4 - Maimonides

Summary

Philosophy in the Jewish world continued to be influenced by the sorts of issues which had earlier arisen within Islamic philosophy, and many Jewish thinkers went on to explore the notions of evil and suffering. It is hardly surprising that they employed the technical apparatus of Islamic philosophy to try to get clearer on the problems which they were considering in Jewish philosophy, since Islamic philosophy during the Middle Ages represented some of the most exciting and daring thinking then available. This approach was continued with enormous philosophical élan by the giant figure of Jewish philosophy, Moses Maimonides. He was born in Córdoba in 1135 and died in Egypt in 1204. He spent most of his life in North Africa and Egypt, his family being obliged to flee the Almohads in Spain, but he remained a symbol of all that was remarkable in medieval Spanish culture. During its domination by Muslims Spain witnessed a flowering of intellectual thought by all the three religions, but especially by Islam and Judaism. It is customary to see this time as a Golden Age of some sort, a period of inter-religious harmony and coexistence, but this is far from the truth. There did exist during the Islamic era in Spain periods of relative toleration and co-operation between the diverse ethnic groups, but this was by no means the norm. When non-Muslim communities were tolerated this was often due to their usefulness to the Muslim rulers, and once that usefulness had diminished the toleration diminished also.