  Maimonides' own sensitivity to the effectiveness and necessity of couching ideas in imaginative images — and, as such, the efficacy of giving voice to truth always indirectly — can help us understand (and, can afford philosophical significance to) what seems to be Maimonides' own indirect (and sometimes, as we have seen in the case of creation, downright confusing) manner of expressing himself in the Guide. Relatedly, Maimonides' sensitivity to the effectiveness of indirectly expressing truths can help us see philosophical significance in his own use of metaphors and parables, as well as his allegorical interpretations of the Bible throughout the Guide. In fact, Maimonides himself expresses the importance of allegory through his own allegorical rendering of the Proverbs 25:11 idea that “A word fitly spoken is like golden apples in silver filigree casings” (“tapūḥēy zahav bi-maskīyyōt kesef, davar davūr al afnav”) (G Intro, P 11). Here, following in the spirit of al-Farabi's Platonic “gentle physician” (see above) who “offers the sick man the drugs that are useful to him in his familiar and appetizing food ” (PL 92), Maimonides is sensitive to the importance of hiding truth (gold) in more familiar (silver) garb—garb which, also following al-Farabi above—must be attractive and fanciful (silver filigree) so as to impress itself upon the imagination of the average person. The truths which Maimonides seeks to reveal with this image are manifold: sometimes, in order to do service to the golden truth, one must craft delicate silver casings (viz., allegories, parables, stories, metaphors, and other effective uses of language); these ‘casings’ are filigreed—incredibly difficult to make, as well as extremely beautiful and tempting to look at; these casings cover the golden core reality (which is to say, allegories hide the truth in itself), and yet, they allow onlookers to catch a glimpse—through the filigree's apertures—of the very golden core which they cover; and, finally, in at once hiding and revealing the true center, these filigree casings of silver are not themselves gold: where gold stands for truth, we may say that these filigree casings of silver are not themselves truth. Where the casings are the allegories, parables, and other methods employed by the Lawgiver (in the Bible and in other forms of religious guidance), the implication is that that many of the ideas of the Bible and of religion more generally (as, for example, anthropomorphic descriptions of God as sitting, standing, talking, willing, etc.) are not actually true. They are, rather, delicate craftings (even: works of art) designed to captivate the interests of average people and, in this way, lead them to living in accordance with the truth.