Messianism – Rabbi Michael Abraham – Lesson 11

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The sectarianism of certain parts of Religious Zionism—and this was in some way a continuation of the discussion I had earlier about messianic characteristics, what I was talking about. There’s some connection between sectarianism and messianism. The characteristic, in the end, if I go back to our central discussion about messianism, is the claim that the main characteristic that can perhaps be tied to messianism is taking metaphysical considerations into account when making decisions. Traditionally, it seems to me at least, that wasn’t accepted. Decisions were made on halakhic and practical grounds—that is, realpolitik, you could say. The moment you inject metaphysical or meta-historical considerations into decision-making—the plans of the Holy One, blessed be He, what stage we’re in, what He wants to achieve, and all sorts of things like that—that is basically some kind of messianic characteristic, though as I said, not entirely unambiguous, but it starts to smell a bit like it. In that context I want to continue from that point, because that point takes me to several sources that also deal with this question. I thought I needed to ground this claim a bit more, this idea of taking metaphysical considerations into account—why I see that as a problem. So there’s a well-known Talmudic passage here, but maybe I’ll start before that. There’s what I mentioned, the famous Nachmanides on Joseph: why Joseph didn’t send word to his father that he was still alive. I mean, once he was already standing on his own feet and had become viceroy in Egypt, he could have updated his father. He knows his father doesn’t know what’s going on, or thinks he’s dead. And Nachmanides, in one of his two explanations, suggests that Joseph wanted to fulfill his dreams, and his dream was that his father and mother and brothers would come bow down to him, and the way to realize the dreams was to leave things as they were. And then I said that people attack Nachmanides for this interpretation, because even if that dream was a prophecy sent by the Holy One, blessed be He, from there to the conclusion that Joseph was supposed to contribute to fulfilling the dream—that’s a big leap.

[Speaker D] Do you have to help the Holy One, blessed be He?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right, do you have to help the Holy One, blessed be He, carry out His plans? Meaning, if this wasn’t prophecy at all and not a dream, then there’s nothing to talk about. But even if it was prophecy, and this dream was sent by the Holy One, blessed be He, still the claim is that he is not supposed to help the Holy One, blessed be He, carry out His plans—leave that to the Holy One, blessed be He. He is supposed to conduct himself according to the two criteria I mentioned earlier: realpolitik and Jewish law. Meaning, the practical considerations of how a person is supposed to live in the world. The moment he inserts metaphysical considerations, that becomes problematic. Now, Nachmanides says that this is what he did, and Nachmanides doesn’t say it critically—on the contrary. So already there you can see that it’s not unequivocal. Meaning, Nachmanides himself accepts such behavior. But the fact that many attack Nachmanides on this point says to me that this is probably not the prevailing approach. Meaning, the accepted view is that we are not supposed to do such a thing. We are supposed to conduct ourselves as Jewish law says, as realistic considerations say, and by the halakhic or moral or normal considerations a person should adopt. So if you know your father thinks you’re dead and you’re alive, then you should inform him. The calculations of the Holy One, blessed be He—how He will fulfill the dreams He sent you—leave that to Him; it’s not your business.

[Speaker E] And what about the whole concept of a fast because of a dream?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] There’s an interesting question there, if you do it in order to prevent the decree. But first of all, I’m not making life decisions as a result of metaphysical considerations. I’m dealing with a metaphysical problem. Meaning, it’s not the same thing. There aren’t some realpolitik or halakhic considerations that should make me do one thing, and because of the dream I do something else. Fine. Beyond that, I think the simple understanding there is not that it’s meant to prevent the dream from coming true, but rather to deal with your anxieties, your fear. It’s the Sages’ psychological treatment, basically—a fast because of a dream. And that’s why it’s also called dream amelioration. Meaning, basically to improve your condition and get you out of the states the dream put you into. But someone who isn’t disturbed by it doesn’t need dream amelioration. So here it definitely sounds more like psychological treatment and not decision-making in life. On the contrary, if anything, maybe it’s even evidence in the opposite direction. Because otherwise they should have obligated me to do it—after all, the dream is telling me something, and the metaphysics supposedly tells me what’s going to happen in the world. So why does it depend on whether I’m worried or not? On the contrary, it seems that I’m actually not supposed to worry. Except that human beings who undergo such an experience—it can put them under stress, fear, problematic psychological states. Fine, so you give them psychological treatment. So much so that, for example, if that really is the view, then assuming we believe there are alternative psychological treatments today—right? Alternative, meaning the regular psychological treatment; maybe that’s the alternative, I don’t know—then maybe you really don’t need to do this. Maybe there is no practical halakhic obligation today to do such a thing. Truth is, I hadn’t thought about it; I’m just thinking about it now. It could be that there really is no obligation to do this. Go to a psychologist and let him try to treat you if you’re under pressure, so do proper therapy. Why do you have to go specifically with the Sages’ psychology, just like we don’t go with the Sages’ medicine?

