著者

手島 勲矢

出版者

宗教哲学会

雑誌

宗教哲学研究 (ISSN:02897105)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.28, pp.1-15, 2011 (Released:2019-09-18)

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Since the time of Aristobulus and Philo of Alexandria, through the age of Moses Maimonides and Judah Halevy, Jewish thought has always developed within both sympathies and antipathies with Greek philosophy. This paper will argue that the ambivalent postures of Jewish thought to Greek philosophy has not only cultural motives but also a logical base in Jewish understanding of human language, which tends to appreciate the “private name” which is for calling one another in the speech of I-Thou, more than the “proper name” for identifying an object as “It” in the general analysis of philosophy. The claim is inspired by the theory of Abraham Ibn Ezra, a Hebrew grammarian in the 12th Century, who distinguishes two kinds of name, i.e., shem ha-etzem (the name of substance) which is the private name used to recognize the only one as unique irreplaceable being, and shem ha-toar (the name of appearance) which is to signify the groups, the types, or the kinds of things by observation of similarities and dissimilarities. Ibn Ezra understands that the reality can not be truly grasped except addressing it as unique with shem ha-etzem, whereas he explains shem ha-toar as a name expressing the imaginative side of reality as perceived by human sense and reason, therefore, connoting the semantic hollowness of generalization by human language. Because of this distinction of the two names, the paper will maintain that Jewish thought reaches the explanations of the world, human, and God as different from those of Greek philosophy, since the latter emphasizes more on the importance of the general name for identifying kinds and types which human language creates about phenomena, while Jewish thought tends to respect more the other name which functions to recognize not only God but everyone of human being as unique and only one in the universe.