God and the World – Lesson 1

Table of Contents

• The purpose of the series and the methodological framework
• Criticism of the yeshiva learning pattern and its implications for the world of thought
• Formal authority and substantive authority, and their implications for theology
• The impossibility of formal authority with respect to facts
• Tzimtzum as the foundation for discussing the relationship between the Holy One, blessed be He, and the world
• The problem of infinity and the kabbalistic solution: surrounding and filling versus transcendence and immanence
• Literal or not literal: the Vilna Gaon, Hasidism, and the claim of nonsense
• The justification for literal tzimtzum: a higher need, perfection, and self-perfection
• An open ending and continuation of the discussion

Summary

General overview

The speaker opens a series on the relationship between the Holy One, blessed be He, and the world as part of the second book in his trilogy, and seeks to present an orderly picture of his view in response to questions and comments that, in his opinion, were already answered in the book. He sets out a methodological introduction according to which a priori conceptual analysis is preferable to merely mapping sources, and argues that in Jewish thought there is no formal authority, because such authority can apply only to norms and not to facts. On that basis, he turns to the issue of tzimtzum and describes the Ari’s model of the line and the contraction, the tension between transcendence and immanence, and the dispute over whether tzimtzum is literal or not literal. He concludes that the view that tzimtzum is not literal does not hold up conceptually, and ends by saying that the question of how the problem of “there is no place empty of Him” is nevertheless resolved will be discussed later.

The purpose of the series and the methodological framework

The speaker presents the series as dealing with the relationship between the Holy One, blessed be He, and the world, and as a systematic reconstruction of his own view, against the background of his feeling that many questions addressed to him keep coming back even when they have already been answered in the book. He connects the discussion to methodological and logical questions such as authority in matters of thought, contradictions in theology, and the burden of proof between competing views. He argues that his critics assume the burden of proof is on him, whereas in his opinion it is not on him, and in any case it has already been met. He declares his preference for a priori conceptual analysis over reliance on sources, and presents this as a tool that filters out possibilities, sharpens concepts, and shows when different methods are really the same view, or when statements do not have coherent content.

Criticism of the yeshiva learning pattern and its implications for the world of thought

The speaker describes a split in yeshivot between analytical study, which maps out different positions, and the study of practical Jewish law, which brings the ruling from the Shulchan Arukh or the Mishnah Berurah. He argues that this creates a mistaken disconnect, because learning is supposed to end with a practical halakhic conclusion. He describes the history in which people once mainly studied books of halakhic decisors, and the Talmud served as a means to that end, and argues that the later pattern allows one to hold on to “all the possibilities” without deciding, which leads to stringencies of the Brisk type because of an inability to decide. He tells the story of Rabbi Chaim, who demanded from Rabbi Yitzchak Elchanan an answer of “yes or no, בלי any reasons,” because on reasons he would be able to raise objections, and presents this as expressing the gap between analysis and decision. He then argues that in the world of thought there is no “Shulchan Arukh,” and therefore importing that dichotomy creates a jumble of positions with no possibility of a decisive ruling.

Formal authority and substantive authority, and their implications for theology

The speaker distinguishes between substantive authority, meaning the authority of an expert whom people accept because he is probably right, and formal authority, which is binding by virtue of the institution itself even if it is not right, illustrating this with a doctor as opposed to the Knesset. He attributes “do not deviate” to the Sanhedrin as formal authority, and emphasizes that after the Sanhedrin there is no formal authority “from above,” but at most substantive authority of a Torah scholar, or formal authority “from below” when a community accepts the local halakhic authority. He argues that the habit of telling miracle stories in order to justify obedience to sages mistakenly replaces the idea of formal authority with the claim that they do not make mistakes. He cites the Kesef Mishneh in the laws of rebellious elders, which grounds the authority of the Talmud in acceptance from below, while emphasizing that even in the Talmud there are mistakes and retractions from mistakes.

The impossibility of formal authority with respect to facts

The speaker argues, through conceptual analysis, that formal authority can be defined only with respect to norms, because one can demand practical obedience even when a person thinks otherwise, as in the example of selecting food on the Sabbath. He argues that with respect to facts, it is impossible to demand that someone “believe” by force of authority when the person has not been convinced, and illustrates this with belief in the coming of the messiah in contrast to the statement of Rabbi Hillel, “Israel has no messiah, for they already consumed him in the days of Hezekiah,” and with the idea that an external verbal statement without an actual change of belief is meaningless. He defines theological questions as factual questions, including whether there is God, whether there is providence, and whether the messiah will come, and argues that therefore no formal authority is possible in them and no “Shulchan Arukh” in Jewish thought is possible. Instead, every person reaches his conclusions by means of tradition, reason, logic, philosophy, and verses, each in his own way. He responds to a questioner who claimed that there are areas in which a person has no independent footing and the Sanhedrin relies on tradition, and replies that even there this is acceptance on the basis of substantive persuasion that the tradition is correct, not by force of “do not deviate,” because “do not deviate” cannot apply in non-halakhic areas.

Tzimtzum as the foundation for discussing the relationship between the Holy One, blessed be He, and the world

The speaker presents tzimtzum as the basis of the discussion and not merely as an abstract kabbalistic question, and attributes to it practical implications, even to the point of connecting it to the dispute between Hasidim and their opponents. He describes the Ari’s account at the beginning of Etz Chaim: a reality filled with the Infinite Light, contraction and removal of the light to the sides, creating an empty space in the shape of a circle, the entry of a “line” of the Infinite Light from above down to near the bottom, and the explanation that the line does not touch the bottom in order to allow for a hierarchy of higher and lower. He describes the development of the worlds around the line: Adam Kadmon as the form of three lines, Atzilut, and after them Beriah, Yetzirah, and Asiyah as “the separate worlds.” He cites the Leshem as saying that Atzilut is called that because the Infinite Light is found “with it,” like a soul in a body, whereas in the separate worlds the light is more external.

The problem of infinity and the kabbalistic solution: surrounding and filling versus transcendence and immanence

The speaker presents the motivation for tzimtzum as a solution to the tension between God’s infinity and “there is no place empty of Him,” on the one hand, and the existence of a world that is not the Holy One, blessed be He, on the other. He explains the language of surrounding and filling: the Infinite Light “surrounds” as something present around the empty space, and the line “fills” as something within the beings, and translates this into the language of philosophy as transcendence versus immanence. He mentions Spinoza as a case of extreme pantheism and presents this as an example of a common conceptual confusion. He then argues that Kabbalah seeks to view transcendence and immanence as two principles held together, not as a dispute, but asks how this really solves the problem if one still has to decide whether beings are divinity or are separate.

Literal or not literal: the Vilna Gaon, Hasidism, and the claim of nonsense

The speaker describes the dispute over whether tzimtzum is literal, and attributes to the Vilna Gaon the position that tzimtzum is literal and that there is an empty space in which the Holy One, blessed be He, withdrew, in the sense that there is a place empty of Him. By contrast, in Hasidic interpretation he attributes to the Ari the position that tzimtzum is not literal and that there is no place empty of Him. He argues that the literature often goes out of its way דווקא to defend literal tzimtzum, but in his view the conception that tzimtzum is not literal is conceptual “nonsense,” because it collapses when it claims that there are no separate beings and yet there is still an “I” that thinks this. He uses Descartes’s question, “I think, therefore I am,” to argue that thought necessarily testifies to the existence of a thinker, and presents the statement “I do not exist” as madness—something one cannot even begin to say without contradicting oneself. He adds that this position also undermines the concept of the prohibition against corporealizing God, if corporeality itself is divinity.

The justification for literal tzimtzum: a higher need, perfection, and self-perfection

The speaker states that the conception that tzimtzum is literal is at least conceptually coherent, and explains that the Holy One, blessed be He, “left room” in order to create separate beings because there is a need for a separate reality to exist. He cites the concept of “the service of God is for a higher need,” the Ari’s words “Give strength to God,” and Rabbi Kook’s words in Orot HaKodesh, part two, about “perfection and self-perfection,” according to which progress itself is a virtue. Since the Holy One, blessed be He, cannot perfect Himself because He is perfect, He created human beings so that they would perfect themselves and thereby “complete” Him—though he notes that clarification is still needed as to in what sense human self-perfection completes the Holy One, blessed be He. He cites the story of Jonah and the gourd and proposes two possibilities for resolving the a fortiori argument there, choosing the possibility that the Holy One, blessed be He, also acts out of a need for reality, just as Jonah acts out of a need for shade.