[Speaker C] Is there anyone today who actually does a fast because of a dream?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I think people do, yes. If it bothers him.

[Speaker E] Someone who’s bothered by it.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Fewer people today are bothered by dreams, but there are some, yes. It’s cheaper than a psychologist. Yes, it’s cheaper than a psychologist, and I think it helps no less. Meaning, if you ask my personal opinion. But my personal opinion is that both no less and no more—they both help not at all. I don’t know. Truth is, psychologically maybe a fast because of a dream does help. I don’t know, maybe it somehow helps a person solve his problems with himself. I don’t know. I have very limited faith in psychology, let’s put it that way.

[Speaker F] Fine, but how does he allow himself to cause his father such suffering for this reason?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That’s exactly the question. And that’s what they attack Nachmanides for in this interpretation—that it’s not plausible. Or at least, if that is the interpretation, then Nachmanides shouldn’t have accepted it; he should have criticized it. But Nachmanides seems to accept it. That’s why I say that even there, true, it’s not a bad source and it comes somewhat close to what I’m saying, but on the other hand Nachmanides doesn’t say that. Meaning, you see it’s not something unequivocal. And therefore, I said, here too in the context of Religious Zionism, it’s an intuition that I think is a reasonable intuition. An intuition many people would have. To say that it’s unequivocal and categorical and clear that there’s a messianic dimension here? No, I don’t think I can say such a thing. Another example, more explicit, is found in the Talmud in Berakhot, a well-known passage. The Talmud says: “And who is wise, and who knows the interpretation of a thing?” Who is like the Holy One, blessed be He, who knows how to make peace between two righteous men, between Hezekiah and Isaiah. Hezekiah said, “Let Isaiah come to me, for so we find with Elijah, who went to Ahab.” Right, Hezekiah wanted Isaiah to come to him, just as Elijah came to King Ahab, as it says, “And Elijah went to appear before Ahab.” Isaiah said, “Let Hezekiah come to me.” And Isaiah argued that Hezekiah should come to him, not he to Hezekiah, for so we find with Jehoram son of Ahab, who went to Elisha. What did the Holy One, blessed be He, do? He brought suffering upon Hezekiah and said to Isaiah, “Go visit the sick man.” As it says, “In those days Hezekiah was sick unto death, and Isaiah son of Amoz the prophet came to him and said to him, Thus says the Lord of Hosts: set your house in order, for you shall die and not live.” Fine, so the Holy One, blessed be He, somehow maneuvered between these two Jews, between Isaiah and Hezekiah. And then the Talmud starts discussing this verse: what does “for you shall die and not live” mean? “You shall die” in this world, “and not live” in the world to come. After all, Hezekiah was tending toward death; the Holy One, blessed be He, brought him suffering, he was on the verge of death. He said to him: “Why all this?” Why this great strictness against me—why? He said to him: “Because you did not engage in procreation.” You didn’t have children. You refrained from procreation. He said to him: “Because I saw through divine inspiration that children unworthy of me would come forth from me.” I saw through divine inspiration that the children who would come from me would be wicked, not good people, and so I preferred to refrain from bringing them into the world. So Isaiah says to him: “What have you to do with the hidden plans of the Merciful One? What you were commanded, you should do; and what is pleasing before the Holy One, blessed be He, let Him do.” What have you to do with the hidden plans of the Merciful One? Why are you entering into the furnace, so to speak, of the Holy One, blessed be He? Don’t do His calculations. If He wants to deal with your wicked children, let Him deal with them. You need to do what you were commanded. You were commanded regarding procreation, so bring children into the world. Don’t make all kinds of calculations about what will come out and what kind of children they’ll be and things like that. The hidden plans of the Holy One, blessed be He, are His own affair. Now here this is a very interesting point, because what does it mean? Is it only because it was revealed to him in prophecy? If, I don’t know, he had some realistic assessment that he would have a wicked son, then he would have had to refrain? Meaning, is the problem only that this belongs to the hidden plans of the Holy One, blessed be He, in the sense that it’s just some prophecy and metaphysics, and you’re not supposed to take metaphysics into account in making decisions? Or not? Maybe it has nothing to do with that—even if you know, if the doctor told you, the psychologist—we talked earlier, the psychologist said, from you and a woman like your wife, only a wicked son can come out, nothing else. Right, we once talked about Moses our teacher, in the portion of Shemot, where it says, “He turned this way and that way and saw that there was no man,” and Rashi says he saw that no one would come from him who would convert, and I said he saw the present and not the future. So Isaiah says to him, “What have you to do with the hidden plans of the Merciful One?” That wording, “the hidden plans of the Holy One, blessed be He,” somewhat suggests that the problem is not simply that this is an illegitimate consideration. The fact that your son will turn out wicked is an illegitimate reason to exempt yourself from procreation. That itself might actually have been a legitimate consideration. But the fact that you’re drawing it from the “hidden plans of the Merciful One,” meaning you’re taking it from dreams—we do not take dreams into account. What have you to do with the hidden plans of the Merciful One? Meaning, things from the hidden realm of the Holy One, blessed be He, where He revealed to you some hidden secrets of one kind or another, sent you dreams—those are not things you are supposed to take into account. What He commanded you—that’s what you are supposed to do. That, in any case, is I think how people usually explain it. Meaning, the claim is that you need to do what you were commanded and not take all kinds of metaphysics into account—not because they’re untrue. That’s not the point. They may well be true, but you’re not supposed to make the calculation. And in the end, it really did turn out that they were true.

