Rambam and thus boost religious tourism in the cities of Cordoba Fes and Tiberias 103 Between December 2018 and January 2019 the Israel Museum held a special exhibit dedicated to the writings of Maimonides 104 Works and bibliography EditJudaic and philosophical works Edit An autograph fragment of Maimonides Guide for the Perplexed Judeo Arabic Autograph manuscript of Maimonides Commentary to Nezikin and Kodashim written in Judeo Arabic solitreo Maimonides composed works of Jewish scholarship rabbinic law philosophy and medical texts Most of Maimonides s works were written in Judeo Arabic However the Mishneh Torah was written in Hebrew His Jewish texts were Commentary on the Mishna Arabic Kitab al Siraj translated into Hebrew as Pirush Hamishnayot written in Classical Arabic using the Hebrew alphabet This was the first full commentary ever written on the entire Mishnah which took Maimonides seven years to complete and it enjoyed great popularity both in its Arabic original and its medieval Hebrew translation The commentary includes three philosophical introductions which were also highly influential The Introduction to the Mishnah deals with the nature of the oral law the distinction between the prophet and the sage and the organizational structure of the Mishnah The Introduction to Mishnah Sanhedrin chapter ten Pereḳ Ḥeleḳ is an eschatological essay that concludes with Maimonides s famous creed the thirteen principles of faith The Introduction to Tractate Avot popularly called The Eight Chapters is an ethical treatise Sefer Hamitzvot The Book of Commandments In this work Maimonides lists all the 613 mitzvot traditionally contained in the Torah Pentateuch He describes fourteen shorashim roots or principles to guide his selection Sefer Ha shamad Letter of Martydom Mishneh Torah a comprehensive code of Jewish law It is also known as Yad ha Chazaka or simply Yad יד which has the numerical value 14 representing the 14 books of the work The Guide for the Perplexed a philosophical work harmonising and differentiating Aristotle s philosophy and Jewish theology Written in Judeo Arabic and completed between 1186 and 1190 105 better source needed The first translation of this work into Hebrew was done by Samuel ibn Tibbon in 1204 52 Teshuvot collected correspondence and responsa including a number of public letters on resurrection and the afterlife on conversion to other faiths and Iggereth Teiman addressed to the oppressed Jewry of Yemen Hilkhot ha Yerushalmi a fragment of a commentary on the Jerusalem Talmud identified and published by Saul Lieberman in 1947 Medical works Edit Maimonides achievements in the medical field are well known and are cited by many medieval authors One of his more important medical works is his Guide to Good Health Regimen Sanitis which he composed in Arabic for the Sultan al Afdal son of Saladin who suffered from depression 106 The work was translated into Latin and published in Florence in 1477 becoming the first medical book to appear in print there 107 While his prescriptions may have become obsolete his ideas about preventive medicine public hygiene approach to the suffering patient and the preservation of the health of the soul have not become obsolete 108 Maimonides wrote ten known medical works in Arabic that have been translated by the Jewish medical ethicist Fred Rosner into contemporary English 33 109 Lectures conferences and research on Maimonides even recently in the 21st century have been done at medical universities in Morocco Regimen Sanitatis Suessmann Muntner ed Mossad Harav Kook Jerusalem 1963 translated into Hebrew by Moshe Ibn Tibbon OCLC 729184001 The Art of Cure Extracts from Galen Barzel 1992 Vol 5 110 is essentially an extract of Galen s extensive writings Commentary on the Aphorisms of Hippocrates Rosner 1987 Vol 2 Hebrew 111 פירוש לפרקי אבוקראט is interspersed with his own views Medical Aphorisms 112 of Moses Rosner 1989 Vol 3 titled Fusul Musa in Arabic Chapters of Moses Hebrew 113 פרקי משה contains 1500 aphorisms and many medical conditions are described Treatise on Hemorrhoids in Rosner 1984 Vol 1 Hebrew 114 ברפואת הטחורים discusses also digestion and food Treatise on Cohabitation in Rosner 1984 Vol 1 contains recipes as aphrodisiacs and anti aphrodisiacs Treatise on Asthma Rosner 1994 Vol 6 115 discusses climates and diets and their effect on asthma and emphasizes the need for clean air Treatise on Poisons and Their Antidotes in Rosner 1984 Vol 1 is an early toxicology textbook that remained popular for centuries Regimen of Health in Rosner 1990 Vol 4 Hebrew 116 הנהגת הבריאות is a discourse on healthy living and the mind body connection Discourse on the Explanation of Fits advocates healthy