1. Kant, Religion, 130–34.
2. Randall, The Making of the Modern Mind, 42.
3. Fraenkel, Teaching Plato in Palestine, 35.
4. Tillich, Biblical Religion, 9.
5. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3.32, 527.
6. Heschel, God in Search of Man, 75. For an excellent study of Heschel’s thought, see Held, Abraham Joshua Heschel, esp. 29: “All religious awareness and insight are rooted in wonder.”
7. To say that the Torah is concerned with how we think is not to say that it contains articles of faith, as some Christian denominations do. It is true, of course, that at an early age, Maimonides argued that one had to accept thirteen principles to be deemed a Jew. These principles were later codified in the “Yigdal” hymn. To this day, his argument remains controversial. See his Commentary on the Mishnah, “Sandredin, Chapter Ten.” For a readily available English translation, see A Maimonides Reader, 402–23.
For further discussion of Maimonides’s principles, as well as their reception, see Kellner, Dogma in Medieval Jewish Thought and Must a Jew Believe Anything? Even in Maimonides’s lifetime, a controversy arose over how deeply he himself was committed to these principles, especially number 13: belief in resurrection.
1. Kugel, How to Read the Bible, 14–15. Note that Kugel lists four assumptions in all. The others are that the Bible contains no contradictions, so there must be a way of making everything consistent, while the second is that the Bible is divinely inspired.
2. Talmud, Shabbat 127a.
3. For Jewish thinkers who foreshadowed Spinoza as far back as the eleventh century and the interest in historical context that developed during the Renaissance, see Levenson, The Hebrew Bible, 88–91.
4. Spinoza, Theological-Political Treatise, chap. 7, 88–89.
5. Spinoza, Theological-Political Treatise, chap. 12, 145.
6. For a landmark decision that decided this issue in favor of a broad interpretation, see Cohen v. California, 403 U.S. 15 (1971). Note that the decision was 5 to 4.
7. For further discussion of this principle (often known by the Latin term lex talionis) in the Torah, see Sarna, Exploring Exodus, 185–89.
8. Iliad, bk. 24, 588–97.
9. Iliad, bk. 24, 740–45.
10. Levenson, The Hebrew Bible, 156–57.
11. Talmud, Chagigah 10a.
12. Talmud, Chagigah 3a.
13. In this respect, I part company with the approach taken by Yoram Hazony in The Philosophy of Hebrew Scripture.
1. In this instance, I have departed from the NJPS translation, which reads: “When God began to create heaven and earth—the earth being unformed and void, with darkness over the surface of the deep and a wind from God sweeping over the water . . .” The grammar and meaning of Genesis 1:1 have long been disputed, in part because it is unclear what the first word (beresheit) is modifying and how the sentence is to be parsed.
2. Note, as Rashi does in his commentary on this passage, that the word for “heavens” (shamayim) is derived from the word for “waters” (mayim).
3. Smolin, The Life of the Cosmos, 24.
4. Plato, Timaeus 30a–b.
5. Wolfson, The Philosophy of the Kalam, 434–52, traces this argument to the Islamic theologian al-Juwayni. Its best-known version is that of Alghazali, The Incoherence of the Philosophers, 12–27. For a modern discussion of the consequences of the argument, see Feldman, “‘In the Beginning God Created,’” 3–26.
6. For an excellent account of astronomy in the Middle Ages, see Grant, Planets, Stars, and Orbs. For more on Maimonides’s view of astronomy, see my Maimonides on the Origin of the World, esp. chap. 5.
7. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 2.19, 307.
