2019-04-22 – The Thought of Rabbi Gedaliah Nadel – Halacha LeMoshe MiSinai – Lesson 1

Table of Contents

• Prophecy and wisdom after the destruction
• Wisdom, understanding, and knowledge as an axiomatic process
• The two goats as a procedure for entering the holy
• The scapegoat and the tension between sacrifice and sending away
• Nachmanides: Samael, bribery, and the distinction between the Creator’s will and the worship of other gods
• The halakhic path of the sent-away goat as the evaporation of holiness
• Inherent sanctity, “its commandment has been fulfilled,” and the gap that raises a question
• Waking up from a dream: atonement through discovering that there is nothing “there”
• Goat-demons in Kabbalah and the dispute between Maimonides and Nachmanides
• The equality of the goats and the lottery: Rabbi Yitzchak Hutner on erasing irrelevant differences
• From sin to regret: going all the way in order to discover the emptiness
• Fifty gates of understanding, the Vilna Gaon, and Leshem: forty-nine versus fifty, and impurity as the opposite of understanding
• Gates and rooms: understanding without wisdom as a chain that closes with no purpose
• Proof, axioms, and mathematics: “analytic emptiness” as a structure without a room
• Postmodernism and relativism: maximal proof that ends in a vacuum
• The fiftieth gate as a layer that is not a “gate”: Nachmanides on the gate that was not created
• Egypt, skepticism, and cynicism: the fiftieth gate of impurity as the impossibility of getting out
• Shutting the mouth of “the Greek” and Nachmanides: going to the edge in order to wake up
• Bialik: “He glimpsed and died” as a framing of the gate that has no antechamber

Summary

General Overview

This passage expands on the statement in Bava Batra in the name of Rav Avdimi from Haifa that from the day the Temple was destroyed, prophecy was taken from the prophets and given to the sages, and it explains that wisdom is closer to prophecy than logical understanding is. Through the commandment of the two goats on Yom Kippur, it develops a conception of a halakhic-conceptual “journey” that begins in holiness and ends in waking up from a dream, in order to reveal that worship of the goat-demons is an illusion. It connects this to the structure of wisdom-understanding-knowledge, to the gates of understanding and impurity in the Vilna Gaon and Nachmanides, and to a critique of approaches that seek to rely only on proof and reason, until they collapse into emptiness and skepticism.

Prophecy and wisdom after the destruction

The Talmud says in the name of Rav Avdimi from Haifa that from the day the Temple was destroyed, prophecy was taken from the prophets and given to the sages, and it explains that although it was taken from the prophets, it was not taken from the sages. The Talmud assumes that wisdom contains a certain dimension of prophecy, to the point that a “sage” is viewed as a kind of “prophet” in that sense. The distinction is made between primary wisdom and understanding, which is deriving one thing from another and drawing conclusions on the basis of prior assumptions.

Wisdom, understanding, and knowledge as an axiomatic process

The text states that wisdom is not mere intellect, but an initial “potential-what” that a person attains directly, whereas understanding is the work of logical calculation and drawing conclusions. Understanding generates many conclusions from the foundational truths of wisdom, and in that way knowledge is formed and pieces of knowledge come into being. The process is described as an endless cycle in which conclusions become the infrastructure of wisdom in the next round, from which understanding derives still more conclusions.

The two goats as a procedure for entering the holy

The portion of Acharei Mot is presented as the procedure for entering the holy following the death of Aaron’s two sons, and not originally as the Yom Kippur service, because the command opens with, “He shall not come at all times into the holy… lest he die,” and goes on to detail how “with this Aaron shall come into the holy.” Only at the end of the passage does the law appear to do this once a year, on the tenth day of the seventh month, so that “on this day He shall atone for you.” In the name of the Vilna Gaon it is said that in the wilderness this procedure could even have been done on any other day, if one followed the commanded order of entry.

The scapegoat and the tension between sacrifice and sending away

The text points to an essential difficulty: the inner goat atones only for the impurity of the Temple and its sacred things, whereas the goat that atones for “all the sins of the children of Israel” is not offered as a sacrifice at all, but is sent to Azazel in an unusual process. It cites Ibn Ezra in the name of Rav Shmuel that “the sent-away goat too is for the Lord,” and rejects this by saying there is no need for that, because the sent-away goat is not a sacrifice, since it will not be slaughtered. Ibn Ezra hints at the secret “after the word Azazel” and encodes it in the phrase, “when you are thirty-three years old you will know it.”

Nachmanides: Samael, bribery, and the distinction between the Creator’s will and the worship of other gods

Nachmanides writes, “Now our master Abraham is faithful in spirit and conceals the matter, but I, the tale-bearer, reveal his secret,” and attributes the secret to the words of the Sages and to Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer. Nachmanides describes giving a “bribe on Yom Kippur” to Samael so that he will not obstruct their sacrifice, and explains the lots as “one lot for the Lord and one lot for Azazel.” He states that the goat is sent “to the minister who rules over places of desolation,” which is fitting for him because they are his domain, and that “from the emanation of his power come drought and desolation… bloodshed and wars… and destruction,” but he emphasizes that heaven forbid this does not mean it is a sacrifice to him; rather, it is to do the will of our Creator, who commanded us this. Nachmanides explains that the lots prevent verbally consecrating something to Azazel, which would appear like a vow to idolatry, and that both goats stand “before the Lord” as a gift to the Lord. He interprets Ibn Ezra’s hint as connected to the verse “And they shall no longer slaughter their sacrifices to the goat-demons,” which appears thirty-three verses later, and he adds the remark about “those who imagine themselves wise in nature and are drawn after the Greek,” who deny everything except what is sensed and pride themselves on rejecting anything they have not grasped with their own reasoning.

The halakhic path of the sent-away goat as the evaporation of holiness

The text describes a halakhic tracing of the scapegoat, in which at the beginning of the process both goats have a clear sacrificial status and must be equal in height, value, and appearance. It describes that after consecration and before the lottery, someone who offers one of the goats outside is liable as one who offers a sacrifice outside, and that even the goat designated to go outside still retains the sanctity of a sacrifice and may not be used for labor. It then describes a gradual destabilization of that status: they pull out its hair on the way out, and there are discussions of how that is possible; the designated man is permitted to eat and drink and to go beyond the boundary and even to engage in practical “desecration” of the day; and there are disputes over whether the sending away is indispensable, while the pushing off the cliff definitely “is not indispensable.” The text brings the view that after it has been pushed off one can take it and eat it, and that it is even said one could slaughter it and make barbecue instead of pushing it off, relying on the words of Rabbeinu Tam that “its pushing off is its slaughter,” and this creates a sense of a sharp transition from a sacrifice with severe sanctity to complete non-sacredness.

Inherent sanctity, “its commandment has been fulfilled,” and the gap that raises a question

The text sets this phenomenon against the rule in Nedarim regarding inherent sanctity, which does not simply lapse on its own, and therefore a sacrifice’s sanctity cannot just evaporate without some act that removes it. It mentions the rule that there is nothing whose “commandment has been fulfilled” and yet one can still commit misuse with it, but asks: here the sending away is not indispensable and the pushing off is not indispensable, so it is unclear what commandment it is that removes the sanctity. The central question is framed as trying to understand the meaning of a process in which holiness seems to melt away along the route, until what is left is just “a lamb in hand,” with no sacrificial significance.

Waking up from a dream: atonement through discovering that there is nothing “there”

The text proposes that the journey of the sent-away goat is a process of waking up from a dream, in which the sins of the year come from living inside a fiction. It describes a “metaphysical experiment” of two identical goats: one goes all the way to the Holy of Holies and one goes all the way to “the place of ruin and desolation,” and in the end it turns out that the atonement of Yom Kippur is determined דווקא by the goat to Azazel and not by the inner goat. It interprets this as going “all the way outside” in order to discover that there are no goat-demons and no real entity there at all, and therefore “they shall no longer slaughter their sacrifices to the goat-demons.” The image is compared to a dream story that dissolves like Alice in Wonderland, and at the end of the process a person discovers that the object onto which he projected sacred and threatening meanings is nothing more than an ordinary animal.

Goat-demons in Kabbalah and the dispute between Maimonides and Nachmanides

The text formulates that in Kabbalistic language, “goat-demons” are beings with no root in the upper worlds, and therefore they are a reality without foundation. It notes that Maimonides does not accept the existence of demons and things like that, whereas Nachmanides does, but even one who accepts their existence sees this as a kind of “virtual” reality and not full reality. The sent-away goat becomes a tool for exposing this rootlessness, and therefore it fits the understanding that worship of them is an illusion that dissolves when you follow it all the way to the end.

The equality of the goats and the lottery: Rabbi Yitzchak Hutner on erasing irrelevant differences

The text explains in the name of Rabbi Yitzchak Hutner in Pachad Yitzchak on Purim that the ability to distinguish between two things requires blurring external and irrelevant differences. It illustrates this with children’s drawings of Jacob and Esau that divert attention to outward differences instead of moral choice, and suggests that דווקא “identical twins” sharpen the point that the difference comes from choice. Accordingly, the two goats must be equal so that one will not be thought “good” because of how it looks; rather, the distinction comes from the lottery, as a representation of a decision that does not depend on externals.

From sin to regret: going all the way in order to discover the emptiness

The text describes how going “all the way” with evil exposes evil as foolishness, similar to the regret that comes after sin when it becomes clear that a person was fooling himself with justifications. It connects this to the movement of the goat to Azazel, which leads a person to the point where it becomes clear that there is no real destination and no “someone” there, and therefore the sin falls apart. It weaves in parables about gratitude that disappears once the need passes, and about attributing one’s livelihood, in order to describe how a person is tempted to replace an inner source with an external mechanism and only afterward wakes up.

