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Treatise One · Section One
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I was asked about the arguments I have at my disposal against those who differ from us — the philosophers and the followers of other religions — and then against the sectarians who dissent from the majority.
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I recalled what I had heard of the arguments of the rabbi who was with the king of the Khazars, the one who entered the religion of the Jews.
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According to what is attested and recorded in the book of chronicles, a dream recurred to him: an angel was addressing him, saying to him, 'Your intention is pleasing to God, but your deed is not pleasing.'
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He used to strive greatly in worship according to the religion of the Khazars, to the point that he himself would perform the service of the temple and the sacrifices with a pure, sincere intention.
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But whenever he exerted himself in those works, the angel would come at night and say to him: 'Your intention is pleasing, but your deed is not pleasing.'
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This led him to investigate the religions and the sects, and in the end he converted to Judaism, he and the multitude of the Khazars.
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Among the rabbi's arguments there was that which convinced me and accorded with my own belief, so I saw fit to set down that argumentation just as it occurred. And the discerning will understand.
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It is related that the king of the Khazars, when he saw in his dream that his intention was pleasing to God but his deed was not pleasing — and he was commanded in the dream to seek the deed pleasing to God — asked a philosopher about his belief.
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The philosopher said to him: There is with God neither favor nor displeasure, for He — exalted be He — is far removed from wishes and purposes.
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For a purpose indicates a deficiency in the one who has it: the fulfillment of his purpose would be a perfection for him, and whatever is not fulfilled is a deficiency.
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Likewise, according to the philosophers, He is far removed from the knowledge of particulars, since they change with the times, and there is no change in God's knowledge.
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So He does not perceive you at all — let alone know your intention and your deeds, let alone hear your prayer or see your movements.
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True — even if the philosophers say that He created you, this is only by way of metaphor, because He is the Cause of causes in the creation of every creature, not because you were intended by Him.
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Indeed, He never created any man at all, for the world is eternal: man has always come into being from a man before him.
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Combined in him are forms, a constitution, and traits of character from his father, his mother, and his kin; the qualities of the climates, the lands, the foods, and the waters; together with the powers of the spheres, the stars, and the constellations, according to the relations that arise from them.
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All of this goes back to the First Cause — not through any purpose of His, but as an emanation that flowed forth from Him: a second cause, then a third and a fourth; the causes and their effects became linked and formed a chain, just as you see them.
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Their linkage is eternal, just as the First Cause is eternal and has no beginning. Every individual among the individuals of the world has causes through which it is completed.
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One individual, whose causes were complete, came out perfect; another, whose causes were deficient, came out deficient.
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The philosopher, for whom predispositions have been prepared by which he receives the moral, intellectual, theoretical, and practical virtues, lacks nothing of perfection.
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But these perfections are only in potential; bringing them out into actuality requires instruction and training.
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To the perfect man there is joined, from the divine order, a light called the Active Intellect; his passive intellect is joined to it in a union so complete that the man sees himself to be that very Active Intellect, with no difference between the two.
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His instruments — I mean the limbs of that man — then act only in the most perfect deeds, at the most fitting times, and in the best of states, as though they were instruments of the Active Intellect rather than of the material, passive intellect.
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Treatise One · Section Five
The separation from bodies — that is the rank of the Active Intellect, which is a sovereign of a rank below the sovereign charged with the lunar sphere.
These are intellects wholly abstracted from matter, eternal alongside the First Cause, never subject to annihilation.
The soul of the perfect human being and that Intellect then become a single thing, so that the person no longer cares about the perishing of his body and its instruments.
His soul finds bliss in life, for he has joined the company of Hermes, Asclepius, Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle.
Indeed, he and they — and all who stood at their level — and the Active Intellect are one single thing.
This, then, is what is meant by the expression 'divine favor' — by way of metaphor or approximation. Follow it: pursue knowledge of the true nature of things so that your intellect becomes active rather than merely passive.
Hold to the most balanced path in character and conduct, for this aids in the apprehension of truth, in persevering in learning, and in assimilation to that Active Intellect.
This entails contentment, submission, humility, and every virtuous trait together with reverence for the First Cause.
Not in order to win His favor or to avert His displeasure, but rather in order to assimilate to the Active Intellect in its preference for truth and in describing everything according to what it deserves.
This is among the qualities of the Intellect. Once you have attained this quality of belief, it does not matter under which law you practice, or which religion you profess and honor.
And perhaps it will inform you and grant you knowledge of the unseen through true dreams and accurate visions.
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Section Two
The Khazar said to him: Your words are persuasive, but they do not answer what I am seeking. For I know from my own inner sense that I am pure of soul and that my deeds are properly directed toward winning the favor of the Lord.
But the reply I received was that this deed is not acceptable, even though the intention is acceptable. So there must be some deed that is intrinsically acceptable, not merely according to one's own estimation.
Otherwise consider the Christian and the Muslim, who have divided the inhabited world between them and fight each other — each of them has purified his intention before God, renounced the world, fasted, and prayed.
Yet each advances resolved to kill the other, believing that in slaying him lies the greatest merit and the greatest drawing near to God. They slay one another, each convinced he is bound for heaven and paradise.
That both of them could be right is an impossibility for reason.
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Section Three. The philosopher said: The religion of the philosophers enjoins the killing of neither of these parties, since they believe in reason.
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Section Four. The Khazar said: What perplexity among the philosophers is greater than their belief in creation ex novo and that the world was created in six days?
And that the First Cause speaks to a particular person among humankind — quite apart from the transcendence the philosophers ascribe to it, keeping it beyond knowledge of particulars.
And yet, given the works of the philosophers, their sciences, their investigations, and their striving, prophecy should have been widespread and prevalent among them.
We in fact observe true dreams in those who never concerned themselves with knowledge or with purifying their souls, while the opposite is found among those who sought it.
This shows that the divine matter and souls possess a mystery beyond what you have described, O philosopher.
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Then the Khazar said to himself: I shall consult the Christians and the Muslims, for one of these two ways is surely the acceptable one. As for the Jews — their abasement, their small numbers, and the contempt all peoples hold for them speak for themselves.
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He said to him: I believe in creation ex novo for creatures and in the eternity of the Creator, exalted be He, and that He created the entire world in six days.
And that all rational beings are descended from Adam and then from Noah, and all trace their lineage back to them.
And that God has providential care for creation and is in contact with rational beings — with displeasure and favor, mercy, speech, appearance, and revelation to His prophets and His saints.
And that He dwells among those multitudes whom He favors. In sum, everything that is found in the Torah and in the records of the Children of Israel — records whose truthfulness cannot be disputed on account of their fame, their continuity, and their publicness —
— and concerning their latter end and their fate: the Divinity became incarnate and became an embryo in the womb of a virgin from the noble women of Israel.
She bore him: outwardly human, inwardly divine — a prophet sent forth in his apparent nature, yet God sent forth in his inward nature.
He is the Messiah, called by us the Son of God. He is the Father, He is the Son, He is the Holy Spirit — and we are truly monotheists, even though the Trinity appears upon our tongues.
We believe in him and in his indwelling among the Children of Israel in honor of them, for the divine command had not ceased to be in contact with them — until their multitude defied this Messiah and crucified him.
Whereupon God's displeasure became permanent upon their multitude, while His favor rested upon the individuals who followed the Messiah.
And then upon the nations who followed those individuals — and we are among them, even though we are not from the lineage of Israel.
