Page:Guideperplexed v1.djvu/34

xxvi thorah, termed Keseph Mishneh, remedied this deficiency. The Introduction is followed by the enumeration of the six hundred and thirteen precepts and a description of the plan of the work, its division into fourteen books, and the division of the latter into sections, chapters, and paragraphs.

According to the author, the Mishne thora is a mere compendium of the Talmud; but he found sufficient opportunities to display his real genius, his philosophical mind, and his ethical doctrines. For in stating what the traditional Law enjoined he had to exercise his own judgment, and to decide whether a certain dictum was meant to be taken literally or figuratively; whether it was the final decision of a majority or the rejected opinion of a minority; whether it was part of the Oral Law or a precept founded on the scientific views of a particular author; and whether it was of universal application or was only intended for a special period or a special locality. The first Book, Sefer ha-madda, is the embodiment of his own ethical and theological theories, although he frequently refers to the Sayings of the Sages, and employs the phraseology of the Talmud. Similarly, the section on the Jewish Calendar, Hilchoth ha-ibbur, may be considered as his original work. In each group of the halachoth, its source, a certain passage of the Pentateuch, is first quoted, with its tradtional interpretation, and then the detailed rules follow in systematic order. The Mishneh thorah was written by the author in pure Hebrew; when subsequently a friend asked him to translate it into Arabic, he said he would prefer to have his Arabic writings tranlated into Hebrew instead of the reverse. The style is an imitation of the Mishnah; he did not choose, the author says, the philosophical style, because that would be