Fifty gates of understanding, the Vilna Gaon, and Leshem: forty-nine versus fifty, and impurity as the opposite of understanding

The text cites the Vilna Gaon on “The Lord has made everything for His sake, even the wicked for the day of evil,” interpreting fifty gates of understanding as corresponding to forty-nine gates of impurity, and that the fiftieth gate will be revealed “until the coming of the redeemer” as the secret of alma de-cheiruta, the world of freedom, whereas the Other Side has no fiftieth gate. It brings the questions of Leshem: that there is a midrash about the forty-nine gates of impurity in Egypt and that if they had entered the fiftieth they would not have been redeemed; that the structure is not truly “one opposite the other”; and that it is unclear why the opposite of understanding is impurity rather than stupidity. It also emphasizes the image in which the sage and the wicked are seen as antitheses even though they are not simple opposites.

Gates and rooms: understanding without wisdom as a chain that closes with no purpose

The text formulates the metaphor of a “gate” as a passage from one place to another, and asks: a chain made only of gates has no meaning without “rooms” to which the gates lead. It presents two models: a closed chain that repeats itself like a circle, versus an open chain that reaches a room at the end, which gives meaning to the whole route. It determines that understanding by itself is a system of “if-then” without infrastructure, and therefore it closes in on emptiness, whereas wisdom is the axioms and direct apprehension that begin the system and give it content.

Proof, axioms, and mathematics: “analytic emptiness” as a structure without a room

The text argues that someone who is willing to accept “only things that are proven” is left with nothing, because every proof rests on axioms that are not proven within the system. It illustrates this with geometry, through the question of the sum of the angles in a triangle, which depends on foundational assumptions and is not a mathematical “truth” apart from the choice of system. It formulates mathematics as the ability to derive a conclusion from an assumption, but not to determine the assumptions themselves, and therefore without primary wisdom there is no “knowledge,” only an empty formal structure.

Postmodernism and relativism: maximal proof that ends in a vacuum

The text describes a relativistic outlook that accepts “every discourse as equivalent to every other discourse” and an inability to decide without an objective standard, and it attributes to this a historical-philosophical root in the demand to accept only what is proven. It defines the result as a vacuum in which everyone is “right” within his own assumptions and there is no way to decide, and therefore skepticism and cynicism emerge. It states that the only way to break the illusion is to follow it to the end, to hold up a mirror in which it becomes clear that the method itself cannot set moral boundaries without abandoning its own claim of universal equivalence.

The fiftieth gate as a layer that is not a “gate”: Nachmanides on the gate that was not created

The text cites Nachmanides in his introduction to Genesis, where he brings the rabbinic statement that fifty gates of understanding were given to Moses except for one, and suggests that this gate lies in knowledge of the Creator. Nachmanides adds, “Do not look closely… for it speaks in the majority, and the one gate was not created,” and the text interprets this as a distinction that the fiftieth is not a gate but a room that gives meaning to the gates. It identifies the gates of impurity as forty-nine gates when they are disconnected from the “room,” and then they become a “body,” like a corpse with no soul, turning that very same system from understanding into impurity.

Egypt, skepticism, and cynicism: the fiftieth gate of impurity as the impossibility of getting out

The text interprets the “fiftieth gate of impurity” as a conception in which there is no room at the end and no foundational point, and therefore it is impossible to persuade a person who accepts only understanding and proof to change his foundations. It compares this to “cynicism” as a form of doubt that protects itself against every claim and blocks dialogue, and it formulates reaching such a state as the loss of the possibility of redemption, because there is no vessel through which to bring in “wisdom” that stands above proof.

Shutting the mouth of “the Greek” and Nachmanides: going to the edge in order to wake up

The text interprets Nachmanides’ words about “those who imagine themselves wise in nature and are drawn after the Greek” as referring to people who identify truth only with what is grasped by logic and the senses, and therefore build intellectual towers devoid of meaning. It suggests that the goat to Azazel is the illustration: you go with the structure to the very edge, and then it becomes clear that there is nothing “there,” and that awakening shuts the mouth of denial regarding the dimension beyond. It presents this as a modern translation of Nachmanides, even while not claiming that this is exactly what Nachmanides meant in the terms of his own time.

Bialik: “He glimpsed and died” as a framing of the gate that has no antechamber

The text concludes by quoting Bialik’s poem “He Glimpsed and Died,” which describes entering the orchard with “fifty gates to the orchard” and striving toward “the fiftieth gate.” The poem describes paths going astray and the question, “And where is the last of the gates? And where is the essence of the antechamber?” until the moment when the doors of the gate open and the one who glimpsed falls. The text connects this to the desire for absolute certainty in one’s basic assumptions, to the desire “to peek beyond the curtain,” and to the frustration that gives rise to skepticism when the fiftieth gate is not something that can be proven like the other gates, but rather the source that gives meaning and is not accessible as proof.

Last time, we did the chapter on a law given to Moses at Sinai, and there was a passage there that I wanted to expand on a bit today. It’s on page 37. Maybe I’ll read it again just to get us back into the topic, and then I’ll spread the discussion out a little. Later in the passage in Bava Batra, the Talmud says: Rabbi Avdimi from Haifa said: From the day the Temple was destroyed, prophecy was taken from the prophets and given to the sages. What, is a sage not a prophet? A sage isn’t a prophet? This is what it means: even though it was taken from the prophets, it was not taken from the sages. Meaning, the Talmud assumes that wisdom too has a certain dimension of prophecy, right? A sage too is basically a kind of prophet. And prophecy of this kind was not taken from the sages, only from the prophets. So he writes as follows: wisdom is close in its essence to prophecy. Wisdom is not understanding. Understanding, discernment, is grasping one thing from another, drawing conclusions from prior premises, doing the logical calculation. Wisdom is primary, wisdom is “koach mah,” a primordial power. Something a person grasps in an immediate way. Understanding gives rise to many conclusions from the basic truths of wisdom, and thus knowledge is formed, pieces of knowledge are formed. A person who has a lot of knowledge is a greater sage, and then he goes back and understands again, and the process repeats: wisdom, then understanding, then knowledge, and so on without end. Meaning, wisdom is the axioms? Yes. Meaning, wisdom is the basic thing from which the whole business begins. It’s something that we grasp in some immediate way; it is not derived from something outside itself. And on the basis of that wisdom, we can derive further conclusions. After we derive those further conclusions, they can serve as wisdom in the next process, from which understanding will derive still more conclusions. So this issue is really what I wanted to talk about a bit—it’s just an opportunity to expand on it a little.

He compares it on some level to prophecy, right? What? He compares it on some level to the capacity for prophecy. Yes, that’s probably the wisdom—the prophetic part of the matter, not the understanding. Seemingly. Seemingly, with wisdom it’s your ability to see something, whereas in prophecy it’s given to you. Meaning, it depends where it comes from, what the source is. In prophecy, the Holy One, blessed be He, comes and communicates, tells the prophet something, right? With wisdom, seemingly, it’s just… It may be that wisdom too is something given to you. I don’t know how we attain this wisdom. We could once look up the source in Tosafot in some tractate that says that prophecy—the prophet prophesies not about what will be, but about what ought to be. Right. So you’re saying prophecy too is not something he receives, but just a kind of perception? He doesn’t foretell facts, but what ought to be. The Tosafot that Hillel Weiss quotes all the time.

This issue of the relationship between wisdom and understanding seems to me connected to the commandment of the two goats on Yom Kippur. There, with the two goats, the Torah in the portion of Acharei Mot describes the whole process. I think I spoke about this once; I don’t remember anymore. In the prophets, I think, no? On Yom Kippur—I don’t remember anymore. I think also here at some point. You also have an article about it. Yes, an article—I don’t know, I wrote about it in one of the books. I think it’s here, Rav Pintchuk… Not an article that was published, I think, about the ministering angels. “Nine Years of Rescue,” “Six Rescue” of the Rabbi. Fine, in the meantime, if you want, of course you’re welcome.

Anyway, the Torah commands in the portion of Acharei Mot and speaks about the two goats as part of the Yom Kippur service. But really, if you look a bit at the section, you see that it’s not even presented as the Yom Kippur service; it’s presented as entry into the holy place. “The Lord spoke to Moses after the death of Aaron’s two sons, when they drew near before the Lord and died. And the Lord said to Moses: Speak to Aaron your brother, that he not come at all times into the holy place inside the curtain, before the cover that is upon the ark, lest he die; for in the cloud I appear upon the cover. With this shall Aaron come into the holy place: with a bull of the herd for a sin-offering and a ram for a burnt-offering. He shall put on the holy linen tunic, and linen breeches shall be upon his flesh, and he shall gird himself with a linen sash and wrap himself in a linen turban; they are holy garments. He shall bathe his flesh in water and put them on.” And then the bull and the goat and all these matters, and the two goats and the whole process. There’s nothing yet about Yom Kippur. “For in the cloud I appear upon the cover. With this shall Aaron come into the holy place: with a bull of the herd for a sin-offering and a ram for a burnt-offering. He shall put on the holy linen tunic, and linen breeches shall be upon his flesh, and he shall gird himself with a linen sash and wrap himself in a linen turban; they are holy garments. He shall bathe his flesh in water and put them on.” Then the bull and the goat and all these matters and the two goats and the whole process—so far there’s nothing about Yom Kippur, nothing at all. “And he shall confess over the goat all the iniquities of the children of Israel and all their transgressions, for all their sins, placing them upon the head of the goat, and send it away by the hand of an appointed man into the wilderness,” and so on. And only at the end: “And this shall be for you an everlasting statute: in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, you shall afflict your souls and do no work, neither the native-born nor the stranger who sojourns among you. For on this day he shall atone for you, to cleanse you; from all your sins before the Lord you shall be cleansed. It is a Sabbath of solemn rest for you, and you shall afflict your souls; it is an everlasting statute,” and so on.