living and the avoidance of overabundance Glossary of Drug Names Rosner 1992 Vol 7 117 represents a pharmacopeia with 405 paragraphs with the names of drugs in Arabic Greek Syrian Persian Berber and Spanish Treatise on logic Edit The Treatise on Logic Arabic Maqala Fi Sinat Al Mantiq has been printed 17 times including editions in Latin 1527 German 1805 1822 1833 1828 French 1936 by Moise Ventura and in 1996 by Remi Brague and English 1938 by Israel Efros and in an abridged Hebrew form The work illustrates the essentials of Aristotelian logic to be found in the teachings of the great Islamic philosophers such as Avicenna and above all Al Farabi the Second Master the First Master being Aristotle In his work devoted to the Treatise Remi Brague stresses the fact that Al Farabi is the only philosopher mentioned therein This indicates a line of conduct for the reader who must read the text keeping in mind Al Farabi s works on logic In the Hebrew versions the Treatise is called The words of Logic which describes the bulk of the work The author explains the technical meaning of the words used by logicians The Treatise duly inventories the terms used by the logician and indicates what they refer to The work proceeds rationally through a lexicon of philosophical terms to a summary of higher philosophical topics in 14 chapters corresponding to Maimonides s birthdate of 14 Nissan The number 14 recurs in many of Maimonides s works Each chapter offers a cluster of associated notions The meaning of the words is explained and illustrated with examples At the end of each chapter the author carefully draws up the list of words studied Until very recently it was accepted that Maimonides wrote the Treatise on Logic in his twenties or even in his teen years 118 Herbert Davidson has raised questions about Maimonides s authorship of this short work and of other short works traditionally attributed to Maimonides He maintains that Maimonides was not the author at all based on a report of two Arabic language manuscripts unavailable to Western investigators in Asia Minor 119 Rabbi Yosef Kafih maintained that it is by Maimonides and newly translated it to Hebrew as Beiur M lekhet HaHiggayon from the Judeo Arabic 120 Burial place EditHe is buried in HaRambam compound complex in Tiberias Tveria Other notable rabbis also buried in HaRambam compound complex Shelah HaKadosh Eliezer ben Hurcanus Yohanan ben Zakkai Joshua ben HananiahSee also EditAverroes Iggeret Teman Epistle to Yemen Maimonides Foundation MimounaNotes Edit Hebrew מ ש ה ב ן מ י מו ן romanized Mōse ben Maymōn Arabic موسى بن ميمون romanized Musa bin Maymun Greek Mwyshs Maimwnidhs translit Mōusḗs Maimōnides Latin Moses Maimonides ˌ r ɑː m ˈ b ɑː m for Rabbeinu Mōse ben Maimōn Our Rabbi Moses son of Maimon The date of 1138 of the Common Era is the date of birth given by Maimonides himself in the very last chapter and comment made by Maimonides in his Commentary of the Mishnah 7 and where he writes I began to write this composition when I was twenty three years old and I completed it in Egypt while I was aged thirty which year is the 1 479th year of the Seleucid era 1168 CE a b He usually left off the Spaniard and he sometimes added זצ ל short for let mention of the righteous one bring a blessing At the end of his commentary to the Mishna he gives a fuller lineage אני משה ברבי מימון הדיין ברבי יוסף החכם ברבי יצחק הדיין ברבי יוסף הדיין ברבי עובדיהו הדיין ברבי שלמה הרב ברבי עובדיהו הדיין זכר קדושים לברכה I am Moshe son of Rabbi Maimon the Judge son of Rabbi Joseph the Wise son of Rabbi Isaac the Judge son of Rabbi Joseph the Judge son of Rabbi Obadiah the Judge son of Rabbi Solomon the Teacher son of Rabbi Obadiah the Judge let mention of the holy ones bring a blessing Seder HaDoros year 4927 quotes Maimonides as saying that he began writing his commentary on the Mishna when he was 23 years old and published it when he was 30 Because of the dispute about the date of Maimonides s birth it is not clear which year the work was published The India Trade a term devised by the Arabist S D Goitein was a highly lucrative business venture in which Jewish merchants from Egypt the Mediterranean and the Middle East imported and exported goods ranging from pepper to brass from various ports along the Malabar Coast between the 11th 13th centuries For more info see the India Traders chapter in Goitein Letters of Medieval Jewish Traders 1973 or Goitein India Traders of the Middle Ages 2008 Such views of his works are found in almost all scholarly studies of the man and his significance See for example the Introduction sub chapter by Howard Kreisel to his overview article Moses Maimonides in History of Jewish Philosophy edited by