An open ending and continuation of the discussion

The speaker sums up that the conception that tzimtzum is not literal does not hold water conceptually, whereas literal tzimtzum does hold up, but the question remains how the problem of “there is no place empty of Him” is resolved if there really is a space from which He withdrew. He says that the continuation of the discussion will deal with that next time. After that there are closing remarks, thanks, and a question about “the acceptance of the Talmud by the whole Jewish people,” to which he replies that this was a gradual process of acceptance that developed until people no longer disputed it, even though at first there were Geonim who disagreed and entered into the Talmud, such as Rav Acha, which hints to Rav Achai Gaon.

Okay, as I wrote to you, today I want to begin a series dealing with the relationship between the Holy One, blessed be He, and the world. This is basically part of the second book in my trilogy that deals with this topic, and more or less these will be the ideas that appear there too—again, without committing to the exact wording, but the ideas are there as well in one form or another. And still, every time anew I get comments and questions and objections and all kinds of things like that which, at least as far as I understand, were already answered in the book itself. Meaning, somehow I get the feeling that people don’t really—I don’t know whether to say they don’t grasp it, because maybe they disagree with me, and that’s allowed—but if they ask me questions that were already answered in the book, then I do have some justification for saying they didn’t really grasp what I wrote there. So I want to present here a genuinely organized picture of the view I believe in regarding this issue, this relationship between the Holy One, blessed be He, and the world.

This touches on quite a few methodological and logical questions around it, like authority in thought, like contradictions, the possibility that contradictions can exist in theology or in faith in God, the question of the burden of proof when two conceptions clash with one another—who exactly has to prove his claim, which of the two. Many of the claims against my position say that the burden of proof is on me and I haven’t carried it. I claim both things: I think the burden of proof is not on me, and I also did carry it, even though it isn’t on me. But this really involves quite a few methodological questions that of course I won’t be able to get into all of, and in a significant number of them, at least, I’ve dealt with them before at some point over the years. But I’ll touch here and there on the methodological aspects as well.

Also, regarding the question of tzimtzum, with which I want to open, because I think it stands at the foundation of the discussion—I touched on it in one of the series or classes I gave a few years ago, I think when we were dealing with Jewish thought. We had some sort of series, or I don’t know, some stretch of time—maybe it was even a year—when we were dealing with Jewish thought, and there among other things I discussed the issue of tzimtzum. But that was already a few years ago, I myself barely remembered it happened, and I assume it won’t be terrible if here and there I also repeat a few things on that matter.

So maybe I want to begin, all the same, with some methodological introduction before I get into the topic itself. The question that often accompanies discussions like this, and often comes up as a claim against what I write, is the question of authority. Can I decide on my own theological, intellectual, and other conceptions, or am I supposed to rely on some authoritative earlier sources, on a tradition that comes down to us, and things of that kind?

So on this matter I’ll first repeat something I’ve really said more than once, it seems to me, so I’ll do it very briefly. The question of authority itself, if one wants to deal with it—and maybe one more sub-introduction before this introduction—my way, both in the trilogy and in general, is to prefer a priori conceptual analysis over recourse to sources. My feeling is that many times people open up an issue—you want to discuss some issue, how do you approach an issue in Jewish thought or something—what do you do? So of course you look for sources, and you look at what each one says, and you sketch some map of the different approaches, what each one says. The Kuzari says this, the Maharal says this, Maimonides says this, and so on, yes? All kinds of conceptions one way or another. There’s an assumption here that in Jewish thought you’re actually not supposed to formulate a position; you’re only supposed to know the different conceptions. Which sounds to me like a very strange business, a very strange approach.

It is partly nourished, I think, by the parallel strange conception in the field of Jewish law. In yeshivot—you know, in yeshivot, in the analysis session, yes, in the morning, when they study the in-depth learning—basically what they study are the approaches of the medieval authorities (Rishonim) and later authorities (Acharonim), and again they draw a map of the different approaches, the connections between them, the practical ramifications, the proofs this way and that, the connection to the Talmudic passage, how each one read the passage—and that’s where they stop. Meaning, they don’t reach the stage where I also decide who is right, meaning what the Jewish law ruling is in practice. At most, after that you go to the Shulchan Arukh or the Mishnah Berurah and you look at what they ruled.

And therefore in yeshivot very often—and not just often, usually—the learning is divided into in-depth study, say in the morning or a bit in the afternoon, depending on the yeshiva, depending when, and then there is halakhic study. Halakhic study means to study Shulchan Arukh, commentaries, Mishnah Berurah, to study the halakhic decisors—even, if you like, Shemirat Shabbat Kehilkhatah, it doesn’t matter—some books of decided Jewish law. And a very large disconnect is created between the in-depth study and the halakhic ruling. And in my view this is a major mistake, and I don’t think it has any basis at all; it’s some terribly strange thing.

At the end of the day, a person needs to arrive at the practical Jewish law bottom line. That’s what the Sages tell us: to study in order to do, meaning to study in order to know what to do. In the end, you need to finish your learning with a conclusion—what is the conclusion, what Jewish law ruling comes out in the end. And people study the in-depth analysis in general, and they do not derive the Jewish law ruling from that in-depth learning, but rather read in the Mishnah Berurah or in the Shulchan Arukh and know what the law will be. Whereas what one really ought to do is to clarify the various approaches and then at the end think: who is right? In my view, who is right—of course I’m not the Holy One, blessed be He, and if I think in a certain way, say against Maimonides and like Rashba, it’s not certain that I’m not mistaken and that Rashba is not mistaken and Maimonides is right. That’s possible, I don’t know. But in the end I have only what I have—the conclusions I can reach. And therefore I’m supposed to reach a conclusion to the best of my ability from the in-depth study of the issue.

There shouldn’t be a difference or gap between in-depth study and the halakhic ruling. The halakhic ruling is the bottom line of the in-depth study. But because of this gap that developed in the later generations—and by the way, it wasn’t like this in the past, but it developed in the later generations—in Europe in the 15th and 16th centuries, the texts they actually studied were not Talmud. Sha’arei Dura or books of halakhic decisors—that’s what they studied, the Rif and so on. Meaning, the Talmud was only a means to understand what the decisors were saying, decide who was right, and reach a conclusion. There wasn’t such a thing as in-depth analysis and then separate study of ruling books in order to know what to do. It was one study.

And what happens as a result is that in the area of in-depth study you can say whatever you want, because there is this possibility, that possibility—all possibilities exist. Everything logically consistent works out. And of course each one of the medieval and later authorities can be reconciled with the Talmud because we are masters of apologetics—we can explain anything in three ways—so in effect we’ll never have conclusive proofs against any of the positions, and we’re left with some complete map. That’s how people remain in yeshivot after they finish studying a passage. And no one takes the next step—what Maimonides and the Shulchan Arukh and the halakhic decisors actually did—determining who is right, which view Jewish law follows. That they don’t do. That we read in the books of the decisors and then we know what the law is.

And the price is that, first, we don’t do what we ourselves think in Jewish law, but what the Shulchan Arukh thought, or the Mishnah Berurah; and second, in the world of in-depth study we do whatever we want—meaning, not whatever we want, but all possibilities remain on the table; we don’t sift among them, we don’t determine who is right and who isn’t. We don’t have the tools. We once spoke about Rabbi Chaim’s method, and maybe that was in the framework of the class, the series on positivism, I no longer remember. I said there that the Briskers are stringent like all the opinions. Yes, there are all the views of the medieval authorities, so they make sure to be stringent in order to fulfill their obligation according to all the opinions. And people think this stems from great fear of Heaven. Maybe fear of Heaven too—I’m not denying that—I’m only saying that in my opinion that’s not where it comes from. It comes from an inability to decide.

Once you have no ability to decide, then you have to be concerned for all the opinions, because who knows who is right? Maybe precisely that medieval authority according to whom I have not fulfilled my obligation is the one who is right. And since I have no ability to decide, I am stringent according to all the opinions. The famous yeshiva story about Rabbi Chaim—that he wanted to rule on some difficult question, so he sent a letter to Rabbi Yitzchak Elchanan, yes, the greatest halakhic decisor of that generation in Kovno. And he says to him: tell me yes or no, without proofs, without reasons. Because if you give me a reason, I’ll give you five reasons against it for why you’re not right. Just tell me yes or no. And that again is an expression of this same distinction we make between in-depth study and decision. Rabbi Chaim dealt with in-depth study; I don’t know what with decisions—decisions are Rabbi Yitzchak Elchanan’s business. But if he did not accept his reasons and could undermine all of them, then why are you accepting his rulings? Meaning there’s something here—this gap is a very problematic gap.

