Islam and Judaism

Early relationship between Islam and Judaism

The founder of Islam, Mohammed claimed to be heir to the Biblical tradition of prophets. He held that God first sent prophets to the Jews, then to the Christians, and finally to the Arabs. As the next and final prophet of God, Mohammed preached that the pagan Arabs of his time should repent of their ways, and accept the belief in the one God, Allah. The Quran states that what Mohammed taught was the same as that written in the Tawrat (Torah), the Zubur, and the Injil.

Mohammed felt that Jews and Christians must recognize that he was exactly such a prophet as those who had come before; that he fulfilled all the conditions called for in their sacred Scripture. However, it appears that Mohammed had little or no actual knowledge of the Jewish and Christian sacred books, as then in the hands of the Jews and Christians. Mohammed felt no need of it. When, therefore, the Jews and Christians refused to recognize his doctrine and to accept his prophethood, Mohammed could only ascribe their conduct to perverse obstinacy. They concealed passages in their books; they misinterpreted others, "twisting their tongues in them" (Koran iii. 72).

The God of Islam and of Judaism are identical

In time Mohammed gave up the attempt to secure such support, and fell back on the simple weight of his own authority. Traditions, which may have taken form later, indicate, in their substance at least, the attitude to which he came. "Have nothing to do," he is reported to have said, "with the People of the Book and their books; say unto them, 'We believe in that which has been revealed to both of us; your God and our God is the same.'" Essentially he meant, "My revelation is the same as that which stands in your books. You misinterpret, conceal, and pervert; my revelation is certain and is enough." Such, apparently, was the attitude of Mohammed himself to the Scriptures. In illustration, reference may be made to the following passages in the Koran, suras ii. 85, 129, 209; iii. 60, 72, 179, 184; iv. 161, 169; v. 47, 85, 109; xix. 28; xxvi. 192; xxix. 45; xlii. 11; lvii. 25; lxi. 6; lxii. 5; lxvi. 10.

But such a position could only be maintained by Mohammed himself with his intense consciousness of the truth of his mission. After his death came rapid changes which were natural in themselves, but the definite origin of which is mostly obscure to us. The only means of access which the earliest Moslems had to the sacred books of the Jews and Christians was through proselytes; and these proselytes, from a variety of causes, misled much more than they instructed their new coreligionists. For one thing, the Moslems regarded them as authorities on the history of the past. They asked innumerable questions, and expected answers. The more marvelous the answer, the better they seem to have been pleased. Only on one point these converts had to be wary: Their replies must square generally with the Moslem scheme of thought and theology; otherwise their heads were in danger. Under these conditions of risk, marvelous tales sprouted freely.

False Citations from Torah

There are many supposed "quotations" from the Torah in the Quran and later Islamic literature that, in fact, do not exist in the Torah. Many times the Quran confuses the Torah the Tables of the Law, and the latter are increased in number. In the Quran the Torah is enormously increased in bulk: it is alleged to contain a varying number of parts, up to 1,000, and to make seventy camel-loads. Each single part takes a year to read through.

According to Islam, only four men — Moses, Joshua, Ezra, and Jesus — have studied it all. Clear statements, all imaginative, are given as to how it begins and ends. Quotations of the wildest character are introduced as from it; and the quoter will say calmly, "I have read them in the Torah." The same is also true in regard to the Book of Pslams, and even to the Christian New Testament. As to the book of Psalms, there exists in Arabic one of one hundred and fifty chapters, only the first two of which agree with the Psalms; the rest being a free imitation of the Koran. Possibly the Torah and the Gospel may at one time have been similarly perverted, but of such corruptions no traces now exist. The Torah was said to begin like sura vi. of the Koran and to end like sura xi. In it was an exact description of Mohammed and of some other persons associated with the beginning of Islam. For the Gospel, the following statement by an early authority will probably suffice: "I found in the Gospel that the keys of the treasure of Korah were a load for sixty mules; no one of them was larger than a finger, and each key served for a separate treasury."

