The Place of Ethics in Medieval Jewish Philosophy—The Case of Saadia Gaon

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This study examines the place of ethics as a distinct discipline in medieval Jewish philosophy, using as an example the case of Saadia Gaon. Before I turn to the question itself, however, a considerable amount of preliminary discussion is necessary. This involves the definition of ethics as a philosophic discipline, as well as the question of the relation between ethics and religion in general and between ethics and Judaism in particular. This last, of course, raises the question of the relation between ethics and halakhah. In these areas I do not plan to settle any issues, only to raise them in order to explicate the problematic of Jewish ethics which forms the background against which medieval discussions must be seen. These matters having been described, it then makes sense to sketch in the historical background, touching briefly on the place of ethics in Bible and Talmud, the periodization of the discussion of ethics in Judaism, and, finally, the various approaches to ethics which we find in the medieval period. These matters will take up the first part of this essay. In the second part of this study I will examine the way in which ethics as a distinct discipline was dealt with by Saadia Gaon, the first of the medieval Jewish philosophers. What, then, is ethics? The Encyclopedia of Philosophy distinguishes among three different but related uses of the term: Ethics may signify (1) a general pattern or Svay of life,' (2) a set of rules of conduct or 'moral code,'