The Meshiv Devarim Nekhohim, Book of Adequate Response, was written in the 13th Century by the Kabbalist Jacob ben Sheshet: in it he rejects the work of philosopher Samuel Ibn Tibbon: The Ma’amar Yikkawou ha-Mayim (Discourse on the Gathering of the waters) disputes Maimonidian rationalism, based on the thought of Aristotle, an omnipresent feature of the Guide for the Perplexed. The Book of Adequate Response represents a crossroads in the philosophical and theological thinking common to the first half of the 13th Century. The divergence of ideas between Jacob ben Sheshet and Maimonides concerns cosmology and numerous other notions: angels, the divine Throne, prophecy, miracles. It is clear that The Book of Adequate Response brings together ideas from a wide variety of origins, from writing, the five books of the Torah, the Prophets and Hagiography, the Talmud and Midrash as well as those of Pirke De-Rabbi Eliézer, written in around 830. The author sets out ideas originating from Gnosticism, through the Sefer HaBahir (Book of Clarity), compiled in Provence between 1150 and 1200 and also the theosophical Languedoc Kabbalah by Abraham ben David, Rabed and Isaac the Blind. The book also inspires the cosmology of the Sefer Yetzirah (Book of Creation).
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