Download or read book Maimonides Spinoza written by Joshua Parens and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2012-04-09 with total page 236 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Until the last century, it was generally agreed that Maimonides was a great defender of Judaism, and Spinoza—as an Enlightenment advocate for secularization—among its key opponents. However, a new scholarly consensus has recently emerged that the teachings of the two philosophers were in fact much closer than was previously thought. In his perceptive new book, Joshua Parens sets out to challenge the now predominant view of Maimonides as a protomodern forerunner to Spinoza—and to show that a chief reason to read Maimonides is in fact to gain distance from our progressively secularized worldview. Turning the focus from Spinoza’s oft-analyzed Theologico-Political Treatise, this book has at its heart a nuanced analysis of his theory of human nature in the Ethics. Viewing this work in contrast to Maimonides’s Guide of the Perplexed, it makes clear that Spinoza can no longer be thought of as the founder of modern Jewish identity, nor should Maimonides be thought of as having paved the way for a modern secular worldview. Maimonides and Spinoza dramatically revises our understanding of both philosophers.
Download or read book Maimonides and Spinoza written by Joshua Parens and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2012-08 with total page 236 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is a revision of predominant understanding of the philosophers Maimonides and Spinoza. It was agreed that Maimonides was a great defender of Judaism, and Spinoza an Enlightenment advocate for secularization. A new scholarly consensus has recently emerged that the teachings of the two philosophers were in fact much closer than was thought.
Download or read book Maimonides Spinoza and Us written by Marc Angel and published by Jewish Lights Publishing. This book was released on 2009 with total page 226 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A challenging look at two great Jewish philosophers, and what their thinking means to our understanding of God, truth, revelation and reason. Moses Maimonides (1138-1204) is Jewish history's greatest exponent of a rational, philosophically sound Judaism. He strove to reconcile the teachings of the Bible and rabbinic tradition with the principles of Aristotelian philosophy, arguing that religion and philosophy ultimately must arrive at the same truth. Baruch Spinoza (1632-77) is Jewish history's most illustrious "heretic." He believed that truth could be attained through reason alone, and that philosophy and religion were separate domains that could not be reconciled. His critique of the Bible and its teachings caused an intellectual and spiritual upheaval whose effects are still felt today. Rabbi Marc D. Angel discusses major themes in the writings of Maimonides and Spinoza to show us how modern people can deal with religion in an intellectually honest and meaningful way. From Maimonides, we gain insight on how to harmonize traditional religious belief with the dictates of reason. From Spinoza, we gain insight into the intellectual challenges which must be met by modern believers.
Download or read book Maimonides Spinoza and Us written by and published by Turner Publishing Company. This book was released on 2011-11-16 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A challenging look at two great Jewish philosophers, and what their thinking means to our understanding of God, truth, revelation and reason. Moses Maimonides (11381204) is Jewish historys greatest exponent of a rational, philosophically sound Judaism. He strove to reconcile the teachings of the Bible and rabbinic tradition with the principles of Aristotelian philosophy, arguing that religion and philosophy ultimately must arrive at the same truth. “p>Baruch Spinoza (163277) is Jewish historys most illustrious heretic. He believed that truth could be attained through reason alone, and that philosophy and religion were separate domains that could not be reconciled. His critique of the Bible and its teachings caused an intellectual and spiritual upheaval whose effects are still felt today. Rabbi Marc D. Angel discusses major themes in the writings of Maimonides and Spinoza to show us how modern people can deal with religion in an intellectually honest and meaningful way. From Maimonides, we gain insight on how to harmonize traditional religious belief with the dictates of reason. From Spinoza, we gain insight into the intellectual challenges which must be met by modern believers.
Download or read book Maimonides and Spinoza written by Barry Jay Luby and published by . This book was released on 1973 with total page 158 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book An Examination of the Singular in Maimonides and Spinoza written by Norman L. Whitman and published by Springer Nature. This book was released on 2020-08-14 with total page 285 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book presents an alternative reading of the respective works of Moses Maimonides and Baruch Spinoza. It argues that both thinkers are primarily concerned with the singular perfection of the complete human being rather than with attaining only rational knowledge. Complete perfection of a human being expresses the unique concord of concrete activities, such as ethics, politics, and psychology, with reason. The necessity of concrete historical activities in generating perfection entails that both thinkers are not primarily concerned with an “escape” to a metaphysical realm of transcendent or universal truths via cognition. Instead, both are focused on developing and cultivating individuals’ concrete desires and activities to the potential benefit of all. This book argues that rather than solely focusing on individual enlightenment, both thinkers are primarily concerned with a political life and the improvement of fellow citizens’ capacities. A key theme throughout the text is that both Maimonides and Spinoza realize that an apolitical life undermines individual and social flourishing.
