The Status of Logical Reasoning – Lesson 2 – Rabbi Michael Avraham

This transcript was produced automatically using artificial intelligence. There may be inaccuracies in the transcribed content and in speaker identification.

🔗 Link to the original lecture

🔗 Link to the transcript on Sofer.AI

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Public… resolution. Oh! Exactly. There the sin is only in the person and not in the object. In an inadvertent sin, the sin is in the object and not in the person. Those are two complementary pictures. Wait, what?

[Speaker C] Maimonides said he repented. He desecrated the Sabbath, I don’t know, ate pork, repented, went through Yom Kippur, everything gets erased for him. Not the essence.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Why Maimonides? What does this have to do with Maimonides? He becomes righteous. What does this have to do with Maimonides? Repentance does repair, yes. Through repentance you become righteous. After repentance you become righteous, that’s true. It has nothing to do with Maimonides; that’s Talmud, nobody disagrees with that.

[Speaker C] No, but here what he said—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] —that no, some of the things will remain for you in the object. No. Again.

[Speaker C] In the object that you did…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, no, no. No. Again, I’ll summarize even though this isn’t our topic, I only introduced the distinction here. The object remains, whether for good or for bad. The person changes, whether for good or for bad. That’s the law. But beyond the letter of the law, when you repair things for the good, they also erase for you the bad consequences in the object. Beyond the letter of the law, even though that’s not how it was supposed to be. The Holy One, blessed be He, cleans away all the dirt that you made. Here, on the bad side, that won’t happen. The good that you did will not be erased if you’ve now changed for the worse, because the Holy One, blessed be He, does not go beyond the letter of the law in order to do harm. All right. That’s it. Good, so regarding one who is commanded and performs versus one who is not commanded and performs. The Talmud says there, yes, “It was taught: From where do we know that even a gentile who engages in Torah is like a High Priest? Scripture says: ‘which a person shall do and live by them.’ It does not say priests, Levites, and Israelites, but rather ‘a person.’ From this you learn that even a gentile who engages in Torah is like a High Priest.” Yes. Even though we know that teaching Torah to gentiles is prohibited because it’s theft, yes, like their keeping the Sabbath. Is that a contradiction? Not necessarily. He is like a High Priest, it’s just forbidden for him to do it. He’s forbidden to be a High Priest. They say: they do not receive reward like one who is commanded and performs, but rather like one who is not commanded and performs. Yes, he is not commanded in Torah study; he receives reward like one who is not commanded and performs, as Rabbi Hanina said: greater is one who is commanded and performs than one who is not commanded and performs. Meaning, a Jew who studies Torah is greater than a gentile who studies Torah. A gentile is one who is not commanded and performs, and a Jew is one who is commanded and performs. A gentile is like a woman in principle.

[Speaker B] Is it possible to say that?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Here, not in the women’s seminary.

[Speaker B] And the essence and the reality… here this is the essence and the reality…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right, the essence is there, but the command is not. You are not responding to a command, because there is no command. So the Ritva writes as follows: “For Rabbi Hanina said: Greater is one who is commanded and does than one who is not commanded and does.” Our rabbis of blessed memory explained the reason for this: when he is commanded, the Satan prosecutes him, whereas this one is not prosecuted by the Satan, and “the reward is according to the pain.” That’s the standard explanation, right? That he has an inclination and all kinds of things of that sort. But our great teacher of blessed memory explained that the commandments are not for the benefit of the blessed God who commands, but in order to benefit us, and one who is commanded fulfills the decree of the King, and therefore his reward is greater than that of one who did not fulfill the King’s command. Even so, that person too deserves reward, for out of goodness of heart and piety he took it upon himself to perform the commandments of the blessed God—and specifically commandments that the blessed God commanded others, in which He has an interest. But one who on his own performs commandments that the Torah did not command at all—this is what they said: whoever is not commanded in a matter and does it is called a fool.

Why are women who fulfill positive commandments dependent on time not called fools? “Anyone exempt from a matter who does it is called a fool,” right? Why are women who sit in the sukkah not called fools? Someone who sits in the sukkah when it’s raining is a fool—the language of the Shulchan Arukh. And women who sit in the sukkah when it’s not raining—same thing, no? Exempt from the matter and does it is called a fool. If you invent a commandment that nobody is commanded in, and you do it, that’s foolishness. Okay? Now of course, if there is a rationale behind it, then no. If you invent a commandment without any rationale—if there’s a rationale, then you didn’t invent it; the rationale says so. Okay? I’m talking about inventions, not rationales.

So what is he actually saying here? He is really saying what “greater is one who is commanded and does” means according to the second explanation. What does “greater is one who is commanded and does” mean? Very simply—without little homiletic lines about the Satan prosecuting him and the evil inclination and things like that. “Greater is one who is commanded and does” means that one who is commanded and does has both benefits. He both obeyed the command and also attained the benefit of the commandment. One who is not commanded and does attained the benefit of the commandment, but he did not fulfill the command, because there was no command upon him. Therefore, greater is one who is commanded and does than one who is not commanded and does. Very straightforwardly, literally. You don’t need these psychologizing explanations one way or another. Okay, that is basically his claim.

