After leading public burnings of a book by this thinker, the author of The Gates of Repentance vowed to bow before his grave for seven straight days. The third section of a modern philosopher’s Persecution and the Art of Writing characterizes this thinker as a “closet atheist.” This thinker developed his view of the heavens by analyzing a passage describing four four-faced animals seen in a vision of a chariot. This author rejected an ancient thinker’s principle that the universe is (*) eternal after listing twenty-six of that thinker’s principles in a book that rejects kalam’s account of creation. This thinker used negative theology in a book addressed to his student Joseph ben Judah that aimed to reconcile Aristotelianism with Jewish theology. For 10 points, name this Jewish author of Guide for the Perplexed and the Mishneh Torah. ■END■
ANSWER: Moses Maimonides [or Moses ben Maimon; or Moshe ben Maimon; accept Rambam] (The Gates of Repentance is by Yonah Gerondi. Persecution and the Art of Writing is by Leo Strauss.)
<Aum Mundhe, Philosophy>
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