Maimonides: Torah and Philosophic Quest (review)

86 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY David Hartman. Maimonides: Torah and Philosophic Quest. Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1976. Pp. xv + 296. $7.95. Medievals and moderns have fiercely debated Maimonides' ultimate allegiance. Some have argued that he was a citizen of Athens whose famed rabbinic writings are noble lies; others, that he was a citizen of Jerusalem whose famed philosophical writings are theological apologetics ; still others, that he sincereIy tried (successfully or not) to be a citizen--or even a patriot --of both cities. Hartman, aligning himself with the last group, claims that Maimonides chose "the way of integration." Moreover, he agrees with scholars such as Arthur Hyman and Isadote Twersky that on the whole Maimonides succeeded in his attempt to integrate philosophy and Judaism. On the other hand, he takes explicit issue with Isaac Husik and Gershom Scholem , according to whom Maimonides tried unsuccessfully to be a citizen of both cities, and with Leo Strauss, according to whom Maimonides was a citizen of Athens alone. It was, Hartman maintains, the talmudic tradition-not the biblical-that made possible Maimonides' integration of philosophy and Judaism (p. 67). He contends that whereas the relationship of man to God described in the Bible is based on reciprocity (man serves God, and God satisfies man's material needs), that prescribed in the Talmud is based on disinterested love (the service of God for its own sake). He then argues that for Maimonides philosophy serves as an instrument to raise the individual to this disinterested love of God prescribed by the Talmud, for philosophy offers "'a God who is sought because of His perfection, and not only because he responds to man's physical helplessness" (p. 76). "To Maimonides," Hartman insists, "the importance of philosophy is that it enables one to become a passionate lover of God," and the passionate love of God is "the goal" of talmudic law (pp. 191-93). All this means that for Maimonides philosophy is not only compatible with talmudic law, but is demanded by it (p. 48). Conversely, Hartman argues that according to Maimonides the talmudic law, with its discipline of the commandments and with its concern for community, legislates "a life-form" (p. 208) that enables one "to live within the human world while aspiring toward a passionate love for God" (p. 196), and indeed aims "to create ideal conditions for the realization of intellectual love of God [Hartman effectively uses this term of Spinoza's in discussing Maimonides]" (p. 104), that is, for the realization of the goal of philosophy. In Hartman's boldest and most provocative formula, the talmudic law according to Maimonides "continuously sets God before the philosopher" (p. 209, cf. pp. 62, 87; cf. Psalms 16:8). Hartman's elucidation of the place of philosophy in Maimonides' rabbinic thought, and of the place of religious law in his philosophy testifies convincingly against Husik's opinion that "the theoretical [Aristotelian] and practical [Jewish] parts of Maimonides' teachings do not hang together satisfactorily" (p. 21), and against Scholem's opinion that Maimonides' "synthesis of the spheres [of philosophy and talmudic law] remains sterile" (p. 142). The main target of Hartman's argumentation, however, is neither Husik nor Scholem, but Strauss. Strauss, who contributed more than any other modern scholar to the understanding of the influence of Plato's political philosophy on Maimonides (as well as on Alfarabi, Averro~s, and other medieval Arabic and Hebrew philosophers), insists that Maimonides' devotion to Judaism was (in Hartman's paraphrase) "based upon practical, political interests which had no relationship to his personal, spiritual quest" (p. 26). Now, Hartman's contention that according to Maimonides the talmudic law aims "to create ideal conditions for the realization of intellectual love of God" presents Judaism as a practical, political means to the philosophic end, and does not contradict Strauss's analysis. But his contention that according to Maimonides the talmudic law "continuously sets GOd before the philosopher" does contradict Strauss's analysis, and it is here that his analysis must be weighed against Strauss's. When Hartman says that according to Maimonides the talmudic law "continuously sets God before the philosopher," he has in mind two things. He has in mind...