We therefore have the better claim to be called the Children of Israel, since we follow the Messiah and his companions — twelve from the Children of Israel, standing in place of the tribes.
Then a multitude from the Children of Israel followed those twelve and became like leaven for the Christian nation, earning thereby the rank of the Children of Israel.
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The Messiah — 'I have not come to abrogate any of the laws of Moses; rather, I have come to reinforce them and to add to them.'
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Section Five. The Khazar said: There is no room here for rational inference — indeed, rational inference renders most of what you have said remote from credibility.
But when direct observation and experience are established to the point that they seize one at the very core of the heart, and one finds no escape from believing what has been thus verified —
— then one turns to rational inference, now refined, to render the improbable more plausible, just as the natural scientists do with remarkable properties they encounter.
These are things that, had scientists described them before being seen, would have been rejected; but once seen, the scientists refined their explanations and assigned them causes from the stars and spiritual forces.
And they did not deny what they had observed. As for me, I find that I am not at ease accepting these matters, since I came upon them from outside and was not raised within them; thorough investigation is therefore incumbent upon me.
He then summoned a scholar from among the scholars of Islam and asked him about his knowledge and his practice.
He said: We affirm the absolute unity and eternity of God, the createdness of the world, the descent of all from Adam and Noah, and we deny corporealism altogether.
And if something appears in the text, we interpret it allegorically and call it figurative and approximate — while acknowledging that our scripture is the speech of God, which is in itself a miracle, and which we are obligated to accept on account of its very nature.
Since no one has been able to produce its like, nor the like of any single verse of its verses. And that our prophet is the Seal of the Prophets and the abrogator of every prior law.
And the caller of all nations to Islam. The reward of the obedient is the return of his soul to his body in a Garden of bliss lacking nothing of eating, drinking, conjugal pleasure, and whatever one desires.
And the punishment of the disobedient is his return in a fire whose torment never ends.
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Section Six. The Khazar said to him: One who seeks to be guided by the command of God, and who wishes to establish as certain for himself that God speaks with human beings — while he finds this implausible — must first have established for himself matters that are famous and beyond dispute.
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And after all, even if he accepts that God has spoken to a human being — and even if your scripture is a miracle — since the scripture is in Arabic, a non-Arab such as I cannot distinguish its miraculous quality and its wondrous nature.
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Section Seven. The Sage said to him: Indeed, miracles were manifest at his hands — yet this did not constitute a proof obligating acceptance of his law.
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Section Eight. The Khazar said: Yes — the soul cannot rest in affirming that the divine is truly in contact with a human being except through a miracle in which physical realities are transformed.
For we know that such a thing can only be accomplished by One who brought all things into existence from nothing — and that it must occur before multitudes who witness it directly, not by means of a report transmitted through a chain of narrators.
And the matter must be examined and tested, trial after trial, so that no suspicion may arise that what occurred was imagination or sorcery.
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And only thereafter can the soul accept this momentous matter — namely, that the Creator of this world and the next, of the angels and the heavens and the lights, should enter into contact with this lowly bit of clay called the human being, speak with him, and fulfill his desires and his petitions.
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Section Nine. The Sage said: Is not our scripture filled with accounts of Moses, peace be upon him, and the children of Israel — accounts no one disputes — concerning what he did to Pharaoh, the splitting of the sea, the manna and the quails for forty years, God's speaking with Moses at the mountain, the halting of the sun for Joshua, and his victory over the mighty nations?
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And what came before all this — the Flood, and the destruction of the people of Lot — is this not universally known, leaving no room for suspicion of fabrication or illusion?
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Section Ten. The Khazar said: Indeed — I find myself compelled to question the Jews, for they are the remnant of the children of Israel, and I see that they are the evidence that God has a law upon the earth. He then summoned a rabbi from among the Jewish sages and questioned him about his belief.
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Section Eleven. He said to him: I believe in the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel — who brought the children of Israel out of Egypt with signs and miracles, who sustained them in the wilderness, and who gave them the land of Canaan after leading them across the sea and the Jordan by means of miracles.
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And I believe in Moses, sent with his law, and then in the thousands of prophets after him who affirmed his law with promises to those who observe it and warnings to those who transgress it — and our faith encompasses all that is recorded in the Torah. The account is long.
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Section Twelve. The Khazar said: I had resolved not to question a Jew — knowing as I do the ruin of their circumstances and the diminishment of their standing, since misfortune has left them nothing worthy of praise.
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Why did you not say, O Jew, that you believe in the Creator of the world, its Orderer and its Governor, and in the One who created you and sustains you — and the like of these attributes, which are the foundation of every religion, and for whose sake one follows truth and justice in order to resemble the Creator in His wisdom and His justice?
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Section Thirteen. The rabbi said: What you describe is the speculative and political religion — the one to which philosophical reasoning leads. But it contains many doubts: ask the philosophers about it, and you will never find them in agreement on a single practice or a single doctrine.
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For these are claims: some of which they can demonstrate by proof, some by which they can only persuade, and some which they cannot even make persuasive — let alone demonstrate.
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Section Fourteen. The Khazar said: I find your words, O Jew, more apt than your opening — and I wish to hear more. Section Fifteen. The rabbi said: Nay, the opening of my words is itself the proof — indeed, it is direct witness, and stands in no need of evidence or demonstration.
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Section Sixteen. The Khazar said: And how is that? Section Seventeen. The rabbi said: Grant me leave to set out some preliminaries — for I see that you regard my words with contempt and find them burdensome.
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Section Eighteen. The Khazar said: Present your preliminaries so that I may hear.
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Section Nineteen. The rabbi said: Suppose someone told you that the king of India is a man of virtue — that you ought to honor him and extol his name, and described the traces of his greatness in terms of what has reached you: the justice of his people, the excellence of their character, and the equity of their dealings. Would that be binding upon you?
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Section Twenty. The Khazar said: How could that be binding upon me, when there is doubt regarding the people of India — whether their justice derives from themselves with no king, or from their king, or from both together?
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Section Twenty-One. The rabbi said: But if his envoy came to you bearing Indian gifts — gifts you have no doubt are found only in the royal palaces of India — accompanied by a witnessed document certifying that they are from him,
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And alongside it were medicines that cure your ailments and preserve your health, and poisons for your enemies and those who make war on you — which, when you deploy against them, will slay them regardless of the disparity in numbers — would you then be bound to obey him?
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Section Twenty-Two. The Khazar said: Yes — and the old doubt would vanish from me, the doubt whether India has a king or not. I would believe that his kingship and his sovereignty had reached me.
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Section Twenty-Three. The rabbi said: And when asked to describe him, how would you do so? Section Twenty-Four. The Khazar said: By those attributes that became certain to me through direct experience, and then by those that had been publicly attested and were clarified by these later ones.
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Section Twenty-Five. The rabbi said: It is in precisely this manner that I answered you when you questioned me. And it is precisely in this manner that Moses opened his address to Pharaoh, when he said to him: The God of the Hebrews has sent me to you — meaning the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob — for their story was renowned among the nations, and it was known that a divine matter had accompanied them, that He had cared for them and wrought wonders on their behalf.
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He did not say to him: the Lord of heaven and earth, or: He who created me and created you, has sent me. Likewise, God opened His address to the whole congregation of the children of Israel by saying: I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt — He did not say: I am the Creator of the world and your Creator. In this same manner I opened with you,
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O prince of the Khazars — when you questioned me about my faith, I answered you with what is binding upon me and upon the community of the children of Israel, those for whom that direct vision was confirmed, and then the successive transmission which is equivalent to direct vision.