8. For an excellent account of Spinoza’s life, see Nadler, Spinoza.
9. Spinoza, Ethics, 4, preface, 153.
10. Hawking, The Theory of Everything, 104.
11. Polkinghorne, Science and Providence, 22.
12. Hawking, The Grand Design, 160–61.
13. Carter, “Large Number Coincidence,” 126.
14. Einstein, Philosopher-Scientist, 63.
16. For an excellent discussion of the variety of alternative universes, see Rubenstein, Worlds without End. It is telling that by the end of the book (235–36) the issues become so speculative that all Rubenstein can offer is a “hunch” about what might be the case. For a discussion of the history of the problem in ancient and medieval sources, see Feldman, “On Plural Universes,” 329–65. Note how much of this debate turns on the question of an actual infinite. For Aristotle and most of the scholastics, such a thing is impossible; for the Jewish philosopher Crescas, as for Spinoza, it is possible.
17. Greene, The Hidden Reality, 146.
18. Swinburne, Is There a God?, 68.
19. See, for example, Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3.51, 619. This passage will be cited and discussed in the conclusion to this book.
20. See Mitchell, The Enlightened Mind, 191.
1. The distinction between love as the perception of value in something as opposed to the bestowal of love on something is spelled out by Singer in The Nature of Love, 3–23. I will have more to say about this distinction below.
2. 1 John 4:8.
3. Maimonides, Mishneh Torah, Book of Commandments, Positive, 206, 222.
4. Diamond, “Love’s Human Bondage,” 41.
5. Diamond, “Love’s Human Bondage,” 42.
6. Note that in the Hebrew Bible, “heart” (lev) normally means “mind” or “considered judgment.”
7. This point is made by Fox, In the Beginning, 13.
8. In response to my reading, Diamond (“Response,” 10–11) argues that while “one flesh” is a euphemism for sexual contact, it does not imply love. I suggest, however, that the “bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh” remark, as well as the reference to clinging, imply that love is very much at stake. Following Rashi, Diamond reads the passage as a warning against idolatry. If Adam is alone, then he might come to regard himself as a divinity. In reply: (1) the problem of idolatry is far removed from the sense of the passage, and (2) if the philosophical interpretation is correct, and Adam has perfect metaphysical knowledge, then idolatry is not a possibility. I will have more to say about idolatry shortly.
9. Cf. Luke 14:26.
10. Augustine, On Christian Doctrine 3.10.16.
11. Augustine, The City of God 10.3.
12. Augustine, The City of God 10.3.
13. Bachya, Duties of the Heart, 2:343–45.
14. Maimonides, Mishneh Torah 1, Repentance, 10.3.
15. Maimonides, Mishneh Torah 1, Principles of the Torah, 4.12. For more on the intellectual love of God in Judaism, see Gersonides’s Commentary on the Song of Songs and Ebreo’s The Philosophy of Love. This tradition culminates in book 5 of Spinoza’s Ethics, prop. 15: “He who clearly and distinctly understands himself and his emotions feels pleasure accompanied by the idea of God. So he loves God, and, by the same reasoning, the more so the more he understands himself and his emotions.”
16. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3.52, 629.
17. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3.51, 623, 627; cf. Maimonides, Mishneh Torah 1, Repentance, 10.3.
18. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3.51, 627.
19. For an excellent review of this literature, see Pope, The Anchor Bible Song of Songs, 89–229.
20. Mishnah, Yadayim 3:5.
21. Plato, Symposium 205d.
22. Plato, Symposium 211c.
23. The reference to the uniqueness and integrity of the individual is taken from Vlastos, “The Individual as Object of Love,” 31. For a response to Vlastos, see Nussbaum, “The Speech of Alcibiades,” 131–69.
24. See, for example, Nicomachean Ethics 1156b1, 1157a6–13, 1158a11, 1164a3, 1171a11.
25. Nicomachean Ethics 1156a6–1156b31, 1166a–1166b29.
26. Nicomachean Ethics 1168a27–1169b2.
27. Note, as Singer (Love, 347) does, that the commandment to love one’s neighbor as oneself (Leviticus 19:18) assumes that there is or can be a legitimate sense in which one does love oneself.