Daniel H Frank and Oliver Leaman Second Edition New York and London Routledge 2003 pp 245 246 According to Maimonides certain Jews in Yemen had sent to him a letter in the year 1189 evidently irritated as to why he had not mentioned the physical resurrection of the dead in his Hil Teshuvah chapter 8 and how that some persons in Yemen had begun to instruct based on Maimonides s teaching that when the body dies it will disintegrate and the soul will never return to such bodies after death Maimonides denied that he ever insinuated such things and reiterated that the body would indeed resurrect but that the world to come was something different in nature See Maimonides s Ma amar Teḥayyath Hamethim Treatise on the Resurrection of the Dead published in Book of Letters and Responsa ספר אגרות ותשובות Jerusalem 1978 p 9 Hebrew This view is not always consistent throughout Maimonidee work in Hilchot Yesodei HaTorah chapters 2 4 Maimonides describes angels that are actually created beings Within the Torah there is also another part which is called hidden mutsnaʿ and this concerns the secrets sodot which the human intellect cannot attain like the meanings of the statutes ḥukim and other hidden secrets They can neither be attained through the intellect nor through sheer volition but they are revealed before Him who created the Torah Rabbi Abraham ben Asher The Or ha Sekhel Contemporary academic views in the study of Jewish mysticism hold that 12 13th century Kabbalists wrote down and systemised their transmitted oral doctrines in oppositional response to Maimonidean rationalism See e g Moshe Idel Kabbalah New Perspectives The first comprehensive systemiser of Kabbalah Moses ben Jacob Cordovero for example was influenced by Maimonides One example is his instruction to undercut any conception of a Kabbalistic idea after grasping it in the mind One s intellect runs to God in learning the idea then returns in qualified rejection of false spatial temporal conceptions of the idea s truth as the human mind can only think in material references Cited in Louis Jacobs The Jewish Religion A Companion Oxford University Press 1995 entry on Cordovero References Edit Moses Maimonides Biography Philosophy amp Teachings Encyclopedia Britannica Archived from the original on 20 December 2016 Retrieved 8 December 2016 Hebrew Date Converter 14th of Nisan 4895 Hebcal Jewish Calendar www hebcal com Archived from the original on 7 March 2021 Retrieved 31 March 2021 Hebrew Date Converter 14th of Nisan 4898 Hebcal Jewish Calendar www hebcal com Archived from the original on 7 March 2021 Retrieved 31 March 2021 H Net Archived from the original on 9 October 2007 Retrieved 6 May 2007 The Influence of Islamic Thought on Maimonides Maimonides Islamic Influences Plato Stanford 2016 Archived from the original on 9 December 2014 Retrieved 6 May 2007 Isaac Newton Judaic monotheist of the school of Maimonides Achgut com 19 June 2007 Archived from the original on 28 April 2015 Retrieved 13 March 2010 Commentary of the Mishnah Maimonides 1967 s v Uktzin 3 12 end Joel E Kramer Moses Maimonides An Intellectual Portrait p 47 note 1 In Kenneth Seeskin ed September 2005 The Cambridge Companion to Maimonides ISBN 9780521525787 1138 in Stroumsa Maimonides in His World Portrait of a Mediterranean Thinker Princeton University Press 2009 p 8 Sherwin B Nuland 2008 Maimonides Random House LLC p 38 Gedaliah ibn Yahya ben Joseph Shalshelet HaKabbalah Archived 13 May 2021 at the Wayback Machine Jerusalem 1962 p ק but in PDF p 109 Hebrew Abraham Zacuto Sefer Yuchasin Archived 6 May 2021 at the Wayback Machine Cracow 1580 Hebrew p 261 in PDF which reads I saw in a booklet that the Ark of God even Rabbi Moses b Maimon of blessed memory had been taken up i e euphemism for had died in the year 4 965 anno mundi 1204 5 CE in Egypt and the Jews wept for him as did all the Egyptians three days and they coined a name for that time of year saying there was wailing and on the seventh day of his passing the news reached Alexandria and on the eighth day the news reached Jerusalem and in Jerusalem they made a great public mourning on his behalf and called for a fast and public gathering where it was that the prayer precentor read out the admonitions If you shall walk in my statutes etc Leviticus 26 3 ff as well as read the concluding verse from the Prophets And it came to pass that Samuel spoke to all of Israel etc and he then concluded by saying that the Ark of God had been taken away Now after certain days they brought up his coffin to the Land of Israel during which journey thieves encountered them causing those who had gone up to flee leaving there the coffin Now the thieves when they saw that they had all fled they