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This sale only lasts for a month, so go and get some books. Welcome to the new Books Network. I'm Caleb Zachron, editor at the new Books Network. Today I'm speaking with Svi Langerman, Professor Emeritus at Buryland University.
We're discussing Svi's latest work, Before My Monodys, a new philosophical dialogue in Hebrew. We might think of My Monodys as the fulcrum on which the lever of Jewish philosophical thought pivots is ideas so profoundly reshape Judaism that it might lead us to misconstrued the nature of Jewish thought for his interventions. Svi uses original sources untangling the web of ideas before My Monodys in this unique and thoughtful work. Svi, thanks so much for joining today on the new Books Network.
Well, thank you for inviting me. Of course, this work was really fascinating. I have a real, just as wonderful publications. I'm always just so surprised by how fascinating I find topics that I didn't know much about.
I had captured My Monodys years ago when I was maybe 11 years old in Hebrew school. So this was a fun book because there were so much about My Monodys that I really did not know beyond just the brief summary that they gave about the guide for Perplex. But before jumping into the book and the topic, I wonder if you could just tell us a little bit about yourself and your background. Okay.
So originally from New England and the Boston area, and I was educated at my BA in history at Boston University and like VHD in History of Science at Harvard. My main professional affiliation or identification is as a historian of science. So I have branched out into this new philosophy and the impact of both science and philosophy and religious thought. In the middle ages, the words that we used for science and wisdom encompassed the things that we considered to be philosophy and we classify as science.
And I moved to Israel and for many years worked at the Institute of Microfilm Hebrew Manuscripts, which was a project that was started to get at least microfilm copies of every Hebrew letter manuscript in the world that we should have a repository. You know, we can't get the originals there, mostly held by long established libraries, public libraries. And I was there simply cataloging it because, you know, a lot of the stuff has never been gone over in detail by someone who's trained in the topics. And this includes a lot of Judeo-Arabic materials, which is Judeo-Arabic is simply Arabic written up in Hebrew letters, which is pretty easy to do because there's a lot of correspondence identity between the letters.
And then I, about 25 years ago or so, I joined the Department of Arabic at Baryland, and I've been doing for the most part, I mean, I've been keeping my fingers in many pies, but for the last decade or so, it's been mostly on in my monities. And now that I'm retired from teaching, I can even, you know, build more time to research because it's, you know, it's what I love doing. It's where I think I have something to contribute to society as well as, you know, my own personal development. So that's about, you know, what they're disabled of me.
Yeah, wonderful. It's always fascinating talking to scholars that started in one discipline and then shifted to another. I think that that, you know, one of the, maybe not problems of academia is the siloing, the focusing so narrowly on one discipline, but really, almost everyone I talked to has interest across the different spectrums. So I think it's fascinating how you migrated sort of to a different field over time.
So this, this text does deal with certain scientific ideas, obviously, not necessarily the way that we might think of them today. But the focus of this work is, is a dialogue. You call it the dialogue between intellect and soul. It's good to see a great overview of this dialogue and how you first learned about it.
Well, I first learned about it by, because of my, my years working at this Institute, even after I, you know, I left, I remain in touch with the people they are and they would send me things to look at it from time to time that either will, like, more specialized things like a history of medical text or an astronomical text or something to Dave Arabic and it turns out that this, this text that had been bought by a man with the name of Jacob Jamal who lives in New York, I think in Brooklyn, he's, he's a real bibliophile and he goes all over the place looking and we had found it and brought it up for sale at Sathvys, but he was kind enough to send a film of it to a set of images to the Institute where I looked at it and said if so, that this was a really interesting thing. Yes, there are, you know, there are different styles for doing philosophy and one of them is a dialogue, which of course is best known to everyone by Plato. Plato's books are almost all dialogues and we assume that they represent, you know, some degree of fidelity, the actual discussions that Socrates had with his colleagues and fellows, but obviously, you know, they can't be real transcripts because there were no, the technology in exist and it's actually, you know, they're literary productions and this continued on in the, in, into the medieval period, but some of the dialogues are not, unlike the Socratic dialogues, we do have actual, you know, people and some of them, maybe although I don't know what we know, but Socrates, you know, for sure were a snarkle characters in the medieval text, they often are almost always took the place of sort of personified entities or values and the, and the dialogue between soul and body or soul and intellect was a very common form of literature, which we have examples in Judeo-Arbic, but in Latin and in other languages as well. So that's the literary side.
It's basically sort of, you can look at it this way as, as a someone trying to sort out, you know, in their own minds, what's the relationship between soul and body or soul in some higher world of values that, you know, each of one of us are all thinking people go through at some time and putting it down as sort of an actual conversation. And in, in the medieval system, it's done also, and it's sort of, it is a hierarchy there that in that there is like body which is sort of like the lowest aspect of our, of our existence is the most earthly and, you know, side of things where we eat and drink and so on. And then there's this higher world of values where we have intellectual truths and values such as justice and of course ideas such as God and angels and soul, the summer in the middle trying to mediate, mediate between the two so that, you know, the soul has control over bodily functions and can, if it's trained, can impose the ethical values on the body and keep you from eating too much or stealing. And also the same time, try to link up as strongly as possible with this higher world of values.