And therefore he says: so what happens with positive commandments dependent on time that women choose to fulfill? Why is that different from a commandment I just make up out of nowhere? Sitting in the sukkah on Hanukkah, okay? Why there too is it not that one who is not commanded and does receives reward as one who is not commanded and does? Why not? That would be adding to the Torah. Why not? Because sitting in the sukkah does have a benefit. Right? The men were obligated, and that’s why. Women were not obligated for some reason. But the benefit probably exists for women too. So there is value in their doing it, because the benefit exists. They are not commanded, okay. But if nobody is commanded, that means it is an act without benefit, so what is the point of doing it? So here, certainly, not only is there no command, there is also no essence. There is nothing. It is worth nothing.

Like a blind person. What? Like a blind person who is exempt from commandments. Exempt—but he can do them, and it has value if he does them. So that is the Ritva. The same thing appears in Tosafot HaRosh, who writes as well there in tractate Kiddushin.

So if someone fulfills something from which he is exempt—he fulfills a rabbinic commandment—there’s nothing to that? Again? If someone who is exempt fulfills a rabbinic commandment, which is only command and not essence. Okay, you’re getting ahead of me. Okay. Sorry. Hello, hello, Tzniotzer. It’s more complicated, but when I get there.

Tosafot HaRosh writes like this there too in Kiddushin: “Greater is one who is commanded and does, even though in tractate Megillah the parable is about a king,” etc.—yes, “he worries and is distressed,” etc. “And additionally, the Holy One, blessed be He, needs nothing from all the commandments; rather, He says and His will is done. Therefore, one who is commanded and does is doing the will of his Creator. But one who is not commanded and does—it is not applicable to say about him that he is doing the will of his Creator, for He commanded him nothing. Even so, there is reward.”

Why is there reward? Because the act has value. It is an act of value. It’s just that the command is not upon you; you did not fulfill the command, right? They are both basically saying in the second explanation that “greater is one who is commanded and does” means that one who is commanded and does both fulfills the command and gains the benefit, and therefore he is greater. One who is not commanded and does gains the benefit, but there is no command upon him. Of course, the assumption is that the fact that he is not commanded is not because there is no benefit for him, but for other reasons. If the fact that he is not commanded is simply because for him there is no such benefit, then obviously there is no point in his doing it, right? The assumption is that the exemption is probably a side exemption—that is, it is not demanded of you, but if you do it, you too will benefit from it, or you too will produce benefit by doing it. It’s just that for some reason it was not required of you. If the fact that you are not commanded is simply because there is no benefit, then obviously there is no point in your doing it. It has no value.

The benefit is always in the object itself. What? The benefit is always in the object itself. So I’m saying: if there is benefit—if there is benefit, then there is value in his doing it even though he is not commanded. But if there is no benefit, then there is no point in his doing it. He is not commanded, and there is no benefit either, so what is the point of doing it—for him?

Is there someone who was not commanded? I don’t know—I was not commanded regarding the prohibition of impurity, right? A kohen was commanded. Okay. Is there any value in my not becoming impure? It depends. If you understand that impurity does not harm ordinary Israelites at all, but only kohanim, then there is no point in not becoming impure, right? There is no value at all. I was not commanded, and I gain no benefit from it, so there is no point. If you understand impurity in the usual way—that impurity really is something problematic for Israelites too, but that this level of avoiding impurity was required only of a kohen—then Israelites are not obligated, but if you avoid it, blessing will come upon you, because it is indeed something of value. And Rashi in several places on the Torah writes that there is value even for Israelites to avoid impurity, even though there is no prohibition.

Okay. Fine. So if that is so, now I’ll go back for a moment to the Tzelach. Basically the claim is this: in every commandment and every transgression there is an element of command and an element of essence. Now if reason tells us, say, to recite blessings of enjoyment—reason says one should make a blessing before eating. Okay. What does that mean? Then the Tzelach is right that this will not be Torah-level. Why? Now we already know how to formulate this: there is no command. On the other hand, what is this reason? What does it mean that there is a rationale? It means that the essence is there. That is, there is spiritual damage if you do not bless, or spiritual benefit if you do bless, right? The essence is there, only the command is not.

Okay. So the Tzelach says: Torah-level, it is not. The Pnei Yehoshua apparently also agrees that it is not Torah-level in the same sense as things that have a command upon them, because otherwise it is very hard to say such a thing—that there should be a positive commandment or a prohibition with no command at all, only reason. Would you get lashes for a prohibition without any command at all, only from reason? There is no such thing. It’s just that the Pnei Yehoshua argues that this is enough for a case of doubt to be treated stringently. Even if it is not Torah-level in the full sense, because there is no command about it, still reason says that there is spiritual harm or spiritual benefit here, and therefore the rule of doubt-stringency applies here too.

And why? Now I’ll spell it out a bit more. Why indeed are we stringent in cases of doubt? Let’s discuss it now according to the distinction I made earlier. In every prohibition—say, in a prohibition, yes? In every prohibition, because there are disputes about doubt in positive commandments, but with prohibitions one must be stringent. Okay. Why? When I violate a prohibition, there is both rebellion against the command and essence, right? Which of these two dimensions is responsible for the laws of doubt? Why must one be stringent—because of the command or because of the essence? The essence. How do you know? Intuitively it is obvious—it’s the essence.