Now in the world of thought we have a problem, because in the world of thought we don’t have a Shulchan Arukh. There is no Shulchan Arukh that decided between the different schools of thought. And so what happens as a result of this split created in the world of learning is that in the last generation, when they also began to study thought in yeshivot—in the past no one did this, of course, but in the last generation they began to study thought and the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) and so on, all kinds of fields no one had ever dealt with—so they imported this dichotomy from the world of halakhic learning and analysis into the world of thought. Except that in the world of thought we have the ability to analyze and organize the different views, but we don’t have books that will give us the final ruling that tells us who is right.

And so what happens is that we are basically left with a jumble of approaches, with a collection of different conceptions. Maybe one can also see a few implications, differences between them, sharpen them, and so on—and in the end we remain with some map, that’s all, some outlook of “everything is open, everything is possible, everything…” I personally think this whole business is so absurd, because the question is: then why do I need to study all those people at all? I too can write a book of thought and now there will be another view. Why do I need to know everyone’s views instead of writing my own, and then as far as I’m concerned let future generations study that too? Meaning, let them put me too into their general map. In other words, once all you do is draw a map, then why is that interesting? In the end, I think at least, the purpose of learning is learning in order to reach a conclusion.

It’s important also to understand the other conceptions, of course, I’m not—obviously I too deal with positions I disagree with—but I deal with them in order to sharpen the issue and in the end reach the conclusion of what I do think, and not just in order to know who said what and why. That sounds to me like, I don’t know, some archaeological or academic occupation—I don’t know what to call it. Torah study that is not academic is supposed to be study that moves toward a conclusion. Meaning, the question is what the conclusion is supposed to be.

Now the problem here is that in books of thought, as I said before, in the world of thought there is no Shulchan Arukh. And there is no Shulchan Arukh because we were not given mechanisms of halakhic ruling. Maimonides writes in three places in his Commentary on the Mishnah that there is no halakhic ruling at all in matters that do not pertain to practice. So in principle, ideologically, no halakhic ruling is issued there; one does not decide who is right. According to Maimonides there cannot be a Shulchan Arukh in the world of thought, even though he himself—what? Rabbi, but what about Maimonides’ Thirteen Principles? Right, I said—that’s the sentence you interrupted me right in the middle of. I said that even though Maimonides himself seemingly contradicts his own doctrine, because Maimonides did try to determine, or to canonize, intellectual principles. There are the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah, there are the Thirteen Principles.

More than that: there’s an article by Haskah—I think it’s in De’ot—where he shows that in those same three places in the Commentary on the Mishnah where Maimonides wrote that one does not issue halakhic rulings in matters not pertaining to practice, if you look in the Mishneh Torah, in those same three issues he did issue a ruling. He wrote one thing in the Commentary on the Mishnah, and in those same three issues in the Mishneh Torah he did rule. Fine, so he discusses there why, how that happens, how one can explain it. But what I described before in the name of Maimonides still requires clarification; there are contradictions in Maimonides, and the question of what exactly Maimonides’ view is in this matter is not completely clear to me.

But for our purposes, the point is that we have no way to reach conclusions. Now it turns out—and this is what I opened with—that even in the halakhic world, but certainly and all the more so in the world of thought, many times one can reach conclusions even without resorting to authorities that determine who is right or what the halakhic ruling is. One can do conceptual, philosophical, logical analysis—a priori, yes—and reach conclusions: who is right, and in whose words perhaps there is even a contradiction, so there is nothing to relate to there at all, and thus arrive at a conclusion. That too is an option.

And many times, when one does conceptual analysis—and by the way I usually deal with Jewish law, I deal little with thought; I wrote the second book of the trilogy in order to explain why there is no point in dealing with thought, not because I dealt with thought there—the point is that many times conceptual analysis makes recourse to sources unnecessary. Once you do the conceptual analysis, you immediately see the map much more simply; it filters out a huge number of possibilities. Suddenly you see that conceptions that seem different are actually the same conception, or there are statements that don’t say anything at all, they are some sort of contradiction or something like that. It really clears the board—or the picture—and makes unnecessary all sorts of appeals to sources, which often come to substitute for conceptual analysis. Yes, so Maimonides says this and Rashba says that and this one says that. First of all, look at what this concept actually says. Are Maimonides and Rashba even talking about the same concept? Who said so? Let’s try to define things a bit, to see what follows and what does not follow from these definitions.

Conceptual analysis, from my experience—I once thought of maybe doing a series on it as well, it could be I’ll do that in the future—on the meaning of conceptual analysis. Why, when, how conceptual analysis can make recourse to sources unnecessary. In any case, also in our context I want to rely quite a bit on conceptual analysis, and in the world of thought, since I do not accept the existence of authority in this field—and in a moment I’ll explain why—the existence of authority in the world of thought, then here conceptual analysis is almost the only tool I have. And therefore this is not just a preference, but basically there is no escaping the use of this tool.

Now why do I say that in the realm of thought there is no authority? Here I’ll repeat it briefly, because I really have discussed it more than once. I distinguish between two concepts of authority. There is formal authority and substantive authority. Substantive authority is the authority of an expert. When I go to a doctor, and he sees that I have some illness, and prescribes me a medicine, now I’ll take that medicine because I trust the doctor’s expertise. And of course I’m not an expert in that matter, so I’ll accept his words. I’ll accept his words not because I am obligated to accept his words. I’m not obligated. If I don’t take the medicine no one can come to me with a complaint. They’ll say I’m stupid, but no one will come to me with a claim in the sense that I did something forbidden, that I failed to obey someone I was obligated to obey. I am not obligated to obey him. I’m not obligated to obey a doctor. It’s only sensible to obey the doctor, because if he understands it and I don’t understand it, presumably what he says is correct. That’s what I call substantive authority—meaning, on the merits he is probably right, and therefore I accept his authority.

There is another concept of authority, which I call formal authority. Formal authority is authority given to a person or institution by virtue of what they are, not because they are right, but because they are what they are. For example, the Knesset. When the Knesset legislates a law, I obey that law not because what the Knesset says is probably right. If I had to formulate a rule of thumb, what the Knesset says is generally wrong, unless proven otherwise. So why do I have to obey Knesset law, comply with Knesset law? Because it is the Knesset, not because it is right. This is not substantive authority—meaning, I’m not obeying because I’m persuaded that it’s correct; I’m obeying because there is an obligation to obey. Again, without getting into the question of why that obligation exists and whether it does, I’m assuming for the moment the accepted views—accepted by me too, but it doesn’t matter, I don’t want to get into that debate right now. I’m just illustrating. So my claim is that the authority of the Knesset is not substantive authority but formal authority. I need to obey it not because it is right; I need to obey it because it is the Knesset, because it is the legislative institution, because it is the sovereign that obligates in this legal framework.

So there are two kinds of authority. Now the authority in the realm of Jewish law and Torah more generally is grounded in the verses, “Do not turn aside from all that they instruct you,” yes, and “You shall do according to all that they instruct you, do not turn aside right or left”—both a positive commandment and a prohibition. This authority, fundamentally, is formal authority. According to most opinions, except perhaps Sefer HaChinukh, according to most opinions this authority was given to the Sanhedrin and only to the Sanhedrin, and to sages ordained on its authority. But no other body has formal authority.

Okay? What does it mean that the authority of the Sanhedrin is formal authority? It means that if the Sanhedrin says something, like the Knesset—if the Sanhedrin says something, then that is the law. I need to obey it not because they are necessarily right, but because that is the law. And again, I’m not getting into halakhic discussions and different opinions—there is “one who errs in the commandment to obey the words of the Sages” at the beginning of tractate Horayot, there is the rebellious elder; one is not always obligated to obey the Sanhedrin, sometimes yes and sometimes no. It’s a complicated discussion. But on the principled level, in those places at least where “do not turn aside” is defined, we are speaking of formal authority, not substantive authority. I obey the Sanhedrin not because they are right, but because they are the authorized body. What they determine obligates me. That is the Sanhedrin’s authority, and it is formal authority.