[Speaker G] Not doing something means violating a commandment that the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded. So if it’s not about violating a commandment that the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded, then why really not take it into account?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay, so that’s the next point I’m getting to, and that’s really a correct comment. So here too it seems that the Talmud is indeed saying that we are not supposed to take metaphysical considerations into account when making decisions. Now that I think about it, what I said about Moses our teacher, “He turned this way and that way and saw that there was no man,” isn’t a parenthetical—it’s another example. There too, Moses our teacher basically took some prophecy about what was going to be with that person—that no one would come from him who would convert—and based on that made a decision what to do with him.

[Speaker C] He made the Holy One, blessed be He’s calculation.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Exactly, he too basically made some kind of calculation of the Holy One, blessed be He, and there it’s brought in Rashi as a legitimate consideration. Rashi doesn’t bring it critically, meaning it’s a legitimate consideration. Again, the point is not simple, and they’ve already raised a difficulty from Ishmael, right, where the Talmud says “as he is there,” that Ishmael is judged as he is there. What will come from him afterward, all sorts of things—that’s not your business; you need to judge him as he is there, which is exactly the opposite. Meaning, there is some tension around this whole issue of taking the future into account, dreams, metaphysics, in decision-making.

[Speaker H] “As he is there” applies to that Egyptian, who needs to be killed now. Moses our teacher says, wait a second, maybe some convert will come from him, so I…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I brought this up when we discussed practical considerations. That really is a possible explanation, but still—even if you accept that explanation—there is some taking of metaphysics into account here, this time leniently. So if he deserves to die, then what do you care what will come from him? If he deserves to die, then you should kill him. Why the consideration of metaphysics, or of what will happen in the future, prophecies, or estimates of one sort or another? No, that’s not relevant.

