A History of Mediaeval Jewish Philosophy

by Isaac Husik

Some of them say that in the captivity in Babylon the old Law was forgotten and Ezra made a new law, the one we have now. This is absurd. The law could not have been forgotten, for the people did not all go into captivity at one time. They were not all put to death; they were led into exile in a quiet fashion, and there were great men among them like Hananiah, Mishael, Azariah, Daniel and others who surely could not have forgotten the Law. Besides Ezra could never have had the consent of all the people scattered everywhere if he had made a law of his own. As a matter of fact the Law as we have it is the same in all details throughout the world.[243]

The next problem we must consider is the perennial one—the problem of evil and of freedom. It is the purpose of the entire book, as Ibn Daud tells us in his introduction.

The further a thing is removed from matter the more perfect is its knowledge. For, as we have already said, it is matter that hinders knowledge. All defect and evil is the result of the potential. Hence the farther a thing is removed from potentiality the more perfect it is and the freer it is from defect. God's essence is the most perfect thing there is; and as he knows his essence, his is the most perfect knowledge. God knows, too, that his perfection is not stationary in him, but that it extends and communicates itself to all other things in order. And the further a thing is from him the less is its perfection and the greater is its imperfection. We have thus a graduated series, at one end the most perfect being, at the other the least perfect, viz., matter.

Now it is impossible from any point of view, either according to reason or Bible or tradition, that evil or defect should come from God. Not by reason, for two contradictories in the same subject are impossible. Now if good and evil both came from God, he would have to be composite just like man, who can be the cause of good and evil, the one coming from his rational power, the other from the spirited or appetitive. But God is simple and if evil comes from him, good cannot do so, which is absurd. Besides, the majority of defects are privational in character and not positive, like for example darkness, poverty, ignorance, and so on, which are not things, but the negations of light, wealth, wisdom, respectively. Being negative, not positive, they are not made by any body.

One may argue that it is in the nature of man that he should have understanding and perfection; and if God deprives him of it, he does evil. The answer is that the evil in the world is very small in comparison with the good. For evil and defect are found only in things composed of the elements, which have a common matter, receiving forms in accordance with the mixture of the elementary qualities in the matter. Here an external cause sometimes prevents the form from coming to the matter in its perfection. The seed, for example, depends upon the character of the soil which it finds for its growth. Now it does not follow that God was bound to give things the highest perfection possible. For in that case all minerals would be plants, all plants animals, all animals men, all men angels; and there would be no world, but only God and a few of the highest angels. In order that there shall be a world, it was necessary to make a graduated series as we actually have it. And as a matter of fact the very defects in the material composites are a good when we have in view not the particular thing but the whole. Thus if all men were of a highly intellectual type, there would be no agriculture or manual labor.

Now there are men whose temperament is such that they cannot distinguish between right and wrong, and they follow their inclinations. To counteract these bad qualities God gave his commandments and warnings. This shows that it is not impossible to oppose these evil tendencies, for in that case the commandments would be useless. The acts of man come neither under the category of the necessary, nor under that of the impossible, but under the category of the possible.

There are two senses in which we may understand the term possible. A thing may be possible subjectively, i. e., in relation to our ignorance, though objectively it may be necessary and determined. Thus we in Spain do not know whether the king of Babylon died to-day or not; and so far as we are concerned, it is possible that he is dead or that he is alive. In reality it is not a question of possibility but of necessity. God knows which is true. The same thing applies to the occurrence of an eclipse in the future for the man who is ignorant of astronomy. Such possibility due to ignorance does not exist in God.

But there is another sense of the word possible; the sense in which an event is objectively undetermined. An event is possible if there is nothing in the previous chain of causation to determine the thing's happening in one way rather than another. The result is then a matter of pure chance or of absolute free will. Now God may make a thing possible in this objective sense, and then it is possible for him also. If you ask, but is God then ignorant of the result? We say, this is not ignorance. For to assume that it is, and that everything should be determined like eclipses, and that God cannot create things possible, means to destroy the order of the world, of this world as well as the next. For why shall man engage in various occupations or pursue definite lines of conduct since his destiny is already fixed?

The truth of the matter is that there are several orders of causes. Some are directly determined by God, and there is no way of evading them; others are entrusted to nature, and man is able to enjoy its benefits and avoid its injuries by proper management. A third class contains the things of chance, and one may guard against these also. So we are bidden in the Bible to make a parapet on the roofs of our houses to guard against the possibility of falling down. Finally there is the fourth class, those things which depend upon the free choice of the individual. Right and wrong conduct are matters of choice, else there would be no use in prophets, and no reward and punishment. When a person makes an effort to be good, his desire increases, and he obtains assistance from the angels.

Since freedom is supported by reason, Scripture and tradition, the passages in the Bible which are in favor of it should be taken literally, and those against it should be interpreted figuratively. When the Bible says that God hardened Pharaoh's heart, it means simply that Pharaoh was allowed to proceed as he began. All the ancient sages of our nation were in favor of freedom.[244]