Jewish Stars in Texas: Rabbis and Their Work Book

Although the book gave some interesting anecdotes about Maimonides, its lack of references allows it to only make precarious claims. The book outlines his life corresponding to his major writings, but its main focus is the life of Maimonides and not the texts he wrote. If you want a brief outline of an attempt to formalize the life and development of Maimonides as a person without any deep reflection on his philosophical and theological writings, then you might enjoy the book. I can't really speak about the section dealing with Maimonides medical writings since I don't really know much about the topic (and since there are no sources, I can't really take his word for it either). I find this to be an odd approach to Maimonides since we really don't know that much about his life, but we have a ton of sources to help us understand his philosophical, theological and medical positions.
In the last chapter of the book Nuland makes a claim tantamount to saying that Maimonides is not so much remembered in the Jewish world for his writings as much as he is remembered as a leader of his community and a promoter of the continuation of Judaism. As someone who grew up in an Orthodox Jewish community, I have never encountered anyone who made such a claim about Maimonides, nor have I ever encountered any in writing (excluding this book). When one pronounces Maimonides name, most people think of the Guide for the Perplexed, and when one calls out Rambam (acronym for Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon) one usually thinks of the Mishnah Torah, as well as the commentary on the mishna and Perek Chelek. Maimonides has had an enormous influence on Judaism, and arguably more than any other single individual. The texts he wrote seem to have, in my opinion, a paramount importance to his influence of Judaism. Although I find it to be an interesting thesis, the claim that Maimonides had more impact on generations of Jews as a inspirational Jewish leader as opposed to a theological, it seems to be unfounded in my opinion.