Besides these three books which Mohammed recognized, there are also given references to the Wisdom literature; and in this case a much closer approximation is made to the truth. There are quotations from the Wisdom of Solomon, the Testament of Solomon (apparently part of Proverbs), and the Wisdom of the Family of David, and these have usually at least a possible source. Further, it must not be thought that all this characterized only the earliest times and the most ignorant and careless minds. Al-Gazzali (d. 1111), the greatest theologian of Islam, and a man of the intellectual rank of Augustine or Thomas Aquinas, quotes almost as credulously and rashly as any. Nor does he ever dream of verifying a quotation. Fakhr al-Din al-Razi (d. 1209), another theologian of eminence, boasted that he knew the Torah and the Gospel by heart; and yet in his commentary on the Koran the most incredible things are cited as being contained in these. The best we can say for him is that either there were a pseudo-Torah and a pseudo-Gospel, which deceived him, or else that he lied. Such were the results of the mendacity of the early proselytes to Islam and of the credulity and carelessness of the Moslems. As some excuse for the last may serve the feeling which grew up that there was sin as well as danger in reading the books of Jews or Christians. Even Ibn Khaldun (d. 1405), the first philosophical historian of Islam, disapproved of such study: Mohammedans had certainty in the Koran, he held, and should be content with that.

Among the various general statements in the Koran that Mohammed had been foretold in the earlier books, only one gives the impression that Mohammed had had a specific passage in mind. It is in sura lxi. 6, where Jesus says, "O Sons of Israel, lo, I am a messenger of God to you . . . giving you good tidings of a messenger who will come after me, whose name will be Aḥmad." This seems a tolerably clear reference to the promise of the paraclete in John's Gospel, ch. xiv. et seq., and a very early Moslem tradition so takes it, quoting an Arabized form of the Greek παράκλητος.

Another passage is Deut. xviii. 18 et seq.: "I will raise them up a Prophet from among their brethren, like unto thee." This, it is explained, could only refer to a prophet of the line of Ishmael; for he was the brother of Isaac, and there was no prophet of the line of Esau; and "their brethren" excludes the line of Jacob. In Isa. xxi. 6-9 the rider on the ass is Jesus and the rider on the camel is Mohammed. The details in Isa. lx. 4-7 are regarded as applying very exactly to Mohammed. Also, in Deut. xxxiii. 2 "Sinai" refers to the Mosaic revelation; "Seir" is a mountain in Syria where Jesus served his Lord; and "Paran" is either a mountain of the Banu Hashim, where Mohammed similarly worshiped, or Mecca itself. These are accepted, as good proofs by the great scientist Al-Beruni (d. 1048).

Islamic Study of Original Sources

But meanwhile, and alongside of this mass of traditional ignorance, a beginning had been made in Islam of the direct study of the older sacred books. It belonged to the brief period of scientific life and liberty under the first Abbassids and especially under Al-Mamun. Through the Persian Aristotelians and physicians, the Syrian monasteries, and the heathen of Harran, Greek civilization and its methods began to affect Islam. So the historians of the time show a commendable desire to go back to original sources and to test and examine for themselves. Ibn Waḍah, who wrote about 880, had an excellent knowledge of the Scriptures, as also, of parts at least, had Ibn Ḳutaibah, who died in 889. Yet in the works of both of these writers are included wild legends that had come down from the earlier times, which the Moslem story-tellers had delighted to retouch and expand, side by side with sober translations from the Hebrew and Greek. And, just as the flourishing time of science under the Abbassids was short, so, too, with this branch of it. Ṭabari (d. 921) is already less affected by it; and Mas'udi (d. 957), although a free-thinking theologian, seems to have gone back to traditionalism. The result was simply that another set of assertions, much more trustworthy, was added to the contradictory jumble which was being passed on from writer to writer.

With Ibn Ḥazm, the Zahirite (d. 1064), however, a new development was reached, with results lasting to the present day. Ibn Ḥazm is distinguished in Moslem history for having applied to theology the principles of literal interpretation already used by the Zahirites in canon law, and for the remorseless vigor and rigor with which he carried on his polemics. He now marked a similar era in treating the doctrine of the older Scriptures, declaring them to be forgeries. Modern education in India and elsewhere has spread a more exact knowledge of the Jewish and Christian Scriptures.

The Golden Age

In 711 CE Muslim armies invaded and occupied most of Spain, which had until then been under Christian rule. At this time Jews made up about 8% of Spain's population. Under Christian rule, Jews had been subject to frequent and intense persecution, but this was alleviated under Muslim rule. This is widely considered to be the beginning of the Golden Age for Jews in Spain.

