Volume 1

The Jewish encyclopedia : a descriptive record of the history, religion, literature, and customs of the Jewish people from the earliest times to the present day / prepared ... under the direction of ... Cyrus Adler [and others] Isidore Singer ... managing editor.

Date:: 1901-1906

Credit: The Jewish encyclopedia : a descriptive record of the history, religion, literature, and customs of the Jewish people from the earliest times to the present day / prepared ... under the direction of ... Cyrus Adler [and others] Isidore Singer ... managing editor. Source: Wellcome Collection.

149/752 (page 101)

$Abraham ibn Daud 12ti, vih. U7, xii. 11-; Kobak, Jeschurun, vi. 169, where Abra- I haul calls his lather AcImeUiar or Ac/melrail. This name may i be a misprint. p p ' ABRAHAM COXaUE OF HEBRON. See I CONQUE (CUENQUI). AbHAIIAM, OF HeBKON. I ABRAHAM BEN DANIEL: Poet and rabbi; j born at Modena in 1511. For several years he was i a tutor at Viadana, Modena, Rivarolo, Arezzo, and Forli, and finally he became rabbi at Ferrara. From loJd to 1553, despite unceasing bodily ailments, he composed over a thousand poetical prayers in vari- ous meters and forms, six of them being in the I Aramaic language. Several of the poems were writ- ten for friends, or suggested by public events, papal oppressions, or prevalent sickness ; and one of them is in honor of his cousin Hadassah, whom he mar- ried in 1539. A manuscript collection of his prayers ! in the Bodleian Library, Oxford, bears the title “Sefer ha-Yashar ” (The Book of the Righteous). Bibliography: Ziinz, Literaturgesch. p. 535; Neubauer, Cot. Bodl. Hebr. MSS. No. 1181. ]\I. K. 1 ABRAHAM IBN DAUD (=DAVID) HA- ; LEVI; called Ben Daud (erroneously Daur,Dior); , also RABaD, from the initials of his name, and RABaDI to distinguish him from Abraham ben : Isa.yc of Narbonne (RABaD II.) and Abraham BEN David of Posquieres (RABaD HI.): Spanish ' astronomer, historian, and philosopher; born at To- ledo about 1110; died, according to common report, 1 a martyr about 1180. His mother belonged to a I family famed for its learning. His chronicle, a I work written in 1161 under the title of “Sefer lia- Kabbalah ” (Book of Tradition), in which he tiercely I attacked the contentious of Karaism and justified I rabbinical Judaism by the establishment of a chain I of traditions from Moses to his own time, is replete : with valuable general information, especially rela- ting to the time of the Geonim and to the history of I the Jews in Spain. An astronomical ivork written I by him in 1180 is favorably noticed by Lsaac Israeli I the Younger (“Yesod‘01am,” iv. 18). Ills philosoph- ical -work, “Al-‘akidah al-Rafiyah ” (The Sublime Faith), written in 1168, in Arabic, has been pre- served in tivo Hebrew translations: one by Solomon I b. Labi, with the title “Emunah Ramah”; the other by Samuel Motot. Labi’s translation was retrans- lated into German and published by Simson Weil. Ibn Daud was by no means an original thinker, nor did he produce a new philosophy; but he ivas the first to introduce that phase of His Posi- Jewish philosophy m IhcIi is generally tionasPlii- attributed to Maimonides and which losopher. differs from former systems of jihi- , losophy mainly in its more thorough I systematic form derived from Aristotle. Accord- \ ingly, Hasdai Crescas mentions Ibn Daud as the i only Jervish philosopher among the predecessors of I Maimonides (“Or Adonai,” chap. i.). But having been completely overshadowed by Maimonides’ classical work, the “Moreh Nebukim,” Abraham ibn Baud’s “Emunah Ramah” (Sublime Faith), a work to which Maimonides himself was indebted for many valuable suggestions, received scant notice i from later philosophers. I The only Jewish philosophical works that Ibn Daud had before him, according to his own state- ' ment (“Emunah Ramah,” p. 2, or in German trans., p. 3), were Saadia’s “Emunot Ave-De‘ot,” and “The i Fountain of Life ” bj” Solomon ibn