15 - Jewish Philosophy

Summary

Judaism and philosophy each have had long and distinguished histories. Each offers a comprehensive outlook on the world, and each has evolved over time. In some periods, they evolved separately; in others, they were indistinguishable. In this chapter, I discuss the ways Judaism and philosophy have influenced each other. My chief claim will be that neither would have taken the path it did without the stimulus provided by the other.

BEGINNINGS

Philosophy as we know it began in Greece in the sixth century BCE. Originally it was indistinguishable from physics, astronomy, and other sciences in that all shared a common assumption: The phenomena we experience in everyday life can be explained by finding the causes or principles that underlie them. Whether we identify these principles as atoms, elements, forces, forms, or substances, the job of the philosopher is to explain the world in a systematic way. Ancient philosophy reached its high point in the fifth and fourth centuries BCE with the life of Socrates and worldviews of Plato and Aristotle. All three challenged the gods and goddesses of Greek mythology by arguing that anthropomorphism could not stand up to rational scrutiny. If all of reality can be explained by basic causes or principles, then God must be subject to them, the source of them, or be one principle among them. To take the most noteworthy example, Aristotle (384–322 BCE) defines God as the first mover of the universe, the ultimate source of motion and activity.