HONORING THE DIVINE AS VIRTUE AND PRACTICE Don Seeman

copy Koninklijke Brill NV Leiden 2008 JJTP 162 Also available online ndash wwwbrillnl

1 Proverbs 252 This verse is cited by R Ba˙ya ben Asher as an effective epi-graph to his long and unattributed citation of Maimonidesrsquo views on divine kavodldquoThe honor [kavod] of God is to conceal a matterrdquo refers to the knowledge of Godrsquostrue essence according to the view cited by R Ba˙ya while ldquothe honor of kingsrdquorefers to the knowledge of God through attributes of divine action See R Ba˙yaben Asher Bihur aal ha-Torah to Exodus 3313 ed R Oacuteayyim Dov Chavel ( JerusalemMossad ha-Rav Kook 1994) vol 2 341ndash43

HONORING THE DIVINE AS VIRTUE AND PRACTICE IN MAIMONIDES

Don SeemanEmory University

Abstract

Honoring the divine is central to Maimonidesrsquo ethical and religious phenomenol-ogy It connotes the recognition of radical divine incommensurability and points tothe hard limits of human ability to know God Yet it also signals the importanceof philosophical speculation within those limits indicating the intellectual and eth-ical telos of human life For Maimonides to honor or show kavod to God is closelyrelated to the meaning of the divine glory (also known as kavod ) that Moses demandsto see in Exodus 33 Mosesrsquo demand to see the kavod is usually interpreted as aquest for some visible sign of Godrsquos presence or at least for a created light whoseexistence could testify to the authenticity of Mosesrsquo prophecy Maimonides is aloneamong early interpreters in treating Exodus 33 as a parable of the philosophicalquest to apprehend divine uniqueness which leads first to negative theology and thento imitatio Dei This article argues that the theme of divine kavod links Maimonidesrsquophilosophical literary and even medical concerns with his practical religious teach-ing and connects the Guide of the Perplexed with his other legal and interpretive worksMaimonidesrsquo consistent fascination with Exodus 33 helps to organize his reflectionson human perfection ethics and the relationship between idolatry and everydayreligious language distinguishing him from dominant trends in both Judaeo-Arabicand later kabbalistic thought

It is the honor of God to conceal a matter and the honor of a king to search a matter out1

The call to honor the divine is the kind of ethical and theologicalimperative that an entire religious community can affirm even whenits members hold vastly different or even contradictory conceptionsof what that imperative entails Moses Maimonides (1135ndash1204)

196 don seeman

engendered considerable controversy in medieval and later Jewishthought by suggesting that our way of honoring the divinemdashinHebrew showing kavodmdashis closely related to a radical reading ofExodus 33 in which the biblical Moses demands to see Godrsquos gloryor honormdashalso kavodmdashand is rebuffed For Maimonides this bibli-cal episode and its rabbinic elaboration constitute the core of a modelfor divine service and philosophical reflection to which he returnsrepeatedly throughout his enormous written corpus Indeed my argu-ment in this paper is that divine honor and its implications for humanperfection are among the organizing theme of Maimonidesrsquo teach-ing and that this helps to bind some of his major philosophicallegal and biblical-interpretive concerns into a single moral and ana-lytic framework The way we understand divine kavod and seek tohonor the divine has ethical philosophical and even medical impli-cations that Maimonides dedicated himself to demonstrating through-out the Guide of the Perplexed and elsewhere His unique understandingof Exodus 33 as a parable of speculation at the very limits of humanphilosophical attainment serves as the literary fulcrum of a wide-ranging discourse about the nature of ethical and intellectual per-fection and the limitations of human language Honoring the divinecorrectly is fundamental in Mamonidesrsquo oeuvre to the distinctionbetween idolatry and true divine service

I Pathologies of Divine Honor

For Maimonides idolatry is rooted in the pathology of misplaceddivine honor The word kavod which may signify honor glory orsubstantiality and distinctiveness depending on context appears noless than six times in the first paragraph of his ldquoLaws ConcerningIdolatry and Idolatersrdquo or Hilkhot aAvodat ha-Kokhavim

In the days of Enosh the people fell into gross error and the coun-sel of the wise men of the generation became foolish Enosh himselfwas among those who erred Their error was as follows ldquoSince Godrdquothey said ldquocreated those stars and spheres to guide the world set themon high and allotted to them honor [kavod] and since they are min-isters who minister before Him they deserve to be praised and glorifiedand honor should be rendered them and it is the will of God blessedbe He that men should aggrandize and honor those whom He hasaggrandized and honored just as a king desires that honor be shownto the officers who stand before him and thus honor is shown to the

honoring the divine as virtue and practice in maimonides 197

2 aAvodat ha-Kokhavim 11 I have relied with some changes upon the translationof Isidore Twersky A Maimonides Reader (New York Behrman 1972) 71ndash72 I havefor example translated kavod as ldquohonorrdquo in every instance in order to make therepetitive quality of the original Hebrew more apparent Unless otherwise notedall translations from the Hebrew in this article are my own Notes on the originalArabic where not otherwise credited were made with the help of my able gradu-ate student and research assistant Nathan Hofer whose comments on this work atall stages have proven invaluable Thanks also to research assistants Michael Ausubeland Daniel Goldstein and to two anonymous reviewers at JJTP for their insight-ful contributions

3 On narrative and philosophical concerns in the Mishneh Torah see IsadoreTwersky Introduction to the Code of Maimonides (New Haven Yale University Press1980) 356ndash507 idem ldquoSome Non-Halakhic Aspects of the Mishneh Torahrdquo In edIsidore Twersky Studies in Jewish Law and Philosophy (New York Ktav Publishing1982) 52ndash75 Warren Zev Harvey ldquoThe Mishneh Torah as a Key to the Secrets ofthe Guiderdquo In eds Ezra Flesicher et al Mehah Sheaarim Studies in Medieval JewishSpiritual Life in Memory of Isidore Twersky ( Jerusalem Magnes Press 2001) 11ndash28This view should be contrasted with that of R Mena˙em Schneersohn whose view(influential in the contemporary non-academic world) is that every apparently nar-rative or philosophic passage in the Mishneh Torah bears only legal significance Seefor instance Kelalei ha-Rambam (New York Kehot Publications 1991) 39ndash40

kingrdquo When this idea arose in their minds they began to erect tem-ples to the stars offered up sacrifices to them praised and glorifiedthem in speech and prostrated themselves before themmdashtheir purposeaccording to their perverse notions being to obtain the Creatorrsquos favorThis was the root of idolatry2

It is extraordinary that an entire chapter of Maimonidesrsquo legal codeor Mishneh Torah is devoted to narrative exposition3 Maimonidestraces human religious history from primeval monotheism throughits decline into ldquogross errorrdquo (ie misplaced kavod ) and then into fullscale idolatry only to be recuperated in fits and starts by the ldquopil-lar of the world Abrahamrdquo and his descendants What remainsunclear however is the precise nature of the ldquoerrorrdquo that Maimonidesattributes to Enosh and his contemporaries

This is because hidden within Maimonidesrsquo prosaic and unexcep-tional language in this chapter is the radical core of his whole philo-sophical project laid out most clearly in the first part of the Guidewhich is that no analogy of any kind can be admitted between Godand any element of the phenomenal world Maimonidesrsquo strategy inpassages like this one is to write in a way that appears to conformwith the commonplace assumptions of traditional religious languageso that only closer investigation reveals a more radical agenda In this case the reader who is not attuned to Maimonidesrsquo philo-sophical ethic may well presume that Maimonides is making the

198 don seeman

4 R Joseph Rosen of Dvinsk cedilafnat Paaanea˙ ( Jerusalem 1979) 4a The Talmudiccitation is from Qiddushin 43a quoting II Samuel 1111

5 The Tosafists however dispute Rashirsquos reading arguing that Uriah could onlyhave been called a rebel on the basis of some real disobedience to the king RabbiRosenrsquos older contemporary R Naftali cedilvi Yehudah Berlin likewise argues (Oacuteiddusheiha-NeΩiv mi-Volozhin [ Jerusalem 1957]) that Uriah could not have been considereda ldquotrue rebelrdquo in the Talmudic sense

6 For a related reading see Moshe Halbertal and Avishai Margalit Idolatry transNaomi Goldblum (Cambridge Harvard University Press 1992) 42ndash45 One nine-teenth-century author who seems to have grasped Maimonidesrsquo rejection of anal-ogy was R Gershon Henokh of Radzin (1839ndash1891) who worked to explicate themeaning of divine kavod for religious praxis R Gershon Henokh was a mystic whowanted to rehabilitate the analogy between divine and human kings but who rec-ognized Maimonidesrsquo rejection of this approach and was forced to posit a distinc-tion between our unredeemed world in which such analogies are dangerous anda future reality in which the manifest power of God would render it safe to honorGodrsquos servants without fear of idolatrous substitution See his marginal notes or

commonplace assertion that worship belongs to God alonemdashand thisis in fact how most traditional commentators have read him eventhough few have succeeded in adducing a precise biblical or rab-binic source for this formulation An exception that proves the ruleis R Joseph Rosen of Dvinsk (1858ndash1936) who argues that this pas-sage draws upon a Talmudic discussion in which Uriah the Hittiteof II Samuel is portrayed as a rebel against King David because hesays ldquoMy master Joab [the Israelite general] and Your Majestyrsquostroops are camped in the openrdquo4 According to Rashirsquos eleventh-cen-tury reading of this Talmudic text Uriahrsquos offense was to ascribehonor to Davidrsquos servant Joabmdashldquomy master Joabrdquomdashin Davidrsquos pres-ence R Rosen reasons by analogy that such displays of divine honordirected toward created beings like the stars should also be culpa-ble in Maimonidesrsquo view5

Yet note the subtle way in which Maimonidesrsquo words actuallyundercut this reading where R Rosen depends upon the common-sense religious-language analogy between the divine and human mon-archs Maimonides takes pains to argue that the analogy itself isfaulty This was in fact the ldquogross errorrdquo committed by Enosh andhis contemporaries who thought that ldquomen should aggrandize andhonor those whom [God] has aggrandized and honored just as a[human] king desires that honor be shown to the officers who stand before himrdquoHuman kings like David may well desire that honor be shown totheir servants according to Maimonides but idolatry begins whenone takes too seriously the analogy between the authority of Godand that of human rulers6 We might suppose that this relates to the


gilyonot to his grandfatherrsquos Mei ha-Shiloa˙ vol I parashat Vayikra (Bnei-Brak 1995)103 Maimonides himself would surely have rejected this solution inasmuch as herejects the sharp distinction between redeemed and unredeemed history Divinekavod was frequently understood by Hasidic writers as an expression of radical divineimmanence which put them in tension with Maimonides even when they usedMaimonidean terminology and ideas Writers who wrestle explicitly with Maimonideson this matter include R Mena˙em Mendl Schneersohn (cedilema˙ cediledek) of LubavitchSefer ha-Oacuteaqirah (New York Kehot 2003) R cediladok Ha-Cohen of Lublin Sefer ha-Zikhronot and R Gershon Henokhrsquos already-mentioned Hakdamah le-Vet Yaaakov (Bnei-Brak 1996) 17ndash29 On the importance of Maimonides to these mystical thinkerssee Shaul Magid Hasidism on the Margin (Madison University of Wisconsin Press2003) Alan Brill Thinking God (New York Ktav Press 2000) and Don SeemanldquoMartyrdom Emotion and the Work of Ritual in R Mordecai Leiner of IzbicarsquosMei Ha-Shiloahrdquo AJS Review 272 (2003) 253ndash80

7 Heqesh is Ibn Tibbonrsquos translation of the Arabic qiyagraves Saadyah and Ha-Leviboth critique the Karaite interpretation of divine law without benefit of rabbinictradition but Ha-Levi extends this critique to other spheres in which the author-ity of revelation could also be said to be threatened including the systematic inno-vation of Sufi-like pietistic practices that were designed to cultivate religious experienceas well as the philosophersrsquo attempts to establish theological truths independent ofScripture All of these can be classified as qiyagraves or heqesh according to Ha-Levibecause they utilize reason to supplant the traditional authority of divine revela-tion See Diana Lobel Between Mysticism and Philosophy Sufi Language of ReligiousExperience in Judah Ha-Levirsquos Kuzari (Albany State University of New York Press2000) 58ndash60 66ndash87 Like Maimonides Ha-Levi (Kuzari 43) identifies the origin ofidolatry in misplaced logical proofs about God but Ha-Levi seems to blame thereliance upon logical proofs per se rather than the misleading analogies with cre-ated beings that are the focus of Maimonidesrsquo critique

8 I believe that this passage may be one of the sources of an important twenti-eth century mysticrsquos complaint that ldquothe honor of heaven which is embodied tendstoward idolatry and debases the dignity of human beings and all creaturesrdquo SeeRabbi Abraham Isaac Kook Middot ha-Rahayah ( Jerusalem Mossad ha-Rav Kook1985) 81 Elsewhere I have argued that Rabbi Kookrsquos (1864ndash1935) understand-ing of divine honor is crucial to undoing the logic of violence inherent to certainstrains of contemporary Jewish mysticism and that the influence of Maimonides inthis matter was profound See Seeman ldquoViolence Ethics and Divine Honor inModern Jewish Thoughtrdquo 1028ndash1036 Rabbi Kook himself argues in his ldquospecialessay on Maimonidesrdquo that the latter helped to purify Jewish mystical thought by

insistent critique of qiyagraves (Heb heqesh) or reasoning by analogy foundin Ha-Levirsquos Kuzari but Ha-Levi is mostly concerned with the sub-stitution of reason for divine revelation in determining forms of wor-ship or practical details of the commandments7 These issues arecertainly relevant to Maimonidesrsquo warning about idolatry as a prod-uct of failed or misapplied reason but mostly Maimonides wants tosignal his opposition to a particular kind of theological presumptionthat is frequently suggested by traditional religious language includ-ing that of Scripture Idolatry begins not with gross anthropomor-phism suggests Maimonides but rather with a fundamentally flawedconception of divine honor in everyday religious life8

200 don seeman

insisting on the radical critique of divine embodiment to which kabbalistic think-ing is prone This essay has been re-published in Mahamarei ha-Rahayah ( Jerusalem1984) 105ndash133 On the debasement of human dignity that follows from too cor-poreal a conception of God see the continuation of aAvodat ha-Kokhavim chapter 1which describes the gradual enslavement of humanity by a priestly class who areempowered by faulty theology

9 Yesodei ha-Torah 1910 Scholars have pointed to the fact that Maimonidesrsquo use of this Talmudic prin-

ciple to combat anthropomorphism goes far beyond the Talmudrsquos more modestapplication to certain kinds of linguistic-interpretive problems like the apparentlyneedless doubling of words ldquoThe Torah speaks in human languagerdquo is howeverused in much the same way by Maimonidesrsquo predecessor R Ba˙ya Ibn PaqudaDuties of the Heart 110 R Meir Sim˙a Ha-Cohen of Dvinsk in hOr Samea˙ ( Jerusalemnd) 1 also cites the late midrash Pesikta Zutarta to parashat Va-Et˙anan ldquoWho canspeak of the prophets who said lsquoI have seen Godrsquo (Isaiah 61) lsquoseek God whileHe may be found call to him while He is nearrsquo (Isaiah 556) and a limitlessnumber of similar verses Yet the Torah speaks in human language and so do theprophets following the Torah the Writings following the prophets and the sagesafter them all in a single manner whose understanding requires some intelligencerdquo

11 Exodus 3318

Readers of the first chapter of the Mishneh Torah would alreadyhave been alerted to the importance of kavod to Maimonidesrsquo critiqueof naiumlve religious language In chapter one of Yesodei ha-Torah orldquoFundamental Principles of the Torahrdquo Maimonides argues thatScriptural attributions of corporeality to God are made ldquoaccordingto the intellects of human beings who know only bodies while lsquotheTorah speaks in human languagersquordquo9 ldquoThe Torah speaks in humanlanguagerdquo is a Talmudic formulation that appears only once in theMishneh Torah but is invoked frequently in the first part of the Guidewhere it indicates that God has been described in inadequate andsometimes even misleading language because of human linguistic andintellectual limitations10 Here Maimonides puts the matter succinctlysince human experience encompasses only corporeal life and evenintellect is constrained by matter it is impossible for humankind tograsp a fundamentally different (and non-corporeal) kind of existenceldquoThe truth of the matterrdquo he writes ldquocannot be grasped or searchedout by human intellectrdquo This assertion of human limitation is imme-diately followed by a discussion of the divine kavod described inExodus 33

What was this that Moses our master sought to grasp as it is writ-ten ldquoShow me please Thy glory [kavod]rdquo11 He sought to know thetruth of the Holy One Blessed be Hersquos existence until it would beknown in his heart like the knowledge of one of the people whose facehe has seen and whose form is engraved upon his heart so that this


12 Yesodei ha-Torah 11013 The narrative account of the request and dialogue could therefore be read as

a literary device for something far more abstract Hannah Kasher (ldquoMaimonidesrsquoInterpretation of the Story of the Divine Revelation in the Cleft of the Rockrdquo[Hebrew] Daat 35 [1995] 49) points out that this was the reading of Efodi onGuide I 21 ldquoDo not think that Moses engaged in bargaining with Him may Hebe blessed through this question [lsquoShow my please Thy kavodrsquo] Rather [the mean-ing is] that he found with his intellect that this apperception [of the kavod] wasinaccessible to himrdquo

14 See Saadyahrsquos Beliefs and Opinions 212 Ibn Paqudarsquos Duties of the Heart 13 andHa-Levirsquos Kuzari 27 and 43 In chapter 43 Ha-Levi writes ldquolsquoGlory of Godrsquo isthat fine substance which follows the will of God assuming any form God wishesto show the prophet This is one view According to another view the Glory ofGod means the whole of the angels and spiritual beings as well as the thronechariot firmament wheels spheres and other imperishable beings All this is styledlsquoGloryrsquo just as a kingrsquos retinue is called his splendour Perhaps this is what Mosesdesired when he said lsquoI beseech Thee shew me Thy gloryrsquordquo Translated by HartwigHirschfeld in Judah Halevi The Kuzari An Argument for the Faith of Israel ed HSlominsky (New York Schocken Books 1964) 211 In general Ha-Levi is muchmore comfortable than Maimonides with the use of corporeal imagery in Scriptureincluding the vision of divine kavod because he believes (see chapter 44) that cor-poreal visions help to instill the fear of God in the human heart Ha-Levi is animportant counterpoint because like Maimonides he deploys kavod as a centralorganizing concept related to themes like the uniqueness of the land and people ofIsrael with regard to prophecy See Lobel Between Mysticism and Philosophy 116ndash20also R Yehudah Moscatorsquos sixteenth century commentary Qol Yehudah on the intro-duction to Part II of Kuzari and the introduction to parts II and IV in the com-mentary of R David Cohen ha-Kuzari ha-Mevohar ed Dov Schwartz ( JerusalemNezer David 2002) Despite his distance from Maimonides on the meaning of thedivine kavod however Ha-Levi is equally far from the kabbalistic view elaboratedby Na˙manides and others (see below) as is already noted by R Israel Ha-Leviin his sixteenth century commentary OΩar Ne˙mad at the end of Kuzari 43

person would be differentiated in his mind from other people Thatis what Moses our master sought that the existence of the Holy Oneblessed be He should be differentiated in his mind from the existenceof other existents until he knows [Godrsquos] existence as it is in itself12

