Maimonides on Knowledge of God

All Stanford students are invited to participate in this evening discussion of Maimonides’ treatment of our knowledge of God in the Guide for the Perplexed.

Maimonides famously argues that we can only know what God is not, not what God is. This is sometimes referred to as Maimonides’ apophaticism (from Greek for “denial”). In this evening seminar, we will discuss and evaluate Maimonides’ arguments for this conclusion as presented in the Guide I.50–54, 57–9.

We will be using Chaim Rabin’s translation of the Guide. The relevant excerpt from the Guide will be uploaded to this page at a later date.

Dinner will be provided to participants. Please RSVP so that Zephyr can plan accordingly. If, for any reason, you find yourself unable to attend after registering, please let us know so that we can update our headcount.

Questions about this event can be directed to Landon Hobbs (lhobbs@zephyr.org).

About the speaker

Landon Hobbs is Research Fellow and Director of Academic Programming at the Zephyr Institute. His research area is Ancient Greek philosophy, with a focus on Aristotle’s metaphysics, especially Aristotle’s understanding of causality and his use of causal principles. Landon came to Zephyr in 2023 after completing his PhD in Philosophy at Stanford.

Eligibility

All Stanford students are eligible to participate in this event.