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Section Twenty-Six. The Khazar said: In that case, your law is intended for you alone.
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Section Twenty-Seven. The rabbi said: Yes — and whoever from among the nations attaches himself to us specifically will share in our good, though he will not be fully equal to us.
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For had observance of the law been required on account of our common creation, then the white and the black would stand equal in it, since God, may He be exalted, created them all. Rather, the law is on account of His bringing us out of Egypt and His attachment to us, by virtue of our being the elect among humankind.
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Section Twenty-Eight. The Khazar said: I see that you are being evasive, O Jew — your words have grown lean again, after they had been substantial.
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Section Twenty-Nine. The rabbi said: I shall make it substantial and enrich it — if only you give me the breadth of your patience, so that I may expand in explaining it.
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Section Thirty. The Khazar said: Say what you will. Section Thirty-One. The rabbi said: By the governance of the natural order there necessarily follow nutrition, growth, and reproduction, together with their faculties and all their conditions — and this is specific to plants and animals, to the exclusion of the earth, stones, minerals, and elements.
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Section Thirty-Two. The Khazar said: This is a proposition that requires elaboration — but it is true. Section Thirty-Three. The rabbi said: And by the psychic order, the totality of animate life is distinguished, from which there necessarily follow voluntary movements, desires, dispositions, external and internal senses, and other things besides.
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Section Thirty-Four. The Khazar said: This too is beyond dispute. Section Thirty-Five. The rabbi said: And by the governance of the rational order, the speaking being is distinguished from the rest of the animals, and from this there necessarily follow the refinement of character, then the governance of the household, then the governance of the city — whence arise political regimes and civil laws.
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Section Thirty-Six. The Khazar said: That is true.
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Section Thirty-Seven. The rabbi said: What rank, then, stands above this one?
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Section Thirty-Eight. The Khazar said: The rank of the greatest sages.
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Section Thirty-Nine. The rabbi said: I mean only a rank that differs from its neighbor by an essential difference — as the plant essentially differs from the mineral, and the human being essentially differs from the animal.
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As for difference merely by degree — more or less — that has no limit, for it is an accidental difference, and not a true difference of rank in any real sense.
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Section Forty. The Khazar said: Then among perceptible beings there is no rank above that of the human?
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Section Forty-One. The rabbi said: What if we were to find a human being who walks into fire without being harmed, who abstains from food without growing hungry, whose face shines with a light too bright for eyes to bear — who neither falls ill nor grows old — so that when he reaches the end of his life he dies a voluntary death, as one who goes up to his bed to sleep on a known day at a known hour, and to that is added knowledge of the unseen: of what was and what shall be? Is not this rank essentially different from the rank of ordinary human beings?
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Section Forty-Two. The Khazar said: Rather, if such a rank exists, it is a divine and royal rank — and this belongs to the wisdom of the divine order, not to the rational, the psychic, or the natural order.
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Section Forty-Three. The rabbi said: These are some of the attributes of the undisputed prophet — through whom it became manifest to all peoples that the divine presence cleaves to them, that they have a Lord who governs them as He wills, in accordance with their obedience and their transgression alike; through whom the unseen was disclosed; and who made known how the world came into being, and the genealogies of mankind before the Flood — how they trace back to Adam — and then the Flood, and the lineage of the nations.
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— and how the nations descend from Shem, Ham, and Japheth the sons of Noah; how the languages were divided and where each settled; how the crafts arose and the cities were built; and how the chronology ran from Adam to this very moment.
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Section Forty-Four. The Khazar said: That is remarkable — if you indeed possess a verified chronology of the creation of the world.
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Section Forty-Five. The rabbi said: Indeed, by that very reckoning we calculate — without any disagreement among Jews on the matter, from the Khazar lands to Abyssinia.
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Section Forty-Six. The Khazar said: What is your count today?
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Section Forty-Seven. The rabbi said: Four thousand nine hundred — and the breakdown is set out explicitly from the lifespan of Adam, Seth, and Enosh down to Noah, then Shem and Eber to Abraham, then Isaac and Jacob down to Moses, peace be upon him.
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These forefathers, through their continuity, formed a core reaching back to Adam himself and to his essence. Each of them had children who were, as it were, husks — they did not resemble the fathers and the divine order did not adhere to them — so the chronology was fixed through those in whom the divine presence dwelt.
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They were solitary individuals, not communities — until Jacob fathered twelve tribes, all of them fit for the divine order. So the divine presence came to rest in a community, and the chronology belongs to them. We therefore carry the chronology of those who preceded Moses, peace be upon him, and we know what has passed from Moses to the present.
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Section Forty-Eight. The Khazar said: This level of detail removes any suspicion of fabrication or collusion — for ten people could not agree on such a thing without ultimately betraying one another and exposing the secret of their agreement, or without someone among them refuting the account of another. How much more so with vast multitudes, when the period in question is recent enough to leave no room for invention and fraud.
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Section Forty-Nine. The rabbi said: Indeed — Abraham himself was present at the division of the languages, and he and his kin retained the language of Eber their forefather; and because of that it is called Hebrew.
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And Moses, peace be upon him, came four hundred years after him, when the world was at the height of its mastery of both celestial and terrestrial sciences —
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— and he came before Pharaoh and the sages of Egypt, and before the scholars of Israel who challenged him and questioned him — those who did not accept it unreservedly that God should address human beings —
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— until He let them hear His address in the Ten Commandments. Such was the attitude of his people toward him — not from ignorance, but from their knowledge and their fear of illusions drawn from celestial sciences and the like, things that do not hold up under scrutiny, such as deception.
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But the divine order is like pure refined gold — the more it is tested, the more it gains in value, a dinar upon a dinar.
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How could anyone imagine that they could fabricate the claim that five hundred years before their time there was only the language of Eber, and that at Babel in the days of Peleg the languages were divided — with such-and-such a nation tracing back to Shem, and such-and-such to Ham, with their respective territories —
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— could it be that today someone could fabricate before us a falsehood about the genealogies of famous nations, their histories and their languages, while the account itself is less than nine hundred years old?
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Section Fifty. The Khazar said: That is impossible — and how could it be otherwise, when we find sciences in scripts that were set down nine hundred years ago, and a report about what was happening nine hundred years ago cannot possibly falsify matters of public knowledge such as genealogies, languages, and scripts.
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Section Fifty-One. The rabbi said: So why was Moses not contradicted in what he brought — when his own people were the ones questioning him, let alone others?
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Section Fifty-Two. The Khazar said: These are strong and compelling arguments. — Section Fifty-Three. The rabbi said: Do you then hold that languages are primordial, without a beginning?
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Section Fifty-Four. The Khazar said: Rather, they are invented by convention — their composition from nouns, verbs, and particles points to that — and this is one of the objections drawn from the places of articulation of speech.
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Section Fifty-Five. The rabbi said: Have you ever seen anyone who invented a language, or heard of such a person?
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Section Fifty-Six. The Khazar said: I have neither seen nor heard of such a thing. There is no doubt that language arose in some age among the ages, and that before it there was no language agreed upon by convention — by some people apart from others — over a tongue.
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Section Fifty-Seven. The rabbi said: Have you heard of any nation that differs regarding the well-known week — beginning on Sunday and ending on the Sabbath? Could the people of China and the people of the western islands independently agree on this without some common origin, some gathering, some convention?