Mosesrsquo request to God ldquoshow me please Thy kavodrdquo represents theprophetrsquos passionate philosophical quest to understand divine unique-ness and unity13 For Maimonides the quest to see divine glory doesnot represent a desire for the corporeal manifestation of divine favorlike the ldquocreated lightrdquo mentioned by Saadyah Ibn Paquda andHa-Levi in this context nor is it a quest for special access to thedivine presence itself as Na˙manides and other kabbalists wouldlater write14 Maimonidesrsquo Moses is enough of a philosopher to knowthat the divine kavod can only entail an abstract conceptual grasp of

202 don seeman

15 Maimonidesrsquo son R Abraham feels obligated not just to note the distinctionbetween his fatherrsquos approach and that of his predecessors (ie Saadyah and oth-ers) but also to seek some middle position between the two In his own commen-tary on Exodus 33 he writes ldquoAll that my father and master peace be upon himhas mentioned with regard to these matters is closer to high level investigation andto the comprehension of the student but what others have written is closer to thelanguage [of the biblical text] There is no avoiding in my opinion some com-promise between the intention of my father and master and those enlightenedscholars who preceded him which is to say that there was some sense of sight ora vision like sight of the created light [in Exodus 33] by means of which Moseswas guided or sought help in the intellectual apprehension of the greatness of theCreatorrdquo See Perush Rabenu Avraham ben ha-Rambam aal Bereishit u-Shemot trans EfraimYehudah Weisenberg ( Jerusalem Keren HoΩahat Sifrei Rabanei Bavel 1994 [1958])96 See however R Abrahamrsquos commentary on Exodus 16 (p 26) in which heseems to identify more closely with his fatherrsquos teaching

16 See The New Brown-Driver-Briggs-Gesenius Hebrew-English Lexicon (Peabody MassHendrickson 1979) 458ndash59 Kavod is derived from the root for heaviness or weightand among its meanings in the biblical context are that of riches and material sub-stance (as in Genesis 311) glory or splendor (as in Genesis 4513) and honor ordignity of position (as in Numbers 2411) all of which relate in different ways tothe distinctivenessmdashgravitas reallymdashof a thing or person to which it is applied Kavodcan also signify the ldquoseat of honor in the inner man the noblest part of manrdquo (asin Genesis 3013) which may be comparable to the usage that Maimonides has inmind when he renders the divine kavod as Godrsquos ldquoessencerdquo

17 This reading of Yesodei ha-Torah 110 is also supported by a closely parallel pas-sage in Maimonidesrsquo commentary on the Mishnah in chapter seven of the ShemonehPeraqim which is devoted to the limitations of human (ie Mosesrsquo) ability to knowGod In Shemoneh Peraqim Maimonides adds the words ldquobut when a person seesthe back [of another] even though he recognizes him through this vision some-times he is in doubt and confuses him with others rdquo Based on R Joseph Kafiqhtrans Mishnah aim Perush ha-Rambam ( Jerusalem Mossad ha-Rav Kook 1989) vol 2 259ndash60 Hannah Kasher (ldquoMaimonides Interpretation of the Story of theDivine Revelationrdquo) notes some subtle differences between this source and the onein Yesodei ha-Torah but she basically agrees that both are concerned with the prob-lem of epistemology and human limitation My only disagreement with Kasher isin the specific emphasis I bring to bear on the issue of divine incommensurabilitywhich makes Maimonidesrsquo parable of the face much more appropriate to his philo-sophical message

divine incommensurability15 On a linguistic level this means thatkavod refers more to the distinctiveness of divinity than to its substan-tialitymdashits perceptible weightiness or presencemdashas many other writ-ers apparently thought16 Note how carefully Moses seeks to establishGodrsquos difference from all beings with the same level of clarity thatallows one person to recognize the unique ldquofacerdquo of another andhow he wishes to have this intimate knowledge of divine differenceldquoengraved upon his heartrdquo17 For Maimonides to compare Godrsquosincommensurability to the unique face is just one more use of homol-


18 On the homologous meanings of ldquofacerdquo including divine incommensurabilitysee chapter I 37 of the Guide ldquoBut My face shall not be seen meaning that the truereality of My existence as it veritably is cannot be graspedrdquo Guide of the Perplexedtrans Shlomo Pines (Chicago University of Chicago Press 1963) 68 Unless oth-erwise noted all translations from the Guide are from this edition Italicized wordsin this translation indicate words used in Hebrew within Maimonidesrsquo originalJudaeo-Arabic text Maimonidesrsquo homologous reading of ldquofacerdquo may be contrastedwith the approach of Nahmanides and many later kabbalists who asserted thateven though corporeal language in Scripture cannot be interpreted literally thereis nevertheless some kind of true analogy between human and divine attributes Fornumerous examples of this principle see Elliot R Wolfson ldquoBy Way of TruthAspects of Na˙manidesrsquo Kabbalistic Hermeneuticrdquo AJS Review 142 (1989) 102ndash178

19 Yesodei ha-Torah 110 citing Exodus 332320 Menachem Kellnerrsquos recent important study of the kavod in Maimonidesrsquo cor-

pus neglects his strong insistence on divine incommensurability in this and somerelated passages Kellner argues instead that Maimonides reads the quest for kavodin Exodus 33 as a search for positive knowledge of the divine essencemdasha view Iwill dispute below See Menachem Kellner Maimonidesrsquo Confrontation with Mysticism

ogous language like verses that describe Godrsquos walking and sittingto make abstract conceptual points about the nature of divine beingor action18

Even so Mosesrsquo request to know Godrsquos existence ldquoas it is in itself rdquo(that is to say as wholly incommensurate and without any mislead-ing analogies to created beings) is a request for something that liesbeyond the limits of human comprehension

[God] may He be blessed answered [Moses] that it is not within thepower of the mind of a living person who is a composite of body andsoul to grasp the truth of this matter as it is in itself [God] may Hebe blessed made known to him that which no person had knownbefore him and none will know after him until he apprehended some-thing of the truth of His existence to the extent that the Holy Oneblessed be He was differentiated in his [Mosesrsquo] mind from other exis-tents the way a person is differentiated when one has seen his backand perceived with onersquos mind [the difference between] all of [thatpersonrsquos] body and clothing from those of other people This is whatScripture has hinted at and said ldquoYou shall see My back but Myface you shall not seerdquo19

Unable to grasp the fullness of divine difference represented by theldquofacerdquo Moses has no choice but to accept a vision of the divineldquobackrdquo which represents a lower degree of certainty about the incom-mensurability of the divine (similar to our uncertainty regarding theidentity of a person we have only seen from behind)20 A measure

204 don seeman

(Oxford The Littman Library 2006) 179ndash215 It should be noted that in the GuideMaimonides seems to identify the divine ldquobackrdquo not with incommensurability perse but instead with the vision of divine ldquogoodnessrdquo (Godrsquos providence in the work-ing of the cosmos) However this seems to me not so much a contradiction as ashift in emphasis at a different moment in the intellectual processmdashas I will explain

21 Hannah Kasher (ldquoMaimonidesrsquo Interpretation of the Story of Divine Revelationrdquo45ndash47) usefully raises some of these questions through different readings of Mosesrsquoengagement with the question of the divine kavod in Exodus 33 Also see ShlomoPines ldquoThe Limitations of Human Knowledge According to Al-Farabi ibn Bajjaand Maimonidesrdquo Studies in Medieval Jewish History and Literature ed I Twersky(Cambridge Mass Harvard University Press 1979) 82ndash109 Herbert A DavidsonldquoMaimonides on Metaphysical Knowledgerdquo Maimonidean Studies vol 3 (19921993)49ndash103 A very helpful discussion is to be found in Ehud Z Benor ldquoMeaning andReference in Maimonidesrsquo Negative Theologyrdquo The Harvard Theological Review 88(1995) 339ndash360 where Benor proposes that ldquoMaimonides found in negative the-ology a method of uniquely identifying the ground of all beingrdquo and thus ldquodeter-mining the reference of the name lsquoGodrsquo without forming any conception of whatGod isrdquo (347)

22 R Nissim of Gerona Derashot ha-Ran ed Aryeh L Feldman ( JerusalemMakhon Shalem 1977) 55 (fourth derashah)

of ambiguity remains as to whether Godrsquos kavod is identified only withthis sheer fact of divine incommensurability or also with some pos-itive essence that remains partly inaccessible to human comprehen-sion However this is an ambiguity that persists through Maimonidesrsquodiscussion of kavod and negative attributes in the first part of theGuide and which continues to divide modern scholars21

What is abundantly clear for Maimonides is that Moses cannotgrasp the fullness of divine honorglory partly because of his com-posite nature as both matter and form (or body and soul) preventshim from doing so Although he is undoubtedly the ldquomaster of allprophetsrdquo Moses nevertheless remains trapped in a web of conceptsand language that oblige him to draw upon human attributes in rep-resenting the divine even though Moses himself knows that this usageis false R Nissim of Gerona (1320ndash1380) was one of several medievalscholars who disputed Maimonidesrsquo reading of Exodus 33 by point-ing out that since Moses must already have known the impossibil-ity of apprehending the divine essence it makes no sense to supposethat he would have asked for such an impossible boon22 But thismisses the point of what Maimonides thinks Moses is really after inthis text which is not so much the positive knowledge of divineessence as it is a deepening and internalization of his prior under-standing of divine difference he wishes to ldquoengrave it upon his


23 Even a sympathetic philosophical reader like R Isaac Arama (1420ndash1494) assumesthat Maimonides believes Mosesrsquo request to see the divine ldquofacerdquo was really a questfor knowledge of positive attributes as opposed to the divine ldquobackrdquo through whichthe so-called negative attributes were ultimately revealed However this leads Aramalike R Nissim and others to wonder how Maimonides could think Moses wouldask for such an impossible boon The advantage of my reading is that it obviatesthis question by making Mosesrsquo request more philosophically plausible and alsoaccounts better for Maimonidesrsquo parable of the desire to distinguish people by theirfaces as used in both the Mishneh Torah and his commentary on the Mishnah SeeR Isaac Arama aAqedat YiΩ˙aq ed Oacuteayyim Yosef Pollock ( Jerusalem nd) vol 2198ndash201 (Shaaar 54)

24 Hilkhot Teshuvah (ldquoLaws of Penitencerdquo) 55 citing Job 11925 Exodus 332026 Isaiah 558

heartrdquo23 According to Maimonides Moses would have engaged inprogressively subtler and more profound affirmations of divine incom-mensurability until he inevitably came up against the hard limits ofhuman understanding represented by Godrsquos negative response to hisdemand ldquoShow me please Thy kavod rdquo

Maimonides returns to this idea near the end of the first bookof the Mishneh Torah where he tries to reconcile human free willwith divine foreknowledge This is a problem whose solution isldquolonger than the earth and broader than the sea and has severalgreat essential principles and tall mountains hanging from itrdquo24

Maimonides refers back to the beginning of Yesodei ha-Torah to remindhis readers that ldquoGod knows with a knowledge that is not separatefrom Him like human beingsrdquo and that the incommensurate natureof divine knowledge makes human reason a poor tool for under-standing God Not surprisingly he then harks back to Exodus 33where he believes that divine incommensurability is already wellestablished

Rather He may His name be blessed and His knowledge are oneand human intellect cannot fully grasp this Just as human knowledgelacks the capacity to know and to find the truth of the Creator as itis written [in response to Mosesrsquo request ldquoShow me please Thy kavodrdquo]ldquoMan cannot see Me and liverdquo25 Just so a person cannot grasp andfind the knowledge of the Creator This is what the prophet has saidldquoFor My thoughts are not your thoughts nor your ways My waysrdquo26

Maimonides was criticized by some commentators for publicizinga dilemma of free will that has no definitive solution but his aus-tere insistence on divine incommensurability may have seemed likethe only way to defend both human will and divine omniscience

206 don seeman

27 See the criticism by R Abraham ben David of Posquiegraveres Hasagot ha-Rabadad loc

28 This problem is in a sense only intensified by those later kabbalists who while

simultaneously27 The phrase ldquoMy thoughts are not your thoughtsrdquofrom the biblical book of Isaiah is treated as equivalent to ldquomanshall not see Me and liverdquo in Exodus asserting the failure of logicand analogy to encompass divine incommensurability

In a very real sense then Moses emerges in the first book of theMishneh Torah as a typological counterweight to Enosh who allowedidolatry to gain a foothold by mistaking his own immersion in humanconcepts and language for a true analogy between the honor of thedivine and that of human kings When he asked to see the divinekavod Moses already understood that God was wholly incommensu-rate but he lacked the depth of experiential clarity that would haveallowed him to apprehend the divine as one person distinguishesanother without fail by looking at his face This is an extremely pre-cise formulation Maimonides means to underline for those readerswho are philosophical initiates that while human beings can graspthe incommensurability of different conceptual categories (ldquoapplesand orangesrdquo) or the difference between bodies separated by spaceneither of these ways of talking about difference is sufficient to encom-pass the radical incommensurability of God Thus to reject Enoshrsquoserror and its potential to engender gross idolatry is only the begin-ning of an extended religious program Having grasped that Godhas no corporeal form and that even relational analogies betweenGod and human kings are ultimately false the individual who aspiresto perfection like Moses did must continue to press on with all duemodesty against the boundaries of knowledge precisely in order toestablish Godrsquos true distinction or kavod We shall see that this is thevery core of intellectual divine service according to Maimonides

Taken together these passages from the first book of the MishnehTorah emerge as a layered and resonant literary representation ofMaimonidesrsquo overall philosophical and religious project Idolatry inthe form of crude image worship must inevitably be condemned ina code of Jewish law but the point of Maimonidesrsquo initial foray intohuman religious history is to call attention to the much subtler prob-lem of well-intentioned divine worship subverted by a false and imag-inary analogy between God and created beings28 ldquoMaimonidesrsquo briefhistorical synopsis of the fate of monotheismrdquo writes Twersky ldquoits


they pointedly reject the strong form of anthropomorphism implied by divine cor-poreality nevertheless insist upon the necessity of a real analogy between divineand human attributes including human body parts See Wolfson ldquoBy Way ofTruthrdquo R Mena˙em Recanati for example writes in his commentary on theTorah (76c) that although God is wholly incorporeal Scriptural choices of languageportraying Godrsquos hands or eyes ldquoare an extremely inner matter concerning the truthof Godrsquos existence since [these attributes] are the source and wellspring of theoverflow that extends to all creatures which does not mean that there is an essen-tial comparison between Him may He be blessed and us with respect to form It is like someone who writes lsquoReuben the son of Jacobrsquo for these letters are notthe form of Reuben the son of Jacob or his structure and essence but rather arecognition [zikhron] a sign of that existent and well-known structure known asReuben the son of Jacobrdquo This kind of analogous conception of the relationshipbetween God and human bodies was by no means unique to R Recanati and italso bore strong implications for the kabbalistic understanding of Jewish ritual ldquoSinceGod may He be exalted and blessed wished to confer merit upon us He createdwithin the human body various hidden and wonderful limbs that are a likeness ofa sign of the workings of the divine Chariot [maaaseh merkavah] and if a person mer-its to purify a single one of his limbs that limb will become like a throne to thatsupernal inner limb that is known as lsquoeyersquo lsquohandrsquo and so forthrdquo Despite all ofRecanatirsquos hedging and subtlety it is clear that this view would have been anath-ema to Maimonides

29 Twersky Code 22730 In aAvodat ha-Kokhavim 36 Maimonides concludes his discussion of the pro-

hibited forms of idolatrous worship by detailing a lesser prohibition of acts of hon-oring idols all of which are acts that emphasize the sensuous corporeality of thematerial form ldquoAnyone who hugs an idol or kisses it or cleans before it or washesit or anoints it or clothes it or causes it to wear shoes or any similar act of kavodhas violated a negative commandment as it is written [Exodus 205] lsquonor servethemrsquordquo This is a close citation of Mishnah Sanhedrin 76 except that our printedMishnah omits the concluding words (ldquoor any similar act of kavodrdquo)

successive corruptions and corrections is streaked with contempo-rary allusions and ideological directives sustaining his attack on exter-nalism and his espousal of intellectualismrdquo29 But this can be putmuch more strongly The distance between Enosh and Moses isreally the distance between popular monotheism as Maimonides per-ceived it in his own day and the purified intellectual spiritualitytowards which he believed that intelligent people were obliged tostrive The popular notion of Godrsquos honor is always threatening tocollapse into idolatry starting with homage paid to those who areperceived as Godrsquos human intermediaries but eventually devolvinginto the worship of material formsmdashall because the concept of divinehonor has been insufficiently clarified30 This danger described atlength at the beginning of aAvodat ha-Kokhavim is what Mosesrsquo lawand example each seek with effort to forestall

208 don seeman

31 In his first gloss on the text of the Mishneh Torah (Yesodei ha-Torah 110) RAbraham ben David of Posquiegraveres (Rabad) takes Maimonides to task for failing torecognize the ldquoprofound secretsrdquo contained in the allusion to Godrsquos ldquofacerdquo andGodrsquos ldquobackrdquo in this biblical episode Maimonides he says must not have knownthese secrets R Joseph Karo defends Maimonides without reacting in any way tohis wholesale rejection of kabbalistic concepts while R Shem Tov Ibn Gaon (bornin 1283) defends Maimonides in his Migdal aOz (ad loc) by claiming that the latterrepented later in life and became a kabbalist It would seem that Maimonidesrsquotreatment of Exodus 33 in the Mishneh Torah struck a sensitive nerve While Rabadincidentally remains circumspect about the specific meaning of the ldquosecretsrdquoMaimonides neglected these are specified at greater length in the sixteenth centuryby writers like R Meir Ibn Gabbai aAvodat ha-Qodesh Part III 30 ( Jerusalem 1992)317ndash20 and R Issachar Eilenberg Beher Sheva No 71

32 See R Saadyah Gaon ha-Niv˙ar ba-Emunot uva-Deaot trans R Joseph Kafiqh( Jerusalem Makhon Moshe 1993) 110ndash11 (Part II 12) Also see OΩar ha-GeonimThesaurus of the Gaonic Responsa and Commentaries ed B Lewin ( Jerusalem 1928) vol 1 15ndash17 For more on Saadyahrsquos view and its later influence on Jewish thoughtsee Joseph Dan The Esoteric Theology of Ashkenazi Hasidism [in Hebrew] ( JerusalemMossad Bialik 1968) 104ndash168 It is telling that the thirteenth century writer RAvraham ben aEzriel who was deeply influenced by R Yehudah he-Oacuteasid citesMaimonidesrsquo formulation of divine non-corporeality from the first chapter of Yesodeiha-Torah at length in his liturgical compendium aArugat ha-Bosem but stops short ofMaimonidesrsquo interpretation of the divine kavod in that same chapter which he sim-ply omits in favor of Saadyahrsquos view See R Abraham b R aEzriel Sefer aArugatha-Bosem ed Efraim E Urbach ( Jerusalem MekiΩe Nirdamim 1939) 198ndash199Urbach also cites the opinion of R Oacuteananel (990ndash1050) later quoted by R Yehudahhe-Oacuteasid (1150ndash1217) which is that the kavod constitutes an actual vision seen bythe prophet as in Saadyah but only ldquoa vision of the heartrdquo (huvnata de-liba) In I 21Maimonides lists this as one of the acceptable readings of the events in Exodus 33although he makes it clear that it is not his preferred reading

II Honor as Absence and Restraint

It is no accident that Maimonidesrsquo interpretation of the theophanyin Exodus 33 aroused more commentary and opposition than therest of his theological exposition in the first two chapters of theMishneh Torah or that it served as an organizing focus for large sec-tions of his later Guide of the Perplexed31 The radical nature of Maimonidesrsquoreading can be adduced through comparisons with those of two othertowering figures whose widely influential views I have already notedBoth Saadyah (882ndash942) and Na˙manides (1194ndash1270) agree that theverse ldquoShow me please Thy kavod rdquo implies a quest for a real visionof something that can be physically seen although they disagree asto what that something is In Saadyahrsquos reading ldquoGod has a lightthat He creates and reveals to the prophets as a proof of the wordsof prophecy that they have heard from God and when one of themsees [this light] he says lsquoI have seen Godrsquos kavod rsquordquo32 Because thelight is merely created and not part of God this reading neatly does