Substantive authority is given to a sage—in the halakhic sphere, I mean—because he is an expert. Someone who is expert in Jewish law, if he says something, I can assume that he is probably right. If I am less learned or not versed in the issue, or for any other reason, then I simply assume he is probably right. So I will obey him not because I am obligated to obey him; I’ll obey him the way I obey a doctor, because he is the expert and therefore he knows, he is probably right—not because there is an obligation to obey him. There is no obligation to obey him. If I did not obey him and it happened that I was right and he was mistaken, nothing happened, because he has no formal authority. I just need to make sure that I do the right thing. Usually I assume that if he is an expert, then if I obey him I’ll do the right thing. But if in fact that did not happen, and I didn’t obey him, and it turns out nevertheless that what I did was the right thing, there is no problem at all. With the Sanhedrin it isn’t like that. If I didn’t obey them, even if it turns out that what I did was in fact correct and the Sanhedrin erred, I am still in the wrong. Why? Because the authority of the Sanhedrin is formal authority. One must obey them not because they are right, but because they are the Sanhedrin. And that is different from various other Torah scholars or other halakhic decisors, whose authority derives from their expertise, simply because they are right, or more skilled, or more knowledgeable, and so on.

The authorities that exist after the Sanhedrin—and let’s leave the Talmud aside for now; the Talmud too has a certain authority, but that is a separate topic—the authorities that exist after the Talmud are all substantive authorities and not formal ones. Meaning, if there is a great Torah scholar, a very great halakhic decisor, then it is very sensible to obey him because he is probably right. But there is no prohibition on someone who does not obey him, aside from the prohibition he may commit if it turns out he really erred and committed a transgression or failed to perform the commandment by not obeying him. Then he’ll pay for that, because he did not act according to Jewish law. But he will not pay for failing to obey the rabbi. There is no obligation to obey him. In that sense he functions like an expert. I consult him because he is more skilled; perhaps I’ll obey him because I think he’s right, but not because there is some “do not turn aside” or some formal authority vested in him.

The exception is authority that comes from below. Say there is a local rabbi, and the community has accepted this local rabbi upon itself, so now he has formal authority. One must obey him because he is the rabbi, not because he is right. But that isn’t because of “do not turn aside.” “Do not turn aside” applies only to the Sanhedrin or those ordained by it. It’s simply because we accepted him upon ourselves. As with judges, we know there is in the Talmud the concept that “they accepted them upon themselves.” The two litigants can accept judges upon themselves even if they are disqualified judges—even cattle herders, women, whoever you want—they can accept upon themselves any judge whatsoever. So here too, after the Talmud and after the Sanhedrin, there are no formal authorities from above, only substantive ones—unless we defined it from below. The public accepted a certain rabbi upon itself, and then it may be that one is obligated to obey that rabbi not because he is right but because he is the rabbi. Fine? But on the principled level, authorities from above simply do not exist at all.

Those are the two kinds of authority, but really I won’t go into it more because this is only background. What matters for us is the next stage. Formal authority—and in the end only formal authority is really authority. Substantive authority is not authority; it is simply sensible to obey the expert because he is right, but that is not authority in the sense that one must obey him, that there is a claim against someone who did not do so, who did not obey him. When we simply say “authority,” we mean formal authority.

By the way, as an aside, very often when people try to explain to others why one has to obey the Sages, or the Talmud, or the Sanhedrin, or something like that, they explain that they were sages with divine inspiration and could raise the dead and all kinds of things—miracle stories and tales of that sort. Why? Because they are trying to persuade people that these are entities that cannot err, that they are certainly right, and therefore one must obey them. But that is a mistake. The obligation to obey them does not derive from the fact that they are probably right, but from the fact that the Talmud has authority, or the Sanhedrin has authority. Therefore there is no reason in the world to tell fantastic stories about them and turn them into people who cannot make mistakes. First, in my opinion it’s also not true. But second, it’s unnecessary. It’s unnecessary because in order to persuade someone to obey them, you don’t need to persuade him that they are right. You need to persuade him that they have formal authority. That’s all.

And there are many implications to the fact that people do not distinguish between these two types of authority. Therefore they resort to arguments that are beside the point in order to explain. The Kesef Mishneh in the Laws of Rebels says: why does the Talmud have authority? Because we accepted it upon ourselves. Authority from below. Not because the sages of the Talmud don’t make mistakes, and not because they had divine inspiration and all kinds of things like that, and not because of decline of the generations. What do you mean? It’s not related at all. We simply accepted them upon ourselves. That’s all.

On the contrary, not a few mistakes appear in the Talmud—first, mistakes that we know are mistakes, scientific mistakes and so on. But beyond that, also in Jewish law. There are sages there who retracted. There are sages who discovered that they had erred in Jewish law. So why can’t we assume that some halakhic ruling in the Talmud is in fact mistaken, incorrect? I see no logic at all in assuming there cannot be mistaken halakhic rulings in the Talmud. Obviously there can be. People can err in anything. The authority of the Talmud does not derive from the fact that it does not err. It derives from the fact that it is the Talmud; that is the law. The Knesset too can make mistakes. But it doesn’t matter—if it legislated the law, that is the law. Okay?

Fine, but as I said, I’m closing the parenthesis. I just want to reach the next point. When I speak about formal authority, which is really the plain concept of authority, formal authority cannot be defined with respect to facts. Meaning: when we speak about formal authority, that can be said only with respect to norms. For example, say the Sanhedrin said that one of the thirty-nine primary categories of labor is selecting. Okay? There really can be discussion about that. You know, “sowing, selecting, sifting”—the Talmud says these are really the same thing, but it says they are three distinct categories, though they are very similar, it should have been one category. But the Talmud said: these are three categories. Okay. So they tell me selecting is one of the primary categories of labor.

Now say I think that’s wrong. Selecting is not one of the primary categories of labor. Maybe it isn’t even a prohibited labor at all. It should be some other labor, I don’t know, something else, or maybe in my opinion there are only thirty-eight primary categories. Okay. Now if the Sanhedrin determined that there are thirty-nine primary categories of labor, including selecting, then I am obligated to obey. What does that mean? That even if I think selecting is permitted, it is forbidden for me to select on the Sabbath. Why? Not because the Sanhedrin is right. But because I need to obey it, because it is the determining authority, not because it is right. It is the Sanhedrin. It has formal authority. What it says is the Jewish law. It obligates me. Therefore I must obey it.

In principle there is no problem with such a demand. I think it’s permitted to select on the Sabbath—fine. They’re not telling me what to think. They’re only telling me: but in practice, don’t select. That’s all. Now let’s try to apply the same thing to a factual matter. For example, belief in the coming of the Messiah. There is a Talmudic text in tractate Sanhedrin, in the chapter Helek. It says there: Rabbi Hillel said, “Israel has no Messiah, for they already enjoyed him in the days of Hezekiah.” The Messiah will not come. The Messiah was supposed to come in Hezekiah’s time, we missed it, he didn’t come, it’s lost. That’s it, the Messiah will no longer come. The Talmud says there: “May the Master forgive Rabbi Hillel,” yes? May his Master, the Holy One, blessed be He, forgive him for his mistake, and so on. But that’s what he says.

Now say I think like Rabbi Hillel—that there isn’t one; it’s lost; the Messiah has already been missed and is not supposed to come. Can someone come and demand that I believe in the coming of the Messiah because the Sanhedrin determined that belief in the coming of the Messiah is obligatory? I claim not. But what I claim is that one cannot demand this of me not because the Sanhedrin lacks authority in the realm of thought—which I also think is true—but because the Sanhedrin cannot be an authority in the realm of thought. Not that I have some verse from which I can prove it. Simply by conceptual analysis, as I said before, it cannot be. And why? Let’s think.

Suppose they tell me: look, to say that the Messiah won’t come is heresy. The Sanhedrin determined that the Messiah will come, therefore you must believe in the coming of the Messiah. Now let’s think about one of two possibilities. Either I was persuaded—meaning I think the Sanhedrin is probably right because they are experts, or because they have some tradition from Sinai, or because they know. I was persuaded that I was mistaken. No problem at all. That is substantive authority; I was persuaded, so I retract. So now I think that yes, the Messiah will come. But that is not the concept of authority. I’m talking about formal authority.