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Section Fifty-Eight. The Khazar said: That is impossible except through a universal convention. And this seems improbable — unless all human beings are descendants of Adam, or of Noah, or of some common ancestor, in which case the week would have been transmitted to them from their father.
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Section Fifty-Nine. The rabbi said: Precisely — that is what I intended. Yes, and the count of ten: people's universal agreement on it in east and west alike — what natural instinct would lead to stopping at ten, unless it were transmitted from one who began with it?
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Section Sixty. The Khazar said: But how does what the people of India report not undermine your faith — that they have ruins and monuments that they verify to be a million years old?
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Section Sixty-One. The rabbi said: It would undermine my faith only if there were a verified doctrine or a book that a multitude had agreed upon without dissent, with a chronology — but no such thing exists. They are simply a people given to wandering; they have no verified tradition.
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They provoke the people of religion with talk of this kind, just as they provoke them with their idols, their talismans, and their stratagems, claiming that these benefit them — and they mock anyone who says he has a book from God, while alongside that they have placed books of little comprehension, understood only by isolated individuals.
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Treatise One · Section Sixty-Two
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Such claims mislead the weak-minded, as do certain astrological books that place dates tens of thousands of years back — like the Book of Nabataean Agriculture, which names figures such as Yanbushad, Saghrit, and Dawani, claiming they lived before Adam and that Yanbushad was Adam's teacher, and similar fabrications.
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The Khazar said: Granted that you refuted me with reference to dim-witted masses and peoples who lack any common doctrine. But what do you say about the philosophers? They are the very standard of inquiry and precision, and they unanimously hold that the world is eternal and uncreated — and this is not ten thousand years, nor millions, but infinite.
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Treatise One · Section Sixty-Three
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The rabbi said: The philosophers have a ready excuse, for they were a people who inherited neither a revealed knowledge nor a religion. They were Greeks, and the Greeks are descendants of Japheth, inhabitants of the north.
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The knowledge transmitted from Adam's time — the knowledge divinely confirmed by God's command — has always resided in the lineage of Shem, who is the chosen one of Noah. This knowledge has been continuous in that elect line from Adam onward.
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Treatise One · Sections Sixty-Four–Sixty-Five
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Knowledge came to the Greeks only once dominion fell to them; it migrated to them from Persia, and to Persia from the Chaldeans. The great philosophers emerged only in that era of Hellenic supremacy — not before it and not after it — and once power passed to Rome, no renowned philosopher appeared among them.
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The Khazar said: This would imply that Aristotle's science is untrustworthy. The rabbi replied: Precisely — he left his mind and his thought to their own devices, having no transmitted tradition he could rely upon. He reflected on the world's origins and its end, and his mind found it as difficult to conceive of an absolute beginning as it did of eternity — yet his reasonings tilted him toward eternity on the strength of speculation alone.
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Treatise One · Sections Sixty-Six–Sixty-Seven
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Had the philosopher belonged to a nation that inherited well-established and widely received traditions — truths admitting no refutation — he would have deployed his reasonings and demonstrations toward establishing creation, difficult as that is to prove, just as he managed to establish eternity, which is even harder to accept.
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The Khazar said: Can demonstration really be decisive here? The rabbi said: Who ever promised us demonstration in this matter? God forbid that divine law should come with what contradicts direct perception or sound proof. Rather, it comes with miracles and the overturning of natural patterns — creating new entities or transforming one thing into another — in order to indicate the Creator of the world and His power to do what He wills, when He wills it.
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The question of eternity versus creation is obscure, and the arguments on both sides are evenly matched. But creation is further supported by the transmitted tradition from Adam, Noah, and Moses — peace be upon them — through prophecy, which is a surer guide than mere reasoning.
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Treatise One · Section Sixty-Eight
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The Khazar said: These convincing arguments suffice me on the matter. And if our association should continue, I will ask you to present the decisive proofs. But return now to the thread of your discourse: how has this great matter become so firmly rooted in your souls?
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How can the Creator of bodies, spirits, souls, intellects, and angels — He who is exalted, sanctified, and declared too transcendent for intellects to grasp, let alone the senses — how can He have contact with this lowly and base creature, vile in its very matter?
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Treatise One · Sections Sixty-Nine–Seventy-One
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The rabbi said: Your very words have spared me much of my reply. To whom do you attribute the wisdom present in the creation of, say, an ant — to the celestial sphere, to a star, or to something else? Surely only to the Omnipotent Creator, who apportions to each thing precisely its due, with neither excess nor deficiency.
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The Khazar said: But this is precisely what is attributed to the operation of Nature. The rabbi said: And what is Nature?
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Treatise One · Sections Seventy-Two–Seventy-Three
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The Khazar said: It is one of the forces — so we have been told by the sciences — and we do not really know what it is, but the learned have surely grasped it.
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The rabbi said: Their knowledge of it is no greater than ours. The philosopher defined it as the principle and cause by which a thing moves and comes to rest from within itself — intrinsically and not accidentally.
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Treatise One · Sections Seventy-Four–Seventy-Five
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The Khazar said: It seems he is saying that a thing which moves of itself and rests of itself has some cause by which it moves and rests, and that cause is Nature.
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The rabbi said: That definition requires considerable ingenuity and precision — distinguishing what acts accidentally from what acts by nature — and it is the kind of thing that impresses listeners. But that, in sum, is the extent of their knowledge of Nature.
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Treatise One · Sections Seventy-Six–Seventy-Seven
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The Khazar said: I see now that they have only misled us with these terms, causing us to associate partners with God when we say 'Nature is wise and active' — and we might even, following the tenor of their language, call it a creator.
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The rabbi said: Quite so. But the elements, the moon, the sun, and the stars do exert effects through heating, cooling, moistening, drying, and their attendant properties — without wisdom being attributed to them; they are merely subservient instruments.
. .
But formation, precise measure, and specification of form — all that involves purposive wisdom — can only be attributed to the All-Wise, Omnipotent, Sovereign. Thus, whoever calls 'Nature' what renders matter receptive through heating and cooling does no harm, provided wisdom is denied to it — just as we deny that the man and woman are the creators of the child when they come together.
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Treatise One · Sections Seventy-Seven (cont.)–Seventy-Eight
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Rather, the two are mere auxiliaries to the matter that receives the human form, while the form itself comes from the All-Wise Fashioner. Therefore, do not find it strange that noble divine traces should appear in this lowly creature, once its matter is prepared to receive them.
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And this is the root of both faith and transgression.
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Treatise One · Sections Seventy-Eight–Seventy-Nine
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The Khazar said: How can the root of faith be the same as the root of transgression?
.
The rabbi said: Yes — the conditions that make one receptive to that divine trace are beyond human capacity, and people are unable to determine their quantities and qualities. Even if they knew their essences, they would never know their times, places, attendant circumstances, and what preparation they require. This demands a complete, fully expounded divine knowledge that comes from God alone.
. .
Whoever receives this divine instruction and follows it according to its precise terms and conditions with sincere intent — that person is the true believer. But whoever sets out to prepare conditions for receiving that trace through cleverness, analogy, and conjecture — such as what appears in astrological books concerning the summoning of spiritual forces and the making of talismans — that person is the transgressor.
.
For such a person offers sacrifices and burns incense by analogy and conjecture, not knowing in truth what is required, how much, in what manner, in what place, at what time, by which persons, and how one ought to undertake it — and numerous attendant conditions whose description would be lengthy.
. .
