Abstract

Ashkenazic Jewish thought in the Middle Ages contrasts with medieval Hispano-Jewish thought in its distance from medieval rationalism. However, it was not entirely uninfluenced by philosophy. In the late twelfth century, rationalist influences are evidenced in the fields of Bible exegesis and mystical thought. The Maimonidean Controversies of the thirteenth centuries brought a halt to these early influences. The late fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries again saw the study of philosophical texts by Ashkenazic Jews, especially Maimonides' Guide, and especially among the rabbis of Prague. ;The period 1560-1620 saw the flourishing of the study of Jewish philosophy among Ashkenazic Jews. The philosophical writings of one of the boldest Ashkenazic rationalists of the period, Joseph ben Isaac ha-Levi, writings based on Maimonidean and Averroian Aristotelianism, form the focus of chapter three of the thesis. Joseph taught philosophy in Prague about 1610. The publication of Joseph's work aroused controversy, and he returned to his home in Lithuania. In a later work, Joseph retreated to less controversial positions, including a clearer stance of Jewish particularism. ;The seventeenth century after about 1620 saw a decline in Jewish rationalism, and the increasing dominance of kabbalah. One hold-out against these trends was the Talmudist R. Yom Tov Lipman Heller, a student of Joseph ha-Levi, and rabbi of Prague in the 1620's. The place of rationalist trends in his thought is the focus of chapter four. Heller takes his opinions from a variety of sources: rabbinic, kabbalistic, philosophical, and vernacular. He fought unsuccessfully for the study of astronomy, mathematics, and philosophy, and against the spread of kabbalistic preaching and rituals. Some of his views on Gentiles, on prayer, on communal disunity, and on fortune, show the influences of medieval rationalist conceptions