And what you are basically saying is this: reason says as follows. If I do not know whether this is pork, okay? If I eat pork, then something problematic will happen—to me, to the world, whatever. Since if you are in doubt, there is a fifty-percent chance damage will occur, beware of it. That means the concern is about the consequences. In other words, what determines the rule that a Torah-level doubt is treated stringently is the essence, not the command.

What is the indication for this? And here I’m coming to your earlier comment: what happens with a rabbinic doubt? A rabbinic doubt is treated leniently. Why leniently? So several later authorities explain, each in his own style, that doubt in rabbinic law concerns the person, not the object. The Netivot—yes, the Netivot in section 234, for example—says that if someone violates a rabbinic prohibition unintentionally, he does not need repentance. Why? Because if he did it unintentionally, then no damage happened, since it is a rabbinic prohibition, and there was no rebellion, because he acted unintentionally—he did not know there was a command—so nothing happened, and he need not repent. That is how he explains a Talmudic passage in Eruvin.

The Talmud says that if one sees his teacher about to commit a transgression, then in a Torah-law case he first stops him and says, “Teach us, our rabbi—did you not tell us that such-and-such is the law?”—to warn him. In a rabbinic case, “first we let the act be done, and only afterward we raise the objection.” First let him do it, and afterward ask him in order to know. But let him do it. What does that mean? A rabbinic transgression is not a transgression? He says no—because an unintentional rabbinic transgression is not really a transgression. Meaning, if he committed the transgression unintentionally, nothing happened. After all, there is no essence there, no damage, and as for rebellion against the command—he does not know that there is a command. So you only need to clarify in order to know the truth, but you are not preventing transgressions here. In Torah law, even if it is unintentional and there is no dimension of command—of violating the command—still there is damage. So you have to stop him before he does it and ask him, maybe he didn’t notice. Okay?

The same thing with doubt. What does that basically mean? That rabbinic prohibitions are laws concerning the person and not the object. When you eat poultry with milk, nothing happened. There is only a concern lest you come to eat meat with milk. Yes, I’m saying “nothing happened” in terms of the consequences. That is, there is a rabbinic command—never mind right now what its source is—but there is a rabbinic command, yet there is no essence. Therefore it is a rabbinic prohibition. A Torah prohibition is something that has both essence and command. What? You could come to commit a transgression, yes—but that in itself is not a problematic act. So it is only a law concerning the person and not the object. Torah laws are both person-oriented and object-oriented.

Okay, we’ll see—I don’t think I’ll manage to get to it—but I have on my website, you can read there. Ah, actually… a big question, also a topic for a separate lecture. There are oaths, for example, which are only person-oriented. There are disputes among the medieval authorities (Rishonim) whether all Torah commandments are person-oriented or object-oriented. The Kehillot Yaakov in Nedarim, section 15, I think 15. And there is more to elaborate on here. But the accepted view is that rabbinic laws are person-oriented, Torah laws are object-oriented. Okay? And I can show that all those sources the Kehillot Yaakov brings do not really disagree with this. That is the straightforward view.

No, no. By person-oriented I mean subjective. Person-oriented means subjective—not “the person” as object, yes. So, as we said regarding unintentional action, I say the same regarding doubt. Why is a rabbinic doubt treated leniently? Because in a doubt you are not certain there is a command, right? Either there is or there isn’t. And no essential damage will happen here, because in rabbinic law there are no such damages. So you can be lenient. That is how Rabbi Shlomo Zalman explains in his notes on Shemittah, and several later authorities explain it this way. Okay?

If that is so, let’s move to Torah law. Why must a Torah-level doubt be treated stringently? From the side of command, we already saw that there is also command in rabbinic law. So a doubtful command—a rebellion against it—is not rebellion, right? So in Torah law too, the obligation to be stringent is not because of the command but because of the essence. And that is exactly what reason says. You have to be careful because there is a fifty-percent chance you will cause damage if there is poison here. If there is a fifty-percent chance it is poison and a fifty-percent chance it is not, you will not drink it, right? Because of the concern—not because of a command, but because of the consequences that will result. The same applies in Torah law. Therefore in Torah law too, the stringency in doubt is because of the essence and not because of the command.

If that is really so, then one can definitely understand what the Pnei Yehoshua says. Because what does the Pnei Yehoshua say? He says the obligation to bless before enjoying something is based on reason. The Tzelach says: but there is no command here, so it is not Torah-level. So what does the Pnei Yehoshua answer? Correct—it is not Torah-level, but here there is essence. This is not a decree and not a fence, right? It is an enactment. So it is something that has value in itself. It is not a concern lest you do something else that would be problematic. By reason—what is the reason? That it is forbidden to enjoy this world without a blessing; one who enjoys without blessing is as if he has committed sacrilege. That gives it essence. Torah-level and rabbinic are words. This gives it essence. There is no command.

Now I ask: what will be the status regarding cases of doubt? In terms of lashes, it will not be Torah-level, because there is no warning. But in terms of the laws of doubt, we saw earlier that the difference between rabbinic and Torah law is not because of severity. Rather, rabbinic law concerns the person and Torah law concerns the object. Prohibitions like these also concern the object. Right? Right? You can say that—only it would be wrong. Yes? He says, you can say it, only it would be wrong. Yes? And I can show this from Maimonides—from several places you can see it. That sometimes a rabbinic doubt is treated stringently and sometimes leniently, depending on which rabbinic law we are talking about.

