Moshe Taku

This shiur was supposed to be about Rav Moshe Taku, but is really about the Maimonidean Controversy, and the relationship between philosophy and religion. I show that there were really three different approaches to the issues (and conflicts) of philosophy and religion. Rambam tries to make Judaism fit with Aristotle (or his version of it which also incorporated some Plato/Plotinus). He reinterprets pesukim and Chazal to fit with philosophy. The French who put him in cherem (instigated by Shlomo Montpellier, who it seems turned out to be a bad egg) rejected any use of philosophy, and stuck to the Divine text of Torah and Talmud. And some of the Spanish and Provencal Rabbis had an 'in between' view, where philospohy was utilised if it fit with the mesorah and was compelling. But it was rejected if it contradicted fundamentals of Torah.

In this shiur I spend quite a bit of time looking at the exchange of letters between Rav David Kimche (Radak) and Rav Yehuda Alfakhar. Which I found very interesting.



Here is the shiur:
Here is the audio shiur (and the pdf sheets to download if you want).
Moshe Taku and Maimonidean Controversy
(Right click and then 'download as')
Moshe Taku Source Sheets