Summa Metaphysica proposes a comprehensive and
integrated metaphysical structure – a new paradigm.
Summa I: God and Evil: Religious Man (published 1988)
and Summa II: God and Good: Spiritual Man (first launched
2005 online) comprise Birnbaum's Summa Metaphysica
series. The author has proposed that one fundamental
concept – and one fundamental concept alone – Quest
for Potential8 (recursive to the infinite power) – ignited –
and drives – the cosmos – and the integral infinite divine.
Building upon his 1988 treatise, in Summa II: God
and Good: Spiritual Man (17 years later) the author
lays out his overarching metaphysical structure in very
significantly greater scope, depth, breadth and texture.
Summa III: The Transcendent Dynamic: Secular Man offers
a metaphysics for 'Everyman' – de-linked from any spirituality
or religious aspects. It might best be classified as 'scientific
metaphysics'. It Is anchored In a creative finesse of science and logic.
Birnbaum's paradigm is non–linear, as opposed to the
linearity of the great bulk of Western philosophy. It is non–
circular, as opposed to the circularity of much of Eastern
philosophy. Rather, Birnbaum's paradigm is what the author
refers to as a "spiral/reflexive" dynamic (elucidated in the
text). The author proposes that this Quest for Potential8
paradigm more elegantly explains the dynamics of the cosmos
– and of life, in particular – than alternate propositions.
According to Birnbaum, only the full plethora of potentials
– and the quest thereof – could have ignited the cosmos.
The combined potentials for love, life, intellectuality,
spirituality and, indeed, for an infinitely Perfect Divine,
ignited, birthed, nurtured, and projected the cosmos
onward on its quest towards infinity. 'Extraordinariation,'
according to the author, is the overarching goal.
Thomas Aquinas wrote Summa Theologica c. 1273 within a
Christian context. The Summa Metaphysica series, proposing
an original, dynamic, overarching, and integrated metaphysics,
is crafted within a Jewish context seven hundred years later.