[Speaker C] No, it’s the opposite consideration.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What? It’s the opposite consideration. Yes, so whether you interpret it this way or that way, whether the decision to kill him stemmed from that, or whether the decision not to mitigate his punishment stemmed from that—in the final analysis, there was a decision there that depended on some prophecy or prophetic estimate, not on the considerations you were supposed to use. That’s why, by the way, they also raise questions on that Rashi. It’s not Rashi, it’s a midrash, but they ask about it already; Rashi’s commentators deal with it—why is this suddenly a legitimate consideration? So that’s why I say that from all these places you can see this is an issue. It’s not a simple matter. But I cannot say that it is categorically invalid. Meaning, there’s Rashi here and Nachmanides there; there’s room for hesitation here, it’s not categorical. Now really, the point you raised earlier: in these places, both with Joseph and here with Hezekiah, we’re dealing with a situation where—let’s start with Hezekiah. With Hezekiah there is a positive commandment of procreation. And Hezekiah didn’t just take metaphysics into account and that was the problem; the problem was that he canceled a positive commandment because of metaphysical considerations. Now that’s a somewhat different claim. It doesn’t mean that you’re not supposed to make metaphysical calculations; rather, that this is not a justification for canceling a positive commandment. If you have a positive commandment incumbent upon you, you must carry it out. Make your calculations in the realm of the optional, not where you have obligations or prohibitions or things like that. And then it blunts the sting a bit, because it basically means that the whole claim here was because it went against Jewish law, not because of the very act of taking metaphysics into account. With Joseph too, you can say something similar—maybe less unequivocally, but I think overall very similar. Your obligation to tell your father that you’re alive, while he thinks you’re dead, is a halakhic obligation, maybe of honoring your father and mother, I don’t know exactly. Even if it’s not a halakhic obligation, clearly it is a very strong moral obligation. Therefore it’s clear that the expected behavior was different, and the metaphysics caused you not to behave that way. Meaning, that also belongs more or less to the same family of considerations as Hezekiah’s case, and therefore there too they do not accept Joseph’s conduct—at least those who argue against Nachmanides. Still, one can attribute it to the fact that he behaved in an obviously immoral way, or even against Jewish law, say, honoring one’s father and mother. Therefore the criticism there is not only because he resorted to metaphysics, but because the metaphysics caused him to violate Jewish law or morality, and that is not justified. Meaning, then there still isn’t a statement here that the very act of taking metaphysics into account is problematic. But I just want to remind you that this is exactly what our whole discussion about messianism, a messianic movement, was also bound up with. Because when I tried to characterize a messianic movement, I said I set up some kind of scale of criteria and said that it probably has to involve actions that are not the expected mode of conduct. Now at what level—sometimes it can be against Jewish law, sometimes against realpolitik, sometimes against morality, against accepted tradition. But it’s supposed to be something that is not the expected behavior. Meaning, if you do—say you study Torah day and night in order to bring the messiah—nobody will call that messianic behavior. Why? Because studying Torah day and night is a commandment—“you shall meditate upon it day and night”—you’re doing what you ought to be doing anyway. You’re doing it for metaphysical reasons, fine, but I think it’s hard to call that messianic conduct. Therefore messianic conduct is always bound up with some behavior that ordinarily, were it not for the messianic and metaphysical considerations, I wouldn’t be supposed to do—whether because of Jewish law, or because of realpolitik, I already listed all the possibilities we discussed. So the examples I’ve brought here are indeed relevant examples. True, both examples, both with Hezekiah and with Joseph, are examples where the complaint against you isn’t because of the very turn to metaphysics, but because you use metaphysics in order to conduct yourself in a way you are not supposed to conduct yourself. But that is exactly what also happens in a messianic movement. In a messianic movement too, it’s not that you want to bring the messiah—that alone is not a messianic movement. Rather, you want to bring the messiah by means of—maybe Leibowitz, or whatever, I gave the scale there, but the simple view is not like that. The simple view is that you do actions that in principle you were not supposed to do, either because they go against tradition, morality, realistic political considerations, common sense, or even against Jewish law. Sabbatai Zevi—and I brought that whole scale. Now if so, then I return and claim that taking metaphysical considerations into account in order to do these things is certainly similar to these examples, and note: even then it’s probably not unequivocal. Because with Joseph, for example, Nachmanides accepts it. So that means Nachmanides accepts that metaphysics can be a consideration—let’s say assuming you are a prophet, meaning the metaphysics is solid. Because if someone is imagining something, then there’s the separate problem of whether it’s true at all. But if you’re a prophet, then the assumption is that it is true. But even if it is true, who says that justifies harming Jewish law? And to that I say: that’s the messianic smell I detect, but as I said, it remains only a smell. Because Rashi or Nachmanides, as a matter of fact, are willing to accept such conduct. So that’s why I say: the messianic smell is there, and still it’s just a smell.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The question is whether the Torah doesn’t educate us to be metaphysical. After all, when the Holy One, blessed be He, says, for example, “Tithe so that you may become rich”—what? Why should I give away money? You’ll become rich, fine. Or in the year…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, you need to give away money because there is a commandment of tithing.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Fine, but what does Jewish law say? Jewish law says fine, but you need to tithe, meaning you need to act.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Jewish law doesn’t say that. Jewish law says to tithe. “Tithe so that you may become rich” is aggadic literature.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That’s true, but the Torah—say the Torah, sorry, another example—regarding the Sabbatical year. The Torah says keep the Sabbatical year because in the sixth year you will receive…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Not “because,” the Torah—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It says “because”?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, not “because,” that’s not correct.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The Torah promises you: don’t worry.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Again, you keep it not in order to receive; you keep it because the Sabbatical year has to be kept. Now you’re afraid? Don’t worry, I’ll calm you down. That’s something else. But the metaphysics there tells you to perform the commandment, not to refrain from a commandment.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Wait, but the Torah educates you. Educates you to what?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That if you perform the commandments you won’t be harmed.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That if you do good deeds, if you do good deeds, then you won’t be harmed.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That’s all, fine. Very good. But if you do bad deeds in order to profit, is that also allowed? Who said so?

