Maimonides (Rambam) and Ravad
The Ravad's criticism of the Rambam's code of Jewish law, the Mishneh Torah, is very harsh. This was not due to personal feeling, but to radical differences of view in matters of faith between the two greatest Talmudists of the twelfth century.
The Rambam's aim was to bring order into the vast labyrinth of the Halakha by presenting final results in a definite, systematic, and methodical manner. But in the opinion of the Ravad this very aim was the principal defect of the work. A legal code that did not state the sources and authorities from which its decisions were derived, and offered no proofs of the correctness of its statements, was, in the opinion of the Ravad, entirely unreliable, even in the practical religious life, for which purpose the Rambam designed it.
Such a code, he considered, could be justified only if written by a man claiming infallibility - by one who could demand that his assertions be accepted without question. If it had been the intention of the Rambam to stem the further development of the study of the Talmud by reducing it to the form of a code, the Ravad felt it his duty to oppose such an attempt, as contrary to the free spirit of rabbinical Judaism, which refuses to surrender blindly to authority.
Read more about this topic: Abraham Ben David