Page:Philosophical Review Volume 27.djvu/322

310 for lucid exposition are everywhere in evidence. It would be well if we could have a description of Christian scholasticism and Moslem philosophy so competent, discriminating, sympathetic, and in the best sense popular. The book naturally invites a comparison with Neumark's Geschichte der judischen Philosophic des Mittelalters (Berlin, I, 1907: II, 1910). Professor Neumark's work is not yet completed; but the two volumes that have been published indicate with sufficient clearness its character and what may be expected. It is marked by extensive learning and an earnest effort to trace the ideas that occupied the minds of Jewish thinkers in the middle ages, so far as possible, back to the Talmudic and pre-Talmudic periods. The second volume is wholly devoted to this, and there is much that is promising and valuable in this endeavor to dig down to the roots in native soil. Professor Neumark does not possess the unusual ability to organize his material or the graces of style that give such charm to Professor Husik's work. Nevertheless, one cannot help feeling that the excellent introduction to the latter, with its clear analysis, its pregnant sentences, and its illuminating touches, in this respect is all too brief, and leaves the reader's interest stimulated rather than satisfied. How are the ideas struggling for expression in Jewish Hellenistic literature, the wisdom-books, the apocalypses, and the Hagada related to the mediaeval speculations? What is the true place of Philo in the development of Jewish thought? To many students, occupying widely different standpoints, his philosophy appears as an altogether exotic plant. Eduard Schwartz, admirer of classical plasticity and admirable stylist himself, in words that are less than fair and seem to betray a bias, disposes of him as a rabbi dabbling in things he does not understand. Emile Brehier, masterwork man in the field of Hellenistic speculation and subtle analyst, with deeper insight and a finer appreciation, assigns him a notable position in the realm of later Greek thought. The rabbis until recent times appear to have been ignorant of Philo; to them he also was a foreigner. There was no resentment on their part because of the heavy debt the church owed to him in the upbuilding of Christological dogma; of this they knew as little as the church itself. The greatest and most influential of early Jewish philosophers fell a victim to the prejudice against Greek speech and Greek speculation which, however regrettable in many ways, undoubtedly helped to save the life of Israel. Was the ignorance of Philo as complete as it seems? Were there no underground passages through which his contributions, without the card of the giver, could pass to later Aramaic or Arabic-speaking generations?