So the claim I want to make is that the Pnei Yehoshua can agree with the Tzelach that this is not Torah-level in the sense that one would be punished for it—that one would receive lashes for it. It is also not a prohibition, but theoretically, yes? Or that it would override a prohibition, that a positive commandment would override a negative one. Okay? But in terms of the laws of doubt, its doubt would be treated stringently. Because here there is harm or benefit in the act itself; it is not merely an obligation to obey. In principle, we should have recited blessings even before the Sages enacted the laws of blessings, because reason dictates blessing. Therefore Gentiles too, for whom the Sages enacted nothing, should also bless. So the question whether something is Torah-level or not Torah-level, and the question whether doubt is treated stringently or not, are not the same question.

So the Pnei Yehoshua can say: you are right that it is not Torah-level, but a doubt is treated stringently. And the Tzelach argues that the doubt is treated leniently because it is not Torah-level. On this matter, I actually agree with the Pnei Yehoshua. I think that doubt is treated stringently in anything that has essence, whether or not it is formally defined as Torah-level. That does not necessarily go together with whether one receives lashes for it or not, whether it is counted among the commandments.

Well, what? What is the rationale? Right. In a doubt, you should be stringent there. Yes. But then you weaken the Torah. I would actually have expected them to give Torah law a stronger status and say that only Torah law has essential force. Easy to say—the question is what is true. It is not a question of what you want to say. Leave aside the rationales—if… It’s not that I want to glorify Torah and don’t care to glorify the rabbis. I’m asking what is true.

He got it from someone who sees what we do not see. Okay, he is only explaining why Torah law is essential and rabbinic law is not. Reason says: murder was a matter… murder was forbidden before the Torah was given. The Holy One, blessed be He, held Cain accountable, right? Was that a person-oriented prohibition or object-oriented? There was essence there. How? Why? Nobody told me anything—how could I know? Because reason says murder is evil. Before the Torah came, reason says murder is evil, not only after the Torah came. Before the Torah came—with Cain. Maybe he will explain that the Torah from the outset… Ah, no, that is another discussion. There are those who want… there are those who raise the idea that after the Torah was given, there are no more rationales. Well, that’s nonsense. Well, that’s nonsense. We do not bring proof from fools.

Anyway, the point I want to make is that basically the dispute between the Pnei Yehoshua and the Tzelach is, all in all, fairly minor. At the end of the day, everyone has to agree that there is no such thing as a Torah law without a command. There is no such thing. But that does not mean—and their disagreement is only over the question: true, it is not Torah-level in the sense of giving lashes for it or something like that. Still, cases of doubt might be treated stringently, says the Pnei Yehoshua, since there is essence here, and if you are in doubt, perhaps you will violate that essence. Okay? By contrast, the Tzelach says no—Torah-level doubt is treated stringently only in something fully defined as Torah-level. Okay? And therefore he says here that a doubt involving blessings should be treated leniently.

On this issue, it seems that the Pnei Yehoshua is entirely right. Only when we say “doubt-stringent” with blessings, that means to bless but without mentioning God’s name. To bless with God’s name raises the issue of “Do not take [the name of the Lord] in vain,” which is a separate matter. Okay? Fine.

So something very interesting comes out here: according to what the rabbi says, not every command has essence, and not every essence has a command. Rabbinic law—no, rabbinic law is command without essence. Torah law—every command has… no, even in Torah law it is not so simple. A law given to Moses at Sinai, for example—I think that according to Maimonides it is command without essence. He knows what the essence is. I’m saying there is no essence. According to Maimonides, in my view, there is no essence in a law given to Moses at Sinai. Maimonides writes in several places that doubt regarding a law given to Moses at Sinai is treated leniently. There is Rashi on “From His right hand went a fiery law for them,” right? Rashi says: it was not given through reason but as a scriptural decree and the religion of Israel in their law. As though it demands. If it were essence—because if it were essence… no, okay, that is a view that says that in fact none of the commandments have essence; it is all just to turn us into servants. Well, that is a strange view. That’s Maharal. Ah? To refine people, or something like that. Yes, okay, there are those who want to say that basically all of it is just that they could just as well have given us opposite commandments—it’s only a question of standing up to the task. Extremely strange. Yes, Maimonides already writes against that in the third part of The Guide for the Perplexed.

Anyway, for our purposes, the dispute between the Pnei Yehoshua and the Tzelach becomes very narrow. Okay? Now it is a dispute about cases of doubt, but at the principled level the conclusion that emerges from here is that clearly, without a command there is no Torah law. There is no Torah law without a command. And still, reason is Torah-level in two senses. In one sense, if reason comes to interpret some verse, then the result is Torah-level. And if reason introduces a novel law, then it has an essence like Torah law—for example with regard to the laws of doubt, the Pnei Yehoshua said it would be like Torah law. That is the meaning of the expression “reason is Torah-level.”

Now, I really do want a bit more—maybe I’ll do it briefly—but I want to talk a little about the meaning of command. A command is basically the antithesis of reason. Reason basically means: I know this and do not need a command. That is called reason. Command—and then the question always arises, so what need is there for command? As I said earlier, I’ll elaborate a bit more. In several places Maimonides seems to grasp this duality between command and essence, or reason, very sharply.