33 Na˙manides already notes that since Ezekiel 312 portrays the angels as bless-ing Godrsquos kavod any reading that treats the kavod as a created light would essen-tially be portraying the angels as idolaters See his commentary on Genesis 461 inR Moshe ben Na˙man (Ramban) Perushei ha-Torah ed R Oacuteayyim Dov Chavel( Jerusalem Mossad ha-Rav Kook 1976) vol 1 250ndash251 Na˙manidesrsquo critique wasamplified in the sixteenth century by R Ibn Gabbai aAvodat ha-Qodesh part III 30317ndash20 Although he was a member of the Na˙manidean school R Yom Tov ibnAvraham Asevilli (Ritva) defended Maimonides convincingly in the fourteenth cen-tury by pointing out that kavod means different things to Maimonides in differentScriptural contexts See his Sefer ha-Zikaron ( Jerusalem 1956) chapter 4 Some ofNa˙manidesrsquo fears may arguably have been realized among the Oacuteasidei Ashkenazof the eleventh to thirteenth centuries whose views were influenced by translatedworks of Saadyah and Ibn Ezra rather than Maimonides and who sometimes por-tray the divine kavod as either a created entity towards which worship should bedirected or as a permanent hypostatis nearly coterminous with God See Dan TheEsoteric Theology of Ashkenazi Hasidism Also see Avraham Epstein in A M Habermaned Mi-Kadmoniyot ha-Yehudim Kitvei Avraham Epstein ( Jerusalem Mossad ha-Rav Kook1957) vol II 226ndash241 who refers to the conception of kavod in at least one ofthese texts as ldquoalmost a second Godrdquo Daniel Abrams ldquoSod Kol ha-Sodot Tefisat ha-Kavod ve-Kavvanat ha-Tefilah be-Kitvei R Eleazar me-Vermaisrdquo Daat A Journal of JewishPhilosophy and Kabbalah 34 (1995) 61-81 shows that R Eleazar of Worms insiststhat worshippers should not have the created kavod in mind during prayer eventhough they may direct their prayers towards the place where the kavod is visibleThe philosophically minded R Joseph Albo (Spain 1380ndash1444) solves this prob-lem in another way by arguing that sometimes the biblical text says ldquokavodrdquo whenit really means God and sometimes God (the tetragramaton) when it really meansa created light or angel who represents God Thus every problematic Scripturalverse can be explained in the least problematic way possible depending upon con-text See section II 28 of Sefer ha-aIqqarim ( Jerusalem Horev 1995) vol I 255ndash56

34 See Na˙manides Perushei ha-Torah vol 1 621 R Ba˙ya ben Asher Bhiur aalha-Torah vol 1 347 and R Mena˙em Recanati Levushei aOr Yaqrut ( Jerusalem

away with the problem of divine corporeality implied by the verseHowever it also leads to a different problem which is that someverses in Scripture seem to portray the created kavod as an object ofworship or at least of veneration forcing later writers to engage innew apologetics to escape the charge that this reading imports idol-atry to the very heart of Scripture33 Saadyahrsquos view was furtherelaborated by other Judaeo-Arabic thinkers like Ibn Paquda (early11th century) and Ha-Levi (1080ndash1145)mdashas well as by Maimonideshimself in certain passages to which we shall return Na˙manidesthe kabbalist by contrast prefers to take a hint of divine corpore-ality in his stride ldquoMoses asked to see the divine kavod in an actualvision [bi-marheh mamash]rdquo This interpretation was further elaboratedby R Ba˙ya ben Asher (d 1340) and R Mena˙em Recanati(1223ndash1290) as entailing a vision of the ldquohigher kavod rdquo (higher inthe sefirotic sense) since ldquothere is kavod above kavod rdquo in the articu-lation of the divine anthropos34

210 don seeman

Zikhron Aharon 2000) 194 whose wording may actually have been influenced bythe Maimonidean formulation of divine incommensurability It is ironic that thephrase ldquothere is kavod above kavodrdquo was apparently first coined by the author of theeleventh century Talmudic lexicon aArukh in a paraphrasing of Saadyahrsquos ldquocreatedlightrdquo theory as it was developed in his commentary on Sefer YeΩirah Joseph Dan[The Esoteric Theology of Ashkenazi Hasidism 111ndash113] argues that Saadyah coined theidea of a ldquohigher kavodrdquo visible only to the angels in order to explain how Mosescould have been denied the ability to see a species of created light that otherprophets (like Isaiah and Ezekiel) were later granted Saadyahrsquos notion of twodifferent levels of created light is left sufficiently ambiguous in the aArukh howeverfor later interpreters to be able to connect it with the Neo-Platonist view of divineemanation popularized within Kabbalah For Na˙manides and his followers ldquokavodabove kavodrdquo refers not to two levels of created light as in Saadyah but to twostages of divine emanation Keter and Malkhut the latter of which was otherwiseknown as Shekhinah Moses wanted to see the former but was only granted a visionof the latter R Meir Ibn Gabbai subjected Maimonides and the whole ldquocreatedlightrdquo school to a withering critique on this score in the sixteenth century In aAvodatha-Qodesh part III chapters 29ndash35 (vol 2 315ndash48) he argues that Moses soughta true physical vision of Godrsquos ineffable unity with the divine attributes or sefirotwhich is normally perceptible only to the mindrsquos eye of a true prophet For a similarreading see the late sixteenth- or early seventeenth-century responsa of R IssacharEilenberg Beher Shevaa no 71

35 Ehud Benor Worship of the Heart a Study in Maimonidesrsquo Philosophy of Religion(Albany State University of New York Press 1995) 47 also points out that inMaimonidesrsquo view Moses must have been virtuous and philosophically accomplishedprior to the revelation of Exodus 33ndash34 I should note that Kenneth Seeskin raisessome of the same conceptual issues I have raised here but without the organizingfocus on divine honor in his Jewish Philosophy in a Secular Age (Albany State Universityof New York Press 1990) 31ndash70

Maimonidesrsquo interpretive scalpel cuts through both of these approachesin order to suggest something much more profound than the simpleneed to understand corporeal imagery as metaphoric or equivocalInstead Exodus 33 serves the more important function of callingattention even to the limits of that project which might have deludeda person into thinking that human beings can know God in somepositive and ultimate sense once they have stripped away these lay-ers of naiumlve Scriptural anthropomorphism Maimonidesrsquo move is bril-liant instead of trying to explain or apologize for the apparentcorporeality of kavod in this verse (as many other writers had done)Maimonides simply characterizes Mosesrsquo use of the term kavod as analready philosophically sophisticated attempt to proceed down thevia negativamdashthe path to differentiating and distinguishing God fromall other existentsmdashwhich he has only hinted at in his legal writingsbut will go on to develop with great energy in the first part of theGuide35 Maimonides is able to do this because for him unlike forany of the other writers whom we have mentioned so far the


36 For R Hai see Avraham Shoshana ed Newly Discovered Geonic Responsa (Notesby Simcha Emmanuel Jerusalem Ofeq Institute 1995) 219ndash221 (resp 155 [67])As the editor notes the opinion attributed in this letter to R Hai is also identicalwith the commentary of R Oacuteananel on Berakhot 7a and is attributed to the latterby many later authors including R Yehudah of Barcelona Perush Sefer YeΩirah edShlomo Hayyim Halberstam (Berlin 1885) 32ndash33 so that perhaps the attributionto R Hai is in error R Oacuteananel also reads the vision of ldquoPardesrdquo sought by somerabbis in Oacuteagigah 14a as a ldquovision of the heartrdquo rather than of the eyes which issignificant because Maimonides may be following his lead in reading the story ofthe ldquofour who entered Pardesrdquo and the biblical account of Mosesrsquo request to seethe divine kavod as essentially parallel sources As with the ldquocreated lightrdquo theoryhowever Maimonides mentions this view in the Guide I21 as a theologically accept-able but inferior interpretation Maimonidesrsquo own view is that only abstract intel-lectual apprehension of speculative truth (but no ldquoprophetic visionrdquo) was involvedin either case

37 See Na˙manides Perushei ha-Torah to Genesis 181 (vol 1 103ndash7) The sub-ject in this context involves a debate over what precisely Abraham saw when hewas visited by three angels disguised as humans Maimonides contends that thisepisode took place within a prophetic vision to which Na˙manides retorts that itwould strain credibility to believe that the whole cycle of events involving the visitof the angels the destruction of Sodom and the salvation of Lotrsquos family by thosesame angels all took place in a vision rather than external reality He writes insteadthat ldquoa special created glory [kavod nivrah] was in the angelsrdquo making them visibleto the naked eye Although the language of ldquocreated gloryrdquo here seems like a nodto Maimonides it is more likely that Na˙manides had in mind those Geonimwho held that all of the prophetic visions in Scripture involved appearances of aldquocreated lightrdquo or glory that takes on different forms (See the lengthy discussionof variations upon this theme by R Yehudah of Barcelona Perush Sefer YeΩirah19ndash46) Although he assimilates the Geonic teaching into his own kabbalistic ontol-ogy (he calls the created glory a ldquogarmentrdquo in the kabbalistic sense) Na˙manidesis strongly attracted to the Geonic insistence that the images of prophecy couldreally be seen with the human eye R Ba˙ya ben Asher Bhiur aal ha-Torah to Genesis182 (vol I 167) likewise pauses to emphasize that Abrahamrsquos vision of the angelswas ldquowith the physical sense of sightrdquo which makes better sense once we under-stand the polemical context vis-agrave-vis Maimonides For more on this issue see ElliotR Wolfson ldquoBeneath the Wings of the Great Eagle Maimonides and ThirteenthCentury Kabbalahrdquo in Goumlrge K Hasselhoff and Otfried Fraisse eds Moses

Scriptural appearance of divine glory or honor is related preciselyto the absence of any legitimate comparison and to the correspond-ingly hard limits of embodied human comprehension

Divine kavod is not treated as a sensory stimulus like light or arevelation that one can perceive with onersquos eyesmdashnor is it even thehuvneta de-liba or ldquovision of the heartrdquo (ie speculative vision) cham-pioned by R Hai Gaon and R Oacuteananel ben Oacuteushiel in the tenthand eleventh centuries36 In fact for Maimonides many propheticvisions do take place in the heart or mindmdashan interpretive stancefor which he was criticized at length by Na˙manides37mdashbut Mosesrsquoencounter with the kavod in Exodus 33 was no vision at all rather

212 don seeman

Maimonides His Religious Scientific and Philosophical Wirkungsgeschichte in DifferentCultural Contextsrdquo (Wuumlrzburg Ergon Verlag 2004) 209ndash38

38 R Yehudah of Barcelona Perush Sefer YeΩirah 34ndash35 ldquoBut Moses our masterwhose mind and heart were purified and whose eyes were more enlightened thanany who dwell below God showed him of His splendor and His glory [kavod] thatHe had created for the glory of His name which was greater than the lights seenby any of the prophets It was a true sight and not a dream or a vision andtherefore [Moses] understood that there was no human form or any other formbut only the form of the splendor and the light and the great created firerdquo

39 Michael Carasikrsquos consistent decision to follow the NJPS by rendering kavod asldquopresencerdquo in The Commentatorrsquos Bible (Philadelphia Jewish Publication Society 2005)299 works well enough for scriptural translations but wreaks havoc on the com-mentary of Saadyah which he cites The whole ldquocreated lightrdquo paradigm popu-larized by Saadyah is after all a response to the grave theological difficulties thatmay arise if one thinks that people are physically able to perceive the divine pres-ence Carasik seems to recognize this dilemma but is unable to fully compensate

it was an intellectual apperception of lack and constraint fostered byhis recognition of Godrsquos radical incommensurability R Yehudah ofBarcelona had already argued in the tenth century on the basis ofhis readings in Geonic literature that progressively higher degreesof prophetic acuity entail progressively less specific visions of the cre-ated light known as divine kavod Ezekiel saw the kavod in the formof a man for example while Moses who was less subject to thevagaries of the imagination saw it only as ldquoa form of splendor andlight and a great created firerdquo which R Yehudah identified as theldquobackrdquo of the created light known as the Shekhinah or kavod38 Thisview attributes less distinctive visions to higher forms of prophecybut Maimonides was the first writer to extend this approach so faras to deny that Moses saw anything at all in Exodus 33

Identifying the divine kavod with the hard limits of human appre-hension also distinguishes Maimonides from some important mod-ern interpreters The Old JPS translation of the Hebrew Biblepublished in 1917 ambiguously renders Exodus 3318 as ldquoShow meI pray Thee Thy gloryrdquo a phrase that can sustain many differentinterpretations but the New JPS published in 1985 renders it moreidiomatically as ldquoOh let me behold Your Presencerdquo This accordswell with the approach taken by medieval interpreters like Na˙manidesand Ibn Ezra but to Maimonides it would have constituted an intol-erable kind of anthropomorphismmdashhe would have preferred some-thing like ldquoOh let me apprehend the full measure of Yourincommensurable uniquenessrdquo39 Among modern Jewish thinkers thesame tension also pits Martin Buber and Abraham Joshua Heschel(the great theorists of divine presence) against Emmanuel Levinas


given the demand for consistency in translation Maimonides by contrast specificallyrejects the idea of consistency in translation with respect to kavod in chapter I 64of the Guide

40 ldquoPresencerdquo is a core theme of Buberrsquos whole philosophical and literary out-look including his interpretation of biblical materials such as Exodus 33 See PamelaVermes Buber on God and the Perfect Man (London Littman Library 1994) 119ndash130For Abraham Joshua Heschelrsquos approach see God in Search of Man A Philosophy ofJudaism (New York Farrar Straus and Cudahy 1955) 80ndash87

41 See Seeman ldquoViolence Ethics and Divine Honor in Modern Jewish Thoughtrdquo1036ndash1042 The Levinas citation is from Emmanuel Levinas God Death and Timetrans Bettina Bergo (Stanford Stanford University Press 2000) 195 Shmuel Trigano(ldquoLevinas and the Project of Jewish Philosophyrdquo Jewish Studies Quarterly 8 [2001]397ndash301) has argued that Levinas is indebted to Saadyah on this score ldquoit is as ifLevinas had reworked Saadyahrsquos lsquogloryrsquo using Maimonidesrsquo negativization for thereis something affirmative in the other human being but there is no positivityrdquo Yetit is only in Maimonides that the ldquogloryrdquo of Exodus 33 appears not even as a rep-resentation or sign of the divine presence but only as the radical critique of anyquest for presence in the anthropomorphic sense My argument linking Levinas withMaimonides here rather than with Saadyah is strengthened by the fact that Levinasused the Guide (especially chapters II 13 and 17) to argue against Nazi (andHeideggerian) fatalism in the 1930s The term kavod does not appear in these chap-ters but the closely related idea of a God who transcends all of the categories andlimits of human comprehensionmdashand who creates the world ex nihilomdashcertainlydoes ldquoPaganismrdquo writes Levinas ldquois a radical impotence to escape from the worldrdquoSee Emmanuel Levinas Lrsquoactualiteacute de Maiumlmonide in Paix et Droit 15 (1935) 6ndash7 andFrancesca Albertini ldquoEmmanuel Levinasrsquo Theological-Political Interpretation ofMoses Maimonidesrdquo in Moses Maimonides His Religious Scientific and PhilosophicalWirkungsgeschichte 573ndash86 I would also add that Levinas is sure to have notedMaimonidesrsquo argument (in Guide I 56 and 63) that even the term ldquobeingrdquo cannotproperly be attributed to God without onersquos doing violence to divine otherness

whose formulation of divine glory as excess or as absence but neveras presence may actually be traceable to his early readings inMaimonides40 ldquoResponsibility cannot be stated in terms of presencerdquoLevinas writes ldquoit is an impossibility of acquitting the debt anexcess over the present This excess is glory (la gloire)rdquo which as Ihave shown elsewhere can only refer to the biblicalHebrew idea ofkavodrdquo41 In rebellion against Heidegger and much of Western the-ology Levinas writes that he is seeking a conception of God asldquowholly uncontaminated by beingrdquo by which he means a God whoseencounter with the world is consistently ethical rather than ontolog-ical This forces him as it does Maimonides to reinterpret the divinetheophany as an encounter with absence rather than with presenceThis is in direct contrast to Heschel who frames his own discussionof kavod as an explicit rejection of the Maimonidean philosophicalparadigm ldquoThe glory is the presencerdquo he writes ldquonot the essenceof God an act rather than a quality Mainly the glory manifests

214 don seeman

42 Heschel God in Search of Man 8243 Mishnah Oacuteagigah 2144 My English translation is based on the Hebrew translation of Kafiqh Mishnah

aim Perush ha-Rambam vol I 250ndash51 I have however restored the word ldquomelan-choliardquo which appears in transliterated form in the original Arabic text of Maimonidesrsquocommentary rather than following both Kafiqhrsquos and Ibn Tibbonrsquos rendering ofthe Hebrew shemamon (normally translated as ldquodesolationrdquo) whose connotations todayare far less medical and technical than what I think Maimonides had in mindMaimonides mentions melancholia quite frequently in his own medical writings wherehe adopts the claim of Greco-Arabic medicine and particularly that of Galen thatthis malady involves ldquoconfusion of the intellectrdquo as well as unwarranted fears orefflorescence of the imaginative faculties This may be why Aristotle or one of his

itself as a power overwhelming the worldrdquo42 For these modern read-ers Maimonidesrsquo view remains a powerful stimulus and in Heschelrsquoscase an irritant that provokes response

The contours of Maimonidesrsquo rejection of kavod as divine presencewere already discernable in his commentary on the Mishnah whichhe completed while still in his twenties The beginning of the sec-ond chapter of Oacuteagigah is one of the most important textual loci forrabbinic discussions of esotericism and secret knowledge and it isalso one of the places in which the notion of divine honor is mostclearly invoked The Mishnah reads

One should not expound the forbidden sexual relationships beforethree nor the work of Creation [maaaseh bereishit] before two and theChariot [merkavah] should not [be expounded] even before one unlesshe is wise and understands on his own And anyone who contemplatesfour things it is better had he not come into the world what is aboveand what is below what is before and what is after And whoeverdoes not have regard for the honor of his Creator [kevod kono] it isbetter had he not come into the world43

In his Judaeo-Arabic commentary to this passage Maimonides inter-prets the Mishnah through the lens of his own philosophical andmedical commitments premised on the danger of false speculationbrought about by incorrect analogies and the cultivation of imagi-nation at the expense of intellect

[W]hen a person who is empty of all science seeks to contemplate inorder to understand what is above the heavens or what is below theearth with his worthless imagination so that he imagines them [theheavens] like an attic above a house it is certain that this will bringhim to madness and melancholiardquo44


students identified melancholia with literary and rhetorical genius as well See JenniferRadden ed The Nature of Melancholy From Aristotle to Kristeva (Oxford OxfordUniversity Press 2000) who makes it clear that melancholia was for many centuriesan organizing principle of both medical and philosophical discourse rather than justa discrete medical diagnosis It seems reasonable to suggest that Maimonidesrsquo asso-ciation of melancholia with the intellectual elite of rabbis who contemplate meta-physical matters draws precisely on this tradition