28. Ethics of the Fathers (Pirkei Avot) 1:14, in Birnbaum, Daily Prayer Book, 482.
29. Nicomachean Ethics 1157b33.
30. Nicomachean Ethics 1158b36–1159a1.
31. Nygren, Agape and Eros. The sharpness of Nygren’s distinction has been roundly criticized. According to Armstrong, “Platonic Eros and Christian Agape,” eros should not be understood as fully acquisitive. Burnaby (Amor Dei, 121–23) points out that while Augustine says that the love of God is grounded in love of the self, this does not mean, as Nygren assumes, that there are two separate intentions with distinct objects. Williams (God’s Grace and Man’s Hope, 67–73) argues that Nygren cannot account for man’s love for God as expressed in the beatitude: “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled” (Matthew 5:6). What would such hunger and thirst amount to, and why would God want to bless them rather than those who do not yearn for righteousness? More recently, Pope Benedict XVI argued in God Is Love (Deus Caritas Est) that both eros and agape properly fall within the scope of God’s love. Finally, there is Tillich: “The desire for God is both the desire for him as love and the desire for him as truth. If the desire for him as love is called agape, the desire for him as truth should be called eros” (Biblical Religion, 72).
32. Nygren, Agape and Eros, 77–78. In defense of Nygren, “indifference to value” is best understood as “transcendent to any previously accepted values.”
33. See chap. 3, n. 1.
34. Shakespeare, Sonnet 130.
35. George and Ira Gershwin, “They Can’t Take That Away from Me,” from the film Shall We Dance (1937).
36. Nygren, Agape and Eros, 449–559, esp. 502–3. For all intents and purposes, Deus Caritas Est is a modern defense of Augustine.
37. See Augustine, The Confessions 10.20–21.
38. Augustine, The Confessions 7.10.
39. Augustine, The Confessions 7.20.
40. Nygren, Agape and Eros, 471–72.
41. Nygren, Agape and Eros, 714.
42. Although this is the view that Nygren ascribes to Luther, May (Love, 114–18) questions whether it is true for all of Christianity on the basis of two considerations: (1) numerous passages in the Gospels suggest that God is concerned with and can be influenced by the actions that we take on earth, and (2) God’s willingness to forgive is not distributed universally or always available. If it were, why do the damned outnumber the saved?
43. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 1.2, 23–24.
44. Cf. Soloveitchik, who argues that we behold God in every nook and corner of creation, and yet “the very moment man turns his face to God, he finds Him remote, unapproachable, enveloped in transcendence and mystery” (The Lonely Man of Faith, 46).
45. Here I follow the lead of Rowley, “The Interpretation of the Song of Songs,” 189–234.
46. Talmud, Avodah Zarah 54b.
47. For example, Exodus 20:5, 34:14, and Deuteronomy 5:9. In some cases (e.g., Deuteronomy 29:19; Ezekiel 5:12, 16:38, 23:25), God’s jealousy is directed against a sinful Israel, but, again, the issue is not love of another human being.
48. Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling, 99.
49. For more on the relation between fear or awe and love, see chapter 10.
1. Later Jewish tradition connects Mount Moriah with the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.
2. Genesis Rabbah 38:13; Josephus, Jewish Antiquities, bk. 1, 154–68, 77–81; Philo, On Abraham, 69–71.
3. In this context, the word translated “faith” (emunah) should not be understood as the acceptance of a formal set of beliefs but rather as an attitude of trust or confidence. Although the difference is sometimes explained as that between faith in and faith that, in all likelihood Abraham’s relation to God contained elements of both.
4. Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling, 85.
5. The painting I am referring to is the one in the Uffizi Gallery in Florence. For a visual image, see http://www.caravaggio.org/the-sacrifice-of-isaac.jsp.
6. For a visual image, see http://www.erembrandt.org/the-sacrifice-of-isaac.jsp.
7. Midrash Genesis Rabbah 56:8.
8. For speculation on what might have happened to Isaac, see Spiegel, The Last Trial, 3–8. Note how much some of the interpretations discussed by Spiegel depart from the biblical text.