He is like the ignorant man who entered the storehouse of a renowned physician, knowing that its medicines are beneficial. But the physician had died, and people came seeking the storehouse for healing. That ignorant man distributed from those vessels to them, knowing nothing of the medicines nor how much of each remedy was proper for each person — and so he killed many with those medicines that were meant to heal.
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They benefited from them. And if it happened that one of those vessels benefited someone, the people inclined toward it
And they said that this was the effective cure — so that whenever it let them down or they saw it benefit another only accidentally, they still inclined toward it, not knowing that what truly healed was the judgment of that learned physician
Who had compounded those medicines and administered them as required, and who had instructed the patient to prepare himself with whatever suited his condition — through diet, drink, exercise, rest, sleep, wakefulness, posture, and the like
Thus it was that humanity before Moses — save for a few — fell under the sway of astral and natural laws, shifting from one law to another and from one deity to another
At times they clung to many of those laws and forgot who directed and governed them, turning them into a source of benefit — whereas those very same laws, depending on one's disposition and preparation, could be a source of harm
[]
Section Eighty
The Khazar said: Return us to the main subject, and tell me how your religion arose, how it spread and became manifest, how consensus was achieved after disagreement, and over what span of time the religion was founded and built until it was consolidated and complete
For the beginnings of religions inevitably arise through individuals who unite to uphold the opinion that God wills to make manifest; they continue to grow and to defend it themselves, or a supporting king arises who compels the masses to adopt that view
[]
Section Eighty-One
The rabbi said: What arises and grows in that fashion are rational laws whose origin lies in human deliberation; if such a law succeeds and is accompanied by good fortune, it is said to be divinely assisted
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— divinely inspired, and the like. As for the Law whose origin is from God, it comes into being all at once — 'Be, and it was' — like the creation of the world
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Section Eighty-Two
The Khazar said: You have astonished us, rabbi
[]
Section Eighty-Three
[]
The rabbi said: The matter is even more astonishing than that. The children of Israel were enslaved in Egypt — six hundred thousand men above the age of twenty, registered by name and lineage, belonging to the twelve tribes, none of whom had strayed or fled to another land, nor had any foreigner been absorbed among them, all of them awaiting the promise that their forefathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (peace be upon them) had been pledged: that they would inherit the land of Canaan
.
Canaan at that time was held by seven nations of the utmost number, strength, and prosperity, while the children of Israel were in the depths of humiliation and misery — with Pharaoh killing their sons lest they multiply
Then Moses and Aaron (peace be upon them) were sent, despite their weakness, and they confronted Pharaoh at the height of his power with signs, miracles, and the shattering of natural patterns — yet he was unable to conceal himself from them or to issue any decree against them
Nor could he shield himself from the afflictions that descended upon the Egyptians — in their waters, then in their land, then in their air, in their vegetation, in their livestock, in their bodies, and finally in their very souls, when in the blink of an eye at midnight the most beloved to them in their homes were slain, every firstborn son
All these afflictions descended with permission, forewarning, and promise, and were lifted with permission and forewarning — so that one could only conclude that they were deliberately willed by a God who acts as He wills, when He wills, not by natural force, astral influence, or chance
And the children of Israel went forth by God's command on that very night
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At the very moment when Egypt's firstborn were dying from Pharaoh's bondage, the Israelites set out toward the Red Sea, with a pillar of cloud and a pillar of fire going before them, guiding and directing them.
At their head were the two divine elders, Moses and Aaron (peace be upon them), who were more than eighty years old when prophecy came to them.
Up to this point they had only a small number of laws, inherited from those earlier individuals going back to Adam and Noah. Moses neither abrogated nor annulled these laws but built upon them.
Then Pharaoh pursued them. The Israelites could not resort to weapons, for they were not a people versed in warfare. So the sea was split and they crossed through it, and Pharaoh and his host drowned.
The sea cast their corpses up before the Children of Israel, so that they saw them with their own eyes. The full account is long and well-known.
. [].
Section [84]. The Khazar king said: This is truly the divine order, and any law associated with it must be accepted, for no suspicion of sorcery, trickery, or illusion could touch the heart here.
If one imagined that the sea and its splitting and their passage through it were illusions, how could one imagine the illusion of their deliverance from slavery, the death of their enslavers, their taking of the Egyptians' garments, and the retention of their own property? That would be the forced assertion of an atheist.
. [].
Section [85]. The rabbi said: After this, when they were in the wilderness where nothing grows, God sent down upon them a food that was miraculously created for them day by day — except on the Sabbath — and they ate it for forty years.
. []. [] []
Section [86]. The Khazar king said: This too cannot be refuted. What endures for forty years for six hundred thousand men and their dependents, descending six days and ceasing on the Sabbath — the Sabbath must be accepted, for the divine order has become inseparable from it.
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. [] []
— the men and those who followed them. It descended six days and was withheld on the Sabbath. Thus the Sabbath was obligatory to observe, since the divine command had come to be as it were inseparably bound to it
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Section Eighty-Seven
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The rabbi said: The Sabbath is established on this basis and on the basis of the creation of the world in six days, which I shall mention presently. For the people, despite their faith in what Moses (peace be upon him) brought following these miracles, retained in their hearts a doubt: how could God address a human being?
Lest the origin of the Law be merely human opinion and reflection, accompanied by inspiration and divine support — for they considered it inconceivable that there be speech without a bodily speaker, since speech is a physical act
.
God therefore willed to remove this doubt from their minds, and commanded them to maintain inner and outward purity. The most stringent requirement was abstinence from women and consecration of self in preparation to hear the word of God. The people prepared and consecrated themselves for the level of prophecy — indeed for hearing the divine address openly, all of them together
This came to pass after three days, preceded by tremendous awe — lightning, thunder, earthquakes, and fires that encircled what is called Mount Sinai. Those fires remained atop the mountain for forty days, visible to all the people
— .
All such conjectures were dispelled by this tremendous spectacle. The people heard the address clearly — the Ten Words, which are the mothers and roots of all laws. One of them is the commandment of the Sabbath
.
The commandment of the Sabbath had in fact been issued earlier, linked to the descent of the manna. These Ten Words were not transmitted by the public on the authority of individual men, nor on the authority of a prophet, but on the authority of God Himself
From that day the people believed that Moses (peace be upon him) was addressed by a word whose origin lay entirely with God, and in which Moses (peace be upon him) had contributed no prior reflection or opinion of his own — so that prophecy would not be as the philosophers maintain: a soul that purifies its thoughts and attaches itself to the Active Intellect
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— a figure that speaks to him and whose speech he hears as imagination in his mind, not with his ears, and whom he sees as phantasm, not with his eyes — and would then say that God had spoken to him. All such conjectures were dispelled by this tremendous spectacle
And accompanying the divine speech was a divine script: God engraved these Ten Words on two tablets of a sublime substance and gave them to Moses (peace be upon him), and the people saw them as divine writing just as they had heard them as divine address
Moses (peace be upon him) made for them, by God's command (exalted be He), an ark, and erected over it the well-known Tent. This remained among the children of Israel throughout the era of prophecy — approximately nine hundred years — until the people transgressed, the Ark disappeared, Nebuchadnezzar prevailed over them, and exiled them
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Section Eighty-Eight
The Khazar said: Whoever hears your account — that God addressed your entire community, wrote the tablets for you, and the like — would be excused for attributing to you the doctrine of corporealism
And yet you yourselves are excused as well, for there is no way to argue against these tremendous, majestic, manifest events — and you are excused for setting aside rational analogy and philosophical inquiry
[]
Section Eighty-Nine
. []
The rabbi said: God forbid anything impossible or anything that reason repudiates and renders absurd. The first of the Ten Words is the command to believe in divine sovereignty. The second is the prohibition against taking any god beside God (exalted be He), against associating partners with Him, and against all likening, comparing, and imagining — in short, against corporealism
. .