45 See for example R Moshe ben Maimon Medical Works ed Suessman Muntner( Jerusalem Mossad ha-Rav Kook 1992) especially Regimen Sanitatis Letters on theHygiene of the Body and of the Soul vol 1 59 (Medical) Aphorisms of Moses vol II 7280 126ndash27 140 144 148 176 Commentary on Hippocratesrsquo Aphorisms vol III 59122 For more on the Maimonidean virtue of equanimity see Samuel S KottekldquoThe Philosophical Medicine of Maimonidesrdquo in Moses Maimonides His ReligiousScientific and Philosophical Wirkungsgeschichte 65ndash82 Seeman ldquoMartyrdom Emotionand the Work of Ritualrdquo 264ndash69

46 See Luis Garcia-Ballester Galen and Galenism Theory and Medical Practice fromAntiquity to the European Renaissance eds Jon Arrizabalaga Montserrat Cabre LluisCifuentes Fernando Salmon (Burlington Vt Ashgate 2002) 150

The danger of speculation on physics (ldquothe work of Creationrdquo) ormetaphysics (the ldquoChariotrdquo) without rigorous intellectual preparationis that reliance on false and misleading analogies (ldquolike an attic abovea houserdquo) and ldquoworthless imaginationrdquo can easily unhinge the humanmind In keeping with the Greco-Arabic medical tradition that hepracticed Maimonides believed that certain forms of melancholia werecaused by the perturbation of the unrestrained imagination whichexcited the passions and caused an overabundance of black bile theheaviest and most corporeal of humors45 The failure and breakdownassociated with intellectual overextension thus leads to twin patholo-gies on the theological and medical planes It invests our conceptionof the divine with false imagining of corporeal substance while atthe same time it also subjects the human sufferer to a malady thatweighs the psycho-physical constitution down with heavy black bileOverwrought passion and imagination are framed as gross and destruc-tive intrusions upon the ethereal subtlety of a well-balanced intel-lect ldquoIt is possible for mental activity itself to be the cause of healthor illnessrdquo writes Galen ldquoThere are many who do not die becauseof the pernicious nature of their illness but because of the poor stateof their mind and reasonrdquo46

Maimonides reads the final phrase of the Mishnah ldquoAnd who-ever does not have regard for the honor of his Creatorrdquo as refer-ring to someone who fails to set appropriate limits for intellectualspeculation ldquoThe meaning of this is that he has no regard for his

216 don seeman

47 Commentary on the Mishnah Oacuteagigah 21 citing Oacuteagigah 16a Kiddushin 40aand Tan˙uma Naso 5 Maimonidesrsquo linkage of intellectual overreaching with secretsin is also suggested by the juxtaposition of these themes in the Talmudic discus-sion in Oacuteagigah Other sources relevant to Maimonidesrsquo formulation include JerusalemTalmud 21 and a variant of the same teaching in Bereishit Rabbah 15 ldquoR Hunaquoted in Bar Kappararsquos name Let the lying lips be dumb which speak arrogantlyagainst the righteous [Psalms 3119] meaning [lips which speak] against [the will of ]the Righteous One who is the Life of all worlds on matters which He has with-held from His creatures in order to boast and to say lsquoI discourse on the workof Creation [maaaseh bereishit] To think that he despises My Glory [kavod] ForR Yose ben R Oacuteanina said Whoever honors himself through his fellowrsquos disgracehas no share in the world to come How much more so when [it is done at theexpense of ] the glory [kavod] of Godrdquo My translation with some stylistic emenda-tions is based on that of H Freedman Midrash Rabbah Genesis vol 1 (New YorkThe Soncino Press 1983) 5

48 See Byron Good ldquoThe Heart of Whatrsquos the Matter The Semantics of Illnessin Iranrdquo Culture Medicine and Psychiatry 1 (1976) 25ndash58

49 See (Medical) Aphorisms of Moses 80 140

intellect since the intellect is Godrsquos honor [kavod]rdquo This extraordi-nary statement indicates both that the intellect is a testament toGodrsquos glory or kavod and that it gives human beings the ability toapprehend Godrsquos kavod through speculation of the type thatMaimonides thinks the Mishnah describes Having regard for theCreatorrsquos honor in this context means husbanding onersquos intellectualresources to protect them from harmful overreaching This teachingalso encompasses an ancillary ethical benefit Maimonides insists thatldquosomeone who does not recognize the value of that which has beengiven to him [ie the intellect] is given over into the hands of desireand becomes like an animal as the sages have said lsquoSomeone whodoes not have regard for the honor of his Creator will commit asin in secretrsquo and they have said lsquoA person does not sin until aspirit of foolishness enters himrsquordquo47 These proofs serve to establishthat honor for the Creator is related to restraint from sin (especiallysexual and other appetite- or imagination-driven sins) and that thisrestraint is dependent in turn upon the control of ldquoanimal-likerdquo pas-sions by a sober intellect Thus Maimonides builds a strong seman-tic network linking themes of uncontrolled desire and imaginationwith ideas about sin illness and intellectual overreaching48

It is not surprising therefore that Maimonides describes the unre-strained desire for a variety of foods as one of the consequences ofmelancholia49 Nor is it unexpected that he would break with Saadyahwho interpreted the verse in which the nobles of the children ofIsrael ldquovisioned God and did eat and drinkrdquo (Exodus 2411) as a


50 See Perushei Rabenu Saadyah Gaon aal ha-Torah trans and ed Joseph Kafiqh( Jerusalem Mossad ha-Rav Kook 1984) 90ndash91

51 Guide 30 (I 5)52 Although his interpretation differs in some ways from mine Kellner (Maimonidesrsquo

Confrontation with Mysticism 196) put the correlation very succinctly ldquoHe [Moses]sought to understand Godrsquos kavod (understood as essence) so that he could havemore kavod (understood as honour) for God and thus better express the kavod (under-stood as praise) for Godrdquo My reading attempts to account more explicitly for thisset of homologies by linking them through the idea of intellectual restraint andacknowledgement of limitation Yehudah Even Shmuel similarly comments in anote to chapter I 32 that divine honor consists simply of the proper functioningof every created thing but fails to emphasize the setting of correct speculative lim-its that in my view makes this possible See Moreh Nevukhim la-Rambam aim PerushYehudah Even Shmuel ( Jerusalem Mossad ha-Rav Kook 1987) vol I 140ndash41

simple expression of the fact that they went on living (ie that theydid not die) after they had witnessed Godrsquos created light50 IndeedMaimonides interprets the juxtaposition of eating with metaphysicalspeculation (ldquothey visioned Godrdquo) as a deep criticism of the Israelitenobles ldquoBecause of the hindrances that were a stumbling block tothe nobles of the children of Israel in their apprehension their actionstoo were troubled because of the corruption in their apprehensionthey inclined toward things of the body Hence it says and they visionedGod and did eat and drinkrdquo51 Regard for the honor of the creatorentails a commitment to intellectual training and to the curtailmentof onersquos appetite which together give rise to a set of virtues includ-ing intellectual probity and gradualism To show honor (kavod ) to theCreator and to understand the nature of the kavod requested byMoses (Godrsquos unique and unknowable essence) therefore turn out tobe closely related propositions since the nature of the divine kavoddescribed in Scripture already demands a particular mode of philo-sophical inquiry Or to put this in another way it now becomesclear that mistaking the divine kavod for an object of sensory per-ception (like a created light) leads to a relative dishonoring of thedivine52

These ideas are repeated and amplified with somewhat greatersubtlety in the Guide of the Perplexed In the thirty-second chapter ofPart I Maimonides returns to the second chapter of Oacuteagigah in orderto repeat his warning about the dangers of intellectual overreachingHe invokes the story of ldquothe four who entered Pardesrdquo four rabbiswho engaged in metaphysical speculation they were all harmed insome way except for Rabbi Aqiba who ldquoentered in peace and leftin peacerdquo According to Maimonides Aqiba was spared because he

218 don seeman

53 Guide 68 These themes are also the subject of Sara Klein-Braslavy ldquoKingSolomon and Metaphysical Esotericism According to Maimonidesrdquo MaimonideanStudies vol 1 (1990) 57ndash86 However she does not discuss kavod which might havecontributed to the thematic coherence of Maimonidesrsquo various statements on thissubject

54 See for instance the beginning of I 33 On the debate among medieval (andmodern) commentators as to whether Moses represents an attainable human idealsee Benor Worship of the Heart 43ndash45 186

was the only one of the four to recognize the appropriate limits ofhuman speculation

For if you stay your progress because of a dubious point if you donot deceive yourself into believing that there is a demonstration withregard to matters that have not been demonstrated if finally youdo not aspire to apprehend that which you are unable to apprehendmdashyou will have achieved human perfection and attained the rank ofRabbi Aqiba peace be on him who entered in peace and left in peacewhen engaged in the theoretical study of these metaphysical matters53

Here Maimonides has skillfully appropriated one of the Jewish mys-tical traditionrsquos greatest heroes to fashion an object lesson in rationalsobriety and intellectual restraint In his commentary on this chap-ter Abravanel (1437ndash1508) complains that Maimonides seems to havedefined the attainment of human perfection as an entirely negativeideal neglecting the positive acquisition of moral and intellectualvirtues But I am arguing that the correct identification of that whichcannot be apprehended (such as the essence of the divine) is a crown-ing virtue according to Maimonides which indicates an already highlevel of moral and intellectual attainment

This notion of self-limitation requires that one exercise a greatdeal of candor in considering onersquos own level of intellectual and spir-itual attainment Although he clearly speaks of limitations that nohuman being can overcome Maimonides also writes that Mosesapproached those limits more closely than any other human beinghas done thus indicating that the appropriate or necessary limits ofspeculation must differ from one person to another54 The danger ofmisjudging or wantonly ignoring onersquos level of attainment is againexpressed in both medical and theological language since the intel-lect can like vision be damaged through straining or overuse

If on the other hand you aspire to apprehend things that are beyondyour apprehension or if you hasten to pronounce false assertions the


55 Ibid 69 This passage should be compared with Ha-Levirsquos description of sightand its limitations with respect to the divine kavod in Kuzari 43 In III 11 (Guide441) Maimonides adds that the relationship between knowledge and the humanform (intellect) is analogous to that between the faculty of sight and the humaneye Both that is can be overwhelmed and damaged

56 Guide 68 On ldquosightrdquo as an equivocal term signifying intellectual apperceptionsee also Guide 27ndash28 (I 4) which cites Exodus 3318 as a main proof-text In bookstwo and three of De Anima Aristotle establishes a close analogy between intellectand sense perception since both are premised on the impression of forms upon thesensory faculties ldquoas the wax takes the sign from the ring without the iron andgoldmdashit takes that is the gold or bronze sign but not as gold or bronze Andit is also clear from all of this why the excesses of the sense-objects destroy thesense organs For if the movement is too strong for the sense organs its formula[or proportion] is destroyed just as the congruence and pitch are lost whenstrings are too vigorously struck (Book II 12 424a)rdquo From Aristotle De Anima (Onthe Soul) trans Hugh Lawson-Tancred (New York Penguin Books 1986) 187ndash188also see Book III 2 426andashb and III 4 429andash430a Aristotle does however placecertain limits on the analogy between the intellect and the senses ldquoa sense losesthe power to perceive after something excessively perceptible it cannot for instanceperceive sound after very great sounds nor can it see after strong colors nor smellafter strong smells whereas when the intellect has thought something extremelythinkable it thinks lesser objects more not lessrdquo (202) Presumably Maimonideswould argue that this is true only for that which is in fact ldquothinkablerdquo and not forsomething that transcends or frustrates thought entirely like the incommensurabil-ity of the divine essence Kasher (ldquoMaimonides Interpretation of the Story of DivineRevelationrdquo 32ndash33) has perceptively argued that Maimonidesrsquo discussion of propheticvision may actually have been influenced by his understanding of optics and theeffects of lenses

contradictories of which have not been demonstrated or that are pos-sible though very remotely somdashyou will have joined Elisha A˙er [awell-known Talmudic rabbi turned heretic] That is you will not onlynot be perfect but will be the most deficient among the deficient andit will so fall out that you will be overcome by imaginings and by aninclination toward things defective evil and wickedmdashthis resulting fromthe intellectrsquos being preoccupied and its light being extinguished In asimilar way various species of delusive imaginings are produced in thesense of sight when the visual spirit is weakened as in the case of sickpeople and of such as persist in looking at brilliant or minute objects55

As he wrote in his commentary on the Mishnah the weakening ofthe intellect leads to the flowering of ldquoworthless imaginationrdquo andto an ethical as well as intellectual collapse It is more than a littleironic that Maimonides who alone of all commentators insists thatthe divine kavod is nothing that can be seen with the eyes never-theless returns so forcefully to the comparison between intellect andvision to make his point following Aristotle in arguing that the sametype of straining and overuse can affect them both56 We are worlds

220 don seeman

57 Beliefs and Opinions I 12 (Kafiqh edition 111)58 Guide 70 It is worth noting that many of the arguments and proof-texts mar-

shaled by Maimonides in this chapter are previously marshaled by R Ba˙ya IbnPaquda Duties of the Heart part I chapter 10 A careful analytic comparison ofthese two sources would exceed the scope of this article but it is clear that IbnPaquda does not thematize divine honor with the same force and persistence thatMaimonides does

59 Maimonidesrsquo view can for example be contrasted with that of Na˙manideswho argues in his introduction to the commentary on the Torah (Perushei ha-Torah7ndash8) that ldquomy words [with respect to the secrets of the Torah] will not be appre-hended or understood at all by any intellect or understanding save from the mouthof a wise initiate [mequbal] to a receptive and understanding ear Reasoning withrespect to [these matters] is foolishness brings great harm and prevents benefitrdquoSee Moshe Idel ldquoWe Have no Tradition on Thisrdquo in Isadore Twersky ed RabbiMoses Na˙manides Explorations in his Religious and Literary Virtuosity (Cambridge HarvardUniversity Press 1983) 51ndash74 Unlike Na˙manides Maimonides explicitly seeks tounderstand the teaching of the ldquoChariotrdquo through speculation as he writes in theintroduction to Part III of the Guide ldquoIn addition to this there is the fact that inthat which has occurred to me with regard to these matters I followed conjectureand supposition no divine revelation has come to me to teach me that the inten-tion in the matter in question was such and such nor did I receive what I believein these matters from a teacher But the texts of the prophetic books and the dictaof the Sages together with the speculative premises that I possess showed me thatthings are indubitably so and so Yet it is possible that they are different and thatsomething else is intendedrdquo (Guide 416)

away here from Saadyahrsquos more literal interpretation of Mosesrsquo requestldquoShow me please Thy kavodrdquo as being in part a prayer for strength-ened eyesight that would allow him to look into the brilliance of thecreated light57 Yet it is worth noting that practically all of thesignificant readings of this passage in Oacuteagigah including Maimonidesrsquoown circle around the unresolved question of limitations to visionand esoteric knowledge

Maimonidesrsquo treatment of divine honor in Guide I 32 recapitu-lates the main themes from his Commentary on the Mishnah

For in regard to matters that it is not in the nature of man to graspit is as we have made clear very harmful to occupy oneself with themThis is what the Sages intended to signify by their dictum Whoeverconsiders four things and so on completing the dictum by saying He whodoes not have regard for the honor of his Creator whereby they indicatedwhat we have already made clear namely that man should not pressforward to engage in speculative study of corrupt imaginings58

He hastens to add that this teaching should not be construed as dis-couraging metaphysical speculation altogether which would be tan-tamount he comments acerbically to ldquoregarding darkness as lightand light as darknessrdquo59 Unlike many earlier and later writers who


60 As a contrast to Maimonides consider for example R Hairsquos polemic againstthose who doubt that God enacts miracles or shows visions to the righteous andhis association of the ldquoFour who Entered Pardesrdquo with the esoteric visions of Heikhalotmysticism OΩar ha-Geonim 13ndash15 R Hai is cited by later kabbalists in the contextof their own polemic against philosophical texts and approaches R Isaiah Horowitzfor example writes that ldquothe avoidance of philosophy and its prohibition is clearfrom the words of all the early and later sages so that it would constitute a bur-den for me to cite them all You may observe a small piece of what they havewritten on this subject in the words of R Hai Gaon on the story about thefour who entered pardes in Oacuteagigahrdquo See R Isaiah Horowitz Shnei Lu˙ot ha-Brit edMeir Katz (Haifa Makhon Yad Ramah 1992) vol 2 259 (Masekhet Shevuot no55) Incidentally Kellner believes that Maimonidesrsquo impatience with the ldquore-mythol-ogizationrdquo of Judaism through Heikhalot literature was one of the main reasons thathe worked so hard to reinterpret the divine kavod (Maimonidesrsquo Confrontation with JewishMysticism 215)

61 Guide 69 citing Proverbs 2516 Here too the metaphors of overeating andvomiting blur into a decidedly non-metaphoric medical reading since in his med-ical writings Maimonides sometimes associates melancholia with an appetite for ldquoverymany kinds of food and in some cases disgust and rejection of food arousingnausea so that he vomitsrdquo while in another passage he describes ldquomelancholic con-fusion of the mind which leads in some cases to strong stomach pains and insome cases to vomiting after a time so that they cannot find peace except throughvomiting or excreting rdquo See (Medical) Aphorisms of Moses vol II 80 140

cite this Mishnah as a mystical testimony or as proof that one shouldrely only upon tradition (kabbalah) in metaphysical matters Maimonidesasserts that the Mishnah teaches an ethos of philosophical persever-ance and measured restraint that allows one to avoid self deception60

This is the sense in which I am arguing that divine honor con-stitutes a diffuse virtue for Maimonides consisting not only of a setof distinctive intellectual practices but also of a stance or settled wayof being-in-the-worldmdashan Aristotelian hexismdashrepeatedly conveyedthough metaphors of restraint in eating walking or gazing Oneshould eat honeymdashldquothe most delicious of foodsrdquo which is here ametaphor for esoteric or elite teachingmdashonly in moderation writesMaimonides ldquolest thou be filled therewith and vomit itrdquo61 The prepon-derance of powerfully visceral imagery in this chapter does not seemaccidental given Maimonidesrsquo understanding of the close relation-ship between the abuses of physical and intellectual faculties Thisis not only an analogy in other words but also a veiled commentabout the way in which overindulgence in the sensory pleasures cancorrupt the speculative faculties This is one of the reasons why everyprocess of intellectual growth must be gradual and restrained involv-ing not just the training of the mind but of the whole personaldquoWhen points appearing as dubious occur to him or the thing he

222 don seeman

62 Guide 7063 Guide 69 citing Ecclesiastes 417 The entire verse is translated by NJPS as

ldquoBe not overeager to go the House of God [ie the Temple] more acceptable isobedience than the offering of fools for they know nothing [but] to do wrongrdquoFor Maimonides the thematic association of reluctance intellectual comprehensionand obedience to God should by now be clear Also see Hilkhot Yesodei ha-Torah413 in which Maimonides cites Oacuteagigah once more in order to admonish readersnot to ldquostroll through Pardesrdquo until they have achieved a requisite grounding inthe knowledge of Jewish law In Guide I13 Maimonides establishes that ldquostandingrdquocan also mean ldquodesistingrdquo or ldquoabstainingrdquo

64 Citing Exodus 282

seeks does not seem to him to be demonstratedrdquo Maimonides writesof his Aqiba-like model-student ldquohe should not deny and reject ithastening to pronounce it false but should rather persevere andthereby have regard for the honor of his Creator He should refrain andhold backrdquo62 The feel of the Arabicmdashwa-yakuffu wa-yaqifumdashmay bebetter preserved by Ibn Tibbonrsquos translation which instead of ldquorefrainand hold backrdquo renders ve-yimanalsquo ve-yalsquoamod or ldquohold back and stand[in place]rdquo This is not merely an expression of intellectual limita-tion but also a stationary posture of restraint that resonates withanother verse that Maimonides quotes approvingly in this chapterldquoGuard thy foot when thou goest to the house of God and so onrdquo whichalso commends intellectual caution in metaphysical matters63