Download or read book Spinoza Descartes Maimonides written by Leon Roth, M.A., D.Phil and published by . This book was released on 1924 with total page 150 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Maimonides and Spinoza written by Barry Jay Luby and published by . This book was released on 1973 with total page 158 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Maimonides Spinoza and Us written by Rabbi Marc D. Angel and published by . This book was released on 2014-07-15 with total page 374 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Maimonides written by Moshe Halbertal and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2013-11-24 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Maimonides was the greatest Jewish philosopher and legal scholar of the medieval period, a towering figure who has had a profound and lasting influence on Jewish law, philosophy, and religious consciousness. This book provides a comprehensive and accessible introduction to his life and work, revealing how his philosophical sensibility and outlook informed his interpretation of Jewish tradition. Moshe Halbertal vividly describes Maimonides's childhood in Muslim Spain, his family's flight to North Africa to escape persecution, and their eventual resettling in Egypt. He draws on Maimonides's letters and the testimonies of his contemporaries, both Muslims and Jews, to offer new insights into his personality and the circumstances that shaped his thinking. Halbertal then turns to Maimonides's legal and philosophical work, analyzing his three great books--Commentary on the Mishnah, the Mishneh Torah, and the Guide of the Perplexed. He discusses Maimonides's battle against all attempts to personify God, his conviction that God's presence in the world is mediated through the natural order rather than through miracles, and his locating of philosophy and science at the summit of the religious life of Torah. Halbertal examines Maimonides's philosophical positions on fundamental questions such as the nature and limits of religious language, creation and nature, prophecy, providence, the problem of evil, and the meaning of the commandments. A stunning achievement, Maimonides offers an unparalleled look at the life and thought of this important Jewish philosopher, scholar, and theologian.
Download or read book Jewish Themes in Spinoza s Philosophy written by Heidi M. Ravven and published by State University of New York Press. This book was released on 2012-02-01 with total page 301 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Breaking new ground in the study of Spinoza's philosophy, the essays in this volume explore the extent to which Spinoza may be considered a Jewish thinker. The rich diversity of Spinoza scholarship today is represented here by a wide range of intellectual methods and scholarly perspectives—from Jewish philosophy and history, to Cartesian-analytic and Continental-Marxist streams of interpretation, to the disciplines of political science and intellectual history. Two questions underlie all the essays: How and in what measure is Spinoza's a Jewish philosophy, and what is its impact on the project of Jewish philosophy as a living enterprise now and for the future? The contributors' varied perspectives afford a highly nuanced vision of the multifaceted Judaic tradition itself, as refracted through the Spinozist lens. What draws them together is the quest for enduring insights that emerge from the philosophy of Spinoza.
Download or read book Spinoza s Heresy written by Steven Nadler and published by Clarendon Press. This book was released on 2001-12-06 with total page 246 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: At the heart of Spinoza's Heresy is a mystery: why was Baruch Spinoza so harshly excommunicated from the Amsterdam Jewish community at the age of twenty-four? In this philosophical sequel to his acclaimed, award-winning biography of the seventeenth-century thinker, Steven Nadler argues that Spinoza's main offence was a denial of the immortality of the soul. But this only deepens the mystery. For there is no specific Jewish dogma regarding immortality: there is nothing that a Jew is required to believe about the soul and the afterlife. It was, however, for various religious, historical and political reasons, simply the wrong issue to pick on in Amsterdam in the 1650s. After considering the nature of the ban, or cherem, as a disciplinary tool in the Sephardic community, and a number of possible explanations for Spinoza's ban, Nadler turns to the variety of traditions in Jewish religious thought on the postmortem fate of a person's soul. This is followed by an examination of Spinoza's own views on the eternity of the mind and the role that that the denial of personal immortality plays in his overall philosophical project. Nadler argues that Spinoza's beliefs were not only an outgrowth of his own metaphysical principles, but also a culmination of an intellectualist trend in Jewish rationalism.
Download or read book Spinoza and Medieval Jewish Philosophy written by Steven Nadler and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2014-12-04 with total page 249 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Over the last two decades there has been an increasing interest in the influence of medieval Jewish thought upon Spinoza's philosophy. The essays in this volume, by Spinoza specialists and leading scholars in the field of medieval Jewish philosophy, consider the various dimensions of the rich, important, but vastly under-studied relationship between Spinoza and earlier Jewish thinkers. It is the first such collection in any language, and together the essays provide a detailed and extensive analysis of how different elements in Spinoza's metaphysics, epistemology, moral philosophy, and political and religious thought relate to the views of his Jewish philosophical forebears, such as Maimonides, Gersonides, Ibn Ezra, Crescas, and others. The topics addressed include the immortality of the soul, the nature of God, the intellectual love of God, moral luck, the nature of happiness, determinism and free will, the interpretation of Scripture, and the politics of religion.
