On Platonism – Continued (Column 384)
In the previous column I defined Platonism and the ideal entities that appear within it. There I distinguished between an idea (eidos), which is a set of properties, and an ideal entity, which is a theoretical object. This distinction has two opposing aspects: (a) the idea exists (in the world of ideas), whereas the ideal entity does not exist (it is an abstract object we invented in our imagination); (b) the ideal entity has the properties of the concrete entity, whereas the idea does not. Thus, for example, the idea of “horseness” has no properties of a horse. Those properties are contained within it but do not describe it. By contrast, the ideal horse, which is an abstract object, has the properties of a horse. We saw one implication of this distinction regarding the “Third Man” argument raised by Plato’s opponents, and now we shall see further implications that sharpen these distinctions.
Platonic and Socratic Love
From time to time we speak of emotions in a Platonic sense, the most prominent being Platonic love. What exactly does that mean? The common definition is love for a woman without the physical component (sexual relations). More abstractly, one can speak of love for a woman who, physically speaking, does not attract me sexually. Why is such love called “Platonic”? I think it can be understood through the definition given by the learned Florentine, Marsilio Ficino, in the fifteenth century: it is love for a person’s personality and wisdom, not for their physical traits. Interestingly, until his time such love was called “Socratic love” (amor socraticus), and Ficino regarded “Platonic love” (amor platonicus) as a synonymous expression.
Upon further reflection, however, I think there is a difference in meaning, or at least in the context, of these two expressions. Socratic love is an exalted love: it does not focus on a person’s lower parts but on the higher. One might say it is love rather than lust—its aims are not egoistic but value-laden (to cleave to the good, the spiritual, the lofty). This follows from the description of Socrates’ personality: he indeed dealt with the exalted and tried to get people to aspire to cleave to it. Plato, by contrast, represents a turn to the ideas. This is not necessarily something more exalted, but rather something more abstract—the abstract dimension underlying reality and the concrete objects in our world. In my understanding, the expression “Platonic love” does not necessarily express a yearning for something lofty, but for something abstract. Platonic love relates to a person’s idea and not to a concrete person. His idea comprises his set of properties; according to Plato it is an abstract entity—but this is love that does not truly address the person before me, only his properties.
In my terminology one could perhaps say that Jacob’s Socratic love is directed toward “Rachel the pure” (and not toward the concrete one)—that is, toward some abstract figure of the Rachel before him. Platonic love, by contrast, is directed toward Rachel’s idea. Socrates loves the “Rachel-ness” within the concrete Rachel, whereas Plato loves the “Rachel-ness” itself (a general set of properties). The object of Socratic love is a pure person, whereas that of Platonic love is an idea, not a person (and not even a pure person). In a moral context we speak of love of the good. When you meet a good person, you are supposed to love them and try to cleave to them. One could say that on the Platonic plane you really love the Good (the noun, i.e., tov with the shuruk vowel) as such, and not the good person before you—not even the good in the particular person before you. Socrates would love that.
What I have defined here as Platonic love is love that does not address a person but rather an idea or an abstract set of properties (an idea). Socratic love, by contrast, addresses the person and not the ideas, but it focuses on his higher part, not his lower parts. In my terminology: it is love for a pure person, not for an idea. To sharpen what may still seem blurry, think of someone who aspires to the good and loves the Good (with shuruk), but who has no love for any person around him—not even for good people. He loves the Good, not good people. Does that sound implausible? You might be surprised, but you all know such people.
My grandfather, of blessed memory, used to say of a certain famous Rebbe that he loved the people of Israel very much, but he had a problem with the individuals. In my terminology, one could say that this Rebbe loved Israel with a Platonic, not a Socratic, love. His love was directed toward “Israel-ness,” not toward Israelis. Socratic love is love for people—even though it is directed toward their higher and exalted part. You can focus it on an abstract Rachel, but through her you develop love for Rachel herself. Plato, by contrast, can love “humanity” with great passion and at the same time be a misanthrope. He is not interested in concrete people but in ideas.
As noted, we all know such people. Not infrequently we wonder about those righteous folks who care for the world and fight tirelessly and self-sacrificingly to improve it, but care less for the concrete human beings around them. An acquaintance of mine—truly a man deserving of great esteem for his principled deeds and devotion—used to say that he has no friends, only fellow travelers. That is a quintessentially Platonic expression. Such people cleave to ideas and values, but it is quite hard to live with them, let alone form an emotional bond. The feeling is that they are objects composed of pure intellect and values—but not so much human beings.
In column 269 I discussed the nature of friendship, in particular the obligations it creates. For Plato there is no place for friendship and it creates no obligation toward a person, since his mental orientation is not love or attachment to a particular person but to an idea. Attachment to a person requires that I see before me a concrete person and not only an idea. If he is a good person—that is, a person in whom the worthy idea is embodied—then one ought to attach to him himself (Socratically, and not merely Platonically).[1]
Popper on Platonism
Karl Popper wrote a monumental book, The Open Society and Its Enemies. The main thrust of the book is a struggle against modernist world-fixers, especially the communists. I was very surprised that the first part of the book is devoted entirely to a critique of Plato and Platonism, but when I read on, I understood the rationale. Popper claims that the root of all evil in the great, destructive ideologies is their Platonism. Such world-fixers place before their eyes some utopian model of human beings and of human society that appears to them perfect, and they strive ruthlessly—using any means and without consideration—to realize it. This striving entails quite a few woodchips flying in the process. The communists spoke of the victims who fell along the way (both among communists themselves and among their enemies) as “oil on the wheels of the revolution.”
Popper placed at the center of his critique our utopias and our certitude about them. He recommends that we not be so certain about our utopia, that we not make wild revolutions, but rather place trust in accumulated experience and in long, controlled processes—without the certainty and dogmatism that are expressed in perfect utopian models that are supposed to guide us and toward which we are to strive with all our might. By way of illustration, I recall a conversation I have already mentioned here with a man who is a professor of economics and holds a communist worldview. That person was, and still is, a member of the Communist Party (Rakah, Maki). To my surprise it emerged in our conversation that he has no utopia. He explained that communists today—at least the shade to which he himself belongs—do not strive to realize a utopia, since they too understand that they have no substitute for a market economy. I asked him in what sense, then, they are still communists, and the answer I received was rather vague. He said that they seek to correct various things locally, without placing some final utopian model before their eyes. The model, he said, is supposed to crystallize in motion. This is communism without a utopian model toward which one strives; it is the very desire to critique and repair that constitutes their communism.
I told him that, logically speaking, this definition does not hold water. It reminds me of those secular-humanist Jews whose “Judaism” is humanism. But humanism is supposed to be shared by all human beings. Judaism might perhaps define a certain sort of humanism (I doubt even that), but humanism itself cannot define Judaism, since it is shared by everyone—or by many, at least as an ideal model. Likewise, the desire to repair and improve is not communism. Communism is supposed to propose a particular kind of improvement or a utopia toward which one strives; once you have given that up, I told him, I do not understand in what sense you are communists. I too want to repair the world en route. As long as you do not define the direction you seek, what distinguishes you from me?! This conversation illustrates the sobering from grand utopias and from Platonic world-repair (which seeks to lead the world to a single, sharply pre-defined utopia).
A Complement and Correction to Popper’s Critique: Between Platonism and Conservatism
Thus far I have explained that Popper dedicates his monumental work—as well as another of his booklets—to a war on historicism (a Platonic view of history). But I think Popper failed to notice that striving for a utopian model is not the root of evil. It is not bad per se, except when it appears in a very particular form.
What I have described so far in Popper’s name is nothing but a conservative argument (see columns 217 and 249). Movements of repair know in advance and with certainty what the ideal model is toward which we must strive—their utopia—for the sake of which they trample the world. Popper, in contrast, proposes that we be more modest and trust trial and error and accumulated human experience, not imagining that we already know better than everyone what ought to be. In his view, the model should crystallize of itself along the way and constantly improve. He claims that we must not think there is some ideal rest and repose—a perfect model to which we are all supposed to arrive—because we never know in advance what it is supposed to look like, and therefore we must not force it upon ourselves. Revolutionary dogmatism is, in his eyes, the mother of all sin.
But in my view there is no need to mix conservative arguments with arguments against Platonism. You can be conservative and still oppose ruthless modernism (like communism). To my judgment, the focal point of harm and evil in modernism is not conservatism but Platonism—that is, attending to an idea instead of to concrete human beings. The communists and their fellow world-repairers did not sin only in that they were not conservative and preferred their utopian model over accumulated experience. Their main failure is that they forgot that their doctrine and their fine models (more or less) were meant to improve the lives of concrete human beings. They saw before their eyes the good of all “humanity” and trampled the concrete people on the path to its realization. They did not really take into account the people who constitute that very humanity about which they care so much. The problem is not that they preferred the model over accumulated experience; it is that they preferred the model over human beings. They saw the forest and ignored the trees—just like the Rebbe and the types I described above. This is the main problem with the great movements of repair, not the mere fact that they had a utopia.