9. Again, for speculation on this point, see Spiegel, The Last Trial, 121–25.
10. Philo, On Abraham, 198.
11. In the Hebrew Bible, the exact nature of the relationship between God and angels can be difficult to discern. In some cases they are simply messengers for God. But in others (e.g., Genesis 18:1–4, 21:15–19, 32:24–30; Exodus 3:2), the angel turns out to be God himself, or the text switches from third person to first without warning. So it is not surprising that in this passage, the angel says both “now I know that you fear God” and “you have not withheld your son from me.”
12. Again, I am indebted to Joseph Stern for conversation on this issue.
13. Levenson, Inheriting Abraham, 85–86.
14. Rashi, Chumash, 1:98. Cf. Eliezer, Pirkei of Rabbi Eliezer, 32, 233–34.
15. See, for example, Spiegel, The Last Trial, 64.
16. For an anthropological perspective on this issue, see Delaney, Abraham on Trial. Note the question raised on p. 101: If Abraham was willing to go through with the sacrifice of his son, how does that make him different from his Canaanite neighbors who were not just willing but actually did go through with the sacrifice of their sons?
17. Sarna, Understanding Genesis, 157–62.
18. Levenson, Death and Resurrection, 113–14.
19. Levenson, Death and Resurrection, 138.
20. Kant, Conflict of the Faculties, 115.
21. Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling, 96–97.
22. Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling, 83–95.
23. Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling, 65–66.
24. Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling, 73.
25. Levenson, Death and Resurrection, 130–32.
26. Philo, On Abraham, 177–99. Although Jephthah’s daughter was sacrificed after his victory in battle, the similarity with Agamemnon is still apparent.
27. Genesis Rabbah 56:4.
28. Soloveitchik, Halakhic Man, 140.
29. Soloveitchik, Halakhic Man, 140.
30. Steinberg, Anatomy of Faith, 130–52.
31. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3.24, 501.
32. See, for example, Jacobs, “The Problem of the Akedah,” 1–9.
33. For an introduction to Stern’s position, see his lecture recorded on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vrXegix-75g. In correspondence with Stern, I have learned that he is working on a book-length study of Maimonides’s view of the akedah.
34. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3.27, 510–12.
35. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3.31, 523–24.
36. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 2.36, 369–73.
37. Maimonides makes an exception for Moses, whose prophecy does not involve the use of imagination, but that need not concern us.
38. Maimonides, Mishneh Torah 1, Basic Principles, 4.12.
39. Genesis Rabbah 56:8.
40. Kierkegaard, Fear and Trembling, 89.
1. Cohen, Reason and Hope, 93.
2. Spinoza, Theological Political Treatise, chap. 13.
3. This point is made in a persuasive way by Sarna in The JPS Torah Commentary, 18–19, 31.
4. Spinoza acknowledges that his rejection of Mosaic authorship was suggested earlier by the medieval exegete Abraham ibn Ezra (1089–1164).
5. For a layman’s account of recent scholarly opinion on the issue of multiple authorship, see Friedman, Who Wrote the Bible?
6. The NJPS translation of Deuteronomy 6:5 has “the Lord is alone.”
7. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 1.51, 113. For Maimonides’s specific remarks on the Tetragrammaton, see Guide 1.61 and 1.63.
8. Needless to say, Kabbalah is a subject unto itself. For a classical introduction to the concept of the Ein Sof, see Scholem, Major Trends, 207, 211.
9. See Talmud, Berachot 9b.
10. Rashi, Chumash, 2:12, 231.
11. Ramban (Nachmanides), Commentary on the Torah: Exodus, 33–39.
12. Exodus Rabbah 3.6.
13. For the connection between the Tetragrammaton and mercy, see Exodus 34:6: “YHWH, YHWH, merciful and gracious God . . .”