So what is it really saying? There’s something here—after all, this comes after the death of Aaron’s two sons. Aaron’s two sons died because they entered the holy place, apparently not in the proper way. So the Torah says how one should do it properly, how one enters and does not die. “With this shall Aaron come into the holy place”—that’s what it says: “Speak to Aaron… that he not come at all times into the holy place… lest he die,” so that what happened to his sons won’t happen to him. So this is how one enters the holy place. What we have here, then, is a procedure for entering the holy place. And at the end of the section it appears that there is a rule to do this once a year. Meaning: to enter on Yom Kippur, on the tenth of the seventh month, on Yom Kippur, and perform the procedure of entering the holy place, “for on this day he shall atone for you to cleanse you from all your sins.” Meaning, this is not as we usually understand it—that this is the Yom Kippur service. It isn’t. It’s the procedure for entering the holy place; only on Yom Kippur there is a law that you have to perform it, that you have to enter the holy place, meaning that you have to carry out this procedure. And in fact the Vilna Gaon writes—he’s speaking only about the wilderness, for various reasons that don’t matter here—it was only in the wilderness and not in the Land, but in the wilderness one could do this on any other day as well. Even to enter the innermost sanctuary, all of it. You can enter—but with this procedure. Meaning, if you carry out this whole procedure, you can enter the holy place. So this whole business is not necessarily connected to Yom Kippur. There is a law on Yom Kippur to do it, but that’s not how it’s presented.

Now, the two goats are of course something that stirs the imagination of the commentators—their imagination, or I don’t know what to call it. And they wonder: what is the meaning of this matter? It requires explanation, yes? Yes. What is the meaning of this goat that goes off to Azazel, that isn’t sacrificed, and it’s actually the one that atones for all the sins? The inner goat atones only for impurity of the sanctuary and its holy things, only for those two things. The goat that atones for all the sins of the children of Israel is actually a goat that isn’t sacrificed at all—it’s not an offering. It goes to Azazel, they push it there, some kind of process for which we know no parallel in Jewish law—except for this case.

Now Ibn Ezra writes there: “And Rabbi Shmuel said that although it is written of the sin-goat that it is ‘for the Lord,’ the sent goat too is for the Lord. And this is unnecessary.” Meaning, Ibn Ezra says: this is how our teacher Rabbi Shmuel explains it, but it isn’t necessary; there’s no need to say that the sent goat too is for the Lord, because “the sent one is not an offering, for it will not be slaughtered.” Meaning, there’s no need to say that the sent one too is for the Lord, because the sent one is not an offering. I assume he does mean that of course this is done for the Holy One, blessed be He, because He commanded it. But there’s some problem here, as though of sacrificing to some other entity or something. He says no—it’s not an offering, and not, say, in the sense of “for its proper sake” that is required for offerings, “the sacrifice is offered for the sake of six things,” as the Mishnah in Menachot says. That does not apply to the goat for Azazel; it is not slaughtered, it is not an offering.

“And if you can understand the secret behind the word Azazel, you will know its secret and the secret of its name, for it has companions in Scripture. And I will reveal to you a little of the secret by hint: when you are thirty-three, you will know it.” Right, that’s Ibn Ezra’s riddle. Nachmanides there writes as follows: “And behold, our teacher Abraham, faithful of spirit, conceals a matter, but I, as a talebearer, reveal his secret.” Right—“faithful of spirit conceals a matter, but a talebearer reveals a secret,” that’s the continuation of the verse. “For our rabbis have already revealed it in many places, and most explicitly in Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer the Great. Therefore they would give Samael a bribe on Yom Kippur so that he would not nullify their offering, as it is said: one lot for the Lord and one lot for Azazel. The lot of the Holy One, blessed be He, for a burnt-offering, and the lot of Azazel, the sin-goat.” Any sin-offering, this is called “the sin-goat.” “And all the sins of Israel are upon it.” So it’s a kind of bribe to Satan on Yom Kippur so that he won’t accuse, or something like that.

“And behold, He has made known to us his name and his deed, and this is the secret of the matter”—I’m reading this skipping a bit—“for they worshipped other gods, namely the angels, offering sacrifices to them, and they were a pleasing aroma to them.” Right—idolatry, other gods. “And behold, the Torah completely forbade accepting their divinity and any worship of them, but the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded on Yom Kippur that we send the goat into the wilderness to the prince who rules in desolate places, and it is fitting for him because he is their master.” Meaning, ruin, wilderness, desolation belong to this prince who rules there, because he is their master. “And from the emanation of his power come drought and desolation, for he is appointed over the stars of the sword and bloodshed and wars and quarrels and wounds and plagues and separation and destruction.” He’s saying that the wilderness is not that Satan, or demons, I don’t know what, the goats—“goats to demons”—dwell in the wilderness because it is wilderness. Rather, it is wilderness because they dwell there. Meaning, from the emanation of their power come drought and desolation.

“And the intention of the sent goat is not that it be an offering from us to him, Heaven forbid, but that our intention be to do the will of our Creator who commanded us thus.” Not to bring an offering to that prince who rules there in those places, but to do the will of our Creator. “And this is the meaning of the lots: for if the priest had verbally consecrated them to the Lord and to Azazel, it would be like worshipping other gods and vowing in his name. But he places them before the Lord at the entrance of the Tent of Meeting, for both are a gift to the Lord.” Only then a lot is cast—who goes here and who goes there—but all of it is really directed to the Holy One, blessed be He. “And Rabbi Abraham hinted to you that you would know its secret when you come to the verse, ‘And they shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices to the goat-demons.’” How did he hint at it? Because that verse appears thirty-three verses later. “When you are thirty-three, you will know it” means thirty-three verses later it says, “And they shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices to the goat-demons.” What does that mean? That if you carry out this procedure and bring the two goats, then they will no longer sacrifice their sacrifices to the goat-demons. Meaning, this comes to address that drive toward idolatry, sacrificing to the goat-demons.

And then skipping again: “And I cannot explain further, because we would need to stop the mouths of those who over-intellectualize about nature, who are drawn after the Greek”—that is Aristotle—“who denied everything except what he sensed, and became arrogant, for he grew proud, thinking that he and his wicked disciples, that anything his reasoning did not attain is not true.” Right—those who rely only on their own reasoning, their own argumentation, and are not prepared to accept anything beyond that. How is that connected to the idolatry he was talking about before? What—what is this doing here at all? It’s not clear. Because all these stories about demons require some side note, so that it won’t seem too strange to you if you can’t understand it on your own. He comes and tells us here about demons that create desolation in the wilderness, so perhaps he needs to add: yes, but know that it’s fine, you don’t have to— not fine. Even if Aristotle thinks it’s wrong, I can tell you that there are demons because I… Ah, you’re saying this is just his move—it’s not directed against Aristotle, but rather what he explained here, Aristotle may not accept. It’s a side comment, not—okay, possible, I hadn’t thought of that. I think there may be something even more essential here too, but I don’t know; it really could be that you’re right.

So what is written here, essentially? That the goat to Azazel is not an offering; it goes to the prince who rules there in the places of desolation. And by that we will manage to solve the problem of “they shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices to the goat-demons.” And somehow this is also supposed to shut the mouths of those over-intellectualizers about nature, those who rely only on reason and science, in our language. Because anything beyond what is sensed does not exist. This too, somehow, it is supposed to do.

Now here I won’t go into the halakhic details of the goat to Azazel, but one can show, by looking at the route this goat goes through, that something very strange happens there—strange halakhically. The first time I gave this lecture was in Yeruham, in a hesder yeshiva, and I told them—at the time it was fashionable, probably still is, to take field trips with the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh). Some people take magnifying glasses, plants or animals. So Yoel Bin-Nun and his group—field tours with Tanakh. I told them: we are going to do a field trip with Rabbi Chaim. We’ll go with Rabbi Chaim on a field trip. So we followed the goat to Azazel and tried to track its halakhic status, and it turns out something very strange happens there.

That is, at first they take the two goats—they have to be equal in height, in value, in weight, the Mishnah says. It’s not indispensable, but they are supposed to be equal. Then they cast lots. Now, this casting of lots—meaning after consecration, before the lot, after the consecration whereby both goats are offerings—someone who offers the goat to Azazel, or one of the goats, outside the Temple area, it is like offering an offering outside; meaning it has the sanctity of an offering. All right? Then they cast the lots, determine one for the Lord and one for Azazel. There’s a discussion there in Rashi and in Turei Even and others about exactly how the lot is done, but it’s quite clear that this is an act of Temple service; it’s part of offering a sacrifice. One is designated for outside, but still, the goat designated for outside also has the status of an offering. You can see this: you may not work with it; the Talmud brings various laws that one may not make use of it. In principle everything has to be done by a priest, only the appointed man who sends it away can ultimately be not a priest. Ideally they do it with a priest, but it doesn’t have to be a priest.

