In the turbulent times of the first crusades to reclaim Palestine and Jerusalem from the Muslims, a Jew was born in 1135 AD in Cordoba, the capital of Muslim Andalusia. His influence would leave a strong mark not only on Jewish thought but also on Christian and Islamic thought. His name was Moses Maimonides, or Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon.
Under the rule of the Spanish Umayyads (756-1031), and especially under the reign of Caliph Abd ar-Rahman III, the Jews of Cordoba experienced a remarkable economic and cultural development. The Jewish quarter was located in the southwest of Cordoba, near the Royal Palace. It was here that a Jewish intellectual elite would develop, based on the fusion of Jewish tradition with the science of the time. The type of cosmopolitan and cultured courtier, educated in the sciences and in Jewish tradition, would provide a certain background and precedent for Maimonides.
However, his childhood was to be marked by deep political and military tensions. Against the backdrop of the fundamentalist Almohad movement initiated by Muhammad Ibn Tumart in Morocco, Andalusia was united with North Africa in a single empire. In this context, Jews were persecuted and many of them converted to Islam. It is known that Maimonides’ family left Cordoba in 1148 and, after wandering around Andalusia, lived in Fez (Morocco), then in Palestine, before settling in Fustat (Egypt).
He began his education with his father, Maimon, and other scholars of the time, surprising them with his versatility and depth of thought. He was first introduced to Jewish studies, but also to the scientific disciplines of the time, especially philosophy and medicine. He was also interested in astrology, which he later considered useless. He studied astronomy, and was of great help in establishing the religious calendar. Of the ancient philosophers, he was most influenced by Aristotle. Although there is no clear evidence that he read their works in their entirety, he mentions philosophers such as Plato, Plotinus, Epicurus, John Philoponus, and Euclid. He also showed his appreciation for certain Islamic philosophers: Al-Farabi, Ibn Bajja, Avicenna and Averroës.
Shortly after Maimonides settled in Fustat, Saladin became Sultan of Egypt. His patron, Al-Qadi Al-Fadil, became Saladin’s chief administrator, and this was to have a beneficial influence on Maimonides’ fate. He became court physician to the Sultan and to Saladin’s son Al-Afdal, and from 1191 he became the leader of the Jews, assuming the highest legal authority within the Jewish community.
The work of Maimonides
Maimonides’ most important works are undoubtedly the Mishneh Torah and The Guide for the Perplexed. Meaning “repetition of the Torah,” The Mishneh Torah is a veritable compendium of Jewish law. Maimonides organised the laws to make them easier to memorise, and arranged all the main topics of the Talmud into 14 volumes, each containing between three and ten treatises. One of his main aims was to unite law with philosophy, or practise with theory.
As for the second work (The Guide for the Perplexed), it was written in Arabic but with Hebrew letters and was divided into three main parts: 1) philosophical concepts on God, 2) his own arguments on the existence of God and problems of cosmology, creation and propheticism, and 3) theodicy and providence, ethics, perfection, and happiness. The work is philosophical in nature, and Maimonides’ two main purposes in it are to explain difficult terms that appear in the prophetic books, and to clarify obscure parables in the scripture texts. In other words, Maimonides aims to help the reader understand certain hidden meanings of the sacred text. After being translated into Latin in the 13th century, the work was read by leading figures such as Alexander of Hales, William of Auvergne, Albert the Great, and Thomas Aquinas.
In addition to the two works mentioned above, Maimonides also wrote a number of letters and essays, including the Epistle to Yemen, written in 1172. This work was a letter to the Jewish community in Yemen who were experiencing severe religious persecution. Maimonides encourages the Jews, advising them to preserve their faith and Jewish identity. This is the context for Maimonides’ attacks on Islam and Christianity, with Muhammad seen as a madman and Jesus as an impostor to whom he wishes nothing more than for His bones to be ground to dust. To encourage his community, Maimonides refers to the imminent coming of the Messiah.
Another important letter is the Letter on Astrology, addressed to the rabbis of southern France, who were concerned about the pernicious effects of astrological determinism on their followers. Maimonides counters these fears by emphasising the role of providence, divine retribution, and free will.
