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The Guide of the Perplexed, Vol. 1

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There is no translation of Maimonides' Guide which compares to this, and, although Pines is known to side more with the Strausian school, his views are rarely if at all worked into this translation. For Maimonidian studies, this is a must buy.

This is volume one of a two volume set, so be sure to get both volumes. Volume one contains two interpretive essays, one by Leo Strauss and one by the translator, the former alone making this translation worthy of purchase, according to the Times Literary Supplement. Maimonides' work itself is an intentionally tangled web of reason, and casual readers will likely leave disappointed with its obscure style. Maimonides assumes a great deal of Scriptural knowledge and a familiarity with the most important commentators of his time. Nevertheless, for those willing to put in the effort both in learning the fundamentals of religion and in exploring an almost endless maze of logic, Maimonides will sketch the outlines of his view of philosophy and faith.

The reasons for reading this book and the second volume are limited. One is that you are studying Maimonides' thought, another that you are studying medieval religion, and so on. But if you really want to know what Judaism means or what the Pentateuch means, this work has limited usefulness.

I have to admit that my viewpoint was prejudiced by reading Strauss' introduction. He makes excruciatingly clear that Maimonides was an Aristotelian. Maimonides believed that there is no way to understand Pentateuch unless you have first studied the science of nature which to him means Aristotle and nothing else. On the face of it this is false. Judaism developed and the Pentateuch was put into writing before Aristotle was ever born or thought of, and generations of Jews operated their culture before Aristotle, and without knowing any of his work after it became available. In fact Greek philosophy was prohibited reading for a long time. That's why the Guide won't really tell you as much about Judaism as it does about Maimonides.

That's aside from the fact that Aristotelian science is a dead letter now. What you will find when you get to volume 2 is that the Mutakallim, against whom Maimonides argues, were right about some things that Aristotle got wrong; they were atomists and believed that a vacuum could exist. The technology to decide these issues as physics didn't exist in Maimonides' time, and even scientific method was half a millennium in the future.

I have to wonder about the student Joseph to whom the work is addressed. Maimonides apparently felt he was intelligent enough to understand the Maaseh Breshit and Maaseh Merkavah, and only lacked the necessary Aristotelian viewpoint. Joseph didn't stay with Maimonides long enough to study Aristotle with him and the work is an attempt to supply alternative training with the caveat that without actually knowing Aristotle, Joseph is just going to have to accept Maimonides' authority as to the meaning. Maybe Joseph was like me: he realized that Judaism and Pentateuch are older than Aristotle and therefore unrelated; and he wasn't willing to just accept the authority of somebody who will only teach from that untenable position. Whatever the reason, he disappeared into history and we don't even know if he ever read the Guide written specifically for him.

I think there are also problems with the translation, or else Maimonides chose to import meanings into Hebrew that it doesn't properly bear. A discussion in Volume 1 about the Hebrew verb "qum" seems to ignore the structure of the Hebrew verb system, and uses examples of "haqimoti" as if they meant physically standing upright, when that verb form actually means "establish"; the discussion fails to reflect this definition. The root does not determine the meaning of the verb, it only relates it to a conjugational paradigm. Maimonides uses this verb in a series of discussions explaining away the anthropomorphisms in Pentateuch.

The original text is available free online, so is ibn Tibbon's Hebrew translation and an English translation. It's up to you to decide what you can use the Guide for and whether you want to accept the authority of the translator as correctly representing what Maimonides said, or of Maimonides as a commentator on the Pentateuch.

One of the most significant and life changing books ever written is Moses Maimonides' Guide of the Perplexed. Maimonides lived from 1138 to 1204. Many people consider him the most important person since Moses who handed Israel God's revelation. Others are convinced that he is far better in many ways than the first Moses. He revealed what the first Moses kept hidden.

There are two modern English translations of this twelfth century philosophical masterpiece. The first is by M. Friedlander published in 1881. Friedlander rendered the title as Guide for the Perplexed, which seems to make more sense than S. Pines' Guide of the Perplexed. Friedlander's version is easy to read English. Pines, who was of German descent, wrote a translation that is frequently difficult to follow and appears to have been written by a person whose first language is German. Nevertheless, Maimonidean scholars prefer the Pines product, saying that it is a more precise version of the original Arabic, the language Maimonides used, and therefore any quote from the Guide in scholarly articles has to be made from Pines.

Pines and Leo Strauss introduce the Pines translation with two scholarly articles containing significant information that reflect the authors' approaches to Maimonides' Guide. The two introductions are quoted frequently in articles about the great master.