[Speaker C] No, it’s like honoring father and mother—“that your days may be lengthened”—all the reward in this world.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, sending away the mother bird—

[Speaker C] “So that it may go well with you and you may have long life.”

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] And that can’t be because a person can… why did they say—

[Speaker C] But we just said it regarding the reason for sending away the mother bird.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Exactly, but here that’s the point—the opposite direction.

[Speaker H] I agree that here there is a combination of the metaphysical with life.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It’s the opposite direction. I’m talking about using metaphysics in order to deviate from the proper path of conduct. You’re talking about metaphysics as backing—don’t worry, if you conduct yourself properly and it seems you’ll get burned, don’t worry, you won’t get burned. That’s something else.

[Speaker G] But assuming it’s true, why can’t you bring it into your realistic considerations? Assuming it’s true, then why can’t a person…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What I’m saying—the novelty—is that even if it’s true, it may still be the case—and again, I say this because Nachmanides really might not accept it—but the novelty is that there are those who criticize him and so on, that even if it’s true you’re not supposed to do it. So what if it’s true? It’s true that the dream should come true; the Holy One, blessed be He, will take care of that.

[Speaker G] I’m saying that throughout the generations it’s more—I’m saying this more from logic and less from knowledge—that the problem was simply that they didn’t believe these things literally.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, that’s exactly what I’m claiming isn’t so. I’m claiming it isn’t so. I’m claiming that even if it’s true, there’s a problem with it. Therefore—let’s jump to the end for a moment—in Religious Zionism, for example, they bring proofs from verses, from the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh), that “But you, mountains of Israel, shall shoot forth your branches and yield your fruit,” meaning that the land is returning and the return to Zion, meaning that people are coming back, the ingathering of exiles and the like. There are not bad signs that this is being fulfilled. Now let’s say it’s true—I think one can argue about it, but let’s say it’s true, okay? Is that enough to justify problematic steps? Or steps that I wouldn’t take were it not for that? That itself is already problematic. That’s the claim. That’s why at the beginning, when we started talking, I distinguished and said that I’m not talking about whether it’s true or not. That’s one question, and it deserves discussion; I’m not claiming it’s definitely true. But I want to assume for the sake of discussion that it is true. Even then there’s room to wonder whether, even if it is true, it is a relevant consideration. What have you to do with the hidden plans of the Merciful One?

[Speaker G] What’s behind that? If it’s true, then why not?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Because that’s the Holy One, blessed be He’s file, not yours.

[Speaker G] But if it’s going to happen, what difference does it make?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It will happen, fine, let it happen. But I don’t need to help it happen. After all, there’s no problem—it happening is—

[Speaker G] It will happen, the Holy One, blessed be He, will make sure it happens. But I’ll build a house near where the return to Zion is supposed to happen, because in the end that’s where it will be. Why not?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No problem, build a house there. If it doesn’t contradict anything, then build whatever you want.