One can strive for a utopian model—and even be revolutionary and very non-conservative—and still do so while taking into account the human beings for whom the utopia is fashioned. Even if we have a perfect forest to which we strive, and even if we are completely convinced of our rightness, we must not fell a multitude of trees on the way to creating that forest. A non-ruthless movement of repair might be mistaken in its utopia (so you likely think, if you are conservatives like Popper), but it is not necessarily evil. When you speak of evil, Platonism in the sense of striving for utopia is not enough; there must also be ruthlessness on the way to that utopia.
A Note on Postmodernism
Popper’s partial analysis also gave birth to postmodernism. It saw modernism and the ills it brought upon us through the very striving for perfect utopias of justice and morality, and therefore decided to give up on truth, justice, and morality, creating instead an alternative of relativism and narrativity. They told themselves—and us—that if only we would give up on the grand utopias, we would no longer have murderous, oppressive world-fixers, and the world would revert to being wonderful. In that sense Popper was part of the emergence of postmodernism (he himself would, of course, strenuously reject that classification). But this is a mistake in several respects. First, the proposed cure is mistaken. Postmodernism does not really offer an alternative. If a person believes in such utopias, postmodern preaching will not change that. The mistake is that postmodernism has no real way to contend with utopian revolutionaries who disagree with it and think there are grand, perfect utopias.
But here I wish to focus on another error—one that concerns the diagnosis of modernism. The postmodern diagnosis is that the main evil in modernism lies in the very existence of utopias. That is a mistaken diagnosis (and again, I am not arguing in favor of utopias; that relates to the question of conservatism), for that was precisely Popper’s mistake. The evil in modernism (which also led to postmodernism) is not the mere existence of a utopia but the way one relates to it and to human beings. The evil is behaving Platonically rather than Socratically: seeing the utopia before one’s eyes while ignoring the concrete people who are trampled along the way. One cannot benefit “humanity” while harming the people who constitute it.[2] Therefore, the remedy is not necessarily to give up on truth and on the grand utopias. One may accept them—or not—but that is not the proper cure for modernism’s ills.
A Note on Racism and Chauvinism
In note 8 of the previous column I mentioned that Platonism identifies objects—including human beings—by their essential properties (those that constitute their idea). A mistake in defining the essential properties can lead to racism, chauvinism, and other ills. One who regards skin color, or a connection between skin color and intelligence or goodness, as essential properties will tend to treat people according to their skin color, gender, and the like. Here, too, one sees Platonist fingerprints: Platonists tend to see our world as an instantiation of fixed ideas that exist somewhere from time immemorial. With such a view it is only natural to conclude there is no way to change the situation. Women will always be uneducated and less capable, and likewise for Blacks, yellow-skinned people, and other groups defined by such natural characteristics.
In the halakhic-Jewish context as well, the prevailing approach is conservatism grounded in Platonism. When I argue for the need to change our attitude toward Gentiles or toward women, one immediately presents me with a Platonic stance: the nature of women is such-and-such, the nature of Gentiles is such-and-such, and therefore the Sages’ words are eternal and there is no need (and not merely no possibility) to change them. Sometimes this begins with the sense that change is impossible (questions of authority and consensus), and the ad hoc justification is Platonic—the claim that there is also no need. They argue that the Sages possessed the Holy Spirit, and therefore if they said something about women it is eternal and unchanging. It is important to understand that without the Platonic assumptions one can still say that the Sages indeed possessed the Holy Spirit and were always right, and yet maintain that the situation has changed and therefore the law regarding Gentiles or women should change. This is not a rebellion against the Sages but an adaptation of their path to our contemporary reality. The claims that the Sages did not err and cannot err do not by themselves lead to conservatism. Conservatism necessarily contains a Platonic element: that a woman or a Gentile does not change across the generations; hence the Sages’ words are necessarily relevant and correct for our times as well. It is important to understand that one who proposes change is not necessarily challenging the Sages’ authority or capacities (and even if one does, there is nothing wrong with that; it is entirely reasonable to think they were not perfect); rather, he opposes Platonic conservatism that has no connection to our stance toward the Sages.
The Relationship Between the Two Aspects of Platonism
On the plane I have just described, Platonism actually leads to conservatism—that is, to a lack of confidence in the possibility of change. This seems, at first glance, the exact opposite of what I described above. There I showed that Platonism underlies the great revolutions and is opposed to conservatism. We saw that Platonism generates ideal utopias (instantiations of ideas) that call upon us to realize them. Communism even espoused historical determinism: those ideas were decreed upon us and will realize themselves willy-nilly. All we can do is join the process and not commit suicide by trying to oppose it (to be the Antichrist blocking the salvation of the modernist religion). Here, by contrast, Platonism stands against the desire and possibility of change; it undergirds conservatism and the refusal to recognize the possibility of change.
Indeed, these are two different sides of the Platonic coin, but it is easy to see that they are two kinds of consequences—somewhat opposed—of Platonic conceptions. I would note that, in my judgment, even here Platonism comes out the loser. I certainly do not trust revolutions and utopias—certainly not ruthless, misanthropic revolutionism—and this is my opposition to Platonism on the plane described above. But I am indeed in favor of change and against rigidities; in that sense I also oppose Platonism of the second (conservative) sort. Just as the utopia is not forced upon us and is not necessarily set in the heavens since Creation, unchangeable, so too the nature of a woman, a Gentile, or a Black person is not necessarily eternal and unalterable. Even if there is an idea of “woman” or of “Black,” there is no necessity to say it includes lack of education or lack of ability. That may be so, but it is not necessary. Even within a Platonic framework (and in the previous column I explained that I personally side with it), one can hang this on the possibility that ideas can be dynamic, or on the claim that those traits are not essential and therefore do not belong to the idea of woman or Black. The second claim is that this is a clinging to irrelevant traits (i.e., non-essential). I fully support a (non-ruthless, non-violent) striving for changes toward equality—whether you see this as a change in the idea, or as a fuller realization of the idea that had not, until now, been realized fully and properly.
In short, there is no real contradiction between these two aspects of Platonism. One can say, generally, that in both cases Platonism leads to a kind of rigidity. Sometimes it is a rigidity of the future model toward which we strive (our utopia), and sometimes it is a rigidity of the present model (which leads to chauvinism and racism). I oppose both sides of the coin, and there is no contradiction: I simply oppose rigidities as such (I have a rigidity against rigidities). And as noted, I say this as someone who holds a Platonic stance on the purely philosophical plane (the existence of ideas).
The Commandment of Love in Halakhah
In column 22 I discussed several emotion-commandments in halakhah (there I referred to an article that expands on this). Regarding the commandment of love, I showed that its core lies in the intellect and not in emotion; in that sense these are what are called Platonic emotions. When I am commanded to love the Holy One, blessed be He, or to love one’s fellow or the convert, this is not a command to love a person who is a Jew or a convert, but to love him by virtue of his being a Jew or a convert. Put differently: to love his Jewishness or his convertedness.
It is easy to get from here to a Platonic reading whereby there is no duty to love people, but only to love ideas. But now I can sharpen that my intention is to a Socratic, not a Platonic, reading. In my understanding there is a duty to love concrete people on account of their being Jews or converts, not a duty to love Jewishness or convertedness. I will go further: one cannot love an idea. That is merely equivocation on the word “love” and a cover for misanthropy. People who love ideas do not love people. At most they love the ideas as they are expressed through people (“fellow travelers,” not friends). That is not love.
In light of what I explained in the previous column, this can be better understood. There I showed that the idea of horseness is not a horse and has no equine characteristics, and the idea of triangularity is not triangular. An idea has no characteristics. It contains characteristics; it is not described by them. Likewise, the idea of the good is not good; hence there is no obligation—and perhaps not even a possibility—to love it. I can, and am commanded to, love something that is good, but the idea of the good is not good. The object of loving the good should not be the idea of the good but an object (a person, or God) that is good. To love a person because he is good is a Socratic, not a Platonic, love. I love a pure (ideal) person because of the good in him; and insofar as that appears in the concrete person before me, I love him as well. But I do not love the good in him; I love him because of the good in him.
I am uncertain whether one can love an idea at all. Love is supposed to be directed toward some being, and the idea—even to a Platonist like me—is not such a being (horseness is not a horse, and humanity is not a human). But even if one can love an idea, it is clear to me there is no obligation to do so. The duty to love the good, or to love a Jew, or to love a convert, has as its object a person, not an idea. One who loves the Good (with shuruk), or convertedness, or Jewishness—but not the Jewish/convert/good person—is a Platonic misanthrope.
