- Lived:
- c. 1021–c. 1058 · al-Andalus (Muslim Spain): born in Málaga, raised in Zaragoza, died in Valencia
- Tradition:
- Jewish Neoplatonism, flowering inside the Arabic-speaking golden age of Andalusian Jewry
- The Big Idea:
- Everything that exists except God — even angels and souls — is built of matter and form; and the universe pours out of God not because it must, but because God wills it.
- In their words:
- "Thou art One, but not like a unit to be grasped or counted... Thou existest, but hearing of ear cannot reach Thee, nor vision of eye." — from Keter Malkhut (Zangwill's translation)
- If you remember one thing:
- For six hundred years, Christian Europe studied the philosophy of a mysterious "Avicebron," assuming he was a Muslim or a Christian — never guessing he was the Jewish poet whose hymn is still sung in synagogues every Yom Kippur. One man, split in two by translation, reunited by detective work in 1846.