Treatise on Resurrection is a response to attacks on Maimonides’ view of the afterlife and the future world. While his opponents identified the future world with the resurrection of the dead, Maimonides seemed to regard the resurrection as a secondary step in the final process of immortality.
In Commentary on the Mishnah, Maimonides seems to argue that the bodies of the righteous will be resurrected at some point in the future, but will not live forever, instead giving way to ultimate intellectual perfection in the form of immortality of the soul. Therefore, in his Treatise on Resurrection, published in 1191, Maimonides, while recognising the public confusion about his position, finds the accusations ridiculous and thus defends his belief in the resurrection. After his theological and philosophical works, Maimonides turned to medicine, writing ten medical treatises between 1190 and 1204. Although mainly quoting Galen, Maimonides occasionally mentions Hippocrates and other Greek and even Muslim medical writers. His most important and popular medical work is his Medical Aphorisms, a work which was intended to convey Galen’s ideas in a summarised form.
Maimonides and Jesus of Nazareth
For Maimonides, Jesus was an impostor who, like the apostle Paul and Muhammad, tried to imitate the Jewish religion: “They have modelled their religions on ours, in order to glorify themselves and to indulge the fantasy that they are somehow similar.” According to Maimonides, the laws and commandments received by the Jews make them a distinguished and unique people among the other nations of the earth. Thus, by observing them, they will acquire moral and intellectual qualities, and the community of the pious will become prominent, achieving a double perfection. In his view, Moses was the greatest man who ever lived on earth and the greatest of the prophets. Jesus of Nazareth, on the other hand, was for him one of the greatest enemies of Israel and one of the greatest outlaws in the world. Jesus was one of the heretics and unbelievers whose minds were destroyed by ignorance and whose souls were darkened by lust, because they had defamed the Law and the Prophets and disregarded the commandments with contempt. Thus the curse of Maimonides was that the bones of Jesus would be ground to dust and His name forgotten.
Fulfilling the words of the prophet Moses (Exodus 12:46; Numbers 9:12) and the prophet king David (Psalm 34:20), the Gospel of John (19:36) affirms the reality that Maimonides sought to deny. Despite his desire to erase the memory of Jesus of Nazareth, His name is exalted above all others. Ironically, the one who originally shared the same desire as Maimonides, the Apostle Paul (Acts 9:5), is the same one who ultimately proclaimed the universal recognition of that name (Philippians 2:9-11).
Maimonides portrayed Jesus as a renegade who sought to undermine the Jewish religion and classified Christianity, which he saw as a later doctrine attached to the name of Jesus, as a form of idolatry. In this context, it is worth asking: if Jesus of Nazareth had the intention of nullifying the Jewish religion, why would He have given such prominence to the Old Testament texts in His teachings (Matthew 5:17-20; Luke 16:31; 24:27; John 5:39-47, etc.)? Furthermore, if He was not the Messiah and His body remained in the tomb, as Maimonides suggests, what would have prompted His first followers to sacrifice their lives for what would have been a false teaching?
For Maimonides, the persecution of the Jews in Yemen was a harbinger of the coming of the Messiah, which was to happen years later, but only God knew the truth. Unfortunately, Maimonides expected a political Messiah, as previous religious leaders had done a thousand years before him: a Messiah who would come for the good of his persecuted and scattered Gentile community; a Messiah who would come, as Maimonides expected, to rebuild the Temple in Jerusalem and restore the sacrificial system. He would be a human Messiah who, having brought supremacy to the people of Israel, would nevertheless die, leaving the affairs of the established kingdom to His descendants. Was such a Messiah needed by the people of Israel? How would this Messiah solve the problem of suffering and death? What would be the purpose of the Messiah Maimonides expected to restore the Temple sacrifices?
These are some of the questions that needed to be answered a thousand years ago. And they still need to be answered today by those who see Jesus of Nazareth as a historical figure who played the role of an “impostor” so well that He kept the Law of Moses and revealed its meaning like no other, and convinced His followers that He was the expected Messiah, which they accepted at the cost of their lives.