Gabirol. On the I one hand, he fully recognizes the merits of Saadia, although he does not adopt his views on the frec- I dom of the will, notwithstanding that the solution of I this problem was to be the chief aim and purpose of his whole system (“Emunah Ramah,” p.98; German trans., p. 125). On the other hand, his attitude toward Gabirol is entirely antagonistic, and even in the pref- ace to his “Emunah Ramah ” he pitilessly condemns Gabirol’s “Fountain of Life.” See Kaufmann,“Stu- dien iiber Solomon ibn Gabirol,” Budapest, 1899. Being the first strict Aristotelian among the Jews— who considered Aristotle and his Arabic commenta- tors, Alfarabi and Ibn Sina, to be the only true phi- losophers (i5. pp. 23, 50, 62; German trans., pp. 30, 65, 78)—Ibn Daud feels himself provoked to constant op- position b}' the doctrines of Gabirol, who represents the Neoplatonic philosophy. Impartial enough to accord to childlike faith its full rights, Ibn Daud desires also to defend the rights of reason, and, coii- sequentl}', re.sists with the utmost energy any at- tempt to set bounds to science; regarding this as a culpable encroachment upon the plan of the Divine Ruler, who did not endow man with the faculty of thought without intent. True philo.sophy, according to Ibn Daud, does not entice us from religion; it tends rather to strengthen and solidify it. Moreover, it is the duty of every thinking Jew to become acquainted Avith the har- mony existing between the fundamental doctrines of Judaism and those of philosophy, and, wherever they seem to contradict one another, to seek a mode of reconciling them. Ibn Daud insists that, how- ever highly philosophy may be valued, the religion of Judaism is preferable. Knowledge, Avhich had been acquired by philosophers through the evolu- tion of several thousands of )'ears, and after over- coming the gravest errors, had been bestowed upon Judaism from the beginning through revelation (ih. p. 63; German trans., p. 79). As to moral truths, it may be even assumed as probable that the philoso- phers did not attain to them through independent study, but rather under the influence of the doctrines of Holy Scripture (ih. p. 101; German trans., p. 130). It is true that on certain points Ibn Daud could not always avoid conflict Avith the doctrines of Aristotle: this wasesiiecially true in regard to the Ibn Daud latter’s theory of the Creation. Ac- and cording to Aristotle, all coming into Aristotle, being results from the fusion of matter into a certain form: matter, therefore, is the necessary basis for any genesis; primary mat ter itself, as the substance common to all things exist- ent, must, therefore, be Avithoiit beginning and must be eternal. But the acceptance of preexistent and eternal matter can not be i-econciled Avith the Biblical history of creation, Avhich implies a creation out of nothing, and subject to time. From this contlict, Avhich later caused IMaimonides to disjmte the au- thority of Aristotle in all matters tianscendental, Ibn Daud Avas not able to extricate himself; and, therefore, he rather tries to glide ov'er the existing difficulties than to solve them. For he nqiresents the course of creation as a series of creative acts; Avhich recalls Gabirol’s doctrine concerning the suc- cession of the various substances. But he him.self subsequentljr admits that this Avas only a hypothesis to satisfy the need of giving an architectonic finish to our notions, intended to mark that gradual process of things Avhich Avould result, had creation really gone through all the stages of existence, from pri- mary matter, Avhich is impcrcc])til)le to us, to all indi- vidual things, though some of these stages may be regarded as partly existing only in abstract notions. To concede the possibility of such a gradual process of creation, hoAvever, Avould be, according to Ibn Daud, a contradiction of our conception of God’s mode of acting. As to the doctrine of God, Abraham ibn Daud,$