Aligned sentence by sentence
. . .
The First Gate. Opening. On the explication of the aspects of the purification of affirming the unity of the Creator (mighty and exalted).
, , ,
The author said: When we investigated the most firmly-established of the pillars of our religion and its foundations, we found that the purification of affirming the unity of our Creator (mighty and exalted) is its root and its foundation-stone —
, , ,
for it is the first gate among the gates of the Law, and by affirming-the-unity faith is distinguished from associationism, and it is the very head of the true reality of religion.
,
Whoever has deviated from it — no deed of his is valid, nor is his faith established.
, .
That is why the first address of God (mighty and exalted) to us at Mount Sinai was "I am the Lord your God…" (Exodus 20:2) and "You shall have no other gods…" (Exodus 20:3).
" .
Then He confirmed it upon us through the hand of His messenger (peace be upon him), in his saying: "Hear, O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is one" (Deuteronomy 6:4).
, , ,
You ought, my brother, to grasp the meaning of this passage — I mean "Hear, O Israel" through its end — and to see how its speech moves within it from one meaning to another, and how it comprises ten meanings corresponding to the Ten Words.
,
That is, He commanded us to bind ourselves to verifying-the-reality of the Creator (mighty and exalted) — and that is His saying "Hear, O Israel."
, .
By his saying "Hear" He does not intend "listen with the ear," but rather He intended firm conviction and binding-obligation, as Scripture says "We shall do and we shall hear" (Exodus 24:7) and its saying "And you shall hear, O Israel, and shall observe to do" (Deuteronomy 6:3).
.
And everything that proceeds in this register, with the term "hearing," the thing intended by it is only binding-obligation, firm conviction, and acceptance.
Then, after He made obligatory upon us belief in the true reality of His existence —
Aligned sentence by sentence
.
He bound us to be firmly convinced that He is our God and our Lord, by His saying "the Lord our God."
.
Then He bound us to be firmly convinced that He is truly one, by His saying "the Lord is one."
, , , , .
And once He had imposed upon us conviction in these three meanings which we mentioned, He moved on from them to that which we are obligated to join to them — namely, purity in love of God, in the outward and the inward, in the life-blood and in property — by His saying "And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might" (Deuteronomy 6:5); and I will clarify this meaning in the Gate of Love, with the help of God (exalted be He).
, .
Then He moved on from them to the reinforcement of the duties of the heart, by His saying "And these words which I command you this day shall be upon your heart" (Deuteronomy 6:6) — He means: bind them within your heart and believe them firmly in your innermost conscience.
.
Then He moved on from them to the duties of the limbs, which comprise both knowledge and action, by His saying "And you shall teach them diligently to your children" (Deuteronomy 6:7).
, .
Then He said "and you shall speak of them" (Deuteronomy 6:7): if you have no child, do not make the child a pretext for your reciting them.
, .
Then He said "when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise up" (Deuteronomy 6:7), since the obligations binding upon them are not impossible for the heart and the tongue, as they may be impossible for the rest of the limbs — in accordance with what I set forth concerning the perpetual obligation of the duties of the heart at the very beginning of this book of mine.
, , " , .
All of this is a reinforcement of what preceded in His saying "And these words which I command you this day shall be upon your heart" (Deuteronomy 6:6, etc.), so that the constant repetition of them upon the tongue necessitates their repetition upon the mind, and thus the heart is never empty of the remembrance of God continually — like the saying of the saint (peace be upon him), "I have set the Lord always before me" (Psalms 16:8); and Scripture said "For the matter is very near to you…" (Deuteronomy 30:14).
Then He moved on from the duties of the limbs to that in which there is action
Aligned sentence by sentence
, .
He divided it into three categories in His saying: "And you shall bind them as a sign upon your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes, and you shall write them upon the doorposts of your house and upon your gates" (Deuteronomy 6:8–9) — these being the tefillin of the hand, the tefillin of the head, and the mezuzah.
, , , ,
All of these are means for the remembrance of the Creator (exalted be He), for the purification of love for Him, and for yearning toward Him — like the words of Scripture concerning the tokens by which lovers remember one another: "Set me as a seal upon your heart, as a seal upon your arm…" (Song of Songs 8:6); and He said: "Behold, I have engraved you upon the palms of My hands…" (Isaiah 49:16); and He said: "I will take you, Zerubbabel son of Shealtiel, My servant, and I will set you as a signet" (Haggai 2:23);
.
And He said: "A bundle of myrrh is my beloved unto me, that lies between my breasts" (Song of Songs 1:13).
, .
He made them three so that they might be the more firm and binding, as the Wise One said: "A threefold cord is not quickly broken" (Ecclesiastes 4:12).
, , .
Thus the totality of what this passage contains is ten meanings: five of them spiritual, and five corporeal.
, , , , .
As for the spiritual ones: the first is our belief that the Creator exists; the second, that He is our Lord; the third, that He is one; the fourth, the purification of our love for Him; and the fifth, the undertaking of obedience to Him with sincerity of heart.
, , , , .
As for the five corporeal ones: the first is "And you shall teach them diligently to your children"; the second, "and you shall speak of them"; the third, "and you shall bind them as a sign upon your hands"; the fourth, "and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes"; and the fifth, "and you shall write them upon the doorposts of your house and upon your gates."
, .
And our Sages said: Why does "Hear" (Shema) precede "And it shall come to pass if you hearken" (Vehaya im shamoa)? So that one may first take upon himself the yoke of the kingdom of Heaven, and afterward take upon himself the yoke of the commandments.
.
For this reason I have seen fit to place the gate of the purification of affirming the unity before all the other gates of this book of mine.
.
It is therefore fitting now that I should explain, concerning the purification of affirming the unity of God, ten matters: the first is the definition of the purification of affirming the unity.
.
The second: into how many divisions the meaning of affirming-the-unity is divided.
.
The third: whether it is incumbent to investigate it by way of rational reflection or not.
,
The fourth: what is the method of investigating its meaning, and what it is fitting for us that should come first
Aligned sentence by sentence
.
what we must know beforehand, prior to the investigation concerning affirming-the-unity.
.
The fifth: on the verification of the premises by which it is established that the world has a Creator who created it not from anything.
.
The sixth: on the manner of employing them to verify the existence of the Creator.
.
The seventh: on the proof that He is one.
.
The eighth: on the explication of the aspects of the figurative one and the true one.
, .
The ninth: that the Creator is one in truth, and there is no true one besides Him.
, .
The tenth: on the divine attributes, the rational ones and the scriptural ones, and the aspects by which their affirmation of Him and their negation from Him are established.
. .
Section 1.
, .
He said: As for the definition of the purification of affirming the unity of God (mighty and exalted) —
.
it is the equality of the heart and the tongue in affirming the unity of God (exalted be He), after the demonstration, by the way of speculative inquiry, of the validity of His existence and the reality of His oneness.
, , .
And that is because affirming the unity of God (mighty and exalted) varies among rational beings according to the variation of their discernment and their understandings: for among them is one who affirms God's unity with his tongue alone — that is, he hears people saying something and follows them in it, while he has no knowledge of the meaning of what he says.
, .
And among them is one who affirms His unity with his heart and his tongue and understands the meaning of what he says by the transmission of his forefathers, yet he has no knowledge of the validity of what he believes concerning the affirmation of God's unity.
, , .
And among them is one who affirms His unity after demonstrating its validity, except that he conceives Him in his imagination like the rest of the individual existing things, so he corporealizes the Creator (exalted be He) and represents Him with a form and a likeness, on account of his ignorance of the true reality of His unity and the meaning of His existence.
,
And among them is one who affirms His unity with his heart and his tongue after he has ascertained the meaning of the true one and the figurative one, and after his demonstration of the validity of [it] —
Aligned sentence by sentence
.
its existence and the reality of His unity — this is the most complete of the aspects of affirming the unity of God (mighty and exalted).
.
That is why I said, concerning the definition of the purification of affirming-the-unity, that it is the agreement of the heart and the tongue in affirming the unity of God, after one has adduced the proof for it, has known Him, and has come to understand the aspects of the reality of His oneness by way of speculative investigation.
. .
Section 2.
, .
He said: As for into how many divisions the affirmation of the unity of God (exalted is He) is divided —
, , , , , , , , , , , .
I say: Since the term "affirming-the-unity" has become widespread in the speech of the people of unity, and their use of it in their utterances has multiplied — until it has become for them one of the expressions of astonishment in prosperity and in adversity, and they employ it at the moment of grief over a misfortune to magnify and decry its gravity, without any reflection upon the knowledge of the true meaning of what is uttered upon their tongues, out of ignorance and incapacity — they imagine that the meaning of affirming-the-unity is genuinely theirs just as its mere word is genuinely theirs, and they do not perceive that their hearts are void of its reality and their consciences empty of its meaning, since they affirm His unity with their tongues and their utterances while in their hearts they believe Him to be more than one, and they picture Him in their consciences in the form of the rest of the existent individuals, and they describe Him with attributes that do not befit the True One, because of their ignorance of the meaning of the True One and the metaphorical one — except for the elect among the people of unity, those who are firmly grounded in knowledge and have understood the meaning of Creator and created and the conditions of the True One and His properties.
.
The philosopher spoke truly in his saying: "None worships the Cause of causes and the First of firsts save the prophet of the age by his very nature, and the philosopher who excels by what he has acquired of knowledge."
Aligned sentence by sentence
, .
But as for those below them, they worship only what is other than Him, because they cannot conceive of an existent except as a composite thing.
.
For this reason, affirming-the-unity necessarily varies according to the variation in the intellects of people.
.
And the gradations of their discernment in affirming-the-unity fall into four divisions.
, , .
The first of them is affirming the unity of God with the tongue alone — and it is the first of its degrees, to which the child and the ignorant person ascend in respect of religion, while there is no real meaning to it within himself.
, ,
The second division is affirming the unity of God with the heart and the tongue, by way of received tradition and a favorable opinion of what has been transmitted, while he has no knowledge of the soundness of that from the side of his reason and his understanding —
, ,
so he is in the position of a blind man who is led by one whose sight is sound, and perhaps he merely imitates an imitator like himself —
, , ,
for they are in the position of a band of blind men, each of whom has placed his hand upon the shoulder of his companion, and his companion likewise upon the shoulder of the one next to him, until the matter ends at the first of them, the one of sound sight who leads them.
, , , , , , .
For if the one leading them is heedless in guarding them, or slackens in watching over them, or one of them falls, or some affliction befalls him, the harm reaches them all, and they stray from their path, and perhaps they fall into a pit or stumble over something that hinders them from walking.
, ,
Likewise, the man of received tradition in his affirming-the-unity is not safe from associationism,
,
and if he hears anything of the speech of the unbelievers and their arguments, his belief may be overturned, so that he becomes a heretic without being aware of it.
" .