Maimonides in fact views whole classes of the commandments aspromoting an ethos of measured restraint that entails ldquoregard forthe honor of the Creatorrdquo In chapters III 44 and 47 of the Guidehe asserts that all of the purity restrictions associated with the Templewhen it stood were intended ldquoto create in the hearts of those whoenter it a certain awe and reverencerdquo that would keep people fromentering the sanctuary too freely The same can be said of theldquohonor and beautyrdquo (kavod ve-tif heret) allotted to the priests and Leviteswho guarded the sanctuary and whose appearance was meant tofoster humility among the people64 Several passages in Maimonidesrsquolegal writings directly relate self-restraint in matters of ritual purityto the conquest of passions and the intellectual perfection that thisconquest allows At the end of ldquoLaws Concerning Impurity of Foodsrdquofor example Maimonides urges the pious to accept additional extra-legal restrictions upon what and with whom they may eat sinceldquopurity of the body leads to sanctification of the soul from evil opin-


65 In the first chapter of Hilkhot aAvodat ha-Kokhavim Maimonides used the termldquoevil opinionrdquo to describe the analogy between human and divine honor that ledto idolatry Reading these two passages in tandem leads one to the sense (also sup-ported in the Guide) that for Maimonides there is a close relationship between grosspassions or appetites and the imaginative faculty and that imagination clouds theintellect leading directly to the attribution of imaginary corporeal attributes to GodSee for example chapter I 32 of the Guide described above

66 Hilkhot Tumehat hOkhlin 1612 citing Leviticus 1144 and 218 In ldquoThe Lawsof Ritual Bathsrdquo Hilkhot Mikvahot 1112 Maimonides similarly calls attention to thefact that laws of purity and impurity are divine decrees and ldquonot among the thingsthat the human mind can determinerdquo There is no physical change at all associ-ated with purity and impurity for Maimonides yet immersion in a ritual bathldquohintsrdquo to the immersion of the soul in ldquowaters of pure intellectrdquo which serve tocounteract sin and false opinionsmdashprobably by symbolizing and also helping tobring about the subduing of the passions See also ldquoThe Laws of Forbidden FoodsrdquoHilkhot Mahakhalot hAssurot 1732 Once the passions are subdued and the intellectdisciplined it is possible to achieve a non-corporeal conception of the divine whichapprehends the attributes of action and seeks to emulate them

67 Kafiqh edition Seder Taharot 2368 See Hilkhot Yesodei ha-Torah 413 and aAvodat ha-Kokhavim 22ndash3 respectively

Both texts it should be noted make reference to the Mishnah in Oacuteagigah

ionsrdquo65 and sanctification of the soul causes a person to imitate theShekhinah [here a synonym for the divine kavod or essence] as it iswritten ldquoYou shall sanctify yourselves and be holy for I the Lordsanctify yourdquo66 Similarly at the end of his introduction to the sec-tion of the Mishnah that deals with purity restrictions (Taharot)Maimonides remarks that purity rules are meant specifically to serveas ldquoa ladder to the attainment of Holy Spiritrdquo by which he meansa level of prophecy deriving from intellectual union with the divine67

All of the commandments together are described as having the effectof ldquosettling the mindrdquo prior to philosophical speculation andMaimonides broadly interprets the prohibition of ldquoturning aside toidolsrdquo as the need to recognize onersquos intellectual limits by eschew-ing thoughts or investigations that would tend to lead one astrayfrom the truth68

Already at the beginning of the Guide in chapter I 5 Maimonidescites ldquothe chief of the philosophersrdquomdashAristotlemdashas a universal modelfor this kind of personal and intellectual probity also expressed innarrative terms by Mosesrsquo reticence to speak with God at the lsquoburn-ing bushrsquo of Exodus 3 A person should not ldquofrom the outset strainand impel his thoughts toward the apprehension of the deityrdquo writesMaimonides ldquoHe rather should feel awe and refrain and hold backuntil he gradually elevates himself It is in this sense that it is said

224 don seeman

69 Guide 29 citing Exodus 3670 Ibid citing Numbers 12871 Divine honor is therefore closely related to the virtue of yishuv ha-daaat or delib-

erateness and equanimity that Maimonides describes in I 34 and in many othercontexts throughout his legal and philosophical works including Yesodei ha-Torah413 For a reworking of this theme by a Hasidic thinker influenced by Maimonidessee Seeman ldquoMartyrdom Emotion and The Work of Ritualrdquo

72 Commentary on the Mishnah Oacuteagigah 21 Compare Aristotlersquos opening to theMetaphysics (980a) which not incidentally also touches on the role of sight in knowl-edge acquisition ldquoAll human beings desire to know [eidenai ] by nature And evi-dence of this is the pleasure that we take in our senses for even apart from theirusefulness they are enjoyed for their own sake and above all others the sense ofeyesight for this more than the other senses allows us to know and brings tolight many distinctionsrdquo See the discussion of this passage by Nancy Sherman ldquoTheHabituation of Characterrdquo in Aristotlersquos Ethics Critical Essays ed Nancy Sherman(New York Rowman and Littlefield 1999) 239

73 For one example among many see chapter I 1 of the Guide

And Moses hid his face for he was afraid to look upon Godrdquo69 In the endMoses was rewarded for this behavior since God allowed to ldquooverflowupon him so much of His bounty and goodness that it became nec-essary to say of him And the figure of the Lord shall he look uponrdquo whichis a way of saying that his initial reticence allowed him to attain anunprecedented degree of understanding70 Divine honor has philo-sophical narrative medical and ritual connotations for Maimonidesall of which point toward the same set of inescapable conclusionsfor intellectual practice71 Maimonides believes that there is a nat-ural human propensity to desire knowledge about divine matters andto press forward against limitation72 Reason is at the very core ofpossibilities for being human73 But only the thoughtful and intel-lectually engaged recognition of those limits that have not yet beentranscended can be said to demonstrate ldquoregard for the honor ofthe Creatorrdquo

III Honor Ethics and the Limits of Religious Language

Maimonidesrsquo ethics are broadly Aristotelian in their shape thoughnot always in their specific content Intellectual and practical virtuesare interdependent as they are in Aristotle As in Aristotle fur-thermore the practical virtues are conceived of as relatively stableacquired states or dispositions (hexoi in Greek middot or deaot in Hebrew)that typically include an emotive component but which have been


74 For more on this understanding of virtue in Aristotlersquos ethics see for exampleNicomachean Ethics 42 (1106a) Roger Crisp ldquoAristotle on Greatness of Soulrdquo in TheBlackwell Guide to Aristotlersquos Nicomachean Ethics ed Richard Kraut (Oxford BlackwellPublishing) 78 Compare the first two chapters of Maimonidesrsquo Hilkhot Deaot

75 Nichomachean Ethics 172ndash73 (1145a)76 Ibid77 See Crisp ldquoAristotle on Greatness of Soulrdquo

directed and habituated for the right ends in accordance with reason74

At the beginning of Hilkhot Deaot Maimonides goes so far as to con-nect the ldquomiddle pathrdquo derived from Aristotle with the ldquoway of Godrdquotaught by Moses and Abraham and to assert that this path can alsobe understood as the fulfillment of the sweeping biblical and rab-binic injunction to emulate God or ldquowalk in Godrsquos waysrdquo Aristotlehowever seems to posit a broad continuum between divine andhuman virtue including ldquoa heroic indeed divine sort of virtuerdquo thatis quite rare he notes that ldquoso they say human beings become godsbecause of exceedingly great virtuerdquo75 Aristotle also says that thegods do not possess virtue at all in the human sense but that ldquothegodrsquos state is more honorable than virtuerdquo which still might implya difference of degree or magnitude rather than one of fundamen-tal kind76 For Maimonides by contrast the distinction between thehuman and the divine is immeasurably more profound While wordsdesignating human virtues like mercy or loving-kindness are some-times applied to God Maimonides explains that these are merelyhomologies that in no way imply any continuum or essential simi-larity between divine and human attributes While Maimonidesrsquoldquodivine honorrdquo is inevitably related to themes of self-sufficiency andlarge-scale generosity that also characterize the Aristotelian ldquogreat-souled manrdquo for example there is simply no sense in whichMaimonides would apply the term megalopsuchos to the incommen-surate divine77 On the contrary while Maimonides devotes a greatdeal of attention to the human emulation of certain divine attrib-utes or imitatio Dei he almost always invokes divine kavod (and Exodus33) to signify that this ldquoemulationrdquo must be qualified since oncecannot really compare God with anything human

In chapter I 21 of the Guide for example Maimonides returnsat length to the apparent theophany of Exodus 33 in order to explainthe equivocal meaning of the word aabor (to pass by) The term neednot refer to physical movement according to Maimonides but mayalso refer to a shift from one objective or purpose to another The

226 don seeman

78 The multiplicity of chapters in the Guide in which Maimonides discusses wordsfrom the theophany of Exodus 33 was already noted by R YiΩ˙ak Abravanel atthe beginning of his commentary to Exodus 33 Perush aal ha-Torah ( Jerusalem ArbelPublishers 1964) vol 2 324 Also Kasher ldquoMaimonidesrsquo Interpretation of the Storyof Divine Revelationrdquo and Mordecai Z Cohen Three Approaches to Biblical Metaphor(Boston Brill Publishers 2003) 202ndash3 who proposes a schema for understandingthe organization of chapters 1ndash49 of the first part of the Guide which highlightsMaimonidesrsquo use of these verses

79 In Yesodei ha-Torah 11080 Guide 48ndash49

stated topic of the chapter is anthropomorphism but the sheer num-ber of chapters in the Guide featuring words crucial to Exodus 33ndash34should make it clear that Maimonidesrsquo choice of proof texts is farfrom arbitrary78 Having explained that the word aabor need not referto physical movement he now cites the phrase ldquoAnd the Lord passedby before his facerdquo which is from the continuation of Mosesrsquo unsuc-cessful quest to ldquoseerdquo Godrsquos kavod

The explanation of this is that Moses peace be on him demandeda certain apprehensionmdashnamely that which in its dictum But My faceshall not be seen is named the seeing of the facemdashand was promised anapprehension inferior to that which he had demanded It is this lat-ter apprehension that is named the seeing of the back in its dictum Andthou shalt see My back We have already given a hint as to this mean-ing in Mishneh Torah79 Scripture accordingly says in this passage thatGod may He be exalted hid from him the apprehension called thatof the face and made him pass over to something different I mean theknowledge of the acts ascribed to Him may He be exalted which aswe shall explain are deemed to be multiple attributes80

Here Maimonides explicitly identifies his teaching in the Guide withthat in the Mishneh Torah where he depicts Mosesrsquo request for clearand experientially irrefutable knowledge of divine incommensurabil-ity But Maimonides has also introduced another feature here uponwhich he will elaborate in later chapters namely that Mosesrsquo desireto apprehend the ldquofacerdquo of God was not only frustrated (he couldsee only Godrsquos ldquobackrdquo) but actually pushed aside or ldquopassed overrdquointo knowledge of a different kind called ldquoknowledge of the actsthat are ascribed to Him may He be exaltedrdquo More important thanthe attack on anthropomorphism which was ostensibly the subjectof this chapter is the way in which Maimonides has quietly eluci-dated an entirely different way of approaching the knowledge ofGod This approach eliminates the need for problematic assertions


81 Guide 8782 Exodus 331383 Ibid 331984 Guide 124

about divine ontology by focusing on the knowledge of divine actionsor action-attributes

Maimonides builds his argument about imitatio Dei gradually overthe course of several chapters in the first part of the Guide In chap-ter I 38 he returns to the meaning of the expression ldquoto see Godrsquosbackrdquo from Exodus 33 which he explains can mean ldquofollowing andimitating the conduct of an individual with respect to the conductof life Thus Ye shall walk at the back of the Lord your God In thissense it is said And thou shalt see My back which means that thoushall apprehend what follows Me has come to be like Me and fol-lows necessarily from My willmdashthat is all the things created by Meas I shall explain in a chapter of this Treatiserdquo81 Maimonides doesnot make good on this promise until I 54 where he explains thatGodrsquos willingness to show Moses the divine ldquobackrdquo is not just anexpression of lesser certainty concerning divine uniqueness as heimplies in the first chapter of the Mishneh Torah but also a positiverevelation of the attributes of divine action

When [Moses] asked for knowledge of the attributes and asked forforgiveness for the nation he was given a [favorable] answer withregard to their being forgiven Then he asked for the apprehension ofHis essence may He be exalted This is what it means when he saysShow me I pray Thee Thy glory [kavod] whereupon he received a favor-able answer with what he had asked for at firstmdashnamely Show me Thyways82 For he was told I will make all My goodness pass before thee83 Inanswer to his second demand [ie to see the kavod] he was told Thoucanst not see My face and so on84

According to Maimonidesrsquo reading the first question that Moses askedconcerned the philosophically radical quest to know Godrsquos essencewhich begins with the certain and unshakeable knowledge of divineincommensurability But from that question God ldquopassed overrdquo toMosesrsquo second question which was his desire to know the divineattributes that would allow him to earn forgiveness for the Israeliteswho had recently sinned by building a golden calf Even thoughMosesrsquo attempt to know Godrsquos essence was frustrated according toMaimonides the implication is that this was a necessary stage ingaining divine assent regarding his other request since ldquohe who

228 don seeman

85 Ibid 123ndash12486 In Duties of the Heart I10 Ibn Paquda also emphasizes that attributes of action

are the sole accessible way of achieving positive knowledge about the divine butone gets the sense from his discussion that practical and cognitive knowledge aresimply distinct whereas Maimonides maintains a much more robust sense of theinterdependence between them This is partly the result of Maimonidesrsquo strong lit-erary reading of Exodus 33ndash34 for which Duties of the Heart offers no parallel

87 Guide 124 citing Genesis 13188 Ibid89 Perushei Rav Saadyah Gaon le-Sefer Shemot 217ndash18

knows God finds grace in His sight and not he who merely fasts andprays but everyone who has knowledge of Himrdquo85 An appropriateunderstanding of the action attributes (which are extrinsic to God)is thus subsequent to and consequent upon onersquos understanding thedivine essence to the extent humanly possible The moment at whichMoses is forced to recognize the ultimate limits of human under-standing (ldquoA human cannot see Me and liverdquo) is thus also themoment at which Moses is pushed from an ontological revelation ofGodrsquos essence towards an ethical and political revelation of Godrsquosways86

Maimonides insists that the ldquothirteen attributes of mercyrdquo revealedto Moses in Exodus 34 (ldquoThe Lord The Lord A God compassionateand gracious slow to anger etcrdquo) were actually part of a muchbroader revelation that was not entirely recorded by the TorahGodrsquos assertion that ldquoI will cause all my goodness to pass beforeyourdquo in Exodus 3319 thus ldquoalludes to the display to [Moses] of allexisting things of which it is said And God saw every thing that He hadmade and behold it was very goodrdquo87 This was a broad and possiblyincommunicable vision of the full span of divine governance in theworld ldquoI mean that he will apprehend their nature [the nature ofall created things] and the way they are mutually connected so thathe [Moses] will know how He [God] governs them in general andin detailrdquo88 The revelation of Godrsquos ldquogoodnessrdquo (ie attributes ofaction or Providence) is therefore a substitute for the vision of kavod-as-divine-essence that Moses initially sought This is quite differentfrom Saadyahrsquos suggestion that ldquogoodnessrdquo might be read as a syn-onym for kavod in Exodus 33 which would imply that Moses actu-ally received what he asked for a vision of the ldquocreated lightrdquo89 ForMaimonides it is precisely the difference between ldquogoodnessrdquo andldquokavod rdquo that is critical in this biblical narrative because he wants to


90 This is perhaps my primary disagreement with Kellnerrsquos discussion of kavod inMaimonidesrsquo Confrontation with Mysticism

91 Hilkhot Deaot 16 Also see Sefer ha-MiΩvot positive commandment number 892 Commentators have noted that Maimonides eschews the formulation of the

Babylonian Talmud (Shabbat 133b Sotah 54b) ldquoJust as He is compassionate so youshould be compassionaterdquo in favor of Sifri aEqev 13 which is close to the languagecited here Also see Midrash Tan˙uma Shemot 20 in which God responds to Mosesrsquorequest to know Godrsquos name at the beginning of Exodus ldquoWhat do you wish toknow I am called according to my actionsmdashWhen I judge the creatures I amcalled lsquoJudgersquo (helohim) and when I conduct myself in the attribute of mercy Iam called lsquoMercifulrsquo My name is according to my actionsrdquo Most other commen-tators it should be pointed out cite the Babylonian Talmud unless they are directlyquoting Maimonides An exception that supports my reading is the heavilyMaimonidean Sefer ha-Oacuteinnukh miΩvot 555 and 611 which cites the Maimonideanformulation in order to make a point about the impossibility of Godrsquos possessingactual attributes In Guide I 54 ironically Maimonides does cite the simpler ver-sion of this teaching from the Bavli but this is in the context of a lengthy discus-sion about the nature of the attributes which makes it less likely that the readerwill misunderstand

present Exodus 33ndash34 as much more than a problematic Scripturalpassage requiring explanation It is rather a model for how peoplewho seek ethical and intellectual advancement ought to proceedAccording to this model it is not enough to study the cosmos (Godrsquos ldquogoodnessrdquo) in order to achieve perfection as some modernscholars of Maimonides intimate90 One must also engage in philo-sophical speculation about the divine at the limits of human appre-hension recognize those limits and engage in the ongoing andprogressive apprehension of what makes the divine and the humanincommensurable

Maimonidesrsquo account is informed by the fact that the classical rab-bis had already identified the ldquothirteen attributes of mercyrdquo revealedto Moses in Exodus 34 as principles for divine emulation ldquoJust asHe is called gracious so you should be gracious just as He is calledcompassionate so you should be compassionate just as He is calledholy so you should be holy in order to emulate Him to theextent possiblerdquo91 Maimonides chose to follow the version of theSifri rather than that of the Talmud perhaps because the formerseems to emphasize that God is called gracious compassionate andholy while humans are called upon to be gracious compassionate andholy92 Even with respect to the attributes of action the ldquogreat eaglerdquoremains committed to minimizing anthropomorphic and anthro-pocentric conceptions of divine activity that inhere almost inescapablyto religious language

230 don seeman

93 Guide 125 (chapter I 54) citing Psalms 1031394 Ibid Passion or affect (infiaagravel in Arabic hif aalut in Ibn Tibbonrsquos Hebrew) is used

in the Aristotelian sense of ldquobeing acted uponrdquo and hence changed by an externalforce which is one of the reasons Maimonides holds that this kind of language can-not be applied to God He is preceded in this argument by Ha-Levirsquos Kuzari 22ldquoThe sage said lsquoAll of these names are descriptions of attributes that are added toHis essence since they are borrowed from the passions that created beings aremoved by Thus He is called lsquoMercifulrsquo when He does good for man eventhough the nature of [these qualities] in us is nothing other than weakness of thesoul and the activation of our natures which is impossible to predicate of Himmay He be blessed rdquo Later writers who sought to preserve Maimonidesrsquo author-ity while rejecting his cosmology sometimes argued that these strictures on divineemotion applied only to the upper reaches of divinity in the sephirotic sensemdashanargument that Maimonides himself would have rejected See Seeman ldquoRitualEfficacy Hasidic Mysticism and lsquoUseless Sufferingrsquo in the Warsaw Ghettordquo HarvardTheological Review 101 2 (2008) and idem ldquoEthics Violence and Divine Honor inModern Jewish Thoughtrdquo

