Thesis 11>2
Latin
Quicquid dicant alii cabaliste, ego partem speculatiuam cabalae quadruplicem diuiderem, conrespondenter quadruplici partitioni philosophiae quam ego solitus sum affere. Prima est scientia quam ego uoco alphabetariae reuolutionis, conrespondentem parti philosophiae quam ego philosophiam catholicam uoco. Secunda, tertia, et quarta pars est triplex merchiaua, conrespondentes triplici philosophiae particularis, de diuinis, de mediis, et sensibilibus naturis.
OCR repairs: Farmer's 'partition:' read as 'partitioni', as Wirszubski prints it (wirszubski1989:6943); the underscore after 'philosophiae' is an OCR artifact (farmer1998:26386). Farmer's 'affere' is kept; Wirszubski prints 'afferre' (wirszubski1989:6944). Wirszubski prints 'conrespondentes' for Farmer's 'conrespondenter' and 'particulari' for Farmer's 'particularis' (wirszubski1989:6943; wirszubski1989:6947). The 1486 print reads 'alphabecariae', the 1487 'alphabecarie' and 'merchiana' (farmer1998:26402).
English
Let the other Cabalists say what they will: I would split the speculative part of Cabala four ways, answering to the fourfold partition of philosophy I am accustomed to put forward. The first is the science I name that of alphabetic revolution, answering to the part of philosophy I name catholic philosophy. The second, third and fourth part is the threefold merkavah, answering to the threefold particular philosophy: of divine, of middle and of sensible natures. unverified draft
'alphabetariae reuolutionis': Pico's own name for the ars combinandi, the art of combining letters, as he states in the Apology (wirszubski1989:6958). 'merchiaua' transliterates merkavah, the Divine Chariot (wirszubski1989:6954). 'catholicam' is left as 'catholic': Copenhaver asks whether it means universal or Catholic, noting that 'catholica' contrasts here with 'particularis' (copenhaver2019:18050).
Doctrine
The thesis divides the speculative part of Cabala, which 11>1 identifies as the science of names, into four parts matched to Pico's fourfold division of philosophy (farmer1998:26383; farmer1998:26412). The first part, the revolution of the alphabet, is in Farmer's reading Pico's anagrammatic method of reading the Torah, apparently the ars combinandi of the Apology (farmer1998:26408). Wirszubski confirms from the Apology that Pico meant by alphabetaria revolutio the art of combining letters (wirszubski1989:6958). It answers to a catholic philosophy, which Farmer glosses as reasoning from cosmic proportion or correspondences (farmer1998:26412). The other three parts form one threefold merkavah, the Divine Chariot of Ezekiel's vision, matched to particular philosophy of divine, middle and sensible natures (wirszubski1989:6950; busi2014:19995). Farmer judges the most natural reading of the three to be the intellectual, animate and corporeal realms, while warning from 28.22 that Pico recognized many orders of chariots (farmer1998:26414). Whether Pico classed gematria, the reading of words through the numerical values of their letters, within this speculative part Farmer leaves open (farmer1998:26410).
unverified draft
Context
Wirszubski finds only one book among the translations Pico used in which merkavah and letter-combination are inseparably linked: Abraham Abulafia's De secretis legis, a mystical reading of Maimonides' Guide through the letter-combining method of the Sefer Yesirah, the Book of Creation (wirszubski1989:6964; wirszubski1989:6977). There the work of the chariot and the revolution of the Law are equated by gematria, both totalling 682 (wirszubski1989:6989). Wirszubski argues that Pico's alphabetaria revolutio was modelled on Abulafia's revolutio legis, which accounts for its universal and speculative character (wirszubski1989:7013). For the threefold chariot he turns to the sefirot: 11>50 places the seventh and eighth sefirot in a lower merkavah, so the chariots must be triads of sefirot, and Azriel of Gerona had read the three triads as intellect, soul and nature (wirszubski1989:7047; wirszubski1989:7084). Busi proposes instead Joseph Gikatilla's Sha'are orah, which calls the three verses of Exodus 14:19-21 that yield the name of seventy-two the three well-known chariots, and Recanati, who copied Gikatilla and assigned each verse to a sefirah (busi2014:19999; busi2014:20028). The seventy-two-letter name is formed from those three verses of seventy-two letters each, read as seventy-two names of three letters, as the Bahir that Pico had in Latin explains (busi2014:20003; busi2014:20047). Busi adds that no Jewish source he knows speaks of divine, middle and sensible natures in connection with the three chariots (busi2014:20032).
unverified draft
Reception
The thesis was not censured; Blum notes that the Cabalistic theses of this set went unchallenged (dougherty2008:2808). Francesco Giorgio, whose commentary on Pico's Cabalistic theses is dated 1539, matched the catholic philosophy of this thesis to metaphysics, the knowledge of all abstract quiddities, in the passage Blum quotes from Wirszubski's edition (dougherty2008:2912; dougherty2008:2930).