And for this reason our early sages, peace be upon them, said: "Be diligent to learn what to answer the heretic" (Avot 2:14).
,
And the third of the divisions of affirming-the-unity is —
Aligned sentence by sentence
,
affirming the unity of God with the heart and the tongue, after inference concerning Him and the soundness of His existence by way of speculation, yet without knowledge of the meaning of the True One and the metaphorical one —
, , ,
He is like one of sound sight who, when he walks upon a road, intending a distant town — and the road is full of confusion, and he has no knowledge of it and cannot distinguish the most direct of the roads to the town toward which he aims, though he has come to know the direction and the region —
,
he wearies himself greatly yet does not reach his goal, on account of his ignorance of the road,
.
as the wise man said: "The toil of fools wearies him, for he does not know how to go to the city" (Ecclesiastes 10:15).
, ,
And the fourth division is affirming the unity of God (mighty and exalted) with the heart and the tongue, after inference concerning Him and arriving at the true reality of His oneness by way of speculation and the use of rational analogy — and this is the most complete and the highest of them,
" .
and to it the messenger (peace be upon him) urged us in his saying: "Know therefore this day, and lay it to your heart, that the Lord is God" (Deuteronomy 4:39).
. . , .
Section 3. He said: As for whether it is incumbent upon us to investigate affirming-the-unity by way of speculation or not —
, .
I say: Everyone for whom it is possible to investigate this matter and what resembles it of intelligibles by way of rational analogy — it is incumbent upon him to investigate that, according to his comprehension and the strength of his discernment.
.
And there has already preceded from me, in the introduction of this book, enough of the discourse on the necessity and obligation of that.
, ,
And whoever is heedless of investigating its soundness and certainty is held accountable for his heedlessness of it, and is joined to the rank of those who fall short in their knowledge and their deeds,
,
and the closest likeness to him in this is a sick man, aware of the disease and the remedy, who, when he resorts to a physician treating him with various kinds of treatment, is too slothful to employ his own understanding and reasoning upon the physician's curing of him, so that he might know
Aligned sentence by sentence
,
[so that he may know] whether his reliance is upon what is correct or upon error, when that is not impossible for him to ascertain.
,
Scripture has obligated us to this in its saying: "Know this day, and lay it to your heart…" (Deuteronomy 4:39).
,
And the proof that by "laying it to the heart" is intended the employment of the intellect is Scripture's saying: "None lays it to his heart, neither is there knowledge nor understanding" (Isaiah 44:19).
" ,
And the saint (peace be upon him) said: "And you, Solomon my son, know the God of your father, and serve Him with a whole heart…" (1 Chronicles 28:9).
,
And he said: "Know that the Lord, He is God…" (Psalms 100:3).
,
And the prophet said: "Have you not known? Have you not heard, that the everlasting God, the Lord…" (Isaiah 40:28).
,
And he said: "I will set him on high, because he has known My name" (Psalms 91:14).
,
And he said: "But let him who glories glory in this, that he understands and knows Me" (Jeremiah 9:23).
" ,
And our saints (peace be upon them) said: "Be diligent to learn what to answer to the Epicurean" (Mishnah Avot 2:14).
,
And Scripture said: "And you shall keep and do them, for this is your wisdom and your understanding" (Deuteronomy 4:6).
,
And the nations' acknowledgment of our wisdom and understanding cannot be valid except through the testimony of demonstrative proofs and rational evidences as to the soundness of our Scripture and the certainty of our doctrine.
,
And God has promised us that He will lift the veils of ignorance from the minds of the nations and make manifest His dazzling light as a proof for us of the soundness of our religion,
.
as he said: "And many nations shall go and say: Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob; and He will teach us of His ways, and we will walk in His paths" (Isaiah 2:3).
.
So it has been established for us, from reason, from what is written, and from what is transmitted, the soundness of the obligation to speculate concerning that whose soundness it is possible for us to grasp with our intellects.
. .
Section 4.
, , .
He said: As for what the path of inquiry into the true reality of affirming-the-unity is, and what it behooves us that our knowledge of it should precede before the inquiry into affirming-the-unity.
Aligned sentence by sentence
, , , , .
So we say: every object of knowledge that is sought — if there is doubt about its existence, then one asks concerning it, "Is it existent or not?"; and once its existence is established, then one inquires concerning it "as to what it is," "how it is," and "why it is."
.
As for the Creator (exalted is He), it is not permissible to ask concerning Him except by "Is He?" alone.
.
So once His existence is established by way of speculation, we inquire concerning Him: "Is He one, or more than one?"
, , .
And once we have ascertained that He is one, we inquire into the meaning of "one" — and in how many ways is said that which is said of it — and by this there is established for us the perfect, pure affirmation of unity, in accordance with what Scripture said: "Hear, O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is one" (Deuteronomy 6:4).
, ,
Therefore it is incumbent upon us to inquire first whether this world has a Creator or not; and once it is established for us that this world has a Creator who created it and brought it into being, we inquire concerning Him: "Is He one, or more than one?";
, .
and once it is established for us that He is one, we inquire into the meaning of the metaphorical "one" and the true "one," and what of its true meaning may be ascribed to the Creator; and thereby the meaning of affirming unity is perfected in our hearts and is made pure in our innermost minds, with the help of God and His support.
. . , .
Section 5. He said: As for the premises by which it is established that the world has a Creator who created it not from anything, they are three premises.
.
The first of them: that a thing does not make itself.
.
And the second premise: that the principles are finite in number, having a first before which there is no first.
.
And the third premise: that everything composite is originated in time.
, .
So once these three premises are established, there follows from them — for one who has skillfully handled and combined them — that the world has a Creator who created it not from anything, as that will be made clear in what we shall begin to explain, God willing.
, . ,
And as for the proof of the validity of these three premises, it is according to what I shall describe. And that is by my saying:
Aligned sentence by sentence
, .
Every existent that comes into being after non-existence cannot escape one of two cases: either it brought itself into being, or something other than it brought it into being.
, , , .
Now whatever we imagine to have made itself cannot escape from being [supposed to have made] itself either after its coming-to-be or before its coming-to-be — and both of these are impossible. For if it made itself after its coming-to-be, then it had no need to make itself, since its coming-to-be preceded its making; so in that case it made nothing at all.
, , .
And if it made itself before its coming-to-be, then in that condition it was non-existent; and from the non-existent neither an act nor an abstention can validly proceed — so the non-existent makes nothing.
.
Thus it is impossible for a thing to make itself in any manner whatsoever.
.
And so the first premise, which we set down earlier, is established.
, , , , , .
As for the soundness of the second premise, it is this: that everything which has an end has a beginning, since it is established that whatever has no beginning has no end; for one does not arrive, from that which has no first, at a limit at which a person may halt. So whatever we have found to have an end, we know that it had a first before which there was no first, and an origin before which there was no origin.
, , .
And when we have halted at an end among the origins of the existents in this world, we know that they had a first before which there was no first and an origin before which there was no origin, because origins cannot be without end in their beginning.
, , , , , , ,
Furthermore, it is well known that everything which has a part has a whole, since the whole is nothing other than the sum of its parts; and it is not admissible that there should be a part of that which has no end, for the definition of a part is a magnitude separated from a magnitude, the smaller measuring the greater — according to what Euclid defined at the beginning of the fifth book of his work on geometry. And if we imagine something that is without end in actuality, and we separate off from it a portion of it, the remainder would inevitably be less than what it was before; and if the remainder is infinite, then that which has no end would be greater than that which…
Aligned sentence by sentence
, .
— having no end to it, and that is impossible.
, , , , ,
And if the remainder is finite, then when we add to it the part that was separated from it — and it is finite — the whole would be finite, whereas at the outset of our description it was infinite; so it is both finite and infinite, and this is an absurdity which is not possible.
, .
Therefore it is not permissible that a part be separated from that which has no end, so everything that has a part is finite without doubt.
, , .
And if we separate, by way of imagination, from those that have come into the bound of existence in this world among individuals — from the time of Noah to the time of Moses (peace be upon them both) — it would be a part of the totality of the individuals of the world, and it is finite; the totality, then, is finite in number.
, , .
Since the totality of this world is finite, its principles must necessarily be finite in number; and it follows that this world must have a first before which there is no first of necessity, and therefore the finitude of the principles in the first follows, in accordance with what we set down earlier.
, , ,
As for the soundness of the third premise: it is that every composite is inevitably put together from things more than one, and those things from which it was composed are prior to it by a priority of nature;
, , , , , ,
and therefore its composer must necessarily be prior to it by a priority of nature and of time. The eternal is that which has no cause, and that which has no cause has no first, and that which has no first has no last; everything that has a first is not eternal, and everything that is not eternal is originated,
.
since there is no intermediate between the eternal and the originated that would be neither eternal nor originated.
, .
Every composite, then, is not eternal, and so it necessarily follows that it is originated.
.
Thus the third premise which we mentioned has been established.
. . , .
Section 6. He said: As for the modes of applying the premises which we mentioned in establishing the existence of the Creator (mighty and exalted).
Aligned sentence by sentence
,
Therefore, when we contemplate this world, we find it to be composed and assembled, not one of its parts being free of composition and order —
, , , , , ,
For we behold it, by our senses and our intellects, like a built house, made ready in all its furnishings: the sky above it is like the roof, the earth is spread out like a carpet, the stars are arranged like lamps, the precious stones are stored away like treasures — each thing of them for its purpose — and man is like the king of the house, putting to use what is within it,
, ,
and the kinds of plants are prepared for his benefit, and the varieties of animals are directed toward his uses,
" .
as the friend [of God] (peace be upon him) said: "You make him to rule over the works of Your hands; You have put all things under his feet: sheep and oxen, all of them, and also the beasts of the field; the fowl of the heaven, and the fish of the sea, whatsoever passes through the paths of the seas" (Psalms 8:7-9).
, ,
Then [consider] the ordering of the sun's rising and setting, for the establishing of the two dominions of day and night, and the sun's ascent and descent, for the establishing of the seasons of spring, summer, autumn, and winter — among the conditions of the times of the year and their benefits,
, ,
and their passing along a single, continuous, perpetual order, as he said: "Who commands the sun, and it rises not, and seals up the stars" (Job 9:7),
.
And he said: "You make darkness, and it is night" (Psalms 104:20).
, ,
Then [consider] the revolving of the celestial spheres, differing in their motions, and the planets and the constellations, [proceeding] upon a measured governance and a firmly-fixed proportion that is not disordered nor flawed — every thing of them being intended toward the purpose of benefit and welfare for the rational beings,
,
as the wise man said: "He has made every thing beautiful in its time" (Ecclesiastes 3:11),
.
and he said: "To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven" (Ecclesiastes 3:1).
.
And the whole of this is manifest in its composition and assembly, in its entirety and in its parts.
