Page:Eight chapters of Maimonides on ethics.djvu/25

Rh The greater part of the Commentary was not translated into Hebrew until after his death. The general introduction to this work and parts of the order Zeraʿim were translated by Jehudah al-Ḥarizi (1194); Moʿed by Joseph ibn al-Fawwal; Nashim by Jaḳob ibn Abbas; Neziḳin by Salomon b. Josef ibn Yaʿkub; Ḳodoshim by Nathanel ibn Almoli (or Almali); and Ṭohorot by an anonymous translator. The commentary on Sanhedrin, Chapter X, was translated probably by Al-Ḥarizi, and also by Samuel ibn Tibbon.

In commenting on the tractate Abot, Maimonides had abundant opportunity to make use of his knowledge of Greek philosophy and particularly of Aristotelian ethics. To this tractate he prefixed an introduction of eight chapters, outlining in a general way a system of ethics based mainly on Aristotle's Nichomachean Ethics, which Maimonides harmonized with rabbinical teachings. This introduction constitutes the most remarkable instance in medieval ethical literature of the harmonious welding of Jewish religious belief and tradition with Greek philosophy.

For the rendering into Hebrew of the Commentary on Abot and its introduction commonly called (The Eight