The Status of Reasoning – Lesson 3 – Rabbi Michael Abraham

Table of Contents

• The status of reasoning in blessings over enjoyment and the relationship between the Pnei Yehoshua and the Tzelach
• Command and essence in every commandment and transgression according to Elchanan Wasserman and the Ramchal
• Rabbinic-level doubt is ruled leniently, “do not deviate,” and the essence of rabbinic prohibitions
• Torah-level doubt ruled stringently as doubt about essence, and its implication for reasoning
• Resolving the dispute about blessings: a rabbinic law with essence and the stringency of doubt concerning blessings
• The spectrum of rabbinic laws in Maimonides’ approach and separating the rules from their practical ramifications
• Derashot: an expanding tool rather than a revealing tool, and their connection to reasoning and to “we do not derive the reason of the verse”
• Shimon HaAmsuni and Rabbi Akiva on interpreting “et,” and the role of reasoning in derashah
• The role of command: formal legislation and religious motivation according to Maimonides
• The ninth root in Maimonides: combining command and content in the count of commandments
• An obligation based on reasoning without a command, and its implication for a minor: stumbling, oath, and the law of a pursuer

Summary

General Overview

The text argues that reasoning does not create a Torah-level command without a verse, but it does have essential force that can sometimes require halakhic decisions, especially in the laws of doubt. It presents a distinction between two dimensions in every commandment and transgression: the command and the essence, and argues that in Torah-level doubt ruled stringently, the main issue is concern for the essence, not concern about rebelling against a command. In this way it reconciles the Pnei Yehoshua and the Tzelach regarding blessings over enjoyment, extends the discussion to Maimonides’ approach to a broad spectrum of rabbinic laws, and explains the relationship between derashot and logical reasoning, including places where the derashah does not uncover what is written but expands beyond it. It concludes with the role of command as a formal source of obligation and as religious motivation, and with a proof that even without a formal command there are obligations rooted in reasoning that can apply even to a minor on the level of essence.

The status of reasoning in blessings over enjoyment and the relationship between the Pnei Yehoshua and the Tzelach

The Pnei Yehoshua argues that the Talmudic phrase, “Why do I need a verse? It is logical,” indicates that a law derived from reasoning receives the same status as a law derived from a verse. The Tzelach argues that no Torah-level prohibition or commandment exists without a verse, and therefore reasoning cannot generate a Torah-level obligation. The text reconciles this by saying that when reasoning serves as an interpretive tool within a commandment or prohibition written in the Torah, it is included in Torah law; but when reasoning creates a new law, such as the obligation to recite a blessing before enjoyment, it cannot be Torah-level without an explicit command. The text adds that for prohibitions, biblical language such as “beware,” “lest,” and “do not” is required for something to count as a prohibition, and therefore a law not appearing in Scripture at all does not become Torah-level.

Command and essence in every commandment and transgression according to Elchanan Wasserman and the Ramchal

Elchanan Wasserman cites the Ramchal in Derekh Hashem to the effect that every commandment and every transgression has two aspects: the aspect of command and the aspect of essence. The aspect of command is the very act of obedience or rebellion, while the aspect of essence is the repair brought about by the commandment or the damage caused by the transgression. The text argues that in the laws of doubt, the central aspect is the conceptual essence, not the aspect of command, because doubtful rebellion is not rebellion, and a doubtful command does not create guilt for disobedience.

Rabbinic-level doubt ruled leniently, “do not deviate,” and the essence of rabbinic prohibitions

The text cites Nachmanides’ difficulty with Maimonides: if every rabbinic law is based on the Torah-level command of “do not deviate,” why is rabbinic-level doubt ruled leniently? It suggests that the difference between Torah law and rabbinic law is that Torah law has an essence beyond the command, whereas rabbinic law consists mainly of the obligation to obey the Sages, without an objective essence in the object itself. It cites the Netivot, section 34, who says that someone who violated a rabbinic prohibition unintentionally does not require repentance, because there is no rebellion against the command, and since there is no essence, no actual corruption occurred. The text sharpens this by explaining that decrees such as poultry with milk are not problematic in themselves, but only because of concern for a slippery slope, so the problem lies in the person’s disobedience to the Sages’ command, not in the object itself.

Torah-level doubt ruled stringently as doubt about essence, and its implication for reasoning

The text argues that Torah-level doubt ruled stringently stems from concern for harm to the objective essence of the prohibition, along the lines of Rabbi Shimon’s comparison to poison: if something is intrinsically harmful, then you stay away even in a case of doubt. It cites Rabbi Shlomo Zalman, in his notes to Shev Shema’teta, who argues that doubt about a command is not rebellion, and therefore it makes sense that rabbinic-level doubt is ruled leniently, because in rabbinic law there is no essence, only command. It notes that one could view the stringency in Torah law as a combination of command and essence, but presents the simpler understanding that essence is the main factor in the laws of doubt.

Resolving the dispute about blessings: a rabbinic law with essence and the stringency of doubt concerning blessings

The text argues that both the Pnei Yehoshua and the Tzelach are right: this is not Torah law, because there is no command, but there is still an essence here, because reasoning reveals a problem of misuse of sacred property in the statement, “Whoever benefits from this world without a blessing is as if he committed misuse of consecrated property.” It argues that this is a special case of a rabbinic law that has essence, and therefore doubt about it is ruled stringently even though it is rabbinic; in that sense it practically sides with the Pnei Yehoshua against the Tzelach regarding the ruling in a doubtful case. It emphasizes that in a blessing with God’s name and kingship there is a concern of “Do not take [God’s name in vain],” so the right stringency is to recite a blessing without God’s name and kingship in order to avoid misuse of sacred property, and it notes that this emerges from the words of Rabbeinu Yonah and others.

The spectrum of rabbinic laws in Maimonides’ approach and separating the rules from their practical ramifications

The text presents that in Maimonides’ approach there are many types of “words of the Sages,” such as laws derived through derashot, a law given to Moses at Sinai, enactments, decrees, scriptural supports, and customs; it is not a package deal in which all the rules of rabbinic law apply identically. It cites Maimonides’ Commentary on the Mishnah in tractate Keilim, chapter 17, regarding measurements, interpositions, and partitions as a law given to Moses at Sinai, and Maimonides’ question why one is stringent in a doubt about a required measure, together with his answer that the measure is an interpretive detail within a prohibition written in the Torah, and therefore its doubt is ruled stringently. It establishes a distinction in the laws of doubt between “there is essence” and “there is no essence,” so that derashot and logical reasoning are rabbinic with respect to command, but their doubtful cases are ruled stringently because they have essence, whereas a law given to Moses at Sinai and decrees are ruled leniently in cases of doubt because they do not have sufficient halakhic essence. It adds that the Torah/rabbinic distinction is categorical for matters like punishments, and cites Maimonides at the end of the fourteenth root that we do not derive punishments by legal inference even for laws produced by methods of derashah, because there is no warning written explicitly in the Torah.

Derashot: an expanding tool rather than a revealing tool, and their connection to reasoning and to “we do not derive the reason of the verse”

The text argues that the dispute between Maimonides and Nachmanides is whether a derashah uncovers layers within the verse or expands the verse beyond what is written there, and according to Maimonides, Torah law is interpreted literally, so the product of a creative derashah is not “written in the Torah” and is not Torah-level law. It explains that “we do not derive the reason of the verse” applies mainly to a law written explicitly, but in laws generated through derashot, reasoning is built into the derivation of the law, so there is no principled reason to avoid using rationale as part of defining the law. It gives the example of “You shall fear the Lord your God,” which requires a logical determination of what is being included, and presents reasoning as a condition for the very existence of the derashah, not just an incidental addition.

Shimon HaAmsuni and Rabbi Akiva on interpreting “et,” and the role of reasoning in derashah

The text analyzes the passage in tractate Pesachim about Shimon HaAmsuni, who interpreted every occurrence of “et” in the Torah and then withdrew when he reached “You shall fear the Lord your God,” and the fact that “the other one does not interpret ‘et’” teaches that the dispute remains even after Rabbi Akiva’s interpretation. It explains that the difficulty is comparing fear of Torah scholars to fear of God, and that Shimon HaAmsuni gave up the theory that “et” comes to include something because of one counterexample, while Rabbi Akiva preserves the theory and finds a solution: “to include Torah scholars.” It presents the point that in this case reasoning does not push forward toward innovation but, on the contrary, works by elimination, choosing the least implausible possibility under the constraint imposed by the derashah. It states that Maimonides brings “You shall fear the Lord your God” as an example of a creative derashah, and adds another example from the Talmud in tractate Shabbat on “in her menstrual impurity,” where Rabbi Akiva changes an earlier practice through the force of derashah.

The role of command: formal legislation and religious motivation according to Maimonides

The text explains that command is needed not only because reasoning does not always decide things, but in order to turn an essence into binding law, similar to the fact that crossing at a red light is not a legal claim without legislation. It cites Maimonides in Laws of Kings, end of chapter 8, that one who keeps the seven Noahide commandments because of rational conviction is not among the pious of the nations of the world but among their wise people, and only acceptance “because the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded them in the Torah” gives the act that status. It also cites Maimonides in Laws of Idolatry, chapter 3, halakhah 6, about someone who worships idols out of love or fear, and explains that “he accepted it upon himself as a god” means recognition of formal authority that obligates obedience, whereas love and fear are forms of worship serving internal needs. It distinguishes between the principled discussion in Maimonides’ Commentary on the Mishnah in Chullin about the sciatic nerve, where our obligation is by force of the command at Sinai, and the separate discussion of a person’s personal motivation in fulfilling a commandment, comparing this to the legal distinction between a basic norm in a legal system and the intention of the person who follows the law.

The ninth root in Maimonides: combining command and content in the count of commandments

The text cites Maimonides in the ninth root, that a commandment repeated many times in the Torah is counted only once, while on the other hand a general prohibition from which many laws emerge is also counted only once, and it cites Rabbi Yerucham Fishel Perla’s question about the apparent contradiction: is the count determined by content or by command? It resolves this by saying that what is needed to count a Torah commandment is a combination of command and distinct content, and when one of those is missing there is no additional count. It presents this as a reflection of the combination of essence and command in the definition of a Torah commandment.

An obligation based on reasoning without a command, and its implication for a minor: stumbling, oath, and the law of a pursuer

The text cites a discussion among later authorities about a contradiction between tractate Sanhedrin, regarding “stumbling” with respect to an animal that was used for bestiality even when the offender was a minor, and tractate Yevamot, regarding prohibitions taking effect only upon adulthood, and suggests that things whose source is reasoning obligate even a minor and a gentile based on understanding, not on age thresholds. It argues that technical-halakhic prohibitions such as ritual impurity and non-priestly service in the Temple are not based on reasoning and therefore do not apply to a minor before the appearance of two pubic hairs, whereas “stumbling” is understood as a problem of essence. It cites Maimonides in Laws of Claims and Counterclaims, that we do not administer an oath to a minor because “he does not know the punishment for an oath,” and explains this as assuming that an oath carries an essential obligation and punishment rooted in reasoning even where there is no formal punishment of lashes or an offering. It also cites the Avnei Nezer in the name of the Ri Migash concerning a written oath, and explains that the obligation to keep an oath is based on reasoning and therefore does not depend on the formal definitions of verbal utterance. The conclusion is that even without an explicit command, a law based on reasoning has real practical halakhic standing, even if it is not Torah-level in the formal sense.