Formal authority, as I said with respect to selecting labor, here too formal authority basically means telling me: listen, you can think whatever you want, but you must accept what the Sanhedrin said, namely that the Messiah will come. In the halakhic sphere one can make such a demand. It is not contradictory. I can think it is permitted to select on the Sabbath and still make sure not to select; there is no contradiction there. But I cannot think that the Messiah won’t come and at the same time think that he will come. That is contradictory. I can say, “I believe with complete faith that the Messiah will come,” but inwardly I wasn’t persuaded; I think he won’t come. So that statement is just lip service. And what is demanded of me is to believe what the Sanhedrin imposes on me, not merely to say it. The statement has no meaning at all if it does not reflect what I think. But one cannot demand that I think what I do not think.

Either persuade me, and then perfectly fine, you changed my position and now I understand that the Messiah will come. But if you did not succeed in persuading me on the substantive level, I still think the Messiah won’t come. So how can you demand of me that I believe the Messiah will come because the Sanhedrin determined it? Factually, either he will come or he won’t come. If I became convinced that factually he will not come, what does it mean that I am obligated to believe that he will come? In practice I believe he won’t come. A demand of that kind is a contradictory demand. There is no room for such a demand—not because one does not issue halakhic rulings in matters not pertaining to practice, and not because the Torah did not give authority to the Sanhedrin except in the field of Jewish law and not in the field of thought. Rather simply because formal authority cannot be defined—it’s conceptual analysis, you don’t need sources for this—cannot be defined regarding questions of fact.

And when I speak about questions of fact—just a second—when I speak about questions of fact, I do not mean only questions of fact that I can look at and see what the correct fact is. Questions like whether the Messiah will come or will not come are also questions of fact. Questions like whether there is a God or there is no God are questions of fact. The question whether the Holy One, blessed be He, exercises providence or does not exercise providence is a question of fact. The fact that I cannot observe this fact directly changes nothing. In the end everyone has his own tools by which he reaches a conclusion about what the correct facts are in his eyes.

Assuming I reached the conclusion—no matter how—that the Messiah will not come, then factually I think he will not come. Whoever says he will come is mistaken in my eyes. Okay? So how can I comply with the demand to obey the Sanhedrin and think that the Messiah will come if I was not persuaded? Again, if I was persuaded then there is no problem. Substantively, that isn’t authority; I was simply persuaded and that’s that. If you demand that I believe it by force of authority, you are really saying I must do it even though I wasn’t persuaded, like with selecting labor. But that is a contradictory demand. One cannot demand that I think something when I am convinced it is not true. Okay? Because I will not think it—even if you demand it till tomorrow, even if I very much want to fulfill this command, I won’t be able to. What do you want me to do? This is the conclusion I have reached. What exactly am I supposed to do now—brainwash myself? That is an impossible demand.

Therefore I say that from conceptual analysis it follows that there cannot be formal authority with respect to facts. And the important point for us is that discussions in Jewish thought, almost all of them, deal with facts, unlike discussions in Jewish law. Discussions in Jewish thought deal with factual questions. Is there a unique spiritual quality to Israel—is there something different about a Jew as opposed to any other person? Will the Messiah come or not? Does the Holy One, blessed be He, exercise providence? Does He exercise providence over animals, over gentiles, over human beings? In what way does He exercise providence? All of these are questions of fact. All of Maimonides’ Thirteen Principles are principles about facts—all of them. So how can there be a demand to accept this factual directive by force of authority without being persuaded? There is no such thing.

Therefore, on the principled level, I want to claim that authority in matters of Jewish thought is impossible. It is no accident that there is no Shulchan Arukh in Jewish thought. A halakhic ruling cannot exist there. Why? Because one cannot demand that a person obey an authoritative halakhic ruling in areas that concern facts. It is irrelevant. And therefore, to close the circle I opened and finish this introduction, in the area of Jewish thought in the end a person needs to reach his conclusions with whatever tools he can: tradition, reason, logic, philosophy, whatever you want, verses from the prophets—it doesn’t matter, each person with his own sources. But once you have reached a certain conclusion, then that is your conclusion. No one can demand that I accept what Maimonides said because he is Maimonides. Unless you persuade me that Maimonides was such a great genius, and had sources of information in these intellectual matters that I do not have, that he is probably right. But then you only persuaded me; you did not demand by force of authority that I accept what Maimonides said. You simply persuaded me that he is probably right. That is perfectly fine, for whoever thinks that is true.

I personally do not think that is true. That Maimonides was a wise man, yes—but I do not think that the intellectual gap between him and me is so great that everything he says I need to accept because he is such an expert. I also do not believe that he had sources of information that I do not have. These are things that came from his own reasoning, and I have things that come from my own reasoning, and I do not see why he is more right than I am on these issues. Therefore I personally am also not willing to accept substantive authority in these areas, authority of an expert. But that is a matter of worldview; each person according to his worldview. Formal authority, however, has nothing to do with worldview at all. Formal authority over facts cannot even be defined. A position claiming that there is formal authority over facts is impossible. Okay, that is my claim. Someone earlier wanted to ask something?

I wanted to say that really, really, really, the Rabbi said very, very correct things in the part about formal authority over facts, in factual matters. Seemingly no person can persuade me about facts by authority—not substantive authority; at most there can be formal authority. But there are certain issues where a person’s a priori logic maybe has no footing, and regarding those I think that when the Sanhedrin says, for example, about the coming of the Messiah, I don’t know whether a person has any power there at all—whether he has any legs to refute it.

That’s not relevant. I’ll tell you why it’s not relevant. For two reasons. First of all—meaning, it would have to be tradition. If a person has no way of making decisions in this area, then how did the Sanhedrin make a decision in this area? And if it is possible to make decisions in this area, then just as the Sanhedrin made one, I too can make one. And now the question is whether I need to accept their authority solely by force of formal authority.

Now one could come and say: fine, but they are conveying to me a tradition they received from Sinai; the Holy One, blessed be He, told them that the Messiah will come. No problem. But if I was persuaded that this is indeed tradition, then I will truly accept it. But I will accept it not because they have authority, but because they are right. And because the Holy One, blessed be He, said so, and He presumably knows. So that is substantive authority, not formal authority. There still is no such thing as formal authority with respect to thought. At most, if you were persuaded that this statement of the Sanhedrin is the product of tradition—and for that you need to persuade me that it really is the product of tradition—then if I am persuaded, I will accept it simply because it is true, not because the Sanhedrin has authority. Therefore “do not turn aside” is not relevant here; it has no connection to “do not turn aside.” “Do not turn aside” does not apply to non-halakhic areas. It cannot apply. A priori, I say, it cannot apply. If I am persuaded that it is tradition, I will accept it because it is true. And if I was not persuaded, one cannot demand that I accept it, because I wasn’t persuaded—so what do you want me to do? Therefore even if something comes by tradition, and even if I accept it, I will do so by force of substantive authority and not by force of formal authority. I will do it because it is true, not because the Sanhedrin said it. Okay?

So that is the introduction with which I wanted to begin. Now let’s get a little into the questions of tzimtzum. I’ll explain later why this is important, but it’s not just some abstract kabbalistic question floating somewhere up in the heavens and that’s it. It has implications in practical life and in worldviews in our world—very cardinal implications. One can argue about how necessary the link is between theological conceptions and practical implications, but as a matter of fact that link certainly exists. For example, the dispute between Hasidim and their opponents—it’s hard to ignore that it is connected to the question whether tzimtzum is literal or not literal. Even though it is a terribly, terribly abstract question, in practical everyday religious life it comes to expression at every step. So this question is not just an abstract one, but I want first to start with it as an abstract question. The implications we’ll see later.

What is the meaning of this whole matter? The story begins with a description that appears at the beginning of Etz Chaim by the Arizal. In fact, the concept of tzimtzum was introduced by the Arizal. And he claims that the way the world was created was basically in the following stages. At the very beginning, all reality, all of existence, was filled with the Infinite Light, and it filled all reality. At some point the Holy One, blessed be He, decided to create a world, so He contracted the Infinite Light and removed it to the sides, and a sphere was formed—“a circle” in the language of the Arizal, though of course the intention is a sphere, maybe even a multidimensional sphere, not necessarily three-dimensional. A sphere of vacuum, yes, where the light withdrew to the sides and a sphere was created. Into this sphere there entered the Infinite Light, a line of Infinite Light from the upper edge, from the top of the sphere, downward, and it stopped a little before it hit the lower part. Now it stops. This is called the line. The picture I just described is called the picture of line and contraction. The contraction is the empty space, that sphere from which the light withdrew, and the line is the line that enters it at the center, a line of light, Infinite Light, which penetrates back into that volume or that space from which it had withdrawn. Okay?

