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> Home | TOC | Index 4 Preface to Isaac Husik, Philosophical Essays: Ancient, Medieval, and Modern A decade ago Isaac Husik died. To the many men and women who knew him and came within the influence of a life marked by simplicity , gentleness, and genuine humor, no fitter description could be made than that "self-portrait" of Hume which Husik's death recalled to a friend: "... a man of mild dispositions, of command of temper, of an open, social and cheerful humor, capable of attachment, but little susceptible of enmity...." To his colleagues in the academic world and to his peers in the search for "the unity of human learning," his death was that of one of the most distinguished historians of philosophy America had produced. To some, the two aspects of his life appeared to be wholly distinct. A closer study will show them to have been whole and integrated. The years since Husik's death have served to establish more firmly a reputation founded upon sound scholarship and breadth of interest in the history of ideas and of learning. His papers on Aristotle's philosophy are among the best on that subject. His A Histon) ofMediaeval Jewish Philosophy, now in its second edition, was not only justly described by a contemporary reviewer as "the first attempt in the English language to present completely the history ... of systematic speculation among Jewish thinkers from the ninth to the fifteenth centuries," but was also recognized as a work which for its soundness and penetration "place son auteur au rang des meilleurs historiens de la philosophie,"J "... un travail de tout premier ordre et dont on peut dire qu'il aura ete classique des Ie jour meme de son apparition."2 His four-volume edition and translation of Joseph Albo's Sefer ha-Ikkarim was the first complete translation on scientific principles into English of an important text first printed in 1485. And to his laurels as historian and philologist Husik had added those of a scholar in jurisprudence who had translated von Ihering's Law as a Means to an End, had edited and translated Stammler's The Theon) of Justice, and had made original contributions to jurispru235 > Home | TOC | Index 236 Jewish Philosophy and the Crisis of Modemity dence. These contributions to scholarship, in the historical and speculative fields, might be regarded, indeed, as sufficient and enduring monuments to Husik's superb linguistic skill and to his devotion to learning. The gathering together and publication of his essays in ancient, medieval, and modem philosophy is, however, no act of supererogation . The essays themselves attest an interest by Husik in rounding out and deepening his knowledge of systematic philosophy and his speculation upon problems which perhaps-and almost certainly in the instance of philosophy of law-were preparatory for more extended studies. The essays are, however, neither tentative nor incomplete. They are the well-considered writings of a great scholar in fields central to philosophy, religion, and law. It has been one of the principal reasons for publishing this book that the essays will serve the useful purpose of bringing together writings scattered beyond easy access by Husik's very versatility in learned journals so varied as the Philosophical Review, the Jewish Quarterly Review, the Columbia Law Review, Mind, and the Archiv fur Geschichte der Philosophie. And were they not so widely scattered , the justification for their publication-if justification be neededis perhaps sufficiently indicated in a comment Husik once made concerning the fortunes of the study he judged to be his outstanding contribution to scholarship and philosophy: "Habent sua fata libelli," he wrote. "Thirty-four years ago I published a paper on 'The Categories of Aristotle' in the Philosophical Review. Like the case of the proverbial Irishman who desired to be buried in a Jewish cemetery because that was the last place the devil would look for an Irishman, so it seems that the Philosophical Review at the time was the last place that an Aristotelian scholar would look for a literary-historical article on the Categories of Aristotle." Perhaps, because of the breadth of Husik's interests , a published essay or unprinted manuscript may be saved from "sua fata" of incarceration within the covers of rank upon rank of "learned journals" to find among the readers of this volume those who will, in its reading, imbue it with new life. Of their author, it has already been suggested in this prefatory essay that his life bore the outward semblance of simplicity...

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