Okay, we talked a bit about the status of logical reasoning. I started with the passage in tractate Berakhot, with the Pnei Yehoshua and the Tzelach, about blessings over enjoyment, the blessing beforehand. We saw there that there’s a dispute about the status of a logical argument. On the face of it, the Pnei Yehoshua raises a strong claim. The Talmud says in several places, “Why do I need a verse? It is logical.” Meaning, the Talmud assumes that something derived from reasoning has the same status as something derived from a verse. If that weren’t so, then what kind of question is that? You do need the verse in order to tell you that the status is Torah-level. On the other hand, the Tzelach argues against him: no, what are you talking about? We never find anywhere a Torah-level commandment, prohibition, or obligation without a command, without a verse. So how does that fit with “Why do I need a verse? It is logical”? So he himself says this, but I expanded it a bit, and the claim is that when reasoning serves an interpretive role—that is, when it helps us understand a commandment or prohibition that appears in the Torah—then of course it has Torah-level status, and you don’t need a verse for that, because in the end, once I apply the reasoning, the result for me is what is written in the verse. In other words, once I’ve interpreted the verse, that’s what it says. So if that’s the case, then I do have a verse for it, so it’s Torah-level. But in a place where reasoning is trying to innovate a new law—not an interpretation or a detail within an existing law, an existing commandment, but a new law—like in this case of blessings over enjoyment, where you want to innovate an obligation to bless over food before eating it, there the Tzelach is right: you can’t say “Why do I need a verse? It is logical.” There is no such thing as a Torah-level law without a verse about it. Regarding prohibitions, the Talmud itself says that you need “beware,” “lest,” and “do not,” right? There’s some formulation that has to be required in Scripture in order for something to count as a prohibition. So certainly if there’s something that comes from reasoning—meaning it doesn’t appear in Scripture at all, not just that it doesn’t appear in those specific formulations—then it certainly won’t be Torah-level. And the same goes for positive Torah commandments. That’s why the Talmud always asks, what is the source for these things? Meaning, we need a source. Without a source, there won’t be Torah-level Jewish law. After that I spoke about the two dimensions that exist in every commandment and transgression. Elchanan Wasserman, in his essay on repentance, brings from Ramchal in Derekh Hashem that every commandment and every transgression has two aspects. One aspect is the command, and the second aspect is the essence. The command means, let’s say, that I take up a lulav. In doing that I did two good things. One, I obeyed a command. Two, I performed some correction for the sake of which this commandment exists—in other words, this commandment was commanded because it does something; never mind right now what. Let’s call that “the essence.” The same with a transgression. If I didn’t take up a lulav, or if I ate pork—it doesn’t matter right now whether it’s neglect of a positive commandment or a prohibition—again there are these two aspects. One aspect is rebellion against the command, or failure to obey the command. The second aspect is the damage from not doing what was incumbent on me; that’s why the commandment exists, because otherwise there is some kind of corruption here. So those are the two aspects in every commandment and transgression. My claim was that in the laws of doubt, the important aspect is the aspect of reasoning, the essence, and not the aspect of the command. What is the simplest proof of that? The questions with which Nachmanides begins, and after him many others, against Maimonides: why is a rabbinic doubt ruled leniently? After all, according to Maimonides every rabbinic law is based on “do not turn aside,” the verses in the Torah. Since that’s so, if I violated a rabbinic law, I essentially violated the prohibition of “do not turn aside”—that’s at least how people usually understand Maimonides; it’s not correct, but that’s how people usually understand him—and if so, Nachmanides asks: then why is a rabbinic doubt leniently ruled? And what I think emerges from here is that when you ask what the difference really is between rabbinic and Torah law—what is the difference really between rabbinic and Torah law, let’s say in Maimonides’ conception—what’s the difference between rabbinic and Torah law? Seemingly both have a verse. The difference is that in ordinary Torah prohibitions, or Torah commandments—it doesn’t matter—there is the aspect of essence. We talked about this. There is the aspect of essence, aside from the command. In rabbinic prohibitions there is no aspect of essence; there is only the command. When you have to obey the sages, you have to obey them not because what they say has some significance in the objective world, but because there is an obligation to obey the sages. I brought the Netivot, I think in section 234, who says there that someone who violated a rabbinic prohibition accidentally does not need to repent. Someone who ate a rabbinically prohibited benefit or something like that accidentally does not need to repent. Why not? Because as far as the command aspect is concerned, he didn’t know; he acted accidentally; this is not rebellion against the command. And there is no essence. So therefore, nothing really happened if you violated a rabbinic prohibition accidentally. Okay, so let’s say I cause someone to stumble into a rabbinic prohibition and he does so accidentally. According to this, it would simply seem that I violated nothing. I didn’t even violate “do not place a stumbling block.” There is the Rema and others regarding interest, that one who causes his fellow to stumble in a rabbinic prohibition himself violates the Torah-level prohibition of “do not place a stumbling block.” It’s no worse than causing him to fall into a pit. There’s no Torah prohibition on falling into a pit, right? So why, if I push him into a pit, did I violate “do not place a stumbling block”? Unless you follow that strange Minchat Chinukh who says no, because I did something bad to him, right? So also if I caused him to commit a rabbinic prohibition, I did something bad to him. What difference does it make that the prohibition is rabbinic? If I caused him to do something bad, then I violated the Torah prohibition of “do not place a stumbling block.” But that’s all only if I really caused him to do something bad. If he violated that rabbinic prohibition accidentally—if he violated a rabbinic prohibition accidentally—nothing bad happened, he violated nothing, he doesn’t even need to repent for it, and automatically it would seem that I too am not violating “do not place a stumbling block,” neither rabbinically nor at the Torah level. To the point that one could ask: why study rabbinic laws at all? Don’t study, stay ignorant; if you stumble, nothing happened, you stumbled accidentally. The question is whether such a thing counts as accidental. In a place where you could have learned, you’re not accidental. You did something—you didn’t damage anything. True, but if you rebelled against the command, the aspect of command exists in rabbinic prohibitions too. Here comes a Jew who says, “I’m Reform, command or no command”—no rabbi exempts you, neither Orthodox nor Reform. Rabbinic law means whoever sits on the Sanhedrin, whoever has the authority of “do not turn aside.” So the claim is basically that in rabbinic prohibitions—the difference between rabbinic prohibitions and Torah prohibitions—is that in rabbinic prohibitions there is only the dimension of command and not the dimension of essence. Let’s say the sages said not to eat poultry with milk. There’s no inherent problem in eating poultry with milk; nothing happened if you ate poultry with milk. Except that there is a concern lest you come to eat meat with milk. But eating poultry with milk in itself—if you didn’t come to eat meat with milk—nothing happened. So what’s the problem if you ate poultry with milk and didn’t come to eat meat with milk? That you didn’t listen to the command of the sages, because the sages said not to eat poultry with milk out of concern that something else will happen—a slippery slope, okay? So the thing in itself has no problem; there is no issue in the object itself, it is only in the person. Okay, so if that’s so, then regarding the laws of doubt we can make the same move. Doubt and accident are pretty similar in many contexts, so regarding doubts we can make the same move. When I ask myself why a Torah-level doubt is ruled strictly—is it because of the essence or because of the command?—then clearly it’s because of the essence. Why? Because there is command also in rabbinic prohibitions, so why there are doubts ruled leniently? Because a doubtful command has no problem attached to it. Why? Because if you are rebelling against it, you aren’t sure there is a command at all. Doubtful rebellion is not rebellion. In other words, rebellion against a doubtful command is not rebellion; you don’t know that there is a command at all. In order to count as a rebel, it has to be clear to you that there is a command and that you are going against it. One can argue about this, but that’s what Rabbi Shimon claims, that’s what Rabbi Shlomo Zalman claims in his notes on Shev Shema’teta and elsewhere: if you have a doubt whether or not there is a command, then if you do not obey it, you did not rebel against the command. So what follows? Therefore, if you have a rabbinic doubt, you can be lenient. Why? Because in a rabbinic doubt there is no essence, only a command. And if you are in doubt, you don’t even know whether there is a command. An essence certainly isn’t there; even if there is a rabbinic prohibition, there is no essence, right? So what exactly is the problem with violating a rabbinic doubt? From here we can understand why in a Torah-level doubt one must be strict. Not because of the command, since command exists also in rabbinic law, but because of the essence. Although one always has to be careful with yeshiva-style dichotomous thinking, because it could be that the doubt in Torah law must be treated strictly because of the combination of both. We always assume it’s either the command or the essence, but maybe it’s not the command alone and not the essence alone, but only when both are present—only then is a doubt ruled strictly. Fine, but in the simple sense—the razor of Occam, if you like—then the rule that a Torah-level doubt is treated strictly stems from the fact that you really have to be strict because of the essence. Now this isn’t just some abstract conceptual investigation. It’s the simple logic. If you have something where there is a doubt whether there is pork there or not, right? What Rabbi Shimon always says: if it were poison, would you eat it? In other words, if eating pork is objectively problematic—in the object itself—then even if you have a doubt, logic says to stay away from it. Okay? Even according to Maimonides, who says that the rule of treating Torah-level doubt strictly is rabbinic—meaning, really Torah-level doubt would be leniently treated—it still stands to reason that the logic exists according to him as well. The Torah-level obligation is not there. Meaning, the obligation is a rabbinic obligation, but the logic for being strict is clear logic. Okay? In contrast, if it’s a doubtful command, that can be debated. There is definitely room for the reasoning that if you’re not sure whether there is or isn’t a command, then you are not considered rebellious if you go against it. So this has logic too; it’s not just some abstract investigation over whether it’s command or essence, with practical consequences and all sorts of things like that. Rather, when we are strict with a Torah prohibition, it’s because of the concern that we may actually run into the prohibition—that something problematic may really happen here. So if that’s the case, it turns out that being strict in doubt is based on the aspect of essence and not on the aspect of command. Why is this important? Because if I now have something that comes from reasoning, like blessings over enjoyment, then the Pnei Yehoshua says: then you have to be strict, because reasoning has the status of Torah law. Right? The Tzelach says, correctly: what are you talking about? Reasoning is not Torah law; only if it interprets some existing commandment. But when it innovates a new law, that is not Torah law. I say: they are both right. Both the Tzelach and the Pnei Yehoshua. Yes, and also the judge’s wife. Why? Because what is the Pnei Yehoshua really saying? The Pnei Yehoshua is really saying: there is reasoning here, and therefore there is essence here. If there is essence here, then yes, the Tzelach is right that it is not Torah law because there is no command, but this is a special case of rabbinic law that contains essence. Usually rabbinic laws have only command, no essence. But here it is a rabbinic law with essence. If it is a rabbinic law with essence, then the doubt should be treated strictly even if it is rabbinic. And that is what the Pnei Yehoshua claims. The Tzelach claims that if it is rabbinic, then the doubt is ruled leniently. On this