Thomas von Aquin und Maimonides über Religion und den Staat

Podiumsgespräch mit Prof. Barbara Hallensleben (Fribourg), Prof. Josef Stern (Chicago) und Prof. Marcia Pally (New York/Berlin).

Eine Simultanübersetzung ins Deutsche wird angeboten.

Prof. Joseph Stern’s talk „Maimonides on the state, divine law, and individual perfection“ explores Maimonides’s notion of the state as arising from an antinomy: between necessary social relations (to satisfy individuals’ bodily needs) and the inevitable instability arising from conflicting human personalities. To address this instability, political associations emerge, governed by rulers who promulgate a variety of laws. Laws aiming only at citizens’ security and material/social welfare arise out of natural conditions but are a human artifact. Laws that also seek to develop citizens’ rational faculties—teaching “correct” beliefs and instilling “correct” values—empower capable individuals to strive for intellectual perfection. Maimonides calls this law “divine,” the best of which is the Mosaic Law. This talk addresses questions arising out of Maimonides’ conception of divine law. Why is a law that cultivates human rational faculties called divine?  How should we conceptualize the relation between communal welfare and individual perfection—and are there tensions here that hint at deeper incompatibilities between community/state and the individual?

Josef Stern is the William H. Colvin Professor of Philosophy Emeritus at the University of Chicago and served as the Inaugural Director of the Joyce Z. and Jacob Greenberg Center for Jewish Studies.  He works in both medieval Jewish and Arabic philosophy and contemporary philosophy of language. Among his recent publications are Metaphor in Context (2000); Quotations and Pictures (2022); and The Matter and Form of Maimonides’ Guide (2013), which was awarded the 2014 Book Prize by the Journal of the History of Philosophy for the best book in the history of philosophy published in 2013.  He is presently at work on a book on Maimonides’ epistemology of prophecy.