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butes, what could be the meaning of the tetragrammaton, about which Maimonides has so much to say? If it expressed a negative at- tribute, why was its meaning kept so secret? Crescas's own view is that there are positive attributes, and that there is a relation between God and his creatures, though not a similarity, as they are far apart, the one being a necessary existent, the other a possible existent; one being infinite, the other finite. 391

We must now try to show that God is one in the sense that there are no other Gods besides. We may proceed as follows: If there are two Gods, one of them controls only part of the world or he does not control it at all. The first is impossible because the unitary world must be due to one agent. But there may be more than one world and hence more than one agent. This is, however, answered by the thought that being infinite in power one could control them all. There is still another alternative, viz., that one agent controls the whole world and the other does nothing. Here speculation can go no further, and we must have recourse to Scripture, which says, "Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God, the Lord is One.” 392 We see here that Crescas is interested in discrediting the logic chopping of the philosophers. No merely logical argument, is his idea, can give us absolute certainty even in so fundamental a doctrine as the unity of God. Like Judah Halevi, Crescas took his inspiration from Algazali, whose point of view appealed to him more than that of Maimonides and Gersonides, who may be classed with Alfarabi, Avicenna and Averroes.

Having discussed the fundamental principles of all religion and philosophy, namely, the existence and nature of God, Crescas next takes up the following six fundamental dogmas of Judaism, God's knowledge of existing things, Providence, Power, Prophecy, Freedom, Purpose.

There are three things to be remembered in the matter of God's knowledge. He knows the infinite, for he knows particulars. He knows the non-existent, as he knows the future; and his knowledge of the contingent does not remove its contingent character. Mai- monides and Gersonides had difficulty with this problem and we know their respective solutions. Gersonides, for reasons metaphysical as well as ethical, does not scruple to limit God's knowledge to universals. Maimonides endeavors to reconcile the dilemma by throwing the