Ethics of Maimonides

5. The “Unity of the Heart”: On Love and Longing (Where Ethical Method Fails)

5 The “Unity of the Heart” On Love and Longing (Where Ethical Method Fails) Contemplating main topics of Maimonidean theology, such as the relationship of cognition and love, love and fear of God, and questions of eschatology , Cohen in this fifth chapter explores the consequences of his Platonic reading of Maimonides’ theory of divine attributes for a Jewish theology that is grounded in but not exhausted by its rational foundations . In discussing the aesthetic dimension of love, Cohen here as well as elsewhere in his Jewish writings focuses upon the medieval thinker Bahya ibn Pakuda. The critique of the Aristotelian eudaemonian ethics continues to be the issue against which Cohen turns his critical argument. Divine Omniscience and Human Volition 107. In keeping with his doctrine of attributes, Maimonides rejects the distinction between intellect and volition. Volition constitutes that force (tlwky) in which impulse merges with reason. Impulse has not yet reached the stage of affect and does not yet claim the status of an autonomous potency vis-à-vis reason . Hence Maimonides is able to teach freedom of will, but not merely in the psychological or anthropological sense, according to which Aristotle admits that even children and animals possess freedom— which freedom, however, lacks all ethical implication. [Aristotle 1945, NE 1111b, 129.] Maimonides insists (See 107.) No contradiction between the freedom of the human being and divine omnipotence. According to Maimonides, the omniscience of God expresses itself as the rational order of the universe, and therefore divine omniscience does not contradict but rather endorses the faculty of human reasoning. Human reasoning, in turn, is predicated upon the freedom of will without which there would be no accountability for one’s actions. Maimonides’ concepts of divine and human will, Cohen claims, converge, or correlate in the ethical task of human perfection—Knowing God and Walking in His Ways.1 ethics of maimonides 108 “The Mediator between God and the human beings is reason” [hamal’akh ben ha-adam uven elohav hu sikhlo], says ibn Ezra in his preface to his commentary on the Torah, emphasizing that the hermeneutical principles of biblical commentary and of the oral tradition reflect a rational practice of interpreting Torah. It is not by chance that Cohen discusses this statement in the context of Shema Yisrael, as he thereby alludes to a playful alliterative association of malakh and melekh, of “mediator” and “king,” positing God’s oneness as the mediating ground for the obligation traditionally expressed as “kabbalath ‘ol malkhuth shamayim” [taking the yoke of God’s kingship upon oneself].2 that intentionality is intrinsic to freedom, a demand that Aristotle dismisses. Maimonides does not brook any contradiction between the freedom of the human being and the omnipotence or omniscience of God. Otherwise we would have to admit a conflict between reason human and divine; it is precisely this conflict, however, that is resolved through the very definition of reason. Perhaps we may then say that ultimately the concept of reason in Maimonides means none other than the establishment of a basic ethical relationship between God and the human being. There can be but one reason upon which knowing God is necessarily predicated. Maimonides adopts the interpretation of ibn Ezra that we may read as a corollary to Hear O Israel: “The mediator between God and the human beings is reason.” ˜ybw μdah ˜yb ˚almh wlkç awh wyhla (See Guide 3:52 rça qwbdh awh . . . lkçh ’yçh ˜ybw wnynyb) [also ibn Ezra 1985, 142; and ibn Ezra’s commentary on Mishlei 22:21 in ibn Ezra 1884, 31]. Mediation and Kingship: Reading ibn Ezra Cohen reads the Shema as the classical Jewish expression of the correlation between God’s oneness and the messianic unity of mankind.3 This reading renders incongruent any mythical imagery concerning the intellect mediating between God and the human being. Maimonides’ use of the neoPlatonic image of divine overflow, “likening God to an overflowing spring of water,”4 represents to Cohen a mere conventional way of speaking, as the implications of divine overflow seem to suggest a mediation of God and world in ontological ways. On the other hand, the concepts of holiness and purity, upon which Cohen’s reading of Maimonides is predicated, demand that any such mediation between God and humankind be volitional. the “unity of the heart” 109 (See 108.) The fundamental identity of knowledge and love. Against a purely rationalist reading of Maimonides ’ theory of...