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Part One · Chapter Thirty-Six — Divine 'Anger' and the Corporealist
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I shall explain to you, when I speak of the attributes, in what respect it is said that such-and-such a matter pleases God or angers Him and provokes His wrath — the sense in which it is said of certain individuals among people that God was pleased with them, or was angry with them, or wrathful. But this sense is not the aim of this chapter; rather its aim is what I now say in it.
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Know that if you reflect upon the whole Torah and all the books of the prophets, you will not find the expression 'fierceness of anger,' nor the expression 'wrath,' nor the expression 'jealousy,' save with respect to idolatry alone; and you will not find God called 'enemy' or 'adversary' or 'hater,' save of a worshipper of idolatry in particular. He said, 'and ye serve other gods' etc., 'and the anger of the Lord be kindled against you' (Deut 11:16–17); 'that ye provoke me not to anger with the work of your hands' (Jer 25:6); 'they have moved me to jealousy with that which is not God; they have provoked me to anger with their vanities' etc. (Deut 32:21); 'for the Lord thy God is a jealous God' etc. (Deut 6:15); 'why have they provoked me to anger with their graven images?' (Jer 8:19); 'through the provoking of his sons and of his daughters' (Deut 32:19); 'for a fire is kindled in mine anger' (Deut 32:22); 'the Lord is vengeful unto his adversaries, and repayeth them that hate him' (Nah 1:2; Deut 7:10); 'until he have driven out his enemies' (Num 32:21); 'for every abomination to the Lord, which he hateth' (Deut 12:31). And this is more than can be counted; but if you survey it through all the books, you will find it.
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The prophetic books came with this great emphasis only because this is a false opinion connected with Him, exalted be He — I mean the worship of idolatry. And the deviation of one who believed that Zayd is standing at the moment when he was sitting is not like the deviation of one who believed that fire is beneath the air, or water beneath the earth, or that the earth is flat, and the like. Nor is the deviation of this second from the truth like the deviation of one who believed that the sun is of fire, or that the sphere is a half-globe, and the like. Nor is the deviation of this third from the truth like the deviation of one who believed that the angels eat and drink, and the like. Nor is the deviation of this fourth from the truth like the deviation of one who believed in the obligation of worshipping something other than God. For the more the ignorance and the unbelief is connected with a great matter — I mean with one who has an established rank in existence — the greater it is than its connection with one who has a rank below that. By 'unbelief' I mean believing a thing contrary to what it is; and by 'ignorance' I mean ignorance of what it is possible to know. So the ignorance of one ignorant of the measurement of the cone, or ignorant of the sphericity of the sun, is not like the ignorance of one ignorant whether the Deity exists or whether the world has a God. And the unbelief of one who supposes that the cone is its half, or that the sun is a circle, is not like the unbelief of one who supposes that the Deity is more than one.
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And you know that everyone who worshipped idolatry did not worship it on the supposition that there is no god besides it; and no man, on any day of the past, ever imagined — nor will any of those to come imagine — that the image he makes of cast metal or of stones and wood, that that image created the heavens and the earth and governs them; rather it was worshipped only on the footing that it is a likeness of a thing that is an intermediary between us and God, as he made clear in saying, 'who would not fear thee, O King of the nations?' etc. (Jer 10:7), and said, 'and in every place incense is offered unto my name' etc. (Mal 1:11) — pointing to the first cause according to them. We have already explained that in our large composition; and this is among the things in which none of the people of our Law disputes.
Yet, although those unbelievers believed in the existence of the Deity — and their unbelief was connected only with a right that belongs to Him, exalted be He, I mean worship and exaltation, as He said, 'and ye shall serve the Lord' etc. — since His existence is established in the belief of the multitude, but they supposed this right to belong to another than Him, that became a cause for the nonexistence of God, exalted be He, in the belief of the multitude; for the multitude apprehends only the acts of the modes of worship, not their meanings nor the reality of the one worshipped thereby. So that became a thing requiring that they deserve destruction, as the text came, 'thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth' (Deut 20:16), and made clear the reason — which is the removal of this false opinion, that another not be corrupted by it — as He said, 'that they teach you not to do' etc. (Deut 20:18); and He called them 'enemies' and 'haters' and 'adversaries,' and said that the doer of that 'moves to jealousy,' 'provokes to anger,' and 'kindles wrath.'
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How then will be the state of one whose unbelief is connected with His very essence, exalted be He, and his believing it contrary to what it is — I mean, he does not believe His existence, or believes Him two, or believes Him a body, or believes Him possessed of affections, or ascribes to Him any deficiency whatever? For this, without doubt, is graver than a worshipper of idolatry who worships it as an intermediary, or as doing good or doing harm according to his fancy.
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So know, O you, that when you believe a corporeality, or a state of the states of a body, you are one who 'moves to jealousy,' 'provokes to anger,' 'kindles the fire of wrath,' a 'hater,' an 'enemy,' and an 'adversary' — far graver than a worshipper of idolatry. And if it occurs to your mind that the believer in corporeality is excused because he was reared upon it, or for his ignorance and the deficiency of his apprehension, then so ought you to believe of the worshipper of idolatry: for he worships only out of ignorance or out of upbringing — 'the custom of their fathers in their hands.' And if you say that the external sense of the text casts them into this perplexity — so likewise: the worshipper of idolatry was called to worship it only by imaginings and deficient conceptions. So there is no excuse for one who does not follow the verifying inquirers, if he falls short of speculation; for I do not pronounce an unbeliever one who does not demonstrate the denial of corporeality, but I do pronounce an unbeliever one who does not believe its denial — and all the more so given the existence of the Targum of Onkelos and the Targum of Jonathan ben Uzziel, peace be upon them, who remove corporeality to the utmost. And this has been the aim of the chapter.