14. Buber, Moses, 52.
15. Here I am following Buber’s rendering of the passage rather than the NJPS translation.
16. Tillich, Biblical Religion, 39.
17. Genesis 19:2, 42:30.
18. Genesis 6:2; Exodus 4:16, 7:1.
1. See, for example, Gabriel, The Military History, 97 ff. For a more recent discussion, see Sommer, “Biblical Criticism.”
2. For a detailed model of how the Tabernacle and its implements might have looked, see Levine, The Tabernacle.
3. Sommer, The Bodies of God, esp. chap. 2. For a more detailed account of my response to Sommer, see my essay “What the Bible Can/Cannot Teach Us about God,” in Imagining the Jewish God. Sommer also has an essay in this volume.
4. Friedman, Commentary, 255–56.
5. Talmud, Sanhedrin 56a.
6. Maimonides, Mishneh Torah 14, Kings and Wars, 9.1. One thing that can be said in defense of Maimonides’s interpretation is that unless a commandment prohibiting murder had been given to Adam and Eve, it is hard to see how Cain can be punished for murdering Abel.
7. Mishnah, Kiddushin 14:4.
8. Maimonides, Mishneh Torah 1, Idolatry, 1.2.
9. Kant, Religion, 108–9.
10. For a modern critique of social contract theory, particularly that of Spinoza and Mendelssohn, see Novak, The Jewish Social Contract, esp. chap. 6.
11. Mendelssohn, Jerusalem, 56–64.
12. Talmud, Yoma 67b.
13. Maimonides’s position is that because God does not do anything in vain, there are reasons for every commandment. The difference between the ordinances and the statutes is that the reasons for the former are easier to discern than those for the latter.
14. See, for example, Sarna, The JPS Torah Commentary, 156.
15. Rashi, Chumash, vol. 2: see commentary on Exodus 31:18 and 33:11.
16. Note that this occurs at Numbers 14, not, as is often thought, after the Golden Calf.
17. Ethics of the Fathers, 3.3, in Birnbaum, Daily Prayer Book, 494.
1. I owe this comparison to Friedman, Commentary, 289.
2. The NJPS translation has “Let me behold Your Presence.”
3. This is not the only passage where people express apprehension about seeing God. See, for example, Genesis 16:13; Deuteronomy 5:23–26; Judges 6:22–23, 13:22–23. At Exodus 24:10, Moses, Aaron, Aaron’s sons, and the elders of Israel were allowed to see God. The usual way to explain the discrepancy is to say that at Exodus 24:10, see should be understood as “beheld” or “saw in a vision” and not as “looked at directly.”
4. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 1.58–59.
5. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 1.59, 137.
6. Levinas, “God and Philosophy,” in Basic Philosophical Writings, 138. For a recent comparison of Levinas with Maimonides, see Fagenblat in A Covenant of Creatures, esp. chap. 4. For a readable introduction to the thought of Levinas, see Morgan, The Cambridge Introduction to Levinas.
7. In Cartesian parlance, the formal reality of the ideatum—God—is such that it cannot be contained by the objective reality of the idea.
8. Levinas, “Philosophy and the Idea of Infinity,” 54.
9. See, for example, Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3.15, 459.
10. Descartes, Philosophical Letters, 18–19.
1. Although one could read “You shall be holy” as a promise rather than a challenge, the normal way is to take it as the latter.
2. According to Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3.37, 595, “Be holy” does not introduce a separate commandment above and beyond those that are already given.
3. Aristotle, Metaphysics 1.1.
4. Maimonides, Mishneh Torah 1, Foundations of the Torah, 1.1. Note the wording: the pillar of wisdom is to know, not to believe in or take on faith. Maimonides is talking about what we would call science.
5. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3.51, 619.
6. Maimonides, Mishneh Torah 1, Foundations of the Torah, 1.2–3.
7. The only occurrence I know of was brought to my attention by Kellner: Mishneh Torah 1, Idolatry, 1.
8. Cohen, Religion of Reason, 110.
9. Sifre to Deuteronomy 346. Cf. Isaiah 43:10–12.
10. For a modern account of how God can have needs, see Novak, The Jewish Social Contract, 179–80. The basic idea is that while there is nothing that God lacks in the sense that getting it would make him a more perfect being, it is nonetheless true that God is concerned about the finite beings he has created and wants to see them flourish.