Then they send it to the wilderness, “by the hand of an appointed man,” and so on. He is supposed to push it off the cliff. At this stage, disputes among the medieval authorities (Rishonim) already begin to arise as to whether it is still an offering or not. For example, they would pull out its hair on the way out, and everyone asks: how can one do such a thing to an offering—not to mention how can one do such a thing on Yom Kippur in terms of plucking? But they say, fine, at this stage it is already no longer an offering. Then it reaches the cliff, goes all the way through the wilderness there—and by the way, this appointed man can eat and drink and go outside the Sabbath boundary, meaning he can violate Yom Kippur freely. In the end he reaches the cliff, and there he is supposed to push it down. There are ten booths along the way, of course, where people sit there, and there is food for him there; part of the whole thing is that there is food there for him. And in the end he is supposed to do the sending away. Surely that’s because of the Sabbath boundary, so from booth to booth, that’s how I remember it. From one booth to the next is one person, from the second booth to the third is another person. Could be, I don’t remember anymore, but there are booths there. I don’t recall now whether they connect it to the issue of the boundary. His escorts, not he. He goes—the appointed man certainly takes it, one appointed man goes the whole way, as it says. He transgresses boundaries; he may eat; he can violate everything. But the booths there, I don’t know, I don’t remember at the moment whether they connect that to the issue of boundaries. But he ate and all the rest that I said.

Now, the sending away itself is disputed as to whether it is indispensable or not. Very strange. And the pushing off, the Talmud says, is certainly not indispensable. Meaning, you can get to the cliff and not push it at all. You can do the whole procedure, tie the crimson thread, and not send it away, according to some views. I don’t understand—this is the sent goat. Meaning, everything you did here was only in order ultimately to send it and push it off the cliff. More than that: it says there that after you push it off the cliff, you can take it and eat it. There is no prohibition; it’s no longer sacred—there it is certainly no longer an offering. More than that, you can… And if it doesn’t stay alive? No, and if it doesn’t stay alive? If it doesn’t stay alive, then of course you can’t eat it, you can’t slaughter it. There’s no slaughter? You can eat it without slaughter. Allowed without slaughter? Yes, of course. Its being pushed is its slaughter. You can eat it without slaughter. There’s a Rabbeinu Tam about this, with some debates, but Rabbeinu Tam writes it as something obvious. And he says more than that: if you didn’t push it off the cliff—after all, the pushing is not indispensable—you get to the cliff, and now you can make a barbecue. Meaning, you get to the cliff, take this thing, and now, if you didn’t push it, then yes, you need slaughter; the pushing is a substitute for slaughter. But if you didn’t push it, then you need slaughter, but there’s no problem. Meaning, you can sit at the cliff and instead of pushing it, have a bonfire gathering—slaughter it, barbecue it on Yom Kippur, do whatever you want. Something here is extremely strange.

There’s something here that gives the feeling of waking up from a dream. Something like that—you start with some holiness, where if someone offers it outside he is liable to death and all sorts of things like that, the sanctity of an offering, and it’s forbidden to work with it and forbidden to lean on it, and all sorts of things—and this all gradually dissolves along the route. At every halakhic stage you can see more and more views and more and more aspects showing that it suddenly stops being an offering. At first it is holy with the sanctity of an offering, and afterward nothing happens. Meaning, there’s something very strange here.

We also know that the rule is—the Talmud in Nedarim speaks about inherent sanctity. There there is a dispute between Abaye and Bar Pada whether inherent sanctity expires on its own or does not expire on its own. In practice, we rule that inherent sanctity does not expire on its own. What does that mean? That if something has inherent sanctity, say something consecrated as an offering, one cannot consecrate it, say, for a limited period—holy for a week, and after a week it stops. There’s no such thing, because inherent sanctity cannot just drift away by itself after a week; it doesn’t happen on its own. You might redeem the sanctity in some cases, depending what you do. But it cannot just happen by itself. So you cannot make inherent sanctity for a limited time, and you cannot stipulate a condition on inherent sanctity, meaning consecrate something with inherent sanctity on condition that if the condition is not fulfilled, the sanctity will expire. There’s no such thing. An act is needed in order to remove inherent sanctity; it does not expire on its own. Meaning, it cannot expire by speech alone.

Now here, it was holy with inherent sanctity, nothing happened, and it vanished—it evaporated. So after it is pushed off the cliff you can say… its commandment has been fulfilled. There is a rule in Jewish law that anything whose commandment has been fulfilled is no longer subject to misuse of sacred property. Meaning, even something holy with sacrificial sanctity, once the commandment has been carried out, that’s it—its sanctity departs. But here—what? It’s not by itself; an act was done. Yes, exactly. But here, the sending away itself is not indispensable according to some opinions, and the pushing certainly is not indispensable, so what commandment exactly was fulfilled here? There’s something designated for something that in the end is not even done, and still this does not prevent us from seeing it as ordinary property at the end. And the question is: what is the meaning of this?

So it seems to me that in the overall picture—and maybe I’ll say the ending first and then come back to details a bit more—I think this process of the sent goat, and in the end it also has to get back to wisdom and understanding—what I call the framework—this process they undergo is really a kind of waking up from a dream. We are basically taking and sending an offering to the goat-demons. And the purpose of this whole matter is to create a situation in which there are two goats equal in height, in weight, and in value. One of them is destined to go all the way inside, to the innermost sanctuary, and one all the way outside, to the place of drought and desolation and goat-demons and all these things. It’s a kind of metaphysical experiment, yes? An experiment: let’s see what happens. Let’s take one and go all the way in to holiness, and all the way out, inward to the outside, right? And let’s see what happens. A kind of butterfly effect: there are two that are completely identical, everything, everything, everything is the same, and one reaches the very best place, one reaches the very worst place. You can see it that way too.

And in the end, at the end of the process, when you enter the innermost sanctuary, all right, so you don’t know, you ascend the levels of holiness, I don’t know, you expect that there sins will be atoned for and everything will be fine. But no—it happens with the other one. The other one carries upon it all the sins of the children of Israel into the wilderness. Through that atonement occurs. This is ruled in both Maimonides and the Talmud. The goat to Azazel is the one that atones on Yom Kippur, not the inner goat. The inner goat is only for impurity of the sanctuary and its holy things. So what is happening there? It seems to me that what is happening there is some statement that tells us that our sins over the course of the year are the result of a kind of life inside illusion, inside a dream. And the goal of this process is to wake us from that dream, to bring us to our senses from that dream. Once we wake up, that is what atones for the sin, and then “they shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices to the goat-demons.” Because what happens when we go all the way outside is that we discover there is nothing there. Think of Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland. She starts, of course, with all the stories—with the Queen of Hearts and the Mad Hatter and all the adventures she goes through there—and at the end she wakes up by the stream and of course it was all a dream. Here too it’s the same thing. You carry out a process: there is holiness, and you may not work with this goat, and so on; you get all the way to the end, and there you don’t need to do anything at all—you discover that there’s actually nothing there. You just have a lamb in your hand; eat it if you want. There’s nothing there. Meaning, you take an offering to the goat-demons and discover there are no goat-demons, there is nothing. Just hallucinations. You are living inside hallucinations. Idolatry, as a metaphor for sin in general, is the result of living inside a bubble.

Goat-demons, by the way, in Kabbalistic language—according to this, then service in the holy place is also idolatry. Why? Because both are the same illusion. Meaning, you have the illusion of worshipping the goat-demons, where in the end there’s nothing there; but also in the sacred service. Your commandments and your sins—in the end you wake up and discover that what you are doing is nothing. According to this parable. Why is it nothing? Because it didn’t produce the effect—you’re living in some kind of, as you said, dreamy feeling. So the one that went inside—what happened to it? It remained holy like any other offering. What happens there? Nothing happens there. That now it will go and atone—the sacred service, this spiritual elevation you think is happening, is not really happening. Why is it happening? Why is it not happening? I don’t understand. That this wasn’t what atoned, right? What atoned was holiness. This atonement has nothing to do with holiness. Two different things. I said earlier: the purpose of the whole matter is entering the holy place altogether. It’s not atonement. Atonement is what is done on Yom Kippur. Entry into the holy place, entry into the holy place. You enter the holy place, you are elevated, everything happens. It’s a regular offering in every respect. But what comes on the other side, what comes along with it, is the goat to Azazel. And there, when you arrive at the end, you wake up and see that it was all a dream. It had the sanctity of an offering and it evaporated. There are no goat-demons, there is nothing.

In Kabbalistic language, goat-demons, demons, are beings without a root. That’s what “se’irim” are called. Usually in Kabbalistic thought every being has roots in higher worlds. It unfolds from world to world. The goat-demons are not like that. They are beings—beings that have no root in higher worlds. They are in the world they are in, and that’s it. They are there; there is nothing above them. So in that sense, the goat-demons—you know Maimonides did not accept the existence of demons and such things, of course; Nachmanides did. There’s a dispute among the medieval authorities (Rishonim) how to look at this. But even according to those who do accept their existence, it’s a kind of virtual reality in a certain sense; it’s not a reality that really exists. Okay, so that is basically the purpose of this journey: to reveal that.

And therefore you begin with a lot between two goats that must be equal in height, weight, value, and in every external respect. For what purpose? Rabbi Yitzchak Hutner explains—he says it about Purim, in Pachad Yitzchak on Purim—there is a saying: “A person is obligated to become intoxicated until he does not know the difference between ‘cursed is Haman’ and ‘blessed is Mordechai.’” Why? After all, the whole point of Purim is to understand the difference between cursed is Haman and blessed is Mordechai. On the contrary, that’s the whole idea: one has to understand that this is cursed and this is blessed, and draw the lessons. So what does it mean, “until he does not know the difference between cursed is Haman and blessed is Mordechai”? Why do we need to reach such a state? He says that in order to distinguish between two things, we must blur all the irrelevant differences between them.