[Speaker G] As part of my political considerations.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] All right, but if you wouldn’t have done it were it not for the messianic consideration—that’s what I’m talking about. If you do it because it makes sense in its place, fine. But if you’re making a calculation such that only because of it you do this action—in other words, otherwise you wouldn’t do it—then there’s already some messianic smell here. And I’ll say again: even though it may be true, because the problem is not that it isn’t true, or part of the problem is that maybe it isn’t true. But I’m saying there’s another problem beyond that, and that’s what I want to sharpen here: even if it’s true, that’s the Holy One blessed be He’s job, not yours. You’re supposed to behave the way you’re supposed to behave: Jewish law, morality, and realpolitik. That’s what you need to do. The rest—leave to the Holy One blessed be He, even if it’s true. He’ll do it Himself. He’ll realize the dreams, He’ll make sure whether his son turns out wicked or not wicked. From Moses our teacher nobody came out who converted—so leave it to the Holy One blessed be He to deal with; are you supposed to kill him because of that? Or all kinds of things of that sort. In other words, these are considerations that are… I’ll maybe bring an example. I think I once spoke about this a long time ago, years ago already, about the halakhic status of dreams. I spoke about it once—I don’t remember when anymore—around Joseph’s dreams, specifically in the Torah portion of Miketz. In the year that I gave a class upstairs there with the kollel, one year with the Haredi kollel that studied here, I gave them a class once a week together with our group. One year it was like that, and that year in Miketz I gave this class. Because in the Talmud, in a number of places, you can see that dreams have some kind of status. I’m not going into all the sources now, and I don’t remember them all, but in several places you see that dreams have status. There’s a Talmudic passage in Sanhedrin, I think page 30, where the Talmud says that someone sees in a dream that money is hidden in some place, and the one appearing in the dream tells him that it is second tithe money. Now he goes to that place and finds money there in that… in exactly the amount they told him in the dream. In other words, that indicates that this dream was not just nonsense but something real. And the dream also said that it was second tithe. So now what do we do? He can only eat it in Jerusalem now—in other words, take it to Jerusalem and buy produce with it and so on—or perhaps the money belongs to charity, to the poor. Right? There are two cases there in the Talmud, if I remember correctly. So the Talmud says: the words of dreams neither add nor detract. Now notice: this is a dream that has indications that it is true. I mean, I dreamed it—I had no idea there was some amount there—I dreamed it, I dug, like Yechezkel, right, we once spoke about that, about the chickens, with the treasure chest in the Galilee, and I dug and found exactly the amount. So this dream is apparently a real dream, and they tell me it’s second tithe. That part I can ignore. So there are some medieval authorities (Rishonim) who want to say that you can’t dream without idle nonsense mixed in, and that really works on the level of maybe it isn’t true. That’s also the Vilna Gaon, famously: they once asked the Vilna Gaon, and he said that maggidim and such—those heavenly messages—that’s all the other side, forbidden to listen to them. They asked him about Maggid Meisharim of Rabbi Yosef Karo, who wrote a book with everything the maggid told him. So he said: that’s in the Land of Israel. In the Land of Israel the maggidim are cleaner. But outside the Land, the maggidim are always mixed up with all kinds of things—straw mixed into grain. You can’t know what is true and what isn’t true. I think in Maggid Meisharim itself there’s so much mixed in there that if that’s what’s called clean in the Land of Israel, then I don’t know what happens outside the Land. In any case, what I’m saying is: you can’t dream without things… just like you can’t have straw without grain, you can’t have a dream without idle things in it. That’s Hazal, in the Jerusalem Talmud I think. So there are medieval authorities (Rishonim) who want to say that for that reason we don’t pay attention to a dream. Meaning, you found the amount—you found it—but who says that this detail, that it’s second tithe, is also true? Fine, so there’s a question here—maybe we should then treat it as a doubt. Can a person simply decide now that it’s not second tithe or not for the poor? It’s a doubt. Fine. In the end you have to analyze it. And there really are medieval authorities (Rishonim) who want to say that it’s only a doubt, and then there are the laws of doubt in gifts to the poor and the laws of doubt in charity and all kinds of topics of that sort.

[Speaker C] But the Talmud doesn’t present it as a doubt.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The Talmud says we don’t pay attention to it. The question is whether we don’t pay attention to it because of the laws of doubt, or whether we don’t pay attention to it as a matter of certainty.