, ,
Then, when we contemplate the plants and the animals, we find them composed of the four elements — namely fire, air, water, and earth — and these are diverse and mutually opposed, and there is no way for us to compose them and arrange them in the natural order, since they transform one into another.
Aligned sentence by sentence
, .
and they are mutually opposed, one to another; and whenever we have bound any of them together, it hastens toward transformation and change.
.
But as for the composition that nature gives them, it is firmly-set and stable for a bounded span of time.
" ,
Some of the philosophers have asserted that the celestial spheres, the stars, and the heavenly bodies are of the nature of fire — corresponding to the saying of the prophet (peace be upon him): "He makes His angels winds, His ministers a flaming fire" (Psalms 104:4).
, .
And in this saying there is a proof of the soundness of this doctrine; and that is not a fifth nature, as Aristotle asserted.
, , .
So when existing things are constituted out of the elements and composed of them, and we have come to know that they were not blended of themselves, nor composed by their own natures — because of the mutual opposition of one to another — it precedes into our minds and becomes clear within our souls that what composed them is other than they, and what bound them together is none but it; and that what assembled them contrary to their natures, indeed by compulsion against them, is their Creator (mighty and exalted), who set firm their binding and made perfect their composition.
.
And when we investigated the four elements, we found them likewise composed of matter and form — and these two are substance and accident.
, , ,
As for their matter, it is the prime matter that bears the four elements — their hyle; and as for the form, it is the first universal form, which is the source of every substantial form and every accidental form, such as heat and cold, moistness and dryness, heaviness and lightness, motion and rest, and the like of these.
, , , ,
So composition and combination are manifest in the totality of the world and in all its parts, in its roots and its branches, in its simple and its composite, in its highest and its lowest.
, .
It follows for us, from what we have set forth, that the whole of it must be originated-in-time — in accord with what has been established for us, that every composite is originated-in-time; so it is necessary that we believe that the world is originated-in-time.
Aligned sentence by sentence
, .
Since this is so, and it is impossible that a thing should make itself, it has been established that the world must have a Maker who originated it and brought it into being.
, , ,
And since it is established that the first principles cannot be without a limit at the beginning, it has been established that the world must have a beginning before which there is no beginning, and a first before which there is no first — and it is He who created it and brought it into being not from anything, nor by anything, nor upon anything,
,
like the saying of Scripture on this matter: "I am the Lord who makes all things, who alone stretches out the heavens, who spreads abroad the earth by Myself" (Isaiah 44:24),
.
And he said: "He stretches out the north over empty space, and hangs the earth upon nothing" (Job 26:7).
, , ,
And He is the Creator (mighty and exalted) whom we have sought and whose existence we have aimed at with our thoughts and our intellects; and He is the Eternal, to whose priority there is no beginning, and the Pre-existent, to whose antiquity there is no end —
,
as he said: "I am the first, and I am the last" (Isaiah 44:6),
.
and he said: "I, the Lord, am the first, and with the last I am He" (Isaiah 41:4).
.
Now a certain people have claimed that the world came to be in the beginning of its existence by chance and happenstance, without any Creator to originate it or any Originator to bring it forth.
,
And it is among the things that astonish me that such an opinion as this should be admissible in a rational mind in its state of soundness.
, .
Yet were the holder of this view to hear one of the people say the like of his own saying concerning a water-wheel that turns to irrigate a piece of land — and claim that it came to be without any effort on the part of a maker who took the trouble of its composition and assembly, and the placing of every instrument among its instruments in the direction of its usefulness — he would denounce that against him, and ascribe him to the utmost limit of ignorance, and hasten to call him a liar and to deem his words absurd.
,
Now if this saying is impossible in his estimation regarding a paltry, contemptible water-wheel made by a slight contrivance for the benefit of a small piece of land, how can he permit himself to hold the like of it concerning this greater water-wheel that encompasses the earth and those creatures upon it which were fashioned with wisdom
Aligned sentence by sentence
, ,
And a power which the intellects of human beings and the understandings of rational creatures fall short of grasping in its true essence — though it is the disposing-cause for the benefit of the whole earth, and of all that is within it, and of all that is upon it —
.
how is it permissible for him to say of it that it came to be without the intention of an intending agent, and without the governance of a wise and powerful one?
,
It is well known to us that, as for matters which are devoid of the intention of an intending agent in any part of them, there is no way that any trace of wisdom and power should be found in them —
,
Do you not see that if a man were to pour ink upon a sheet of paper all at once, it would not be possible that there should be formed from it upon it an ordered book and legible lines, like that which comes to be by the pen?
, , .
And were a man to bring before us an ordered book of the sort that there is no way for it to come to be without the agency of a pen, and were he to claim that he poured the ink upon the paper and the writing took shape upon it of its own accord, we would hasten to give him the lie, and to affirm that it does not come about apart from the intention of an intending agent.
, .
So if the tracing of drawn figures by an agreed convention of ours is, in our view, impossible, how can it be permissible — concerning that which is subtler in craftsmanship and far more remote in perfection, by what is, for us, without limit — that it be said it came to be without the intention of an intending agent, and the wisdom of a wise one, and the power of a powerful one?
.
And in what we have adduced in establishing the existence of the Creator (exalted be He) by way of His traces, there is sufficiency for one who has understood and dealt fairly.
.
And there is in that enough of a refutation and a rebuttal against the eternalists, who believe that the world is eternal.
.
So understand.
. . , , , .
Section 7. He said: As for the proof that the Creator (exalted be He) is one, it is this: that since it has been established for us by the method of inference that the world has a Creator, it became incumbent upon us to investigate concerning Him — whether He is one, or more than one.
.
It behooves us, then, to demonstrate the soundness of His oneness from seven aspects.
,
The first of them is by way of our consideration of the causes of existing things; for when we examine them closely, we find them
Aligned sentence by sentence
, , , .
fewer in number than their effects; and whenever we investigated the causes of those causes, ascending, we found them too to be fewer in number than them, and the higher we ascended the fewer they became in number, until they terminate in a single cause, which is the Cause of causes.
, , , , .
The explanation of this is that the individuals of existing things are infinite in number; but when we arrive at the species that comprehend them, these are fewer in number than what is beneath them, since each species among the species contains many individuals — so the species are finite in number.
, , .
And when we relate the species to their genera that contain them, the genera are fewer in number than them, since beneath each genus among the genera are many species; and likewise, the higher we ascend the fewer in number the genera become, until they terminate in the genera of genera.
, , , , , , , , , , , .
Now the Philosopher said that the genera of genera are ten, and they are: substance, quantity, quality, relation, place, time, position, possession, acting, and being-acted-upon.
, .
And when we investigate the causes of the individuals of the species of these ten genera, we find them to be five: motion, and the four elements, which are fire, air, water, and earth.
.
And when we investigate the causes of the four elements, we find them to be matter and form, and these are two.
, , , .
And when we investigate the cause of these two, it is inevitably fewer than them, and it is the will of the Creator (exalted be He); and there is nothing fewer than two except one — so the Creator (exalted be He) is one of necessity, from this aspect.
" , .
And the saint (peace be upon him) said: "Thine, O Lord, is the kingdom, and Thou art exalted as head above all" (1 Chronicles 29:11), meaning by this: highest of every high thing, loftiest of every lofty thing, first of every beginning, and cause of every cause and effect.
The second aspect is from the standpoint of the trace of wisdom manifest throughout this whole world — its uppermost part
Aligned sentence by sentence
.
and its lower part is its inanimate matter, its plant-life, and its animal-life.
.
So when we contemplate it, it indicates to us that the whole of it is the governance of a single Director and the making of a single Creator.
, , .
That is because we find it, despite its diversity in its principles and its elements, alike in its branches and corresponding in its parts; so the traces of the wisdom of the Creator (mighty and exalted) are manifest in the small of creation and in the great, bearing witness that it belongs to a single, wise Creator.
, .
For had the world belonged to more than one Creator, the form of the wisdom would have differed among the parts of the world and been contradictory in its universals and its particulars.
, , .
Again, we find it, in its stability, its subsistence, and its well-being, with one part of it in need of another, and no part of it is completed except by another part — like the need of the links of the coat of mail, the parts of the bed, the limbs of the human body, and all composite things, one part of them for another, in their subsistence and their completion.
, , , , .
Do you not see the need of the moon and the stars for the light of the sun, the need of the earth for the sky and the water, and the need of the animals one for another — for some of their kinds eat the rest, like the beasts of prey among the birds, the fish, and the beasts of the land — and the need of man for all of them, while the subsistence of all is through man?
, .
And the need of the countries, the regions, the sciences, and the crafts one for another — for the wisdom is manifest in the fine of creation and in the grand, and in the small of it and the great.
, , ,
For the trace of the wisdom and the power manifest in the creation of the elephant, for all the vastness of its body, is no more wondrous than the trace of the wisdom manifest in the creation of the ant and the mote, for all their minuteness; rather, the smaller the creature, the more apparent the trace of the wisdom and the power within it, and the subtlety of the Maker is the more wondrous and the more evident in it,
.
So that indicates that the whole of it is the governance of a single Director and a single Creator, on account of its mutual likeness, its mutual correspondence, and its mutual agreement upon the perfection of the order of the world and its subsistence as a whole, in all its parts.
And had it belonged to more than [one…]
Aligned sentence by sentence
.
[were there more than] one Creator, the form of wisdom would differ in some of the parts of the world, and some of it would be independent of the rest.
, , .
So since it is varied in its roots and its elements, yet concordant in its branches and its compounded things, this indicates that the One who originated it, composed it, governs it, and directs it is one.
.
The philosopher said: nothing that God has created is more wondrous than [the rest of] what God has created.
, " , .
He means that the wisdom in whatever is subtle and great, small and large, among the parts of the world is uniform and proportioned, as the friend [of God] (peace be upon him) said when he described the kinds of the traces of wisdom and the order of its building-up of the world: "How manifold are Your works, O Lord! In wisdom You have made them all; the earth is full of Your possessions" (Psalms 104:24), and he said: "How great are Your works, O Lord! Your thoughts are very deep" (Psalms 92:6).
.
The third aspect is from the standpoint of the general createdness of the world as a whole.
, .
For the proofs have demonstrated the createdness of the world, and it follows necessarily from this that it has an Originator, because of the impossibility of a thing's coming into being of itself.
, .
So when we find a thing brought-into-being, and it is established for us that it came to be after it had not been, we know by the testimony of sound intellects that something other than it originated it and brought it into being.
, , , .
So once it is established that the world has a Creator who originated it, it is not permissible for us to hold Him to be more than one, since there is no dispensing with a single Creator for the existence of the world, and there is no avoiding Him; and had it been possible for the world to subsist and be established in our intellects by less than one Creator, we would have held it to be so; but since we can conceive of nothing that could fashion something else by less than one, we know with necessary knowledge that He is one.