In my terminology here, one can say that the commandment to love the convert is directed toward a pure convert, but not toward the idea of convertedness (because love always relates to a person, not an idea). Such a convert likely does not truly exist, but this is a Platonic abstraction that describes the halakhic definition of the commandment. One must love the ideal convert, and from there, actual converts—because he appears in them.
So far I have dealt with the duties of love. To sharpen matters further, I will briefly discuss the duties and prohibitions of hatred.
Platonic Hatred and Socratic Hatred: Hatred in Halakhah
In halakhah there are chiefly two aspects of hatred: the prohibition to hate one’s fellow and the duty to hate evildoers.[3] Thus rules Maimonides (Hil. De’ot 6:5):
“Whoever hates one of Israel in his heart transgresses a negative commandment, as it is said: ‘You shall not hate your brother in your heart.’”
Some have understood Maimonides to mean that the prohibition is to keep the hatred in one’s heart, but there is no prohibition on hatred itself. Most decisors, however, agree that it is prohibited to hate a fellow Jew (in addition to the failure to fulfill the positive commandment to love one’s fellow).
Many decisors nevertheless understood that one is indeed commanded to hate an evildoer. The sugya in Pesahim (113b) discusses a case where one person saw his fellow commit a transgression and there is no second witness to join him. In such a situation he may not come and testify against him, since the testimony of a single witness is not accepted, and he would be merely spreading slander. But the Gemara adds that this witness is permitted to hate the offender:
“R. Shmuel bar Rav Yitzhak said in the name of Rav: it is permitted to hate him.”
The Gemara brings a proof from the verse concerning helping one’s enemy load and unload his donkey:
“As it is said (Ex. 23): ‘When you see the donkey of your enemy lying under its burden…’ What is ‘enemy’? If you say a gentile enemy—yet it was taught: ‘The “enemy” of whom they spoke is an Israelite, not a gentile.’ Rather, obviously an Israelite. And is one permitted to hate him? But it is written (Lev. 19): ‘You shall not hate your brother in your heart’! Rather, where there are witnesses that he committed a transgression—everyone hates him; what is different about this one? No, rather in a case like this: he alone saw in him a matter of sexual impropriety.”
That is, the verse “You shall not hate your brother in your heart” applies to a regular person; but an offender may be hated. A situation in which only one person hates so-and-so is precisely where that person alone saw him commit a sin and there is no second witness.
Rav Naḥman bar Yitzhak holds not only that it is permitted, but that it is even a mitzvah to hate him:
“Rav Naḥman bar Yitzhak said: It is a mitzvah to hate him, as it is said (Prov. 8): ‘Fear of the Lord [Masoret HaShas: [hatred of]] evil.’”
He learns this from the verse (Prov. 8:13):
“The fear of the Lord is hatred of evil; pride and arrogance and the way of evil and a perverse mouth do I hate.”
Others cite here the verse in Psalms (139:21–22):
“Do I not hate those who hate You, O Lord, and contend with those who rise up against You? I hate them with a perfect hatred; they have become my enemies.”
The commentators explain that the prohibition against hating a fellow Israelite is said of “your brother” (as in the verse)—that is, one who is your brother in Torah and mitzvot. A wicked person is not in the category of “your brother” (not “one who acts as your people”), so the prohibition does not apply to him, and there is even a duty to hate him.
But this would seem to contradict the sugya in Bava Metzia 32b, which brings a baraita:
“Come and hear: [Between] one whom you love to unload and one whom you hate to load—a mitzvah with the hater, in order to subdue his inclination.”
We see that if a person has a hater, he is obligated to work on his inclination so as not to hate him.
And Tosafot, s.v. “shera’ah,” in Pesahim there, raise a contradiction between the two sugyot:
“‘Who saw in him a matter of sexual impropriety’—but if you say that in Elu Metziot (B.M. 32b) we say: ‘[Between] one whom you love to unload and one whom you hate to load—a mitzvah with the hater in order to subdue his inclination’—how does ‘subduing his inclination’ apply here, since it is a mitzvah to hate him?”
From Pesahim we see that there is a mitzvah to hate him; so why must one subdue his inclination so as not to hate his fellow?[4]
Tosafot resolve the difficulty thus:
“One can say: Since he hates him, his fellow also comes to hate him, as it is written (Prov. 27): ‘As in water face answers to face, so the heart of man to man.’ As a result they may come to complete hatred, and therefore ‘subduing his inclination’ is relevant.”
Tosafot assume that even with respect to an offender one must not come to complete hatred. By helping him load, one helps oneself avoid reaching complete hatred toward the offender—which is prohibited.
What is the meaning of this “complete hatred”? Later authorities discuss this at length.[5] It would seem this should be explained as Platonic hatred: we must hate the wickedness in him, not him.
This also emerges from the Gemara (Berakhot 10a):
“There were hooligans in the neighborhood of R. Meir who were causing him much distress. R. Meir sought mercy that they die. Beruriah his wife said to him: What are you thinking? Because it is written (Ps. 104): ‘May sins cease (yittamu ḥata’im)’—does it say ‘sinners’ (ḥote’im)? It says ‘sins’ (ḥata’im)! Moreover, look at the end of the verse: ‘And the wicked will be no more.’ If sins cease—then ‘the wicked will be no more.’ Rather, pray for them to repent—and then ‘the wicked will be no more.’ He sought mercy for them, and they repented.”
Beruriah tells R. Meir to pray that his neighbors—who greatly tormented him—repent, rather than die. She offers a homiletic reading of the verse “May sins cease”—not sinners. It is the sins that must cease, not the sinners themselves.[6] So too, one should hate the wickedness, not the wicked.
Indeed, many commentators understood that this is hatred of the sin, not of the sinner. But I will say again here: an emotion is supposed to be directed toward a person, not toward an idea. The implication is that, even with respect to hatred (as we saw with love), there is a duty of Socratic hatred, not Platonic hatred. We do not hate the person—but we also do not hate merely his bad traits and his criminality (his being a sinner). We must hate the person himself on account of his traits. His being a sinner is the reason for the hatred toward him, but not the object of the hatred itself.
We can now see that this is precisely the same mistake that translates the command to love the convert into a love for the idea of convertedness. I explained that love (in its original halakhic sense, not in figurative senses) is directed toward people and not toward ideas. The same applies to hatred. There is a duty to hate evildoers themselves—but not with complete hatred, i.e., not hatred of him as a person, but hatred directed toward him on account of his being a sinner. Still, it is not hatred of wickedness; it is hatred of the wicked themselves.
Emotional Duality
One consequence of this definition is what the commentators write regarding the commandment of hatred: that we must love him as a Jew alongside hating him as a sinner (many explain Tosafot’s “not complete” hatred in Pesahim this way). My claim is that one can live in a state of emotional duality. And again, if the reading is Platonic, there is no contradiction at all: I love Jewishness and hate sin. The fact that both are embodied in one and the same person poses no problem, since on the Platonic plane the emotions are not directed toward the person but toward the ideas. But I claim there is a problem, since emotions are directed toward people and not toward ideas. These are Socratic, not Platonic, love and hatred. My claim is that Socratic hatred can also dwell side by side with Socratic love toward that same person—even though the emotions are directed to the person and not to his traits. I hate him because he is a sinner and love him because he is a Jew. This is a complex state and hard to implement in practice, but there is no contradiction.
To dissolve this seeming contradiction and to understand the commentators, there is no need to empty love and hatred of human content and turn them into Platonic, misanthropic emotions. Even if they are Socratic emotions directed toward people, this is entirely possible and certainly not contradictory: even if I hate the offender for his offending, there is no license to hate him as a person and as a Jew. I must hate him because of the offending in him and love him because of the Jewishness in him.
As I remarked above, I am not at all sure that one can truly feel such emotions toward ideas. The use of the term “love” here is equivocation. The idea of the good is not good and therefore not worthy of love. The idea of Jewishness is not Jewish and therefore not worthy of love. Love of an idea is not really love. In my view one can define and direct love toward the pure Jew (who is indeed a Jew, even if he does not exist in actuality but appears through concrete Jews), but not toward Jewishness. Yet even if, in principle, one can define an emotion toward an idea, I argue that the halakhic command surely concerns an emotion toward people, not toward ideas.
[1] In that column I discussed the question (raised by Sarah Stroud) whether one has an obligation toward a person by virtue of his being my friend, irrespective of his being a good and worthy person.
[2] One can, of course, justify doing harm to a few in order to bring good to many. In principle that is a legitimate consideration, but in practice movements of repair bring harm and suffering to many people and, in many cases, fail to bring the promised repair that would justify it.
[3] On this duty see “The Commandment to Hate the Wicked,” David Ben-Zion Klein, HaMa’ayan, Tishrei 5738; and in R. Yehuda Levi’s article, “‘Feed the Wicked and Let Him Die’ versus ‘Preventing from Transgression,’” HaMa’ayan, Tammuz 5771.