[Speaker C] Don’t pay attention—you can eat it.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, but it could be that under the laws of doubt I’m also allowed to eat it. It’s enough that it be a doubt in order to permit me to eat. Tashbetz—the medieval authorities (Rishonim) discuss this. It could be that from the standpoint of doubt that’s enough. No, the practical difference is that if I have a dream where, from the standpoint of the laws of doubt, there would be stricter implications, then I would have to be concerned. The Talmud doesn’t say not to pay attention to dreams at all. That’s how some commentators explain it. But in Maimonides I can show from a number of places that it doesn’t seem that way. In Maimonides, he says, apparently quite clearly, that although this dream is a true dream, and we are not worried about straw in the grain, still we do not pay attention to it. The words of dreams neither add nor detract—that is a halakhic statement, not a factual statement. In other words, it’s not a statement saying that dreams contain errors. Rather, even if the dream is correct, it doesn’t matter. In Jewish law we do not take dreams into account. Now there are other places where we do take dreams into account. For example, excommunication in a dream requires ten people. You have to gather ten in order to release him from it. And there too there is a bit of room for discussion, because some say it’s like ameliorating a dream, and only if it disturbs you. But the simple meaning of the Talmud, and that’s also how it appears in the halakhic decisors, is that always—if you see ten people excommunicating you in a dream—you need to do a release of bans, a release from excommunication. And when you wake up—not in the dream—when you wake up, you take scholars and do the release.

[Speaker F] And what’s the difference between that and this?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right, so now the question is what the difference is between that and this. My claim is that Maimonides makes a distinction—and Maimonides also brings this distinction. My claim is that Maimonides distinguishes between subjective law and objective law. In other words, laws that pertain inwardly to me, within my personal world—a subjective law—I can also take dreams and subjective experiences I’m going through into account. But where I’m dealing with halakhic questions that also concern others, the public domain, the words of dreams neither add nor detract. The words of dreams belong to the private domain. I’ll say again: the assumption is that the dream is true. So that’s not the point. If the dream isn’t true, then there’s nothing to distinguish—it’s just not true. The question is whether the dream is true, and Maimonides basically says halakhically that a dream, despite being true, has no halakhic status. I don’t take it into account even though it’s true. So that’s all when we’re talking, say, between me and a poor person, or gifts to the poor, or if it’s money of second tithe, then that also has ramifications because it’s in the area of prohibitions. So anything that is Jewish law in the halakhic sense, objective Jewish law, with public significance—I don’t take dreams into account at all even if they’re true. In places where I’m doing an amelioration for excommunication that I experienced in a dream—I want to solve my own personal problem—that’s in my personal sphere, so there I can also take dreams into account, on the assumption that dreams contain something real. All right? So yes, I bring this as an example; one could expand on it. I don’t remember all the sources and all the calculations right now and exactly what Maimonides says, but it’s written up. If you want, I can send it to you. In the synagogue? The book you just mentioned? In any case, as an analogical example I want to say the same thing here. That here too, even though the metaphysical consideration may be true—a dream, or whatever other metaphysical consideration—you still can’t automatically conclude that it may be taken into account. I’m saying at least in a place where that consideration leads me to act in a way I would not have acted were it not for that consideration. In that kind of situation, maybe this is what is meant by: what business do you have with the secrets of the Merciful One? In other words, you should do what you are supposed to do according to the usual realistic, halakhic, and practical reasoning, and metaphysical considerations are not supposed to intervene here—not because they’re false, but despite the fact that they’re true. Even if they are true. Because that’s the Holy One blessed be He’s accounting; that’s His job. It has nothing to do with your decision-making.

[Speaker E] That now reminds me of “we do not pay attention to a heavenly voice.”

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right, right. Yes, that’s a similar example, because the claim that we do not pay attention to a heavenly voice does not mean that the heavenly voice is wrong. Or that someone misled us and it wasn’t the Holy One blessed be He. Quite the opposite. The Holy One blessed be He says, “My children have defeated Me.” In other words, the Holy One blessed be He spoke; the heavenly voice spoke in His name, and still we do not pay attention to a heavenly voice. Why? Because metaphysical matters are not supposed to take part in our halakhic decision-making. In our halakhic decision-making, what enters are our reasons. Even though it’s clear to us that the Holy One blessed be He is right. In other words, He gave the Torah, and He tells us what the law is regarding the segmented oven, yes, the oven of Akhnai. A heavenly voice comes out and tells us what the Holy One blessed be He says about it, right? That really is a very good example. And they say: we do not pay attention to a heavenly voice; it is not in heaven.