desired to have the coffin cast into the sea but were unable with all their strength to uproot the coffin from the ground even though they had been more than thirty men and when they considered the matter they then said to themselves that he was a godly and holy man and so they went their way However they gave assurances to the Jews that they would escort them to their destination and so it was that they also accompanied him and he was buried in Tiberias Marder Michael 11 November 2014 The Philosopher s Plant An Intellectual Herbarium New York Columbia University Press p 97 ISBN 978 0 231 53813 8 Archived from the original on 17 July 2021 Retrieved 20 September 2020 Early Years www chabad org Archived from the original on 16 July 2020 Retrieved 21 May 2020 Maimonides Ancestors Archived from the original on 25 December 2021 Retrieved 21 May 2020 Iggerot HaRambam Iggeret Teiman www sefaria org Archived from the original on 23 April 2021 Retrieved 31 March 2021 Stroumsa Maimonides in His World Portrait of a Mediterranean Thinker Princeton University Press 2009 p 65 Abraham Heschel Maimonides New York Farrar Straus 1982 Chapter 15 Meditation on God pp 157 162 a b 1954 Encyclopedia Americana vol 18 p 140 Y K Stillman ed 1984 Libas Encyclopaedia of Islam Vol 5 2nd ed Brill Academic Publishers p 744 ISBN 978 90 04 09419 2 Stroumsa 2009 Maimonides in His World p 59 A K Bennison M A Gallego Garcia 2008 Jewish Trading in Fez on the Eve of the Almohad Conquest PDF MEAH 57 33 51 Archived from the original PDF on 22 November 2011 See for example Solomon Zeitlin MAIMONIDES The American Jewish Year Book Vol 37 pp 65 66 Archived 25 December 2021 at the Wayback Machine Davidson p 29 a b Goitein S D Letters of Medieval Jewish Traders Princeton University Press 1973 ISBN 0 691 05212 3 p 208 Magazine rambam temple mount Jewish No Jew had been permitted to enter the holy city which has become a Christian bastion since the Crusaders conquered it in 1096 www jewishmag com Archived from the original on 3 November 2018 Retrieved 9 February 2018 Cohen Mark R Poverty and Charity in the Jewish Community of Medieval Egypt Princeton University Press 2005 ISBN 0 691 09272 9 pp 115 116 Goitein Letters of Medieval Jewish Traders p 207 Cohen Poverty and Charity in the Jewish Community of Medieval Egypt p 115 Baron Salo Wittmayer 1952 A Social and Religious History of the Jews High Middle Ages 500 1200 Columbia University Press p 215 ISBN 978 0 231 08843 5 Archived from the original on 25 December 2021 Retrieved 16 November 2020 Rustow Marina 1 October 2010 Sar Shalom ben Moses ha Levi Encyclopedia of Jews in the Islamic World Archived from the original on 18 June 2020 Retrieved 17 June 2020 a b c Julia Bess Frank 1981 Moses Maimonides rabbi or medicine The Yale Journal of Biology and Medicine 54 1 79 88 PMC 2595894 PMID 7018097 a b c Fred Rosner 2002 The Life of Moses Maimonides a Prominent Medieval Physician PDF Einstein Quart J Biol Med 19 3 125 128 Archived from the original PDF on 5 March 2009 Retrieved 14 January 2009 Gesundheit B Or R Gamliel C Rosner F Steinberg A April 2008 Treatment of depression by Maimonides 1138 1204 Rabbi Physician and Philosopher PDF Am J Psychiatry 165 4 425 428 doi 10 1176 appi ajp 2007 07101575 PMID 18381913 Archived from the original PDF on 5 March 2009 Abraham Heschel Maimonides New York Farrar Straus 1982 Chapter 15 Meditation on God pp 157 162 and also pp 178 180 184 185 204 etc Isadore Twersky editor A Maimonides Reader New York Behrman House 1972 commences his Introduction with the following remarks p 1 Maimonides s biography immediately suggests a profound paradox A philosopher by temperament and ideology a zealous devotee of the contemplative life who eloquently portrayed and yearned for the serenity of solitude and the spiritual exuberance of meditation he nevertheless led a relentlessly active life that regularly brought him to the brink of exhaustion Responsa Pe er HaDor 143 Karo Joseph 2002 David Avitan ed Questions amp Responsa Avqat Rokhel in Hebrew Jerusalem Siyach Yisrael p 139 responsum 32 first printed in Saloniki 1791 Click to see full English translation of Maimonides s Epistle to Yemen The comment on the effect of his incessant travail on his health is by Salo Baron Moses Maimonides in Great Jewish Personalities in Ancient and Medieval Time edited by Simon Noveck B nai B rith Department of Adult Jewish Education 1959 p 227 where Baron also quotes from Maimonides s letter to Ibn Tibbon regarding his daily regime Maimonides he chabad org in Hebrew Archived from the original on 1 August 2021 Retrieved 2 August 2021 אגרות הרמב ם מהדורת שילת Sarah E Karesh Mitchell M Hurvitz 2005 Encyclopedia of Judaism Facts on File p 305 