Panel: PHILOSOPHERS READING THE BIBLE



364.8 - REVEALED TRUTH OR RATIONAL TRUTH? JOSEPH IBN KASPI AND THE USE OF PHILOSOPHY IN BIBLICAL EXEGESIS

AUTHORS:
Fusaro M. (Università di Modena e Reggio Emilia (DREST - Italian Doctoral School of Religious Studies) ~ Modena e Reggio Emilia ~ Italy)
Text:
Holy Scriptures and religion deal with matters of faith, which are primarily anthropological issues, such as 'Who created the world?' 'Why does human make mistakes?' 'What type of relationship exists between human and God?' 'Can human actions be attributed to God?' and so on. Between 12th and 14th centuries, particularly in France and Spain, a broad debate developed within Jewish religious and intellectual entourages concerning the legitimacy of answering such existential and ethical questions through revealed truth, i.e. the Torah, or through rational thought, i.e. philosophy. The latter seemed, for someone, more adequate both to respond to Jewish society' needs of that time and to defend Jewish religion from external attacks. Joseph Ibn Kaspi (14th cent.), one of the exponents of the golden age of mediaeval Jewish philosophy, extensively employs the Judeo-Arabic philosophical tradition to address biblical exegetical issues, attempting to balance on the fine line between philosophical theories and the denial of revealed truth. Ibn Kaspi within his Biblical Commentaries (e.g. Maṣref la-Kesef), his Commentaries on Maimonides' Guide of the Perplexed (Maskiyyot Kesef and 'Ammudei Kesef) and in his biblical dictionary Sharshot Kesef discusses issues such as the creation and eternity of world, man's sin, and the knowability of God by interpreting the Torah through the philosophy of Maimonides, Averroes and Aristotle, creating a complex network of discrepancies and similarities between these sources. In my research I will highlight these topics by analysing extracts from Kaspi's works, some of which are still unpublished. Because of the mixture of revealed truth and rational truth in Kaspi's thinking, he becomes a problematic figure in the later Jewish tradition, but on the other hand he seems to be appreciated by important figures in the history of the relationship between philosophy and religion, such as Johanan Alemanno and Baruch Spinoza.