Ethics of Maimonides

2. Maimonides: A Radical Platonist

2 Maimonides A Radical Platonist Ethics, not Aristotelian metaphysics, according to Cohen, constitutes the epitome of Maimonides’ thought. Knowledge of God is inextricably linked to the cognition of the Good, which, according to the last chapters of Maimonides’ Guide of the Perplexed, corresponds to the cognition of “lovingkindness, justice, and true judgment.” In this second chapter, Cohen investigates the relationship between ethical (autonomous ) knowledge and religious tradition, between Written and Unwritten Law, reason and revelation. He discusses the question of what kind of response to the “Pauline polemic against the Law” emerges from Maimonides’ ethics. (See 32.) Maimonides: the most genuine representative of Jewish philosophy. Cohen’s reading of traditional Jewish literature, and of Maimonides, in particular, originates in a commitment prior to his understanding of any particular text: Cohen trusts that traditional Jewish texts will lend themselves to a distinctly ethical reading. The philosophical implications of the concepts of purity and holiness demand that ethics be paramount in Judaism. And by “ethics” Cohen does not mean “morality” in its 32. There is no greater testimony to Maimonides as the most vital and most genuine representative of philosophy within Judaism than the fact that his ethics constitutes the core and effective center of his metaphysics . It would be fallacious to assume that by this homage we mean to imply that his metaphysics dissolves into disquisitions of morality , lacking the strict conceptuality of accepted metaphysical terminology; the first two parts of his Guide of the Perplexed clearly refute any such misapprehension. Here, neither the Cohen’s Reading of Maimonides: Urtext for a Contemporary Debate ethics of maimonides 24 manifold manifestations of practical wisdom,1 but rather the formulation of a theoretical maxim aiming at a fundamental critique of social reality. Systematically exploring a correlation between the Platonic idea of the Good and the messianic vision of the prophets,2 Cohen’s reading of Maimonides (and his theory of divine attributes) commits the greatest authority of Jewish rabbinic thought to the cognitive pursuit of ethics. Maimonides’ zeal in knowing God’s actional attributes—represented in lovingkindness, justice, and true judgment—represents to Cohen what is genuinely humane in Judaism. As such, the ethical bent in Maimonides’ thinking becomes imperative for any reading of Jewish literature. The Characteristics of Maimonides ’ Ethics—Urtext of a conspeculative structure of principles nor the astronomical underpinnings of a cosmic edifice of reason is wanting. However, it is the third part of this oeuvre that dispels any doubt about the meaning and purpose of wisdom: it is ethics. Even had he not authored the Eight Chapters, we would still be in possession of his ethical system in his concluding chapters of the Guide; they form the gravitational center of the entire exposition. [Maimonides Eight Chapters 1983b contains his introduction to the Mishna tractate of Avoth, providing a general introduction to the theme of ethics. Maimonides ’ Aristotelian terminology in the Eight Chapters led to the classical Aristotelian reading of Maimonides ’ ethics which Cohen opposes in this essay. See Rosin 1876, 6–7; as well as Gorfinkle in Maimonides 1912, 5.] temporary debate. Ever since Leo Strauss’s Philosophy and Law, a distinct tradition in contemporary Maimonidean scholarship inadvertently adopted Cohen’s Platonic turn.3 This is evident in a variety of readings: whether we take ethics to mean a commitment to political theory, as in Berman’s “The Political Interpretation of the Maxim”; or to indicate human perfection, as in Kellner’s Maimonides on Human Perfection; or to refer to the transcendental ideal in terms of halakic normativity, as in Twersky ’s Introduction to the Code of Maimonides; or in terms of a commitment to love and lovingkindness , as in Hartman’s Maimonides: Torah and Philosophic Quest; or Harvey’s “Maimonides on Human Perfection.”4 Classical expositions of Maimonides have stressed the Aristotelian character of his thought, evident in such interpretations as those by Harry A. Wolfson , Isaac Husik, Julius Guttmann, Shlomo Pines, Marvin Fox, Colette Sirat, and others. The translation of Cohen’s philosophical essay “Charakteristik der Ethik Maimunis ” provides the Urtext for the contemporary Platonic reading of Jewish philosophy in general, and of Maimonides’ thought in particular . maimonides 25 (See 33.) The signatory seal. Maimonides employs the Arabic term khatma, corresponding to the Greek sfragi" meaning seal, mark, signet, signature. Designating the concluding chapters of the Guide as khatma, Maimonides presents them as the conclusion in the light of which the entire Guide is to...