 The decade that Strauss spent at the New School was arguably the most productive, and certainly the most pivotal, of his intellectual career. In his first years at the New School, Strauss published the seminal essays that would become the book Persecution and the Art of Writing, published in 1952. In these essays, Strauss argued that, when reading certain pre-modern thinkers, it is necessary to read between the lines. The possibility of persecution gives rise to a certain type of writing that allows one set of the readers, the majority, to receive one message while allowing a second set of readers, the philosophical elite, to take away another message. While this type of writing is often referred to as “esoteric,” it is more properly understood as “exoteric,” that is, writing that outwardly veils a secret teaching of some sort. For Strauss, Maimonides, Judah Halevi, and Spinoza were all exoteric writers. Despite the profound differences between them, Maimonides and Spinoza both outwardly teach that philosophy and revelation are reconcilable with one another. Yet, according to Strauss, the careful reader will notice that their respective arguments actually suggest the opposite: that philosophy and revelation are in fact irreconcilable. Halevi, on the other hand, outwardly teaches that philosophy and revelation are irreconcilable. But whereas Halevi’s dismissal of philosophy in the face of revelation seems to suggest that philosophy is not a challenge for revelation, Strauss argues that the careful reader will notice that Halevi’s argument in fact suggests the opposite: that philosophy is not just a challenge for revelation but a supremely dangerous one.