, ,
For things that are established by the way of inference about them, and whose existence is a necessary existence — it is not incumbent upon us to hold them in greater [number] than what necessity calls for in the completion of the thing by which they are inferred,
, , ,
An illustration of this: when we see a piece of writing uniform in its arrangement, and the form of the script in which it is written being a single form, it occurs first to our intellects that a single scribe [wrote it]
Aligned sentence by sentence
, , ,
He wrote it and arranged it; for a document cannot be valid nor complete with less than a single writer, and had its writing been valid by fewer than one writer we would believe it to be so —
.
And though it is possible that more than one may have written it, it is not permitted to us to believe that of it except by a proof that testifies to the soundness of [that claim] — such as a difference in the form of the script in part of it, or the like.
,
So when this is so, and the direct observation of the document's writer — when he performed the writing, before or after — is not attained, we have been freed from observing him in his very self and person by [our] observation of the writing,
, ,
and the inference about him from his act and the orderly arrangement of his writing stands in place of direct observation of him; so we know of necessity that an existent writer, knowing how to write and able to do it, wrote that document,
, , .
and that no other shared with him in it, on account of its order and evenness; for the act of [multiple] agents is divergent, not orderly and not even, and contrary, not perfected and not well-fashioned.
, , ,
And likewise is the case concerning the Creator of the world (exalted is He): since the traces of wisdom in His creatures are alike and resembling one another, necessity compelled [us] to believe in a single Creator who created it, for there is no escape from Him in the existence of the originated things,
.
and that He is not a thing perceptible to sight (exalted is He) like substance and accident.
.
And since He is not perceptible to sight (mighty and exalted), neither His existence nor the soundness of believing in Him can be established except by inference and reflection upon His creatures.
, , , ,
Thus our belief in His existence — that He is One, eternal, who has never ceased and shall never cease, and that He is Almighty, Wise, Living — stands in place of direct observation of Him (exalted is He above that), since He is not of the category of things perceptible to sight,
, .
So necessity compelled [us] to believe in a single Creator who created it, for there is no escape from Him in the existence of the originated things; but as for more than one — there is an escape from that, and no need of it.
,
So whoever claims that He is more than one — his statement cannot be established except by a proof other than the proof we have brought forward; and there is no way [to that] —
Aligned sentence by sentence
, , ,
— rather, toward the establishment of this, by reason of the impossibility that the rational proofs should mutually negate one another; on the contrary, all the proofs bear witness to His oneness, and negate of Him any notion of multiplicity, of association, and of likeness,
,
as in His saying (exalted be He): "Is there a God beside Me? Indeed, there is no Rock; I know none" (Deuteronomy 32:39),
, ,
and He said: "I am He, I am the first, I am also the last; My hand also has founded the earth, and My right hand has spanned the heavens; when I call to them, they stand up together" (Isaiah 48:12–13),
.
and He said: "A righteous God and a Savior; there is none beside Me" (Isaiah 45:21).
, , .
And the fourth aspect: that I say to one who holds the belief that the Creator is more than one — either the essence of them all is a single essence, or it is not one.
, .
Now if he says that the essence is one, then the reality is therefore one, and the Creator is not more than one.
,
But if he says that each one of them has an essence other than the essence of the others, then it necessarily follows that there must be a distinction between them, by reason of their differing and their divergence,
, , , , ,
and everything distinguished is bounded, and likewise the bounded is finite, and everything finite is composite, and everything composite is originated, and every originated thing has an originator,
.
So whoever claims that the Creator of the world is more than one — it follows that He must be originated.
.
But it has already preceded, from what we said, that the Creator of the world is eternal, and that He is the Cause of causes and the First of firsts.
, " .
He is therefore one of necessity, as in the saying of the saint (peace be upon him): "You are the Lord, You alone" (Nehemiah 9:6).
Aligned sentence by sentence
, , ,
The fifth aspect — from the standpoint of the meaning of multiplicity and unity. That is, that Euclid defined unity in his book and said: "Unity is that by which each thing is called one,"
, ,
He means that unity is prior to "the one" by nature, just as we say that heat is prior to the hot thing,
,
and were it not for unity, no thing among things would be called one.
, , , .
The notion that is conceived in our intellects regarding unity is pure singularity and exclusiveness which no likeness can enter, nor any partnership in any state whatsoever, nor any multiplication, nor number in any way, nor connection to anything, nor separation from anything.
, ,
The meaning of multiplicity is a sum of units, and it is not possible for multiplicity to precede the unity out of which it became multiplied,
.
so whatever multiplicity we find, whether by our senses or by our intellects, we know with certain knowledge that unity is prior to it, as the numerical "one" is prior to all the rest of number.
, ,
So whoever claims that the Creator is more than one is compelled to believe that the One is prior and antecedent to all of them, by virtue of the priority of "the one" to number and of unity to multiplicity;
, , .
the Creator, then, is one in every respect, eternal with no eternal beside Him, as He (exalted) said: "Before Me no god was formed, and after Me there shall be none" (Isaiah 43:10).
.
The sixth aspect — from the standpoint of the accident that necessarily attaches to everything multiple.
,
That is, that multiplicity and aggregation
Aligned sentence by sentence
, .
— an accident entering upon substance, namely quantity; and the Creator of substance and accident is not attained by any of their attributes in His essence.
, , , , ,
Now since it has been established that the Creator is elevated above being likened or compared to anything of His creatures, by reason and by Scripture, and since the multiplicity that enters upon substance is an accident, it is not permissible that any of the attributes of multiplicity should attach to the essence of the Creator (exalted be He); and if He is not described by multiplicity, then He is the One of necessity, for there is no intermediate between unity and multiplicity.
, .
And if the Creator is not more than one, then He is necessarily One — like the saying of Hannah, "There is none holy as the Lord, for there is none beside You" (1 Samuel 2:2).
, , ,
The seventh aspect: if the Creator were more than one, then either each one of them would be capable of creating the world, or else none of them would be capable of that except by the help of another.
,
Now if each one were capable of that, then the Creator of the world is one, since He is capable of it and has no need of the help of another.
, ,
But if that could not be accomplished except by their combining, then not one of them is complete in strength and power, since each one of them is incapable and deficient.
, , , , , ,
So each one of them is weak; and everything weak is finite in strength and essence; and everything finite is bounded; and everything bounded is composite; and everything composite is originated; and every originated thing has an originator.
, .
And the weak cannot be eternal, for the Eternal is incapable of nothing and has no need of the help of another.
.
So the Creator is not, then, more than one.
, , ,
And if it were possible for there to be more than one, it would be possible for there to be mutual hindrance and disagreement among them in the creating of created things, so that the creation of the world would not be accomplished by them.
Yet in our finding this world to be...
Aligned sentence by sentence
, , ,
a single order and a single motion adhering to every part of its parts, that does not vary through the ages — we know that its Creator, its Governor, and its Director is one, whose work nothing other than Himself alters, nor diminishes His governance,
, " .
as He (exalted) said: "And who, like Me, can call, and declare it, and set it in order for Me?" (Isaiah 44:7); and the friend [of God] (peace be upon him) said: "For ever, O Lord, Your word stands firm in the heavens. Your faithfulness is to all generations; You have established the earth, and it stands" (Psalms 119:89–90).
, , .
And among that which we witness in the traces of God's governance over the created things is that governance is not perfected, nor does it endure upon a single state, except through the singling-out of one individual in counsel, in governance, and in deliberation — like the king in the city and the soul in the body.
, , .
And Aristotle said, in his book, concerning this matter — I mean the affirmation of unity: "There is no good in a multitude of rulers; rather, the ruler is one."
.
And the Sage said: "For the transgression of a land, many are its princes; but by a man of understanding and knowledge its [order] shall be prolonged" (Proverbs 28:2).
.
And in what we have adduced concerning this matter there is sufficiency for whoever understands.
.
And it suffices as a refutation of the doctrine of the Dualists, and of the Christians regarding the Trinity, and of others besides them.
.
For in our establishing the unity of the Creator of the world (mighty and exalted) there is a nullification of the claim of everyone who has alleged that He is more than one.
.
So understand.
. . , .
Section 8. He said: As for the explication of the aspects of the True One and the Metaphorical One —
, , ,
that is, that "one" is a noun derived from "unity," and it is predicated in two ways:
Aligned sentence by sentence
, .
One of them is accidental, and it is the figurative one; the other is substantial and abiding, and it is the true one.
, , , , , ,
And the accidental one is likewise of two kinds: the first kind of the two is that in which multiplicity, aggregation, and assembly are manifest — like the one genus that comprehends many species, and like the one species that comprehends many individuals, and like the one individual which is composed of many parts, and like the one army which is a totality made up of people,
, , , , ,
and like our saying "one mudd," and "one qafiz," and "one rubʿ," and "one raṭl" — each of which comprehends a totality of things, while "one" is said of each one of those things,
, , ,
So each one of what we have mentioned is called "one" by way of figurative usage, and that is on account of the agreement of those things which that name gathers together in a single meaning; and it is called "many" on account of what it contains of many matters,
, , .
And when those things are divided and set apart, "one" is said of each thing among them; so the "one" in matters such as these that we have mentioned is an accident — it is one from one respect and many from another respect.
, , , ,
And the second kind of the accidental one is the "one" predicated of the single individual, which is not multiplied nor general for a totality of things in its outward appearance — except that it is many in its own essence, on account of its composition from matter and form and substance and accident; and it
Aligned sentence by sentence
,
and it is receptive of coming-to-be and passing-away, division, transmutation, conjunction, separation, change, variance, and association.
, ,
Thus plurality attaches to the thing that is called "one" in respect of all that we have described, for they are the opposite of unity.
, , .
For the "one" predicated of a thing which there attaches to it from its own essence something of the kinds of plurality and transmutation is, without doubt, an accident; and it is "one" by way of metaphor, not in reality — so understand.
, .
As for the true "one," it too is said in two modes: one of them in conception, and the second in actuality.
, ,
As for the conceptual one, it is the numerical "one" which is the root of number and its starting-point,
,
and the meaning of the numerical "one" is that it is a mark and sign for a starting-point before which there is no starting-point,
,
since every true starting-point is called "one," as Scripture says: "And there was evening and there was morning, one day" (Genesis 1:5),
, ,
in place of "first day" He said "one day," from the standpoint that "one" is a name for every starting-point before which there is no starting-point;
, , .
and when it is doubled it is called "two," and when it is tripled it is called "three," and so on up to ten.
, ,
Then it returns again to the "one," then to a hundred and to a thousand, up to that of number which has no end.
.
And for that reason the definition of number is a totality compounded of units.
, ,
I have called it conceptual only because number does not fall under the corporeal senses, but is rather apprehended by conception;
.
but as for the thing numbered, it is perceived by the five corporeal senses, or by some of them.
