Blessed is our G-d the Eternal, the G-d of our forefathers, who has caused us to live and sustained us, in the full meaning of these words, and has brought us to this time, wherein we may present the entire House of Israel with the masterpiece of Mishneh Torah in an elegant, clear and thoroughly proof-read edition, as far as we could make it so, as it issued from the hands of our sacred Rabbi, Moshe son of Mimon, the illuminator of darkness, the Great Eagle (The Mimonides was given the name "Great Eagle" on account of the great scope of matters surveyed from his great height, while maintaining a clear and sharp gaze capable of distinguishing all aspects of reality. (This name probably originates from the prophetic description that corresponds to the image of the Rambam in Ezekiel XVII, 3: "...A great eagle with great wings, long-winged, full of feathers...”.). A heavenly treatise of Torah splendor, in all its magnificence and glory, the likes of which has never been, neither before nor since. A work of total perfection: In scope of subjects, in perfect classification and order, in its polished language and in the precision of the description and formulation.
More than once, we find the Rambam admiring the precise and comprehensive formulations of the Sages of the Mishna; How with sparse language and single words, they contrived to express one of life's deep and total issues, which the Rambam himself required a number of chapters to elucidate. His wonderful words on this matter, presented at the end of the fifth chapter of his introduction to his interpretation of the Mishnah in Avot, constitute an equally valid description of his own tractate of "Mishneh Torah":
“The Sages, may they rest in peace, have already included this entire matter within the shortest possible saying, and have comprehensively and totally dealt with the entire issue, so that when you look at the brevity of their words, how they have encapsulated the entirety of this great and enormous issue, regarding which others have written many words without encompassing it completely, you know without any shadow of a doubt that these are divine words".
No one confronting this impressive work of Torah can remain unmoved by the perfection of its results and the method by which it was executed: The enterprise of a single man, whose nature was already known during his own lifetime through the publication of his “interpretation of the Mishnah”. A person who also devoted much of his time to leading a community and giving Torah lessons, without helpers and within an unbelievably short time, just 10 ten years, or event within 14 years(!);(As estimated by Rabbi Kapakh in his introduction the “Guide to the Perplexed”, page 21.) This simply could not be achieved without divine help.
In his introduction to the “Mishneh Torah”, the Rambam interprets the meaning of the title (Introduction, 39). It seems that the verses with which the present introduction opens, which address the obligation of a king to write a second Torah book, must have been before our Rabbi, and the selection of this name: "Mishneh Torah" assumes an additional meaning: The book of kings intended for the sons of kings, and "all of Israel are sons of kings".(As stated by Rabbi Shimon in the Mishnah Tractate of Shabbat, 15, 4. And it is there that the Rambam comments: "Halacha is as Rabbi Shimon says...".)
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