95 Guide 128

For instance one apprehends the kindness of His governance in theproduction of embryos of living beings the bringing of various facul-ties to existence in them and in those who rear them after birthmdashfac-ulties that preserve them from destruction and annihilation and protectthem against harm and are useful to them in all the doings that arenecessary to them Now actions of this kind proceed from us only afterwe feel a certain affection and compassion and this is the meaningof mercy God may He be exalted is said to be merciful just as it issaid Like as a father is merciful to his children 93 It is not that He mayHe be exalted is affected and has compassion But an action similarto that which proceeds from a father in respect to his child and thatis attached to compassion pity and an absolute passion proceeds fromHim may He be exalted in reference to His holy ones not becauseof a passion or a change94

Humans may be compassionate but God is only ldquocalled compas-sionaterdquo when human virtues are really what we have in mind Itis in fact the incommensurability of the divine that links our knowl-edge of God with the attainment of ethical perfection since imitatioDei expresses our inability to attain real knowledge of divine inten-tionality and forces us to focus on the results of divine action insteadof their cause ldquoFor the utmost virtue of man is to become like untoHim may He be exalted as far as he is able which means that weshould make our actions like unto His The purpose of all this isto show that the attributes ascribed to Him are attributes of Hisactions and that they do not mean that He possesses qualitiesrdquo95

The very term imitatio Dei which I have been using for the sake of


convenience must remain in brackets for Maimonides because theterm ldquoemulation of the divinerdquo is potentially so misleading

Some modern readers have been misled into supposing that sinceGod cannot be said to possess emotive virtues human perfectionmust therefore also reside either in the performance of the com-mandments or in the cultivation of a rational persona without anyexpectation of embodied and frequently affective qualities like com-passion or kindness that must be inculcated over time96 Maimonidesrsquoson R Abraham by contrast insists that Maimonides thinks imita-tio Dei is an ethical directive distinct from general obedience to thecommandments because it requires not only correct actions but alsothe cultivation of freestanding moral virtues97 It would be surpris-ing if anyone writing in a broadly Aristotelian context like Maimonidesthought otherwise98 When Maimonides writes in I 54 that ldquoall pas-sions are evilrdquo readers ought to remember the strong distinction hemakes in both philosophical and medical writings between the stormytransience of passing affect (infiaagravel in Arabic or hif aaluyot in Ibn TibbonrsquosHebrew)mdashwhich is a dangerous departure from the mean (Galencalls it pathe psyches) related to illness and errormdashand settled moralemo-tional states (middot or deaot) that are duly chosen and inculcated

96 See for instance Howard Kreisel Maimonidesrsquo Political Thought (Albany StateUniversity of New York Press 1999) 140 175 who argues that imitatio Dei leadsto the transcendence of all emotional traits and other writers who identify imitatioDei with the performance of the commandments as objective acts without refer-ence to the expression of any intentional virtue Cf Kenneth Seeskin Searching fora Distant God The Legacy of Maimonides (Oxford Oxford University Press 2000)95ndash98 Menahem Kellner Maimonides on Human Perfection and Shalom RosenbergldquoYou Shall Walk in His Waysrdquo trans Joel Linsider The Edah Journal 2 (2002)

97 I have relied upon the Hebrew translation of R Abrahamrsquos responsa whichis printed as a commentary on the eighth positive commandment (ldquoTo EmulateGodrdquo) in Maimonidesrsquo Sefer ha-MiΩvot trans Moshe Ibn Tibbon ( Jerusalem ShabseFrankel Publisher 1995) 218 Maimonidesrsquo own language in Sefer ha-MiΩvot men-tions the imitation of Godrsquos ldquogood actions and honorable traitsrdquo which is also thetopic of the first chapter of Hilkhot Deaot and the fourth chapter of Shemoneh Peraqim

98 J O Urmson ldquoAristotlersquos Doctrine of the Meanrdquo in Essays on Aristotlersquos Ethicsed Amelie Oksenberg Rorty (Berkeley University of California Press 1980) 157ndash70reminds critics that for Aristotle ldquoexcellence of character is concerned with bothemotions and actions not with actions alonerdquo (159) so that ultimately there is ldquonoemotion one should never experiencerdquo (165ndash66) Aristotle himself writes ldquoWe havenow discussed the virtues in general they are means and they are states Certainactions produce them and they cause us to do these same actions expressing thevirtues themselves in the way that correct reason prescribesrdquo See Nichomachean Ethics70 (1114b) cf L A Kosman ldquoBeing Properly Affected Virtues and Feelings inAristotlersquos Ethicsrdquo in Aristotlersquos Ethics Critical Essays 261ndash276

232 don seeman

through habitual training in accord with reason99 In his legal writ-ings Maimonides frequently invokes imitatio Dei in characterizingactions that transcend the requirements of the law in order to real-ize meta-legal values such as ldquoHis mercy is upon all His worksrdquovalues that describe a generative ethos rather than a set of specificactions known in advance100

Maimonidesrsquo decision to situate this question of the imitation ofthe divine within these two contextsmdasha discussion of political gov-ernance in I 54 of the Guide and a discussion of personal ethicaldevelopment in the first chapter of Hilkhot Deaotmdashpoints more to thedifferent genres of the two works than it does to any fundamentaldiscrepancy between his messages101 Aristotle too opens the NichomacheanEthics by identifying his object of study as both individual ethics andpolitical science ldquofor while it is satisfactory to acquire and preservethe good even for an individual it is finer and more divine to acquireand preserve it for a people and for citiesrdquo102 The structural oppo-sition that some modern readers posit between politics and ethicshas little or no relevance in this context where ldquothe true politicianseems to have spent more effort on virtue than on anything elsesince he wants to make the citizens good and law abidingrdquo103 Yethere too we must remember that the dual ethical and political natureof Mosesrsquo revelation in no way detracts from the need to continue

99 See Nichomachean Ethics 42 (1106a) Garcia-Ballester Galen and Galenism 140ndash41Maimonides makes this distinction in a medical context in Regimen Sanitatis 58ndash63Also see Benor Worship of the Heart 46 Aristotlersquos doctrine of the mean upon whichMaimonides relies is itself arguably based upon a medical analogy See IzhakEnglard ldquoThe Example of Medicine in Law and EquitymdashOn a MethodologicalAnalogy in Classical and Jewish Thoughtrdquo Oxford Journal of Legal Studies 52 (1985)238ndash47

100 Psalms 1459 See for example the ldquoLaws of Slavesrdquo (Hilkhot aAvadim) 98 andldquoLaws of Impurity of Foodsrdquo (Hilkhot Tumhat Okhlin) 1612 ldquo[T]he law alonerdquoTwersky notes ldquo is not the exclusive criterion of ideal religious behavior eitherpositive or negative It does not exhaust religious-moral requirements for thegoal of the Torah is the maximum sanctification of liferdquo (Introduction to the Code ofMaimonides 428)

101 Also see Sefer ha-MiΩvot positive commandment number 8102 Aristotle Nicomachean Ethics trans Terence Irwin (Indianapolis Hackett Publishing

Company 1985) 3 (1094b) and 23 (1100a) respectively Also see the useful dis-cussions in Eugene Garver Confronting Aristotlersquos Ethics (Chicago University of ChicagoPress 2006) and Malcolm Schofield ldquoAristotlersquos Political Ethicsrdquo in The BlackwellGuide to Aristotlersquos Nicomachean Ethics ed Richard Kraut (Oxford Blackwell Publishers2006) 305ndash322

103 Nichomachean Ethics 29 (1102a)


the graduated and possibly asymptotic philosophical quest to refinethe apprehension of divine uniqueness104

On the contrary while the moment of Mosesrsquo confrontation withhuman limitation can be described as a collapse of ontology intopolitics and ethics (the vision of Godrsquos ldquogoodnessrdquo rather than Godrsquoskavod ) this collapse is neither total nor catastrophic The point ofMaimonidesrsquo repeated appeals to the biblical narrative in Exodus 33is not that Moses was wrong for seeking to know the divine kavodbut rather that Mosesrsquo confrontation with his own speculative limitswas a necessary prerequisite for his later apprehension of the divineattributes Without the intellectual training and virtue associated withldquoShow me please Thy kavodrdquo in other words the knowledge of pos-itive attributes (even action attributes like those made known toMoses) leads too easily to reification and idolatry or to the melan-cholia caused by false analogy and ldquovain imaginingrdquo It was after allthe inability to ldquorefrain and hold backrdquo and to ldquohave regard for thehonor of their Creatorrdquo that led the children of Israel to idolatry inthe matter of the Golden Calf which forms the narrative backdropfor Mosesrsquo appeal to know God in Exodus 33

That I may know Thee to the end that I may find grace in Thy sight and con-sider that this nation is Thy peoplemdashthat is a people for the governmentof which I need to perform actions that I must seek to make similarto Thy actions in governing them105

The lonely philosopherrsquos quest to know God and the prophetrsquos activeintercession in his peoplersquos governance turn out to be differentmoments in a single process concerned with knowing and emulat-ing God106 Divine emulation only strengthens but does not obvi-ate the religious and philosophical obligation to continue purifyingspeech and thought

104 See the useful discussion of various modern views on this matter in KellnerMaimonides on Human Perfection (Atlanta Scholars Press 1990)

105 Guide 124ndash125 citing Exodus 3313106 Various readers have puzzled over the relationship between ethical and spec-

ulative knowledge in Maimonidesrsquo corpus I find especially intriguing the sixteenth-century kabbalist R Isaiah Horowitzrsquos suggestion that each of Maimonidesrsquo famousldquoThirteen Principles of Faithrdquo is actually derived from one of the ldquoThirteen Attributesof Mercyrdquo described in Exodus 34 While some of R Horowitzrsquos readings feelforced and there is no evidence to suggest that Maimonides himself could haveheld such a view this intuition of a close relationship between speculative and eth-ical knowledge in Maimonides does seem to me to be correct and is supported bythe revelation of ethical knowledge at the limit of philosophy in Exodus 33-34 SeeR Isaiah Horowitz Shnei Lu˙ot ha-Brit vol 1 212ndash219 (Shaaar ha-hOtiyot Shaaar hAlef )

234 don seeman

Maimonidesrsquo own philosophical labor models this graduated approachWith respect to the understanding of divine kavod in Exodus 33 he admits of at least three different classes of readings that appealto different classes of readers107 First there are false and vulgarnotions like divine corporeality (ie the idea that ldquoShow me pleaseThy kavod rdquo was really an attempt to see some kind of divine form)that must be extirpated at almost any price Onkelosrsquo and Saadyahrsquosbelief in the created light hypothesis by contrast is incorrect yet tol-erable because it does not contravene any point of philosophicalnecessity108 The most sophisticated views like Maimonidesrsquo ownequation of Godrsquos essence (kavod ) with unknowable incommensura-bility cannot be grasped by everyone and must sometimes actuallybe hidden from those who would misconstrue them Thus the authorrsquosmuch cited principle that ldquothe Torah speaks in human languagerdquotakes on different meanings throughout the Guide In the early chap-ters of the first part of the Guide it means that the Torah eschewscertain kinds of anthropomorphic language that would portray Godin a negative light God is never portrayed as sleeping or copulat-ing even according to the plain meaning of Scripture for examplebut is frequently portrayed as seeing hearing and feeling emotion109

Later chapters in the first part do however call attention to theanthropomorphic nature of ethical and emotive language that isapplied to God by Scripture110

Finally in chapters I 57ndash59 Maimonides teaches that even highlyabstract qualities like ldquoonenessrdquo cannot really be attributed to Godexcept in a certain negative or equivocal sense that constantly givesway to unintelligibility ldquoSimilarly when we say that He is one the

107 See James Arthur Diamond Maimonides and the Hermeneutics of ConcealmentDeciphering Scripture and Midrash in The Guide of the Perplexed (Albany State Universityof New York Press 2002)

108 See for instance I18 where Maimonides teaches that the nearness of Godrefers to intellectual cognition ldquoThe verse (Exodus 242) is to be interpreted in thisway unless you wish to consider that the expression shall come near used with ref-erence to Moses means that the latter shall approach the place on the mountainupon which the light I mean the glory of God has descended For you are free todo so You must however hold fast to the doctrinal principle that there is nodifference whether an individual is at the center of the earth or in the highestpart of the ninth heavenly sphere For nearness to Him may He be exaltedconsists in apprehending Himrdquo (Guide 44ndash45) Also see chapters I 4 and 25

109 Guide 104ndash106 (chapter I 47)110 Ibid 133 140 (chapters I 57 59)


meaning is that He has no equal and not that the notion of one-ness attaches to His essencerdquo111 It is worth pointing out that theArabic word translated here as ldquoessencerdquo is dhagravetihi This word hadpreviously been used by Ibn Paquda throughout chapter I10 of hisDuties of the Heart which foreshadows many of the themes raised byMaimonides in the first part of the Guide Ibn Paqudarsquos translatorJudah Ibn Tibbon consistently translated dhagravetihi as divine kavod inhis 1160 translation some thirty years before his son Samuel IbnTibbon published his famous Hebrew translation of MaimonidesrsquoGuide As we have seen Maimonides himself also directly makes thisassociation of kavod with unknowable essence in chapter 110 of Yesodeiha-Torah the first chapter of his legal code The association contin-ues in a somewhat more elliptical form throughout the Guide

In chapter I 59 Maimonides insists that no religious speech nomatter how refined can do justice to the divine glory

Glory [or praise] then to Him who is such that when the intellectscontemplate His essence their apprehension turns into incapacity andwhen they contemplate the proceeding of His actions from His willtheir knowledge turns to ignorance and when the tongues aspire tomagnify Him by means of attributive qualifications all eloquence turnsto weariness and incapacity112

The Arabic term for glory used here is sub˙agraven which is a cognateof the Hebrew sheva˙ or praise and is identified in I 64 as one ofthe equivocal meanings of kavod In a different context ldquowearinessand incapacityrdquo are identified with the pathology of melancholia thatcomes upon a person who ignores intellectual limitations yet herethe inability to speak or to conceive of the divine essence is para-doxically a source of praise at the very heart of true divine worship

This has strong implications for the life of prayer According toMaimonides fixed prayers and some anthropomorphic language arenecessary for a broad religious community yet the enlightened believermust also recognize that all words of praise are potential obstaclesto understanding

The most apt phrase concerning this subject is the dictum occurring inthe Psalms Silence is praise to Thee which interpreted signifies silence withregard to You is praise This is a most perfectly put phrase regarding

111 Ibid 133112 Ibid 137

236 don seeman

this matter113 For whatever we say intending to magnify and exalton the one hand we find that it can have some application to Himmay He be exalted and on the other we perceive in it some deficiencyAccordingly silence and limiting oneself to the apprehension of theintellects are more appropriatemdashjust as the perfect ones have enjoinedwhen they said Commune with your own heart upon your bed and be stillSelah114

Maimonides has already told us that ldquopraiserdquo is sometimes a syn-onym for kavod and here the concept of praise without speech par-allels the biblical kavod with no image In Guide I 59 Maimonidesfamously cites the Talmudic story of Rabbi Oacuteaninah who criticizeda man for praising God as ldquothe Great the Valiant the Terriblethe Mighty the Strong the Tremendous the Powerfulrdquo because ofthe multiplicity of terms that had not already been ratified by theprophets and sages of Israel115 ldquoIt is as if a mortal king who hadmillions of gold pieces were praised for possessing silver onesrdquoMaimonides writes indicating that the composition of endless var-ied liturgies and flowery praises of God should be disallowed116

Other writers took a less extreme position on this issuemdashR Haifor instance thought that the stricture on linguistic flourish appliedonly to formal prayer and not to informal supplication117 One ofthe great offences from Maimonidesrsquo point of view was ironicallya medieval hymn known as Shir ha-Kavod (the lsquoSong of Gloryrsquo) becauseof its robust anthropomorphic imagery of divine grandeur Maimonidestakes precise aim at this kind of religious poetry whose objection-able nature connects to the theme of intellectual restraint and divinehonor with which we began

113 Psalms 6512114 Guide 139ndash140 citing Psalms 45 On the importance to prophecy of sleep

and the moments before sleep see Diamond Maimonides and the Hermeneutics ofConcealment For a comprehensive view of Maimonidesrsquo attitudes towards prayer seeBenor Worship of the Heart

115 Guide 140 based on Talmud Berakhot 33b116 Ibid117 In his ldquoLaws of Prayerrdquo or Hilkhot Tefillah 97 Maimonides rules somewhat

sweepingly (and in language reminiscent of the Guide) that the multiplication ofdivine titles and praises beyond those used by Moses is prohibited under Jewishlaw since ldquoit is not within human power to adequately praise Himrdquo Later com-mentators (like Maharsha to Berakhot 33b) cite Rav Hairsquos view Along these linessee Shul˙an aArukh hOra˙ Oacuteayyim 1139 and related commentaries


This kind of license is frequently taken by poets and preachers or suchas think that what they speak is poetry so that the utterances of someof them constitute an absolute denial of faith while other utterancescontain such rubbish and such perverse imaginings as to make menlaugh when they hear them Accordingly if you are one who hasregard for the honor of his Creator you ought not listen in any way tothese utterances let alone give expression to them and still less makeup others like them118

Just as ldquoregard for the honor of the Creatorrdquo is expressed in intel-lectual terms through resistance to ldquofalse analogy and vain imagin-ingrdquo so it is expressed in ritual terms through restraint to liturgicalflourish

The relationship between speech apprehension and the divinekavod which ldquofillsrdquo the world is made even more explicit in Guide I 64

In fact all that is other than God may He be exalted honors HimFor the true way of honoring Him consists in apprehending His great-ness119 Thus everybody who apprehends His greatness and His per-fection honors Him according to the extent of his apprehension Manin particular honors Him by speeches so that he indicates thereby thatwhich he has apprehended by his intellect and communicates it toothers Those beings that have no apprehension as for instance theminerals also as it were honor God through the fact that by theirvery nature they are indicative of the power and wisdom of Him whobrought them into existence Thus Scripture says All my bones shallsay Lord who is like unto Thee120 whereby it conveys that the bonesnecessitate this belief as though they put it into speech It is inview of this notion being named glory [kavod] that it is said The wholeearth is full of His glory for praise is called glory121

Maimonides specifies in this chapter that kavod is an equivocal termIt can ldquosignify the created light that God causes to descend in aparticular place in order to confer honor upon it in a miraculousway And the glory of YHVH abode upon Mount Sinai and [the cloud]

118 Guide 142119 ldquoHonoring himrdquo here is taaΩimuhu from the same root as ldquoHis greatnessrdquo

aaΩmatahu so that another way of translating this might be ldquoRendering God greatmeans apprehending His greatnessrdquo This is well within the homonymic sense ofkavod as praise set forth by Maimonides in I 64

120 Psalms 3510121 Guide 157 citing Isaiah 63

238 don seeman

covered it and so onrdquo122 Or it can ldquosignify His essence and true real-ity may He be exalted as when [Moses] says Show me I pray TheeThy glory [kavod] and was answered For man shall not see Me and live123

Or finally it can signify praise as in ldquothe honoring of Him mayHe be exalted by all menrdquo including the manifest (and silent) wit-ness of creation124

This concept of ldquothe honoring of Him may He be exaltedrdquowhich calls for correct forms of praise is however also clearly depen-dent upon the knowledge of ldquoHis essence and true realityrdquo Themany possible meanings of kavod invite the reflective reader to con-template with some urgency its appearance in any specific narra-tive context None of Maimonidesrsquo predecessors put such greatemphasis upon a handful of verses in Exodus 33ndash34 but that isbecause none of them viewed this episode as a fundamental prismthrough which both imitatio Dei and the limits of religious speechcould be understood The whole Maimonidean attempt to clarifyreligion is encapsulated by his reading of these verses whose mean-ing he must therefore jealously guard from misinterpretation Andso as Part I draws to a close in chapter I 64 Maimonides tellinglypauses to insist that we take care to understand the Scriptural termkavod correctly ldquoUnderstand then likewise the equivocality [multi-plicity of meanings] with reference to gloryrdquo he notes with laconicunderstatement in chapter 64 ldquoand interpret the latter in every pas-sage in accordance with the context You shall thus be saved fromgreat difficultyrdquo125