, ,
And the second mode, which is a true "one" existing in actuality, is the entity which does not multiply, nor change, nor undergo transmutation,
, ,
nor is it described by any attribute of the attributes of bodies, nor does coming-to-be attach to it, nor passing-away, nor finitude,
, , ,
nor does it shift, nor move, nor does it resemble anything, nor does anything resemble it, nor does it associate with anything;
for it is, however you may conceive it, a pure "one," and it is the root of every multiplied thing — in accordance with what has preceded of our statement that unity
Aligned sentence by sentence
, , , , , , , .
[a cause] for multiplicity. The True One has neither a beginning nor an end, for everything that has a beginning and an end must necessarily admit generation and corruption upon it, and everything which generation and corruption enter into is changeable, and changeability is the opposite of unity, so it would be more than one — since in the state before the beginning it is other than itself in the state after it — and so multiplicity is necessary for it.
, , .
Likewise resemblance in that which is resembled is an accident, and everything to which an accident attaches is multiple, so the True One — nothing of accidents attaches to Him in His essence in any way.
, , , .
And if a speaker should say that unity in the True One is an accident, we say that the meaning of unity in the True One is the negation of multiplicity and plurality from Him; so when we describe the One by a description, we describe Him only in the sense of the absence of multiplicity and plurality, for the True One is not described by any description that entails for His essence multiplicity, change, division, or transformation in any way.
, .
This is the whole of the discussion concerning the One in the figurative sense and the One in the true sense — so understand it.
. .
Section 9.
, , .
He said: As for the proof that the Creator (exalted is He) is a True One, and that there is no True One besides Him —
,
we say: since every composite thing — its coming-into-being is not completed
Aligned sentence by sentence
,
except by the participation of its parts from which it is composed — which is the union of some of them with others — and the root of participation
Aligned sentence by sentence
.
…unity.
, , .
And likewise the existence of a composite thing is not complete except through the diversity of the parts of which it is composed, for composition can only be from things more than one; thus the root of diversity is multiplicity.
, ,
Now since the trace of composition and combination and order is found in this world — in its universals and its particulars, its roots and its branches — it necessarily follows that in all of them the notion of commonality and of diversity is found, whose two roots are unity and multiplicity.
, ,
And since unity is prior to multiplicity by nature, just as the one is prior to all the rest of number, it necessarily follows that the cause of the multiple is not itself multiple at the first of the principles, on account of the priority of the notion of unity to every multiple thing.
, ,
And since the causes are finite at the beginning, and it is impossible that the Maker make the like of Himself, it is not permissible that the cause of multiplicity and unity be like them — I mean, multiplicity and unity.
, , .
So if the cause of the things-brought-into-being is not multiplicity alone, nor multiplicity and unity, it necessarily follows that the cause of being is truly one.
, , .
And we have already set forth in our discourse that the causes, whenever they ascend toward the beginning, grow fewer until they terminate at the root of number, which is the True One, and that is the Creator, exalted be He.
, , , .
And it is also known that everything which exists in some thing accidentally must of necessity exist in another thing substantially and truly, having no transfer from it except by its corruption — like heat in hot water, for it is an accident in the water, whereas in fire it is substantial and stable.
, .
And like moisture in the bodies in which it is an accident, whereas in water it is substantial and stable.
, ,
And it is also known that everything which exists accidentally in any one of the things — that accident only acquires it from the thing in which it is substantial, just as we observe regarding the heat of hot water, which is an accident in it, that it is acquired from…
Aligned sentence by sentence
, , .
The fire in which heat is essential — just as we observe the moisture of moist bodies to be accidental in them, that it is acquired by them from the water in which moisture is essential — and likewise all the composite things, when we examine them.
, , .
By this same analogy proceeds the discourse concerning the meaning of unity: since it is accidental in every one of the created beings, as we have set forth, it must be that unity in the cause of the created beings is essential, fixed, and true; and from it the composite things have derived the meaning of unity accidentally, as we have explained.
, ,
So when we investigated the meaning of pure unity among the created beings, we did not find it fixed and true for a single one of them — even though every one of the genera, the species, the individuals, the substances, the accidents, the celestial bodies, the spiritual substances, and every number and numbered thing, every finite and bounded thing, is called "one" and has the meaning of unity ascribed to it —
,
it is called "one" only by way of metaphor, in that it is a totality of things named "one" from the angle of their agreement and their resemblance in some respect —
.
and it is many in its essence, inasmuch as it admits of multiplication, partition, change, variance, conjunction, separation, increase, decrease, motion, transmutation, resemblance, configuration, and the rest of the accidents, the particular and the general, belonging to every one of the created beings.
.
So pure unity is not existent, nor truly predicated, of anything among the created beings.
, , , .
Now since unity exists in the created beings accidentally, and since the proof and the demonstration have already shown that the Creator is one, we have known with certain knowledge that the unity which we have applied to every one of the classes of created beings by way of metaphor is derived from the meaning of the True One; and that pure oneness is what is ascribed to the Creator of all (exalted and sanctified).
,
For He is the True One, and there is no true one besides Him, as we have set forth; and all the conditions of the One which we have mentioned
Aligned sentence by sentence
, , "
is not fitting nor proper except for Him; and likewise all the kinds of multiplication, accidents, transmutations, motions, and likenesses — and everything that does not befit the True One — are denied of Him, after the manner of the saying of the saint (peace be upon him):
,
"Many things have You done, O Lord my God, Your wonders and Your thoughts toward us; there is none to be compared to You" (Psalms 40:6).
,
And he said: "To whom then will you liken Me, that I should be equal? says the Holy One" (Isaiah 40:25).
,
And he said: "To whom then will you liken God? Or what likeness will you compare to Him?" (Isaiah 40:18).
,
And he said: "There is none like You among the gods, O Lord, neither are there any works like Your works" (Psalms 86:8).
.
And he said: "There is none like You, O Lord; You are great, and Your name is great in might" (Jeremiah 10:6).
, , .
Thus it has become valid and clear that the Creator of the world (exalted be He) is one in truth, and that there is no true one besides Him; for everything upon which the name "one" falls — apart from the Creator — even if it is one from one of the aspects, is many from another aspect, as we have mentioned.
.
But as for the Creator (exalted be He), He is one in every respect, according to what we have explained.
.
And in what we have adduced concerning this matter there is sufficiency for whoever has understood.
. .
Section 10.
, , , .
He said: As for the exposition of the divine attributes — the rational ones and the written ones — by which the Creator (exalted be He) is described, and the intended purpose of them, they are very many, according to the creatures and the blessings common to them; and they are divided into two kinds: essential and active.
, , ,
And the meaning of our saying "essential" is that they are attributes fixed for God (exalted be He) before the creatures and after them, which He merits in His essence and in His very self —
Aligned sentence by sentence
, , , .
And they are three attributes: that He (exalted be He) is existent, that He is one, and that He is eternal, having no beginning.
, , .
The purpose in our describing Him by these attributes is to express His meaning and to verify His existence, in order to alert [men] to Him and to make the rational creatures understand that they have a Creator whom they are obligated to worship and to obey.
, , ,
As for the necessity of describing Him as existent, it is because the proofs have indicated His existence through the observation of His traces in the world, as the Scripture says: "Lift up your eyes on high, and see: who has created these? He who brings out their host by number, He calls them all by name; by the greatness of His might, and because He is strong in power, not one is missing" (Isaiah 40:26).
, .
Thus it became obligatory upon us to describe Him as existent, since it is established in our minds that from the nonexistent no act can come and no command can issue; so when His traces and His creatures were established as valid, His existence became valid in our minds.
, , ,
As for our describing Him as eternal and everlasting, it is because the proofs have indicated that this world has a beginning with no beginning before it, and a starting-point with no starting-point before it,
, , , .
and it is valid that the principles cannot be infinite in number at their beginning; so it is necessarily obligatory that the Creator of the world have a beginning with no beginning before Him — and that is the meaning of eternity — as the Scripture says: "From everlasting to everlasting You are God" (Psalms 90:2), and it says: "Before Me no god was formed, neither shall there be after Me" (Isaiah 43:10).
, , ,
As for our describing Him as one, we have already explained that by the clear proofs, and it is established by the manifest testimonies that the meaning of pure unity is necessarily attached to His essence,
.
And the meaning of "one" is the negation of multiplicity from His essence, and the impossibility of change, transformation, accidents, generation, corruption, conjunction, separation, resemblance, association, and difference from the true reality of His essence, and the rest of the categories of multiplicity.
, ,
And you ought, O my brother, to understand from these attributes that they do not necessitate for the essence of the Creator (exalted be He) any change or separation; rather, their meaning is the negation of their opposites from the Creator (exalted be He); so what results from their meaning concerning
Aligned sentence by sentence
.
…our intellects and our understandings that the Creator of the world is not multiple, nor nonexistent, nor originated.
,
And likewise you ought to know that each one of these three attributes which we have mentioned necessitates the rest of them once its meaning has been ascertained,
, , , .
and the explanation of this is that the True One, when it adheres to and is established in any of the things, then it is of necessity required that it be existent and pre-eternal — since it has been verified that the nonexistent is not described as one nor as many; so when the meaning of the True One is properly ascribed and established for a thing, then the name of existence and its meaning is properly ascribed to it.
, , , .
And likewise the meaning of pre-eternity necessarily belongs to it, because the True One does not come to be, nor perish, nor change, nor alter; so it is therefore pre-eternal, since it has no beginning. So whoever has the meaning of pure unity established for him, then the meaning of existence and pre-eternity is necessarily required for him.
.
And likewise I say that the attribute of absolute existence, when it is required for a thing, then by its being required there is required for it the attribute of the True One and the attribute of pre-eternity.
, , , , , , , .
As for its deserving the attribute of the One, that is because the absolutely existent cannot be existent after its own nonexistence, and does not change from a state of existence to non-existence, nor from non-existence to existence; and whatever is so is not many, for the many is not found absolutely — I mean, with a permanent, continuous existence — because of the priority of the One to it; so every absolutely existent thing is not many, and it is therefore one.
,
And likewise it also deserves the attribute of pre-eternity,
Aligned sentence by sentence
, .
For the Existent in the absolute sense has neither beginning nor end, so the meaning of eternity necessarily applies to Him.
.
Likewise I say that the attribute of eternity is necessary for the one to whom the attribute of the True One and the attribute of absolute existence are necessary.
, , , , , , , , .
As for His deserving the attribute of the True One: it is because the Existent in the absolute sense is that which has no beginning, and that which has no beginning is not multiple, since every multiple has a beginning, namely the one; so the multiple is not eternal, and the eternal cannot be other than one. Thus the necessity of the attribute of oneness follows from the necessity of the attribute of eternity, and likewise the attribute of existence follows from the necessity of the attribute of eternity, for the non-existent is not described as eternal nor as originated.
, , , , , .