So this is what the book is, the dialogue discusses. It's not on the highest level in terms of having, you know, detailed or getting to some tough questions and providing detailed answers, which is one of the reasons why I can date it as early as I can. And soul is just turning to intellect and trying to get it convinced that the proper course in life is to link up and intellect to develop your intellect and not sink into the body and its demands. And now there is no, it's in Hebrew, but there are here and there terms of words, phrases that are in Arabic, not in Hebrew, that is because there was not yet a full, a fully developed Hebrew vocabulary for this sort of work.
And this is one of the indications that it's early because the, we go back to the 11th century or something, it will be really difficult to write a high level book on philosophy and medicine and so on. And Hebrew because you didn't have words for all the components of these sciences just as today. You know that if you go around the world, a lot of languages will say computer. So it's not, it's an English verb, but they haven't yet come up with word of their own or if they have, it hasn't caught on yet.
So this is something similar to this case in indication that it's an early page because particularly after my monodies and after the translation, the Hebrew translation of the monodies guy which made the biggest impact on Judas Wazuhi, as you said, there was already, there was then said in emotion, you know, the full Hebrew idiom for discussing these things. So that's one thing that is very early in fact, and there are also some new Hebrew words that are coined. And the author of this dialogue tells you that he is, you know, he's chosen this word, it tells you why. So that's another indication that it's early.
The indication that it's from from Spain or Liberia is really just from the context in that this sort of type of work was only produced in Spain in our Spanish bintures. It's not whether you know, to how soon you can talk of Spain is a very hotly debated topic or was in Spanish history, but so let's say the Ethiopian peninsula, because there were at least two early writers to, again, I think 11th century or something that one of them is going to give you role the famous poet who wrote his dialogue between a student and a master in in Arabic, but it survives only really in Latin translation. And then there's a sort of ethical work with Sufi influences by Baki even Pakuta, which has a dialogue between the same two characters as my dialogue between soul and intellect. And so this fits into the sort of type of work that was being produced in the appearing peninsula, particularly in the those sections at that time, but what most of it was was under Arab Islamic rule.
And therefore, the standard scientific language was Arabic. So that's that's that's basically what the dialogue is about and and what's the literary standpoint and the content. What was the idea in peninsula like in the time just before my monitor is what do we know about the political rule and the religious religious maybe makeup of the people? Okay, well, I mean, don't have all the stuff in my fingertips, but at one point, let's say in the ninth century, there was a strong unified caliphate in India, in peninsula because when the Umayyad Caliphate in Damascus was overthrown replaced by the Abbasid Caliphate in the new city of Baghdad, some of the people from the human dynasty actually made it their way over the court of a and set up a new dynasty there and it was a unified kingdom and it had a lot of it was a lot of scientific and philosophical writing also sort of because in those days it was considered sort of the glory of the throne, the glory of the state was that you were a center of culture and center of science and literature and so.
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There was not, it did not play out in sort of social or legal equality like one like I expected a the Muslims were the rulers, the Christians and the Jews my monadies but the Christians had this you know they had their strong support in the north where they were actually Christian states and there was a lot of active Christian resistance. The Jews were as usual like looking for someone to be their their their safe guard and some places things worked out well and some places they didn't. Now my monadies was from Cordoba which is a death and was independent state but there was sometimes slowly before when he was a child a very large and powerful and what we would call it a fundamentalist movement which is sprung up in in New South Africa I believe mostly purpose the Muahidun that people were you know defending the unity of God of the Amo as a cause of English had conquered most of Spain they were extremely intolerant and that's what basically what would cause my monadies to eventually move to the east but my dialogue seems to belong to periods that's before that it's during again this period of these city states the period in which people like I said immigrant people and Bakhya are flourished as I pointed out in the book when could make an argument I don't that either one of those was actually the author because of there are so many similarities not just in choosing literary form but overlap in in expressing the same ideas and various matters of a controversial or even in having in common a wild of being superficial in the way even to be rolled the poet was accused by a Jewish critic of you know trying to put it up defending his views but with like three or four shallow arguments instead of like one solid one so you would get you know here's a proof and another proof and another another really satisfying in a way that my author does that but I I try to avoid you know speculating even though you know we could sometimes an academic page because then everyone will get people start saying well you know you're on you're off the wall and get you know you're getting up in the press because it's all this back what I don't I don't go for that but in fact I found points of conversation that only between between the dialogue not just being those two figures but between other important figures of free commodity and philosophy such as you got a baby the poet the author of the kusari for example in in in there's a there was a a view expressed in some works the time not too many but actually I think because in a way sometimes goes back to book I don't know it in some form that one if someone can actually reach the height of perfection in intellectual development then there's no point living anymore I mean what your point of living on earth is to you know cultivate your intellect and if you've once you've done that then you might as well die and that that that point is made by by a levy in a scoozery though in one of his poems though the kusari actually takes a