IV On Divine Honor and the Phenomenology of Human Perfection

In chapter 8 of the first part of the Guide while ostensibly just describ-ing the question of divine corporeality Maimonides alerts us to thefact that kavod will be central to his whole philosophical project inthe Guide He references the word ldquoplacerdquo (maqom) and explains thatthis term when applied to the divine refers not to a location butrather to ldquoa rank in theoretical speculation and the contemplation of

122 Ibid 156 citing Exodus 2416123 Ibid citing Exodus 3318ndash20124 Ibid 157125 Ibid


the intellectrdquo Yet Maimonides restricts his focus to just two biblicalverses that each thematize divine glory in this context Ezekielrsquos ldquoBlessedbe the glory [kavod] of the Lord from His placerdquo and Godrsquos responseto Moses ldquoBehold there is a place by Merdquo from Exodus 33126

He then interrupts the flow of his argument in order to offer a strik-ing methodological recommendation for how the Guide should bestudied

Know with regard to every term whose equivocality we shall explainto you in this Treatise that our purpose in such an explanation is notonly to draw your attention to what we mention in that particularchapter Rather do we open a gate and draw your attention to suchmeanings of that particular term as are useful for our purposes These our words are the key to this Treatise and to others a case inpoint being the explanation we have given of the term place in thedictum of Scripture Blessed be the glory of the Lord from his place For youshould know that this very meaning is that of the term place in its dic-tum Behold there is a place by Me127

Here we have Maimonidesrsquo more or less explicit admission that theepisode in Exodus 33ndash34 and kavod in general are ldquokey to this trea-tiserdquo as a whole We have already seen how frequently this themeis referenced throughout Part I of the Guide as Maimonides pushesthe theme of divine incommensurability to exclude more and moreof our linguistic and conceptual categories The divine kavod is notmentioned again in Part II but it is central to the discussion oftheodicy and human perfection that occupies much of Part III

In chapter III 9 for example Maimonides describes how matteracts as a ldquostrong veilrdquo to prevent the apprehension of the non-corporeal The theme is not new but in this context it facilitates thetransition from Maimonidesrsquo discussion of metaphysics (ldquothe Chariotrdquo)to his consideration of the vexing problem of human sufferingMaimonides wants to emphasize that the material substrate of allhuman understanding makes impossible the full comprehension ofdivine ways and that this should inspire in readers a deep reservoirof humility that will influence how they reflect upon the problemsof evil and human misery Rather than doubting divine power orbeneficence in other words one should acknowledge that some

126 Ezekiel 312 and Exodus 3321127 Guide 34

240 don seeman

things are beyond the power of human apprehension ldquoThis is alsowhat is intendedrdquo he writes ldquoin [Scripturersquos] dictum darkness cloudand thick darkness128 and not that He may He be exalted was encom-passed by darkness for near Him may He be exalted there is nodarkness but perpetual dazzling light the overflow of which illu-mines all that is darkmdashin accordance with what is said in the propheticparables And the earth did shine with His glory [kavod]rdquo129 This is nota perceptible light for Maimonides but a parable of human intel-lectual perception at its limits

In the chapters that follow Maimonides insists that most peopleare born under all of the conditions required to achieve felicity butthat suffering is frequently caused by human agency in the formof violence that ruins the social order or overindulgence that ruinsthe individual constitution130 Despite the inevitable ravages of pri-vation in which ldquothe harlot matterrdquo seeks and then discards newmaterial forms (causing sickness and decay) existence itself remainsone of the greatest goods that the Creator bestows131 Yet Maimonidesalso insists that divine ldquogoodnessrdquo cannot effectively be measuredby human desires or prejudices and that we must learn to viewcreation from the perspective of divine (rather than merely human)intentionality132 ldquoI will cause all My goodness to pass before theerdquoin Exodus 33 was a promise that Moses would apprehend the work-ings of divine providence but it was no promise that these work-ings would always be pleasurable to the people whom they concernEven death and passing away are described as ldquogoodrdquo by Maimonidesin ldquoview of the perpetuity of generation and the permanence ofbeing through successionrdquo though he harbors no illusion that theseexperiences will always be perceived as ldquogoodrdquo by the individualsufferer133 A crucial proof text which also links this discussion toMaimonidesrsquo view of the divine kavod is a verse from Proverbs chap-ter 16 ldquoThe Lord hath made everything limaaanehurdquo which may betranslated as either ldquofor its own sakerdquo or ldquofor His [Godrsquos] sakerdquo

128 Deuteronomy 411129 Guide 437 citing Ezekiel 432130 This is the overall theme of III 12131 In III 10 for instance he writes ldquoRather all His acts may He be exalted

are an absolute good for He only produces being and all being is a goodrdquo In III12 ldquoFor His bringing us into existence is absolutely the great good as we havemade clear rdquo See Guide 440 and 448 respectively

132 Guide 448ndash56 (chapter III 13)133 Ibid 440 (chapter III 10)


Maimonides takes this phrase to mean ldquofor the sake of His essencemay He be exaltedmdashthat is for the sake of His will as the latteris His essencerdquo134

This reading dispels the popular anthropocentric view held bySaadyah and possibly by the younger Maimonides himself whichpurports that the world was actually created for the sake of humanbeings135 Maimonidesrsquo insistence that ldquofor His [Godrsquos] sakerdquo reallymeans ldquofor the sake of his essencerdquo also combats the view that theworld was created in order to open a space for divine service fromwhich God too would benefit as in the theurgistrsquos credo that ldquohumanservice is a divine needrdquo which was popularized by the school ofNa˙manides136 Indeed this chapter of the Guide has even some-times been cited by later kabbalists seeking to qualify the radicalimplications of this early kabbalistic teaching137 For Maimonidesthe discussion of Godrsquos unique and unknowable essence leadsinevitably back to his earlier discussion of the unfathomable divinekavod

134 Ibid 452ndash53 citing Proverbs 164135 See Norman Lamm ldquoManrsquos Position in the Universe A Comparative Study

of the Views of Saadia Gaon and Maimonidesrdquo The Jewish Quarterly Review 55 (1965)208ndash234 Also see the statements Maimonides made as a young man in the intro-duction to his commentary on the Mishnah where he cites the view that the worldwas created for the sake of the righteous individual This anthropocentric positionwas typically embraced by later kabbalists For a classical statement see R MosheOacuteayyim Luzzattorsquos early eighteenth century ethical tract Mesilat Yesharim (DialogueVersion and Thematic Version) ed Avraham Shoshana ( Jerusalem Ofeq Institute1994) 369 as well as 66ndash74 of the dialogue version and 204ndash8 of the thematicversion Luzzatto argues that since the world was created for the sake of humanspiritual advancement human beings can either elevate or desecrate creation throughtheir behavior Joseph Avivirsquos introductory essay to this edition suggests that Luzzattowas specifically motivated (especially in the dialogue version) by his disagreementwith Maimonides on this score

136 See Na˙manidesrsquo commentary to Exodus 2946 where he writes that thebuilding of the Tabernacle by the Israelites fulfilled ldquoa need of the Shekhinah andnot merely a need of human beingsrdquo which was later formulated as aavodah Ωorekhgavoah or ldquohuman service is a divine needrdquo See R Ba˙ya ben Asherrsquos commen-tary on Exodus 2946 and Numbers 1541 as well as the whole second section ofR Meir Ibn Gabbairsquos aAvodat ha-Qodesh which details this principle and makes itone of the central points of his long polemic against Maimonides

137 The important Lithuanian writer R Shlomo Elyashiv (1839ndash1926) goes outof his way to cite Maimonidesrsquo Guide (especially I 69 and III 13) in his qualificationof this principle The idea that ldquohuman service is a divine needrdquo still requires ldquosweet-ening and clarificationrdquo he writes despite its extensive and widespread kabbalisticcredentials ldquoAs for what is written [in Proverbs 164] that God made everythingfor His own sakerdquo writes R Elyashiv ldquoand similarly what has been established

242 don seeman

We have already explained that His essence is also called His glory[kavod] as in its saying Show me I pray Thee Thy glory Thus his say-ing here The Lord hath made everything limaaanehu [For His sake] wouldbe like saying Everyone that is called by My name and whom I have createdfor My glory I have formed him yea I have made him138 It says that every-thing whose making is ascribed to Me has been made by Me solelybecause of My will139

This radical rejection of both anthropocentrism and false analogiesbetween human and divine intentionality has medical as well asphilosophical implications in Maimonidesrsquo writing It lends a degreeof equanimity to human consciousness by forestalling foolish andunanswerable questions about the purpose or telos of different cre-ated beings A person who ldquounderstands every being according towhat it isrdquo writes Maimonides ldquo becomes calm and his thoughtsare not troubled by seeking any final end for what has no finalend except its own existence which depends upon the divine willmdashor if you prefer you can also say on the divine wisdomrdquo140 This isprecisely the opposite of the melancholia and desolation that attendthose who pursue questions beyond human comprehension andthereby ldquofail to have regard for the honor of their Creatorrdquo141

that [God] created everything for His glory [kavod] the meaning is not heaven for-bid that it was for His advancement or benefit but the deep intention is that Hislight and glory [kavod] should be revealed to those who are worthy of it becausethe revelation of His light and the revelation of His glory may He be exalted isitself the joy and sweetness and brilliance for all those who are worthy to cling toHim and to be together with Himrdquo R Shlomo Elyashiv Shaaarei Leshem Shevo ve-A˙alama ( Jerusalem Aharon Barzani 1990) 1ndash10 (chapter 11) R Elyashivrsquos some-time student R Abraham Isaac Kook directly advanced this same approach in histreatise on ethical development Musar hAvikha ( Jerusalem Mossad ha-Rav Kook1971) 46ndash49 Rabbi Kook attempts to reconcile the Maimonidean and Kabbalisticpositions by arguing that human perfection is the greatest of divine ldquoneedsrdquo thisis essentially R Elyashivrsquos position On the influence of Lithuanian Kabbalah uponRav Kookrsquos thought see Tamar Ross ldquoThe Concept of God in the Thought ofRav Kookrdquo (Hebrew) Daat 8 (1982) 109ndash128

138 Isaiah 437139 Guide 453 It is worth noting that all three of these biblical sources are already

juxtaposed in Sifri aEqev 13 which we have already cited above as the source ofMaimonidesrsquo formulation of imitatio Dei Thus it may be argued that Maimonidesrsquorich thematic associations were already evident in one of his primary rabbinicsources

140 Ibid 456141 In III 19 (479) Maimonides punctuates this set of reflections on providence

and the problem of evil with a reflection on Psalm 7311 in which he says thatthe Psalmist ldquobegins to make clear that God may He be honored and magnifiedwho has given us the intellect with which we apprehendmdashand because of our inca-pacity to apprehend His true reality may He be exalted there arise in us these


Theological truth and psycho-spiritual well-being are always closelyconnected in Maimonidesrsquo corpus and these in turn are dependentupon correct belief and practice

Nearly half of the third part of the Guide is devoted to a discus-sion of the commandments and their purpose Maimonides arguesthat the commandments collectively foster tiqqun ha-nefesh or the per-fection of opinion and intellect as well as tiqqun ha-guf which liter-ally means the perfection of the body but actually refers to bothindividual and socio-political organization and welfare142 It shouldbe noted that these two types of perfection correspond broadly tothe primary causes of human sufferingmdashimmoderate desire and polit-ical violencemdashthat Maimonides described in his chapters on theod-icy We have already touched upon Maimonidesrsquo belief that someof the commandments promote an ethos of self restraint identifiedwith showing honor to the divine But the performance of the com-mandments is by itself insufficient to guarantee the attainment ofhuman perfection as Maimonides makes clear in the parable of thepalace in Guide III 51 Those who perform and study the com-mandments without speculative understanding are at best like thosewho walk about the palace from the outside and hope for a glimpseof the king It is only in the last few chapters of the Guide thatMaimonides returns to an integrated depiction of what constituteshuman perfection in which kavod plays an important role

In chapter III 51 for example Maimonides invokes the intensityof passionate love and attachment (aishq in Arabic or ˙esheq in Hebrew)that accompanies profound contemplation and apprehension of thedivine One attains this kind of love through a lifetime of ritual andintellectual discipline whose net effect may well increase with advanc-ing age and physical decline ldquo[T]he fire of the desires is quenchedthe intellect is strengthened its lights achieve a wider extension itsapprehension is purified and it rejoices in what it apprehendsrdquo143

Just as the moments preceding sleep are treated throughout the Guide

great doubtsmdashknows may He be exalted this our deficiency and that no atten-tion should be directed to rash reflections proceeding from this our inadequatethoughtrdquo

142 Compare Schofield ldquoAristotlersquos Political Ethicsrdquo which describes the rela-tionship of law and political science to both individual and collective excellences inAristotle

143 Guide 627

244 don seeman

as precious times during which the disciplined intellectual seeker canattain a level of apprehension not available at other times so ldquowhena perfect man is stricken with years and approaches death this appre-hension increases very powerfully joy over this apprehension and agreat love for the object of apprehension become stronger until thesoul is separated from the body at that moment in this state of plea-surerdquo144 This is the level described in biblical language as ldquodeath bya kissrdquo which is attributed only to Moses Aaron and Miriam145

The other prophets and excellent men are beneath this degree but itholds good for all of them that the apprehension of their intellectsbecomes stronger at the separation just as it is said And thy righteous-ness shall go before thee the glory [kavod] of the Lord shall be at thy rear146 Bring your soul to understand this chapter and direct your efforts tothe multiplying of those times in which you are with God or endeav-oring to approach Him and to decreasing the times in which you arewith other than He and in which you make no efforts to approachHim This guidance is sufficient in view of the purpose of this Treatise147

In this chapter kavod has once again been invoked at the limits ofhuman knowledge although here the implication is that human lim-itation can be transcended to at least some degree when the holdof matter has been weakened The phrase ldquoThe kavod of the Lordshall be at thy rearrdquo from Isaiah 588 can also be rendered as ldquoThekavod of the Lord shall gather you inrdquo which in this context meansthat a person devoted to intellectual perfection may die in passion-ate contemplation of the divine kavod or incommensurate essence ofGod

Yet far from being in disjuncture with his previous discussion ofreasons for the commandments here Maimonides emphasizes thatspeculative attainment like that described as ldquodeath by a kissrdquo isgrounded in a lifestyle linked to all of the religious practices ldquo[which]have only the end of training you to occupy yourself with His com-mandments may He be exalted rather than occupying yourself with

144 Ibid145 Miriamrsquos inclusion is important here because of what it says about Maimonidesrsquo

view of womenrsquos potential for intellectual perfection which he hints at in a moreveiled and possibly ambivalent way in relevant passages of the Mishneh Torah suchas Yesodei ha-Torah 413 and Teshuvah 101

146 Guide 628147 Ibid


that which is other than Herdquo148 The directive to hold God as uniqueand without analogy to worldly things has here been activated andexpressed through a set of practical ritual interventions that makeeven the quotidian routines of daily life into a series of sites forreflection upon ldquoHis commandments may He be exaltedrdquo ratherthan ldquothat which is other than Herdquo This is divine incommensura-bility ritualized

Maimonides continues to elaborate the philosophical value of thecommandments in III 52 However here he posits a distinctionbetween the passionate love of Godmdashwhich is attained ldquothrough theapprehension of His being and His unity may He be exaltedrdquomdashandthe fear or awe of Godmdashwhich is inculcated ldquoby means of all theactions prescribed by the Lawrdquo including practices that cultivatehumility like walking about with a bent carriage and with onersquoshead coveredmdashsince ldquoThe earth is full of His glory [kavod] all this beingintended firmly to establish the notion that we are always beforeHim may He be exalted and walk to and fro while His Indwelling[Shekhinah] is with usrdquo149 This is just another way of saying that themultiplicity of commandments allows a person to be constantly occu-pied with the divine to the exclusion of that which is not divine Itshould come as no surprise that Maimonides invokes kavod to makehis points with respect to both overpowering love in chapter 51 andfear (the impulse to ldquorefrain and hold backrdquo and ldquoto have regardfor the honor of the Creatorrdquo) in chapter 52 In the second chap-ter of Yesodei ha-Torah too he links the commandments ldquoto love andto fear this awesome and honored (nikhbad ) Deityrdquo within a singlehalakhic formulation One begins by contemplating the wisdom

148 Ibid 622 For more on this theme compare Hilkhot Mezuzah (ldquoLaws of Mezuzahrdquo)613 and Hilkhot Shemittah ve-Yovel (ldquoLaws of Sabbatical and Jubilee Yearsrdquo) 1312ndash13

149 Ibid 629 citing Isaiah 63 Sometimes even the details of a commandmentor the gesture with which it is performed can be conceived as an instantiation ofdivine honor as in the important passage at the end of Hilkhot She˙itah (ldquoLaws ofSlaughterrdquo) 146 Maimonides describes the law mandating that the blood of cer-tain kinds of slaughtered animals and birds be covered with earth and cites theTalmudic teaching that this should be done with the hand or with the slaughterknife rather than with onersquos foot which would appear to debase the performanceof the commandment or show it to be disgraceful in the eyes of the person per-forming the act Maimonides adds a peroration which is not found in his rabbinicsources ldquoFor honor [kavod] does not pertain to the commandments themselves butto the one who commanded them may He be blessed and saved us from grop-ing in the darkness He prepared for us a lamp to straighten perversities and alight to teach us straight paths Just as it is said [in Psalm 119105] lsquoYour wordis a lamp to my feet and a light to my pathrsquordquo

246 don seeman

attested to by Godrsquos ldquogreat and wondrous creationsrdquo which inspirepraise and the passionate desire to know Godrsquos great name Yetldquowhen a person thinks about these very things he is immediatelythrown backwards and frightened terrified in the knowledge that heis a tiny and inconsequential creature remaining in his small andlimited intellectrdquo before the perfect intellect of Godrdquo150 Love drawsthe individual to know God while fear literally ldquothrows him backrdquoupon his own limitations a movement reflected in ritual gestures inobedience to the divine law and in medical and theological termi-nology found throughout the broad Maimonidean corpus We needan analytic framework subtle enough to encompass these differentmoments in the phenomenology of divine kavod without unnecessar-ily reducing them to a single frame

One of the ways in which Maimonides accomplishes this richreverberation of kavod-related themes is by shifting attention to differentaspects of the verses that he cites in different contexts In the lastchapter of the Guide he returns to Exodus 33 in the course of mak-ing a point about the inseparability and mutual reinforcement ofspeculative and ethical human perfection

For when explaining in this verse the noblest ends he [ Jeremiah] doesnot limit them only to the apprehension of Him may He be exaltedFor if this were His only purpose he would have said But let him thatglorieth glory in this that he understandeth and knoweth Me that I am One orhe would have said that I have no figure or that there is none like Me orsomething similar But he says that one should glory in the appre-hension of Myself and in the knowledge of My attributes by whichhe means His actions as we have made clear with reference to thedictum Show me now Thy ways and so on151 In this verse he makesit clear to us that those actions that ought to be known and imitated