Thus it has become clear that these three attributes have one meaning, and one signification, and that they do not necessitate any otherness in the essence of the Creator (exalted be He), nor the entry of accidents upon Him, nor multiplicity in His meaning, since the purpose we apprehend from them is that the Creator (exalted be He) is neither non-existent, nor originated, nor multiple.
.
And if it were possible for us to express His meaning by a single word comprehending these attributes all at once, so that these three meanings would arise in our minds by a single word just as they arise to the intellect by the three attributes which we have mentioned, we would have expressed Him by it.
, , , .
But since we did not find, among the languages in which we speak, a word that would indicate the true reality of the meaning of the Creator, we expressed the one meaning by more than one word; so the multiplicity found in the attributes of the Creator (exalted be He) is not on account of His essence, but rather by reason of the deficiency of the describer's expression in conveying His meaning by a word that would indicate it.
, , , ,
So understand, regarding the meaning of the Creator (exalted be He), that there is nothing like Him; and everything by which you describe Him among the attributes — understand from it the negation of its opposite from Him. For this reason Aristotle said that the negative ones among the attributes of the Creator (exalted be He) are truer than the affirmative, because everything affirmed of Him among the attributes is not free from being either attributes of substance or of accident, and the Creator of substance and accident is not attained by
Aligned sentence by sentence
, , , , .
one of His attributes in His essence, and everything that is negated of Him among the attributes is true beyond doubt, and it is fitting for Him, since He is more exalted than every attribute and quality, and higher than every likeness and similitude.
.
For this reason it behooves you to understand by these three rational attributes which we have mentioned only the negation of their opposites concerning the Creator (exalted is He).
, , , , , ,
As for the divine attributes of action, they are the descriptions by which the Creator (exalted is He) is described on account of His deeds, and He may share in being described by them with some of the created beings; and they are permitted to be ascribed to Him only out of the necessity of making Him known and apprehending His existence, so that we may bind ourselves to His obedience; and the use of this category among the attributes of the Creator (exalted is He) has been frequent in the Book of God and in the books of His prophets and in the praises of the prophets and the saints to God (exalted is He); and it too is of two kinds,
, , , , , , , , , , .
the first being descriptions that indicate a bodily shape and form, as in the saying of the Book: "And God created man in His own image, in the image of God He made man" (Genesis 1:27), "by the mouth of the Lord" (Numbers 9:18), "I, My hands have stretched out the heavens" (Isaiah 45:12), "in the ears of the Lord" (Numbers 11:1), "and under His feet" (Exodus 24:10), "Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the Lord" (Isaiah 51:9), "who has not lifted up My soul unto falsehood" (Psalms 24:4), "in the eyes of the Lord" (Genesis 6:8), "and the Lord said in His heart" (Genesis 8:21), and whatever resembles that among the bodily limbs.
, , , , , , .
And the second kind is bodily motions and acts, such as "And God saw the light" (Genesis 1:4), "and the Lord repented that He had made man on the earth, and He grieved in His heart" (Genesis 6:6), "and the Lord smelled" (Genesis 8:21), "and God remembered" (Genesis 8:1), "and the Lord heard" (Numbers 11:1), "and the Lord awoke as one asleep" (Psalms 78:65), and much that resembles that among the acts of rational beings.
" , ,
Yet our forebears (peace be upon them), in their interpretation of the holy scriptures, rendered for us this category of the descriptions of the Creator (exalted is He) in the most subtle manner that can be understood from them, and attributed them to the Glory of the Lord, as they rendered "and behold, the Lord stood above him" (Genesis 28:13),
, .
as they rendered "and behold, the Lord stood above him" — "and behold, the Glory of the Lord".
,
"And God went up from him" (Genesis 35:13) — "and the Glory of the Lord was withdrawn from above him".
Aligned sentence by sentence
. , .
"…of the LORD. And the LORD descended, and the Glory of the LORD was revealed" (cf. Exodus 19, Numbers 14).
.
They brought it forth in a fitting manner and removed it from the Creator (mighty and exalted), so that nothing of corporeality and accidents should attach to the Maker.
, .
The excellent master, our teacher Saadia Gaon (may God be pleased with him), has expounded at length in the clarification of this meaning in the Book of Beliefs, and in the commentary on the order of Bereshit.
, , .
and in the explanation of the order of Va'era, and in the Book of Formation, with what makes unnecessary the explanation of these matters in this book of mine.
, ,
That upon which we are agreed is that necessity drove [Scripture] to corporealize the Creator and to describe Him with the attributes of created things, in order to establish the meaning of affirming the Creator in the souls; so the prophetic books expressed that to the people in corporeal terms that draw near to their intellects and their understandings,
, ,
For had the books described Him with what befits Him of spiritual terms and spiritual meanings, we would have been ignorant of both the term and the meaning, and no obedience can be valid toward one of whom one is ignorant;
, ,
so it was necessary that the term and the meaning be according to the understanding of the hearer, so that the meaning should fall upon his imagination according to its corporeality understood from the corporealizing term at first,
, .
then it is refined for him, and he is made to know that this is an approximation and a figurative expression of the book, and that the true meaning is more subtle, more exalted, more noble, and more remote than that we should comprehend of it the full reality of the subtlety of its meaning.
, , .
The understanding, discerning person aspires to strip the husks of the term and its corporeality away from the meaning, and ascends in his imagination from rank to rank in it, until there is attained for him of the true reality of the sought meaning what is within his capacity and his apprehension.
, ,
But the ignorant, dull person believes in the Creator according to the apparent sense of the book's expression; yet when he binds himself to the obedience of his Lord and strives in action for His sake, his excuse in the matter is broadened by reason of his ignorance and the slightness of his understanding,
.
since a person is required to do only according to his capacity and his apprehension, in his intellect, his discernment, his strength, and his means.
.
Except that the ignorant one, when learning of knowledge is possible for him and he neglects it, he is held accountable for it and punished for his shortcoming and his sitting back from seeking it.
And had the book proceeded in
Aligned sentence by sentence
, .
to express this meaning in a manner befitting the true reality of its sense — which none would grasp save the discerning rational man alone — then most speakers would remain without religion and without Law, on account of the dullness of their understanding and the weakness of their power to distinguish the spiritual meanings.
, .
So the discourse from which a corporeal meaning is grasped does not harm the rational man, because of his distinguishing himself from it, and it benefits the ignorant man, so that it may settle in his soul that he has a Creator whose obedience is incumbent upon him.
, , .
This is comparable to one who has arrived as a guest upon a man of means who is honored by him, and his hospitality became incumbent upon him, and the guest has beasts of burden whose fodder is incumbent upon him: so he sent to him much barley for the fodder of his beasts, and dispatched a little of the food suited to him, only according to the need and the sustenance.
, .
And likewise the language, and all the books of the prophets and the accounts of the saints, were expanded in the descriptions of the Creator (mighty and exalted) by the corporeal expressions that we have mentioned, according to the understandings of the multitude and that by which the common folk address one another; and for this reason our early sages said concerning this matter, "The Torah spoke in the language of the sons of man" (Berakhot 31b).
, .
And the books alluded, by a little of the spiritual meanings which the possessors of intellect and understanding grasp, so that all might be equal in the knowledge of the existence of the Creator (exalted be He), even though the true reality of His essence differed in their intellects.
, .
And likewise is the discourse concerning every subtle meaning in the Book of God, such as the reward of the world to come and its punishment.
And likewise is the discourse concerning the exposition of the hidden science whose elucidation we have purposed in this
Aligned sentence by sentence
, , , , .
the Book, because the Book confined itself to making it clear in [only] a summary manner, relying upon those who possess intellects, and it indicated [the rest] of it by way of allusions for awakening [the mind] — which we have already mentioned at the beginning of this book — so that he who is able to investigate it and to seek it might be awakened to it, and so reach it and understand it, as the friend [of God] said: "but they that seek the Lord understand all things" (Proverbs 28:5).
" , ,
And the messenger (peace be upon him) cautioned us and warned us not to picture for our Creator (mighty and exalted) a form, nor a likeness, nor an image, in his saying: "Take therefore good heed unto yourselves, for ye saw no manner of form" (Deuteronomy 4:15), and he said: "and ye saw no form, only a voice" (Deuteronomy 4:12).
, ,
He means by His saying "Take therefore good heed unto yourselves": guard yourselves in your imaginations and your thoughts not to liken the Creator (mighty and exalted) by any image, and not to picture for Him a form or a likeness, since your sight did not fall upon any shape nor upon any form at the time of His addressing you.
,
And he said: "To whom then will ye liken God? or what likeness will ye compare unto Him?" (Isaiah 40:18).
,
And he said: "To whom then will ye liken Me, that I should be equal? saith the Holy One" (Isaiah 40:25).
,
And the friend [of God] said: "For who in the sky can be compared unto the Lord? who among the sons of the mighty can be likened unto the Lord?" (Psalms 89:7).
, .
And he said: "There is none like unto Thee among the gods, O Lord; neither are there any works like unto Thy works" (Psalms 86:8) — and much that is like this.
,
And because of the impossibility of picturing Him in the intellects and of likening Him in the thoughts, we found that Scripture ascribes most of its praises and its laudations to the Name of the Creator (mighty and exalted),
, , , , ,
such as His saying "and let them bless Thy glorious Name" (Nehemiah 9:5), "that thou mayest fear this glorious and awful Name" (Deuteronomy 28:58), and he said "and because of My Name he was afraid" (Malachi 2:5), "But unto you that fear My Name shall the sun of righteousness arise" (Malachi 3:20), "Sing unto the Lord, sing praises to His Name; extol Him that rideth upon the skies, by His Name Yah" (Psalms 68:5).
, ,
and all of that is by way of magnifying, exalting, and elevating the Essence of the Creator (exalted be He), since nothing of His true nature, beyond His existence, is sound in our imaginations except His sublime, lofty Name alone;
,
but as for His Essence and the true reality of its meanings, there is for it no form, nor shape, nor likeness in our thoughts and our imaginations — and for this reason His Name is repeated [again and again].
Aligned sentence by sentence
, .
frequently in His Book and the books of His prophets, since we apprehend of Him nothing but His existence and His name.
, " ,
And the Scriptures have associated Him with the heaven and the earth, and with the world, and with the spirits — as in the saying of Abraham (peace be upon him): "And I will make you swear by the Lord, the God of heaven and the God of the earth" (Genesis 24:3),
,
and Jonah said: "I fear the Lord, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land" (Jonah 1:9),
" ,
and the messenger (peace be upon him) said: "Let the Lord, the God of the spirits of all flesh, appoint" (Numbers 27:16),
,
and He (exalted is He) said: "I am the Lord, the God of all flesh" (Jeremiah 32:27),
.
And the reason for this is that He made Himself known to us much from the standpoint by which we comprehended Him and understood His meaning.
", ,
And we found that He made Himself known to us much from the side of our fathers (peace be upon them) — as in His saying: "The Lord, the God of your fathers, has appeared to me, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob," and so on (Exodus 3:16),
.
and He said: "The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob has sent me to you" (Exodus 3:15).
