Conclusion: Mishneh Torah as Parable

This chapter studies Mishneh torah as a great parable that is not explicitly identified as such. In the introduction to The Guide of the Perplexed, Maimonides chooses Jacob's dream of the ladder with the angels ascending and descending to illustrate the complex type of parable that is significant in all its details, as opposed to parables that are significant only in outline. He thus announces the centrality of this parable to his vision. In its later appearances in the Guide, it serves to concentrate that book's ideas in the realms of physics, metaphysics, and prophecy. Mishneh torah embodies all that Jacob's dream stands for in the Guide. Ultimately, the form of Mishneh torah in the literary sense is a parabolic representation of the form of the commandments in the technical, philosophical sense.