How could we not declare God free of corporealism when we declare many of His creatures free of it — such as the rational soul, which is the human being in the truest sense? For that which speaks within Moses, reasons, and deliberates is not his tongue, nor his heart, nor his brain — these are merely instruments belonging to Moses. Moses himself is a rational, discerning soul
[]
It is not a body, does not occupy a place, nor is any place too small to contain it, nor is it itself too small to receive within itself the forms of all created things. We therefore describe the soul with attributes that are regal and spiritual — all the more so then the Creator
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All we are obliged to do is not to deny what has been transmitted by continuous testimony concerning that witnessed event.
Then we say: we do not know how the meaning took on bodily form until it became speech and struck our ears.
Nor do we presume to know what He — may He be exalted — created ex nihilo, nor what He subjected of existing things to His will, for His power does not fall short.
[]
Just as we say that He — may He be exalted — created the Tablets and inscribed them with an engraved writing, just as He created the heavens and the stars by His will alone.
[ ]
God — may He be exalted — willed it, and it took on bodily form in the measure He willed and in the shape He willed, and the script of the Ten Commandments was inscribed upon it.
Just as we say that He split the sea and made it into walls, standing still to the right and to the left of the people.
In just this way, the air that reaches the ear of the prophet takes on the forms of letters that convey the meanings which God desires the prophet and the multitude to hear.
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The Khazar said: This is a satisfying interpretation. The rabbi said: I do not assert with certainty that the matter is precisely as I have described.
But what is established by this — verified by the witness of those who witnessed it — is that the matter proceeded directly from the Creator without any intermediary.
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And that He created the world in this manner — as you see He fashioned the Tablets, the manna, and other such things — so the doubts of the philosophers and eternalists vanish from the soul of the believer.
The Khazar said: Take heed, rabbi — do not let a natural affinity lead you to describe the virtues of your people while leaving aside their well-known transgressions, even in the midst of these revelations.
For I have heard that in the midst of all this they fashioned a calf and worshipped it instead of God.
The rabbi said: It was a sin made more grievous on account of their greatness — for the great man, even ordinary failings are reckoned as errors.
[]
The Khazar said: This is your partisanship and excessive zeal for your people. What sin is greater than this? And what distinction remains after it?
The rabbi said: Grant me a little time to establish before you the nobility of this people. Sufficient as a witness is that God chose them as His own party and nation from among all the communities of the world.
And the descent of the divine influence upon their entire community, such that all of them reached the threshold of direct address — and the influence extended even to their women, so that there were prophetesses among them.
This was after the divine influence had rested only upon isolated individuals since the time of Adam — for Adam was the perfect one, without exception.
For there is no excuse for imperfection in the work of a wise and capable craftsman who chose the material for the form he desired, with no hindrance from the mixture of the father's seed and the mother's blood, nor from nutrition and upbringing during the years of childhood.
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And the divine faculty beyond the intellect — that is, the rank by which one connects with God and the spiritual beings and apprehends truths without instruction but by the lightest reflection.
He and all who resemble him among his descendants are called among us 'sons of God.'
Adam fathered many children, but only Abel was fit to be Adam's successor, for he resembled him. When Cain his brother slew him out of jealousy over this rank, Seth was appointed as the one who resembled Adam.
And so the divine influence continued until Noah through isolated individuals who were the quintessence, resembling Adam, called 'sons of God' — possessing perfection in physical constitution and moral character, long lives, knowledge, and capacity.
Among them there were perhaps some upon whom the divine influence did not rest, such as Terah — yet Abraham his son was a disciple of his ancestor Eber.
.
Thus the divine influence descended from ancestors to their descendants. Abraham was the chosen essence of Eber and his disciple, and it is for this reason he is called a Hebrew.
Shem was the chosen essence of Noah, for he inherited the temperate climes whose center and culmination is the Land of Israel — the land of prophecy.
. . .
Japheth went to the north and Ham to the south. The chosen essence of Abraham from all his sons was Isaac, and all his other children were distanced from this special Land so that it might be reserved exclusively for Isaac.
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The chosen essence of Isaac was Jacob, and his brother Esau was set aside, for Jacob was deemed worthy of that Land. And all of Jacob's children were chosen — all of them were fit for the divine influence.
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In Egypt, as the tree of noble stock is cultivated until it produces perfect fruit resembling the first fruit from which it was planted — that is, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, and his brothers.
So the fruit appeared in Moses, peace be upon him, and Aaron, and Miriam, peace be upon her, and the likes of Bezalel and Oholiab and the heads of the tribes.
And in the seventy elders who were continuously fit for prophecy, and in the likes of Joshua, Caleb, Hur, and many others.
At that point they merited the manifestation of the divine light upon them and that divine providence — even though there were sinners among them who were blameworthy.
Yet they were nonetheless the chosen elect in the sense that in their innate constitution and natural dispositions they derived from the quintessence, and they beget those who will be quintessential.
Thus the sinful father is preserved on account of the quintessential element that mingles within him — which manifests in his child or grandchild, however the seed is purified.
As we said regarding Terah and others upon whom the divine influence did not rest, yet whose innate constitution was such as to produce a quintessential individual — something that does not hold for the innate constitution of everyone descended from Ham or Japheth.
We observe this same phenomenon in natural matters: how many a person does not resemble his father at all, yet resembles his grandfather.
There is no doubt that that nature and that resemblance lay latent in the father, even if it did not appear to the senses — just as the nature of Eber lay latent in his descendants until it became manifest in Abraham.
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The Khazar said: This indeed is the genuine nobility transmitted from the time of Adam, and Adam was the most noble of creatures upon earth — so a distinction above everything on earth is rightly yours. But where is this distinction given this transgression?
The rabbi said: All the nations at that time took images as objects of worship. Even when the philosophers could demonstrate divine unity and lordship by rational proof, they still required some form.
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They venerate it and tell their common people and masses that through this form a divine order is connected, and that it is distinguished by a wondrous and extraordinary matter.
Among them are those who attribute this to God, just as we do today with places we hold sacred, such that we seek blessing even from their soil and stones.
The Children of Israel had been promised that there would descend to them from God a matter they could behold and venerate, just as they had venerated the pillar of cloud and the pillar of fire at the time of their exodus from Egypt.
When the people heard the proclamation of the Ten Words, and Moses, peace be upon him, ascended the mountain to await the Tablets so as to bring them down inscribed,
He would fashion for them the Ark, which would serve as a visible focal point containing the divine covenant and the Lord's handiwork — namely the Tablets —
The people remained waiting for Moses, peace be upon him, to descend, maintaining their condition unchanged — neither altering their dress, their circumstances, nor their state of consecration that they had adopted on the Day of the Mountain.
When he was delayed from them forty days — and he had not provisioned them, nor had he departed from them except with the intention of departing that same day — ill surmise began to overtake some of that vast multitude.