If there are two figures—for example, in children’s books when they draw Jacob and Esau, they draw Jacob with the face of an angel, and Esau as some wicked villain, a kind of beast, hairy, really like anti-Semitic literature only in the opposite direction, and then that’s apparently allowed. These drawings are harmful drawings—not only are they incorrect. They’re harmful because they direct attention to external differences. Esau is perceived as something not worthy of emulation, not worthy of being a person one should learn from—why? Because he looks like some wicked, hairy villain, not because of what he chooses to do. On the contrary: if you want to sharpen the difference between Jacob and Esau, you should draw them as identical twins. Then say: okay, this one chose this and that one chose that, and the difference is the result of what they chose, not how they looked and how they were born. What relevance is there to how they look?

So here too, the two goats need to be equal in height, in weight, and in value—this is what Rabbi Yitzchak Hutner says—in order to blur all the irrelevant differences, so that we won’t think that this goat is good because it is fattened, plumper, better, and therefore really more important. No. It is good because it was chosen to be inside. It looks exactly the same as the one outside. The whole question of the lot is a representation; this whole spiritual journey I’m describing here, all of it represents things we are supposed to undergo. The goats are just—you know, like Rabbi Meir knew fox fables. What are fox fables? It seems to me Rashi explains there that when you give a person a parable, when you rebuke him, don’t speak about him. Tell him a story about a fox. A fox came and did such-and-such, and this one did so-and-so to him—why? Because if you speak about him, he won’t accept it. Antagonism immediately arises. So tell him stories about foxes. All right? Very often, when we look at ourselves—“a person does not see his own blemishes,” right? It says that about the priest, not important now. A person cannot criticize himself. I usually seem okay to myself. If you want to go on some kind of inner journey, dress it up as these two goats and look at what happens to them, and then try to draw the conclusions about yourself.

So here, the lot basically reflects what happens to us at the moment of choice. We choose between good and evil. That is what is expressed by the lot between the goats. What determines the relation to the goats is the lot, not how they were born and nothing else—just as with human beings, what determines whether we are this way or that is what we chose, not how we were born and how we look. A lot and choice are kind of opposites. What? A lot and choice. No, obviously, goats don’t choose, what can you do. No, let the priest choose. No, the priest also has nothing on which to base a choice. By what would he choose? Just because? It has to be a lot. Exactly. This is Switzerland. These are Swiss elections. It’s a lottery. Don’t do anything because in the parable it ruins it a bit. No, it doesn’t ruin it. The point of the lot is to tell you this is not what nature itself determines, but something beyond. There it’s a lot; with you it’s choice. It doesn’t matter—it’s only meant to be a parable, not a one-to-one representation.

Then what happens is that the result of your choice—you can choose between good and evil, and you are judged on the basis of your choice. That’s what you are judged by. Now when you choose evil and go with it all the way, you discover that it’s simply nonsense. It’s like how people always regret it after they do something wrong. At first, when we do it, we explain to ourselves in a thousand ways why it’s really good and right and no problem and an opportunity and this and that. After we’ve done it, we understand perfectly well that it’s nonsense, that we fooled ourselves. And in that sense, this is the awakening of the goat to Azazel. You choose evil—fine, let’s do the experiment all the way through, let’s go all the way, be a complete villain as it were, right? Go all the way to the place of drought and desolation, bring an offering to the goat-demons. Fine? And then you’ll see there are no goat-demons. It’s all nonsense. When you get to the place you’re going, you see there is nothing there. And that’s what is written there at the end: “and they shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices to the goat-demons.” Once you do this experiment, you basically reach a point where you understand there’s nothing to sacrifice to the goat-demons. Or in the moral analogue: sins are the result of our fooling ourselves.

It’s like the story: someone very sick comes to a doctor. The doctor treats him, he recovers, he is deeply grateful. “Thank you, doctor—tell me, how much do I owe you?” The doctor says, “As much as you would have wanted to pay me an hour ago.” Once I’m healthy, it’s already less. Like the nobleman and Moshe. The nobleman says to Moshe: come on, you say the Holy One, blessed be He, supports you? I support you. So Moshe says to him: no, no, the Holy One, blessed be He, sends us our livelihood; we thank Him every morning. So the nobleman says: you know what, Moshe, fine, if that’s what you think, then I decree that you now go to the forest, with no connection to civilization, and let’s see if the Holy One, blessed be He, will provide for you. He goes to the forest, poor man, doesn’t know what to do, prays to the Holy One, blessed be He. In the meantime the nobleman says to his servant: put a basket of food by the tree every morning. When he comes back he’ll say, wow, what a miracle, the Holy One, blessed be He, supported me—and I’ll say to him: there, see who supported you. Of course he puts the basket there, and the fellow is deeply impressed by the miracle done for him. He comes back cheerful and happy. The nobleman asks him: so, what happened, Moshe? Did you have something to eat? He says: of course, the Holy One, blessed be He, sent me a basket every morning. So the nobleman says: what, are you kidding? He calls the servant and says: tell him—who put the basket there every morning? The servant says: yes, me, the nobleman told me to put it there. So Moshe says: fine, exactly, that’s how the Holy One, blessed be He, supported me. Through you. So again, these are those same illusions one wakes up from. And it’s true, right?

Anyway, there is some danger in these stories. There’s some danger in them, because until a few generations ago, if a person was sick there wasn’t much to do—you could pray, until the doctor takes out some antibiotic and the person gets healthy. So what does that mean—the Holy One, blessed be He, or the doctor? You know the story about someone stuck in the middle of the desert? Again we’re in stories. He’s stuck in the middle of the desert, praying to the Holy One, blessed be He, to send him some—I don’t know—some camel caravan or someone to get him out of there; he doesn’t know what to do, how to get out. And at some stage he sees some camel caravan passing there, and he says: if You send me one, I’ll repent, I’ll finish the entire Talmud, I’ll do whatever You want. Then the camel caravan comes and passes by… no need, Holy One, blessed be He, I’ve already managed. Everything is fine.

Okay, in any event, as far as our topic is concerned, what we have here is some sort of journey of disillusionment, let’s call it that. That is the idea of the two goats, and therefore “they shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices to the goat-demons.” Now, for our purposes, if I want to apply this to wisdom and understanding, and to understand what this has to do with “the Greek and his disciples” there in Nachmanides, then let’s give this a slightly more modern interpretation. And here I come to wisdom and understanding.

Understanding, in its essence, is to infer one thing from another. And wisdom is what Rav Gedalia said: the things we grasp immediately, directly. Okay? Now we know that the sages say there are fifty gates of understanding in the world. “Fifty gates of understanding were created in the world,” and so on. There are several sources that mention this. But in Proverbs there is the verse: “The Lord has made everything for His purpose, even the wicked for the day of evil.” The Vilna Gaon on that verse writes as follows: “And he said, ‘The Lord has made everything,’ etc., because fifty gates of understanding were created in the world, and the fiftieth gate was not revealed until the coming of the redeemer, which is the secret of the world of freedom. That is because the Other Side has only forty-nine gates of impurity, and it has no fiftieth gate. And when all its forty-nine are filled, then it will be removed from the world, for it will be burned away as dung is burned away to its end. Therefore the fiftieth gate will be revealed and it will be removed from the world. And this is ‘The Lord has made everything for His purpose’—fifty gates of understanding. ‘Even the wicked’—its numerical value is forty-nine, corresponding to the forty-nine gates of impurity—‘for the day of evil,’ for when the wicked flourish… it is only in order that they be destroyed forever.”

What is he saying? The verse says “The Lord has made everything…” “The Lord has made everything for His purpose, even the wicked for the day of evil.” The phrase “everything” has the numerical value of fifty. And “even” has the numerical value of forty-nine. So he says: “The Lord has made everything for His purpose”—there are fifty gates of understanding—but opposite them there are only forty-nine gates of impurity. “Even the wicked for the day of evil” refers to the gates of impurity. There is a difference: this is fifty and this is forty-nine. And he also says there that once all forty-nine gates of impurity are filled, it is removed. Meaning there really is no fiftieth gate there, right? Okay—so what is the meaning of this? How does it work?

There are several difficulties. The Leshem brings this Vilna Gaon and raises a few questions. First, there is a Midrash saying that when the children of Israel were in Egypt, they sank into the forty-nine gates of impurity, and then the Holy One, blessed be He, skipped over the mountains and leapt over the hills and took them out early. Why? Because if they had sunk into the fiftieth gate, it would have been impossible to take them out. So you see there is a fiftieth gate. So how can the Vilna Gaon say there are only forty-nine? That’s one point.

A second point: why is it fifty here and forty-nine there? Usually it’s “one opposite the other God made.” Why here fifty and there forty-nine? It ought to have the same structure. Third, why is the opposite of gates of understanding not gates of foolishness? It’s not gates of foolishness, but gates of impurity. Why is impurity the opposite of understanding? Understanding corresponds to foolishness; impurity corresponds to holiness. But why understanding and impurity? It’s a little like the wise son and the wicked son in the Passover Haggadah. Somehow it is always presented as though the wise and the wicked are two antitheses. But wise and wicked are not opposites. You have righteous and wicked, or wise and foolish. Meaning, why is wise the opposite of wicked? Indeed it doesn’t say there explicitly that they are opposites, but that’s how it comes across. “A base and not wise people.” Yes—wisdom, in many places in the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) and also among the sages, is presented as the antithesis of wickedness or depravity. Besides, that wicked son there sounds pretty smart. What? Besides, the wicked son there is depicted as fairly clever. He may be intellectually clever, certainly. Right—the question is what “wise” means. So that’s what the Leshem asks on the Vilna Gaon: what is the meaning of this picture he is describing?