150 Yesodei ha-Torah 21ndash2 In his edition of the Mishneh Torah R Joseph Kafiqhadduces a possible source for this formulation It is from Sifri to Deuteronomy 3326ldquoAll of Israel gathered before Moses and said lsquoMoses our master what is the mea-sure of honor above [kavod maaalah]rsquo He said to them lsquoFrom what is below youcan learn what the measure of honor above isrsquo This may be likened to a personwho said lsquoI desire to behold the honor of the kingrsquo They said to him lsquoEnter intothe kingdom and you will behold itrsquo He [attempted to] enter the kingdom andsaw a curtain stretched across the entrance with precious stones and jewels affixedto it Instantly he fell to the ground They said to him lsquoYou were not even ableto feast your eyes before falling to the ground How much more so had you actu-ally entered the kingdom and seen the face of the kingrsquordquo

151 Exodus 33


are loving-kindness judgment and righteousness He adds another corrobo-rative notion through saying in the earthmdashthis being a pivot of theLaw152

The Hebrew word that Pines translates here as ldquogloryrdquo is actuallyhillul which is usually rendered as ldquopraiserdquo but which Maimonideshas already identified as one of the synonyms or equivocal mean-ings of kavod in I 64 The glancing reference to Exodus 33 and thephrase ldquoShow me now Thy waysrdquo might well be missed by a care-less reader but it corresponds to the apprehension of divine attrib-utes that Moses only experienced when he reached the hard limitsof his ability to understand the divine essence or kavodmdashthus ldquotheknowledge of Myself and of My attributesrdquo

Although Maimonides has taught that ethical perfection is a moreldquoexternalrdquo or disposable form of perfection than intellectual perfec-tion it is clear from chapter 54 that he is not referring there to thekind of ethical perfection that follows upon speculation at the lim-its of human capacity The person whose ethical behavior rests onlyupon tradition or instrumental rationality can hardly be comparedwith Moses whose ldquoShow me now Thy waysrdquo implies a crowningperfection of imitatio Dei Essentially the same point is made at theend of the first book of the Mishneh Torah where Maimonides writesthat a person who has come to acquire knowledge and love of Godldquoperforms the truth because it is the truthrdquo without any instrumentalconcern for reward or punishment153 Indeed we are told that onecan love God and seek to perform Godrsquos will ldquoonly to the extentthat one knows Godmdashif much much and if little littlerdquo154 Neithercognitive nor practical knowledge can be conceived in isolationbecause knowledge of God translates into an intense love accompa-nied by the desire to approximate those attributes that Scripture has specified for human emulation The observance of the law is

152 Ibid 637153 Hilkhot Teshuvah 101 A similar statement can be found in the introduction

to the tenth chapter of Sanhedrin in the Commentary on the Mishnah (Kafiqh edi-tion 135) ldquoThe only telos of truth is to know that it is the truth and the com-mandments are true therefore their telos is their fulfillmentrdquo Compare AristotlersquosNichomachean Ethics 24 on the performance of virtuous actions for their own sakemdashalso discussed by M F Burnyeat ldquoAristotle on Learning to be Goodrdquo in AristotlersquosEthics 205ndash239

154 Ibid

248 don seeman

spiritualized through a powerful consciousness of imitatio Dei whichin turn promotes the ongoing asymptotic acquisition of deeper andmore refined intellectual apprehension

Both divine kavod and the concept of honoring the divine areinvoked at each stage of this graduated intellectual process Thuskavod accompanies the passion to know Godrsquos incommensurableessence (ldquoShow me please Thy kavod) and is also identified with theethos of restraint known as ldquohaving regard for the Creatorrsquos honorrdquoit signifies both the collapse of religious speech into silence which istrue praise (ldquoHis kavod fills the worldrdquo) and the collapse of ontologyinto an apprehension of Godrsquos ldquogoodnessrdquo which humankind canemulate through kindness judgment and righteousness Taken togetherthese different instantiations of divine honor constitute a graduatedmodel of spiritual and intellectual practice that appears in differentforms throughout Maimonidesrsquo corpus but is brought together in asingle overarching statement at the Guidersquos conclusion

It is clear that the perfection of men that may truly be gloried in isthe one acquired by him who has achieved in a measure correspondingto his capacity apprehension of Him may He be exalted and whoknows His providence extending over His creatures as manifested inthe act of bringing them into being and in their governance as it isThe way of life of such an individual after he has achieved this appre-hension will always have in view loving-kindness righteousness and judg-ment through assimilation to His actions may He be exalted just aswe have explained several times in this Treatise155

Maimonidesrsquo claim that he has already explained this concept sev-eral times over the course of the treatise should not be taken lightlyWe have already had occasion to note the repetition of key themesinvolving the interpretation of Exodus 33ndash34

Those who (1) have achieved the apprehension of God (ie divineincommensurability) within human limits (2) accepted those limitsand gotten ldquopushed asiderdquo into the knowledge of divine providenceand (3) emulated Godrsquos ldquoloving-kindness righteousness and judg-mentrdquo are those who have modeled their moral and intellectualpractice upon the example of Moses While we may refer to thislast stage as imitatio Dei for the sake of convenience it is crucial tounderstand that this is not the emulation of the divine personalityor mythic biography revealed in the stories of Scripture It is rather

155 Guide 638


the adoption of moral-conceptual categories like mercy or gracious-ness that have been abstracted through the intellectual apprehensionof divine governance While Maimonidesrsquo radical de-anthropomor-phization of God might be thought to rob imitatio Dei of any realcontent it actually goes hand in hand with the progressive unfold-ing of ethical exempla that are now essentially without limit becausethey have been freed of mythological constraint156 It is not the specificactions of God described in Scripture that are the real focus of divineemulation in this framework but rather the core valuesmdashlike mercyand compassionmdashthat can be abstracted from them (and from nature)by reflection

Maimonidesrsquo insistence on the equivocal meaning of words likekavod in the first part of the Guide is thus not just an exegetical cau-tion or a strategy for attacking gross anthropomorphism as has typ-ically been presumed Instead it is a central organizing feature ofhis pedagogy which presumes that the Guide should really serve asa guide for practical religious and intellectual growth157 The falseanalogy between human and divine honor is at the very root of idol-atry for Maimonides and his thoughts never strayed far from thisfoundation Yet the equivocal nature of this labile and resonant termallows for different conceptions of divine honor to emerge along acontinuum of differently positioned virtues and related practicessometimes kavod means trying to understand the essence of divineincommensurability while at other times it means acknowledging ourhuman inability to complete that task or the collapse of ontology intopolitics and ethicsmdashthe drive to know and to emulate attributes likeldquoloving-kindness righteousness and judgment in the earthrdquo with

156 This is I believe the heart of R Kookrsquos argument (Middot ha-Rahayah 81)that ldquoWhen the honor of heaven is lucidly conceptualized it raises the worth ofhumanity and of all creatures [while] the honor of heaven that is embodiedtends towards idolatry and debases the dignity [kavod] of humans and all creaturesrdquoFailure to purify the God concept leads to an anthropomorphic understanding ofdivine honor which tends to collapse over time into to ldquoa cruel demand from aphysical being that longs for honor without limitrdquo Only exaggerated human ser-vility is thought to magnify the glory of such a God the same way that it oftenhelps to promote the glory of human kings See Seeman ldquoViolence Ethics andDivine Honor in Modern Jewish Thoughtrdquo in which I previously underestimatedMaimonidesrsquo influence on this formulation

157 Kellner Maimonides on Human Perfection 56 Focusing on kavod would in myopinion give Kellnerrsquos argument an operational aspect that could sharpen his con-clusion

250 don seeman

which the Guide concludes Human perfection cannot be reduced toany one of these features without the others On the contrary itrelies upon the dynamic interrelationships reproduced in these chap-ters and sometimes upon the tensions that arise between them overtime

Time is in fact the crucial and frequently missing element ofcommentary upon Maimonidesrsquo elaboration of these themes Byunearthing the different aspects of divine honor and their associatedvirtues within a single biblical narrative and a few key rabbinic pas-sages Maimonides gives kavod an organic exegetical frame that isricher more flexible and ultimately more evocative than any sim-ply declarative statement of philosophical principles could be Thismay be one of the most distinctive features of Maimonidesrsquo presen-tation as compared with that of other writers like R Ba˙ya IbnPaquda who raised some of the same issues in a less dramatic form158

We should not in other words view Maimonidesrsquo decision to embedhis most radical theoretical propositions within readings of Scripturalnarratives like Exodus 33 as an esoteric gesture or an attempt toapologize for traditional religion in a philosophical context Insteadwe should attend to the ways in which his decision to convey teach-ings about divine honor through an unfolding analysis of Scripturalnarrative renders those teachings compatible with a reading that alsounfolds over time in the form of an educational strategy or a rit-ual model rather than just a static philosophical assertion that isdifficult to operationalize Ritual like narrative is fundamentallydiachronic in nature159

Ultimately the goal of honoring the divine is asymptotic forMaimonides It may never be fully realized within human consciousness

158 Duties of the Heart 110159 On the unfolding of ritual process over time see for example Victor Turner

In the Forest of Symbols (Ithaca Cornell University Press 1967) For an applicationof this anthropological principle to a Jewish mystical text Seeman ldquoMartyrdomEmotion and the Work of Ritualrdquo The importance of learning and inculcatingvirtue over time in an Aristotelian context has been described by M F BurnyeatldquoAristotle on Learning to be Goodrdquo and idem Nancy Sherman ldquoThe Habituationof Characterrdquo Burnyeat writes ldquoWhat is exemplary in Aristotle is his grasp of thetruth that morality comes in a sequence of stages with both cognitive and emo-tional dimensions (206ndash7) Given this temporal perspective then the real prob-lem is this how do we grow up to become the fully adult rational animals that isthe end towards which the nature of our species tends In a way the whole ofthe Nichomachean Ethics is Aristotlersquos reply to this questionrdquo


yet it remains for all that a powerful telos that must never be for-saken Divine kavod is a concept broad and deep enough to encom-pass multifaceted goals of human perfection in both cognitive andethical terms while helping to dispel the naiumlve anthropomorphism ofreligious language It serves as a primary conceptual fulcrum for theprocess of human self-education away from idolatry that begins inScripture with Abraham and reaches a certain kind of apogee inMoses yet remains tantalizingly incomplete

196 don seeman

engendered considerable controversy in medieval and later Jewishthought by suggesting that our way of honoring the divinemdashinHebrew showing kavodmdashis closely related to a radical reading ofExodus 33 in which the biblical Moses demands to see Godrsquos gloryor honormdashalso kavodmdashand is rebuffed For Maimonides this bibli-cal episode and its rabbinic elaboration constitute the core of a modelfor divine service and philosophical reflection to which he returnsrepeatedly throughout his enormous written corpus Indeed my argu-ment in this paper is that divine honor and its implications for humanperfection are among the organizing theme of Maimonidesrsquo teach-ing and that this helps to bind some of his major philosophicallegal and biblical-interpretive concerns into a single moral and ana-lytic framework The way we understand divine kavod and seek tohonor the divine has ethical philosophical and even medical impli-cations that Maimonides dedicated himself to demonstrating through-out the Guide of the Perplexed and elsewhere His unique understandingof Exodus 33 as a parable of speculation at the very limits of humanphilosophical attainment serves as the literary fulcrum of a wide-ranging discourse about the nature of ethical and intellectual per-fection and the limitations of human language Honoring the divinecorrectly is fundamental in Mamonidesrsquo oeuvre to the distinctionbetween idolatry and true divine service

I Pathologies of Divine Honor

For Maimonides idolatry is rooted in the pathology of misplaceddivine honor The word kavod which may signify honor glory orsubstantiality and distinctiveness depending on context appears noless than six times in the first paragraph of his ldquoLaws ConcerningIdolatry and Idolatersrdquo or Hilkhot aAvodat ha-Kokhavim

In the days of Enosh the people fell into gross error and the coun-sel of the wise men of the generation became foolish Enosh himselfwas among those who erred Their error was as follows ldquoSince Godrdquothey said ldquocreated those stars and spheres to guide the world set themon high and allotted to them honor [kavod] and since they are min-isters who minister before Him they deserve to be praised and glorifiedand honor should be rendered them and it is the will of God blessedbe He that men should aggrandize and honor those whom He hasaggrandized and honored just as a king desires that honor be shownto the officers who stand before him and thus honor is shown to the







198 don seeman











200 don seeman




11 Exodus 3318









202 don seeman













204 don seeman














206 don seeman











208 don seeman









210 don seeman









212 don seeman











214 don seeman














216 don seeman












218 don seeman













220 don seeman













222 don seeman














224 don seeman














226 don seeman












228 don seeman












230 don seeman



95 Guide 128










232 don seeman
















234 don seeman














111 Ibid 133112 Ibid 137

236 don seeman

















238 don seeman














240 don seeman













242 don seeman















143 Guide 627

244 don seeman













246 don seeman





151 Exodus 33







154 Ibid

248 don seeman






155 Guide 638






250 don seeman















198 don seeman











200 don seeman




11 Exodus 3318









202 don seeman













204 don seeman














206 don seeman











208 don seeman









210 don seeman









212 don seeman











214 don seeman














216 don seeman












218 don seeman













220 don seeman













222 don seeman














224 don seeman














226 don seeman












228 don seeman












230 don seeman



95 Guide 128










232 don seeman
















234 don seeman














111 Ibid 133112 Ibid 137

236 don seeman

















238 don seeman














240 don seeman













242 don seeman















143 Guide 627

244 don seeman













246 don seeman





151 Exodus 33







154 Ibid

248 don seeman






155 Guide 638






250 don seeman









198 don seeman











200 don seeman




11 Exodus 3318









202 don seeman













204 don seeman














206 don seeman











208 don seeman









210 don seeman









212 don seeman











214 don seeman














216 don seeman












218 don seeman













220 don seeman













222 don seeman














224 don seeman














226 don seeman












228 don seeman












230 don seeman



95 Guide 128










232 don seeman
















234 don seeman














111 Ibid 133112 Ibid 137

236 don seeman

















238 don seeman














240 don seeman













242 don seeman















143 Guide 627

244 don seeman













246 don seeman





151 Exodus 33







154 Ibid

248 don seeman






155 Guide 638






250 don seeman














200 don seeman




11 Exodus 3318









202 don seeman













204 don seeman














206 don seeman











208 don seeman









210 don seeman









212 don seeman











214 don seeman














216 don seeman












218 don seeman













220 don seeman













222 don seeman














224 don seeman














226 don seeman












228 don seeman












230 don seeman



95 Guide 128










232 don seeman
















234 don seeman














111 Ibid 133112 Ibid 137

236 don seeman

















238 don seeman














240 don seeman













242 don seeman















143 Guide 627

244 don seeman













246 don seeman





151 Exodus 33







154 Ibid

248 don seeman






155 Guide 638






250 don seeman









200 don seeman




11 Exodus 3318









202 don seeman













204 don seeman














206 don seeman











208 don seeman









210 don seeman









212 don seeman











214 don seeman














216 don seeman












218 don seeman













220 don seeman













222 don seeman














224 don seeman














226 don seeman












228 don seeman












230 don seeman



95 Guide 128










232 don seeman
















234 don seeman














111 Ibid 133112 Ibid 137

236 don seeman

















238 don seeman














240 don seeman













242 don seeman















143 Guide 627

244 don seeman













246 don seeman





151 Exodus 33







154 Ibid

248 don seeman






155 Guide 638






250 don seeman















202 don seeman













204 don seeman














206 don seeman











208 don seeman









210 don seeman









212 don seeman











214 don seeman














216 don seeman












218 don seeman













220 don seeman













222 don seeman














224 don seeman














226 don seeman












228 don seeman












230 don seeman



95 Guide 128










232 don seeman
















234 don seeman














111 Ibid 133112 Ibid 137

236 don seeman

















238 don seeman














240 don seeman













242 don seeman















143 Guide 627

244 don seeman













246 don seeman





151 Exodus 33







154 Ibid

248 don seeman






155 Guide 638






250 don seeman









202 don seeman













204 don seeman














206 don seeman











208 don seeman









210 don seeman









212 don seeman











214 don seeman














216 don seeman












218 don seeman













220 don seeman













222 don seeman














224 don seeman














226 don seeman












228 don seeman












230 don seeman



95 Guide 128










232 don seeman
















234 don seeman














111 Ibid 133112 Ibid 137

236 don seeman

















238 don seeman














240 don seeman













242 don seeman















143 Guide 627

244 don seeman













246 don seeman





151 Exodus 33







154 Ibid

248 don seeman






155 Guide 638






250 don seeman

















204 don seeman














206 don seeman











208 don seeman









210 don seeman









212 don seeman











214 don seeman














216 don seeman












218 don seeman













220 don seeman













222 don seeman














224 don seeman














226 don seeman












228 don seeman












230 don seeman



95 Guide 128










232 don seeman
















234 don seeman














111 Ibid 133112 Ibid 137

236 don seeman

















238 don seeman














240 don seeman













242 don seeman















143 Guide 627

244 don seeman













246 don seeman





151 Exodus 33







154 Ibid

248 don seeman






155 Guide 638






250 don seeman









204 don seeman














206 don seeman











208 don seeman









210 don seeman









212 don seeman











214 don seeman














216 don seeman












218 don seeman













220 don seeman













222 don seeman














224 don seeman














226 don seeman












228 don seeman












230 don seeman



95 Guide 128










232 don seeman
















234 don seeman














111 Ibid 133112 Ibid 137

236 don seeman

















238 don seeman














240 don seeman













242 don seeman















143 Guide 627

244 don seeman













246 don seeman





151 Exodus 33







154 Ibid

248 don seeman






155 Guide 638






250 don seeman

















206 don seeman











208 don seeman









210 don seeman









212 don seeman











214 don seeman














216 don seeman












218 don seeman













220 don seeman













222 don seeman














224 don seeman














226 don seeman












228 don seeman












230 don seeman



95 Guide 128










232 don seeman
















234 don seeman














111 Ibid 133112 Ibid 137

236 don seeman

















238 don seeman














240 don seeman













242 don seeman















143 Guide 627

244 don seeman













246 don seeman





151 Exodus 33







154 Ibid

248 don seeman






155 Guide 638






250 don seeman









206 don seeman











208 don seeman









210 don seeman









212 don seeman











214 don seeman














216 don seeman












218 don seeman













220 don seeman













222 don seeman














224 don seeman














226 don seeman












228 don seeman












230 don seeman



95 Guide 128










232 don seeman
















234 don seeman














111 Ibid 133112 Ibid 137

236 don seeman

















238 don seeman














240 don seeman













242 don seeman















143 Guide 627

244 don seeman













246 don seeman





151 Exodus 33







154 Ibid

248 don seeman






155 Guide 638






250 don seeman














208 don seeman









210 don seeman









212 don seeman











214 don seeman














216 don seeman












218 don seeman













220 don seeman













222 don seeman














224 don seeman














226 don seeman












228 don seeman












230 don seeman



95 Guide 128










232 don seeman
















234 don seeman














111 Ibid 133112 Ibid 137

236 don seeman

















238 don seeman














240 don seeman













242 don seeman















143 Guide 627

244 don seeman













246 don seeman





151 Exodus 33







154 Ibid

248 don seeman






155 Guide 638






250 don seeman









208 don seeman









210 don seeman









212 don seeman











214 don seeman














216 don seeman












218 don seeman













220 don seeman













222 don seeman














224 don seeman














226 don seeman












228 don seeman












230 don seeman



95 Guide 128










232 don seeman
















234 don seeman














111 Ibid 133112 Ibid 137

236 don seeman

















238 don seeman














240 don seeman













242 don seeman















143 Guide 627

244 don seeman













246 don seeman





151 Exodus 33







154 Ibid

248 don seeman






155 Guide 638






250 don seeman









Documents

HONORING THE DIVINE AS VIRTUE AND PRACTICE Don Seeman