ISBN 978 0 8160 5457 2 Archived from the original on 25 December 2021 Retrieved 20 September 2020 H J Zimmels 1997 Ashkenazim and Sephardim Their Relations Differences and Problems as Reflected in the Rabbinical Responsa Revised ed Ktav Publishing House p 283 ISBN 978 0 88125 491 4 Archived from the original on 25 December 2021 Retrieved 20 September 2020 Siegelbaum Chana Bracha 2010 Women at the crossroads a woman s perspective on the weekly Torah portion Archived 12 September 2015 at the Wayback Machine Gush Etzion Midreshet B erot Bat Ayin ISBN 9781936068098 page 199 Last section of Maimonides s Introduction to Mishneh Torah אבקת רוכל קרו יוסף בן אפרים 1488 1575 page 70 of 417 hebrewbooks org in Hebrew Archived from the original on 6 May 2021 Retrieved 31 March 2021 Moses Maimonides The Commandments Neg Comm 290 at 269 71 Charles B Chavel trans 1967 Leslie Donald The Survival of the Chinese Jews The Jewish Community of Kaifeng Tʻoung pao 10 Leiden Brill 1972 p 157 Pollak Michael Mandarins Jews and Missionaries The Jewish Experience in the Chinese Empire The Jewish Publication Society of America 1980 p 413 Pollak Mandarins Jews and Missionaries pp 297 298 Hebrew Source of Maimonides s Levels of Giving with Danny Siegel s translation PDF Archived PDF from the original on 26 October 2012 Retrieved 19 September 2012 a b The Guide to the Perplexed World Digital Library Archived from the original on 23 July 2013 Retrieved 22 January 2013 Unbreakable How the Middle East is Tied to Western Gaming London Al Bawaba 23 December 2020 Retrieved 14 November 2022 Jonathan Klawans Purity Sacrifice and the Temple Symbolism and Supersessionism in the Study of Ancient Judaism Oxford University Press 2009 ISBN 978 0 195 39584 6 p 8 Dogma in Medieval Jewish Thought Menachem Kellner See for example Marc B Shapiro The Limits of Orthodox Theology Maimonides Thirteen Principles Reappraised Littman Library of Jewish Civilization 2011 pp 1 14 Siddur Edot HaMizrach 2C Additions for Shacharit Thirteen Principles of Faith www sefaria org Archived from the original on 28 November 2020 Retrieved 27 September 2020 Landau Rabbi Reuven 1884 Sefer Degel Mahaneh Reuven in Hebrew Chernovitsi OCLC 233297464 Archived from the original on 5 August 2021 Retrieved 27 September 2020 Brown Jeremy 2008 Rabbi Reuven Landau and the Jewish Reaction to Copernican Thought in Nineteenth Century Europe The Torah U Madda Journal Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary an affiliate of Yeshiva University 15 2008 112 142 JSTOR 40914730 Archived from the original on 2 November 2020 Retrieved 27 September 2020 Shapiro Marc B 1993 Maimonides Thirteen Principles The Last Word in Jewish Theology The Torah U Madda Journal Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary an affiliate of Yeshiva University 4 1993 187 242 JSTOR 40914883 Archived from the original on 4 October 2020 Retrieved 27 September 2020 Levy David B Book Review New Heavens and a New Earth The Jewish Reception of Copernican Thought www touroscholar touro edu Journal of Jewish Identities 8 1 2015 218 220 Archived from the original on 11 July 2020 Retrieved 27 September 2020 Brown Jeremy 2013 New Heavens and a New Earth The Jewish Reception of Copernican Thought Oxford University Press doi 10 1093 acprof oso 9780199754793 001 0001 ISBN 9780199754793 Kraemer 326 8 Kraemer 66 a b Robinson George Maimonides Conception of God Archived 1 May 2018 at the Wayback Machine My Jewish Learning 30 April 2018 Reuven Chaim Klein Weaning Away from Idolatry Maimonides on the Purpose of Ritual Sacrifices Archived 2021 10 29 at the Wayback Machine Religions 12 5 363 Telushkin 29 Commentary on The Ethics of the Fathers 1 15 Qtd in Telushkin 115 Kraemer 332 4 MT De ot 6 1 Moses Maimonides 2007 The Guide to the Perplexed BN Publishers Joseph Jacobs Moses Ben Maimon Jewish Encyclopedia Archived from the original on 23 May 2011 Retrieved 13 March 2011 Shlomo Pines 2006 Maimonides 1135 1204 Encyclopedia of Philosophy 5 647 654 Isadore Twersky 2005 Maimonides Moses Encyclopedia of Religion 8 5613 5618 Joel E Kramer Moses Maimonides An Intellectual Portrait p 45 In Kenneth Seeskin ed September 2005 The Cambridge Companion to Maimonides ISBN 9780521525787 Rudavsky T March 2010 Maimonidies Singapore Wiley Blackwell p 10 ISBN 978 1 4051 4898 6 Guide for the Perplexed on Sacred texts com Archived from the original on 14 April 2010 Retrieved 13 March 2010 Kraemer 422 Commentary on the Mishna Avot 5 6 Mishneh Torah Repentance 9 1 www sefaria org Archived from the original on 1 August 2021 Retrieved 2 August 2021 Such as the first religious criticism of Kabbalah Ari Nohem by Leon Modena from 1639 In it Modena urges a return to Maimonidean