unverified draft
Historiography
Farmer grants that Wirszubski's reading of the chariots as triads of sefirot may coincide with medieval usage but holds that it conflicts sharply with Pico's thesis, whose Latin he says Wirszubski misreads, and reads Pico's opening disclaimer as a rejection of traditional views of the chariots (farmer1998:26419). Busi observes that Wirszubski found no Kabbalistic passage naming three merkavot and suggests that the texts of Gikatilla and Recanati escaped him (busi2014:20073). Busi also reads the whole classification as Parisian, scholastic in structure rather than Jewish, and holds that Wirszubski's Hebrew and Aramaic tools work on it only in part (busi2014:20089; busi2014:20104). Blum, in the Dougherty volume, reads the hierarchy as placing a universal science above theology, and notes that Giorgio did not reconcile 11>2 with 11>3, which make metaphysics and theology speculative in one place and practical in the other (dougherty2008:2896; dougherty2008:2952). Copenhaver suggests that Pico's triple chariot was probably modelled on the chariots in Recanati (copenhaver2019:18113). Howlett finds the division not necessarily very meaningful up close, since in practice Pico moves among the sefirot, number and letter play, and parables (howlett2021:5415). The editor's inference: Pico here lays a scholastic map of the sciences over Kabbalistic terms that no single Jewish source supplies, which is why each modern reader has found a different source for it (busi2014:20033; wirszubski1989:7043).
unverified draft
Pico's sources
- Abraham Abulafia, De secretis legis (Latin by Mithridates), linking the work of the chariot with the revolution of the Law: model for alphabetaria revolutio, according to Wirszubski (wirszubski1989:6964)
- Azriel of Gerona, Quaestiones super decem numerationibus, three triads of sefirot as intellect, soul and nature: supports Wirszubski's triadic reading of the threefold chariot (wirszubski1989:7087)
- Joseph Gikatilla, Sha'are orah, and Menahem Recanati, commentary on the Torah: the three verses of Exodus 14:19-21 as three chariots: Busi's proposed source for the threefold chariot (busi2014:19999)
Quotations cited
- “triplex merchiava is a triadic configuration of sefirot” — Chaim Wirszubski, Pico della Mirandola's Encounter with Jewish Mysticism (wirszubski1989:7052)
- “Nessuna delle fonti ebraiche che conosciamo parla però” — Giulio Busi and Raphael Ebgi, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola: Mito, magia, Qabbalah (busi2014:20032)
- “not necessarily very meaningful up close” — Sophia Howlett, Re-evaluating Pico: Aristotelianism, Kabbalism, and Platonism in the Philosophy of Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (howlett2021:5416)
Not established
- Which misreading of the Latin Farmer attributes to Wirszubski; the visible differences are 'conrespondentes' against 'conrespondenter' and 'particulari' against 'particularis', but Farmer does not say which he means.
- Whether Pico classed gematria with the revolution of the alphabet (Farmer leaves it open).
- Whether Pico knew Gikatilla's Sha'are orah directly; Busi asserts reading of the Bahir and of Recanati, not of that work.
Discussed in
- Crofton Black, Pico's Heptaplus and Biblical Hermeneutics (2006)
- Giulio Busi and Raphael Ebgi, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola: Mito, magia, Qabbalah (2014)
- M. V. Dougherty (ed.), Pico della Mirandola: New Essays (2008)
- Sophia Howlett, Re-evaluating Pico: Aristotelianism, Kabbalism, and Platonism in the Philosophy of Giovanni Pico della Mirandola (2021)
- (author to be confirmed from front matter), Erkenntnistheorie und christliche Kabbalah: Das Paradigma des Pico della Mirandola (n.d.)
- Chaim Wirszubski, Pico della Mirandola's Encounter with Jewish Mysticism (1989)
Farmer's cross-references
- 11>50 Cum dicunt cabalistae a septima et octaua petendos filios, ita dicas in merchiaua inferiori accipi, ut ab una petatur ut det, ab altera ne p
- 11>68 Qui sciuerit quid sit denarius in Arithmetica formali, et cognouerit naturam primi numeri spherici, sciet illud quod ego adhuc apud aliquem
- 23.4 Elementa in octo coeli corporibus coelesti modo bis inueniuntur, quae quis inueniet si retrogrado ordine in illa bina numeratione processeri
- 28.22 Licet fiat multiplex coordinatio curruum, tamen inquantum attinet ad phylacteriorum mysterium duo sunt currus ordinandi, ita ut ex secunda,
- 3>53 Qui primam materiam negat, nec sensui contradicit, nec rationem physicam negat.
- 3>54 Ad probandum primam materiam esse, magis certificat uel uia numerorum, uel uia catholicae philosophiae, quam ulla ratio physica in qua sensu
- 7a>10 Quomodo elementa sint in caelo.
- 8>14 Per dictum illud Zoroastris, adhuc tres dies sacrificabitis et non ultra, apparuit mihi per arithmeticam superioris merchiaue illos computan