The reigns of Abd al-Rahman I (called Al-Nasir; 912-961) and his son were the golden era for the Spanish Jews and Jewish science. Abd al-Rahman's court physician and minister was Hasdai ben Isaac ibn Shaprut, the patron of a number of other Jewish scholars and poets. During his term of power the scholar Moses ben Enoch was appointed rabbi of Cordova, and as a consequence Spain became the center of Talmudic study, and Cordova the meeting-place of Jewish savants. After the downfall of Al-xxxakim, who likewise favored the Jews, a struggle for the throne broke out between Sulaiman ibn al-xxxakim and Mohammed ibn Hisham. Sulaiman solicited the assistance of Count Sancho of Castile, while Mohammed, through the agency of wealthy Jewish merchants in Cordova, obtained the aid of Count Ramon of Barcelona. For this Sulaiman took fearful revenge upon the Jews, expelling them mercilessly from city and country (1013). With this came the end of the Golden Age of Jews in Spain for many years.

Terrified by the conquests of King Alfonso VI. of Castile, Al-Mu'tamid, heedless of the remonstrances of his son, called to his aid the ambitious Yusuf ibn Tashfin of North Africa. In the terrific battle of Zallaḳa (Oct., 1086), in which Jews fought bravely both in the Christian and in the Moorish army, Yusuf won a victory and the sovereign power. The Almoravides, a warlike, fanatical religious sect, now became the rulers of southern Spain; they did nothing to improve the welfare of the Jews. Yusuf ibn Tashfin endeavored to force the large and wealthy community of Lucena to embrace Islam. Under the reign of his son Ali (1106-43) the position of the Jews was more favorable. Some were appointed "mushawirah" (collectors and custodians of the royal taxes). Others entered the service of the state, holding the title of "vizier" or "nasi"; among these may be mentioned the poet and physician Abu Ayyub Solomon ibn al-Mu'allam of Seville, Abraham ibn Meïr ibn Ḳamnial, Abu Isaac ibn Muhajar, and Solomon ibn Farusal (murdered May 2, 1108). The old communities of Seville, Granada, and Cordova prospered anew.

Under the Almohades

The power of the Almoravides was of short duration. A fanatic of North Africa, Abdallah ibn Tumart, appeared about 1112 as the upholder of Mohammed's original teachings concerning the unity of God, and became the founder of a new party called the Almohades, or Muzmotas ("Shebeṭ Yehudah," p. 3, gives the correct date as 4872 [= 1112]). Upon the death of Abdallah, 'Abd al-Mu'min took the leadership and endeavored with sword and brand to exterminate the Almoravides as political and religious enemies. In North Africa he won victory after victory. In the same year in which the Second Crusade brought new distress to the German Jews, 'Abd al-'Mu'min passed over to southern Spain in order to wrest that country from the Almoravides. He conquered Cordova (1148), Seville, Lucena, Montilla, Aguilar, and Baena, and within a year the whole of Andalusia was in the possession of the Almohades. As in Africa, so in Spain, the Jews were forced to accept the Islamic faith; the conquerors confiscated their property and took their wives and children, many of whom were sold as slaves. The most famous Jewish educational institutions were closed, and the beautiful synagogues every where destroyed.

The terrible persecutions by the Almohades lasted for ten years. On account of these persecutions many Jews made a pretense of embracing Islam, but a great number fled to Castile, whose tolerant ruler, Alfonso VII., received them with hospitality, especially in Toledo. Others fled to northern Spain and to Provence, in which latter country the Ḳimḥis sought refuge. Various attempts on the part of the Jews to defend themselves against the Almohades were unsuccessful; the courageous Abu Ruiz ibn Dahri of Granada especially distinguished himself in such a conflict (1162; see "Al-Maḳḳari," ed. Gayangos, ii. 23). The part taken by the Jews in the struggle against the Almohades must not be underestimated; the latter's power was broken in the battle of Navas de Toledo on July 16, 1212.

In the Ottoman Empire

Jews residing in predominantly Muslim Ottoman empire lived in a tolerant environment with Turkish Arab and Christian neighbors.

In Jewish mystical literature

The Zohar, a work of Kabbalah, permits travelling Jews, under the circumstance where the number of Jews are insufficient to form a minyan[?], to pray alongside Muslims in a salaat[?], provided that Jewish prayers be uttered by the Jews.

Dar ul-Islam was considered the golden medinah for the Medieval Jew because of the considerable ease to observe kashrut the halacha in a land where halal and the shari'a were maintained, unlike in Christian countries.