What makes the Guide so important? Maimonides addresses all of the important questions that people have about God and religion. What approach did Maimonides take concerning religion? He was a rationalist. He insisted that people should not base their ideas about this world and life upon blind faith and tradition. Faith is the acceptance of ideas as true even though the ideas are contradicted by science and reason. No sensible person would prescribe a medicine to a dying person based only on tradition. He wrote that the views of Hippocrates and Galen, the ancient teachers of medicine, for example, needed to be reevaluated based on modern science. Is the Guide easy to understand, even in the Friedlander edition? No. Maimonides recognized that the common uneducated people, who rely on the teachings they were given as children and never advanced, could not accept his rational teachings, so he wrote his Guide in a way that the general public would think he agreed with them and the educated would see that he presented new ideas. Thus, people need to learn how to pay special attention to what he wrote. Do all people agree with Maimonides today? No. the same problem that Maimonides faced during his lifetime continues to exist.

What are some of the Maimonidean rational ideas that the common people could not and still do not accept? God has no emotions; he does not become angry. The Bible speaks of God becoming angry because the common people need to believe that God will punish them for doing wrong; people who accept this idea are more restrained from committing many wrongs.

Angels and demons do not exist. God is all-powerful and needs no helpers. When the Bible speaks of angels, it is referring to a force of nature. The word "angel" is a metaphor for anything that carries out what God would have considered proper.

Prophets never received a communication from God. Prophecy is a higher level of intelligence. Some Maimonidean scholars say that Maimonides considered even the fourth century BCE pagan philosopher Aristotle a prophet because he was so intelligent and was able to communicate truths to people.

Maimonides wrote that "the truth is the truth no matter what its source." People make a terrible mistake when they think that only their own religion communicates the truth.

Neither passive piety nor study of the Bible, Talmud and mystical tracts bring people to God. Near the end of the Guide, Maimonides summarized his views and pictured Talmud scholars as people who stumble outside God's palace without knowing how to enter. The purpose of the Bible, he stressed, is three-fold: it teaches true ideas and helps improve individuals and society. People fulfill the Bible's mandate when and only when they study and understand about science and nature and use it to improve themselves and society.

These are some of the many insights that Moses Maimonides presented in his philosophical masterpiece. If people read and reread the masterpiece many times, they will derive a new understanding of life from each reading and be able to enter God's palace. They will then be all that they can be.

The appreciation of the book will depend greatly on your level of comfort with the rabbinical view. If you seek a philosophical approach you might be better of with Aristotle and modern science, and if you are interested in rabbinical exegis then go to the source and study the Talmud and other works. Maimonides possesses immense authority and is distanced from us by many centuries. He gives invaluable insight into certain issues but at the same time creates or entrenches other fundamental perplexities open to debate or critique. The introduction will serve the reader well especially on the author's contemporaries. Buy both volumes as the second and the third part of total three parts of the Guide are in the second volume.

Igor Karpov, Toronto,Canada
igorkarpov at rogers dot com

The University of Chicago Edition in trade paperback is in two handsome volumes: a gold and a green trade paperback.

Here's blurbage from the back:

"This work by Pines and Strauss must be recognized as one of the most important contributions to the study of Maimonides in the present century. The translation is of a quality unequalled in a modern language." - Journal of the History of Philosophy

"Leo Strauss' penetrating essay alone would give high value to this volume.... On the other hand, whithout this essay the new translation would make this an important book that is unlikely to be surpassed for a long time." - Times Literary Supplement

"Competent Reviewers have without exception praised this translation.... As a whole, the book is simply indispensable." - The Modern Schoolman

The University of Chicago Edition in trade paperback is in two handsome volumes: a gold and a green trade paperback.

Here's blurbage from the back:

"This work by Pines and Strauss must be recognized as one of the most important contributions to the study of Maimonides in the present century. The translation is of a quality unequalled in a modern language." - Journal of the History of Philosophy

"Leo Strauss' penetrating essay alone would give high value to this volume.... On the other hand, whithout this essay the new translation would make this an important book that is unlikely to be surpassed for a long time." - Times Literary Supplement

"Competent Reviewers have without exception praised this translation.... As a whole, the book is simply indispensable." - The Modern Schoolman

The University of Chicago Edition in trade paperback is in two handsome volumes: a gold and a green trade paperback.

Here's blurbage from the back:

"This work by Pines and Strauss must be recognized as one of the most important contributions to the study of Maimonides in the present century. The translation is of a quality unequalled in a modern language." - Journal of the History of Philosophy

"Leo Strauss' penetrating essay alone would give high value to this volume.... On the other hand, whithout this essay the new translation would make this an important book that is unlikely to be surpassed for a long time." - Times Literary Supplement

"Competent Reviewers have without exception praised this translation.... As a whole, the book is simply indispensable." - The Modern Schoolman