For example, in the ninth principle, Maimonides in the first part of the ninth principle says that we do not count commandments that repeat themselves several times. If the Torah repeats twelve times the obligation to observe the Sabbath, we count only one positive commandment to observe the Sabbath, not twelve. There is one essence, and you multiply it ten times. Carefully—here, ten times, ten commandments—what’s the problem? There are ten commandments to observe the Sabbath. Wait. So Maimonides says we do not count it many times, only once. That is the first part of the principle.

In the second part of the principle, Maimonides writes about a general prohibition—a prohibition stated in an all-inclusive way. A general prohibition such as “Do not eat over the blood,” from which they derive a warning for the stubborn and rebellious son, not to eat on the day judgment is decreed, not to eat before prayer, and several other things derived from that verse. Maimonides says there too we count only one commandment. These are several different prohibitions learned from the same verse; this is called a general prohibition, and we count only one commandment. So what is the status of the others? We derive them from it. In the count of the commandments we count only one commandment. They are all Torah-level, but in the count we count only one.

So Rabbi Yerucham Fishel Perla asks, in his introduction to Rav Saadia Gaon’s Book of Commandments, in the essay on the principles—he goes through them one by one—so on the ninth principle he asks that this is a contradiction in Maimonides. The first part of the principle contradicts the second. Why? Because in the first part Maimonides says that if several verses say the same thing, you count once. Meaning, what determines the count is the content, not the number of commands, right? In the second part he says if there is one command with several contents, you count once. So here you see that the commands determine it, not the contents; there are several contents and one command. Right? So what determines the count—the contents or the command? Maimonides contradicts himself in the same principle.

What do you say? I think he leaves it unresolved. It’s so strange—the question doesn’t even get off the ground. So, what do you say? Damage—he counts damages. So if you count damages, then really you should count the contents, not the command. Is Sabbath observance one damage? Well, yes. And “Do not eat over the blood”—everything I explained to you—that is one damage. No, it’s not one damage, they are entirely different prohibitions. You are basically saying these are different applications of the same prohibition; that would not be a general prohibition. A general prohibition is exactly not that.

Meaning, there are many prohibitions that can be violated in many ways—for example, “You shall do no labor on the Sabbath,” there are thirty-nine primary labors and subcategories and so on. These are not different prohibitions. Why not? Because they are different ways of violating the prohibition of labor. That is not a general prohibition; that is a regular prohibition with many possible ways to violate it. A general prohibition means that there are five different prohibitions here which, in principle, should have been written in five different verses, but for some reason the Torah wrote them in one verse. The commands are different—that is why it is called a general prohibition. If they were just different ways of violating the same prohibition, it would not be a general prohibition.

So Rabbi Yerucham Perla says: then why do we count only one? There are different contents here. If you go by contents, you should have counted five prohibitions. The answer is clear: you need both. In order to count a prohibition in the Torah, there must be its own command and its own essence. You need both things, two conditions. The first part of the principle speaks about where the condition of content is missing: there are many commands, but only one content, so I cannot count twelve commandments to observe the Sabbath because I do not have twelve distinct command-and-content pairs, right? In that case, what is missing is content. There are commands, but no distinct content. In the second part, what is missing is the command. There are contents—five distinct contents—but only one command. Again, I cannot count them separately, because in order to count, I need both conditions: there must be both command and content. It is simple.

Okay, so what does this mean? Exactly what I think we saw reflected there. Maimonides basically says that for every Torah commandment these two dimensions must both exist. There must be a command about it, and there must be content, essence, corruption and repair, okay? Otherwise it is not a Torah commandment. If there is only content without command, then it is like the rationales of the Pnei Yehoshua. If there is only command without content, then it is simply rabbinic law, like fences or decrees. Okay? That is basically the…

Now what is the idea behind this? Why indeed do we need command in addition to content? Why is reason not enough? Honoring father and mother, or “Do not murder”—why do we need these commands? Everyone understands that one must not do these things, that one should honor parents or not murder, not steal. What is the issue? Why do I need the commands?

So here one has to understand—and maybe I’ll bring it through an example. Suppose there were no law forbidding passing through a red light. Okay? People would still learn this through reason. It would still be dangerous to go through a red light, right? You’d go to court—what… wait, wait. It would still be dangerous to go through a red light, right? Let’s say the traffic is just as it is today, only there is no law. Therefore it is dangerous to go through a red light, okay? Now someone went through a red light. Okay—can you take him to court? No. Dangerous, dangerous—so long as there is no prohibition, you cannot sue him for it, right? You cannot try him for that. Okay? That means there is importance to legislating the law that one may not go through a red light—not because otherwise I would not know one must not go through a red light; I would know that even without it. It’s just that without the law it would not be legally binding; it would not be law. It would only be logic.