point I actually agree with the Pnei Yehoshua. Since if reasoning is involved here, then you have a concern that you may be committing sacrilege. By the way, sacrilege also applies accidentally, right? So that’s even more so. Since we are dealing with sacrilege, yes? One who enjoys this world without a blessing is as though he committed sacrilege. So with sacrilege involving consecrated property, yes, here too there is a concern that you are violating sacrilege, and therefore the Pnei Yehoshua is correct that we should have been strict. And when he says “Why do I need a verse? It is logical,” what he means is: why do I need a verse? Reasoning reveals to me that there is essence here, just like a verse. The verse reveals that there is essence, and reasoning also reveals that there is essence, so what difference is there? In both cases, in doubt one must be strict. Is the level between rabbinic and Torah law another level entirely? There is—I won’t have time to get into this too much—but in Maimonides’ approach, I wrote a book about this, in Maimonides’ approach there is a whole spectrum of rabbinic laws. There are many types of rabbinic laws. For Maimonides, for example, laws that emerge from hermeneutic derivations are also rabbinic, against almost all the medieval authorities. Or things that are laws given to Moses at Sinai are rabbinic according to Maimonides. Okay? Meaning, for Maimonides this is rabbinic, yes, and a doubt is treated leniently. Even if there are contradictions in Maimonides, they can be reconciled. A doubt is treated leniently. In his Commentary on the Mishnah on Keilim chapter 17, Maimonides writes there about prescribed measures. “Measures, interpositions, and partitions are laws given to Moses at Sinai.” So Maimonides says there: if so, then why in a doubt about a prescribed measure are we not strict—no, sorry, since this is a law given to Moses at Sinai, he asks: then why in a doubt about a measure are we not lenient? Why are we strict? And he says: because the measure is a law that is a detail within an existing law. Let’s say a measure in eating pork. Let’s say I have a doubt whether there is an olive-bulk here. Right? So because of doubt I have to be strict. Right? Never mind, half a measure—let’s say according to Resh Lakish that half a measure is prohibited only rabbinically. So because of doubt I have to be strict. Why do I have to be strict? The measures are a law given to Moses at Sinai. Meaning, Maimonides assumed that in a law given to Moses at Sinai, doubt is ruled leniently. And what is his answer? One must be strict because the measure only defines the prohibition of pork, but the prohibition of pork is written in the Torah. It is not a law given to Moses at Sinai. Here the law given to Moses at Sinai is playing an interpretive role; it is not innovating a brand-new law. By the way, most laws given to Moses at Sinai are like that. There are very few laws given to Moses at Sinai that innovate a new law. Maybe orlah outside the Land of Israel, maybe the willow ceremony and the water libation, although that did not remain the final Jewish law, but according to that opinion in the Talmud it is a law given to Moses at Sinai, and so on. So you see in Maimonides that even a law given to Moses at Sinai is rabbinic and its doubt is ruled leniently. And laws that emerge from hermeneutic derivations are also rabbinic; he doesn’t say what the law is regarding doubts about them. Since you asked, I’ll expand just a little more, because it completes the picture I spoke about earlier. In Maimonides, the claim—I’ll jump straight to the bottom line without all the proofs and questions and everything, because that could take two weeks—is that Maimonides seems to hold that if we divide laws by their sources or their force, then basically the highest source is a law explicitly written in the Torah. Okay? That is Torah law. After that comes a law derived from a verse by a hermeneutic derivation. It is not explicitly written in the Torah, but it is an existing derivation. We have a tradition that this is the law, and the derivation upholds the tradition. Maimonides says that too is Torah law. But a law that emerges from a derivation is not Torah law; it is rabbinic teaching. That is Maimonides’ second root principle. A law for which there is a tradition but no derivation is a law given to Moses at Sinai; that too is rabbinic teaching. Ordinances and decrees are rabbinic laws according to everyone. Maimonides also agrees that those are rabbinic laws according to everyone. But even there, the Ritva in tractate Rosh Hashanah writes in its place that if there is a scriptural support-text, then the rabbinic law is considered more severe than a rabbinic law that has no scriptural support-text. Then there is a rabbinic law without a scriptural support-text, and after that customs and various things. Meaning, there is a whole spectrum of laws, all of them rabbinic. Now my claim is stronger: not only is there a spectrum of rabbinic laws, but “rabbinic law” is not one basket of practical consequences. Meaning, there can be practical consequences where some of these laws will count like Torah law, and other practical consequences where those same laws will count like rabbinic law. It is not a package deal that once you say “this is rabbinic,” all the rules of rabbinic law apply. No. There are several types of rabbinic law, and different rules apply to each one. I’m expanding a bit here because it completes what I said earlier. For example, in the laws of doubt: for something that comes from safeguards and decrees, in doubt we go leniently. Okay? What about a law given to Moses at Sinai? That too is rabbinic teaching, so lenient. But with derivations, I argued that it is strict. A doubt is treated strictly even according to Maimonides, although laws that emerge from derivations are rabbinic teachings, their doubts are treated strictly. Similarly, laws that emerge from reasoning—they too are rabbinic laws according to Maimonides; I didn’t mention them in the list. Laws that emerge from reasoning are also not Torah laws, because there is no command concerning them, but their doubts are treated strictly. And why? Because in all those cases, all those types are types of rabbinic laws that have essence. Therefore, in the laws of doubt, what determines the rule is not whether you are rabbinic or Torah-level, but whether you have essence or not. If you have essence, then doubt is treated strictly. So in reasoning there is essence. In a law that emerges from a derivation there is also essence. In a law given to Moses at Sinai there is not, and therefore its doubt is leniently treated. What does that mean—a law given to Moses at Sinai, in that there isn’t? Obviously when the Torah commands something there is some reason for it. Even when the tradition is oral, a law given to Moses at Sinai, it isn’t some whim; there is logic behind it. But from a halakhic standpoint the logic behind it is not considered halakhically sufficient. Because if it were, it would enter the Torah as an ordinary command. Why was it left as a law given to Moses at Sinai? Because the Jewish law says: this too you have to do, but for this it isn’t strong enough; it has no essence sufficient to enter as Torah law. Therefore, doubt concerning a law given to Moses at Sinai is treated leniently. Ordinances and decrees—of course their very nature, or decrees at least; ordinances are a bit different—but decrees are by nature something that has no essence, that’s obvious. After all, a decree means the thing itself is not problematic; rather, there is concern that you may come to do something else problematic. Meaning, the thing itself is not problematic, so it has no essence; therefore doubt is treated leniently. Okay? So the division regarding the laws of doubt is between whether there is essence or there is not essence, and not between Torah law and rabbinic law. The division between Torah law and rabbinic law applies, for example, regarding punishment. Punishment is imposed only for Torah laws—I’m not talking about disciplinary lashes—but only for Torah laws, real Torah laws. Meaning, the whole spectrum of rabbinic laws according to Maimonides is not punishable. Including laws that come from derivations. Maimonides writes this explicitly. Maimonides says at the end of the fourteenth root in the introduction to the enumeration of the commandments—in older editions this appears as one single section. People didn’t notice there that root 14 ends and then begins the introduction to Sefer HaMitzvot. Since it all speaks about punishments, it looks like one continuous move. But in the introduction to Sefer HaMitzvot, Maimonides writes there that laws that come from derivations—“one does not punish on the basis of derivation.” And Nachmanides attacks him for this, because what do you mean, “one does not punish on the basis of derivation”? That means you don’t punish by force of an a fortiori argument. Maimonides understands “one does not punish on the basis of derivation” to mean that one does not punish because of any hermeneutic measure. Meaning, every law that comes from a hermeneutic measure is called “one does not punish on the basis of derivation.” And what’s the idea? The idea is like “one does not punish unless one first warns.” Meaning, once it comes from derivation—when it comes from a derivation—there is no warning, because it isn’t written in the Torah. You make some derivation, but it isn’t written in the Torah, so you can’t punish. Because one does not punish unless one first warns. For Maimonides, “one does not punish on the basis of derivation” means you do not punish for something that has no warning in the Torah. That is what “one does not punish on the basis of derivation” means. Without getting into all the explanations that are always brought in the later authorities as to why one does not punish on the basis of derivation—maybe there is a refutation, maybe the lighter punishment is not enough for the more severe case, all sorts of things like that—no. According to Maimonides it has nothing to do with any of that. According to Maimonides, one does not punish on the basis of derivation because you cannot punish without there being a warning in the Torah. And a derivation is not a warning. Okay? So therefore regarding punishments, the division really is categorical: for rabbinic law one does not punish, for Torah law one does punish. But regarding the laws of doubt, the division is not categorical. The same can be discussed regarding human dignity, for example. Human dignity overrides a prohibition in the Torah—“do not turn aside”—only rabbinic law. It does not override Torah law. Maybe in passive non-action it overrides even Torah law, but a Torah law that requires positive action it does not override. Okay? Here too there is room to discuss: does this speak about all rabbinic laws, or only rabbinic laws without essence, or only—who knows. In short, according to Maimonides this is not a package deal. When you say something is rabbinic or Torah law, that still does not automatically tell you what the rules are that will apply to it. Each of those rules must be discussed on its own terms: whether doubt is treated strictly, whether punishment applies, whether human dignity overrides it, and all sorts of things like that, whether an oath takes effect on it. There are all kinds of distinctions between Torah and rabbinic law. Now what, basically—what is the root of the matter? The root of the matter, as I said earlier, is that regarding the laws of doubt, what determines the outcome is whether there is essence, and not whether it is Torah or rabbinic law. Therefore, rabbinic laws that have essence—the doubt will be treated strictly. And therefore the Pnei Yehoshua is right that in the case of doubtful blessings one should be strict and not lenient. And I said that this is also correct in practice. Only one should be strict and bless without using God’s name and kingship, because to bless with God’s name and kingship involves a doubt concerning the prohibition of taking God’s name in vain, and there too one must be strict. Okay? So what we should do is bless in wording only, just enough to remove us from the issue of sacrilege. And I brought this from the words of Rabbeinu Yonah and others who write this. Fine, so that is regarding essence and command. Maybe—I’ll continue further regarding derivations, since I already started on that. Why, in derivations, is the doubt treated strictly, as I said earlier? Because a derivation contains essence. So why isn’t there punishment for it? It’s rabbinic, and one doesn’t punish for it. So Maimonides says: because one does not punish on the basis of derivation. Meaning, because there is no warning for it. In other words, we see that derivations are exactly like reasoning; derivations and reasoning are the same in terms of their status. Why? Because there is essence here but no command. In reasoning there is no command at all. In derivations there is a command, but it isn’t written in the Torah; rather, we somehow extract it from the Torah through a derivation. So the claim is that derivations and reasoning are basically the same thing; their doubts should be treated strictly. Therefore, many of the questions against Maimonides—how can you say that derivations are rabbinic teachings, when in many places we see that their doubts are treated strictly?