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Question following ‘No man has control over his own spirit’

שו”תCategory: generalQuestion following ‘No man has control over his own spirit’
asked 5 years ago

Hello Rabbi,
First of all, I wanted to thank the rabbi for his wonderful books. Beyond the content itself, I want to thank him for the form of discourse that the rabbi encourages and for his lack of compromise on the truth.

Several questions came to my mind from reading the rabbi’s first and second books. I’ll actually start with the last question that came to my mind.

On the subject of knowledge and choice, the Rabbi places the assumption of choice alongside the assumption that everything is known in advance (not from the standpoint of someone’s knowledge, but from the standpoint that knowledge exists) and explains that these premises cannot coexist with each other – that is, to say both is a logical contradiction – ‘nonsense’ in the Rabbi’s language.

Why is this nonsense?

When a person chooses Y and infinite knowledge says that he will do Y, there is no contradiction between the two assumptions. When a person chooses X and infinite knowledge says that he will do X, is there really a contradiction between the two assumptions? To be fair, no – only when we add the assumption that when there is a discrepancy between the infinite knowledge that exists and the actual choice, then it is not possible to say that both things will exist together.
It follows that there is no logical contradiction! Rather, we have merely assumed the finality (to be honest, I remember that the Rabbi discussed the issue of assuming the finality in ‘Emet Ve’taziv’ and the first book, but I don’t remember all the details related to this)

In addition to this question, I wanted to ask about our attitude towards the words of the sages.
The Rabbi assumes that the only tool given to humans (or at least the only one we currently have) is our intellect.
Is this a correct interpretation of the words of the sages?
Is it correct to regard Maimonides’ words as things that are based on the current science of his time? Even though when we study “The Strong Hand” we find, after delving deeper into his words, that Maimonides’ golden tongue, which sometimes seems obscure and illogical to us, is actually precise and not as obscure as it seems to us at first glance?

I certainly accept that statements like “Rambam said” will not satisfy me as an answer, but they will certainly make me try and find a solution to his words, and when I reach the point where things seem obscure to me – I will probably stay with the TSA and not say that his words are incorrect.

For my last question, I wanted to ask about the example given on page 157 of the book ‘No Man Has Dominion Over the Spirit’, which discusses the matter of conspiring witnesses.
The rabbi places the killing of the condemned man in the actions of the judges, and according to the 7th Amendment, it was not really an act of man (if, of course, everything was carried out according to true law, etc.), but the reason the man was sentenced to death is not because the judges decided to do so out of a ‘natural’ or ‘divine’ procedure, but because the witnesses conspired to testify against him – and therefore, in my opinion, the Doge is not appropriate, because here we clearly see that it was the actions of man that caused the death of the condemned man, and therefore there is no point in saying that there was a supposed act of God here, and in truth, the law remains puzzling.

In any case, I wanted to thank the rabbi again for the wonderful work he does.


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0 Answers
מיכי Staff answered 5 years ago
I didn’t understand your question about knowledge and choice. Newcomb’s paradox is the best explanation for why this is nonsense. I think I brought it up there. I didn’t understand the connection between what you wrote about the strong hand and your conclusion about the Holy Spirit or the supreme knowledge he had. A wise person does not necessarily have supreme knowledge. By the way, if there were enough brilliant minds sitting around him, they would find pearls in him like they find in the Rambam. I don’t say this to mock him, but to say that your impression of him is not necessarily well-founded. On page 157 I said nothing about conspiring witnesses. I quoted the words of the Ramban. What is your question? Why is the example supposed to be appropriate and why is it not appropriate? Chen Chen.

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