ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses particularism, pluralism, and liberty in a manner that uses some resources to be found in Maimonides. In a good deal theorizing the understanding of liberty has been largely driven by the view that there are universally endorsable principles that are accessible to any rational agent. Political theory may regard religious commitment as one of those options permissible in pursuit of a good life, as long as the mode of commitment satisfies the theory’s criteria of legitimate activity. Judaism can support a liberal polity, while at the same time sustaining commitments that it takes to be more important than liberty. Judaism, as Maimonides understood it, is a way of eliminating the evils of idolatry; that is, the evils of worshipping and taking guidance from false sources of good and truth. Liberal theory would be more plausible if it were true that politics is what people take to be fundamental.
