Maimonides in His World: Portrait of a Mediterranean Thinker: 44 (Jews, Christians, and Muslims from the Ancient to the Modern World)

Stroumsa, Sarah

ISBN 10: 0691152527 / ISBN 13: 9780691152523

Published by Princeton University Press, 2012

About this Item

This is an ex-library book and may have the usual library/used-book markings inside.This book has soft covers. In good all round condition. Please note the Image in this listing is a stock photo and may not match the covers of the actual item,500grams, ISBN:9780691152523.

Seller Inventory # 2947240

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Maimonides in His World: Portrait of a Mediterranean Thinker: 44 (Jews, Christians, and Muslims from the Ancient to the Modern World)
• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Publication Date: 2012
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0691152527
• ISBN 13: 9780691152523
• Binding: Soft cover
• Condition: Good
• Weight: 500 grams
• Seller catalogs:
  • Philosophy

About this title

Synopsis

While the great medieval philosopher, theologian, and physician Maimonides is acknowledged as a leading Jewish thinker, his intellectual contacts with his surrounding world are often described as related primarily to Islamic philosophy. Maimonides in His World challenges this view by revealing him to have wholeheartedly lived, breathed, and espoused the rich Mediterranean culture of his time.


Sarah Stroumsa argues that Maimonides is most accurately viewed as a Mediterranean thinker who consistently interpreted his own Jewish tradition in contemporary multicultural terms. Maimonides spent his entire life in the Mediterranean region, and the religious and philosophical traditions that fed his thought were those of the wider world in which he lived. Stroumsa demonstrates that he was deeply influenced not only by Islamic philosophy but by Islamic culture as a whole, evidence of which she finds in his philosophy as well as his correspondence and legal and scientific writings. She begins with a concise biography of Maimonides, then carefully examines key aspects of his thought, including his approach to religion and the complex world of theology and religious ideas he encountered among Jews, Christians, Muslims, and even heretics; his views about science; the immense and unacknowledged impact of the Almohads on his thought; and his vision of human perfection.


This insightful cultural biography restores Maimonides to his rightful place among medieval philosophers and affirms his central relevance to the study of medieval Islam.

About the Author

Sarah Stroumsa is the Alice and Jack Ormut Professor of Arabic Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, where she currently serves as rector. Her books include Freethinkers of Medieval Islam.