You1 who study my Treatise, know that something similar to what happens to sensory apprehensions happens likewise to intellectual apprehensions in so far as they are attached to matter. For when you see with your eye, you apprehend something that is within the power of your sight to apprehend. If, however, your eyes are forced to do something they are reluctant to do—if they are made to gaze fixedly and are set the task of looking over a great distance, too great for you to see, or if you contemplate very minute writing2 or a minute drawing3 that is not within your power to apprehend—and if you force your eye, in spite of its reluctance, to find out the true reality of the thing, your eye shall not only be too weak to apprehend that which you are unable to apprehend, but also too weak to apprehend that which is within your power to apprehend. Your eye shall grow tired, and you shall not be able to apprehend what you could apprehend before having gazed fixedly and before having been given this task. A similar discovery is made by everyone engaging in the speculative study of some science with respect to his state of reflection.4 For if he applies himself to reflection and sets himself a task demanding his entire attention,5 he becomes dull and does not then understand even that which is within his scope to understand. [35b] For the condition of all bodily faculties is, in this respect, one and the same. Something similar can happen to you with regard to intellectual apprehensions. For if you stay your progress because of a dubious point; if you do not deceive yourself into believing that there is a demonstration with regard to matters that have not been demonstrated; if you do not hasten to reject and categorically to pronounce false any assertions whose contradictories have not been demonstrated; if, finally, you do not aspire to apprehend that which you are unable to apprehend—you will have achieved human perfection and attained the rank of Rabbi Aqiba, peace be on him, who entered in peace and went out in peace6 when engaged in the theoretical study of these metaphysical7 matters. If, on the other hand, you aspire to apprehend things that are beyond your apprehension; or if you hasten to pronounce false, assertions the contradictories of which have not been demonstrated or that are possible, though very remotely so—you will have joined Elisha Aḥer.8 That is, you will not only not be perfect, but will be the most deficient among the deficient; and it shall so fall out that you will be overcome by imaginings and by an inclination toward things defective, evil, and wicked—this resulting from the intellect’s being preoccupied and its light’s being extinguished. In a similar way, various species of delusive imaginings are produced in the sense of sight when the visual spirit9 is weakened, as in the case of sick people and of such as persist in looking at brilliant or minute objects.
In this regard it is said: Hast thou found honey? Eat so much as is sufficient for thee, lest thou be filled therewith and vomit it.10 In a similar way, the Sages, may their memory be blessed, used this verse as a parable that they applied to Elisha Aḥer. How marvellous is this parable, inasmuch as it likens knowledge to eating, a meaning about which we have spoken.11 It also mentions the most delicious of foods, namely, honey. Now, according to its nature, honey, if eaten to excess, upsets the stomach and causes vomiting. Accordingly Scripture says, as it were, that in spite of its sublimity, greatness, and what it has of perfection, the nature of the apprehension in question12—[36a] if not made to stop at its proper limit and not conducted with circumspection—may be perverted into a defect, just as the eating of honey may. For whereas the individual eating in moderation is nourished and takes pleasure in it, it all goes if there is too much of it. Accordingly Scripture does not say, Lest thou be filled therewith and loathe it, but rather says, and vomit it. This notion is also referred to in Scripture in the dictum: It is not good to eat much honey, and so on,13 as well as in the dictum, Neither make thyself overwise; why shouldst thou destroy thyself?14 It likewise refers to this in the dictum: Guard thy foot when thou goest to the house of God, and so on.15 This is also referred to by David in the dictum: Neither do I exercise myself in things too great or in things too marvellous for me.16 The Sages too intended to express this notion in their dictum: Do not inquire about things that are too marvellous for you; do not investigate what is hidden from you; inquire into things that are permitted to you; you have no business with marvels.17 This means that you should let your intellect move about only within the domain of things that man is able to grasp. For in regard to matters that it is not in the nature of man to grasp, it is, as we have made clear, very harmful to occupy oneself with them. This is what the Sages intended to signify by their dictum, Whoever considers four things, and so on,18 completing the dictum by saying, He who does not have regard for the honor of his Creator; whereby they indicated what we have already made clear: namely, that man should not press forward to engage in speculative study of corrupt imaginings. When points appearing as dubious occur to him or the thing he seeks does not seem to him to be demonstrated, he should not deny and reject it, hastening to pronounce it false, but rather should persevere and thereby have regard for the honor of his Creator. He should refrain and hold back. This matter has already become clear. The intention of these texts set down by the prophets and the Sages, may their memory be blessed, is not, however, wholly to close the gate of speculation and to deprive the intellect of the apprehension of things that it is possible to apprehend—as is thought by the ignorant and neglectful, who [36b] are pleased to regard their own deficiency and stupidity as perfection and wisdom, and the perfection and the knowledge of others as a deficiency and a defection from Law, and who thus regard darkness as light and light as darkness.19 Their purpose, in its entirety, rather is to make it known that the intellects of human beings have a limit at which they stop.
Do not criticize the terms applied to the intellect in this chapter and others. For the purpose here is to guide toward the intended notion and not to investigate the truth of the essence of the intellect; for other chapters are devoted to a precise account of this subject.20