Download or read book A Book Forged in Hell written by Steven Nadler and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2011-10-09 with total page 299 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When it appeared in 1670, Baruch Spinoza's Theological-Political Treatise was denounced as the most dangerous book ever published. Religious and secular authorities saw it as a threat to faith, social and political harmony, and everyday morality, and its author was almost universally regarded as a religious subversive and political radical who sought to spread atheism throughout Europe. Steven Nadler tells the story of this book: its radical claims and their background in the philosophical, religious, and political tensions of the Dutch Golden Age, as well as the vitriolic reaction these ideas inspired. A vivid story of incendiary ideas and vicious backlash, A Book Forged in Hell will interest anyone who is curious about the origin of some of our most cherished modern beliefs--Jacket p. [2].
Download or read book Maimonides and the Book That Changed Judaism written by Micah Goodman and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 2015 with total page 274 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A publishing sensation long at the top of the best-seller lists in Israel, the original Hebrew edition of Maimonides and the Book That Changed Judaism has been called the most successful book ever published in Israel on the preeminent medieval Jewish thinker Moses Maimonides. The works of Maimonides, particularly The Guide for the Perplexed, are reckoned among the fundamental texts that influenced all subsequent Jewish philosophy and also proved to be highly influential in Christian and Islamic thought. Spanning subjects ranging from God, prophecy, miracles, revelation, and evil, to politics, messianism, reason in religion, and the therapeutic role of doubt, Maimonides and the Book That Changed Judaism elucidates the complex ideas of The Guide in remarkably clear and engaging prose. Drawing on his own experience as a central figure in the current Israeli renaissance of Jewish culture and spirituality, Micah Goodman brings Maimonides’s masterwork into dialogue with the intellectual and spiritual worlds of twenty-first-century readers. Goodman contends that in Maimonides’s view, the Torah’s purpose is not to bring clarity about God but rather to make us realize that we do not understand God at all; not to resolve inscrutable religious issues but to give us insight into the true nature and purpose of our lives.
Download or read book A Companion to Spinoza written by Yitzhak Y. Melamed and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2021-07-06 with total page 44 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An unparalleled collection of original essays on Benedict de Spinoza's contributions to philosophy and his enduring legacy A Companion to Spinoza presents a panoramic view of contemporary Spinoza studies in Europe and across the Anglo-American world. Designed to stimulate fresh dialogue between the analytic and continental traditions in philosophy, this extraordinary volume brings together 53 original essays that explore Spinoza's contributions to Western philosophy and intellectual history. A diverse team of established and emerging international scholars discuss new themes and classic topics to provide a uniquely comprehensive picture of one of the most influential metaphysicians of all time. Rather than simply summarizing the body of existing scholarship, the Companion develops new ideas, examines cutting-edge scholarship, and suggests directions for future research. The text is structured around six thematically-organized sections, exploring Spinoza's life and background, his contributions to metaphysics and natural philosophy, his epistemology, politics, ethics, and aesthetics, the reception of Spinoza in the work of philosophers such as Kant, Schelling, Schopenhauer, and Hegel, and more. This unparalleled research collection combines a timely overview of the current state of research with deep coverage of Spinoza's philosophy, legacy, and influence. Part of the celebrated Blackwell Companions to Philosophy series, A Companion to Spinoza is an ideal text for advanced courses in modern philosophy, intellectual history, and the history of metaphysics, and an indispensable reference for researchers and scholars in Spinoza studies.
Download or read book Maimonides s Yahweh written by Amy Karen Downey and published by Wipf and Stock Publishers. This book was released on 2019-03-20 with total page 236 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The life of Moshe ben Maimon (Maimonides) remains a mystery to many within evangelical Christianity. However, he is lauded as a second Moses by many within modern Judaism. Does he deserve that title? Maimonides’s via negativa created a rationale for rejecting the messiahship claims of Jesus in Rabbinic Judaism. Therefore, this book seeks to illustrate that Maimonides, in his desire to create an anti-Christian apologetic regarding the incarnation, fashioned a Judaism that does not reflect the truths of the Tanakh (Old Testament) and developed a Judaism that was untenable for the Jewish people of the twenty-first century. Many Jewish people today are turning in a thousand and one different directions for spiritual answers, but not in the only way that will offer the way to God: Jesus of Nazareth (John 14:6). This work examines the history of Maimonides, his teachings, and an apologetic approach to bring the gospel back to the Jewish people (Rom 1:16).
