To Believe, or to Seek Knowledge of the Divine?

Aug. 18 2023

While credos and catechisms were unknown to the rabbis of the Talmud, some medieval Jewish thinkers sought to identify certain beliefs as foundational and necessary to adherence to the Jewish religion. Most famous of these was Moses Maimonides, who summed up thirteen such principles in one of his early works, and codified theological axioms in his legal magnum opus. Dovid Campbell examines some later rabbis who took a contrary position:

One of the earliest and most powerful challenges to Maimonides’ project came from Rabbi Ḥasdai Crescas (1340–1410). Striking at the root, Crescas claimed that the entire notion of commanded belief was incoherent. Unlike our actions, our beliefs are not something we experience as being chosen. We do not choose to believe that cats exist or that two plus two equals four. Beliefs like these are simply the natural consequences of the facts and experiences we have acquired. It is therefore inconceivable that the Torah would legislate a commandment regarding belief, a commandment we cannot choose to obey or disobey.

Over the centuries, Crescas has found himself in good company. . . . Perhaps the most surprising support for Crescas comes from someone who ostensibly set out to defend Maimonides’ thirteen principles: Don Isaac Abarbanel (1437–1508). While upholding the idea that Exodus 20:2 (“I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, the house of bondage”) presents us with a biblical commandment, Abarbanel also concedes to Crescas that beliefs are ultimately involuntary and therefore not subject to command. His compromise position, which he attributes to Maimonides himself, presents us with a radically different understanding of what the Torah expects from us.

Abarbanel argues that while beliefs themselves are natural consequences of perceived evidence, the acquisition and investigation of that evidence is certainly a volitional process. It is this process of inquiry—and only this process of inquiry—that is commanded here by the Torah, and our efforts to arrive at ideal beliefs through this process are the sole determinants of our Divine reward (or punishment). In other words, the resulting beliefs are not our problem.

Read more at Lehrhaus

More about: Hasdai Crescas, Isaac Abarbanel, Judaism, Moses Maimonides

Egypt Is Trapped by the Gaza Dilemma It Helped to Create

Feb. 14 2025

Recent satellite imagery has shown a buildup of Egyptian tanks near the Israeli border, in violation of Egypt-Israel agreements going back to the 1970s. It’s possible Cairo wants to prevent Palestinians from entering the Sinai from Gaza, or perhaps it wants to send a message to the U.S. that it will take all measures necessary to keep that from happening. But there is also a chance, however small, that it could be preparing for something more dangerous. David Wurmser examines President Abdel Fatah el-Sisi’s predicament:

Egypt’s abysmal behavior in allowing its common border with Gaza to be used for the dangerous smuggling of weapons, money, and materiel to Hamas built the problem that exploded on October 7. Hamas could arm only to the level that Egypt enabled it. Once exposed, rather than help Israel fix the problem it enabled, Egypt manufactured tensions with Israel to divert attention from its own culpability.

Now that the Trump administration is threatening to remove the population of Gaza, President Sisi is reaping the consequences of a problem he and his predecessors helped to sow. That, writes Wurmser, leaves him with a dilemma:

On one hand, Egypt fears for its regime’s survival if it accepts Trump’s plan. It would position Cairo as a participant in a second disaster, or nakba. It knows from its own history; King Farouk was overthrown in 1952 in part for his failure to prevent the first nakba in 1948. Any leader who fails to stop a second nakba, let alone participates in it, risks losing legitimacy and being seen as weak. The perception of buckling on the Palestine issue also resulted in the Egyptian president Anwar Sadat’s assassination in 1981. President Sisi risks being seen by his own population as too weak to stand up to Israel or the United States, as not upholding his manliness.

In a worst-case scenario, Wurmser argues, Sisi might decide that he’d rather fight a disastrous war with Israel and blow up his relationship with Washington than display that kind of weakness.

Read more at The Editors

More about: Egypt, Gaza War 2023