—are no problem at all. Maimonides agrees that their doubts are treated strictly. Again, the assumptions are always that it’s a package deal: if it’s rabbinic then all the rules, and if it’s Torah law then all the rules. No. For Maimonides the picture is more complex. So are you basically claiming that the derivation is actually the human creation? The human touch? Almost. What I really want to say is this—I’ll formulate it more precisely. In the second root principle, when Maimonides speaks about derivations, he says that they are like branches emerging from roots. “Do not think that I fail to count the laws that come from derivations because they are not true,” that I do not believe in derivations. No, they are true—but they are branches emerging from the roots, which are the commandments that we were commanded to Moses at Sinai, the roots. And the derivations are the branches. What does that mean? Maimonides understands—and this is a major dispute, a major meta-halakhic or interpretive dispute—Maimonides understands that the derivation… Usually people understand, and Nachmanides probably understood this way, that a derivation is another tool that exposes additional dimensions within the verse. There is the plain-sense interpretation, there is the midrashic interpretation—plain sense, hint, derivation, mysticism. All those tools expose more and more layers within the verse. So they basically understand derivations as something that uncovers things from within the verse, and therefore of course the product will be Torah law, because you uncovered something that was in the verse. Maimonides, who says it is not Torah law, is basically claiming that a derivation does not uncover what is in the verse, but expands what is in the verse beyond it. Okay? Therefore you cannot say that the product of the derivation is written in the verse, because a derivation is not a revealing tool but an expanding tool. And if it isn’t written in the verse, it is not Torah law. Because for Maimonides, “Torah law” is interpreted literally. Torah law means “from the Torah,” meaning something written in the Torah. If it is not written in the Torah, if it is not in the verse, then it is not Torah law. Okay? Again, it has essence, but it is not Torah law. Now look at an interesting way of viewing these things. For example—actually, before that let me preface one thing. We know that we do not derive law from the reason of the verse. There is a dispute between Rabbi Shimon and Rabbi Yehuda; we rule like Rabbi Yehuda. Maimonides rules like the first tanna; he claims there is a third tanna, but never mind—that we do not derive law from the reason of the verse. What does that mean? Let’s say it says, “Do not take a widow’s garment as a pledge”—you don’t take collateral from a widow. So Rabbi Shimon says: only from a poor widow; from a wealthy widow you may. Because logic says that the problem is only with a poor widow. Never mind that there is another logic, that you give her a bad reputation among her neighbors, not merely pitying the widow. But that’s Rabbi Shimon. Rabbi Yehuda says: no, whether a poor widow or a wealthy widow. In practice we rule like Rabbi Yehuda: we do not derive law from the reason of the verse. Okay? What does that mean? We can think about the reasons for the commandments. Whoever enjoys that, good health to him, even though in my view these things are usually completely secondary. But there’s no prohibition. However, you cannot use that when you come to define the parameters of the commandment. All right? You can engage in reasons for the commandments, but you cannot use the reason as an interpretive tool, as a tool that defines the halakhic definition of the commandment. Okay? Therefore, Rabbi Yehuda can agree that “Do not take a widow’s garment as a pledge” is because we have compassion on the widow, but he will not infer from that that if so it applies only to a poor widow. No—both a poor widow and a wealthy widow. Likewise, “He shall not multiply wives for himself, lest his heart turn away”—that’s a dispute in the Mishnah, three views in the Mishnah. Is “He shall not multiply wives for himself” the prohibition, and “lest his heart turn away” the reason? Okay? There too, the question is whether “He shall not multiply wives for himself—lest his heart turn away” means that if they are righteous women who will not turn his heart away, then may he multiply wives? Right? You are deriving law from the reason of the verse. The question is whether we do that or not. There Rabbi Shimon and Rabbi Yehuda switch roles. Never mind—Rabbi Shimon does not derive law from the reason of the verse and Rabbi Yehuda does. But for our purposes, the claim is that we can engage in the reason for the commandment, we can agree on the reason for the commandment; we simply do not use it in halakhic interpretation—what today in the legal world is called purposive interpretation. We do not do purposive interpretation with commandments. Many later authorities, maybe even some earlier ones, ask in various places that we do in fact see derivation from the reason of the verse in various laws, in Talmudic discussions; in all kinds of places we see it. Or earlier authorities, yes—the Rif, for example, who explains the exemption of tooth and foot damage in the public domain. There is a Rif at the beginning of Bava Kamma, and Maimonides and the Rosh following him in somewhat different formulations, who explain that every person has permission to walk in the public domain, and therefore if an animal causes damage by tooth or foot, then it is the injured party’s problem; meaning, the injured party should watch out, because people walk there lawfully together with their animals. So I think Emek Shlomo asks him there something—I think—that you are deriving law from the reason of the verse, because it has practical implications. He gives a practical implication. There is a dispute between Tosafot and the Rif on a long page, yes? An animal walking in the public domain and there is a long plank, one end of which is in the injured party’s courtyard, and it caused damage in the injured party’s courtyard. Okay? Now if you say the animal has permission to walk in the public domain, then true, the damage was in the injured party’s courtyard. Meaning, he draws a halakhic conclusion from the reason he finds for that law. Okay? So the Maharsha asks: what, how can you derive law from the reason of the verse? We rule that we do not derive law from the reason of the verse. And this exists elsewhere too. In many of these places the solution is very simple. We do not derive law from the reason of the verse only in a law explicitly written in the Torah. If the law is learned from a derivation, then yes, we do derive law from the reason of the verse. Even if it is Torah law, let’s say, regardless of Maimonides—because for Maimonides it’s even simpler—but even regardless of Maimonides, still we derive law from the reason of the verse. Why? Because whenever you derive something, there is always logic in the background. Without logic you can’t derive. “The Lord your God shall you fear”—the word “et” comes to include, let’s say the “et” comes to include, right, Ben-Gurion. So what are we deriving—what are we to include? Benches? Air conditioners? Wall cabinets? Include what? “The Lord your God shall you fear”—to include Torah scholars. Why Torah scholars? Because logic says that if I am including something, then the logic points to Torah scholars and not lecterns. Okay? Meaning, whatever seems most reasonable to me. Now, when there is a derivation—notice the difference between a derivation and a verse. In a verse, what is written is written. I can have theories about why that thing is written. Theories can be better or worse; we do not derive law from the reason of the verse. Okay? But in a derivation, the law itself is based on logic. It’s not that I’m deriving law from the reason of the verse. Without the logic there would be no law. What is written in the verse is the word “et”; no law is written there. What do I include? “The Lord your God shall you fear”—what do I include? I have to decide by logic what to include, so I include Torah scholars. Okay? Fine. So if I used logic to generate the law, then there is absolutely no reason not to derive law from the reason of that law. Let’s say a Torah scholar who has no understanding—must one honor him too? Then I’d say no. Why not? Because from the outset the obligation to honor him applies only when he resembles the Holy One, blessed be He, because I am including something that resembles the Holy One, blessed be He. One who does not resemble the Holy One, blessed be He—I won’t, I’m just making something up now for the sake of discussion. Now nobody can tell me that I am deriving law from the reason of the verse. The law itself is a derivation from the reason of the verse. Without the reason of the verse there would be no law. So how can you say that we do not derive law from the reason of the verse for things that emerge from derivations? People think that a derivation is some kind of hocus-pocus on the verse and poof, out comes a law. It’s not hocus-pocus, it’s logic. There is no derivation without logic. Nowhere in the universe. There is no derivation without logic. There is no such thing. It sounds as if if there’s no logic, then all options are open—even benches. There is logic by which you end up with a Torah scholar and not—no, by logic you can reach the true law. Okay. The sages decided what logic seemed more convincing to them. The sages decided on the basis of pure logic. Logic. But it is logic. Logic says what is most reasonable, okay? That too is logic; it’s part of the same reasoning. There can also be disagreements over that reasoning, that’s all fine. So we decide the Jewish law as we decide the Jewish law in any disagreement. But in the end, that is the reasoning that was accepted. Does that not invalidate it—there’s no source somehow? No, no source at all—what are you talking about? Nothing. Rabbi Heiman said this in our yeshiva—he was a lecturer in the Hebron yeshiva, in one of the classes, and he said that the sages had intuition and that’s how they brought things out, and all this went… I’ll tell you something even more heretical. No, when you say they had intuition, that means they hit the truth. Okay. Meaning there is some sort of truth, and they had intuition about what the truth is. I say no—who says they hit the truth? That was their reasoning. Now since they are the Sanhedrin, they have authority, and what they decide binds me. Not because they hit the truth of what the Holy One, blessed be He, intended. I have no idea whether He intended it or not. But it doesn’t matter. It doesn’t depend on that at all. I’m taking one step further. Really, if someone had said this, they wouldn’t have expounded him at all. These are questions about whether derivations support and rely on something else. There is—but Maimonides says there is, as I said earlier. Maimonides says that supporting derivations are apparently Torah law, and Maimonides says like three or four. All derivations are creative except for three or four, he says this in the Letter to Rabbi Pinchas the Judge in Alexandria. There are almost no supporting derivations. There are a few here and there. It doesn’t have to be that there are only three or four; maybe there are ten. But very few. Now leave it, we don’t have to enter speculation. Maimonides himself brings this derivation of “The Lord your God shall you fear” as an example of a creative derivation. No, I agree that this can definitely be interpreted as a creative derivation, and there are many such derivations. But surely there are also simple derivations where the sages—there are supporting derivations, presumably. Then that means these derivations too should belong to the group where we do not derive law from the reason of the verse. For supporting derivations? Definitely possible, yes. In terms of their status, Maimonides sees them as Torah law, unlike creative derivations, which are rabbinic. Look at what the Talmud in tractate Pesachim says. It brings there regarding derivation from “et”: “And the other one does not expound ‘et’”—never mind in some other dispute there in the Talmud. Meaning, there is a tanna who does not expound “et.” As it was taught in a baraita: Shimon HaAmsuni—and some say Nechemya HaAmsuni—would expound every “et” in the Torah. Once he reached “The Lord your God shall you fear,” he stopped. His students said to him: Rabbi, what will become of all the “ets” that you expounded? He said to them: just as I received reward for the exposition, so I receive reward for the withdrawal. Until Rabbi Akiva came and expounded: “The Lord your God shall you fear”—to include Torah scholars. Now this is a fascinating move in the Talmud, a very famous Talmudic passage, and people don’t notice what is hidden between the folds of this sugya. He used to expound every “et” in the Torah. First of all, maybe let’s start from the end. So in the end, did Shimon HaAmsuni agree with what Rabbi Akiva said? He backed down, right? Then Rabbi Akiva came and rescued the exposition for him, and said: “The Lord your God shall you fear”—to include Torah scholars. So everything is fine, we understand, right? The Talmud says no. The Talmud says, “And the other one does not expound ‘et,’ as it was taught.” Meaning, the Talmud says that the dispute remained even after Rabbi Akiva said what he said. Shimon HaAmsuni