Rhetorical Attitudes

 

By: Jonathan Seidel

Polemical advice:

Philo, Saadia and Halevi each present a narration of polemical attitudes in their treatises. There is an agenda to respond to the questioner or the audience. Due to the apparent polemical exercise, it is not entirely clear what the author really intended and what he really believed. The dialectical procedure presented mainly in Philo and Halevi testifies to contradiction of sorts to play off their real intent with the fabricated response to the questioner. Yet despite this manifestation highlighting their esotericism, this model presents a multitude of possible derivations in support of Judaism. The goal of these alternatives is to present Jewish excellence in varied forms. Even when attacked in a certain frame, adequate response is possible.

The frame game is a situational confrontation where there is an obvious presentation of an attitude that one must follow. Someone is controlling the narrative and the expectation is to react kindly. Though ideally attacking the frame over the message is the correct path in order to not be sucked into another’s ideology, in this case it is imperative to do the latter. In this debate style presented by the philosopher, his goal is to use his opponents’ strengths against him. Steel-manning the adversary and beat him at his own game. Halevi’s dialogical style best depicts this with the Khazar king. The king is justly sceptical of rationalism and thus the sage responds with a sceptical analysis. Instead of arguing with the king over rationalism and philosophy, he takes the king’s a priori beliefs and finds an alternative route to convince him. Halevi’s model portrays a varied route to the Andalusian norm by providing an alternate point of view. If the rationalism is rejected then what. Halevi’s version is indebted to convey a novel identification with Judaism which headlights historical tradition. 

Philo and Saadia are more subtle in their rebuke but it is clear they are writing with a certain audience in mind. Philo’s hellenistic grasp prompted a revised version to hint to Judaic legitimacy. Hellenism’s hold on Judaism was rampant and Philo’s model attempted to bridge the world just as Soloveitchik tried to with modernity almost two millennium later. His polemical voice raises philosophical association to the forefront of Jewish thought. A religion so based in ritualistic aspects and legal magnitude lacked analytical depth. He translated Jewish history into a knowledgable itinerary. Philo’s model captured the essence of Judaism on their terms. He presented a systematised version of religion in hellenistic typology. Judaism was moving at its own pace through its rabbinic valve. Philo opted to meet the other side at their own game and quash them.

Saadia explicitly designed different route. His issue was with the rising karaites. His philosophical investment relied on debunking the karaites with logic and rationality. Both the geonim and karaites vied for authentic tradition. The alternative was to use a different metric. Fighting the odds with logic over competing traditional claims. Rationality was the model of overcoming the karaite invasion. The new heuristic was an outside mechanism that could deconstruct their claims. Voiding karaism was the goal and he presented it well. The geonic academies were competing with karaism for legitimacy and Saadia was the leader of the preservation. Saadia’s treatise follows rabbinic superiority. The oral was a main focus attracting the historicity and power of the sage. Using the kalam ideology, he furthered a revolutionary Jewish model.  

Returning to Halevi, his dialogical model is poetic in its narration. Philo and Saadia are more systematic than narrational. Halevi’s style mirrored Ibn Gabirol and even the talmudic sages. The dialogic rhetoric preserves a certain integrity. He muscles a fluid illustration. Unlike, the former two, Halevi does not conceal his polemical attitude nor is it clear who he fighting. Though it seems he is targeting philosophy, it is intentional to appeal to the Khazar king. Halevi does mention in his introduction that he is answering a fellow questioner in Rome. His motion of historical representation is tactical. Given his dialectic presence, it seems he was not anti-philosophy but was conjuring a pro-Jewish anti-philosophical orientation. The dialogue manages both sides of Halevi’s thought the exoteric anti-philosophy and his Andalusian scientific rationality. 

Each of these thinkers presented a nuanced view of the religion they so wholeheartedly treasured. Yet it was for this reason that Philo and Halevi’s works were not immediately appreciated. Saadia was responding to a looming threat. His polemic is to salvage Judaism as its leader just as Vilna Gaon openly rebuked hasidim and Hirsch fought reform. His target was the karaites. He made numerous remarks about his intentions. Saadia was a defender of faith and oral law. His rhetoric was highly polemical in voiding karaism entirely. Halevi and Philo were not in the authority-targeting business. Philo’s work is also openly polemical but it is more of an olive branch than a discursive critique. His work is a defining feature of exploiting the hellenistic clause. Halevi’s interest only seems historically relevant to the questioner. It is likely that Halevi’s interest was the karaites but it is not entirely clear. His historical approach has its own relevancy to the oral law ideological thrust of Saadia but it is not at all certain. Even Maimonides may have targeted them as well. 

Saadia’s influence went quite far in the Andalusian mindset. Though criticised by Miamonides among others, his interest and investment jumpstarted the rationalist philosophical stream in medieval Jewish society. He preceded Maimonides, in advocating a rational approach that jived with tradition as well as rationalising the commandments. Philo’s influence went less to nothing in the Jewish world. Like, ibn Gabirol, it was christian philosophers who not only drew from them but also believed them to be christians. Due to their sociological proximity it was inevitable they would seep into oblivion. Philo was philosophising in greek at a time of deep unrest in the Jewish world. Hellenism was rampant and the rabbinic world was transitioning to a harsh preservation model. Ibn Gabirol novelly wrote “secularly” as well as a hermit which isolated his works. Despite living in a rampant philosophical society his own self-isolation was his own demise. Halevi’s fame gradually grew overtime. His non-rationalist approach was not heeded too well in his overtly rational community. The Kuzari was referenced by Nahmanides’ school, revived, cemented by Italian scholars during the renaissance and then divergently interpreted by post-enlightenment scholars. Though ironically, Halevi’s current mountainous fame was marginal for the better part of half a millennium. His work only became necessary in the mitigation of maimonidean rationalism. 

The absence of Philo’s influence from the philosophical canon marred his works entirely. Saadia’s work is studied but nearly as much as Halevi. Halevi specifically transformed into Maimonides’ foil and historical approach attributed to him by later scholars stands in contrast to Maimonides. Saadia’s rationalism is usurped by Maimonides and Halevi his greatest philosophical opponent. It is Halevi’s contemporary standard that though was not his initial intent has morphed into a revolution of its own. He stands alone as the precursor to the historical approach to religious validation. Books such as Hirsch’s Nineteen Letters, Rosenzweig’s Star of Redemption, Keleman’s Reason to Believe and recently Koppel's Judaism Straight Up (though the latter is less a theological apologetics a la empiricism). Aish’s discovery seminar program is another example of this trend. This stands against the contemporaries mystical affiliations that denounce rationalism on a different account. Halevi’s model is inspirational to those who wish to validate on philosophical non-mystical grounds. 

Halevi is by far the most interesting given the appropriation through the years whether through the historical or mystical valve. Yet, it should not be detracted from its own layer of appreciation. The religious affiliation that diverts from the long standing Maimonidean stream and his “radical” expositors. Jewish philosophy was not uniform at least textually and it is the rhetorical device that marshals potential alternatives to the Andalusian heritage and fosters credible affinities to religious sensitivity.