Why doesn’t this line go all the way down, by the way? Why doesn’t it touch the lower part of the space? They explain there that if it had touched the bottom, I think this explanation is not in the Arizal—I think it’s in Leshem—if it had touched the bottom, then the line would not have been able to create a hierarchy of up and down. The line does not touch, so that it can be defined that the lower part of the line is “down,” and as one rises it is more and more “up,” until one reaches contact with the Infinite Light, which is the highest there is. That is the connection to the Infinite Light. Therefore there are defined sides of up and down. There is a hierarchy. One can produce beings according to their level of distance from the light, what are called vessels. Vessels are the thing that is distant from the light. The more material a thing is, yes, the thicker it is, the less abstract, the lower it is in this description.

If this line had reached all the way down, then basically the bottom and the top would have looked the same; both would have been connected to the Infinite Light, and there would have been no way to define what is up and what is down. You need to remember that when you imagine this matter, you see in your mind a sphere with a line descending inside it, so what’s the problem? This is down and this is up. But since outside of this thing we of course have the earth and other external things that define what up and down are. But imagine that all of reality is only this sphere. There is nothing outside it. And through its middle runs this sort of line from top to bottom. You understand that there is no way at all to know what is up and what is down. Meaning, this line is intended to create that axis which determines upper and lower. Okay?

Now around this line, around this line, additional beings are formed. Say around it there is some enveloping layer called Adam Kadmon, for example. Okay? There are several ways of describing this; one of the ways is in the form of worlds. So there is Adam Kadmon, there is the world of Atzilut, then Beriah, Yetzirah, and Asiyah. Okay? There are basically the Infinite Light, then line and contraction, Adam Kadmon, Atzilut, Beriah, Yetzirah, and Asiyah—seven worlds, basically, in their hierarchy. The most abstract world is the world of the Infinite Light filling all reality. After that it contracts, and the world of the line entering the middle and contraction is formed. After that, around the line there is formed an envelope in the shape of a human being. It already has three lines. You know, the sefirot in Kabbalah are divided into three lines: Chokhmah, Binah, Da’at; Chesed, Gevurah, Tiferet; Netzach, Hod, Yesod, and Malkhut. So there are the two side lines, like the arms and legs, and then the middle line, which is the torso. That is basically the shape of a human being in a very schematic way; therefore it is called Adam Kadmon, because this is the earliest place in which the human form appears. That is the world of Adam Kadmon.

Around that world there is formed the world of Atzilut. The world of Atzilut is already really a full human form, but it is still a very abstract world. Beneath the world of Atzilut there are the worlds of Beriah, Yetzirah, and Asiyah, which are called the worlds of separation. In what sense are they worlds of separation? The world of Atzilut—the Leshem explains what the world of Atzilut is, why it is called Atzilut—because the Infinite Light is with it. “With it” in the sense of Atzilut, like a soul in a body. When you think about the relationship between our soul and our body, you see that in fact we are dealing with one being. These two components unite at such a level that we no longer see them as two; they are fused. They are inside one another and they create basically one entity. So in the worlds from Atzilut and above, they are basically connected to the Infinite Light in such a way that they are not completely separate from it. It is within them like a soul within a body; it is with them, therefore it is called Atzilut.

Beriah, Yetzirah, and Asiyah are separate worlds. These are worlds in which the Infinite Light is not inside them like a soul in a body, but is external to them in some way. Now this whole story is basically the basis for the whole kabbalistic picture. Then there are many details, but basically that is the general picture, and everything else is details inside the picture. A great many details are filled into this picture. The Throne of Glory is in the upper part of the world of Beriah. There is the dikna, the beard, that descends from Adam Kadmon, the beard of the man. There is the head and the hands and the feet and the sefirot and the configurations. These are all details within this general picture, less important for our purposes.

Now what is this picture actually trying to achieve? What is the motivation to create a picture like this at all? So this picture, as is generally accepted, and the kabbalists themselves say it and scholars say it too, basically comes to solve a philosophical problem. The philosophical problem is that on the one hand the Holy One, blessed be He, is omnipotent and infinite, and nothing can exist apart from Him or detached from Him. And on the other hand we know that there is a world that is not the Holy One, blessed be He. I, myself, am a distinct being; or a table; or a mouse here, I don’t know. Every being that exists here in the world is not the Holy One, blessed be He; it is something else.

And then the question is how exactly these two things fit together. If the Holy One, blessed be He, is infinite, then there is no place devoid of Him. So how can there be things that are not Him? If there are things that are not Him, that means that in that place where those things are, He is not present. Again, when I speak here of “place,” this is of course something very abstract. I do not necessarily mean place in the sense of physical space, but any kind of reality, whatever it may be. Even if it does not occupy physical space, still, if it is a reality that has independent existence, then it is not God. If it is not God, that means He is not infinite; He has a limit. There, He is not present. There is a place where He is not present, and this is perceived by philosophers and kabbalists as a problematic statement. It contradicts His whole infinity; it contradicts the belief that nothing can exist without Him. Therefore one of the things tzimtzum comes to solve is this problem.

Basically the claim is that all this existence somehow exists within divinity in some sense. We still need to understand in what sense exactly, but the point is not that there is no divinity here. Somehow space opens up within divinity, and there all things exist, but He is not really absent there—meaning, in some sense He is still there. And what expresses this in the picture I described before is the line. Meaning, basically all the beings that exist in the world exist in some kind of envelope around the line. This whole envelope exists in some space empty of the Infinite Light, where there is no divinity, but inside each such being there is a line which is Infinite Light. And that is what in kabbalistic language is called surrounding versus filling. The surrounding Infinite Light is what is around. Around is the light surrounding that sphere, that ball, and the filling is the line, which is inside and fills things from within. So there is Infinite Light inside things and Infinite Light surrounding them. And in some sense the claim is that the existence of these things is not completely detached from the Infinite Light, from the Holy One, blessed be He.

So this is somehow supposed to solve the problem I described earlier—that there is no place devoid of Him and nothing can exist without Him, yet there are things that are not Him. It’s supposed to solve the problem, though in a moment I’ll come back to that. In the language of philosophers, this problem is described as transcendence and immanence. That’s the philosophical translation of the terms surrounding and filling. What does that mean? Transcendence means a God who is abstract, very far from us, with an infinite and incomprehensible distance between us and Him, not connected to our world at all nor to our conceptual world. That is the transcendent God. The immanent God—immanent means built in—is a God built into us. Basically divinity has some expression that one could even say is material. In other words, the material from which I am made, the table is made, it too has some divinity in it, and that is the immanent God.

Now sometimes philosophers present this as a dispute between a conception of God as immanent and a conception of God as transcendent. For example, Spinoza, who speaks of pantheism—that is basically an extreme conception of immanence. Because he basically says that God is nothing other than the material totality itself. Nothing beyond it. God is simply the thing itself. He does not fill reality; He is reality itself. In a certain sense, according to Spinoza the Infinite Light never withdrew at all. It is still here. Everything is divinity, if one understands it that way. Or alternatively, he was really an atheist: there is no God, and all there is is only matter. So to call the material totality “God”—so what? It’s just a name. In the final analysis he believes that there is only a material totality and nothing outside it.

So here this is part of the problem of undefined issues or undefined concepts, which is very common in Jewish thought. In any case, this is sometimes presented as a dispute between the transcendent conception and the immanent conception, but Kabbalah basically wants to say that these are two aspects, not a dispute. God is both transcendent and immanent; He both surrounds and fills. There is both Infinite Light around the empty space and also a line that enters into the empty space. He is both inside and outside. That is the broad description.

Now the question is how this really solves the problem. Practically speaking, make up your mind: either I am here, in which case I am not God and He is not here. What difference does it make to me that He is also inside me and around me? I myself am not Him—how did that solve the problem? And if you claim that I myself am also Him, then why do I need all these stories? Then you are basically saying there is nothing besides the Holy One, blessed be He. We are back to “there is nothing besides Him,” transcendence alone—and that’s it. Or really immanence alone—and that’s it. So something problematic exists here in the doctrine of tzimtzum in the sense that it does not really solve the problem it came to solve.

