The place of emotion in the work of God
Peace and blessings,
In several places you extol the dimension of reason in the service of God, as well as in ethics and morality. In fact, you claim that human values reside solely in the intellectual level.
Therefore, a person who realizes that he has wronged another and done something wrong, and asks for forgiveness, even though he is devoid of emotions – this is an act of the highest order! Similarly, a person who worships his Creator without emotions and only out of intellectual acceptance of God – this is an act of the highest order!
With your permission, I would like to dwell on the matter for a moment, clarify it, and ask your opinion:
I agree that the automatic state of the emotional breakthrough is meaningless. But, as you like to quote from the words of the author of the Tanya about the divine soul and the animal soul, he explains that the divine soul fights for the whole package, at the end of the process is to produce in a person also a divine emotion, but it starts from the brain, you do not have to accept this model, but there is certainly emotion here in the service of God.
It is found, according to the author of the Tanya, that a person who asks for forgiveness because of emotion is an animal soul. Because of reason alone, he is the beginning of a divine soul. Because of reason, to the point that even his emotions are filled with it, he is an ideal divine soul.
As mentioned, you are not obliged to accept these words of the author of the Tanya, but the following seems reasonable to me:
A. It can be argued by way of inference. A person whose entire emotions are filled with the content of God’s love, then he has observed the intellect so much that he has also told the emotion, and therefore the value is the intellect, that the emotion is only an indication. I think you will agree with this formulation. Here the emotion is ‘the revelation of a word in vain’
B. Beyond that, you do not see any virtue in a person whose feelings are also imbued with the love of God, and that there is no human-aesthetic value here of a more ‘elevated’ person, closer to God. In other words, an automatic state of emotion – devoid of value. But a person who has worked on himself and succeeded in having his feelings also filled with Godly content, is a ‘higher’ person. There is a more ‘harmonious’ and ‘complete’ value here, this is an ideal. And according to this, a person must try to fulfill his feelings, and not be satisfied only with a cold and alienated intellectual dimension.
I would love to hear your thoughts on these two options.
I have said and written more than once that if emotion is merely an expression of internalization and intellectual decision, there is nothing wrong with it. It is true that there is no value in it in itself, but only in the decision it expresses. And no one who is not endowed with the emotion to express his decisions (that lobe in his brain is screwed up), but has decided clearly, is no less important than a person who has an emotional expression for it.
But is there any point in a person trying to fulfill his feelings? Is there any virtue in a person who has made up his mind and developed his feelings over a person who has not developed his feelings?
There is something elusive here.
Perhaps we can put it this way: there is value in the ’action’ of a person with an intellectual dimension who also brought the emotional layer. Indeed, this action without intellectual ‘action’ is therefore worthless. But that does not mean that the value is limited to the intellectual level alone, without the development of emotion
A person who does not have emotion – then there is none. That is fine. But for creations with emotion, there is value in the emotion being more elevated
In my opinion, no. As long as the intellectual-voluntary decision exists, its expressions are not important. If it sharpens it and the emotion is aroused more, that is of course valuable, but again, it is not because of the emotion but because of what it expresses.
Remaining divided?
I find it hard to accept that the expression is not interesting. And that it is not a clear example of ’aesthetic value’ (see column etc.’), which creates a more ideal ‘human’ figure?
We will probably remain divided.
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