The common people began to fragment into factions as opinions and conjectures multiplied, until a group among them resorted to seeking an object of veneration like those of other nations —
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— without thereby denying the lordship of the One who had brought them out of the land of Egypt, but rather that this object would serve as something they could point toward when describing the wonders of their Lord,
Just as the faithful did with the Ark of Moses, peace be upon him, saying 'the Lord is there,' and just as we do with the heavens and everything whose motion we know with certainty comes only by the will of God.
Their error was first in the making of an image, from which they had been forbidden, and then in attributing a divine matter to something fashioned by their own hands and choice without God's command.
The virtuous kings used to demolish them so that none would be venerated except the House which God had chosen and the divine worship which He had commanded.
What excuses them is what preceded — the confusion that had fallen among them. Those who worshipped it were no more than some three thousand out of six hundred thousand in all.
As for the excuse of the elite who assisted in making it, their purpose may have been to distinguish the sinners from the faithful, so that the sinners who worshipped the calf might be put to death.
That sin was not an outright departure from the obedience due to the One who had brought them out of Egypt, but they did transgress one of His commands — for He, exalted be He, had forbidden images, yet they made one.
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This episode appears to us horrific and reprehensible because sculpted objects of worship have now disappeared from most nations in our time; yet it would have seemed minor at that earlier moment, since all nations were then making images.
Were it not for the necessity of gathering our community together, this too would be reprehensible — just as during the time of the kingdom it was condemned when sincere worshippers erected houses of worship known as bamot.
The virtuous kings would demolish them so that no sanctuary would be venerated save the House that God had chosen and the divine worship He had ordained — nor would any images be objected to therein that He Himself had commanded, such as the cherubim.
Punishment did fall upon those who worshipped the calf from that very day and they were slain; their number was approximately three thousand out of six hundred thousand in all.
The manna continued to descend for their sustenance, the cloud to shade them, the pillar of fire to guide them, and prophecy continued to spread and increase among them.
. [].
Section [98]. The Khazar said: You have reinforced my view in what I believe and in what I saw in my dream — that a person cannot attain the divine order except through a divine command, meaning through deeds that God has ordained.
For otherwise most people are diligent seekers — even the astrologer, the maker of talismans, the fire-worshipper, the sun-worshipper, the dualist, and the rest.
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. [].
Section [99]. The rabbi said: Yes — and thus are our laws explicitly set down in the Torah, from God's direct address to Moses and from what Moses wrote and delivered to that great multitude assembled together in the wilderness.
It requires no chain of transmission from isolated individuals, verse by verse or chapter by chapter — for the qualities of the sacrificial offerings, how they are offered, at what place and facing what direction,
How the slaughter is performed, what is done with the blood and the limbs across the various procedures — all of this by express clarification from God. For if the least thing is missing from it, the whole is vitiated,
Like natural compounds whose composition depends on precise proportions too subtle for the imagination to grasp — so that if those proportions were disturbed by the slightest amount, that compound would be destroyed.
.
That plant, or that animal, or that organ would then be an imperfect or non-existent example of its kind. Similarly He specified how the sacrificial animal is to be dismembered and what is to be done with each of its limbs.
Who is to eat and who is to burn, who is to offer from among the designated classes who do not exceed their charge, and what the qualities of those who offer must be so that no defect be found in them —
Down to their bearing and their vestments — especially the Aaronide who is permitted entry to the place of the divine order where the Shekhinah dwells with the Ark and the Torah.
And all that is associated with this of purification, ritual cleansing, the grades of purifications, sanctifications, and prayers — a matter whose description is lengthy, and reference for it is made to the reading of the Torah and what the rabbis transmitted, all deriving from God's address to Moses.
Likewise the entire structure of the Tabernacle was shown to Moses on the mountain — the tent, the curtains, the table, the menorah, the Ark, the surrounding court with its pillars, curtains, and all its furnishings — presented to him first in spiritual form, and then as physical shapes, according to what was mapped out for him.
. .
Likewise the great House that Solomon built was from what had been shown to David in its spiritual form. And the glorious promised House of the Temple that we await — it was shown in its form and structure to the prophet called Ezekiel. And there is nothing obligatory in the worship of God
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Had this been so, the philosophers would have attained through their wisdom and reason merely a fraction of what the children of Israel attained.
The Khazar said: With such an account the soul finds genuine satisfaction in accepting this Law, without doubt or hesitation.
A prophet came to a people enslaved as bondsmen, promising them immediate liberation from servitude without delay.
He brought them into the land of Canaan against seven nations each stronger than they, and assigned each tribe its portion of the land before they had even arrived there.
All of this was accomplished in the shortest span of time through wondrous miracles. This confirms the greatness of the One who sent, the majesty of the messenger, and the special distinction of those to whom he was sent.
Had he claimed to be sent to guide the entire inhabited world yet his message failed to reach even half of it, this would be a blemish upon his mission.
For God's purpose in this would not have been fulfilled. It would have been an excuse that the scripture was in Hebrew, burdening the peoples of Sind, India, and the Khazars with understanding and practicing it.
The rabbi said: Moses summoned to his Law none other than his own people and the speakers of his tongue, and God promised them the perpetual confirmation of that Law through time by means of prophets.
The Khazar said: But would it not have been fitting for the guidance to extend to all, as wisdom would seem to demand?
The rabbi replied: Would it not be equally fitting for all animals to possess the power of speech? Have you forgotten what was said earlier about the ordered succession of Adam's lineage and the consistent descent of the divine prophetic impulse upon a particular individual?
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The choicest core among brethren, and the elect of the father, was receptive to that divine light; all others were like husks incapable of receiving it—until the sons of Jacob came, pure kernel through and through, distinguished from the rest of humanity by a divine particularity.
This made them as if a distinct species and a different, angelic substance. All of them aspire to the degree of prophecy, and many among them attain it.
And those among them who do not attain prophecy draw near to it through meritorious deeds, sanctification, purification of self, and the company of the prophets.
Know that whoever encounters a prophet—at the very moment of that encounter, upon hearing his divine words—a spirituality is born in him, and he becomes set apart from his kind through purity of soul and its yearning toward those elevated degrees.
The commitment to humility and purity—this was for them the clearest sign and the most luminous, overwhelming proof of reward in the World to Come.
For what is sought through it is nothing other than that the human soul become divine—departing its senses, beholding the supernal world, delighting in the vision of the royal light, and hearing the divine speech.
Such a soul is secure from death when its bodily instruments perish. And when one finds a Law whose study and practice lead to this degree, it is beyond doubt the Law that can be trusted to preserve souls after bodies have passed away.
The Khazar said: The promises made by other religions are richer and more ample than yours.
The rabbi replied: But all of those promises are deferred until after death, and nothing in this life provides any indication that they will be fulfilled.
The Khazar said: Indeed, I have never seen any believer in those promises who truly yearns for them to arrive soon. On the contrary, were it possible to defer them a thousand years while remaining alive in this world—with all its misery and tribulation—he would choose to do so.
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The Khazar said: He would undoubtedly wish that his soul might remain perpetually in its separation from the senses and abide in that delight within the divine light—and that is the one who truly longs for death.
The rabbi said: Our promises, however, consist in our being joined to the divine order through prophecy and all that approaches it, and in the divine order being joined to us through providential care, miraculous distinctions, and signs.
This is why the Torah does not repeatedly say: if you observe this Law I shall restore you after death to gardens and delights. Rather it says: you shall be My own treasure, and I shall be your God who guides you.
There will be among you those who enter My presence and ascend to heaven, like those who in their own persons moved freely among the angels.
And My angels shall move among you upon the earth; you will see them singly and in battalions, guarding you and fighting on your behalf.