The same thing in Jewish law. In Jewish law too, Cain himself should have known that murder is forbidden even without a command. So why do we need the command? In order to turn it into law—so that now Cain can be held accountable for having done it. Punishment, as I said before. Therefore a Torah law is a law for which one can be punished. And in order for punishment to be possible, there has to be a law prohibiting it. It is not enough that it is very reasonable. It is very reasonable not to murder, or very reasonable to bless before eating, or whatever. You cannot punish unless there has been a warning—there is no punishment unless there is prior warning. Why? Just like civil law. If the law does not prohibit it, then okay, you were not right to take such a risk, you did something wrong, but you cannot be sued for it. It was not prohibited.

In this context I distinguish between two kinds of authority: formal authority and substantive authority. Formal authority is institutional authority. It is authority given to someone because of who he is. For example, the authority of the Knesset comes from the fact that it is the Knesset. In our system, the Knesset determines the laws—unfortunately. Okay? So the Knesset has authority, and by virtue of the fact that it decided, one must obey. Does that mean it is right? Not necessarily. Usually not. But its authority is unrelated to whether it is right or not. That is formal authority. Because it was decided in the Knesset, it binds—not because it was decided in the Knesset, it is right, but because it was decided in the Knesset, it is binding. Not the same thing.

Substantive authority is the opposite. Substantive authority is authority like that of a doctor. The doctor tells me: take such-and-such medicine if you are sick, and it will heal you. Now, am I obligated to obey him? Wait—am I obligated to obey him? Judgment call. No. I am not obligated to obey him at all, right? But it is very sensible to obey him, because I do not understand medicine and he does. Okay? The authority of an expert, like a doctor for example, is what I call substantive authority. It is not really authority, because no one can sue me for not obeying the doctor. I do not have to obey him. Is it sensible not to obey the doctor? I will simply remain sick. Okay? That is what I call substantive authority. Meaning, substantive authority stems from the fact that you are probably right. The doctor is probably right if I argue with him, because he understands medicine and I do not. So I am not obligated to obey him, but I will obey him because he is probably right.

Formal authority, by contrast, is institutional authority. It stems from the fact that you are the judge or the legislator or whatever, and you are the authority whose voice must be obeyed regardless of whether you are right or not. Okay? That is formal authority. Do you understand that this is exactly the two aspects we discussed regarding commandments? The command creates something with formal authority. One must obey because there was a command, regardless of whether it is correct, whether I understand that it is correct, whatever. Whether true or not true—my reasoning creates something tied to substantive authority, not formal authority. I obey it because it is right. Okay? But as I said before, substantive authority has no capacity for enforcement. You cannot sue me for failing to obey substantive authority. I did something irrational—okay, so I did. What? My choice. If it had been prohibited, then one could sue me: you violated a prohibition. Okay?

So there is a difference here. There are, for example, all these stories that everyone mentioned in the Talmud can revive the dead and all sorts of nonsense of that kind. Why did they invent these tall tales? Because they are trying to convince people that the Talmud has authority—that one does not argue with the Talmud, right? Now for little children that is probably really necessary, but for someone who has matured a bit, one has to explain that obeying the Talmud is not because it is right, but because that is the law. It is formal authority, not substantive authority. Therefore they do not need to be fiery angels for that, and you do not have to assume the Talmud is right about everything. It is not right about everything; there are quite a few mistakes in the Talmud. Some of them we can see, and from that I can understand that there are others we do not see. There are—certainly there are. So what? The authority to obey, the authority of the Talmud, does not stem from its being right. It is formal authority. There is a question of where it comes from, after all they are not tannaim, they are not ordained, it is not the Sanhedrin. Never mind that right now; I am not entering that topic at the moment. But the authority of the Talmud is institutional authority, formal authority. Therefore there is no need whatsoever, in order to establish this, to tell me tales that they were prophets and could revive the dead. No, no—I’m not entering the question of what created the formal authority, but it is formal authority. You do not accept it because they know better. You accept it because they are the ones who determine.

I just spent five minutes speaking against that accepted idea, precisely for that reason. Because the accepted idea is that we obey them because they are surely right, because they are heavenly beings, because they know everything. But what can we do if these heavenly beings made mistakes at every turn? I can show you the places where they made mistakes. Why does that not matter? Because there is formal authority.

Not because they knew better? No—they knew better, they made mistakes. But they made mistakes, they made mistakes. But a doctor is substantive authority, not formal authority. He knows more than you. Now you can decide whether to listen to him or not. Can you also decide whether to listen to the Talmud or not? So I ask: can you also decide whether to listen to the Talmud or not? Leave aside the Kitzur Shulchan Arukh for now, wait a second—you’re already pulling me by the tongue, third time and you’ll succeed. You don’t just take what you want. There is a halakhic obligation: you cannot disagree with the Talmud. Since when? From the fact that it determines—what difference does it make? It determines what is and is not Jewish law. You can do whatever you want, but you have violated Jewish law. Jewish law says one must obey the Talmud. The Talmud itself certainly is not going to say that—you must obey me. Again, you are mixing things up. The doctor—you are not obligated to obey him. A doctor is substantive authority, not formal authority. The Talmud has formal authority. There is no halakhic decisor who disagrees with the Talmud—not because it is more right, but because it has formal authority. It is the institution. Like the Knesset. It is our legislative institution, the Talmud. Not because it is right, but because it is the legislating institution. The court is something else: the Knesset legislates, the court interprets—that is different.