did not accept it from him. They remained in dispute. And that tannaitic dispute continues in other places too; there are other tannaim who disagree in that same dispute, just as Rabbi Akiva and Shimon HaAmsuni do. The dispute remained in place. What is the dispute about? Shimon HaAmsuni would expound every “et” in the Torah. As I said earlier, every such derivation from “et” is always based on logic. “Et” comes to include, and the question is what it comes to include. There you activate the reasoning. By the way, maybe let me say one more sentence before I continue. So why do you need the derivation at all if you already have logic? You’ll say: in order to make it Torah law. But no—according to Maimonides this doesn’t make it Torah law; even a derivation remains rabbinic teaching. So what do you need the derivation for? You have logic—use logic. What does the derivation add? To anchor it? Why do I need to anchor it? What? To become liable for it on the Sabbath? What? No, because if it just comes from plain— I have logic. What’s the problem? “Why do I need a verse? It is logical.” Where did you get that from? From logic. Where do I get logic from? From my own head. It’s not certain if we’re told the source. Right, so in many places there are situations where even if I have logic, that doesn’t necessarily mean I will use it and decide accordingly in practice. Logic is a nice thing; you can take it many places. Very often a derivation or some other support is required to tell me: use the logic. Where do we see this? For example, there is a Talmudic passage in the chapter on the wayward and rebellious son. The Talmud derives there “a son”—and if there shall be to a man—not “a daughter”; “a son and not a daughter,” meaning there is no law of a wayward and rebellious daughter. The Jerusalem Talmud says this is a scriptural decree. In the Babylonian Talmud there is another wording; I don’t remember exactly, but Rashi writes there that this is a scriptural decree. Now the medieval authorities explain: girls are not usually bandits; you know, the concern with a wayward and rebellious son is that he will become a bandit. Girls are not usually bandits, and so on. Fine, that’s all just to put a reason into words, it’s not interesting. But the Meiri writes there, brings this reason—that girls are not usually bandits—and then he asks, wait a second, then why did they say it is a scriptural decree if that’s so? That is already interesting. The Sefer HaChinukh also says this, and as I recall Maimonides too says this. But okay, they give reasons—they don’t really mean to explain, it’s just playing around. But after the Meiri brings that reason, he says: wait, then why do they say it is a scriptural decree? Meaning, he takes that reason seriously. Therefore he says: if that is the reason, then why do they call it a scriptural decree? Now his reasoning isn’t entirely clear, but I think he means what I am about to say now. The claim is basically this: I have the logic that girls are not usually bandits, and by the same token I could say that good boys who grew up in a good home also are not usually bandits. So should we not apply the law of the wayward and rebellious son to them either? How far are we going to take this logic? Where do we stop? Where do we begin? Is it strong enough to start drawing distinctions? There is a law of the wayward and rebellious son, so there is a law of the wayward and rebellious son, what? But it says “son.” All the coming announcements are intended equally for men and women. In the Torah, masculine language… There is—no, that isn’t new logic; the logic is old. The Talmud in several places derives “men and not women,” which is new logic. Usually that is something strange. Yes: “And the two men who have the dispute shall stand before the Lord”—men and not women. In tractate Shevuot the Talmud disqualifies women from testimony. Right? “Men” always means both men and women. By implication. Yes, “people.” What are we, Merav Michaeli? When we want to say the general public, we say “people.” Yes. Just this morning I heard again those annoying people talking about forty-eight hostages and hostage-woman—forty-seven hostages and one hostage-woman. And you can’t say forty-eight hostages because that’s against the rules of political correctness. Well no, the Torah came before political correctness, and when it says “people” it means generally. And when they derive “men and not women,” that is usually a support-derivation in my opinion. Usually that is drawing the target after the arrow. There it is obvious enough to disqualify women, because after all “And the two men who have the dispute shall stand before the Lord” refers to the two litigants, not witnesses. So what does that have to do with disqualifying women from testimony from a verse that says “And the two men who have the dispute shall stand before the Lord”? It’s obvious that the game is rigged there. Anyway, for our purposes, the claim is that if I am right about what the Meiri says—and if not, then I’m saying it—that the fact that something is a scriptural decree does not mean there is no logic behind it. There is logic behind it; it is just that without the verse, maybe I would not have applied that logic. By the way, here too you don’t need the verse in order to make it Torah law, because if I derive “a son and not a daughter,” it is a detail within the commandment of the wayward and rebellious son, which has a source in the Torah. Meaning, if I had derived “a son and not a daughter” by logic, then I would say that the law of the wayward and rebellious son was said only about sons and not daughters—as interpretive logic. I don’t need a verse to make that Torah law, because there are verses about the section of the wayward and rebellious son. Okay, so why do I need the verse? Because the logic by itself probably would not have been something I’d use. I would not have ruled in practice based on it. There can be lots of logical arguments; that one is not strong enough to decide the law by itself. Therefore the verse—or the derivation—comes and says: “a son and not a daughter.” But that derivation teaches me the logic. It’s just that the logic alone could not have—I would not have used it had I not had confirmation from the derivation or the verse or whatever it may be. As I mentioned at the beginning of the series—beginning of the series, there were three classes here—but at the beginning of the first class I think I spoke about this when they bring… Ah yes, when I mentioned earlier that one does not punish on the basis of derivation. So Rabbi Yosef Engel brings that there are three reasons why one does not punish on the basis of derivation. One reason is lest there be a refutation. The second reason is that perhaps the punishment for the lighter case is not sufficient to punish for the more severe one. And the third reason is that they learn it from “his sister, the daughter of his father and the daughter of his mother.” Yes—why is that needed? “The daughter of his father and the daughter of his mother” is already included in “the daughter of his father.” Okay? To teach you that one does not punish on the basis of derivation. And the Talmudic Encyclopedia copies this, and everyone copies that there are three views regarding the rule that one does not punish on the basis of derivation. Now aside from the fact that there are two other explanations that for some reason people don’t bring—one of which I mentioned earlier in Maimonides’ approach, and they are probably the correct explanations too—but aside from that, the very fact that people treat this as three views is absurd. Why is it three views? There is a verse that teaches that one does not punish on the basis of derivation, and there are two explanations for what that verse teaches. Why is the fact that there is a verse or derivation an alternative to the two logical explanations? Because people assume that if there is a verse, then in principle there should be no logic there. So if you bring me logical explanations and you brought a verse, then apparently there is no logic—that makes three views. No. The verse gives me the source, and the logical explanations propose what the source means. There are two views, let’s say according to Rabbi Yosef Engel’s framing. There are two views. The source is that verse, and there are two logical explanations of what that source says: whether it is because there is concern for a refutation, or because the punishment is not severe enough. All right? Those are two explanations. Yes, this is that constant assumption that if something is written in a verse, if it is a scriptural decree, then there is no logic behind it. No. Something that is a scriptural decree has logic behind it, as we saw in the Meiri earlier. And the logical explanations you offer are explanations of the scriptural decree. They are not alternatives; they are not separate things. Okay. Fine. So back to our case. The claim, then, is that Shimon HaAmsuni would expound every “et” in the Torah. He would extract from logic, for every such “et,” what it comes to include. Right? Now I’m translating what we saw earlier. Then when he came to “The Lord your God shall you fear,” he stopped. So first of all, what was the problem with “The Lord your God shall you fear”? “Et” comes to include—it comes to include Torah scholars—what’s the problem? So that’s a derivation. No, all of that is a derivation. “Et” to include is a derivation. No, and Torah scholars in a status somehow like “the Lord your God.” Ah, the problem was: how can you include something and compare it to the Holy One, blessed be He? “To whom will you liken Me that I should be equal,” right? “The Lord your God shall you fear”—to include Torah scholars. Meaning, just as you fear the Holy One, blessed be He, so too you should fear Torah scholars—which is almost idolatry in partnership. Therefore Shimon HaAmsuni said a priori: there cannot be something included here. After all, I cannot compare anything to the Holy One, blessed be He, right? So what did he do? What does “he stopped” mean? He gave up all the earlier derivations he made too. Exactly. Meaning, apparently it is not correct that “et” comes to include. I wrote an article about this on my website and argued that he was Popperian. Popper, in philosophy of science, says that a scientific theory is a theory that is open to falsification. What does that mean? If it offers some kind of prediction that can be subjected to an experimental test, then if the experiment confirms the theory—you can’t prove it—then it wasn’t refuted. And if the experiment refutes the theory, then it has been refuted. He says: I have a theory that all ravens are black. You can’t prove it, right? You can never see all the ravens, or know that you’ve seen them all. But if I see one pink raven, I’ve refuted the theory, right? So you can refute a theory; you can’t prove a theory. Right? Thomas Kuhn and others argue against him that one counterexample does not refute a good theory. We don’t give up so quickly on good theories. He says this on the sociological level; I say it on the essential level. And that is indeed correct. No, it’s not an accusation against the conservatism of the scientific community. That is the right way to behave. If you have a good theory and you have one counterexample, leave it as needing further study—move on to the next Tosafot like Rabbi Akiva Eiger. But this isn’t mathematical theory, it isn’t mathematics. No, no, we’re talking about scientific theory. Mathematical theory—well, there’s no such thing as mathematical theory, there are mathematical theorems. If you have a counterexample, then either the example is wrong or the theorem is wrong. Yes, that’s obvious. But in science, really, you have to be careful. The fact that there is one counterexample proves nothing. You need a minimal number of counterexamples in order to break a paradigm, to start looking for another paradigm. Okay? Not one example. Again, this “et” that he uses—depending on how you view the hermeneutic rules—I do not agree that this is a mathematical rule, but that’s another question. Some people want to see it that way. I don’t agree. No, it isn’t logic. It’s guidelines, guidelines of reading. In my opinion that is very much not logic, but leave it, I won’t get into that now. So what Shimon HaAmsuni was basically saying was: I have a counterexample—Popper, yes?