opposite of the point of view but that's because he's a poet so you can say you know you can say opposite things and it doesn't matter and so that's that's and and and and I point out other similarities to not only to to other Jewish thinkers but to if you were expressed in the Kalam the Kalam is there was a a form of a reaction theological reaction but with a philosophical basis that that that that that that took place in developed in Islamic countries this sort of alternative to philosophy based on an entirely different system including a different scientific view they were atomists they believe that that that the world is composed of atoms that move around and avoid which sounds well okay they're on the right track but this will consider absolutely wrong the one of the worst mistakes you could make from the when they go Aristotle and so there are echoes of that in the book very interestingly the author doesn't seem to really have a hold on the on the on the reals of faith he takes an argument to try and prove that air exists because if you're trying to convince a totally uneducated audience that the world is made up of the four traditional elements here were air earth water and fire like the banded at that name a lot of people said well what's air I mean I you know like water I can I can drink and fire I can feel earth I can pick up a bowl it's just it's like nothing so there are and the arguments that are used to prove that air exists were also arguments that were used in the debate over atomism to prove that there's no such thing as a vacuum so these are these are points of quite a good then the the the dialogue refers by name only to two thinkers play the one hour spot which is not surprising but still and but he seems to have a definite preference for Plato which again indicates an early stage in the history of a media philosophy because I think that the throughout the across the board in Europe and in the Islamic East people were first you know turned on to Plato and was only after a while that the the Irish and the Indian you know point of view went out and here this this seems to be a either either is I think a strong point of contact between this author and the occultist shot which is a play in the school in in France particularly insofar as having justice as the supreme the supreme virtue the supreme goal that's the that's the highest value in his system so it has points of contact with all of these different streams of thought which are not necessarily totally compatible with each other and that's why I said this is the before my mind is because my mind is you know had a fully developed system I mean a real system based on principles where he it's clear what he what he what he what which which which points of view is advancing and which he's rejecting and that and it was no longer possible to really have this sort of what you might call eclectic point of view that you know you you're looking for answers and you'll take them wherever you find them so this this this this way of fitting my mind is into the context of the development of philosophical and scientific thought I think I hasn't been possible until now because by now not just because this Texas you know one more addition to the to the corpus of text that we have to work on but but a lot of you know solid work has been done on all of these people that I've mentioned even can be rolled about the Al-A-V also we've been to and some others and and and now it's easier to uncover the points of contact and the points of difference between with this dialogue even the short dialogue with so many different thinkers and to say to show this is the state of fear these are people who are looking for answers who find them in various places who can just can defend their points of view but only to a certain point and and and and you leave it with a you know sort of being convinced about the the virtue of justice and the need to cultivate the mind over the body but not with the full mechanism of the full machinery of the system such as out of a monadies. So in the course of this this work of translating the dialogue did you you know change your mind on something on anything or did it help provide you with a new insight into something that might have been mystifying you prior?
I can't think of that at the moment because I mean I mean when you study my own things you're mystifying about things he says and doesn't say but this kind of dialogue is not going to change it. It wasn't eye-opening in that sense it was more it was more enlightening to me in terms of coming to grips with the wide range of views and ideas and theories that were available and and seeing how they could all be put together in one way because you know as you mentioned there's also this tendency among scholars there was to sort of pigeonhole or label these people that he's a nail-platedist he's a he's a visualist of that and but most of them it's only possibly true. They were they wore several hats and they could you know defend different positions and maybe change their mind or depending on their audience to different stances so in that sense it was you know enriching very in that that's also anytime you have to translate a text it forces you to come to grips with it because if you're reading a text in your in your native language you can sort of like fool yourself if you understand it when you really don't but when you have to put it into a different language and take a stand with what this guy really saying then it's a it's a it's a it's a new ball game and it's again something that's that's every warning. Yeah this is you know been an absolutely fascinating discussion I think you know the thing for me that's just sticks out so much is the the degree to which these thinkers or what you know the text that you look at you know obviously it's not exactly clear the author but just the degree to which they were reading and inspired by thinkers from a myriad of different traditions I think it's very easy for us today to imagine the past as these different thinkers in different groups you know that the Greeks were siloed the you know the Muslim thinkers were siloed the Jewish thinkers were siloed when in reality they were reading each other they were in dialogue even if they were arguing each other.
Yeah well they mean you know nothing in the book actually touches upon you know touch the illogical issues the types of things that were bad as a doctrine I mean there was there's nothing terrible prophecy so you could not do who was a prophet it wasn't a prophet or things like that and in that and so in that context it can be a really a free flow of information and I think that there was. Well see thank you so much for being just on the new books network the book is before my monadies a new philosophical dialogue in Hebrew thank you so much. Thank you.