This audiobook is narrated by an AI Voice.
Ovadia Sforno was a rabbi, physician, exegete, and philosopher, and one of the last great Jewish scholastics. His forgotten masterpiece, Lumen Gentium (Light of the Peoples), brought the classical methods of Aristotle to bear on universal questions. Written at the urging of Pope Julius II and dedicated to King Henry II of France, this masterpiece stands as a rare monument at the very dawn of the Counter-Reformation. It bridges the intellectual worlds of Athens and Jerusalem to resolve the apparent contradictions between Aristotle’s metaphysics and biblical faith. Sforno masterfully illuminates classical concepts that become intelligible through analogies from the poetic and rhetorical language of the Hebrew Bible. For example:
Tohu va-Bohu (formless chaos) represents Aristotle's prime matter, pure potentiality devoid of form or determined characteristics from which cosmic order emerges.
Ruach Elohim (the Spirit of God) represents the immaterial celestial movers, the active principles of the world's intelligibility.
Yad Hashem (the hand of God) serves as the Hebrew parallel to Atlas, the bearer of the heavens, charged with preventing cosmic collapse.
Nishmat Chayyim (the breath of life) represents the immortal intellective soul, uniquely endowed in the 'image of God' with free will.
The translation adheres to the precise Latin terminology found in Sforno’s authoritative philosophical sources, restores the semantic precision of the original text, and integrates Sforno’s original pagination, allowing scholars to easily cross-reference the translation with the original Latin edition. The Henry II Edition of Lumen Gentium is a must-read for scholars of philosophy, theology, and readers seeking to explore the timeless conversation between faith and reason.