—I have a counterexample, so the theory that “et” comes to include has been refuted. Right? That’s it, now I have to give up all the derivations I made. By the way, we were left with very few derivations of “et” as including, but apparently he expounded every “et” in the Torah. He probably had hundreds of derivations. “Every et” probably means every “et” relevant for derivation. I’m not sure he expounded every occurrence of the word “et” in the Torah. In any case, he threw out all the derivations. And that itself, by the way, shows—just see how many things are hidden between the folds of this sugya—that this “et” as inclusive is not a law given to Moses at Sinai. It is not a Sinaitic tradition. If it were a Sinaitic tradition, he could not have thrown it out. This was a conjecture of the sages. The sages conjectured that the word “et” comes to include, and Shimon HaAmsuni shared that conjecture until it was refuted, and then he gave it up. Meaning, the general hermeneutic rules themselves are up for discussion. This is not some law given to Moses at Sinai where, okay, I have a counterexample so it needs further study, but I don’t give up the hermeneutic rules because of that. Okay? No. Here we see that yes, he does give up. Fine, but that is another discussion. In any case, Rabbi Akiva came—“until Rabbi Akiva came.” His students said to him: Rabbi, what will become of all the ‘ets’ that you expounded? He said to them: just as I received reward for the exposition, so I receive reward for the withdrawal. That’s the Ketzot, you know. Once someone came to him and said: listen, I wrote a book that in my eyes is no less good than your book. Why did your book succeed so much and mine didn’t? Do you have any idea? So the Ketzot asked him: tell me, when did you write the book? He said: in the morning, when I was fresh, with a healthy head, so I wrote the book. The Ketzot said to him: I wrote at night; in the morning I erased. Much harder—and I tell you from experience—much harder to erase than to write. Once you have a good idea, giving it up is like splitting the sea. When it becomes clear to you that it’s wrong, that it doesn’t hold water, you’ll use every justification in the world. It is very hard to give it up. And here is Shimon HaAmsuni, right? There is that famous story about Rabbi Shach. There’s a story that during a general lecture he gave in Ponovezh, someone asked a certain question. He thought for a moment, closed the Talmud, and stepped down from the platform. He said: my whole premise in this lecture was wrong. He stopped the lecture. And that story is really—it’s really a wonder. More of a wonder than all the wonders they tell about in Bnei Brak circles. And it’s very hard to do such a thing. Fine. Shimon HaAmsuni gave up all the “ets,” and then Rabbi Akiva came: “The Lord your God shall you fear”—to include Torah scholars. What is he basically saying? Rabbi Akiva? Rabbi Akiva was not Popperian. He says: look, “et” comes to include. That passes the test in many, many examples. This is a good theory, okay? And you have one example that doesn’t fit it, one counterexample. That’s Thomas Kuhn, yes? So he says: okay, one example doesn’t fit, then we’ll somehow force it. If I get many examples and with each one I have to force the reading, then I’ll abandon the theory. But one example—one example I can solve. What’s the solution? To include Torah scholars. And the “et” comes to tell you: yes, even though this looks like idolatry in partnership and even though it’s problematic, choose what is least implausible. In other words, notice what this really means. There is no logic requiring fear of Torah scholars. There is no logic that you have to fear Torah scholars. On the contrary, the logic is that you should not fear Torah scholars, because otherwise this is idolatry in partnership. Only because there is the derivation of “et” and I have to include something—what can I do?—I choose what is least implausible. This is an excellent illustration of the role of reasoning in the context of derivations, as opposed to reasoning like blessings over enjoyment. In blessings over enjoyment, the reasoning tells me directly: one should bless before eating. Here, reasoning enters in the opposite way. Basically, it is not correct to fear anyone but the Holy One, blessed be He, right? But I have an “et” that comes to include, so I must include; there is no choice. I use logic—I use logic to do elimination, to determine what is least implausible. Okay, so that is probably what it includes: Torah scholars. Never mind, one can argue about this too; that’s what people asked earlier as well, but they decided on Torah scholars. They themselves were Torah scholars, so they decided it was about themselves. Not exactly a great trick. But in the end, the claim is that this illustrates very well the role of reasoning in the context of derivations. Reasoning in the context of derivations is sometimes present but not strong enough; sometimes it is even the opposite. The logic says not to fear anyone, but the derivation forces me to include something, so I choose what is least implausible. Okay. But still, if you now ask me: will I apply the reason of the verse here? Will I derive law from the reason of the verse regarding fear of Torah scholars—like I said earlier about a Torah scholar who has no understanding—must one fear him? A practical dilemma I had recently. I was sitting and watching on YouTube—there is some channel, “The great sages of the generation” of Degel HaTorah. It is a painful experience. Not recommended to anyone, really. People reveal themselves there in their disgrace and nakedness. Terrible. People who probably give excellent advanced lectures are revealed as complete fools. Really. And I’m talking about the top rank. The top rank. What? Did you see the one? That’s some rabbi who told them what to say exactly according to the agendas. Okay. Here they go without any such thing; these rabbis are disconnected, disconnected from the world. No, fine, never mind. Again, I’m not getting into why this is so, but the fact is that it is so. The fact is that it is so. I wrote some sharp things there and people were a bit insulted, hurt, I don’t know exactly what. I think that a Torah scholar without understanding—a carcass is better than him, with all due respect to his advanced lectures. In any case, there are claims that they’re innocent, naive people. Why go against them? I don’t know. If you’re naive, then stay home. If you don’t stay home when you’re naive, then you’re also stupid, not just naive. No, it can be that you’re naive and you stay in your room and don’t speak about things you don’t understand; I respect that. But when you take leadership and instruct everyone what to do, and give guidance on how to relate to phenomena in the world and what to do here, when you’re naive—to put it gently—then you’re also stupid. Anyway, that example, by the way, is brought by Maimonides in the second root principle. That is one of the examples Maimonides gives of a derivation that creates law: “The Lord your God shall you fear.” Meaning, we also see from this sugya that it created the law, right? Because we see that this law was created by virtue of the distress between Shimon HaAmsuni and Rabbi Akiva. There is an “et” that comes to include, I don’t know what to do with it. Ah, so it comes to include Torah scholars. Meaning, we see that a new law was created here; this is not a supporting derivation. If it were a supporting derivation, what was the problem? Why was Shimon HaAmsuni stuck at all? Why did Rabbi Akiva have to come and innovate this? Rabbi Akiva came and innovated. By the way, another example of a creative derivation, not a supporting one, is “she shall remain in her menstruation,” in tractate Shabbat 64, I think. It says there that the earlier generations used to practice that a woman should not braid her hair and should not adorn herself during her menstrual period. Until Rabbi Akiva came and said: might she then become repulsive to her husband? What are you talking about? Then he derived “she shall remain in her menstruation” only until she immerses in water—but he permitted braiding and adorning herself. Arranging the hair, putting on makeup, all sorts of things like that. Yes, it seems to me she’d become repulsive to her husband if she braids and adorns herself—but I don’t know, maybe their reason was different. In any case, the claim—the Talmud’s claim—is that the earlier generations said otherwise, and Rabbi Akiva came and made a derivation and changed the law that had been accepted until then. So to say that all derivations are merely supportive derivations, as Gersonides wants to claim I think, is absurd. It has no basis. Okay, so that is regarding derivations and regarding essence. In order to understand the relation between reasoning or essence and command, there is Maimonides in his ninth root principle—which here I’ll do briefly because we need to finish this series today; one class got cut because of the conference. Did you see that channel where they talk like that, where people ask—I don’t remember the name of the channel on YouTube. On YouTube. “Great sages of the generation, Degel HaTorah,” something—find it there, yes. I don’t recommend it, really don’t recommend it. I actually enjoyed it. It was a very painful experience. No, it was real—I’m saying it jokingly, but really, a very painful experience. But it was surprising—that’s how they talk? It surprised me a lot, really surprised me. Because I’m used to pundits talking nonsense, Knesset members talking nonsense, people who speak in their name talking nonsense. But when you see the people themselves. But he has to scare them so they won’t go. I don’t know what “has to scare them” means. He’s expressing his opinion there. Listen, there is a limit to nonsense, even when you want it, even when you do it for a purpose. So explain to them that they’ll be corrupted or something like that. Fine, I don’t agree, but I can understand the claim. What was said there was just—really—a very painful experience. Then afterward I started thinking, who knows what Rabbi Akiva Eiger was like. Who knows—if Rabbi Akiva Eiger had stood there and spoken those things, from those areas not written in Rashi, on topics a little bit off to the side. Maybe he too would have said unbelievable nonsense there. I don’t know. Once you see things like that, you can no longer know anything. It’s terrible. The greatest desecration of God’s name I think I’ve ever seen, that channel. Terrible. Anyway, Maimonides in the ninth root principle writes—the root principles are the rules for counting the commandments—that if the Torah repeats the same commandment several times, you count it only once in the enumeration of the commandments. For example, his example is that the Torah commands keeping the Sabbath twelve times; we do not count twelve positive commandments, we count one. Okay? Rabbi Yerucham Fishel Perla, in his notes on that root principle, raises a contradiction against Maimonides from the second half of that same root principle. Because in the second half of that root principle Maimonides speaks about a general prohibition. And he says there that if there is a verse from which several different laws emerge, we count it as one commandment or one prohibition. “Do not eat over the blood”—that’s the most famous example. Various things are learned from it: a warning to the wayward and rebellious son, not to eat on the day they issue the judgment, not to eat before the morning prayer, for some reason it seems from Maimonides that this is Torah law, and more. So one counts only one commandment. That is what Maimonides writes. So Rabbi Yerucham Fishel Perla says, apropos the dichotomous yeshiva-style investigations I mentioned earlier, that there is a contradiction in Maimonides from beginning to end. Why? Because in the first part Maimonides says that if there are several commands but they have one content, then you count only once. Meaning, what determines the number of commandments? The content—not the number of commands, but the number of contents, right? Now in the second part he says that if there are several contents that emerge from one command, we count one commandment. So what determines it? The commands and not the contents. So decide: do the commands determine it or do the contents determine it? What do you say? I already hinted at it. Right. Clearly Maimonides says that for a commandment to be counted as a Torah commandment, there has to be a combination. There has to be a command, and that command must have distinct content not included in other counted commandments. Okay? The combination of these two requirements is the condition for a commandment to count as a Torah commandment. In the first half of the root principle he speaks about a case where the content is missing and there are commands, and we count once because there is only one content. In the second half he says there are several contents but only one command. Again, we count once because there is only one command. In order to count, you need command and content. Okay? Or for our purposes, what does this basically mean? That there must be essence to the commandment and there must be a commandment, right? The Sabbath, for example—we said that if someone kindles a fire, that’s the same thing as if he, I don’t know, deals with boundaries or something like that. There is the whole question whether boundaries are Torah law or not, but if he sorts on the Sabbath, right? Is that the same thing as kindling a fire? What’s the difference? Or if he gathers produce into piles. God knows what that labor is. But if he gathers produce into piles on the Sabbath, yes? That’s collecting scattered fruit into a basket. This always kills me—how did they make that into a prohibited labor? You collect scattered fruit into a basket. No, no—Torah law, one of the thirty-nine primary prohibited labors. There are problems in Jewish law because of this. A prohibited labor where it’s hard to arrive at the prohibition itself. No, yes, but just the definition itself—it’s incredibly strange. Anyway. Here—“Do not cook a kid in its mother’s milk” is interesting: three contents—benefit, eating, and cooking—and it is written three times. Because of the repetition we learn—this is Nachmanides’ claim against Maimonides in the ninth root principle—that if the Torah repeats something, it is not simply repeating. Maimonides says the Torah repeats in