THE following question might perhaps be asked: Since there is no
possibility of obtaining a knowledge of the true essence of God, and
since it has also been proved that the only thing that man can
apprehend of Him is the fact that He exists, and that all positive
attributes are inadmissible, as has been shown, what is the difference
among those who have obtained a knowledge of God? Must not the
knowledge obtained by our teacher Moses, and by Solomon, be the same
as that obtained by any one of the lowest class of philosophers, since
there can be no addition to this knowledge? But, on the other hand, it
is generally accepted among theologians and also among philosophers,
that there can be a great difference between two persons as regards
the knowledge of God obtained by them. Know that this is really the
case, that those who have obtained a knowledge of God differ greatly
from each other; for in the same way as by each additional attribute
an object is more specified, and is brought nearer to the true
apprehension of the observer, so by each additional negative attribute
you advance toward the knowledge of God, and you are nearer to it than
he who does not negative, in reference to God, those qualities which
you are convinced by proof must be negatived. There may thus be a man
who after having earnestly devoted many years to the pursuit of one
science, and to the true understanding of its principles, till he is
fully convinced of its truths, has obtained as the sole result of this
study the conviction that a certain quality must be negatived in
reference to God, and the capacity of demonstrating that it is
impossible to apply it to Him. Superficial thinkers will have no proof
for this, will doubtfully ask, Is that thing existing in the Creator,
or not? And those who are deprived of sight will positively ascribe it
to God, although it has been clearly shown that He does not possess
it. E.g., while I show that God is incorporeal, another doubts and is
not certain whether He is corporeal or incorporeal: others even
positively declare that He is corporeal, and appear before the Lord
with that belief. Now see how great the difference is between these
three men: the first is undoubtedly nearest to the Almighty; the
second is remote, and the third still more distant from Him. If there
be a fourth person who holds himself convinced by proof that emotions
are impossible in God, while the first who rejects the corporeality,
is not convinced of that impossibility, that fourth person is
undoubtedly nearer the knowledge of God than the first, and go on, so
that a person who, convinced by proof, negatives a number of things in
reference to God, which according to our belief may possibly be in Him
or emanate from Him, is undoubtedly a more perfect man than we are,
and would surpass us still more if we positively believed these things
to be properties of God. It will now be clear to you, that every time
you establish by proof the negation of a thing in reference to God,
you become more perfect, while with every additional positive
assertion you follow your imagination and recede from the true
knowledge of God. Only by such ways must we approach the knowledge of
God, and by such researches and studies as would show us the
inapplicability of what is inadmissible as regards the Creator, not by
such methods as would prove the necessity of ascribing to Him anything
extraneous to His essence, or asserting that He has a certain
perfection, when we find it to be a perfection in relation to us. The
perfections are all to some extent acquired properties, and a property
which must be acquired does not exist in everything capable of making
such acquisition.
You must bear in mind, that by affirming anything of God, you are
removed from Him in two respects; first, whatever you affirm, is only
a perfection in relation to us; secondly, He does not possess anything
superadded to this essence; His essence includes all His perfections,
as we have shown. Since it is a well-known fact that even that
knowledge of God which is accessible to man cannot be attained except
by negations, and that negations do not convey a true idea of the
being to which they refer, all people, both of past and present
generations, declared that God cannot be the object of human
comprehension, that none but Himself comprehends what He is, and that
our knowledge consists in knowing that we are unable truly to
comprehend Him.
(Friedlander translation)