11. Heschel, God in Search of Man, 137.
12. Cohen, Religion of Reason, 33.
13. Cohen, Religion of Reason, 110. The NJPS translation has “And the Lord of Hosts is exalted by judgment.”
14. Cohen, Religion of Reason, 13–15, 113–43.
15. Cohen, Religion of Reason, 457–58.
16. Cohen, Religion of Reason, 457.
17. Kant, The Metaphysics of Morals, 250–51.
18. Cohen, Religion of Reason, 456.
19. Cohen, Religion of Reason, 137.
20. Cohen, Religion of Reason, 208.
21. Cohen, Religion of Reason, 136.
22. For an abridged and easily accessible translation of Halevi’s masterpiece Kuzari, see Three Jewish Philosophers, 33. Needless to say, the question of whether the God of the philosophers is distinct from the God portrayed in the Bible has been debated since ancient times. For a modern attempt to show that there is no difference between them, see Goodman, God of Abraham.
23. Buber, Eclipse of God, 60.
24. Buber, I and Thou, 80.
25. Buber, I and Thou, 84.
26. Buber, Eclipse of God, 119.
27. Buber, Eclipse of God, 119–20.
28. Buber, Between Man and Man, 184.
29. The Levinas Reader, 83. For Levinas’s view of Judaism in particular, see “A Religion for Adults,” in Difficult Freedom, 11–23.
30. For this insight, I am indebted to Putnam, Jewish Philosophy, 73–75.
31. Spinoza, Ethics, 5, prop. 42.
32. For Maimonides’s view on what makes things holy, see Kellner, Maimonides’ Confrontation, esp. chap. 3.
1. Walzer, Exodus and Revolution, 7.
2. Walzer, Exodus and Revolution, 10–17.
3. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3–32, 528–29.
4. The passage could also be taken to mean: “These are your gods.”
5. Genesis Rabbah 30.7.
6. For an excellent study of how the Golden Calf was viewed by later traditions, see Smoler and Aberbach, “The Golden Calf Episode,” 91–116.
7. Thucydides, The Peloponnesian War 3.10.82.
8. Note that at Exodus 17:6, Moses strikes the rock without arousing God’s anger. The difference is that on that occasion, he was commanded to do so, whereas on this occasion, he is not.
9. Throughout this speech, Moses tells the people you rebelled against God, when in fact it was their parents who rebelled. Clearly, the you is corporate or collective: you the nation.
10. Israel’s harlotry is a familiar theme in prophetic literature. See Hosea 1–3; Isaiah 1:21; Jeremiah 3:1, 4:30–31; Ezekiel 23:1–45.
11. Again, for a more extended treatment of the role of messianism in Jewish thought, see my Jewish Messianic Thoughts.
12. Genesis Rabbah 9:7. Cf. Talmud, Yoma 69b.
13. Talmud, Berackot 60b.
14. Talmud, Eruvin 13b.
15. Pelagius, The Letters, 164–70. Pelagius also makes the point that if sin is inevitable, habitual sinners will take comfort in their condition, believing that nothing else can be expected of them.
16. Augustine, City of God 12:22, 13:14.
17. Kant, Religion, 60. Given his commitment to an inherent perversity that taints all of our actions, Kant revised his understanding of ought implies can to mean not that we should fulfill the dictates of morality but that we should strive to fulfill them. Although not as extreme as Kant, Cohen adopts a similar position in Religion of Reason, 211–12.
18. Kant, Religion, 56.
19. Talmud, Shabbat 118b. According to another legend (Taanit 64a), only one Sabbath is needed.
1. Note, however, that when Hillel (Shabbat 31a) was asked to teach a gentile the whole Torah while standing on one foot, he referred to Leviticus 19:18: Love your neighbor as yourself. By contrast, Jesus lists Leviticus 19:18 as the second most important commandment.
