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PDF FormatSocial isolation is an important philosophical issue for Maimonides, and Diamond examines it by comparing the mental state of the leper to that of the hero of the book of Job. Indeed, the afflictions suffered by Job are very reminiscent of the biblical description of leprosy’s physical symptoms. Diamond explains that, according to Maimonides, acute physical pain leads the sufferer to the mistaken conclusion that there is no moral order to creation and that he has fallen victim to an arbitrary fate. Job was protected from such doubts because he was not denied human companionship. This allowed him to engage his fellows in a series of profound philosophical and psychological dialogues. In the course of these discussions, Job began a process through which he arrived at a better understanding of the order of the universe. This interaction was essential to his spiritual development. Unlike Job, the leper is isolated and deprived of all contact with others. The lack of social ties prevents him from properly understanding the true causes of his situation. He continues to maintain his mistaken beliefs and suffers the consequences.
The convert and the leper are “outsiders” because of their actions or beliefs. In contrast, the king is an outsider because of what he is. The role he must fulfill separates him from society at large. Like the leper and the heretic, his presence is fraught with moral and theological problems: most especially, the danger that because of his power and exalted status the king may come to be perceived by his subjects as a god. Maimonides deals with this difficulty in a highly original way. He does not separate the ruler from the community or make him transcendent of it—much like a god—but adopts the opposite method. He obligates the king to act with unblemished morality and extreme humility.
The requirement of profound humbleness is unusual in the context of Maimonides’ general concept of ethics. Influenced by Aristotle, Maimonides usually asserted that the moral individual follows the middle path, or “the mean,” in order to maintain balance and abstain from exaggerated or abnormal behavior. As he wrote in the Mishneh Tora:
Every human being is characterized by numerous moral dispositions which differ from each other and are exceedingly divergent.… To cultivate either extreme in any class of dispositions is not the right course nor is it proper for any person to follow or learn it. If a man finds that his nature tends or is disposed to one of these extremes, or if one has acquired and become habituated to it, he should turn back and improve, so as to walk in the way of good people, which is the right way.The right way is the mean in each group of dispositions common to humanity; namely, that disposition which is equally distant from the two extremes in its class, not being nearer to the one than to the other.
However, Maimonides qualifies this requirement by noting two attributes which a moral person must avoid, even if it requires going to the opposite extreme. The first is anger, and the second is arrogance or pride. Regarding pride, he explains:
There are some dispositions in regard to which it is forbidden merely to keep to the middle path. They must be shunned to the extreme. Such a disposition is pride. The right way in this regard is not to be merely meek, but to be humble-minded and lowly of spirit to the utmost.
According to Diamond, Maimonides’ discussion of the king defines his concept of extreme humility. His choice of the term “lowly of spirit” (shfal ruah) in this context is not a coincidence. The expression traditionally refers to the lowest classes of society—the poor and oppressed, widows and orphans, etc. These groups are typically vulnerable to and dependent on others who are stronger than they are. A social structure of this type can lead to arrogance and conceit on the part of the strong and give them the mistaken idea that power and authority are in the hands of men rather than God. Maimonides’ demand that the king must be “lowly of spirit” is a warning against such delusions. By drawing a parallel between the king and the weakest classes of society, Maimonides conveys a clear message about the universal order: Even the king is not truly sovereign. Just like the lowliest of humans, he is entirely dependent on a higher authority.
This sentiment is intended to subdue the dangerous euphoria of power. Simultaneously, it serves as a metaphor for the moral attributes that prevent man from misunderstanding his place in the order of things. Only by putting his ego aside and realizing that he does not stand at the center of the universe can man achieve a clear awareness of his dependence—and the dependence of the world as a whole—on God.
In the last chapters of his book, Diamond moves from the subject of flesh-and-blood figures to a discussion of the nonhuman—God and the Sabbath. God is the ultimate “outsider,” a perfection that is beyond everything that exists in the physical world. The Sabbath is a temporal anomaly that breaks the normal, profane flow of time.
The discussion of God, or more precisely, the “indwelling” of God as the shechina, or the divine presence—to which Diamond devotes two chapters of his book—touches on one of Maimonides’ most challenging theological ideas. His assertion in this context is bound up in the intellectual tradition of “negative theology.” It holds that God is fundamentally different from anything which we are capable of perceiving with our senses. No attributes or physical descriptions can convey his absolute otherness. God can be presented only by way of the negative. In other words, through emphasizing the radical dissimilarity between God and the world we inhabit.
This basic postulation demands an explanation of the anthropomorphic representations of God in the Bible—a task Maimonides undertook in the Guide of the Perplexed. One of these representations is the revelation of the shechina (meaning “indwelling” in Hebrew), which by its very name implies movement in space. Maimonides rejects the possibility that one can relate spatial movement to God, and instead he offers an abstract, spiritual meaning for the verb “shachan” (to dwell)—as he does for other words which the Bible uses to describe divine actions, such as “halach” (going), “yatza” (going out, exiting), etc. He explains the reference to God’s “place” (makom) which appears in the books of the Prophets in a similar manner. Since God has no body which occupies space, makom does not refer to physical location; it is rather an indication of God’s “rank and the greatness of his portion in existence.” By the same reasoning, when God says to Moses, “there is a place by me,” Maimonides defines the word “place” as referring to “a rank in theoretical speculation and the contemplation of the intellect, not that of the eye.”
Maimonides’ negative theology informs his understanding of divine providence as well. He asserts that it is impossible for man to achieve direct knowledge of the essence of God. However, one can study the manner in which God acts through contemplation of nature. The creation, after all, bears witness to its creator, and knowledge of the world allows man to better understand his maker (this is why Maimonides was of the opinion that the study of the sciences was obligatory). Contemplation of the world reveals that nature operates according to laws and is not subject to arbitrariness or divine caprice. The rising of the sun each morning, for example, is part of the natural order, and one need not fear that it may be interrupted or disturbed by the whimsical intervention of God or man. Ignorance of the workings of nature leads to a mistaken understanding of God’s actions and eventually to the erroneous idea that divine providence is concerned with maintaining a precise account of every human action and deed. Error gives birth to error and, even worse, to heresy: Those who hold to such a simplistic concept of providence may interpret incidents of suffering and injustice in the world as proof that God is indifferent or simply limited.
Against this false perception, Maimonides presents a theory of divine providence that emphasizes God’s otherness in relation to the world. Despite the fact that God does not intercede in nature at every moment, the configuration of the cosmos according to immutable, predetermined laws is divine providence. One who correctly grasps his place in creation and his standing in relation to God sees pain or suffering not as divine retribution, but rather as an integral part of the natural order and the laws that govern it. On the other hand, one who is caught up in the arrogant delusion that the entire universe revolves around him, and that God is intimately involved in his life, is prone to feeling that divine providence has abandoned him when things go wrong.
The examples cited above illustrate the essence of Diamond’s thesis quite well. His analysis of each of these archetypes charts a path through Maimonides’ theological and philosophical principles. Ultimately, Diamond asserts that Maimonides uses these extreme archetypes to challenge accepted beliefs and social conventions. This is undoubtedly an ambitious and thought-provoking argument. But is it founded on a solid methodological basis? The answer, as we shall see, is not a simple one.