[4] Strictly speaking, one could have answered that the case concerns a person I hate without license, and therefore I must subdue my inclination. The common assumption is that the Torah does not address offenders; therefore the verse speaks of a legitimate “hater.” Yet in the parallel Tosafot in B.M. 32 it seems they indeed intended to resolve it this way:
“‘To subdue his inclination’—and if you say: since in Arvei Pesahim (there) it is established that it concerns an Israelite whom it is permitted to hate, such as where he saw in him a matter of sexual impropriety—what relevance is there to ‘subduing his inclination’? One can say: It is not speaking of the ‘hater’ in the verse.”
It seems they mean that in the verse it really is speaking of someone it is permitted to hate (because he is an offender), whereas the “hater” in Pesahim is a different one, as we suggested here.
[5] See Maimonides, Hil. Rotze’ah 13:13–14; Shulḥan Arukh, Ḥoshen Mishpat 282:11 and the commentaries; Hagahot Maimoniot, Hil. De’ot 6:3; Ḥafetz Ḥayyim 4:4 n. 14; Ḥazon Ish, Yoreh De’ah end of §2; Ben Adam Leḥavero I, pp. 200–272; Lere’akha Kamokha, mitzvat “Lo Tisna,” ch. 4; the book Tanya, ch. 32; Middot Re’iyah, “Love,” §§8–9, and there §§5–6, and more.
[6] The plain sense of the verse, of course, is that “sinners” are the sinning people. The teaching is a homily.
Discussion
Is the following connected to Platonism in halakhah: there is a view that impurity is a “separate matter,” meaning a kind of reality in its own right, and from this one can derive consequences (that nullification in a majority helps for impurity of touch but not for impurity of carrying, as stated explicitly in the Gemara. That is how it is explained in Gate 3 chapter 8. It is a long matter and depends on very complex and highly obscure sugyot in Beitzah 38 and Bekhorot 23, which I happened to have occasion to study recently). Is this attitude toward impurity like light and energy, which are physical rather than Platonic terms, or is it like the legal status of a married woman—which you defined in the article on legal statuses—or is it something in between?
I crawled in fear when opening my mouth to thread a conversation—what will happen after the full study, Heaven forbid.
A. I think I answered. The ideal horse has no specific tail length (or it has every tail length), unless there is an ideal length. What it necessarily has are the essential properties of horses (and perhaps a range of tail lengths).
B. There is no line that distinguishes communists from non-communists. A person can define a 240% tax as communism, and another can define it as capitalism.
C. In my view, that is the root of Popper’s identification. Except that he assumed that if there is a utopia, there must necessarily be trampling, and I am adding that this is not so; there is also disregard for people there. I described such figures from real life as well. The quantitative consideration in note 2 is important, because in my view the initial justification is quantitative, but the fact is that the communists did evil to people in a way disproportionate to the good it might have brought. At some stage you lose contact with people and remain attached to the idea in a Platonic way. As I said, I described such figures from life. Like what people say about leftists, that they spend their whole lives working for the weak—but only for those very far away from them.
D. “As in water face answers to face” is a result. You may thereby arrive at hatred of the person as such. In any case, there is no necessity to read this into Tosafot. I am willing to say it in my own name as well.
As for note 4, I think that is what I wrote. Since one is permitted to hate him, it is not clear why one should restrain one’s inclination. After all, it is permitted. I’ll change it, because the intention is not to the hater of the verse but to the other hater. The verse speaks of someone whom one is permitted to hate.
E. Still, the peshat is not as she says. You are only explaining the derash more fully.
Impurity is certainly not a physical concept but a metaphysical one. Exactly like a legal status. One can see this as a kind of idea. Light and energy are physical concepts, since they have an effect on physics.
If so, if impurity is a Platonic matter, then R. Shimon’s explanation there is a nice example of Platonic usage in halakhah. Usually one can manage even without the conception that a legal status exists as an entity (that is, even if there is such an entity, it does not affect the laws, but merely corresponds to them). But in that chapter, R. Shimon actually derives consequences from the fact that impurity is a separate matter. And by this he explains an obscure Gemara in Bekhorot, where Tosafot are really pressed, and an obscure halakhah in Rambam, where the Raavad and the commentators stood like a heap of flowing liquids, etc.
Ahhhh. In your reply you wrote “I will change it” in the sense of changing, meaning that before it had been written incorrectly (I read it as “I will repeat,” meaning: explain again). But in my opinion, correcting that one word is not enough, and now the whole note does not work out.
Unnecessary—and the wording there is in fact fine (only inside the parentheses it should say that he is indeed a transgressor). If you can delete my last two comments, that would be appreciated. Thank you.
This does not seem different to me from the implications I presented in the article on legal statuses, or from a discussion of the meanings of a law applying to the object itself (cheftza)—as in vows or consecrated items.
A. I still don’t understand. Is it possible to sculpt the abstract ideal horse in marble? If not, then it is the idea. If yes, then it has a very specific tail length. A tail is of course an essential property of a horse, and it exists in all horses. I do not see how the retreat to an ideal tail helps here. Maybe this is trivial from what you wrote, but just to be sure—I understand from your words that it is impossible to sculpt it, and nevertheless it is different from the idea; is that correct?
[By the way: the difference between a first reading and careful study does not always express itself in more comments. In the first reading, besides understanding what is written—which is presumably the main thing—there is also a kind of mapping: what fits comfortably with what I think; what adds something new or fills a lacuna and in fact does not clash; what does clash with what I think but, on first thought, the arguments do not seem bombastic enough to replace a paradigm [this is usually where the comments sit]; and what does clash and also raises a serious difficulty that forces me to stop and examine. After that, in fuller study, there is a kind of attempt—within the limits of human dogmatic fixation that has solidified over time—to muster some sort of openness and indeed consider replacing something I hold with the new thing being proposed. It is a kind of reflection that takes time to sink in. And just as writers and artists speak of inspiration for creation, there is also an inspiration for being convinced. Even when it happens, it does not always happen immediately after hearing the arguments. First of all there is resistance. It’s interesting what in psychology causes that. There are rare cases in which already during the reading itself there is a sense of surrender (for me, for example, that happened with John Stuart Mill’s little book on utilitarianism. Every word was a pearl entering an open oyster). Therefore, typically, fuller study expresses itself, if anything, in deleting comments rather than in writing more.]
A. Maybe it can be sculpted. For the tail, put in some tail or an ideal tail (if there is such a thing). But even if it can’t be sculpted, that doesn’t make it an idea. One can sculpt it when the sculpture includes only the essential properties (and then we also would not violate “you shall not make for yourself a graven image,” because it would be missing limbs).
I enjoyed your remarks about the first and second reading. As for Mill, he writes wonderfully and very systematically and is well constructed. Not long ago I reread On Liberty, and although to people of our time most of the things seem self-evident, the systematic presentation is very impressive, especially in light of the period in which it was written. When you read carefully, you discover that he is very precise and closes almost all the possible gaps (the gaping mouths of the oysters).
One thing at a time. First possibility: some tail whatever (say I chose a length of 11 cm). It is not clear why that in particular is what the one and only ideal horse has. Second possibility: an ideal tail does not help, because an ideal horse-tail is a collection of horse hairs 10–15 cm long, so it is the same question (having a length is essential to a horse-tail). Third possibility (apparently): no tail at all—obviously impossible, because having a tail is essential to a horse. If it has no tail, then it also has no belly, ears, head, hooves, or anything. It remains only the information that describes the collection of horses—that is, the idea as defined in the previous post. I do not understand the notion that you can’t sculpt it and yet “it’s a horse” (perhaps saying “it’s a horse” three times in a row is a charm against the evil eye?). Who needs this ideal horse at all?
A. An ideal horse is a horse with a tail of any length. So one can choose any tail you want.
B. I didn’t understand. If there is an ideal length, then that is the length one chooses. And if there is a range, choose randomly from within it.
C. Even if you “sculpt” a horse without a tail, this is not really a sculpture. Sculpt a horse with a tail of some length (not a length chosen arbitrarily, but a defined length. This is not a concrete sculpture). And that leads me to D: it cannot be sculpted and yet it is still a horse. The reason is that it is an object, even if imaginary, and not an idea, which is a collection of properties without a (theoretical) substance bearing them. After all, even if it can be sculpted, the sculpture is not the ideal horse; it is a representation of the ideal horse. So why is sculpting it important in order to exclude it from the category of idea?
I think that if you apply this to the examples I gave (such as misanthropy for its own sake), it will become clearer. I explained there that one cannot love an idea, but one can love a theoretical object. The idea of the good is not good, but the perfect good object is good (and therefore one can and should love it, value it).
What about the law that prohibitions nullify one another (if one mixed together piggul, notar, and tamei and ate them, he is exempt)? Does this necessarily indicate a conception of legal statuses (with a different status for each prohibition), or even if there is only the law “do not eat,” since the reasons are different, nullification is still relevant (just as one might love because of conversion, so one might refrain from eating because of piggulization)?