The Mongols, being Shamanists, Buddhists, Nestorian Christians and Muslims at different stages of the Mongol domination of Turan, greatly enhanced Jewish status, partly due to the Mongols' strategic interests with commercial ethnic groups like Jews and Armenians. It is conjectured that the Yiddish word for the kippa, "yarmulke", derived from the Turkic work "yarmuk", meaning "rain cover". There are also accounts of special Mongol charters protecting Jews all over the Golden Horde in the events when the Khans' Muslim or Christian subjects directed their hostilities towards the Jews. The Yiddish culture of Eastern Europe in modern times had extensive affinities to the Muslim Tatar cultures of Crimea, Russia, Poland-Lithuania and the North Caucasus. Jewish Kletzmer bands often celebrate the themes of "Bulgarsky", revealing the origin of Kletzmer music in Eurasian Bulgaria (not the Balkans). It is safe to say that the culture of the Eastern European shtetls had the same soul as the Tatar cultures of Russia and Ukraine.

However, in the rather fervently Sunni Mongol khanate of the Timurids and the Uzbeks, heavy Jiziyya[?] was imposed on the Jews of Central Asia, especially Bukhara, which was collected yearly, accompanied by a humiliating slap on the taxpayers' face (Central Asian Muslims also developed this myth scapegoating the existence of Jews in their cities for the devastating onslaughts of Genghis Khan and Timurlenk, casting their Mongol overlords in a noble "scourge of God" mold).

In 17th Century, the pseudo-Messiah of the Sephardic Jews in Ottoman Rumelia, after a thwarted proto-Zionist adventure, converted nominally to the Sunni Muslim orthodoxy of the Caliphate, and founded the crypto-Judaic sect within Islam called "Donmeh". This sect heavily drew mystic elements from Lurian Kabbalah, Sufism and Shi'ite Alawism and was involved in the palace intrigues of the Ottoman Empire.

Interplay between Jewish and Muslim philosophy

There was a great deal of intellectual cross-fertilization between the Muslim and Jewish rationalist philosophers of the medieval era. See also the articles on Jewish philosophy and Early Muslim philosophy.

Arabic philosophy dates from the appearance of dissenting sects in Islam. A century had hardly elapsed after Mohammed revealed the Koran, when numerous germs of religious schism began to arise. Independent minds sought to investigate the doctrines of the Koran, which until then had been accepted in blind faith on the authority of divine revelation. The first independent protest was that of the Kadar (from the Arabic kadara, to have power), whose partisans affirmed the freedom of the will, in contrast with the Jabarites (jabar, force, constraint), who maintained the belief in fatalism.

Rise of First Radical School

In the second century of the Hegira, a schism arose in the theological schools of Bassora, over which Ḥasan al-Baṣri presided. A pupil, Wasil ibn Atha, who was expelled from the school because his answers were contrary to tradition, proclaimed himself leader of a new school, and systematized all the radical opinions of preceding sects, particularly those of the Kadarites. This new school or sect was called Motazilite (from itazala, to separate oneself, to dissent). Its principal dogmas were three: (1) God is an absolute unity, and no attribute can be ascribed to Him. (2) Man is a free agent. It is on account of these two principles that the Motazilites designate themselves the "AsḦab al-'Adl w'al TauḦid" (The Partizans of Justice and Unity). (3) All knowledge necessary for the salvation of man emanates from his reason; he could acquire knowledge before as well as after Revelation, by the sole light of reason—a fact which, therefore, makes knowledge obligatory upon all men, at all times, and in all places.

The Motazilites, compelled to defend their principles against the orthodox Islamic faith, looked for support to the doctrines of philosophy, and thus founded a rational theology, which they designated "'Ilm-al-Kalam" (Science of the Word); and those professing it were called Motekallamin. This appellation, originally designating the Motazilites, soon became the common name for all seeking philosophical demonstration in confirmation of religious principles. The first Motekallamin had to combat both the orthodox and the infidel parties, between whom they occupied the middle ground; but the efforts of subsequent generations were entirely concentrated against the philosophers.

From the ninth century onward, owing to Calif al-Ma'mun and his successor, Greek philosophy was introduced among the Arabs, and the Peripatetic school began to find able representatives among them; such were Al-Kindi, Al-Farabi, Ibn Sina, and Ibn Roshd, all of whose fundamental principles were considered as heresies by the Motekallamin.