Aristotelianism The Scandal of Kabbalah Leon Modena Jewish Mysticism Early Modern Venice Yaacob Dweck Princeton University Press 2011 Menachem Kellner Maimonides Confrontation With Mysticism Littman Library 2006 Maimonides Philosopher and Mystic Archived 13 September 2018 at the Wayback Machine from Chabad org Norman Lamm The Religious Thought of Hasidism Text and Commentary Ktav Pub 1999 Introduction to chapter on Faith Reason has historical overview of religious reasons for opposition to Jewish philosophy including the Ontological reason one Medieval Kabbalist holding that we begin where they end Oath and Prayer of Maimonides Library dal ca Archived from the original on 29 June 2008 Retrieved 13 March 2010 Friedlander Michael January 1956 Guide for the Perplexed Dover Publications ISBN 9780486203515 Archived from the original on 20 October 2019 Retrieved 11 March 2020 Maimonides Moses 15 December 1974 The guide of the perplexed Pines Shlomo 1908 1990 Strauss Leo Bollingen Foundation Collection Library of Congress Chicago ISBN 0226502309 OCLC 309924 Isidore Twersky Introduction to the Code of Maimonides Mishneh Torah Yale Judaica Series vol XII New Haven and London Yale University Press 1980 passim and especially Chapter VII Epilogue pp 515 538 Reif Stefan C 1994 Review of Sobre la Vida y Obra de Maimonides ed Jesus Pelaez del Rosal Journal of Semitic Studies 39 1 124 doi 10 1093 jss XXXIX 1 123 This is covered in all histories of the Jews E g including such a brief overview as Cecil Roth A History of the Jews Revised Edition New York Schocken 1970 pp 175 179 D J Silver Maimonidean Criticism and the Maimonidean Controversy 1180 1240 Leiden Brill 1965 is still the most detailed account David Hartman Maimonides Torah and Philosophic Quest Philadelphia Jewish Publication Society of America 1976 p 98 On the extensive philosophical aspects of Maimonides s halakhic works see in particular Isidore Twersky s Introduction to the Code of Maimonides Mishneh Torah Yale Judaica Series vol XII New Haven and London Yale University Press 1980 Twersky devotes a major portion of this authoritative study to the philosophical aspects of the Mishneh Torah itself The Maimunist or Maimonidean controversy is covered in all histories of Jewish philosophy and general histories of the Jews For an overview with bibliographic references see Idit Dobbs Weinstein The Maimonidean Controversy in History of Jewish Philosophy Second Edition edited by Daniel H Frank and Oliver Leaman London and New York Routledge 2003 pp 331 349 Also see Colette Sirat A History of Jewish Philosophy in the Middle Ages Cambridge Cambridge University Press 1985 pp 205 272 Mercedes Rubio 2006 Aquinas and Maimonides on the Divine Names Aquinas and Maimonides on the possibility of the knowledge of god Springer Verlag pp 11 65 126 211 218 doi 10 1007 1 4020 4747 9 2 ISBN 978 1 4020 4720 6 Vivian McAlister Maimonides s cooling period and organ retrieval Canadian Journal of Surgery 2004 47 8 9 NeoHasid org Rambam and Gaia neohasid org Archived from the original on 8 December 2013 Retrieved 11 December 2013 David Morris Major Grant Awarded to Maimonides Florida Jewish Journal Archived from the original on 30 July 2007 Retrieved 13 March 2010 Eisner Jane 1 June 2000 Fear meets fellowship The Philadelphia Inquirer p 25 Archived from the original on 23 November 2020 Retrieved 29 August 2020 via Newspapers com 1 Israeli New Shekel Rabbi Moses Maimonides exchange yours Linzmayer Owen 2012 Israel The Banknote Book San Francisco CA www BanknoteNews com Archived from the original on 29 August 2012 Retrieved 25 December 2021 Harvard University Press Maimonides after 800 Years Essays on Maimonides and his Influence by Jay M Harris Hup harvard edu Archived from the original on 19 May 2009 Retrieved 13 March 2010 Shelly Paz 8 May 2008 Tourism Ministry plans joint project with Morocco Spain The Jerusalem Post The Israel Museum Jerusalem www imj org il 2 October 2018 Archived from the original on 20 May 2019 Retrieved 11 July 2019 Kehot Publication Society Chabad org Maimonides 1963 Introduction p XIV Maimonides 1963 Preface p VI Maimonides 1963 Preface p VII Volume 5 translated by Barzel foreword by Rosner Title page TOC כתבים רפואיים ג פירוש לפרקי אבוקראט משה בן מימון רמב ם ת ש תש ב אוצר החכמה Archived from the original on 21 June 2016 Retrieved 19 July 2016 Maimonides Medical Aphorisms Treatises 1 5 6 9 10 15 16 21 22 25 Brigham Young University Provo Utah כתבים רפואיים ב פרקי משה ברפואה משה בן מימון רמב ם ת ש תש ב אוצר החכמה Archived from the original on 21 June 2016 Retrieved 19 July 2016 כתבים רפואיים ד ברפואת הטחורים משה בן מימון רמב ם ת ש תש ב אוצר החכמה Archived from the original on 21 June 2016 Retrieved 19 