Now here I think it can be explained as follows. The first question we can ask is: why is the metaphor we use a metaphor of a gate—gates of understanding? Why gates? A gate usually is something that leads from one place to another, right? A gate from outside inward, from room to room, whatever—but it leads us from one place to another. So understanding, whose meaning is basically deriving one thing from another, uses the relevant metaphor of a gate. Right? There are gates of understanding. The problem is that a chain consisting only of gates has no meaning. A gate is supposed to lead from one place to another. Meaning, if there is no place to which it leads, or place from which it departs, then it has no meaning. Therefore, obviously, between the gates there should be rooms. Meaning, there is gate, room, gate, room, gate, room. Okay? How many rooms are there? There are forty-nine gates. Fifty-one? No. Fifty gates of understanding. Fifty. No. If there are fifty gates, there are forty-nine rooms. Forty-nine gates. Fifty-one? Fifty rooms? Including the first and last? No, it depends how you frame it. Whether the beginning and end are gates, or the beginning and end are rooms. Yes, I would draw it differently. It’s an edge problem, what in mathematics is called a boundary issue. The question is how you close the chain. If you close it on itself in a circle… then it’s the same number. The same number, right. So forty-nine rooms. But if you leave it as an open chain, then fifty rooms, right? There’s one more room. Those are the two models we’re talking about: a closed chain and an open chain. A closed chain has forty-nine gates and forty-nine rooms. An open chain has forty-nine gates and fifty rooms.

And basically, the meaning of the matter is this: when you derive one thing from another—that’s what is called understanding—in the end you can be left with nothing. Because all you can know through understanding is that if this is true then this too is true, and if this is true then this too is true. Like in logic or mathematics. Say someone in mathematics studied geometry. And let’s say he says—this is a question I once asked students—what is more true in geometry, the theorems or the axioms? The theorems have proofs; the axioms do not. Fine, so the question is what is more true. Most of them didn’t fall for it; most understood, though some did. Obviously the theorems are not truer than the axioms, because a proof means grounding the theorem on the axiom, on the axioms. But whether they are equally true is also a question. If the proof is valid, then I think yes. But okay, that’s already a little, a little, a little something that could be discussed. But it is built on the axioms. There are some more assumptions there, some other things that can happen. No, I’m saying: take all the assumptions and build a valid argument. If the argument is valid, then there can be no weakening in the force of the proof. There is entailment; in a proof there is entailment. Why? Maybe not. Ah, maybe it’s not true. That’s what I’m talking about. It’s not equivalent. It’s not valid at 100% at the same level; it’s a tiny bit less. If the assumption is that it’s correct. It’s like mathematics—you don’t refute mathematics. In mathematics, at most you find a mistake. In physics, you can refute a thesis. You perform an experiment and discover the thesis is incorrect. In mathematics you cannot refute; at most there is a mistake in the proof. That’s all. I’m speaking on the assumption there is no mistake in the proof. Then basically it’s the same thing. Okay?

So that means that this whole structure ultimately draws its meaning from the axioms. If you accept the axioms, then all the theorems, all the statements derived from the axioms, teach you more and more things. But if you are not willing to accept the axioms, only things that are proven—only the theorems—then you know nothing, you can accept nothing. You know nothing at all, right? In other words, if we translate this into broader philosophical language: if someone comes and says, I hold the position that I accept only proven things—what I’ve seen called in books an analytic position—only proven things, then of course he is left with nothing. He accepts nothing, right? Because there is no truth… Yes, because proof always rests on axioms, and if you don’t accept things that are not proven, then you don’t accept the axioms. So what help is proof to you? Proof can help if you accept the axioms; then you can learn more things from them. But if you don’t accept the axioms, proofs won’t help. Therefore, someone who thinks he will accept only proven things ultimately remains with nothing. The maximalist ends up with absolutely nothing.

By contrast, if someone accepts the axioms, then whatever he derives from them through logical or mathematical tools—through understanding, what is called deriving one thing from another—has meaning. If we go back to the metaphor of gates and rooms, if I have, say, a chain of gate-room, gate-room, gate-room, then at the end there should be some room I’m supposed to reach. If at the end there isn’t such a room and instead it closes back on itself, then you’ve returned to a gate. Right? So what was the point of walking the whole route? You didn’t advance anywhere. In a circle you don’t progress. Okay? So the circle that closes on itself, in our context, represents someone who accepts understanding without wisdom. Someone who accepts only logic, only “if-then,” without accepting the primary basis on which everything rests. Someone speaking of an open chain, not a chain closing in a circle, is basically assuming that at the edge there is some room that gives meaning to everything before it. From the beginning. Yes, from the beginning—but let’s say that’s where I am standing. Now I begin to walk. So I pass through gates, but the whole meaning of the gates is that in the end I will reach some room. Think of some huge museum with all kinds of gates and rooms, and they promise you that at the end there will be wonders—you should go through all this hassle because in the end there is something extraordinary there. Then you get to the end and discover nothing. So what was the point of all your walking? Only if in the end there really is some room, some thing that has meaning, from which you can learn or receive something, does that give meaning to the whole structure surrounding it.

And so too in logic. If you accept the fundamental assumptions, then you can talk about everything you learn from them by means of understanding; it has meaning. If you do not accept the fundamental assumptions, then the whole structure has no meaning. Therefore understanding that has no wisdom at its foundation has no meaning whatsoever. It is just nonsense.

Now, there are people who live inside this delusion that says: we will accept only proven things. That “Greek and his wicked disciples who became proud in their own minds, thinking that whatever they did not perceive in their reason is not true.” This they accept. Aristotle represents that outlook. But in fact, when you go all the way into that outlook, you discover there’s nothing there. It’s nonsense. You can build magnificent intellectual structures, but in the end you blow on them and there’s nothing there. The whole structure is just an illusion. Only if there is—does that fit with Aristotle? It doesn’t fit Aristotle all that well. What? Does it fit Aristotle? First principles, axioms? I said this is a modern translation of what Nachmanides is saying. For Nachmanides, Aristotle was one who accepted what he grasped in his own mind. Grasping in one’s own mind is not proof. I’m translating it into modern language because in another moment I’ll explain where this touches our world—relativism, postmodernism, narratives, and so on.

So this approach that says I accept only proven things is really an approach that can build very impressive intellectual towers that actually say nothing, have no meaning. Therefore a person who wants to be a pure mathematician knows nothing about anything. Because if you don’t know the assumptions, then you also don’t know any of the conclusions. And if you are a responsible mathematician, let’s call it that, and I ask you what is the sum of the angles in a triangle, you ought to tell me: I don’t know. It depends on your basic assumptions. If you have Euclidean assumptions, then one hundred and eighty. If in another space, then the sum is different. Okay? As a mathematician, you cannot answer that. Mathematics cannot assert any proposition. Mathematics can only derive a conclusion from an assumption. That’s what mathematics can do. And the assumptions—that’s not the mathematician’s mandate. Each person will adopt assumptions as he sees fit. Therefore mathematics is empty. That’s what is called analytic emptiness.

Now many people don’t feel this. They think this is very substantial. If I now translate this into our world: in our world there is a certain duality, but really they are two sides of the same coin. On the one hand, in postmodern thought, a relativistic thought, a thought willing to accept any discourse as equivalent to any other discourse—this is basically a position saying that everyone has his own assumptions and his own form of discourse and his own definitions, and there is no way to judge and decide; there are no objective standards that determine who is more right and who is less right. But the root of this outlook—historically as well as philosophically—is actually something that seems the opposite. It is an outlook that demanded maximal proof as a condition of acceptability. Meaning, I refuse to accept anything unless it is proven absolutely. Only, this was the dream and its collapse. The collapse of that dream is that if you are not willing to accept anything unless it has proof, you will accept nothing. So everyone has proofs—it depends on what his assumptions are. If proof alone, in your view, is the tool for examining ideas, you will not be able to examine ideas. At most you will be able to detect inconsistency in someone. If someone is inconsistent, you can show him: here you derived incorrectly; this is not a valid logical conclusion. But generally people don’t fail because of logical inconsistency; rather there are arguments about fundamental assumptions, and so on. And in those arguments you have no way of deciding.

Therefore, precisely this maximalist outlook that demands proofs for everything—but only proofs—ultimately arrives at a vacuum. And if I return for a moment to the gates of understanding and the gates of impurity, then in the introduction to Genesis, Nachmanides writes: “Our rabbis already said that fifty gates of understanding were created in the world, and all were given to Moses except one, as it says: ‘You made him little less than God.’ And their number is accepted by the sages through tradition, that they are fifty minus one. And it is possible that this gate is knowledge of the Creator, blessed be He, which was not given to a creature. And do not be troubled by their saying ‘fifty gates of understanding were created in the world,’ for they speak according to the majority, and that one gate was not created.” The first gate was not created. Or in my language, I would say: the first gate is not a gate, it is a room. Fifty gates of understanding are not fifty gates of understanding. They are forty-nine gates of understanding plus a room. Actually fifty rooms, with forty-nine gates between them. Okay? That is called fifty gates of understanding.

Now, what were the questions the Leshem asked on the Vilna Gaon? First, why isn’t it one corresponding to the other? Why is it that one side is forty-nine and the other fifty? Why is the opposite of understanding impurity and not foolishness? And what do we do with that Midrash about Israel in Egypt—when they were about to sink there into the fiftieth gate, they could no longer have gotten out? Now we can understand it. The fifty gates of understanding are not fifty. They are forty-nine gates. There are only forty-nine actual gates. The fiftieth is the room. There are fifty rooms. The last room is a room, not a gate. All right?