, .
And the reason for this is that He made Himself known to us from the standpoint by which we came to know Him, namely the tradition of the fathers, whose way of life we have inherited from them — as Scripture said: "For I have known him, to the end that he may command his children and his household after him, that they may keep the way of the Lord, to do righteousness and justice," and so on (Genesis 18:19).
, .
And it may be that He made Himself known by them because of their being singled out for the worship of God in their time, since the people of their age worshipped other than God.
, , ,
And likewise is the case concerning that by which He was named "the God of the Hebrews" (Exodus 5:3) and "the God of Israel" (Genesis 33:20) — as he said: "Not like these is the portion of Jacob, for He is the Fashioner of all" (Jeremiah 10:16),
.
and the saint said: "The Lord is the portion of my inheritance and of my cup" (Psalm 16:5).
,
And had it been possible for us to grasp the true reality of His meaning, He would not have made Himself known to us by anything other than it,
,
so when the grasping of the true reality of His meaning was barred to our intellects, He described Himself as being the Lord of the noblest of His creatures, both rational and non-rational,
" ,
and therefore He said to the messenger (peace be upon him) when he asked Him: "And they shall say to me, What is His name? what shall I say to them?" (Exodus 3:13) — He said:
Aligned sentence by sentence
.
to him: "I will be what I will be; and He said: thus shall you say to the children of Israel, 'I-will-be has sent me to you'" (Exodus 3:14).
, ,
Now when He knew that the people would not understand from this name the true reality of its meaning, He added clarification and said after it:
,
"And God said moreover to Moses: thus shall you say to the children of Israel, 'The LORD, the God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, has sent me to you'; this is My name for ever, and this is My memorial unto all generations" (Exodus 3:15),
, ,
He intended by saying that, that since the people were ignorant of this expression and its meaning by way of their intellects, He informed them that I am the One known to them by way of the transmission of their fathers,
, , ,
for the Creator (exalted be He) does not set down a path to His knowledge apart from these two aspects: I mean that which is grasped by the intellect by way of His manifest traces in His creatures, and the second, that which is transmitted by way of the fathers and the righteous forebears,
" .
as the friend (peace be upon him) said: "which wise men have told and have not hid it from their fathers" (Job 15:18).
,
And since our apprehension of every existent thing comes about only from one of three aspects — one of them being our senses,
Aligned sentence by sentence
.
the corporeal [senses], namely sight, hearing, taste, smell, and touch.
, .
And the second is by way of our intellects, which is the gate of inference about an existing thing from its traces and its actions, whereby we ascertain the correctness of its existence and the true reality of its meaning from it, by the correctness of what we have perceived with our senses; and this is what is called in the Book "knowledge and the discipline of understanding" (Proverbs 1:2).
.
And the third is the truthful report and the sound tradition.
.
Since the perception of the Creator (exalted be He) by way of our senses is impossible, His perception is not permissible except by way of the truthful report and by way of inference about Him from His traces alone.
, , , " ,
And since inference was established for us by way of His traces in the created things, and the multitude of the descriptions of the Creator (mighty and exalted) was more than what could be encompassed on account of them, the prophets and the friends [of God] described Him with varying descriptions, among them the description of the Messenger (peace be upon him) in his saying: "The Rock, His work is perfect, for all His ways are justice" (Deuteronomy 32:4),
, .
and he said also: "For the Lord your God, He is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great, the mighty, and the awesome God, who does not show favor nor take a bribe, who executes justice for the orphan and the widow, and loves the stranger" (Deuteronomy 10:17-18).
, , .
And He (exalted) said, in describing His conduct among the created things: "The Lord, the Lord, God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in lovingkindness and truth, keeping lovingkindness for thousands" (Exodus 34:6-7); and all of these are attributes inferred from His traces in His creatures, and the wisdom and the power manifest in His works.
, " ,
And when we seek to uncover anything of this meaning with our intellects and our discernment, we are powerless to attain the least part of the parts of His descriptions and His praises, as the friend [of God] (peace be upon him) said: "Many things You have done, O Lord my God, Your wonders and Your thoughts toward us" (Psalm 40:6),
,
and he said: "Who can utter the mighty acts of the Lord, or make heard all His praise?" (Psalm 106:2),
.
and he said: "And let them bless Your glorious Name, which is exalted above all blessing and praise" (Nehemiah 9:5).
And there came in
Aligned sentence by sentence
" , , , , .
Our fathers (peace be upon them) have transmitted: that prayer-leader who went down before Rabbi Hanina and said, "the great, the mighty, the awesome, the powerful, the strong, the courageous God." He said to him: "Have you finished all the praises of your Master? As for us, 'the great, the mighty, the awesome' — had Moses not uttered them and the Men of the Great Assembly come and established them in the prayer, we would not have said them; yet you have praised Him all this much! It is like a king of flesh and blood who had a thousand thousand golden dinars, and they were praising him with [coins] of silver — is this not a disgrace to him?" (Berakhot 33b).
.
And He said to you: "Praise is silence for You, O God, in Zion" (Psalm 65:2).
, , .
And they said: "The medicine for everything is silence" — it is like a pearl that has no price: the more you praise it, the more you cheapen it.
, , , .
It is therefore fitting for you, O my brother, that you strive with your soul and oblige it to recognize the true reality of its Creator (mighty and exalted) from the aspect of His effects, not from the aspect of His essence — for He is the nearest of all near things from the aspect of His effects, and the farthest of all far things from the aspect of representing His essence and depicting it, since He has no existence in our imaginings in any way from these aspects, according to what we have already set down.
, , .
So when you arrive at removing Him from your imagination and your sense as though He had no existence, yet you find Him from the aspect of His effects as though He never parts from you — that is the ultimate goal of knowing Him, to which the Messenger urged in his saying: "And you shall know this day, and lay it to your heart, that the Lord, He is God" (Deuteronomy 4:39).
, .
And one of the knowers said: "The most knowledgeable of people concerning God is the most bewildered of them about Him."
, .
And it was said: "The most learned of people concerning God is the most ignorant of them of the true reality of His essence; and the most ignorant of them of Him is the one who, in his own estimation, is the most learned of them of the true reality of His essence."
, .
And someone asked one of them about God, and he said: "God is One."
, .
The questioner said to him: "And how is He?" He answered him: "A great King."
, , ,
He said to him: "And where is He?" He answered him and said: "On the watch." The questioner said to him: "It is not about this that I asked you." He said to him:
Aligned sentence by sentence
, .
Your asking by means of these expressions requires only the attributes befitting the created thing, not the Creator; but as for the attributes which we must ascertain of our Creator (exalted be He), [it is] what I have already told you, that there is no way for us to anything other than that.
, , , , .
And it was said of one of the righteous that he used to say in his intimate prayer: "O Lord, where shall I find You? Nay, where shall I not find You? You are hidden, yet You are not seen, and all is full of You."
.
like His saying: "Do I not fill the heavens and the earth? says the Lord" (Jeremiah 23:24).
,
So the utmost of the knowledge of Him is your acknowledgment and your certainty that you are at the utmost of ignorance regarding the true reality of His essence;
,
and when a form is represented to you of Him in your imagination, or a likeness in your thought, then employ the way of inquiry into its meaning,
,
and His existence will continue to be ascertained by you, while His likeness becomes impossible to your imagination, until you find Him only by the way of inference alone;
, ,
And the closest of the likenesses in that, by way of approximation and expression, is our finding the true reality of the soul without our apprehending of it a form, nor a shape, nor a color, nor a smell, despite the fame of its acts and the manifestation of its traces in us;
, .
and likewise the intellect: despite the manifestation of its traces and the clarity of its acts, we apprehend of it no form nor likeness in our thoughts — how much more so the Creator of all, who has nothing like Him.
, , .
And the philosopher said: If speech falls short of [reaching] the soul, how much more must it fall short of [reaching] the Creator (mighty and exalted).
, .
And since we have reached this point in our discourse, we have no need to explain this matter more than this, out of apprehension and wariness of it.
, , , .
And one of the sages said: "Into what is too wondrous for you do not inquire, into what is hidden from you do not search; into what you have been permitted reflect, for you have no business with hidden things" (cf. Ben Sira, b. Chagigah 13a).
.
And they said: "Whoever has no regard for the honor of his Maker, it were fitting for him as though he had not come into the world" (Mishnah Chagigah 2:1).
,
And he said: "Shall it be told Him that I would speak? Or did ever a man wish that he were swallowed up?" (Job 37:20),
Aligned sentence by sentence
" .
They said: if a man comes to recount the mighty deeds of the Holy One, blessed be He, he is swallowed up out of the world.
.
And Scripture said: "And He smote the men of Beth-shemesh, because they had looked into the ark of the Lord" (1 Samuel 6:19).
" , ,
And the friend [of God] (peace be upon him) said: "It is the glory of God to conceal a matter" (Proverbs 25:2), that is, the concealment of His secret from the common people,
" .
And David (peace be upon him) said: "The secret of the Lord is with them that fear Him" (Psalm 25:14).
, , ,
And among the things you must verify concerning the matter of the bodily senses which we have mentioned, and the psychic senses, which are memory, thought, imagination, opinion, and discernment, is that all of them terminate in a single matter,
Aligned sentence by sentence
, ,
And it is the intellect, which supplies it with a faculty for the apprehension of meanings; and each sense among them has a particular object which it apprehends and apprehends nothing else,
, ,
as colors and shapes, which we apprehend only by the sense of sight; and as sounds and melodies, which we apprehend only by the sense of hearing alone;
, , ,
and likewise scents and the kinds of things smelled, by the sense of the nose; and the kinds of tastes are apprehended by the sense of taste alone; and heat and cold and many of the qualities are apprehended by the sense of touch alone;
,
and each sense among them has a power to apprehend its object up to a certain limited distance which it reaches, and then it halts at the end of that distance,
, .
as sight, for it apprehends the seen thing when it is near to it, and the farther sight is from the seen thing, the weaker its apprehension of it becomes, until sight halts and does not apprehend the seen thing.
, .
and likewise the sense of hearing, and likewise the rest of the senses.
, ,
and there is no way to apprehend a sensible object without its sense that is prepared for it; and whoever seeks that, his object eludes him at his seeking of it,
, , , .
like one who seeks to apprehend melodies by the sense of his sight, and colors by the sense of his hearing, and tastes by the sense of touch — their existence eludes him, even though they exist for whoever seeks them by the instruments through which they are apprehended.
, , .
and likewise is the case with the spiritual senses which we have mentioned: that each sense among them has a certain power for the apprehension of a certain object which is not apprehended by another, and it has a certain limit which, when the sense reaches it, it halts short of it — in the manner of what we mentioned concerning the bodily senses.