order to strengthen the point. Does he count it only once because of that? Yes. And Nachmanides argues that when the Torah repeats itself, each repetition comes to teach something; the Torah does not repeat for nothing. That’s what you said about “Do not cook a kid in its mother’s milk.” In any case, the question there is whether this is derivation or plain meaning. Because the Torah says three times, “Do not cook a kid in its mother’s milk,” and we say one is for the prohibition of benefit, one is for the prohibition of cooking. The question is whether benefit and eating are a derivation—no, “do not cook” is literally written. Benefit and eating. The question is whether this is derivation or the plain sense of the verse. Because there is repetition, and you need to explain what each verse says. The derivation helps you understand what is written in each of the verses, but now that is what is written in the verse. It has no other content that the derivation merely expands. That is the content of the verse; there is no other content. Meaning, according to the Jewish law, in the case of cooking there is no Torah prohibition to eat meat and milk that were not cooked together. Never mind—but still, eating and benefit: are those Torah prohibitions or prohibitions from derivation? If it was cooked together. If it was cooked together. They have interpretation, but they are not bound to one interpretation. Meaning, they make the interpretation, each one for himself. My nephew is married to a Karaite woman, so I got to know some of the issues. Is there a generation of Karaites here? Sure there is. Of course. Ramla, Ashdod, Moshav Matzliach—there are whole communities here. It isn’t clear, by the way, the Chief Rabbinate married them off; somehow it seems to me they are considered Jews, or at least they—I’m not exactly sure. Not every skeptical Jew is a Karaite; these are just Karaites. No, no, Karaites are a distinct community. Not in the beliefs—I’m not talking about the beliefs. We can marry off secular Jews too; that’s not the point. The issue with Karaites is whether they are considered Jews on the ethnic level, not on the level of beliefs. Fine, never mind. Anyway, we see from that ninth root principle in Maimonides a reflection of the fact that Torah law needs reasoning or essence and command. And indeed, the meaning of the command in this context—if the essence is there, then why do you need the command? Sometimes you need the command in order to reveal that the essence or the logic is strong enough. But it’s not just that. The command is required simply in order to turn this into law. I think I mentioned this example, yes? If there were no law forbidding running a red light. Yes, then someone who ran a red light would be endangering himself or others; that would be wrong, but you couldn’t sue him, because there is no prohibition. As long as it is not legislated, there is no prohibition. Therefore, the need for a command is not only because the logic is weak or not unambiguous. The need for a command is in order to turn the logic into law—or in our earlier language, into Torah law. Torah law means law, all right? In the halakhic context. And without legislation, it’s not law, even though all the logic exists even without the legislation—that’s why they legislated. But as long as it isn’t legislated, there is no law. Okay? Now in this context the command has another role. Maimonides writes in Laws of Kings at the end of chapter 8: “Anyone who accepts the seven commandments and is careful to perform them is one of the pious among the nations of the world and has a share in the world to come; and this is when he accepts them and performs them because the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded them in the Torah and informed us through Moses our teacher that the descendants of Noah had previously been commanded in them. But if he did them because of intellectual conviction, he is neither a resident alien nor one of the pious among the nations of the world, but one of their wise men.” And there is another version, “not one of their wise men but one of…” The correct reading is “but one of their wise men.” So what does Maimonides say? That when you do a commandment, you must do it because of the obligation to the command at Sinai, not because it seems logical to you. What do we see here? That the command has yet another significance. When you come to fulfill the commandment, you have to fulfill it because of the command, despite the fact that it also has logic, and the logic itself could also have caused you—and even should have caused you—to fulfill the commandment. But it is not a commandment unless you did it because of the obligation to the command at Sinai. He’s talking about the seven Noahide commandments, but this is true for Jews too; that’s obvious. What? Isn’t that two commandments? Isn’t that two commandments? What isn’t two commandments? You get reward for one commandment. What isn’t two commandments? I didn’t understand the comment. What do you mean, not two commandments? Essence and command? Obviously not. It’s one commandment. So you do it because of the command of the Holy One, blessed be He. Similarly, there is Maimonides in Laws of Idolatry, chapter 3, law 6. This starts from a dispute in tractate Sanhedrin between Abaye and Rava: if one worships idols out of love or fear, is he liable or exempt? All right? Maimonides rules that one who worships idols out of love or fear is exempt. But what does it mean to worship idols out of love or fear? Rashi and the Rivash and the Raavad and basically all the earlier authorities say that worshiping idols out of love or fear means out of love or fear of another person, not love and fear of the idol itself. Why? Because if it is love and fear of the idol itself, there is no greater idolatry than that. You are basically doing toward the idol what you were supposed to do toward the Holy One, blessed be He. But when you read Maimonides, Maimonides says otherwise. In Maimonides it says: “One who worships a star out of love, such as because he was attracted to this form because its workmanship was especially beautiful, or who worships it out of fear of it lest it harm him, as worshipers of the sun imagine that it does good and evil—if he accepted it as a god, he is liable to stoning; but if he worshiped it in its normal manner or by one of the four modes of worship out of love or fear, he is exempt.” What does that mean? Roundabout. This is not love and fear of another person. And the Raavad comments there: “And we explain it as love of a person and fear of a person, not love of the idol nor fear of it.” Why? Because if it is worship out of fear and love of the idol itself, then he is certainly liable to stoning—that is obvious idolatry—and Maimonides says no. So when is he liable for idolatry? If you worship the idol out of love or fear, you are exempt; then when are you liable? Maimonides says: if “he accepted it as a god.” What does “he accepted it as a god” mean? Okay, what does that mean? What is a god? What does the word “god” mean? There’s a practical implication for Rosh Hashanah that just passed. But “god” means someone whose word must be accepted because of who he is—someone who has formal authority by virtue of who he is, and you have to obey what he says. That is why judges in the Torah are called “elohim,” because you obey a judge not because he is right—maybe he is also right—but not because of that. You obey him because he is the judge. Meaning, he has formal institutional authority; by virtue of being the judge, you must obey him. That is called “elohim.” A god is someone whose word you carry out because he said it—not because he is right, not because you love him, not because you fear him, and not for any other reason—but because he has formal authority and what he says must be done. That is what “god” means. And Maimonides says: if you worship idols out of love or fear, then basically you are not doing it because they are god; you are doing it to sustain emotions within yourself—love or fear or something like that. That is worship not for its own sake. If you worship it because you understand that it is the god and one must obey its voice, that is pure idolatry. Here too, of course, the question arises: but then he is coerced—he really thinks this way, what can you do? A person coerced by his own mind really thinks this really is the god, the idol. So what do you want from him? His own mind coerced him. The same question, yes. So okay, I won’t get into that here. But the point is that Maimonides is basically telling us that the motivation for why I keep commandments—even toward the Holy One, blessed be He, not only toward idolatry—must be obligation to the command. Not even love and fear. One who serves God out of love or fear is not serving God; he is serving himself. Because he is basically serving the Holy One, blessed be He, in order to sustain feelings of love or fear that exist in him. True service, really, of the Holy One, blessed be He, is to serve Him because He said so. Because there is obligation, because He is God—“the Lord, He is God”—and that is why you need to serve Him, not because of love or fear. Now that doesn’t mean one shouldn’t love and fear. There is the commandment to love God and the commandment to fear God; those are two commandments, fine, do them. But the motivation for why you keep commandments, including the commandments of love and fear, is because of the command. And that is what is called accepting Him as God. Accepting Him as God means that I understand that He is God, and that what He says I must do because He said it, not because of reasons. Someone who looks for explanations as to why it is logical, why it is moral, why all sorts of things like that—that person is not serving God. Not because it isn’t logical or moral—that is another discussion, and that too can be discussed—but that is not my point here. Maybe it is logical and moral, but the reason I do it is not because of intellectual conviction, as Maimonides wrote in Laws of Kings, but because of accepting Him as God. Okay, that is one side. On the other hand, I do it for that reason—but that doesn’t mean I have to suffer because I—no, no, you don’t have to suffer. On the other side, Maimonides writes in his Commentary on the Mishnah—not brought here, I’ll say it orally—in tractate Chullin, in the chapter on the sciatic nerve, there is a tannaitic dispute whether the prohibition of the sciatic nerve applies to a non-kosher animal or only to a kosher animal. Yes, in a non-kosher animal anyway you may not eat it, but the question is whether you transgress two prohibitions—both the sciatic nerve and the prohibition of the non-kosher animal. So there is a debate in the Mishnah itself between Rabbi Yehuda and the sages, and Rabbi Yehuda says to the sages—sorry, Rabbi Yehuda says to the sages: how can you say that this prohibition applies only to a kosher animal? After all, it was said to the sons of Jacob, and in Jacob’s time there was not yet a distinction between kosher and non-kosher animals; that is before Sinai. Therefore it is obvious that it applies both to non-kosher animals and kosher animals. So the sages answer him that it was said at Sinai and repeated at Sinai. Yes, repeated at Sinai. Meaning, it was said to Jacob and repeated at Sinai. Maimonides writes there that this teaches us a general principle: what we keep as commandments is not because of a divine command in general, but because of the divine command given at Sinai, because of the obligation to the divine command given at Sinai. Therefore, for example, among the sons of Jacob it says, “Therefore the children of Israel do not eat the sciatic nerve to this day.” That is merely a description of a custom; it is not a command. The Rashba in his aggadic novellae to Berakhot, I think, comments on this: how did they derive a prohibition concerning the sciatic nerve from that? “Beware,” “lest,” and “do not”? There is no command here at all. “Therefore the children of Israel do not eat the sciatic nerve”—they are just telling us a story, that the children of Israel had a custom not to eat the sciatic nerve as a remembrance of Jacob’s struggle with the angel. How do you get a prohibition from that? A prohibition has to be a command. The Torah prohibits. So really the point is that this description is a description of what happened with Jacob, but at Sinai, says Maimonides, there was a command. Where? I don’t know. But there was a command. We keep it because of the command that existed at Sinai. Is this the same as Maimonides in Laws of Idolatry and Laws of Kings that we saw? My answer is no, even though people always bring them together. It is not the same thing. Maimonides in Laws of Kings and Laws of Idolatry is speaking about the question of why—what is your motivation when you come to do the commandment or the transgression, as in idolatry. What must your motivation be when you come to do the commandment or the transgression? Your motivation should be obligation to the command, or rebellion against the command in the case of a transgression. Okay? In the Commentary on the Mishnah on the sciatic nerve, Maimonides is not speaking at all about the question of why you come to do the commandment. He is speaking about the fundamental question of why we are obligated in the commandments. We are obligated in the commandments not because it is God’s will. We are