Jehuda ha-Lewi o poglądach filozofów na temat duszy. Księga Kuzari, rozdz. V, 10–14 – próba przekładu i interpretacji
Judah Halevi on Philosophers’ Views of the Soul. The Book of the Kuzari, Chapter V, 10-14, Attempt at Translation and Interpretation

Summary/Abstract: In sections 10 and 15 of the fifth chapter of The Book of the Kuzari, Judah Halevi offers a summary of Arabic philosophers’ (al-falasifa) views on the human soul in order to submit them to critique. He puts them in a mouth of a Jewish sage debating with the Khazar king. The critique of philosophers’ opinions surprises the Khazar king, who seemingly had already accepted their arguments. In his description of philosophers’ views, Halevi summarizes and paraphrases an early treatise by Avicenna, Compendium of the Soul (Al-maqala fi an-nafs), without however mentioning the source. The argument of the author of The Book of the Kuzari is mostly of Aristotelian character, nonetheless in his description of cognitive psychological process as a connection between synthesis (tarkib) and analysis (tahlil) Platonic traces can also be found, whereas in his accepting of the divine emanation (al-fayd al-ilahi) as one of the sources of knowledge – Neoplatonic ones. In addition, while arguing against the opinions of philosophers, Halevi draws from the thought of al-Ghazali, who devoted his famous work Incoherence of Philosophers (Tahafut al-falasifa) to this subject. The aim of this article is to present a Polish translation of the relevant excerpt of The Book of the Kuzari introduced by a concise discussion of its key features and Halevi’s Arabic sources.

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