To mark the fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Professor Shlomo Pines’ magisterial translation of Moses Maimonides’ Guide of the Perplexed by the University of Chicago Press, the Chicago Center for Jewish Studies in collaboration with the Shlomo Pines Society of Jerusalem held two major events in 2013-14. Moses Maimonides (1135-1204; Moses ben Maimon, Musa ibn Maymun, also known by the acronym RaMBaM) was arguably the greatest Jewish thinker of the Middle Ages. Born in Cordoba, Spain, his family fled the Muslim Almohades first to North Africa, then to the land of Israel, finally settling in Egypt where Maimonides was head of the Jewish community and the foremost rabbinic figure of his time. His three seminal works, the first running Commentary on the Mishnah, his comprehensive code of rabbinic law, the Mishneh Torah, and his philosophical magnum opus, the Guide of the Perplexed, transformed rabbinic Judaism. The Guide, originally composed in Judaeo-Arabic (Arabic in Hebrew characters) is one of the great medieval philosophical works in all three faiths and set the agenda for all subsequent Jewish philosophy to this day. Its English translator, Shlomo Pines was one of the greatest historians in the last century of medieval Jewish and Arabic philosophy and science who also wrote on topics in ancient philosophy, Byzantine and Christian philosophy and thought, rabbinics, and early modern philosophy through Spinoza and Kant. Pines’ translation of the Guide has made it accessible to English speaking audiences in a way it had never been before and, through its accuracy and consistency of translation, has had a transformative impact on scholarship on the Guide, not only in English but also in Hebrew.
The first part of this celebration of Pines’ translation was the annual Shlomo Pines Lecture, traditionally delivered at the Israel Academy of Sciences in Jerusalsm, which was presented by Professor Josef Stern of the University of Chicago in June 2013 on the topic “Pines’ Guide at 50: Philosophy in Translation and Translation in Philosophy.” The lecture was accompanied by a symposium on the impact of Pines’ translation on contemporary philosophy. The second event was an international conference held at the University of Chicago on January 19-21 entitled ““Pines’ Maimonides: The History of the Translation and Interpretation of The Guide of the Perplexed.” As Professor of Jewish Philosophy at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Pines also raised a whole generation of scholars, a number of whom participated in the conference, including Warren Zev Harvey (Hebrew University), Sarah Stroumsa (former Rector of the Hebrew University), Jeffrey Macy (Hebrew University). Tzvi Langermann (Bar-Ilan University), and Steven Harvey (Bar Ilan University). The conference covered four major themes: (1) A critical evaluation of Pines’ translation; (2) the history of the translation of the Guide of the Perplexed from Arabic into medieval Hebrew, Latin, Spanish, French, English, and modern Hebrew; (3) the impact of the Guide in translation on Latin Scholastic philosophy, early modern philosophy, and contemporary philosophy; and (4) critical discussions of Leo Strauss’ and Pines’ introductions to the University of Chicago edition. Both the papers and discussion at the conference were of very high quality. A number of papers opened up new avenues of research and many of the papers on the history of translation and translators recovered figures of whom we until now knew very little.
This conference is only one of many ventures in which the University of Chicago and its Center for Jewish Studies is deeply engaged with Israel. Last year the University’s Institute for Molecular Engineering entered into a formal agreement to collaborate in joint research with Ben-Gurion University on topics concerned with water and nano-technology. This summer UChicago will be sending up to four undergraduates to Ben Gurion as interns to work on research programs concerning water, from laboratory science to the economics, politics, and history of water. The Oriental Institute is engaged in archeological excavation in Israel and undergraduates from Chicago intern on the dig. This Spring UChicago shall have two very distinguished Israeli scholars as visiting professors. The inaugural Joyce Z. Greenberg Professor of Jewish Studies will be Prof. Dan Diner (Hebrew University), a scholar of modern German and European Jewish History, and he will return in Spring 2015. Prof. Dan Laor (Tel Aviv University), the leading biographer of Shai Agnon and Natan Alterman, will be the Israel Studies Professor, funded by the JUF of Chicago, and will teach two courses on modern Hebrew Literature and Film. Next winter and spring, two more eminent faculty, Isaiah Gafni (Hebrew University) and Rafi Greenberg (Tel Aviv University) will teach courses on Ancient Jewish History and on Archeology and Contemporary Israeli culture, respectively. In addition, the Center for Jewish Studies regularly hosts visiting Israeli authors and artists and supports the highly successful College Study Abroad Program in Jerusalem.
Josef Stern
William H. Colvin Professor in the Department of Philosophy
Director, Chicago Center for Jewish Studies