And on this issue opinions were divided among kabbalists. Some think this is a dispute between the Vilna Gaon and the Arizal. Many kabbalists addressed this issue. And the question is whether the tzimtzum is literal or not literal. The conception attributed to the Vilna Gaon is that the tzimtzum is literal. What does that mean? That the Holy One, blessed be He, really withdrew; that this material reality—us, or even other material entities—is not God. They are separate things. He may be inside them in some sense, around them in some sense, but the thing itself is not God. The Holy One, blessed be He, withdrew; in the space He is not present; there is a space here that is genuinely empty of Him. In short, there is a place devoid of Him. That is the view of the Vilna Gaon.

And in the view of the Arizal—or at least that is how people infer from his words—the tzimtzum is not literal. What does that mean? That the Holy One, blessed be He, did not really withdraw. He did not really withdraw. This is only some description to make it intelligible, but the truth is that there is no place devoid of Him. He is still present. All things are Him, and He is present everywhere. There are all sorts of disputes here, and I am not sufficiently expert to decide them, but it seems to me this is mainly a Hasidic interpretation of the Arizal. I don’t know to what extent one can prove it from the Arizal himself. So there is a dispute here between the Hasidim and the Vilna Gaon and their opponents who follow him, on the question whether the tzimtzum is literal or not literal.

Now what are the two sides? The side that says the tzimtzum is not literal is very clear, because you want to preserve the claim that there is no place devoid of Him, that He is infinite—the question we came to solve. Except then it’s not clear what exactly you have said with this whole story. Then just say everything is divinity and be done with it. What is the whole story of the empty space and the line and all these metaphors and all the—? It is not literal, it’s some kind of metaphor, yes? So what exactly is this metaphor a metaphor for? At the end of the day, everything is divinity and that’s all.

The second conception says that the Holy One, blessed be He, really is not here—or in other words, it says I have no solution to the problem; there really is a place devoid of Him. It is not true that He is infinite. There are places where He is not present. Now if you look at all the literature dealing with this dispute, almost all of it is devoted to justifying the anti-Hasidic conception, that of the Vilna Gaon—the conception that the tzimtzum is literal. Because that is perceived as the more difficult, more challenged position. How can you say such a thing? After all, there is no place devoid of Him. So they provide all kinds of explanations one way and another. But honestly I simply can’t understand these discussions at all. Because it is obvious that the Hasidic conception is simply nonsense. Not that it is incorrect; it says nothing. It is just lip service, saying nothing. Why? Again I return to it: conceptual analysis is worth a thousand sources. Let’s do the conceptual analysis.

What does it really mean to say that the tzimtzum is not literal? The tzimtzum is just a metaphor. But really the truth is that none of this happened. The Holy One, blessed be He, did not withdraw, and the Infinite Light continues to fill all reality, and everything is fine. So now I ask: do we exist or do we not exist—human beings or all the entities that exist here? We do not actually exist, because everything is the Holy One, blessed be He. So for whom is this metaphor intended? Who is that one reading the metaphor, trying to understand it, thinking about it? Who is that? Or in other words, what I am really asking here is Descartes’ question, when he says: I think, therefore I am.

Yes, Descartes basically says, “I think, therefore I am.” What does he mean by that? Descartes was looking for a way to ground claims about the world without relying on observation, but rather rationalistically, through thought alone. Descartes was the last of the rationalists. In his period science and the empiricist conception had taken over, the conception saying that we can draw information about the world only through observation. If you have musings or philosophical and logical arguments one way or another, you cannot derive information about the world from that. Descartes tried to defend against the empiricist attack and present an argument that could teach us something about the world through conceptual analysis alone.

And what he said was this: if I think, then apparently there is someone who thinks, and therefore it is clear that I exist. Now this argument can be very confusing, because one could equally say: I walk, therefore I exist. If I walk, apparently there is someone who walks, therefore I exist. Or if I sit, then apparently there is someone who sits, therefore I exist. If I am redheaded, then apparently there is someone redheaded, therefore I exist. That would be a silly argument. Descartes did not mean that argument. Descartes meant to relate specifically to “I think,” not to “I walk.” Why? Because even if I think that I am not thinking, I am thinking.

A logical argument is an argument that begins from a premise and derives from it a conclusion. As far as Descartes was concerned, a logical argument would not help him, because the question would always be: how do you know that the premise is true? You can place several premises here—but how do you know the premises? Do you have proof for them too? No. Therefore Descartes tries to build an argument that requires no premise at all, an argument that begins from conceptual analysis. And what he is basically saying is this: if I think, then clearly I exist. But it could also be that I do not think, and then I would not exist. So the conclusion that I exist is not necessary. Therefore “I walk, therefore I exist” is not a good argument, because perhaps I am mistaken and I am not really walking; I only think I am walking. Therefore you cannot prove from the fact that you walk that you exist, because maybe the premise that you walk is not true. But the premise that I think is certainly true. Because even if I think that I think, that thought itself is a thought. So I think.

With walking, someone can tell me: maybe you only think you are walking, but perhaps you are not walking, you only think you are walking. But regarding thought, one cannot say: you only think that you think, but really you are not thinking. No. Because if I think that I think, that too is thinking. So whichever way you look at it, I think. Therefore Descartes’ brilliant idea was not to derive my existence from the fact that I think, but to show that “I think” is itself a necessary claim. Consequently, if I think then I also exist—that is already simple. Even if I walk then I exist, except that “I walk” is not a necessary claim, because maybe I am only imagining it. But “I think” is a necessary claim. Because even if I only think that I think, that too counts as thinking. Therefore, since this claim is necessary, we have found a premise that is necessary, from which one can derive the conclusion that I exist. And since the premise is necessary and cannot be undermined, the conclusion that I exist is likewise necessary.

And basically what Descartes is claiming is that one cannot cast doubt on the fact that I exist. Because even if I cast doubt on my existence, I ask myself: who is the one casting doubt? I am. So whichever way you look at it, I exist. In short, I cannot cast doubt on the fact that I exist.

So I ask that same question of the Hasidim who tell me that the tzimtzum is not literal. You are basically saying that I do not exist and only the Holy One, blessed be He, exists—there is nothing besides Him. I ask: who is the one thinking that only the Holy One, blessed be He, exists and I do not exist and there is nothing besides Him? I am the one thinking that. So you tell me: no, that’s only a metaphor. Fine—but who thinks this metaphor? Who thinks that this is only a metaphor? It is I. He thinks it. You, through Him, think it. Who is this “you through Him”? Who is “you”? You are He. So what does it mean, I am not He, it is He, He is He. What does “I am He” mean? Nonsense.

So there is a thinking being. But there is a thinking being—He is thinking, the Holy One, blessed be He. So the Holy One, blessed be He, wrote Etz Chaim to Himself and thinks to Himself that there was a contraction and a line entered and all this was a metaphor for Himself, because otherwise He won’t understand Himself? No, no—it’s for you. But there is no “for me”; I do not exist. You cannot say such a thing. It’s simply nonsense.

Rabbi, are we saying this is a contradiction, basically? Of course. No, it serves Him. He wants there to be some part of Him that will think, supposedly, that it doesn’t exist. He wants there to be some part of Him that thinks—what do you mean, “He wants”? Everything you’re saying now is also His thoughts, not yours; you don’t exist. Do you understand that this is simply nonsense? But that’s what He wanted. What do you mean, that’s what He wanted? How do you know what He wanted? Presumably. Presumably for whom? For the Holy One, blessed be He, or for you? For us. Ah, for us—so we are here after all. I didn’t say we weren’t. You cannot even open your mouth. You cannot say such a thing. If you saw a person walking down the street saying, “I do not exist,” you would institutionalize him as insane. That is all one can do with this direction. But it doesn’t seem like one can deal with it philosophically.

Wait, he doesn’t say that I do not exist. It’s not that I do not exist—I exist, but also I exist. If you too exist, then you are not Him. Wait, let us assume for the moment, according to their view, yes, that the tzimtzum is not literal. Then only the Holy One, blessed be He, exists, right? “There is nothing besides Him.” And I’m walking around here and only He exists—but He exists. Meaning, I don’t understand. Of course He exists, but the question is whether only He exists. If I am walking around here, who is this “I”? The Holy One, blessed be He, is also the matter, also everything here—everything is the Holy One, blessed be He. Now you’re talking to me about anthropomorphism—how does this business even work? What is this nonsense? By the way, what does the prohibition of anthropomorphism mean according to this? The prohibition of anthropomorphism doesn’t exist, because matter too is basically Him. So what do you mean? Anthropomorphism is exactly the right thing.