2. Talmud, Berakhot 54a, 61b.
3. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3.51.
4. Moran, “The Ancient Near Eastern Background.”
5. Again, see Talmud, Berakhot 54a.
6. The question of when or if it is permissible to die as a martyr is a complication, to say the least. Leviticus 18:5 says: “You shall keep my judgments and statutes so that by doing so, you shall live. I am YHWH.” On the other hand, the Talmud (Sanhedrin 74a) lists three commandments for which one should choose death rather than disobedience: idolatry, murder, and impermissible sexual unions. If, for example, a criminal asks you to commit murder or be murdered yourself, you are to choose the latter. The issue of idolatry raised difficult questions for Jews who swore false oaths to save their lives. On this issue, Maimonides tried to stake out a liberal position. See his “Letter on Martyrdom,” 15–34, as well as David Hartman’s commentary. For a recent discussion of this letter, also see Halbertal, Maimonides, 51–55.
7. Bachya, Duties of the Heart, 1, 19.
8. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3.51, 627–28. Note, however, that the commandment to love God only mentions ahavah.
9. Cf. Ethics of the Fathers, 1:3, in Birnbaum, Daily Prayer Book, 478: “Be not like servants who serve the master for the sake of receiving an award, but be like servants who serve the master without the expectation of receiving a reward; and let the fear of Heaven be upon you.”
10. In this passage, the NJPS translation uses “revere” instead of “fear.”
11. See, for example, Mishneh Torah 1, Basic Principles, 1.2. For Maimonides’s listing of fear and love as separate responses to God, see Mishneh Torah, Book of Commandments, Positive Commandments, 3 and 4, as well as The Guide of the Perplexed 3.52.
12. Maimonides, Mishneh Torah 1, Repentance, 10.6. Cf. The Guide of the Perplexed 3.28, 512–13.
13. This description is derived from Plato, Seventh Letter 344a–b. Cf. Republic 486d–487a; Phaedo 67b–c, 80d, 81a–82c.
14. Again, the source for this view is Plato. See Republic 500b–d.
15. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 1.18.
16. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3.28, 512–13.
17. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3.23.
18. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3.23, 492–93.
19. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 3.51, 621.
20. Rosenzweig, The Star of Redemption, 164.
21. Rosenzweig, The Star of Redemption, 164.
22. Rosenzweig, The Star of Redemption, 159, 161.
23. Rosenzweig, The Star of Redemption, 202.
24. Rosenzweig, The Star of Redemption, 176–77.
25. Rosenzweig, The Star of Redemption, 179.
26. Rosenzweig, The Star of Redemption, 181.
27. Rosenzweig, The Star of Redemption, 107.
28. Rosenzweig, The Star of Redemption, 199.
29. Rosenzweig, The Star of Redemption, 156.
30. Rosenzweig, The Star of Redemption, 202.
31. Rosenzweig, The Star of Redemption, 164.
32. Levinas, The Levinas Reader, 83.
33. For a book-length discussion of how the idea of the self came to dominate Western culture, see Taylor, Sources of the Self.
34. Buber, Eclipse of God, 60.
35. Cohen, Religion of Reason, 100–101.
36. Cohen, Religion of Reason, 98.
37. Rosenzweig, The Star of Redemption, 18.
38. Levinas, Difficult Freedom, 20.
1. I owe this comparison to Friedman, Commentary, 660.
2. Cf. Numbers 32:26; Deuteronomy 3:19, 20:14.
3. Needless to say, the Holocaust is a subject unto itself. For a one-volume collection of responses to it, see Morgan, A Holocaust Reader. I have two entries in this volume.
4. Heschel, God in Search of Man, 42.
5. Maimonides, The Guide of the Perplexed 1.32, 68.
6. Talmud, Chagigah 14b.