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Action-oriented Talmud

שו”תCategory: Talmudic studyAction-oriented Talmud
asked 8 years ago

Hello Rabbi,
In the first book, page 16, page 2, it is written:
And they honored him at his death – teaches that they set up a sitting at his grave. Consider the following statements by Rabbi Nathan and Rabbanan: one said: three, and another said: seven, and I say to her: thirty. 24: And they honored him at his death – this is Hezekiah, king of Judah, who went out before him with thirty-six thousand pioneers, the words of Rabbi Judah; see Rabbi Nehemiah: And did they not do so before Ahab! Rather, they placed a book on his bed and said: This is what is written in it. And indeed, we are the servants of the Lord! We have purified them, but we do not abandon them. And I will not abandon them, we are the servants of the Lord. Rabba bar bar Hanna said: May we be able to hear Dr. Yochanan’s prayer for the sake of the hearing, because he was a servant of the throne and was in our eyes from the mouth of the man, he did not strip to the palms of his hands and put on tefillin and recite the blessing. And Hadar said to them: Even if we have established what we have said, we have taught what we have not said. And the Mar said: Great is the study of Torah, which leads to action! Lk: Ha, ha, lagmur, ha, lagmur.
I remember that your understanding of a great Talmud that leads to action is that when the Talmud is directed toward action, then it is a Talmud that is greater than action. How should the Gemara above be understood in your opinion and how does it align with your perception of a Talmud that is directed toward action?
I once thought about another possibility of understanding the Gemara that a great Talmud brings about action in the following way:
If I just observe the Torah without studying it, let’s assume it has value X.
If I just study the Torah without practicing it, let’s assume that it has a value of Y.
The argument is that when I study, I will probably come to observe the Torah anyway (after all, the Talmud brings about action – that is, it makes a person want to observe the Torah he has studied), and therefore I gain X+Y.
Whereas when I only observe, it does not result in learning (studying) the Torah, and therefore I only earn X.
Mathematical: X+Y)>X). When of course Y is positive.


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מיכי Staff answered 8 years ago
On the contrary, the Gemara’s question there is that if Talmud leads to action, this means that the action is greater (see Rashi and Tos). Therefore, the Rishonim here really make it difficult to see how this is consistent with the issue of sanctification that Talmud is greater because it leads to action, and they answer in several ways. According to Thos, the fact that a scripture exists teaches us implicitly that it also learned (otherwise it would not exist), and therefore it does not necessarily concern the order of importance. Your interpretation also fits in well here, of course (because if it exists, then it necessarily also learned, and then there is the double value).

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