Now, what are the gates of impurity? What is impurity? The ultimate source of impurity is a corpse, right? What is a corpse? A corpse, in principle, has a body like ours, only without the soul that animates the body, that gives it a root. It lacks what gives it life, what makes it an organism. It loses its meaning without the point that gives it all its meaning. Gates of impurity are the conception of gates of understanding without the room at the end. That is what is called gates of impurity. So gates of impurity are the same gates as the gates of understanding—it’s not opposite them; they are those very same gates! But they become gates of impurity when you take only the body without the soul, when you take only the “if-then,” only the understanding without the room at the end, only the derivations without the axioms that give them all their meaning. That is what is called impurity. It’s a corpse. This thing is a corpse. It makes a great impression, it’s a sophisticated body and everything—but it has no meaning, it says nothing. You cannot know anything from it. Therefore, there really is “one opposite the other” here. It is one opposite the other because there are forty-nine gates of understanding and forty-nine gates of impurity. The fiftieth gate was not created. The fiftieth gate is not a gate; it is a room. All right? Therefore it is there, but it is not part of the system of understanding. Rather, if you hold the forty-nine gates and understand that there is a room at the end, then these gates are gates of understanding. If you deny that there is a room at the end, then those same gates are gates of impurity. They are the very same gates.

When you join wisdom, then understanding becomes… it becomes knowledge! Meaning, if there is wisdom at the beginning, then understanding becomes knowledge. Why? Because then you know that the sum of the angles in a triangle is one hundred and eighty degrees. But if you know all geometry and yet do not accept the axioms, then you do not know that the sum of the angles in a triangle is one hundred and eighty degrees; you know only that if you assume this, then that follows. So you have no knowledge. You know nothing. Therefore wisdom plus understanding creates knowledge. Knowledge cannot emerge from understanding alone; there has to be wisdom at the foundation. Analytic emptiness? Yes, exactly. Therefore, when wisdom is the axioms—how do we reach the axioms if they are not proven? That is what Rav Gedalia says: wisdom is primary, something a person grasps in an immediate way. Meaning, you cannot—it does not come from a gate; it is a room. Because it does not come from somewhere else from which you can derive a proof for wisdom. Wisdom is the beginning of the process, the axiom. So it does not come on the basis of prior proof. It does not rest on understanding; it is wisdom. There is no gate that leads to it. It begins the whole matter; it gives the whole thing its meaning. Then you can begin working with gates. All right?

So if that is so, then there really is “one corresponding to the other.” Understanding really is opposed to impurity, not to foolishness, because this is not about stupid people versus smart people; it is about worldviews. The question is whether understanding has wisdom at its foundation, or whether there is only understanding and no wisdom, in which case these are really gates of impurity. And when the children of Israel were about to enter the fiftieth gate of impurity, the meaning is that they were about to enter the conception that the gates are gates of impurity, that there is no fiftieth gate. That is the fiftieth gate of impurity. The conception that there is no fiftieth gate—that is the fiftieth gate of impurity. And from there you cannot emerge. That is why they would not have come out of Egypt. Why? Try persuading someone who accepts only understanding. Meaning, he accepts only proven things. Now try to persuade him of anything on earth. It is impossible to persuade him of anything, right? “Mockery is polished as with oil,” the sages say—that’s really a verse. But “mockery” in the language of the sages means doubt. So “Strike the scoffer and the simple will become prudent”—that’s Amalek. Mockery means making fun of everything, because maybe it’s this and maybe it’s the opposite. You make a joke out of everything, so there is nothing you really take seriously, because it could be this and could be its opposite. What—nothing seems to you more important or more true than anything else. Once you’re like that, there is no way to talk to you. How am I supposed to convince you not to be a scoffer, not to be a skeptic? You can’t convince a skeptic not to be skeptical—what argument could you bring him? What could you do? At most you can say to him: and what about skepticism itself—don’t you doubt that too? Yes, I doubt that too. Fine. I don’t know what that means, but…

Historically, it sounds less likely that this is what they were like at the Exodus from Egypt—they were, if anything, people of doubt? On the contrary, maybe they believed in everything, not in nothing. To believe in everything and to believe in nothing is the same thing. To follow after every… No, but that’s not saying there’s no wisdom; maybe it’s saying everything is wisdom—it’s like holding only wisdom without understanding. Understanding without… No, but to hold several different wisdoms… to hold several different wisdoms is to hold nothing at all—that’s exactly the point. When you worship idols, this idol and that idol and also the Holy One, blessed be He, and this and that, you are really not believing in any of them, because it’s a contradiction. You cannot accept both sides of a contradiction. So really, you are not accepting anything. That is exactly the same postmodern illusion. The postmodern illusion—people can write books about it. Not can—they do, unfortunately. They write whole books on this matter, and it’s all very learned and… they say nothing. It’s unbelievable. You can assume these assumptions and get there, and assume opposite assumptions and also get there. But they say this… They babble, they confuse your mind, and it looks to you like… in the story of—I don’t… you can’t really just assume assumptions… whatever they tell you… But they said otherwise—they said accept only these assumptions… But their consciousness isn’t like that. Ask, talk to people, and you’ll see. No, their consciousness is exactly like that. We—what are you talking about? Of course there isn’t… no truth. That’s when you pin them to the wall. What is their lived experience? Their lived experience is certainly: there is lots of wisdom and lots of… we have a worldview and we have this—but wait, aren’t you claiming that actually nothing… yes, but truth now takes on a different meaning. It’s not truth in the classical sense of true versus false, but truth in some other sense. And they build for themselves an entire tower that is simply meaningless. But the experience in which they live is an experience of a plurality of truths, not of no truth. A plurality of truths.

And therefore it’s terribly hard for me when I argue with people like this—these claims immediately come up. “What are you talking about? We have lots of truths…” You try to define, just a moment, let’s define the concept of truth—what does it mean when you believe something? They speak only about experience. Only about experience, agreed, but they turn the experience into a kind of truth. That’s the illusion that is created. And the only thing there is, is experience. And therefore that is truth—that is their concept of truth. They redefine it… you know, it’s all word games. So now they redefine this as truth, and now they have a plurality of truths, and I try to explain to them that all you did was swap one word for another. You just took one pill or another pill. You’re not talking about anything; you’re living on pills. Fine. It is very difficult to get people out of this conception.

You try to take them into some systemic framework. Look, I talk to students of Rav Shagar and people of that sort—they’re all there. They’re all there. You can’t talk to them. You simply can’t talk to them; they don’t understand anything, they don’t understand what you’re saying. It’s all kinds of word games and this “complex truth” and this and that, mental pilpulim. They say nothing. It’s a collection of meaningless babble. Plain nonsense. Really, a collection of nonsense—it’s unbelievable. In Jerusalem I spoke about this—there are interesting things in his books, he was a smart man, Rav Shagar, but his philosophy is simply a vacuum. There’s nothing there, such words of nonsense that it’s unbelievable. In philosophy, at the foundational level, he says nothing. He doesn’t even need the philosophy for most of the things he says. And in those things there are many meaningful points. But the conceptual anchor into which he inserts all of this is simply a heap of absurdities that has now captured—I don’t know what—become some kind of new cult. He has become the rebbe-admor of our generation, apparently.

In any case, for our purposes, the claim I want to make—this is a kind of modern midrash on Nachmanides, not that I think Nachmanides intended all this—but I think it’s not a bad translation into the reality of our day. When we speak of going all the way inward and all the way outward, the meaning is: you know what? You are living in a world… let’s go all the way with it. All right? Just as Rav Shagar opens his book, I think, with a story of an honor killing, right? In “Knesset Canaan,” “Theory and Criticism,” they dealt with this a lot. There was an honor killing, and Danny Rabinowitz, who wrote in Haaretz, wrote about it: what do you want? Why are you condemning it? This is their culture; don’t impose your culture on them. And this aroused a lot of anger and uproar in Haaretz and elsewhere, because it basically held up a mirror to them. But no one is willing to accept that it really is a mirror. “What are you talking about? We’re not there”—exactly the same illusion I spoke about earlier. “What are you talking about? That’s wrong, that’s horrible. After all, the whole plurality-of-truths idea is so that I’ll relate tolerantly to others.” And what if in the end he murders you too—will you relate tolerantly to that? That’s also a position.

Now once, someone there… it’s actually not that sophisticated, by the way; it’s a very simple argument. But they built a system so absurd, so interwoven within itself, so tangled within itself, that they can’t understand very simple things. And therefore there had to be—and Rav Shagar keeps recycling this story and making of it, I don’t know, a plurality of truths and beyond that, above reason, and one has to understand that it is I-don’t-know-what, all kinds of nonsense like that. And the point in the end—I think that many times he means the right thing, and the philosophy he uses destroys everything. It’s just the wrong tool to express what he wants to say. That’s what I think, if I understand what he wanted to say correctly. Truly, he was a smart man. I think he was a smart man, a captive infant, meaning a smart man who was captured inside a conceptual system that enchanted him and simply took him captive. I have no other explanation for what happened there.

