ctrine that man acts always under the
compulsion of external and internal forces. In opposition to this theory
is one incontestable fact, our own inner sense of freedom which tells us
at every step that _we_ have acted, and at every decision that we have
decided. Man can maintain his own power of self-determination against all
influences from without and within; his will is the final arbiter over
every impulse and every pressure. Moreover, as we penetrate more deeply
into the working of the mind, we see that a long series of our own
voluntary acts has occasioned much that we consider external, that the
very pressure of the past on our thoughts, feelings and habits, which
leaves so little weight for the decision of the moment, is really only our
past will influencing our present will. That is, the will may determine
itself, but it does not do so arbitrarily; its action is along the lines
of its own character. We have the power to receive the influence of either
the noble or the ignoble series of impressions, and thus to yield either
to the lofty or the low impulses of the soul.

In this way the rabbis interpret various expressions of Scripture which
would seem to limit man's freedom, as where God induces man to good or
evil acts, or hardens the heart of Pharaoh so that he will not let the
Israelites go, until the plagues had been fulfilled upon him and his
people.(724) They understand in such an instance that a man's heart has a
prevailing inclination toward right or wrong, the expression of his
character, and that God encouraged this inclination along the evil course;
thus the freedom of the human will was kept intact.

7. The doctrine of man's free will presents another difficulty from the
side of divine omniscience. For if God knows in advance what is to happen,
then man's acts are determined by this very foreknowledge; he is no longer
free, and his moral responsibility becomes an idle dream. In order to
escape this dilemma, the Mohammedan theologians were compelled to limit
either the divine omniscience or human freedom, and most of them resorted
to the latter method. It is characteristic of Judaism that its great
thinkers, from Saadia to Maimonides and Gersonides,(725) dared not alter
the doctrine of man's free will and moral responsibility, but even
preferred to limit the divine omniscience. Hisdai Crescas is the only one
to restrict human freedom in favor of the foreknowledge of God.(726)

8. The insistence of Ju