Maimonides' Empire of Light: Popular Enlightenment in an Age of Belief (review)

The Jewish Quarterly Review, XCII, Nos. 3-4 (January-April, 2002) 613-614 Ralph Lerner. Maimonides' Empire ofLight: Popular Enlightenment in an Age ofBelief. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2000. Pp. ?vi +221. This book consists of two parts: eight chapters by Ralph Lerner, followed by translations of five texts. Four of the texts are by Maimonides ("Epistle to Yemen," translated by Joel Kraemer; Mishneh Torah selections , translated by Ralph Lerner; "Treatise on Résurrection," translated by Hillel Fradkin; and "Letter on Astrology," translated by Ralph Lerner) and one is by Shem ??? Falaquera ("Epistle of the Debate," translated by Steven Harvey). The eight chapters which precede these translations consist of an introduction ("Philosophy in the Public Square"), chapters introducing each of the translated texts that follow, and chapters on Maimonides' Guide of the Perplexed and Albo's Sefer ha-cIqqarim (which Lerner prefers to call Book of Roots as opposed to what Albo clearly meant, that is, Book of Principles of Religion). Each of Maimonides' texts translated here is already available in a perfectly adequate and not particularly scarce translation. ' The translations presented here are certainly fluent and readable, but do not appear to me to advance our understanding of the texts beyond the already available translations, most of which, I might add, are much more thoroughly and helpfully annotated than those in this book. Ralph Lerner's introductory chapters are elegantly written. They focus "upon the way a master teacher addressed the confusions of his distressed and distracted people" (p. xi). The task of this master teacher, Maimonides, is to instruct an unwilling or inattentive public (p. xii) without causing it damage. Lerner's task, at which he succeeds impressively, is to introduce these Maimonidean texts to a modern public, some of it willing and attentive , but all of it living in a social, scientific, and religious reality entirely unlike that of their original audience. It is hard for me to judge how useful these introductions would be for someone unfamiliar with Maimonides' thought. They do not really add much to what a careful and thoughtful reader (which Lerner certainly is) "Yemen" and "Resurrection" are available in Abraham Halkin and David Hartman , Crisis and Leadership: Epistles ofMaimonides (Philadelphia, 1985) and Mishneh Torah selections are found translated by Moses Hyamson and reprinted in Isadore Twersky's A Maimonides Reader (New York, 1972). This volume also contains Boaz Cohen's translation of "Yemen" and Lerner's translation of "Astrology." Harvey's translation of Falaquera is taken from his own book, which is still very much in print: Steven Harvey, Falaquera's "Epistle ofthe Debate": An Introduction to Jewish Philosophy (Cambridge, Mass., 1987). 614TOE JEWISH QUARTERLY REVIEW could get from the texts themselves. Scholars of medieval Jewish thought will find very little in these introductions that they do not already know. However, this part of the book is nonetheless important for focusing on the role played by Maimonides as a dedicated educator of the masses and for emphasizing the lessons that may be learned from his popular writings. Scholars often focus on Maimonides the scholar, paying insufficient attention to Maimonides the public teacher. Maimonides' Empire of Light is a welcome corrective to this common, one-sided approach. University of HaifaMenachem Kellner ...