Okay, true—but that is not the basis of the Knesset’s authority. It may happen that the Knesset also says something correct. But the obligation to obey is not because it said something correct, but because it is the Knesset. That is all. It does not mean it is always wrong. It only means that even if it is wrong, there is still an obligation to obey because it is the Knesset. That is all.

So the claim—what I really want to say—is that the fact that every commandment has both command and essence is not for nothing. Wait, wait—you’re interrupting, friends, friends, one second. The fact that every commandment has both command and essence has a reason. Only through the command is obligation created; essence does not create obligation. Essence creates logic—that it makes sense to act this way, okay? To create obligation, like with the red light, reason says not to go through a red light because it is dangerous, but there is no obligation not to go through a red light. You cannot sue me if I went through a red light. It becomes law when there is a command, and now there is an obligation to obey. Now it no longer depends on whether you understood or did not understand, whether it seems sensible to you or not. Now it is simply the law.

And therefore the need for command in Jewish law is basically a formal need. When I ask about “Do not murder” or “Honor your father and your mother,” “why do I need a verse? reason tells me so”—the answer is no, because reason would tell me that it is very sensible to honor parents or not to murder. The command turns it into a prohibition. Okay? It turns it into an obligation to act this way or not act this way. Therefore the command is needed even in things whose rationale I fully understand.

And that is the reason the Tzelach says—and as I said before, in my opinion the Pnei Yehoshua agrees with him—that if reason introduces a novel law, it cannot become an obligation. It will not be a commandment. In order for it to be a commandment, there must be a command. Okay? The role of the command is to turn the matter into a commandment, not to reveal something to me.

People always say: “why do I need a verse? reason tells me so”—meaning, “Do not murder” was written because without it being written, I would only know it morally, and then there would be different definitions of murder, I would not know this detail or that detail, and so on. I would not know that the punishment is execution by the sword; I would not know narrowing someone’s access, bringing a thing close to fire, and all sorts of devices of that type—these are all sorts of definitions in the prohibition of murder. Okay? So, they say, the command is needed in order to teach me all those tricks. But that is not true. It is not true because the command does not teach me those tricks. There is no source for all those cases like narrowing someone’s access or bringing something close to fire. Where did the Sages get that from? From reason. Well, they had reason even without the command. The command did not come to teach that. The command came to turn the moral prohibition into halakhic law. Without a command, it is not halakhic law. That is all. Exactly as, without a law against going through a red light, passing through a red light is irrational, but it is not prohibited. It is not an offense. Okay? That is the role of command.

Therefore there are commands. Maimonides, for example, takes this one step further. He says that if you—Maimonides in the Laws of Kings, at the end of chapter 8, is talking there about the laws of a resident alien. Maimonides writes in the Laws of Kings, speaking of a resident alien: “Anyone who accepts the seven commandments and is careful to observe them is among the pious of the nations of the world and has a share in the World to Come—provided that he accepts and performs them because the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded them in the Torah and informed us through Moses our teacher that the descendants of Noah had already been commanded in them. But if he does them because reason compels it, then he is not a resident alien, nor among the pious of the nations of the world, but among their wise men.” “But among their wise men,” not “and not”—that is the more correct version. Okay?

What is Maimonides saying? In the end, what is “because reason compels it”? It is the command versus the logic. If you keep the seven Noahide commandments because your reason tells you that this is proper—you are a moral person, you do things of value—but you are not among the pious of the nations of the world, meaning there is no religious value here; it is not a commandment. On the street people say “you did a mitzvah,” meaning you did a good deed. No. A good deed is the opposite of a commandment. A commandment is a good deed done מתוך obligation to a command—that is what is called a commandment.

Maimonides is basically saying—what? Someone who does it from reason did the right thing; he is wise, but he is not pious. It is not a commandment. Why? Because a commandment has to be done because “the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded them in the Torah and informed us through Moses our teacher that the descendants of Noah had already been commanded in them.” And a Gentile who keeps the seven Noahide commandments, but not because he was commanded at Sinai—or because at Sinai we were told that Noah had been commanded in them—then he is doing the right thing, but he has not done a commandment. And the commentators say—and it is obvious—that this also applies to a Jew, not only to a Gentile.

“If someone tells you there is wisdom among the nations, believe it; if he tells you there is Torah among the nations, do not believe it”—maybe perhaps one could interpret that this way too, maybe. In any case, what Maimonides is basically saying here is that for a commandment to be a commandment, you need to be obligated by the command.

Now notice: this is even more far-reaching than what we saw before. What we saw before says that if there is no command, then it is not law, and therefore not a commandment. Here it says one step more. Even after there is already a command—it is like motivation—your motivation, when you fulfill the command, must be because of obligation to the command; otherwise it is not a commandment. Understand that this is an additional novelty.

For example, Maimonides in his commentary to the Mishnah on Chullin, in the chapter on the sciatic nerve, brings there a dispute whether it applies to kosher animals and to non-kosher animals, a dispute between Rabbi Yehudah and the Sages. Maimonides says there a major principle, and everyone links it to this Maimonides here, but that is not right; it is not the same principle. Maimonides says there that everything we observe is because of the command of the Holy One, blessed be He, at Sinai. Even the sciatic nerve we do not refrain from because of Jacob our father and his encounter with the angel, but because the Torah given at Sinai said not to eat the sciatic nerve. Okay? That is what he says there.