Argument for Creation

Aristotle, the prince of the philosophers, demonstrated the unity of God; but from the view which he maintained, that matter was eternal, it followed that God could not be the Creator of the world. Again, to assert, as the Peripatetics did, that God's knowledge extends only to the general laws of the universe, and not to individual and accidental things, is tantamount to giving denial to prophecy. One other point shocked the faith of the Motekallamin—the theory of the intellect. The Peripatetics taught that the human soul was only an aptitude—a faculty capable of attaining every variety of passive perfection—and that through information and virtue it became qualified for union with the active intellect, which latter emanates from God. To admit this theory would be to deny the immortality of the soul (see Alexander of Aphrodisias).

Wherefore the Motekallamin had, before anything else, to establish a system of philosophy to demonstrate the creation of matter, and they adopted to that end the theory of atoms as enunciated by Democritus. They taught that atoms possess neither quantity nor extension. Originally atoms were created by God, and are created now as occasion seems to require. Bodies come into existence or die, through the aggregation or the sunderance of these atoms. But this theory did not remove the objections of philosophy to a creation of matter. For, indeed, if it be supposed that God commenced His work at a certain definite time by His "will," and for a certain definite object, it must be admitted that He was imperfect before accomplishing His will, or before attaining His object. In order to obviate this difficulty, the Motekallamin extended their theory of the atoms to Time, and claimed that just as Space is constituted of atoms and vacuum, Time, likewise, is constituted of small indivisible moments. The creation of the world once established, it was an easy matter for them to demonstrate the existence of a Creator, and that He is unique, omnipotent, and omniscient.

Toward the middle of the eighth century a dissenting sect—still in existence to-day—called Karaites, arose in Judaism. In order to give a philosophical tinge to their polemics with their opponents, they borrowed the dialectic forms of the Motekallamin, and even adopted their name (Mas'udi, in "Notices et Extraits des Manuscrits de la Bibliothèque Royale," viii. 349-351), and thus transplanted the Kalam gradually to Jewish soil, to undergo the same transformations there as among the Arabs.

Saadia Gaon

One of the most important early Jewish philosophers influenced by Islamic philosophy is Saadia Gaon (892-942). His most imporant work is Emunot ve-De'ot (Book of Beliefs and Opinions). In this work Saadia treats of the questions that interested the Motekallamin so deeply—such as the creation of matter, the unity of God, the divine attributes, the soul, etc. — and he criticizes the philosophers severely.

For to Saadia there is no problem as to creation: God created the world ex nihilo, just as Scripture attests; and he contests the theory of the Motekallamin in reference to atoms, which theory, he declares, is just as contrary to reason and religion as the theory of the philosophers professing the eternity of matter. To prove the unity of God, Saadia uses the demonstrations of the Motekallamin. Only the attributes of essence (sifat-al-datiat) can be ascribed to God, but not the attributes of action (sifat-al-af'aliyat). The soul is a substance more delicate even than that of the celestial spheres. Here Saadia controverts the Motekallamin, who considered the soul an "accident" (compare "Moreh," i. 74), and employs the following one of their premises to justify his position: "Only a substance can be the substratum of an accident" (that is, of a non-essential property of things). Saadia argues: "If the soul be an accident only, it can itself have no such accidents as wisdom, joy, love," etc. Saadia was thus in every way a supporter of the Kalam; and if at times he deviated from its doctrines, it was owing to his religious views; just as the Jewish and Moslem Peripatetics stopped short in their respective Aristotelianism whenever there was danger of wounding orthodox religion.

Neoplatonic Philosophy

Jewish philosophy entered upon a new period in the eleventh century. The works of the Peripatetics —Al-Farabi and Ibn Sina (Avicenna)—on the one side, and the "Encyclopedia of the Brethren of Purity"—a transformed Kalam founded on Neoplatonic theories—on the other side, exercised considerable influence upon Jewish thinkers of that age. The two leading philosophers of the period are Ibn Gabirol (Avicebron) and Bahya ibn Pakuda[?] — the former standing upon a purely philosophical platform, the latter upon a religio-philosophical one; and both attaining similar results. Both believe in a universal matter as the substratum of all (except God) that exists; but Bahya goes further and determines what that matter is: it is Darkness ("Ma'ani al-Nafs," translated by Broydé, p. 17). But this matter did not exist from all eternity, as the Peripatetics claimed. It is easy to perceive here the growth of the Peripatetic ideas as to substance and form; but influenced by religion, these ideas are so shaped as to admit the non-eternity of matter. In all that pertains to the soul and its action, Gabirol and Bahya are undoubtedly influenced by the "Brethren of Purity." Man (the microcosm) is in every way like the celestial spheres (the macrocosm). Just as the heavenly spheres receive their motion from the universal soul—which is a simple substance emanating from God—so man receives his motion from the rational soul—another simple substance emanating from Him.

