वाचनालय

The Guide of the Perplexed

Maimonides

His philosophical work, written in Arabic in Hebrew letters around 1185–1190 for his disciple Joseph ben Judah. In three parts: the first explains biblical terms that seem to attribute to God a body, place or passions, and develops negative theology; the second discusses the proofs of God's existence, creation versus Aristotle's eternity of the world and the nature of prophecy; the third treats Ezekiel's divine chariot, evil, providence, the reasons for the commandments and human perfection, and concludes with the imitation of God's ways. Maimonides warns that he writes with deliberate contradictions to guide only those who are prepared, which has given rise to widely divergent readings. Translated into Hebrew by Samuel ibn Tibbon (1204) and Judah al-Harizi, and into Latin as *Dux neutrorum*, it influenced Christian scholasticism and Spinoza.