, , ,
and likewise is the case with the intellect: that it apprehends the intelligible things in themselves and by way of inference; so what is near among them it apprehends through the true reality of itself, and what is far and whose apprehension is hidden from it, it apprehends by way of inference about it,
,
and since He (mighty and exalted) is the most hidden of all hidden and the most distant of all distant, from the aspect of His essence to us, the intellect apprehends nothing but the meaning of His existence alone,
, ,
so whenever it seeks to apprehend the true reality of His essence or to liken Him, His existence eludes it after it had been ascertained, since it sought what is not within its power — according to what we described of the eluding of the bodily sensible object when it is sought without the sense that is prepared for it.
Aligned sentence by sentence
. ,
35. And therefore we ought to seek the existence of the Creator (exalted) from the aspect of His effects in created things, and to infer Him from them,
, ,
and when His existence has been established for us from this aspect, it is incumbent that we halt and not seek in our thoughts to form an image of Him, nor in our minds to liken Him, to give Him a likeness, and to apprehend the inner reality of His essence,
, ,
for if we do this, supposing thereby that it brings Him nearer to our understanding, we lose His existence — since everything imaged in our imaginations is a notion of something other than Him,
.
And the Sage said: "Hast thou found honey? eat so much as is sufficient for thee, lest thou be filled therewith, and vomit it" (Proverbs 25:16).
,
And I see fit to bring this matter near to you by means of two close illustrations,
, , ,
the first of them shows you that each sense apprehends its sense-object and then halts, and the other sense takes over after it and then halts, and likewise the rest of them,
, .
and when they have halted, the intellect takes over the apprehension of what lies within its power to apprehend; and all this concerns one and the same matter.
, ,
And this is: imagine a stone thrown from a distance, having a whir, that has struck a certain man,
, , ,
so he apprehended by his sense of sight the color of the stone and its shape, and apprehended by his sense of hearing the whir of the stone, and apprehended by the sense of touch its coldness and its roughness,
,
then the bodily senses halted and apprehended of the matter of the stone no more than that,
, ,
then the intellect apprehended that the stone has a thrower who threw it, since it has been established that the stone did not move of its own accord,
, .
for what is of such a kind that it is apprehended by the bodily senses, its apprehension is impossible for the intellect without them; and all the more is it impossible for the bodily senses to apprehend that which is of such a kind that it is apprehended by the intellect alone.
, .
So when it is impossible for our intellects to apprehend the inner reality of the essence of the Creator (exalted), how may it be permitted to us to liken Him, to delimit Him, to form an image of Him, and to compare Him to anything among the objects apprehended by our bodily senses? — and that is impossible.
, ,
And the second illustration shows you that, as for the spiritual notions, when we have ascertained the truth of their existence, it is not of sound judgment to probe exhaustively after them and to investigate their essence, for that ruins our intellects,
and this is like one who sought to apprehend
Aligned sentence by sentence
, .
[Whoever toils to apprehend] the sun from the side of its light, its rays, and its shining, and the dispelling of the darkness by it, stands upon the certainty of its existence, benefits from it, makes use of the glow of its light, and attains the desired purpose from it.
But whoever desires to apprehend it
Aligned sentence by sentence
, .
from the side of its disk and fixes his sight upon the eye of the sun — his sight is veiled, his light is lost, and he derives no benefit from the sun.
, , ,
Likewise it happens to us, when we apprehend the existence of the Creator (exalted be He) from the side of His traces, and His wisdom in them, and His power in His creatures: we comprehend Him and we understand His meaning, and at that point our intellects are illumined by the knowing of Him and by our apprehending all that is in our intellects to apprehend,
.
as He has said: "I am the Lord your God, who teaches you for your benefit, who leads you in the way you should go" (Isaiah 48:17).
, , .
But when we attempt by our intellects to apprehend the meaning of His essence, and its conceiving, and its representation in our imaginings, we lose our intellects and our discernment, and we apprehend by them nothing of what we know — like what happens to our sights when we gaze attentively with them at the eye of the sun.
.
So it behooves us to be wary of this matter, and to keep it in mind when investigating the meaning of the existence of the Creator (exalted be He).
, , ,
Likewise it is incumbent upon us to safeguard ourselves concerning His descriptions — with which He has described Himself, and with which His friends have described Him — from believing them according to the outward sense of their wording and the literal import of their bodily expression,
, ,
rather it is incumbent upon us to know, with certain and sound knowledge, that they are metaphors and expressions in accord with our discernment and what our understandings and intellects can bear — on account of the necessity of being acquainted with Him and of magnifying His glory; and He (exalted) is loftier and more sublime than all of that, to a degree without limit,
.
in line with what the Scripture said: "And exalted above all blessing and praise" (Nehemiah 9:5).
, , ,
One of the philosophers said: He whose understanding has fallen short of explicating the meanings of the simple realities has clung to the names by which the revealed Books have spoken concerning the Maker,
, ,
and he does not know that the address in the books of the religious laws is only according to the measure of the understandings of those upon whom they were sent down, not by the measure of what is encompassed by the One who addresses them,
, .
and it is only like the whistling to a draught-animal at the watering of water, by which it is urged on to drinking more than it would be urged on by addressing the animal in the finest speech.
So when you have grasped, O my brother, this rank
Aligned sentence by sentence
, , , , , , " .
of affirming-the-unity by your intellect and your understanding — then purify yourself for the Creator (mighty be His Name), and strive in apprehending His existence from the side of His wisdom, His power, His tenderness, His mercy, and the intensity of His care for the creatures, and make these your means unto Him, so that you will be among the seekers of the Lord, and you will receive from Him aid and reinforcement toward understanding Him and apprehending the true reality of His meaning, as the prophet (peace be upon him) said: "The secret of the Lord is for those who fear Him, and His covenant — to make them know" (Psalm 25:14).
, .
And I shall expound for you exemplars in the Second Gate of this book of mine; if you take them up and walk by their road, this will be made easy upon you, if God wills.
, , , ,
As for the corrupters of the purification of affirming-the-unity for God, they are many. Among them is associationism with God, which is of various kinds; among them is the doctrine of the people of two and the people of three;
,
and among them is the worship of images, and of the sun, and the moon, and the stars, and the fire, and plants, and animals;
,
and among them is the belief in corporealization of the Creator (exalted be He) after [one has reached] knowledge of the purpose in the Book's use of [such language] for Him;
, ,
and among them is hidden associationism, which is ostentation in religious acts before people, and it is of many kinds which I shall expound in the Fifth Gate of this book, with the help of God (exalted be He);
, ,
and among them is the inclination, along with desire, toward the disgraceful appetites of the bodies — for this is hidden associationism, since the human being associates, together with his worship of his Lord, the worship of his own desire;
, " .
And the Book said: "Let there be no strange god in you" (Psalm 81:10), and our early ones (peace be upon them) said: "Who is the strange god that is in a man's body? Say: this is the evil inclination" (b. Shabbat 105b).
,
And perhaps some ignorant, dull-witted person, when he reads this book and comes upon what we have mentioned in this Gate, will say: And does it remain hidden from one who has read but a single leaf of the Book of God
Aligned sentence by sentence
.
Is the meaning of the unity of God hidden, that this [author] should alert us to it and guide us toward it?
,
So I say in answer to that what the Wise One has counseled concerning him: "Answer a fool in line with his folly, lest he be wise in his own eyes" (Proverbs 26:5),
,
for the speaker of this statement is weak in discernment, [unable] to grasp the generality of things that come upon different kinds,
,
for the general thing, when it comes upon different kinds, their reception of it varies — by the more and the less, the stronger and the weaker,
,
An example of this is the generality of the sun's light for the people of the earth,
,
for we find that they are divided concerning it into three divisions:
, .
the first is for the people of clear vision, whose sights are sound and free of every defect; they benefit from the sun, make use of its illumination, and accomplish their needs by it.
, , ,
the second division is concerning the blind, whose sight has wholly departed; the sun neither benefits nor harms them, but rather they benefit from it by the hand of intermediaries,
, ,
and the third division is a people whose sights have grown weak in making use of them in the sun, so that it harms their sights if they do not veil them from the sun's illumination,
,
so that if they hasten to the treatment of their sights with eye-salves and ointments and the refining of their nourishment, together with guarding them from making use of them in the sun's light, they will join the sound and benefit from the sun that had been harming them,
.
but if they are heedless of the treatment for them, they will quickly join the rank of the blind, and the light of their sights will depart.
, .
And on this example the meaning of the unity, which has come in the truthful Book of God, is divided among the ranks of the rational beings — after its being universal to them, as the sun's light is universal to those who possess vision whom we have described — so that their understanding of it varies into three divisions.
,
the first is the people of pure intellects and keen native faculties,
,
the second division is a people whose intellects have grown weak in discerning what is in the Book of God altogether,
.
and the third division is a people whose intellects have grown weak below the intellects of the first rank, yet they have strength to discern most of the close, easy matters.
As for the first rank — I mean those who possess sound intellects —
Aligned sentence by sentence
, , , .
[They are people of sound intellects who are free] from defects: when they understand what has come down upon them in God's Book concerning the affirmation of divine unity, they are guided to it, and its meaning is realized in their souls through the strength of their minds and the purity of their intellects; such people have no need of this book, except that it may remind them of what they have been heedless of.
, , .
As for the second rank, they have no knowledge of God's Book, let alone of the affirmation of divine unity that has come down in it; they merely hear its report and do not comprehend its meaning, so there is for them neither benefit nor harm in my book.
, , , .
As for the third rank, they understand the affirmation of divine unity that is in God's Book with a partial understanding, but their discernment is not strong enough to grasp its meaning and to stand upon its true reality; if a guide leads them to it and makes them understand its meaning by way of the true demonstrations and the rational proofs, they verify its meaning, its profit becomes plain to them, and they join the first rank; but if they are heedless of investigation and speculation into what would strengthen their discernment and polish their intellects, they fall to the level of the ignorant.
, .
So this book of mine is profitable for this rank with a general, comprehensive profit, because investigation is possible for them; and it is for them in the place of the beneficial eye-salves for those of weak sight, for whom recovery comes about through their treatment.
, , , , , .
The Book has likened the ignorant man to the blind, and wisdom to light, and likened ignorance to darkness, in its saying: "And I saw that wisdom excels folly, as light excels darkness" (Ecclesiastes 2:13); and it said: "The wise man's eyes are in his head, but the fool walks in darkness" (Ecclesiastes 2:14); and it said: "Hear, you deaf; and look, you blind, that you may see" (Isaiah 42:18).
, .
And it likened knowledge and culture to the tree of life, as it says: "She is a tree of life to those who lay hold of her" (Proverbs 3:18), and it said: "For they are life to those who find them" (Proverbs 4:22).
, , .
May God guide us to the path of His knowledge, and direct us to His obedience, and grant us success toward what pleases Him, by His mercy.