In fact, creation came through emanation, and in the following sequence: (1) The active intellect; (2) the universal soul—which moves the heavenly sphere; (3) nature; (4) darkness—which at the beginning was but a capacity to receive form; (5) the celestial spheres; (6) the heavenly bodies; (7) fire; (8) air; (9) water; (10) earth ("Ma'ani al-Nafs," 72; compare Munk, l.c., p. 201). But as regards the question of the attributes which occupy the Jewish and Moslem theologians so much, Bahya, in his work on ethics, "Hovot ha-Levavot," written in Arabic under the title of "Kitab al-Hidayat fi faraidh al Kulub" (The Duties of the Heart), is of the same opinion as the Motazilites, that the attributes by which one attempts to describe God should be taken in a negative sense, as excluding the opposite attributes. With reference to Gabirol, a positive opinion can not be given on this point, as his "Fons Vitæ" does not deal with the question; but there is reason to believe that he felt the influence of the Asharites, who admitted attributes. In fact, in his poetical philosophy, entitled "Keter Malkut" (The Crown of Royalty), Gabirol uses numerous attributes in describing God.By way of a general statement, one may say that the Neoplatonic philosophy among the Jews of the eleventh century marks a transitional epoch, leading either to the pure philosophy of the Peripatetics or to the mysticism of the Cabala.

The Apotheosis of Philosophy

The twelfth century saw the apotheosis of pure philosophy and the decline of the Kalam, which latter, being attacked by both the philosophers and the orthodox, perished for lack of champions. This supreme exaltation of philosophy was due, in great measure, to Gazzali (1005-1111) among the Arabs, and to Judah ha-Levi (1140) among the Jews. In fact, the attacks directed against the philosophers by Gazzali in his work, "TuḦfat al-Falasafa" (The Destruction of the Philosophers), not only produced, by reaction, a current favorable to philosophy, but induced the philosophers themselves to profit by his criticism, they thereafter making their theories clearer and their logic closer. The influence of this reaction brought forth the two greatest philosophers that the Arabic Peripatetic school ever produced, namely, Ibn Baja (Aven Pace) and Ibn Roshd (Averroes), both of whom undertook the defense of philosophy.

Since no idea and no literary or philosophical movement ever germinated on Arabian soil without leaving its impress on the Jews, Gazzali found an imitator in the person of Judah ha-Levi. This illustrious poet took upon himself to free religion from the shackles of speculative philosophy, and to this end wrote the "Cuzari," in which he sought to discredit all schools of philosophy alike. He passes severe censure upon the Motekallamin for seeking to support religion by philosophy. He says, "I consider him to have attained the highest degree of perfection who is convinced of religious truths without having scrutinized them and reasoned over them" ("Cuzari," v.). Then he reduced the chief propositions of the Motekallamin, to prove the unity of God, to ten in number, describing them at length, and concluding in these terms: "Does the Kalam give us more information concerning God and His attributes than the prophet did?" (Ib. iii. and iv.) Aristotelianism finds no favor in his eyes, for it is no less given to details and criticism; Neoplatonism alone suited him somewhat, owing to its appeal to his poetic temperament.

But the Hebrew Gazzali was no more successful than his Arabian prototype; and his attacks, although they certainly helped to discredit the Kalam—for which no one cared any longer—were altogether powerless against Peripatetic philosophy, which soon found numerous defenders. In fact, soon after the "Cuzari" made its appearance, Abraham ibn Daud published his "Emunah Ramah" (The Sublime Faith), wherein he recapitulated the teachings of the Peripatetics, Al-Farabi and Ibn Sina, upon the physics and metaphysics of Aristotle, and sought to demonstrate that these theories were in perfect harmony with the doctrines of Judaism. "It is an error generally current," says Ibn Daud in the preface of his book, "that the study of speculative philosophy is dangerous to religion. True philosophy not only does not harm religion, it confirms and strengthens it."