So what I want to say is that there is some kind of very powerful illusion here, and when you go all the way with it, the only way to solve the issue is to go all the way with it. The only way you can hold up a mirror to people is to say to them: friends, right, so I murder you—an honor killing. Do you have criticism of that? On what basis? It’s my culture, all right? It’s your culture, and this is… there’s family honor, there is ISIS today, this and that? Yes, very simple. It’s not some terribly sophisticated move, right? The fact is, when you hold a mirror up to these people, suddenly you see some fanatical church. Suddenly the postmodernism ends. Why? Because they suddenly understand… they went all the way with it and they understood that it’s all nothing, they woke up from the dream. Because you go all the way. If you don’t go all the way, you can live inside that dream and it feels like a full life. But he doesn’t have to accept this nonsense either… What? He doesn’t have to accept the murder. What do you mean? I’m saying, he can say everyone may hold his own opinion, but he may not do actions that contradict the possibility… But if my opinion is to do that action, then that’s my opinion. Why can’t I hold that opinion? You can’t… But it contradicts the whole possibility of existing. So what? Fine—who said one must exist? My opinion is that you won’t exist; I’ll exist, you won’t. That’s my opinion. You can’t deal with that. You’ll have to stop it; yes, you can say: I’m postmodern up to here. Fine—but then it’s no longer postmodernism. No, everyone has his own space within which… there are people who accept a great many things; for instance in Arab society they may be ready to accept a lot until this point, until revenge. No, but I’m saying more than that: I want to claim that the postmodern illusion is that there is no boundary. That’s exactly the point. Once you reach a boundary, you already understand: okay, so you have a boundary here and I have a boundary there. You can already better understand my dogmatism, because you too stop somewhere. This illusion that says no, I never stop, everyone is just consistent with his own thing—that is an illusion. You really aren’t. So the way to solve this problem is simply to go all the way with it.

And that is what they do with the goat to Azazel and the goat for the Lord: they go all the way in and discover there is nothing there—I was living in a bubble. I was living in an illusion. One wakes up. And thus one “stops the mouth of that Greek and his wicked disciples,” who think that everything is only logic or understanding. Fine—let’s go with this all the way, let’s see where it brings us. If there is no room at the end, we will keep circling forever. These gates—we won’t even know where we are, we will have learned nothing. It is simply waking up from a dream. There is no other way to deal with this issue.

Now if for someone it isn’t a dream but something real, then he really won’t wake up—he’ll go all the way with it. But of course blessed evolution will eradicate him from the world, because he won’t be able to defend himself against those—and in the end this is not a sustainable thesis. It will disappear, in the end it will disappear. What? That’s not really what Nachmanides intended. I said: this is a modern midrash on Nachmanides. But I think it is not a bad translation for the world we live in. I don’t think Nachmanides saw things this way; he didn’t live in such a world. But there is something there which, when translated into today’s terms, seems to me much sharper. So today I can define it more sharply. In Nachmanides’ day these conceptions weren’t yet formulated so sharply. No, but that view really—Aristotle, something he didn’t understand, didn’t accept, more or less. No, true, but that was what was then called proof. Today we distinguish between logical proof and observation and… Nachmanides says “the science of astronomy and mathematics” in the introduction to Milhamot, that our Torah certainly is not… He treats astronomy and mathematics as the same thing. For him mathematics and astronomy are both science. Even though mathematics is abstract and astronomy is empirical science. But for him it’s all the same. There isn’t yet a very sharp distinction between science and mathematics, between abstract thought and observation or science. They didn’t have that distinction yet. Right, so that’s why I’m saying Nachmanides’ conceptual world was not developed enough to sharpen this all the way. But I do think it is faithful to the source in the sense that—it is a modern midrash on what Nachmanides is doing. That’s how it seems to me, at least. If he were alive today, I think this is what he would say. It seems so to me.

In any event, this metaphysical experiment they perform is an experiment of: let’s see what happens if we go only with understanding and no wisdom. Those are the gates of impurity. So what do we discover there? All the goat-demons—beings without root. Those are the goat-demons. What are beings without root? Understanding without wisdom. Those are the gates of impurity. They are considered connected to the goat-demons too, the places of impurity, desolation, all those things. Those are the gates of impurity. And when the inner goat goes all the way inward, to the innermost sanctuary, the Holy of Holies is really the room at the end of that chain—those are the gates of understanding. And the other side goes all the way, until in the end you wake up from the dream and beside you is a lamb that you can throw on the grill. You started with holiness and offerings and all that, and if I translate into the moral analogue and so on, in the end you wake up with nothing at all—with a nice lamb you can slaughter and grill. That’s all. There is nothing. You wake up from the fact that you were living in a dream, that this whole business doesn’t exist. Then “they shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices to the goat-demons.” Because then in the end you understand that goat-demons are beings without root—they do not really exist, they are virtual beings. They do not really exist. And all these fantasies that carry us off to all kinds of places—we can wake up from them if once, at least once a year, we allow ourselves to take them all the way to the end.

And that is also what atones for all sins on Yom Kippur. Because in the end you understand where—one second—where the root of sin comes from. And the root of sin comes from life within this illusion, within this fantasy. You build for yourself all kinds of worlds, I don’t know, conceptual constructs, and when you take them all the way to the end you see that they aren’t really there. Maybe the issue isn’t the end, but the beginning? Meaning, maybe the fiftieth gate is the fiftieth room; maybe it’s the first room, not the last? Depends from which side you look at it. When you go backward and don’t arrive at the room at the beginning, you arrive at the room at the end, where you build something like that… yes. Since it’s always the first—it’s the root, the very, very beginning. Obviously. But again, the question is this: think of the process of scientific inquiry. When we observe phenomena and from them infer the general laws underlying the phenomena, which comes first? The laws come before the phenomena; the laws underlie the phenomena, right? The phenomena happen because of the laws. But how do we progress in scientific inquiry? We begin with the phenomena and from them arrive at the laws. Meaning there is a difference between how the thing is built and how I discover it. Those are two different things. I begin the journey from the end toward the beginning. Obviously the room is the beginning, but when I go, I go backward. That is how I discover it. I don’t begin—the Holy One, blessed be He, began from above. When He created the world, He created it—basic assumptions, conclusions, as it were, some kind of structure that begins from above. But when I ascend, I ascend from below upward. Meaning, I am below. And I need to try to understand what is happening up there. So the journey, by definition, always goes opposite to the natural direction of things, the direction in which things are actually structured.

And so I think what he says here is that understanding without wisdom means that understanding has no meaning without this primary wisdom. Maybe that’s what Gedalia means, I mean. Maybe it’s interesting to finish with this. Menachem Finkelstein once sent me a poem of—Glovinsky isn’t here, so it’s okay, we’re safe—called “He Gazed and Died” by Alterman, “He Gazed and Died”—sorry. What? Maybe Bialik. By… Bialik? Yes, Bialik, right, very good. Bialik. Fine, with Glovinsky we would also have no problem. He might have been here.

“He entered the hidden treasures of the orchard with his torch in hand, and the orchard has fifty gates. And on all its paths are terrors, abysses upon abysses and mountains upon mountains. And the flaming swords at the gates, and behind the doorposts serpents lying in wait”—lying in wait with an aleph, yes. “And he passed in peace among them all, stepping over serpents and slipping beneath the sword. Further and further within he hastened to come, with his torch before him. In astonished silence the mighty withdrew, then his soul dared to come to the fiftieth gate. He would dare and come to the treasury of treasuries, where no stranger had yet trod. And he would tunnel to the borders of no borders, where opposites unite at their root”—yes, understanding and wisdom; the room is one room, not two rooms. “And he would continue and tunnel, and find the straight in crooked paths. And he inclined toward it”—yes, the crooked is the straightest path—“and he inclined toward it and came in one of the times to the place of no time and no place. To the point where light with darkness is spent, he reached the edge of the void where no eye had dominion. And at the fiftieth gate, the final one—ah, hidden God, how distant still.”

“And the torch grows dim and fades, the roads become confused, the paths bend, and all are only corridor to corridor—and where is the final gate? Where is the very essence of the chamber?” Meaning, where is the chamber to which the gates are leading? It’s beautiful, I think. If so, I don’t know what he meant by it, but… Maybe Bialik was in study sessions with Nachmanides in Horeshaim. Maybe. I don’t know if he meant all this, but against this background I think it’s very beautiful. “And already his soul was exhausted from burrowing, the light of his eyes no longer trustworthy, and his spirit no longer steady. And when he could no longer walk upright on two feet, he crawled on his belly. And as he licked dust, on his lips one final plea: ‘If only I could come to the fiftieth gate—after all my exile—let me peer beyond the veil.’”

After all, what is the whole problem with the fiftieth gate? The problem is that we have no proof for it. Why does everyone call its existence into question? The people of understanding, enlightenment, because we have no proof for it. How will I reach the goal? Why was it not revealed to Moses our teacher? What does it mean, not revealed? Moses our teacher was given the fundamental assumptions, but they were given to him as fundamental assumptions. He does not have the conviction that it is true because he does not have—you do not have a proof for that thing. And that is what leads many people to deny the existence of the fiftieth gate. You don’t have one hundred percent certainty. Exactly. And from here begins all skepticism, because this thing is a room and not a gate; we have no proof for it.

So that is what he says: “If only I could come to the fiftieth gate, after all my exile, and look beyond the veil.” “The prayer was heard, and before the dimming torch reached its end, the fiftieth gate appeared before him, all pure marble stones.” Of course that’s the four who entered the orchard, with white marble stones—pure marble stones, here this is the white. “The hand trembled, the eye blazed with radiance, to knock—just one more moment of restraint—and suddenly he strengthened himself and dared and rose from his crawling and knocked. Then the torch was extinguished and the doors of the gate were opened, and he peered inside; and his body collapsed, and beside it a wisp of smoke, crouching upon the threshold of restraint.” Right? Meaning, you can’t really enter that gate, because entering that gate would mean that you had certainty in the fundamental assumptions as you have certainty in a proof. And that we do not have. We cannot. That is what frustrates us all the time: how will we know that it’s true? Maybe the opposite? And that is the root of all skepticism. And this desire to enter the fiftieth gate, the fiftieth room, is really the desire not merely to know the fundamental assumptions—“I know that through two points there passes one straight line, but prove to me that this is true. How can I be sure?” How many times I’ve heard that question. People say to me: wait, how can I be sure? Yes, I agree too, that is my feeling. How can I be sure? So this is that desire to enter the fiftieth gate. All right.