Now I think that perhaps this connects to the matter of the sophisticated combinations of one who sets his dog on someone, which you presented in one of the posts, for which according to the Pnei Yehoshua he is exempt (and by the way, I interpret the Pnei Yehoshua differently, not like Ayelet HaShachar understood him). In the case of three olive-bulks of piggul, notar, and tamei, the problem is only a doubtful warning: that is, at some point in his mouth, while chewing, there happens to be a majority of piggul and a minority of notar, so the notar becomes piggul, and the eater violates piggul rather than notar. That is the novelty there according to the view that prohibitions nullify one another and a doubtful warning is not a valid warning. But why shouldn’t we say that even without chewing, if he has on his plate three olive-bulks of piggul, notar, and tamei, and the specific prohibition was not identified, then it is permitted to eat, because each particular prohibition is nullified in a majority that is not itself (just as a majority of permitted food nullifies a minority of prohibited food, so a majority of “not-piggul” should nullify a minority of piggul). It seems to me there is room here for some pilpul.
You are uncertain whether one can love an idea, and you say that the commandment to love the convert is Socratic love of the convert himself. But what about love of God? I saw that you wrote in the past (post 22) that this is not love of a substance; so is this not a matter of loving the divine idea / cleaving to His will? Is this love of an object, as implied here?
It is hard to say that love of God is only the deeds themselves; there is a commandment regarding an emotion that is supposed to be expressed in deeds.
And perhaps if so, every love (including love of the convert) is also love of the idea, which should also be expressed in love of the individual insofar as he is part of the idea (say, a person who finds the very idea of conversion disgusting cannot fulfill love of the convert even if he especially loves a particular convert because the Torah commanded us especially to love a convert). And just as there can be a utopia without trampling people, so too one can love the idea without ignoring love of the particulars—a Platonic emotion that is not misanthropic.
Thank you very much.
I do not see any necessity to make the nullification of prohibitions depend on there being a metaphysical legal status of prohibition. One can also explain the law of nullification by saying that the Torah does not require you to suffer too great a financial loss; therefore, if a little prohibition falls into a majority of permitted food, then if the whole mixture is prohibited you would lose a huge amount of permitted food in order to avoid a little prohibited food. Therefore the Torah permits it. There is room to discuss this, since one must spend all his money in order not to transgress a prohibition, and that too must be set aside. But this is an example of an explanation that does not depend on ontic assumptions.
To be sure, this is correct only regarding nullification of a prohibition in permitted food. Nullification of one prohibition in another is perhaps an extension of nullification of prohibition in permitted food. After all, kosher sekhakh also nullifies invalid sekhakh (in Rashi at the beginning of Sukkah).
Of course one can engage in pilpul, but this is another example of kinds of explanation that do not depend on metaphysics and Platonism.
I intentionally did not deal here with the Holy One, blessed be He, because I am doubtful whether with regard to Him one can distinguish at all between the ideal substance and the idea. He is a singular substance, and therefore it is not clear whether He has an idea at all. And He Himself is also an ideal substance. Therefore this is Socratic love by definition. Is it an emotion? I touched on that there.
What do you mean by “an extension of nullification of prohibition in permitted food”? Regarding kosher sekhakh, I understand that you bring it from there concerning the question whether nullification helps only to nullify prohibitions or also to create legal effects (for example, a majority of threads spun for the sake of the mitzvah validating a minority of threads not spun for the sake of the mitzvah), but I didn’t understand what analogy you intended from there (when the laws are different, it is obvious that nullification is relevant even without legal statuses).
It’s fun to deal with shadows. You can imagine many shapes in shadows, as in clouds.
But it starts to get boring once you understand the principle.
And when the prohibitions are different? It is the same thing. Nullification is possible there too even without legal statuses.
Ah, I understand. You are saying that different laws are like prohibition and permission, and your question is only about one prohibition in another (different) prohibition. I do not see a fundamental difference (although my reasoning is not applicable to different prohibitions, it is also not applicable to valid and invalid sekhakh—after all, you do not throw them in the trash and suffer financial loss. As I said, my reasoning was only a demonstration).
What is the principle?
With God’s help, 24th of the Omer, 5780
To Rabbi M. D. A. — greetings,
Can one not love an idea? Surely “love of virtue” is love for the person who bears and implements the good trait, and from love of the idea one arrives at love of the person who serves as a dwelling place for that idea. As the philosopher said: “Aristotle is dear, Plato is dear, but truth is dearer still.”
Regards, Simchah Fishel HaLevi Plankton
And there is also love for a person who does not yet actually bear the idea, but in whom the potential is hidden to grow and become one of those who bear the idea. Thus even a newborn baby is beloved because “he was created in the image of God” and because “there was given to him a precious instrument.” He is beloved because of the virtue hidden within him to grow gloriously into one of those who realize the idea. Love of future virtue.
I brought examples, not an explanation that I really mean to stand behind. My aim was only to show that there is no necessity to assume something ontic.
For example, one can explain it like R. Gedaliah Nadel: that in a general view of a mixture, a person gives it a designation according to its majority. If there is a majority of permitted food with a minority of prohibited food within it, then the whole mixture receives the designation of permitted. And so too regarding valid and invalid sekhakh, or different prohibitions that nullify one another. There is no lack of such explanations or others, and I see no necessity at all to assume something ontic.
Indeed, that is what I wrote. One cannot love an idea. “Love of an idea” is a borrowed term for love of the bearers of the idea. The good in itself is not fit for love, because the good itself is not good, nor did it choose to be so. So what is there to love in it? Certainly there is no value or obligation to love it. A person who bears that idea is worthy of love.
Just by way of example: you do not love saltiness as an idea. You love salty foods because of their saltiness.
This I accept (although my initial gut-level explanation is still legal statuses).
It seems that the posek has found one principle on which to base the discussions that touch on Platonism, and it would be interesting to know what that principle is.
The principle is launching a categorical declaration into the air and then withdrawing in peace and honor. It is the same principle for all discussions, not only for discussions about Platonism.
With God’s help, 24th of the Omer, 5780
To Rabbi M. D. A. — greetings,
You assume that there is value and an obligation to love only one who chose to bear the virtue, and that may perhaps be true if we are discussing the side of obligation and value. But love is first and foremost a natural emotion arising from the pleasure the lover has from the beloved.
Therefore a person loves food because of the taste that is pleasant to him, even though the food did not choose its taste; and a person loves one who is good and pleasant toward him because he makes life pleasant for him; and a person loves wisdom because he delights in the knowledge and clarity it gives him; and a person loves a work of art because he delights in its beauty.
To the natural emotion is added the ethical demand to love one who chose the good. Then, for example, if there is a person who by nature is piercing and terribly hurtful, and we see that he stubbornly overcomes his nature and tries not to hurt others—then we will love him because of his intense effort, even though in practice it is much more pleasant for us to be in the company of someone whose goodness is natural.
Regards, Zusha Leib Zaltzman
Zusha, I think that someone who never hurts anyone is actually the type with whom it is hard to be a real friend.
A distant, polite, collegial relationship involves no hurt at all, and perhaps in that respect it really is more convenient to work with impeccably polite people (I work with some Canadians, and their absolute politeness—even when I have in fact said nonsense or delayed over something too much, and correspondingly the pressure on me always to remain polite too even when I am in fact rather short-tempered—is actually very irritating), but a more serious friendship and certainly a marriage involve as well (at least in my case; perhaps I am the exception) some exposure to vulnerability and some freedom to hurt. If real feelings and real opinions always have to be covered over and restrained, that is exhausting, uncomfortable, and does not allow you really to know the other person. A person is also recognized in his anger, and I want to know my friends for real. Obviously one still sometimes restrains oneself and absorbs things and so on, and I definitely do not think every fleeting splash of stomach acid should spill outward in the name of some damned thing like inner truth; but the opposite extreme, toward politeness, is not good at all either, at least to my taste. There is of course a difference between kinds of relationships—colleagues/neighbors, acquaintances, friends/family, teacher/student, and so on—but still, in general I think the rule you described is the opposite. Someone who only knows how to be nice and smiley is fine as a neighbor you nod to at the entrance to the supermarket, nothing more than that.
In Rabbi Michi’s formulation, this is a “museum approach.” Someone who relates to me as to a museum, I also have to relate to him that way (sometimes), and in practice that is exhausting and distancing. Perhaps on a discussion site this is different from real life itself (which we are privileged to live thanks to the wonderful leadership of the prime minister).
With God’s help, 24th of the Omer, 5780
To T.G. — a good day,
But there is a middle way between extreme politeness, which brings indifference and alienation (or the appearance of them), and unrestrained frankness, which brings anger and bitterness.
One does not eat either salt or sugar separately and in large quantities; rather, one uses them in a controlled and measured way. When you put in a little of them, they give a good taste to the drink or dish. But when you put in a lot, it is “spoiling the dish.”