July 2016 Title page TOC כתבים רפואיים א הנהגת הבריאות משה בן מימון רמב ם ת ש תש ב אוצר החכמה Archived from the original on 29 June 2016 Retrieved 19 July 2016 Title page TOC Abraham Heschel Maimonides New York Farrar Straus 1982 p 22 at sixteen Davidson pp 313 ff באור מלאכת ההגיון משה בן מימון רמב ם תשנ ז אוצר החכמה Archived from the original on 21 June 2016 Retrieved 19 July 2016 Bibliography Edit This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain Joseph Jacobs Isaac Broyde 1901 1906 Moses Ben Maimon In Singer Isidore et al eds The Jewish Encyclopedia The Executive Committee of the Editorial Board and Jacob Zallel Lauterbach New York Funk amp Wagnalls Barzel Uriel 1992 Maimonides s Medical Writings The Art of Cure Extracts Vol 5 Galen Maimonides Research Institute Archived from the original on 17 June 2016 Retrieved 14 November 2015 Bos Gerrit 2002 Maimonides On Asthma vol 1 vol 2 Provo Utah Brigham Young University Press Bos Gerrit 2007 Maimonides Medical Aphorisms Treatise 1 5 6 9 10 15 16 21 22 25 Provo Utah Brigham Young University Press Davidson Herbert A 2005 Moses Maimonides The Man and his Works Oxford University Press Feldman Rabbi Yaakov 2008 Shemonah Perakim The Eight Chapters of the Rambam Targum Press Fox Marvin 1990 Interpreting Maimonides Univ of Chicago Press Guttman Julius 1964 David Silverman ed Philosophies of Judaism Philadelphia Jewish Publication Society of America Halbertal Moshe 2013 Maimonides Life and Thought Princeton University Press ISBN 9780691158518 Archived from the original on 5 September 2015 Retrieved 23 June 2015 Hart Green Kenneth 2013 Leo Strauss on Maimonides The Complete Writings Chicago University of Chicago Press Hartman David 1976 Maimonides Torah and Philosophic Quest Philadelphia Jewish Publication Society of America ISBN 9780827600836 Heschel Abraham Joshua 1982 Maimonides The Life and Times of a Medieval Jewish Thinker New York Farrar Straus Husik Isaac 2002 1941 A History of Jewish Philosophy Dover Publications Inc Originally published by the Jewish Publication of America Philadelphia Kaplan Aryeh 1994 Maimonides Principles The Fundamentals of Jewish Faith The Aryeh Kaplan Anthology I Kellner Menachem 1986 Dogma in Medieval Jewish Thought London Oxford University press ISBN 978 0 19 710044 8 Kohler George Y 2012 Reading Maimonides s Philosophy in 19th Century Germany Amsterdam Studies in Jewish Philosophy 15 Kraemer Joel L 2008 Maimonides The Life and World of One of Civilization s Greatest Minds Doubleday Leaman Daniel H Leaman Frank Leaman Oliver 2003 History of Jewish Philosophy Second ed London and New York Routledge See especially chapters 10 through 15 Maimonides 1963 Suessmann Muntner ed Moshe Ben Maimon Maimonides Medical Works in Hebrew Translated by Moshe Ibn Tibbon Jerusalem Mossad Harav Kook OCLC 729184001 Maimonides 1967 Mishnah with Maimonides Commentary in Hebrew Vol 3 Translated by Yosef Qafih Jerusalem Mossad Harav Kook OCLC 741081810 Rosner Fred 1984 1994 Maimonides s Medical Writings Vol 7 Vols Maimonides Research Institute Volume 5 translated by Uriel Barzel foreword by Fred Rosner Seidenberg David 2005 Maimonides His Thought Related to Ecology The Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature Archived from the original on 8 December 2013 Retrieved 11 December 2013 Shapiro Marc B 1993 Maimonides Thirteen Principles The Last Word in Jewish Theology The Torah U Maddah Journal 4 Shapiro Marc B 2008 Studies in Maimonides and His Interpreters Scranton PA University of Scranton Press Sirat Colette 1985 A History of Jewish Philosophy in the Middle Ages Cambridge Cambridge University Press See chapters 5 through 8 Strauss Leo 1974 Shlomo Pines ed How to Begin to Study the Guide The Guide of the Perplexed Maimonides in Arabic Vol 1 University of Chicago Press Strauss Leo 1988 Persecution and the Art of Writing University of Chicago Press ISBN 9780226777115 reprint Stroumsa Sarah 2009 Maimonides in His World Portrait of a Mediterranean Thinker Princeton University Press ISBN 978 0 691 13763 6 Archived from the original on 3 June 2016 Retrieved 19 January 2011 Telushkin Joseph 2006 A Code of Jewish Ethics Vol 1 You Shall Be Holy New York Bell Tower OCLC 460444264 Twersky Isadore 1972 I Twersky ed A Maimonides Reader New York Behrman House Twersky Isador 1980 Introduction to the Code of Maimonides Mishneh Torah Yale Judaica Series New Haven and London XII Further reading EditMaimonides Abu ʿImran Musa Moses ibn ʿUbayd Allah Maymun al Qurṭubi www islamsci mcgill ca Archived 27 August 2011 at the Wayback Machine History of Medicine AIME Archived from the original on 24 May 2013 S R Simon 1999 Moses Maimonides medieval physician and scholar Arch Intern Med 159 16 