Your enduring presence shall be in the land that aids in attaining this degree—the Holy Land—whose fertility and drought, blessing and curse, are all bound to the divine order in accordance with your deeds.
The world will run its course along natural lines—except for you, who, when the Divine Presence dwells among you, shall witness the fertility of your lands and the ordering of your rains, never deviating from their appointed times.
And if you transgress, you will experience drought, famine, pestilence, and destructive beasts, while the rest of the world prospers—so that you will know with equal certainty that your affairs are directed by an order higher than the natural order.
As for the promises of all those other laws, a single principle underlies them all: the hope of drawing near to the Lord and His angels. Whoever reaches that degree need fear no loss.
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This Law was presented to us visibly and directly. Our situation is like that of a company of companions who travel together, inseparably, through a wilderness.
One of them traveled to India and was received by the king of India with great honor and esteem, because the king recognized that he was one of those companions, having known their father of old, and they had been his devoted friends.
The king gave him treasures to carry back to his companions, clothed him in royal robes, and sent with him a retinue from his court—people whom no one would have imagined would leave the king's presence.
He returned to his companions accompanied by those Indian envoys, and the companions welcomed them warmly, attended on them with devoted service and honor, and built them a palace in which they dwelled.
And the companions began to seek access to India and an audience with the king, striving earnestly, guided by those envoys who directed them along the shortest and most correct path.
All of them understood that whoever wishes to reach India will find it easy, provided he adheres to the king's commands and honors the envoys who bring him into the king's presence.
They had no need to ask why they should take upon themselves this obedience, for the reason is plainly manifest: to draw near to the king—and nearness to him is the very summit of felicity.
Now, the companions are the children of Israel; the first traveler is Moses; and the subsequent travelers are the rest of the prophets.
The Indian envoys are the Shekhinah and the angels. The royal robes are the intelligible light that descended upon his soul through prophecy and the sensible light that illuminated his countenance. The treasures sent are the two Tablets with the ten Words.
But those other laws witnessed none of this. They were merely told: observe the commands of the king of India as those companions observed them, and you will be joined to the king after death—otherwise you will be cast far from him.
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. [] .
And He will punish you after death. Among them are those who say: no one has come to inform us that he is in Paradise for hundreds of years, or in the Fire.
.
The majority were moved by the orderliness of their affairs and the unity of their creed; they committed to that obedience and allowed themselves, inwardly, only a faint hope.
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But outwardly, their hope was strong and well-founded, surpassing and prevailing over the common people by virtue of their faith.
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How then could these people boast of what they will receive after death over those to whom such reward comes in this very life?
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Is not the nature of the prophets and the saints closer to eternal permanence than the nature of one who has not approached this rank?
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Section [110]. The Khazar said: It seems quite remote from reason that a person should be, by nature, gross, corrupted in body and soul like the beasts —
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— and then the people of the religions say that he becomes alive forever in bliss by a word he utters with his mouth, even if he knew nothing throughout his entire life but that one word.
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Section [111]. The rabbi said: We do not deny anyone the reward of his merit before God, whoever he may be and from whatever nation.
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But we hold that the fullest excellence belongs to the people who are brought near in their lifetime, and accordingly we assign their degrees before God after death in that same proportion.
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Section [112]. The Khazar said: Apply that analogy in reverse then, and assign their rank in the hereafter according to their rank in this world.
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Section [113]. The rabbi said: I see that you are taunting us with humiliation and poverty. Yet it is by these very things that the most excellent of nations glory.
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— the left cheek, and if someone takes your cloak give him your tunic as well — and his companions and followers endured centuries of humiliation, beating, and killing to reach the boundaries well-known among them. And those are the glory.
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Likewise the founder of the religion of Islam and his companions, until they prevailed and triumphed. It is by those early ones that glory and dominance are claimed.
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Not by those kings whose standing grew great, whose position expanded, whose chamberlains multiplied, and whose processions became imposing.
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Our proximity to God is closer than theirs, if only we were to have dominion in this world.
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Section [114]. The Khazar said: That would indeed be so, if your humility were voluntary — but it is compelled. And when you do seize victory, you are killed.
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Section [115]. The rabbi said: You have struck home, O king of the Khazars. Indeed, if the majority of our people were as you say — committed to humility out of submission to God and His law — we would not have neglected the divine command for this long period.
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But the few among us hold to this view, and the majority still earn reward, for each bears humiliation between compulsion and choice — for he could, if he wished, become an ally and an equal to the one who humiliates him by uttering a word, with no difficulty.
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And such a thing does not go unrewarded before the just Judge. Were we to bear this exile and affliction for God's sake as we ought, we would be a glory for the awaited generation with the Messiah.
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We do not equate in our own minds everyone who enters our religion by a word alone — but only through deeds that are burdensome to the soul: purification, instruction, circumcision, and many legal observances; and ultimately he must follow our way of life.
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Among the conditions and purposes of circumcision is that one should always remember that it is a divine sign ordained by God at the seat of the dominant passion, so that it becomes subdued.
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Perhaps then it will be a noble seed fit to receive the divine influence. Whoever adheres to this path has obtained for himself and his descendants a goodly portion of nearness to God.
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— exclusively destined for prophecy. As for others, their utmost goal is to draw from them, and to become saints of knowledge, not prophets.
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As for those promises that impressed you — our Sages have long depicted Paradise and Hell, specifying their length and breadth, and have described their bliss and punishment in far greater detail than the description found in the neighboring faiths.
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My discourse with you from the outset has been based on what appears in the explicit texts of the prophets' speech; and those texts do not multiply the promises of the hereafter explicitly as much as the words of the Sages do.
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Indeed, in the prophetic word there is the return of the dust from the human body to the dust, and the return of the spirit to the Creator who bestowed it.
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In the prophetic word there is also the resurrection of the dead in the future, and a prophet named Elijah — identified as al-Khiḍr — who was sent in times past and whom God raised up as He raised up others.
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It is said that he did not taste death. And in the Torah, one who prophesied with God's permission prayed for himself that his death be easy and that his end be like the end of the children of Israel.
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One of the kings — Saul, consulting Samuel — summoned a dead prophet, and he prophesied for him all that would befall him, just as he had prophesied for him during his lifetime.
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And even though this king's act was reprehensible in our law — namely consulting the dead — it demonstrates that the people in the age of the prophets believed that souls endure after the perishing of bodies.
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The opening of our daily prayer — which even the common folk do not omit, let alone the learned — reads: 'My Lord, the soul which You breathed into me in its purity: You created it, You preserve it, You will take it from me, and You will restore it to me in the hereafter.'
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So as long as it accompanies me I will praise You and thank You, O Lord of all worlds. Glory be to You, who returns the spirit to the dead bodies.
The very Paradise that people speak of so frequently was taken from the Torah: it is the rank that was prepared for Adam, had he not —
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— sinned, he would have remained there immortal.
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Likewise Gehenna — it is simply a well-known place near Jerusalem, a ravine from which the fire never goes out, where impure bones, carcasses, and all kinds of refuse are burned. The word is a compound Hebrew term.
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Section [116]. The Khazar said: So there is nothing new beyond your law except the rewards as reported of Paradise and the Fire, their ranking, the repetition of those accounts, and their elaboration.
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Section [117]. The rabbi said: Yes — and even that is not new, for the Sages have elaborated on it so thoroughly that there is nothing you will hear of it that you will not find in the Sages' writings if you seek it.