Maimonides

The authority of Ibn Daud, however, did not suffice to give permanence to Aristotelianism in Judaism. This accomplishment was reserved for Maimonides, who endeavored to harmonize the philosophy of Aristotle with Judaism; and to this end he composed his immortal work, "Dalalat al-Ḥairin" (Guide of the Perplexed)—known better under its Hebrew title "Moreh Nebukim"—which served for many centuries as the subject of discussion and comment by Jewish thinkers.

In this work, Maimonides, after refuting the propositions of the Motekallamin, considers Creation, the Unity of God, the Attributes of God, the Soul, etc., and treats them in accordance with the theories of Aristotle to the extent in which these latter do not conflict with religion. For example, while accepting the teachings of Aristotle upon matter and form, he pronounces against the eternity of matter. Nor does he accept Aristotle's theory that God can have a knowledge of universals only, and not of particulars. If He had no knowledge of particulars, He would be subject to constant change. Maimonides argues: "God perceives future events before they happen, and this perception never fails Him. Therefore there are no new ideas to present themselves to Him. He knows that such and such an individual does not yet exist, but that he will be born at such a time, exist for such a period, and then return into non-existence. When then this individual comes into being, God does not learn any new fact; nothing has happened that He knew not of, for He knew this individual, such as he is now, before his birth" ("Moreh," i. 20). While seeking thus to avoid the troublesome consequences certain Aristotelian theories would entail upon religion, Maimonides could not altogether escape those involved in Aristotle's idea of the unity of souls; and herein he laid himself open to the attacks of the orthodox.

Averroism

Ibn Roshd (Averroes), the contemporary of Maimonides, closes the philosophical era of the Arabs. The boldness of this great commentator of Aristotle aroused the full fury of the orthodox, who, in their zeal, attacked all philosophers indiscriminately, and had all philosophical writings committed to the flames. The theories of Ibn Roshd do not differ fundamentally from those of Ibn Baja and Ibn Tufail, who only follow the teachings of Ibn Sina and Al-Farabi. Like all Arabic Peripatetics, Ibn Roshd admits the hypothesis of the intelligence of the spheres and the hypothesis of universal emanation, through which motion is communicated from place to place to all parts of the universe as far as the supreme world—hypotheses which, in the mind of the Arabic philosophers, did away with the dualism involved in Aristotle's doctrine of pure energy and eternal matter. But while Al-Farabi, Ibn Sina, and other Arab philosophers hurried, so to speak, over subjects that trenched on religious dogmas, Ibn Roshd delighted in dwelling upon them with full particularity and stress. Thus he says, "Not only is matter eternal, but form is potentially inherent in matter; otherwise, it were a creation ex nihilo (Munk, "Mélanges," p. 444). According to this theory,therefore, the existence of this world is not only a possibility, as Ibn Sina declared—in order to make concessions to the orthodox—but also a necessity. Driven from the Arabian schools, Arabic philosophy found a refuge with the Jews, to whom belongs the honor of having transmitted it to the Christian world. A series of eminent men—such as the Tibbons, Narboni, Gersonides—joined in translating the Arabic philosophical works into Hebrew and commenting upon them. The works of Ibn Roshd especially became the subject of their study, due in great measure to Maimonides, who, in a letter addressed to his pupil Joseph ibn Aknin, spoke in the highest terms of Ibn Roshd's commentary.

Influence on Exegesis

The influence which the Arabic intellect exercised over Jewish thought was not confined to philosophy; it left an indelible impress on the field of Biblical exegesis also. Saadia's commentary on the Bible bears the stamp of the Motazilites; and its author, while not admitting any positive attributes of God, except these of essence, endeavors to interpret Biblical passages in such a way as to rid them of anthropomorphism. The celebrated commentator, Abraham ibn Ezra, explains the Biblical account of Creation and other Scriptural passages in a philosophical sense. NaḦmanides, too, and other commentators, show the influence of the philosophical ideas current in their respective epochs. This salutary inspiration, which lasted for five consecutive centuries, yielded to that other influence alone that came from the neglected depths of Jewish and of Neoplatonic mysticism, and which took the name of Cabala.

Post-Zionism relations

This section will discuss the relationship between Jews and Muslims since the creation of the State of Israel. This section will not be about the Arab-Israeli conflict or the Israeli-Palestinian conflict; those subjects have their own entries.

See also: Islam, Judaism