Even with bitter herbs, the preferred mitzvah is specifically to take lettuce, whose bitterness is slight and refined. And one of my friends told me in the name of a relative that when you put more than one teaspoon of sugar in tea—you ruin the taste.
And from the parable to the point: words of criticism need to be mixed with much understanding and appreciation, and then they are received respectfully, with understanding, and sometimes even with agreement.
Regards, Zissel Leibish Zaltzman-Korinaldi
If we have defined love for a man of virtue as Socratic love, then we can define love that comes from responsibility and investment as Xenophontic love, after Xenophon, the student of Socrates, who took responsibility as a senior commander to bring the ten thousand Greek soldiers safely back to their homeland, as described in his book The March of the Ten Thousand (Anabasis).
A rabble of retreating mercenaries is not exactly the height of human virtue, but the sense of responsibility toward his comrades-in-arms and the investment in returning them to their homeland despite the dangers and adventures deepens in the giver and investor’s heart a great love for the people he cared for.
This kind of love is the love of parents for their children and of teachers for their students. A love that begins with responsibility and investment, and in many cases the investment bears fruit and turns also into love of the virtue of the children and students.
Regards, Yaron Fishel Ordner
The principle is simple.
You want a theory that says nothing to be accepted?
Make sure it supplies or stimulates desires.
If desire wants something beautiful? Give it the most beautiful thing.
If desire wants more, give it infinity.
And so on.
That way no one will object, because it suits them and feels great to them that the universe has the potential to satisfy them.
It is all in the imagination; practically speaking, it has no meaning whatsoever. There has been no development in reality that was developed on the basis of the nonsense mentioned here—such as ideas, perfect beings, and the like.
The only thing stimulated by this is desire, through the imagination created by the words.
With God’s help, 10 Iyar 5780
To the Last Posek — greetings,
As a quintessential decisor, for whom “a judge has only what his eyes see,” you refuse to stray into fantasies about a better and loftier reality, to which one should aspire and advance.
In contrast to the decisor who rules categorically that “what has been is what will be,” and that the world has no remedy but to lie on its back “without dreams and without hopes,” stands the creator, who sees before his mind’s eye a better reality, straighter and happier, whose realization he strives toward.
And contrary to your words, no real development ever occurred in the world without someone first envisioning that the world could be developed and cultivated, repaired and improved.
Of course, a beautiful dream of a wonderful future is not enough. The wonderful future grows out of the reality of the “here and now.” A human being cannot create something from nothing. The creator must study reality well in order to take from it the tools for its repair. One who disconnects from reality and “jumps higher than his navel” may fall; but one who goes slowly, step by step—advances and helps others advance.
The creator needs, on his way to realizing the dream, a closely accompanying decisor, who will clarify for him, without illusions, the existing limitations—practical and ethical—a firm decisor who will not allow the creator to take uncalculated risks, and will not let him act by improper means in order to realize his goal.
The creator who looks to the future needs the decisor to illuminate the present for him, but the decisor must not think he is the “last posek,” that the gray reality he encounters is the final word. The decisor sees in his set table a “work table” on which the creator will develop his creation.
Regards, Pedahzur Fishel Peri-Gan
And at a gathering of rabbis held on the occasion of the launching of the “Daf Yomi” project, Rabbi Meir Shapiro called over one of the rabbis whose wife was the daughter of his teacher from his youth. And he said to him: “Tell your wife that one should not belittle a child’s dreams.” He related that he had conceived the idea of Daf Yomi while still a child studying with his teacher. The teacher’s daughter, who was already an older girl, laughed at the child’s imaginary dreams—and behold, the dream rose and became a reality, and in the many decades since then, the number of men and women studying Daf Yomi has multiplied beyond measure.
Paragraph 6, line 2
… that he is the “last posek,” that the gray reality…
There, line 3
… the decisor sees in his set table a “work table” on which the creator will develop his creation.
My remarks referred to lies and fabricated theories spread by people of imagination and sophisticated powers of seduction.
I saw nothing in my words that harms the desire to imagine a better world and thereby improve the world. For that one need not invent strange and bizarre idols and images. One only needs to imagine, want, and do.
Although I delayed over it, it is still not clear to me. I return to it again, with your permission, to get even more concrete clarification.
I observed all the horses and saw that tail length can be 4, 5, or 6 cm, and nostril diameter can be 1 or 2 cm. So in the idea, under the entries for tail and nostrils, that is exactly what is written. (For simplicity let us assume the values are discrete. Perhaps one extends by reasoning to a collection of continuous ranges that contain the discrete values.) There is no dependence between the properties, and there can be six possible horses.
Does the ideal horse look like one of those six? Is each of the six a representation of an ideal horse? Does the ideal horse have no tail at all, and no nostrils either?
[Separately and independently, I identify that tail length 4 and nostril diameter 1 is the healthiest, most beautiful, strongest, and fastest horse, so it is the perfect horse. I think the Greeks assumed a unity of perfections, meaning that the most beautiful body is also the healthiest, etc.—or at least that there exists a body that is both the most beautiful and the healthiest, etc. I do not assume that, and it is not essential to the matter.) As you explained, this has no connection at all to the ideal horse.]
To T.G. [tallit gadol?] — greetings,
The ideal horse’s tail is no less than twelve thumbbreadths, as it is written: “You shall make yourself tassels on the four corners—of your horse…”
Regards, Pferdman Sosnovietzki the Digger
An important insight. What about the diameter of the nostril?
To T.G. — greetings,
The diameter of the horse’s nostrils is to be determined according to the amount of air needed for the horse’s functioning, since it requires much air for its running.
Regards, P.S.H.
As I wrote, all the possibilities exist. I see no reason and/or way to decide, and it is also not important.
With God’s help, 11 Ziv 5780
To T.G. — greetings,
And perhaps the idea represented by the physical horse in the material world is its soul? Just as a human being’s soul is not the limbs and nostrils but the thoughts and feelings—so too for a horse, according to its level: it has thoughts and feelings and unique character traits, and these are what are truly “in the horse,” while its body is only a vessel for their expression?
With the blessing “the sound of joy and song,”
Eliezer Lipman Sosnovietzki-Dehary
(owner of the old platform)
So for the sake of continuing the clarification process (while the candle still burns—how is it that they don’t charge a subscription fee here?), may one assume that every one of the billions of hypothetical horse-forms one can imagine is the form of some pure horse?
That is, this is something unique to each and every horse, and not something shared by all horses together?
Yes
I don’t understand. Where is all this going?
I wrote that only to Eliezer Lipman. But what is someone who does not understand to do? I had heard of an idea and of a perfect horse; of a pure horse I heard here for the first time, even though from your words it seems to follow that this is an ancient concept of ancient concepts. For some reason the penny refuses to drop for me, and until it drops I have no pure horses.
With God’s help, 11 Iyar 5780
In Scripture and in the words of the Sages we find that the horse’s traits express human traits. The horse is the symbol of Egypt, both in pride and in sensuality, and therefore the king is forbidden to multiply horses for himself, lest he return the people to Egypt.
The horse expresses man’s confidence in his own power and the might of his hand, and therefore the prophet says, prophesying of Israel’s return to its God: “Assyria shall not save us; we will not ride upon horses, nor will we say any more to the work of our hands, ‘Our God.’”
On the other hand, the horse expresses nobility and honor. “The man whom the king delights to honor”—his honor is expressed in riding on a horse. Elijah too goes up to heaven in a whirlwind with “a chariot of fire and horses of fire.”
In the chapter HaRo’eh (Berakhot 56b), the Gemara distinguishes between one who sees a red horse, which if running is a bad sign for him, but if at rest is a good sign for him; and in contrast, a white horse—whether running or at rest—is a good sign for him. The red horse expresses warlikeness, whereas the white horse expresses honor and nobility (see Malbim on Zechariah 1:6).
In the Zohar, the letters of the Torah are compared to horses of fire, and Rav Kook explains (Orot HaTorah 5:4)
:
“‘Horses of fire—these are the letters of the Torah’—where a person cannot attain the depth of the idea by his own power, the creative power is magnified through his connection with the letter of the Torah, and he rises far beyond his own power, like the speed and security of travel by riding.
There is one who goes on foot, who proceeds by the power of his own contemplation in the intellectual matters of Torah generally, and is not aided in the meaning of things by the letters of the Torah. And there is one who does not have the strength to go on foot, and goes by the letters of the Torah even in those matters that are simple and in which a person on foot ought to go on foot by his own power.
And there is one who, wherever it is possible to go on foot, uses the letters of the Torah not because of weakness, but as one rides a horse for honor, in order to adorn the matters more, or to ride where it is impossible to arrive by one’s own power, except through joining inquiry to the letters of the Torah.”
