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"Open ye the gates, that the righteous nation which keepeth the truth may enter in."—(Is. xxvi. 2.)
PART I.
CHAPTER I.
צלם, Form. דמות, Likeness. תואר, Shape.[1]
Some have been of opinion that by צלם in Hebrew, the shape and figure of a thing is to be understood, and this explanation led men to believe in the corporeality [of the Divine Being]: for they thought that the words נעשה אדם בצלמנו, "Let us make man in our form" (Gen. i. 26), implied that God had the form of a human being, i.e., that He had figure and shape, and that, consequently, He was corporeal.[2] They adhered faithfully to this view, and thought that if they were to relinquish it they would eo ipso reject the
- ↑ The author begins the homonymous expressions explained in this part of the work with צלם, because it is both the first and the most striking instance of anthropomorphism occurring in the Bible. According to Narboni (ad locum), Maimonides here confirms the rule, that "the end of the work is the beginning in thought" תכלית המעשה תחלת המחשבה. The aim of man's life, viz., the highest development of his intellectual faculties (שכל הפועל), is treated in the last chapter of this work; these intellectual faculties of man are also discussed in the present chapter.
- ↑ Comp. Annotations of R. Abraham, son of David (השגת רא״בד) on Maimonides' Mishnah Torah, Book I. (ספר המדע), on Teshubhah iii. 7. "Why does Maimonides call him (who says that God is corporeal, endowed with a certain form) a heretic (מין)? Many men, even greater and better than Maimonides, believed it, they being apparently supported by some passages in the Bible, and particularly by Agadic writings, which frequently lead the reader astray." Comp. I. xxvi. sqq.