obligated in the commandments because the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded at Mount Sinai. Because of the command. It is not the same statement. I’ll give you an example. In Israeli law, for example, there are indeed discussions similar to what we find there on the sciatic nerve in the Commentary on the Mishnah, about the question of what is called the basic norm, the Grundnorm, yes? The basic norm of the legal system. In a positivist conception, the legal system is some kind of logical hierarchy of principles, at the top of which stands some foundational principle. That is called the basic norm. For example, the basic norm in Israeli law is that whatever the Knesset legislates is binding, or something like that—it doesn’t matter. Fine? There is discussion about this. By what right do you judge a person because he committed an offense? Because the Knesset has binding status and he violated the laws of the Knesset, and therefore you judge him. Okay? This discussion is a discussion dealing with the question of what justifies the judge’s action. It has nothing to do with the person himself. The lawmaker is not interested in whether I paid taxes and said beforehand, “for the sake of the unification of the Holy One and His Presence, to fulfill the commandment of paying taxes,” or whether I paid taxes because I was afraid they’d throw me in jail. He isn’t interested. As long as I paid taxes, everything is fine. And if I didn’t pay taxes, again, he isn’t interested. I’ll go to jail because I didn’t pay taxes. My motivations do not interest the lawmaker, or the judge, or the police officer. Okay, criminal intent yes, but not motivations. It’s not the same thing. Is this like object and person? Yes, exactly. The question is whether there was an offense or not. But the question of what is the theoretical justification for the binding force of these laws—that is a discussion that also arises in the legal system. That is jurisprudence, an issue in jurisprudence. What justifies the force of law? Why obey the law? A question that is very interesting also in the general legal context. It is not a question about what my intentions or thoughts should be when I comply with the law; that’s not interesting. It is a theoretical question: what is the justification for the law having force? Now in Jewish law, both things exist. In the Commentary on the Mishnah in Chullin, that is a discussion that also exists in law. What is the fundamental justification for obligation to the commandments? Obligation to the divine command at Sinai. Okay. The discussions in Laws of Kings and Laws of Idolatry are discussions of the question: what is the motivation of the person who performs it? What should be in his head when he comes to perform the act? And there they say something additional: not only that the fundamental justification for why you must do it is because the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded, but when you do it you are also supposed to think that you are doing it because the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded. It’s basically a kind of “commandments require intention.” More than that—it is “commandments require faith,” not just “commandments require intention.” But the idea is like “commandments require intention.” Okay. Now I still want to manage one more thing. So we saw that in every commandment there is an aspect of essence—the reasoning—and the command. The command turns it into law, but the essence has importance—for example regarding the laws of doubt. So if there is reasoning here, or there is essence, then in doubt I will be strict. There are rabbinic laws that have essence and rabbinic laws that do not have essence. Reasoning in general does not create Torah law, but it does indicate that there is essence here, and therefore with respect to the laws of doubt, for example, this can have implications. Now I just want to end with one more point: even if there is reasoning and no command, as I said earlier, this still has halakhic status. It is not something detached from Jewish law. It has halakhic status even though it is not Torah law in the formal sense. Where do we see this? In several places. For example, several later authorities—this was my only encounter ever with Rav Dov Lando on this point. I remarked this to him, and the yeshiva student immediately pulled out a list—I was in the middle of the sugya. He had just come out of some totally different class; he had given some lecture during the vacation period, back when I lived in Bnei Brak, and I pointed out something to him from this contradiction. He says to me: yes, that’s the Ayelet Yitzchak and the Chelkat Yoav, and he gave a whole list there. The man’s knowledge was insane. Insane knowledge. In any case, several later authorities discuss a contradiction between two Talmudic passages. On the one hand, a Talmudic passage in tractate Sanhedrin 56, in the sugya of “stumbling and disgrace.” The Talmud says there that if someone had intercourse with an animal, or an animal had intercourse with a woman, then the animal is killed. There is an opinion because of stumbling and an opinion because of disgrace. What is disgrace? Rashi says “stumbling”—what is stumbling? That a transgression was committed through it. Yes. Then later in that sugya the Talmud says that even an animal that had intercourse with a young girl, or a young boy who had intercourse with an animal, even then the animal is killed. And we see there that even according to the one who says it is because of stumbling. Now why? After all, a minor commits no punishable offense; he is not liable. So why is this called stumbling? That is one side. So we see that a minor’s transgression is a transgression. On the other hand, there is a Talmudic passage in tractate Yevamot 33, in the sugya of one prohibition not taking effect on another prohibition. The Talmud says there that if we are talking about one instant, where two prohibitions take effect on you at the same time, then both take effect and you are liable from both. Otherwise it is “one prohibition does not take effect on another.” So how can it be at the same moment? For example: a minor who produced two pubic hairs, entered the Temple, served there in a state of impurity, and produced two hairs. The moment he produced two hairs, both the prohibition of non-priestly service and the prohibition of impurity took effect on him, and therefore both took effect at once. So what do we see there? That until he produced two hairs, those prohibitions were not relevant to him. A minor’s prohibitions are not prohibitions. The answer is that things whose basis is logic obligate even a minor. That’s my formulation. They say there that whatever obligates a gentile also obligates a minor, because regarding a gentile no prescribed measures were stated, as the Chatam Sofer says, and the measure of legal majority is also a measure. From when is a gentile liable for his seven commandments? From when he understands. There is no age thirteen, no two hairs, or anything like that. From when he understands, because the measure of majority is also a measure, and prescribed measures were not stated for the descendants of Noah. Okay? Now if there is something for which a descendant of Noah is liable, the Talmud says: there is no matter in which the descendants of Noah are liable and a Jew is exempt, something forbidden to a descendant of Noah but permitted to a Jew. Okay? Meaning, whatever is forbidden to a descendant of Noah is obviously also forbidden to a Jew. The reverse can happen, but this cannot happen. Why? Because every Jew of course also contains within him a small descendant of Noah, right? A Jew is a descendant of Noah plus another layer, but first of all there is also a descendant of Noah in him; where you have two hundred, one hundred is included. But I would put it more generally. If I look at what those later authorities are saying, they basically want to say this: whatever a descendant of Noah is liable for is based on logic. Logic obligates everyone who understands it. There are no prescribed measures for when you become obligated in logic. If you understand, you are obligated; if you don’t, then not. Okay? It is not a formal matter. Now things whose basis is logic—even a Jewish minor will be obligated by them. He won’t be commanded at the formal halakhic level, but he will be obligated like a descendant of Noah, because if he understands and the logic says this, then certainly he is obligated. Everyone who understands is obligated. Therefore regarding the animal and “stumbling,” there we are dealing with something toward which logic tends. There is room to deliberate, but in the simple reading that is how it seems. And if that’s so, then even for a minor it is called stumbling. But with non-priestly service and impurity in the Temple, those are halakhic prohibitions. That is not a moral matter; it is not a matter of logic. So there, until he produces two hairs, he is not liable. So a minor would be exempt, yes. Likewise in Maimonides, there is a strange Maimonides—people have already pointed this out—that explains another thing, the law of a minor pursuer. As a distinction between responsibility and guilt—we don’t have to get into it—the minor simply understands through logic that it is forbidden to kill someone, and therefore it is permitted. The question is whether he understands. It is only a question of whether he understands. Are you saying that the law of a pursuer applies to a minor under age thirteen? Obviously. Absolutely. How do we know? Because from the moment he puts out his head, he is already a pursuer. When he puts out his head, he has certainly not yet arrived at any understanding. No—the point is that it says that they kill the mother and not the child. No, because once he has put out his head. But if there had been a law of pursuer there, they would indeed kill him, right? They only say: from Heaven they are pursuing him. Right? Why? And if he were a pursuer, then what? Maimonides in Laws of Claims and Defenses writes: “My teachers ruled that one does not administer a Torah oath based on the claim of a minor. But a rabbinic oath of inducement is administered, and even if the minor is not sharp in business dealings, one administers an oath of inducement on his claim. And one cannot reverse the oath onto a minor, for a minor is never made to swear at all; even a general ban he does not accept, because he does not know the punishment of an oath.” You do not make a minor swear because he does not know the punishment of an oath. If there were a very bright minor who did know the punishment of an oath, would you make him swear? There is no punishment of an oath on him. Not that he doesn’t know the punishment of an oath. There is no such punishment. A minor has no punishment; he is not liable. So what does it matter that he does not know the punishment of the oath? Because he is not of sound legal understanding, so he does not understand the punishment of the oath. If he is of sound understanding, then all the more be careful with him, because then he understands that he is not commanded and does not care to swear falsely. What is this thing? You see from Maimonides that regarding an oath, a minor does have punishment. If he knew, one could make him swear. Since I am concerned that he does not know, do not make him swear. But there is punishment of an oath on him. Not lashes, not a guilt-offering—but punishment by Heaven. Still, punishment. Because there is punishment of an oath on him. And the source of this, in my opinion—as with many puzzling laws in Maimonides—is the Ri Migash. In the sugya—the Avnei Nezer, yes, the author of Eglei Tal, Avnei Nezer—in a responsum in Yoreh De’ah, discusses there written oaths. It is a major dispute among later authorities about written oaths, but he brings a responsum of the Ri Migash. And the Ri Migash claims that someone who swears in writing is bound by it, even though explicit verbal articulation is required. Someone who swears in writing is bound by it. The Avnei Nezer explains why: because keeping an oath is logic. Since it is logic, it obligates us, and it does not enter into all the limitations that Jewish law imposes. An oath for which one is formally liable—there are halakhic restrictions: whether there is verbal articulation and so on, and then there are lashes and everything. But the moral or logical obligation to stand by your word if you swore is not connected to the halakhic definitions. That is certainly an obligation that exists. And as proof he brings the fact that the Patriarchs in Genesis took oaths. After all, Sinai had not yet happened; there were no laws of oaths yet at all, so what were they swearing? Clearly there is a social, human, moral, logical concept of an oath and the need to keep an oath, and that certainly obligates everyone in every form. Therefore Maimonides says in exactly the same way that this also obligates a minor. Because whoever is obligated in this matter is whoever understands it, since it is an obligation whose basis is logic. Lashes he will not receive. Why won’t he receive lashes? Because this is not Torah law; there is no prohibition here. But to say that he is obligated—certainly he is obligated. We could expand on this much more, but we’ll stop here. All right, thank you very much. May you be sealed for good. May you be sealed for good. For a change, may it be a somewhat better year.