1841 5 doi 10 1001 archinte 159 16 1841 PMID 10493314 Athar Yawar Email Address 2008 Maimonides s medicine The Lancet 371 9615 804 doi 10 1016 S0140 6736 08 60365 7 S2CID 54415482 Moses Maimonides biography Jewish philosopher scholar and physician Archived from the original on 30 April 2015 Retrieved 4 June 2015 External links EditThis article s use of external links may not follow Wikipedia s policies or guidelines Please improve this article by removing excessive or inappropriate external links and converting useful links where appropriate into footnote references April 2022 Learn how and when to remove this template message Wikimedia Commons has media related to Moshe ben Maimon Wikiquote has quotations related to Maimonides Wikisource has original works by or about Moshe ben Maimon About MaimonidesMaimonides entry in the Jewish Encyclopedia 1906 Maimonides entry in the Encyclopaedia Britannica Maimonides entry in the Encyclopaedia Judaica 2nd edition 2007 Seeskin Kenneth Maimonides In Zalta Edward N ed Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy Maimonides entry in the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy Video lecture on Maimonides by Dr Henry Abramson Maimonides a biography book by David Yellin and Israel Abrahams Maimonides as a Philosopher The Influence of Islamic Thought on Maimonides The Moses of Cairo Article from Policy Review Rambam and the Earth Maimonides as a Proto Ecological Thinker reprint on neohasid org from The Encyclopedia of Religion and Ecology Anti Maimonidean Demons Archived 20 July 2008 at the Wayback Machine by Jose Faur describing the controversy surrounding Maimonides s works David Yellin and Israel Abrahams Maimonides 1903 full text of a biography Y Tzvi Langermann 2007 Maimonides Abu ʿImran Musa Moses ibn ʿUbayd Allah Maymun al Qurṭubi In Thomas Hockey et al eds The Biographical Encyclopedia of Astronomers New York Springer pp 726 7 ISBN 978 0 387 31022 0 PDF version Maimonides at intellectualencounters org Kriesel Howard 2015 Judaism as Philosophy Studies in Maimonides and the Medieval Jewish Philosophers of Provence Boston Academic Studies Press doi 10 2307 j ctt21h4xpc ISBN 9781618117892 JSTOR j ctt21h4xpc Friedberg Albert 2013 Crafting the 613 Commandments Maimonides on the Enumeration Classification and Formulation of the Scriptural Commandments Boston Academic Studies Press doi 10 2307 j ctt21h4wf8 ISBN 9781618118486 JSTOR j ctt21h4wf8 The Guide An Explanatory Commentary on Each Chapter of Maimonides Guide of The Perplexed by Scott Michael Alexander covers all of Book I currently Maimonides s worksComplete Mishneh Torah online halakhic work of Maimonides Sefer Hamitzvot English translation Oral Readings of Mishne Torah Archived 13 October 2007 at the Wayback Machine Free listening and Download site also had classes in Maimonides s Iggereth Teiman Maimonides 13 Principles Archived 31 October 2016 at the Wayback Machine Intellectual Encounters Main Thinkers Moses Maimonides in intellectualencounters org Maimonides Mishneh Torah Autograph Draft Archived 29 January 2013 at the Wayback Machine Egypt c 1180 British Library Autograph responsum of Moses Maimonides pre eminent Jewish polymath and spiritual leader Ilana Tahan Digitized works by Maimonides at the Leo Baeck InstituteTexts by MaimonidesSiddur Mesorath Moshe a prayerbook based on the early Jewish liturgy as found in Maimonides s Mishne Tora Rambam s introduction to the Mishneh Torah English translation Rambam s introduction to the Commentary on the Mishnah Hebrew language Hebrew Fulltext The Guide For the Perplexed by Moses Maimonides translated into English by Michael Friedlander Writings of Maimonides manuscripts and early print editions Jewish National and University Library Facsimile edition of Moreh Nevukhim The Guide for the Perplexed illuminated Hebrew manuscript Barcelona 1347 48 The Royal Library Copenhagen Archived 11 August 2021 at the Wayback Machine University of Cambridge Library collection Archived 29 January 2010 at the Wayback Machine of Judeo Arabic letters and manuscripts written by or to Maimonides It includes the last letter his brother David sent him before drowning at sea A Ashur A newly discovered medical recipe written by Maimonides Archived 3 November 2018 at the Wayback Machine M A Friedman and A Ashur A newly discovered autograph responsum of Maimonides Archived 1 November 2018 at the Wayback Machine Works by Maimonides at Post Reformation Digital Library Works by Maimonides at LibriVox public domain audiobooks Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Maimonides amp oldid 1136598690, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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