There he is talking about the first novelty—that without a command it is not law. Without a command I am not obligated to do it. Here there is a different novelty. The novelty says: fine, there is a command, now there is law. But I did it not because of my obligation to the command, but because it seemed logical to me. There is law, but I did not perform a commandment. This statement is about the person—the person’s fulfillment of the commandment—not about whether this is a commandment or not. The first statement is about whether it is a commandment at all: without command it is not a commandment. Here what is written is that without your motivation being obligation to the command, you do not have fulfillment of a commandment on the part of the person. You do not have fulfillment of a commandment. Reward is only a result.

This is the difference between secular law or civil law and Jewish law. In Israeli law—in civil law, not only Israeli, yes—the novelty of the commentary to the Mishnah in Chullin applies: if the law did not determine it, then it is not prohibited; we observe it because of the law, right? But this novelty of Maimonides here applies only to Jewish law, not to civil law. Because in law, the law does not care whether you pay taxes because you feel bound by the law to pay taxes. If you paid taxes, all is fine; if you did not, they will sue you. The person’s motivations do not interest the legislator or the law.

Okay. What does matter is that—wait, friends, let me speak—without there being a law, without legislation, the thing is not law. Once it is law, I do not care why you do or do not do it. If you do it, fine; if you do not, you’ll be hit with sanctions. In Jewish law, first there has to be a command for it to be law. Second, there must be obligation to the command, because otherwise your act is not fulfillment of a commandment in the person. This does not exist in civil law.

Here we are talking about the seven Noahide commandments, and as I said earlier—and I’m expanding—I said earlier that I extend this to everything. The commentators also discuss it, and it is obvious. Clearly it applies to every commandment for every Jew. Why did he say it specifically about the descendants of Noah, you ask? Because the seven Noahide commandments—Maimonides writes this one law earlier, or two laws earlier—Maimonides writes that the seven Noahide commandments are things toward which reason inclines. Therefore with Noahide commandments, this issue can arise in practice: one can fulfill them because they are logical and not because one was commanded. Nobody is going to avoid redeeming a firstborn donkey because it makes sense, okay? Or whatever. He does it because there is a commandment. There was a command to Abraham our father, who was not commanded in the Sinai sense because it was before Sinai, and still he did not do it without the command he received—that is, I did not say that as a joke.

So in short, what I basically want to say is that this novelty of Maimonides written here is a novelty only about Jewish law. The novelty in the commentary to the Mishnah in Chullin is a novelty about every law—that without legislation it is not law. Okay?

By the way, in the Nuremberg trials, one of the principal things discussed there—and maybe the most central foundation that shook the whole matter—was that they tried people on the basis of things that had not been legislated. The Nazis said: we obeyed orders, we obeyed the law, right? What do you want from us? Now there was a serious problem in how to build the legal construction that would allow you to try someone even though he obeyed the law. What is so simple about that? Well, they said there are things that indeed—they obeyed the law against people, they obeyed the law. Yes, yes. The Nazi law was to kill the Jews—what is the problem? He obeyed the law. On the contrary, if he had not obeyed, he should have been tried for not obeying the law. So how can you try someone for the fact that he obeyed the law?

So there they invented all sorts of constructions, that there are things legislated by implication. Meaning, by the very fact that you belong to humanity, there is some kind of legislation that need not even be said explicitly—the basic moral principles. But all that was only meant to get around this point: without legislation, there is no law. You need a legislative process in order for law to have force.

So if I now return again to command and reason: command and reason are not competing on the same field at all. I’m summarizing what we have seen. Command and reason are not competing on the same field. Reason explains why this makes sense, and command says why it is obligatory. Two different things. It can be very logical, but I am not obligated. It can have no logic, but I am obligated. It can be both logical and obligatory. Then both things exist, and this is not duplication: it is logical, and besides that I am also obligated.

Take, for example, the ruling of a district psychiatrist, as distinct from the ruling of an ordinary psychiatrist. What an ordinary psychiatrist determines—I would accept it because he is an expert, say, if you believe in that. So I accept it because he is an expert. But a district psychiatrist—I must accept it because he also has authority by force of law. So I am obligated to accept it, not only is it sensible to accept it. The difference between a judge and a legal expert who is not a judge: the legal expert knows the law like the judge, but what he says does not bind me. Still, what he says is probably correct because he is a jurist. But the judge, beyond being a jurist, is also a governmental authority. He has authority to judge, and therefore I must obey him not because he is right—although he may also be right—but that is not why I must obey him. I must obey him because he is the judge.

Okay? Therefore reason and Scripture—I am summarizing now—reason and Scripture, or command and essence, do not compete on the same plane. The whole question of “why do I need a verse? reason tells me so” is a baseless question; there is no such question at all. Only where reason comes to interpret a law—then fine, obviously if that is so, why do I need a verse? Reason can interpret the law for me that way. But to apply this to cases that are new law, that is simply a misunderstanding. It is not a matter for give-and-take. It is a misunderstanding. If the Pnei Yehoshua meant that, then he is simply mistaken. I do not assume he meant that—charity principle.

The point is that the existence of a rationale does not make the command unnecessary. They do not come near one another; there is no connection at all. Okay? Fine, we’ll stop here.