So the point is that I think that of these two conceptions, the one that needs defending is actually the conception that the tzimtzum is not literal. Contrary to what is common in the literature, which searches for explanations of how one can justify the conception that the tzimtzum is literal. It is obvious that the tzimtzum is literal. Obvious that it is literal. The Holy One, blessed be He, withdrew and left us space so that we could be created here. Why? Why? Because He Himself apparently needed it. This is what the medieval authorities call “service for a higher need.” The Holy One, blessed be He, needs these separate entities, these independent beings, in order to fulfill some function that He needs, that He cannot fulfill by Himself.

The Arizal writes about this that this is the meaning of the verse that says, “Give strength to God.” “Give strength to God” means that we give power to the Holy One, blessed be He. There are certain things He cannot do; only we can do them. And this has a beautiful explanation in Orot HaKodesh, part two, where he speaks there about the problem of perfection and perfecting. Perfection and perfecting—I’ll say it briefly—basically what he claims is that one of the perfections in the world is to be in the process of becoming perfect. Yes, meaning that the very fact that you are advancing is itself a perfection. Not that the progress is meant in order to reach a better state, but the very progress is itself an excellence. It is not only a means to be in a better state; the progress is itself an excellence. Okay, that’s the claim. Therefore, becoming perfected is itself one of the perfections. That is what Rabbi Kook claims.

Now this has many interesting philosophical implications; I once wrote about it. We won’t get into that here. I also spoke about it in the past. Now Rabbi Kook asks: if so, then the Holy One, blessed be He, cannot be characterized by this perfection. The Holy One, blessed be He, cannot become perfected because He is already perfect. Whoever is already perfect cannot become perfected. So how can that be? One of the perfections is missing from Him. If so, then He is not perfect. There is something here that is self-contradictory. If becoming perfected is itself one of the perfections—not only being perfect, but in order to be a perfect being you also need to be capable of becoming perfected—then the Holy One, blessed be He, cannot be a perfect being, because He lacks the capacity for perfecting, because He is already perfect; He has nowhere to advance. Rabbi Kook says: because of this He created us. He created us so that we would become perfected, and thereby that would complete Him.

Now the point is—I’ll perhaps bring some parable for this. In the Book of Jonah, at the end, the Holy One, blessed be He, dries up the gourd there, and Jonah asks for death. And the Holy One, blessed be He, says to him: “Are you truly so grieved over the gourd?” And he says yes. So the Holy One, blessed be He, says to him: “You cared about the gourd, for which you did not labor and which you did not grow, and shall I not care about Nineveh, the great city, in which there are thousands of people and many animals?” Now this a fortiori argument, on its face, doesn’t even begin. Jonah did not care about the gourd; he cared about himself. Yes, like the joke about the fisherman who says he loves fish—if he loves fish, why does he catch them? The fisherman loves himself, not the fish. He wants the fish for himself. Jonah wanted the gourd for himself; he did not care about the gourd, he cared about himself; he needed shade. But the Holy One, blessed be He, does not need Nineveh. So what kind of a fortiori argument is this—“You cared about the gourd for which you did not labor and which you did not grow, and shall I not care about Nineveh, the great city”?

Once I gave the guys in the yeshiva in Yerucham two answers to this. One answer is that we have a criminal mindset. The fact—very relevant to current events—the fact that a person has an interest does not mean that everything he does stems from that interest. It’s true that the gourd served Jonah, and it’s also true that Jonah needed the gourd, but who says Jonah did not also care about the gourd? Who says he acted only for self-interested reasons? The fact that a person has an interest does not prove that he acts because of the interest, or only because of the interest. It could be that he also cared about the gourd. And the Holy One, blessed be He, saw that, and then He says to him: you cared about the gourd—how do you expect Me not to care about Nineveh?

In politics we say all the time, “He has an interest,” and immediately we make the jump: probably he is acting because of the interest. But that isn’t certain. It could be that he is acting because he thinks it is right. The fact that it also fits his interest—fine, maybe. So what? There is no necessity that a person does something— even if he really has an interest, even if you proved he has an interest—that still doesn’t mean he acted because of the interest. Two different things. In criminal law, in the movies anyway, you always see that the rule among American lawyers—or not only American ones—is that to convict someone you need to show intent, meaning motive, that he had a purpose to do it; you need to show opportunity; you need to show ability, right? There are three things, I think: opportunity, ability, the tools, the capacity to do it, and the interest in doing it, what he gains. You need to prove all three things in order to convict a person.

Now you understand that even if you proved all three things, it still doesn’t convict him. The fact that he had the opportunity and he had the interest and he was at the right time in the right place—meaning, he had the opportunity—and he had the interest because he would gain something from the murder, and he also had the means to do it, he has a gun—okay, does that prove he committed the murder? Of course not. Maybe someone else murdered. The fact that he was there and had the ability to do it and had an interest in doing it still doesn’t prove that he did it. Therefore obviously you also need some evidence directly connecting him to the matter. Those three things are necessary conditions but not sufficient. So that is one possibility for explaining the a fortiori argument.

But there is also an opposite possibility, and that is the important one for us. It may be that our mistake is not in understanding Jonah the prophet, but in understanding the Holy One, blessed be He. Jonah the prophet really prayed about the gourd or got angry about the gourd because he wanted the gourd; he did not care about the gourd, he cared about himself. But the Holy One, blessed be He, also does not do things for Nineveh’s sake; He does things for His own sake. He needs Nineveh—that’s why He created them. And once again it comes out that the a fortiori argument works. Either neither of them acts out of self-interest, or both of them do. Two possibilities for resolving it.

So the claim basically is—and I choose the second possibility here—that the Holy One, blessed be He, created some corner, some space, in order to produce reality there, because He needs there to be reality here. For example, according to Rabbi Kook’s explanation, because He needs someone who can also become perfected, because He Himself cannot become perfected. By the way, I once wrote an article about this, because this is still not enough; one still needs to add something here—namely, in what sense my becoming perfected perfects the Holy One, blessed be He. Fine, so I become perfected; He created me and I’m a deficient person, so I can become perfected. But how does that solve the Holy One’s problem? The Holy One, blessed be He, is perfect; He cannot become perfected. In some sense there has to be some connection between me and Him such that my perfecting will count somehow as His excellence too, so that it completes Him as well. That needs separate discussion; I won’t do it here.

In any case, what I want just to summarize is that the conception that the tzimtzum is not literal, in my opinion, does not hold water on the conceptual level. It is simply nonsense; I don’t understand what can be done with that conception. It’s just words. The conception that the tzimtzum is literal at least conceptually holds water. Now the question is, fine, but then how do you solve the problem that tzimtzum came to solve? So there is something besides Him, and then it is not true that there is no place devoid of Him. There are things that are not Him; there are spaces in which He is not present. So what did you gain from this whole business of tzimtzum? Okay, so that—we’ll get into that next time.

If anyone wants to ask or comment, now is the time.

Thank you for the class. I wanted to remind those who need to pay to please pay. Good evening. See you. Anyone else?

It was a wonderful class, thank you very much.

You’re welcome, with pleasure.

Rabbi, where do you find the acceptance by all Israel of the Talmud?

What do you mean, where? Go out and see. What, the fact that the halakhic decisors relate to the Talmud means all Israel accepted it?

Not only do they relate to it; all the decisors write that one cannot disagree with it.

Meaning, it wasn’t some sort of referendum in which we accepted the Talmud. No, it’s a process that developed. That’s why at first there are Geonim who disagree with the Talmud. Tosafot writes that every place it says Rav Aha, it means Rav Aha Gaon. So there are Geonim who entered into the Talmud and state positions against the Amoraim. And by the way, Rav Aha Gaon is a fairly late Gaon; he’s not even close to the Amoraim—later than the Savoraim, at the end of the Geonic period. It took time for the Talmud to receive its status that one does not disagree with it. But in the end, the public as a whole accepted it.

Fine, but that really isn’t our topic here; that’s a different discussion. Okay, good, so good night, Sabbath peace, goodbye.