The letters of the Torah give a person strength, speed, and confidence, reinforcing and confirming what a person reaches by his own analysis and reasoning, but also enabling him to attain deeper insights than he would have reached by his own thought alone.
Regards, Eliezer Lipman Sosnovietzki Dehary
In paragraph 9, line 4
… than he would have reached by his own thought alone.
Can one see the ten sefirot of Kabbalah as Platonic ideas of the divine attributes?
“The foundation of love of Israel is love of the good and the kindness, and their practical realization toward others. One must look at another while tolerantly ignoring the evil in him, emphasizing the good. In no way does this mean flattering the wicked and ignoring their wickedness, but one should see the good in them. Therefore zealotry is permitted only when it is pure and contains no element of hatred of Israel. But the way of zealotry whose basis is hatred has no place among us, and is contrary to the spirit of original Judaism. In the soul of the nation—the soul of Israel—there is no deficiency whatsoever, Heaven forbid; defects exist only in the particulars and not in the whole, and therefore the root of love of Israel for the entire nation exists and endures forever” (R. Tzvi Yehuda, Or LeNetivati, p. 307).
Platonic love, or Socratic, or both together?
And what is the difference between “permitted zealotry” and forceful trampling utopias?
I will preface that I do not agree with his words—not with the negation of zealotry rooted in hatred, nor with the claim that defects exist only in the particulars and not in the whole (whatever that may mean). But if he means that one should love the collective of Israel and not the individuals, I addressed that in the post. I assume he simply phrased himself imprecisely.
The question regarding zealotry is broad, and this is not the place to offer general definitions. In general, zealotry is permitted where you do not employ it against other opinions or to promote your own opinions, but only against wickedness.
Perhaps he meant that love of the individual, or the prohibition of hating him (incidentally, in the Daf Yomi today), is derived from love of the collective.
Socratic love is derived from love of the Platonic idea. Or it is its practical expression.
“For I the Lord your God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, upon the third generation and upon the fourth, of those who hate Me.”
With God’s help, Pesach Sheni 5780
And when all the nations will ascend to celebrate in Jerusalem, the prophet’s vision will be fulfilled: “On that day there shall be upon the bells of the horses, ‘Holy unto the Lord’” (Zechariah 14:20). The early commentators explained that even the ornaments on the horses’ foreheads or the bells on their necks will be consecrated by the pilgrims as sacred vessels with which to offer sacrifice to the Lord.
According to this approach, the “bells of the horse”—symbols of splendor and pride—will be sanctified through their self-nullification, becoming “sacred vessels” for sacrifice. But according to Rav Kook: “This is the measure of every man, but there is yet a higher level, namely the raising of all the profane into holiness. This is the measure of the most elevated of the righteous, and the measure destined for the world in its exalted future: ‘On that day there shall be upon the bells of the horses, ‘Holy unto the Lord’’” (Shemoneh Kevatzim 4:39).
Horse-ness itself—with all the pride and exultation, the beauty within the splendor—will be elevated to bear and lead toward holiness. The horse will bear upon its forehead the crown of holiness, as it leads the pilgrims to the house of the Lord, and even on its return home the horse will expand the border of holiness to every place “where the horse runs and neighs.” Service of God with pride and exultation, beauty and splendor, brings man near to holiness, and holiness near to man.
With the blessing “the sound of joy and song,” Eliezer Lipman Sosnovietzki Dehary
Paragraph 2, line 6
… destined for the world in its exalted future, …
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… the horse will expand the border of holiness…
Jonathan’s translation is interesting, rendering “bells of the horse” as “the polished things of the horse.” It seems that mitzlot is from the root tzll, in the sense of “clear” = “bright/polished.” Perhaps the ornament is called that because it shines? Or perhaps it refers to a tool used to clean and polish the horse’s skin?
Regards, Y.P.O.R.
R. Tanhum the Jerusalemite (in his commentary on the Twelve Prophets, ed. Hadassah Shi) discusses this at length, bringing several proposals of the commentators and examining them.
Some explained that “the bells of the horse” means its forehead, or “its sides that cast shade on the ground.” R. Tanhum objects: “It is not reasonable that a horse be designated by something on which is written ‘Holy unto the Lord,’” and he resolves that the horse will become superfluous because there will be no wars, and therefore it will be dedicated to God.
After bringing additional interpretations—saddles, decorative collars, bells—R. Tanhum proposes: “In my opinion this is not one of the horse’s ornaments. The best view, in my opinion, among what they said about it, is that it is the name of implements placed on its face and sides to protect them in battle. And they are called thus because they shake as it walks, and they make a sound and rustling, just as cymbals are so named…”
When there are no wars, the “bells/shields of the horse,” the armor that protects it, will become unnecessary, and they “will be dedicated to God Most High, and ‘Holy unto the Lord’ will be written on them; or they will melt them down and hammer them into pots for the pilgrims, and write this on them.”
In short: “They shall beat their armor into cooking pots” 🙂
Regards, Amiuz Yaron Shnitzler
R. Isaac Abarbanel proposes:
“And it is more correct to explain that the sanctity of the nations and their submission before the Lord will be so great that not only will the people themselves call in the name of the Lord with their mouths when they go up to Jerusalem, but even on the horse-bells, namely the jingling bells they hang on their necks when they go up there, they will write and engrave ‘Holy unto the Lord,’ in order to publicize that they are among the celebrants, for this will be in their eyes an honor and a glory.”
In modern language: the pilgrims from all the nations will stick on their “vehicles” a sticker saying “Holy unto the Lord,” to publicize their faith in the Lord.
Amen, may it be so in our days!
With the blessing of a “happy 32nd,” Simchah Fishel HaLevi Plankton
R. Mendel Hirsch (son of R. Samson Raphael Hirsch), in his commentary on the haftarot, sees here a vision of holiness appearing even in ordinary life:
“On that day, when the distinction between humanity and Israel has already disappeared, the distinction between profane and holy will disappear as well. Everything that is holy, because it has been dedicated to its Creator, blessed be He, possesses that holiness only in order to be in need of the sanctification of life.
Here one looks toward a time when everything, even the simplest thing—and not in Jewish language: even the most secular thing—will be holy, will serve the Lord. To such an extent that the thing which today proclaims upon the forehead of the High Priest ‘Holy unto the Lord’ will then proclaim upon every bell, upon the ‘bells of the horse’: ‘Holy unto the Lord.’”
These words are close to those of Rav Kook in Shemoneh Kevatzim 4:39, which I cited above.
With the blessing of sanctifying life, Avishai Lipman Sosnovitzki Dehary
With God’s help, 32nd of the Omer, 5780
I mentioned Jonathan’s translation (according to the Keter Mikraot Gedolot version?), which rendered it “the polished things of the horse,” and I raised the conjecture that this refers to one of the horse-grooming implements.
In the standard Mikraot Gedolot it reads “the harness of the horse,” and perhaps this is related to “the yoke and the bow” (Kelim 21), which are among the implements of a plow.
On that basis one might perhaps suggest that “the bells of the horse” are its “yoke-bars,” the poles to which the horse is harnessed.
And perhaps it is specifically on the horse’s yoke-bars that “Holy unto the Lord” will be written, to declare that the horse’s strength will no longer be harnessed for negative purposes such as wars and the like, but rather for peaceful purposes, transporting passengers or plowing.
Just as the weapons of war will be turned into agricultural tools—so the war-horses too will be harnessed only for peaceful purposes.
Regards, Lipa Feivish Sosnovitzki Dehary
According to the meaning of yatzul, a pole to which an animal is harnessed, one might perhaps also explain the verse in Job 40:31: “Can you fill his skin with booths, and his head with fish-spears,” where the fish-spear is an instrument by which the fish is caught by its head.
And perhaps likewise in what is described in Gideon’s dream, “a cake of barley bread tumbling through the camp”—perhaps tzelil is a peel or spit by means of which one holds the bread when turning it over in the process of baking.
Regards, Pilsod
Many thanks.
As for the translation of mitzlot ha-sus: according to the version “berurin,” you explained tzalul in the sense of “clear.” That meaning of tzalul as “clear” seems to me to be neither biblical nor rabbinic Hebrew. On the Keter site the text is “kerurin”; perhaps this is from the sense of a cushion on the horse’s back, and it interpreted mitzlot as that which shades/covers, meaning what covers the horse’s back.
To explain mitzlot in biblical Hebrew like yatzul in rabbinic Hebrew seems to me a bit forced, both linguistically and in terms of content.
The verse is difficult, but I like Radak’s explanation best (as usual). You brought it, and I will write it too in order to show its advantage. On that day, the mitzlot on the horse—and they are ringing metal bells—will be used as vessels for the Temple service. And the pots people have in their homes will be consecrated and used like sprinkling bowls to collect the great quantity of blood. And every pot in Jerusalem and in Judah shall be holy unto the Lord of Hosts. In this way the verses connect very well as one subject. Except that the phrase “upon the bells of the horse” is difficult (whereas according to the interpretation that one writes “Holy unto the Lord” on the bells of the horse, it is easier). It would seem that his explanation takes “upon the bells of the horse” to mean “the bells that are on the horse,” just as “they shall come up with acceptance on My altar” means “they shall come up on My altar for acceptance.”
As for tzelil lechem se‘orim and uvetziltzal dagim rosho, there is no reason to explain all the diverse appearances of the basic root tz-l in one single sense. In Job, the more plausible explanation to me of tziltzal dagim is from tzel [shade], corresponding to the beginning of the verse, “Can you fill his skin with booths?” as Ramban brought. The verse is speaking of fishermen who fill their booth on the shore with the catch of their fishing, and it boasts of the Leviathan’s might, that fishermen cannot prevail over it. That fits the adjacent verse, “Shall traders divide him?” better than it fits the more distant verse about “putting a rope through his nose.” And if one explains it as a tool for catching fish (as in modern Hebrew), then tziltzal is simply a name in itself, not necessarily because it jingles. As for tzelil lechem se‘orim, there is no better explanation than that of Targum and Radak: from the language of roasting, like “cakes baked on coals.”
And since we are speaking of tziltzal, I will add something.
In one of his poems about sailing to Israel, Yehudah Halevi wrote: “And when the ship spread out to cross, wings like the wings of the stork [passed] over me,” meaning that the ship’s sails seemed to Yehudah Halevi as though they were its wings. I once saw someone marvel at Yehudah Halevi’s picturesque expression, not knowing that—as usual—the commentator on Tanakh had already said it. For regarding the verse “Ho, land of whirring wings,” the Targum explained tziltzal as the sails of ships, which are stretched out and shade, and are like wings for the ship.
Similarly, Ibn Gabirol wrote in one of his wrath poems, “A people whose fathers are loathsome to me, unfit to be dogs for my flock,” meaning that those people were so contemptible in his eyes that even their fathers were unworthy to be even dogs to guard R. Shlomo ibn Gabirol’s flock, a sign of the gap in worth between him and them. And once someone referred to this as some kind of original expression of Ibn Gabirol indicating the heat of his anger and the greatness of his pride, etc. But it is a verse in Job: “whose fathers I disdained to set with the dogs of my flock,” which Ibn Gabirol inserted exactly according to its context there in the chapter and in the poem. There are many, many examples of this sort of thing.
With God’s help, eve of Lag BaOmer 5780
From Haman’s suggestion to take “the horse on which the king rode and on whose head a royal crown was set,” it emerges that an ornament was placed on the head of the king’s horse, expressing that it was “the king’s horse.”
R. Amos Hakham, in Daat Mikra there, refers to the book Penei Olam HaMikra, which brings pictures of ornaments placed on the head of the king’s horse, which in his opinion the author of Esther calls “a royal crown.”
It is worth noting that nezer is not necessarily a “crown.” The frontlet on the forehead of the High Priest is also called “the holy crown”; and the anointing oil on the head of the High Priest is called “the crown of the anointing oil of his God”; and the hair of the Nazirite is called “the crown of his head.” Here too, it is possible that the “royal crown” on the head of the royal horse is called a “royal crown.”
The book Penei Olam HaMikra is not in front of me, but it may be that the ornament of the royal horse was a gold plate on its forehead, like the frontlet of the High Priest. R. Mendel Hirsch has already noted the wording “Holy unto the Lord,” which recalls the High Priest’s frontlet.
Perhaps the kings of the nations who come up to Jerusalem will adorn their horses not with the emblem of the king but with the words “Holy unto the Lord,” to symbolize that the true King is the King of kings, and there is none besides Him.
Regards, Pilsod
And what is the idea of the mare?
“To my mare among Pharaoh’s chariots I compare you, my beloved” (Song of Songs)
[There is an anomaly here. I think that if a comment is deleted, then comments threaded under it are deleted along with it. But when there is some kind of database restoration, the threaded comments come back, because no delete command was issued for them; they were only not displayed, and restoration flattens the situation and then they reappear. I have run into this several times, and that is, in my opinion, the explanation. That is, if one really wants to delete, one has to delete each comment individually, and it is not enough to uproot only the root.]
Very fascinating, and shema‘ateta ba‘ya tziluta [a sugya requires clarity]. A few things even before a full study.
A. I asked this in the previous post too, and I still haven’t understood the answer. A horse has the property “having a tail 10–15 cm long.” How does that appear in the abstract ideal horse?
B. The communist economist who accepts a market economy. You wondered about him, so what is the difference between you and him? I wonder at your wondering. Take property rights, for example. One can think that property rights are something intrinsically correct (and we infringe them only minimally for necessities and acts of charity), or that property rights are merely an incentive so that the producer of GDP will keep producing GDP (leaving money with its owner is charity so that he will continue producing). Both sides agree that they would not take a 0 percent tax even if there is a right to property, and that they would not take a 100 percent tax even if there is no right to property; but would the point at which the tax rate is set, and the way it is distributed, be the same for both sides? Presumably not. [Personally, I completely identify with what that economist said.]
C. Communism–Popper–Platonism. You presented an anti-utopian argument (communists relate to human beings, but the utopia does not succeed) and you presented an anti-Platonic argument (communists do not relate sufficiently to human beings for the sake of ideas). As for the anti-Platonic argument, this is a very new identification (for me), to identify communism with something Platonic (is this your own historiosophic innovation?). On the face of it, everyone cared only about human beings and not about any idea.
And the anti-utopian argument really does not touch Platonic ideas (it does touch the proposal of rule by philosophers). The anti-utopian argument is not an “essential” argument but a statistical one, as emerges from note 2 (a very important note): if it is clear that creating the forest will lead to more happiness for more trees, then nobody disputes that it is definitely worthwhile to trample many trees. The problem is only that trampling the trees is paid in cash, while the forest is a credit-based conjecture that may not materialize, and then Popper argues that a proper expected-value calculation—that is, one that factors in skepticism in the right measure—says that the trampling is not worthwhile in terms of flourishing for more trees. By contrast, there is another claim, namely that a human being differs categorically from a tree of the field, and it is not justified to harm person A in order to benefit person B when there is no “natural” connection between them (and that is a claim that in my eyes is really strange, but it has already been discussed). Therefore, even if there is perfect knowledge, it is still forbidden to trample many trees. [This always reminds me of the favorite book The Bridge on the River Kwai, which takes local deontology to an extreme: a prisoner-general who, in the name of the values of diligence and loyalty, worked devotedly for his captors in building infrastructure for the war against his own country.] Is the anti-utopian argument really only statistical, or also deontological (“essential”)?
D. Complete hatred in Tosafot on Pesachim. You explain that it is Socratically permitted to hate him because of the wickedness in him, and it is a mitzvah to restrain one’s inclination so as not to arrive at complete ordinary hatred of the wicked person himself. But Tosafot explain the move to complete hatred by the matter of “As in water face answers to face, so the heart of man to man.” You are describing a projection from Socratic hatred to personal hatred, and that ostensibly does not depend on “as in water face answers to face.” So I understand Tosafot as describing a natural, mutually intensifying two-sided process of hatred (positive feedback). There are degrees of hatred, but the equilibrium points are 0 and 100, not 60, because hatred begets hatred and actions that deepen the hatred. So Tosafot are saying one must keep the dosage under control and not be swept away.
In note 4 you explained in Tosafot on Bava Metzia that the verse deals with a person whom it is forbidden to hate at all. But the Gemara in Pesachim explicitly assumes otherwise, namely that the Torah is not speaking about transgressors (“But is it permitted to hate him?”). Ostensibly Tosafot mean the opposite: that the verse speaks about someone whom one is permitted to hate, whereas the baraita about restraining one’s inclination deals with baseless hatred and not with the hater of the verse.
E. Note 6. In connection with your earlier post about the relation between peshat and derash (whether derash has any anchor at all in the peshat), I will try to explain the anchor for the derash (and no doubt others have already noted this). First, a description of the problem. Chet [sin] (an abstract noun, like pesha and avon) has the plural chata’im, with a reduced pataḥ under the ḥet and an ungeminated tet, like nerd and karkom, whose plurals are like neradim. But chata [sinner] (an adjective/noun, like nagar [carpenter], napaḥ [blacksmith], ganav [thief]—a person who sins) has the plural chatta’im, with a full pataḥ under the ḥet and a geminated tet. Beruriah interpreted chatta’im (plural of chata) as though it were chata’im (plural of chet), and ostensibly that departs from the peshat. The justification for this could be that chata’im is a title in the pattern of occupational nouns, something very attached to the person: one who once did carpentry is not a carpenter; only one who regularly engages in carpentry is a carpenter. And once he stops engaging in carpentry, he is no longer a carpenter. So too, even if they repent, then the sinners will cease, and they will become just ordinary people who sinned.