[Speaker G] So if it’s true or not true, what difference does it make? How do I know whether it’s true or not true?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So there you go—“it is not in heaven.”

[Speaker G] The heavenly voice could be a matter where, in the way halakhic rulings work, it doesn’t matter to us what the Holy One blessed be He ruled. Even if we’re wrong, we need to do what we think, even mistakenly.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But we are mistaken. You asked before: if it’s true, then why should I care? But we know—

[Speaker G] that this dream about second tithe—it’s a matter, it’s not a matter of being mistaken or not mistaken; it’s a matter of truth.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Why? There too it’s a matter of truth. I want to know what the Jewish law is, and the Holy One blessed—

[Speaker G] He tells me what the Jewish law is. Jewish law is not what the Holy One blessed be He said, but what we think.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Why? Why did you decide that? Why? Because you decided that metaphysical things—what the Holy One blessed be He says—do not pertain to decision-making. That’s exactly what I’m deciding here too. I could answer you in exactly the same way.

[Speaker G] By the same token I could decide that if I rule one thing and a rabbi tells me something else, then I should do according to what I rule and not according to what the rabbi said. That’s an approach I know from somewhere.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] An approach I know from somewhere. Yes.

[Speaker G] So it’s not because the rabbi is somehow more metaphysical than I am, or things like that.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, no, obviously not. You can make such decisions in other contexts too, but I’m talking about metaphysics. You’re assuming something that isn’t correct. After all, there too you could ask exactly the same question. The truth is what the Holy One blessed be He said, so what do you mean—why does it matter that this is metaphysics and it’s the Holy One blessed be He? No, no, no—because Jewish law is apart from metaphysics. Fine, so I’m saying the same thing: decision-making too is apart from metaphysics. So what’s the question? But why should I care—it’s the truth. There too exactly the same question applies. What’s the difference? What’s the difference between Jewish law and other decision-making? Why—what’s the difference? Why should other decisions depend on reality? Why? Jewish law also depends on reality. Why, why? That’s exactly the question: what’s the difference? That’s exactly the point. Rather, what are you saying? That this is the Holy One blessed be He’s role and this is our role. Our role is to use our own heads and not metaphysical things and other such things. And if the Holy One blessed be He wants to realize dreams, fine—there is no lock on the gates of creativity, meaning—

[Speaker C] let Him do what He thinks—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] and realize the—

[Speaker C] what He needs or what He wants. I’m supposed to do what I was commanded. That’s it. Or what the reasonable considerations say I need to do. It’s not because it’s untrue, but because that’s the Holy One blessed be He’s role and not mine. Exactly parallel to the oven of Akhnai: that is the Jewish law even though it isn’t the truth, because my role halakhically is to formulate Jewish law according to what I understand, even though it isn’t the truth. I think it’s very similar. But there are rules to this. What? There are rules to this—how one may formulate Jewish law, how one does it—not just anyone saying, well this is what seems right to me, and that’s it.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, that’s a different topic. But I already spoke about the fact that I think a person has to make decisions for himself. But obviously it has to be done responsibly. In other words, he has to be a person who is capable of making decisions; not just anyone casually saying, this is what seems right to me, and making decisions. But someone who really is capable—then even if he isn’t the leading Torah authority of the generation and may be wrong, my decisions are mine to make, not someone else’s. But that’s already a different discussion. Okay, so that’s one remark, just to strengthen this point: going after a metaphysical consideration, even if it’s true, has some messianic odor to it. And that’s a certain novelty. I brought those examples only to show that it’s not—certainly not absurd. To me it’s even reasonable, although I agree that it’s not necessary and not universally accepted—not fully accepted. Even today it isn’t accepted. I said that both the ideological anti-Zionists and the ideological Religious Zionists both disagree with this conception, because both in effect inject metaphysical considerations into their decision-making. Another remark related to this issue: if I’m now talking—going back to Religious Zionism—there are all kinds of signs of redemption. The Talmud in Sotah even brings this: in the footsteps of the Messiah, insolence will increase, and so on. There are signs in the Hebrew Bible itself: “And you, mountains of Israel,” I mentioned earlier, “you shall give forth your branches,” the ingathering of the exiles, all kinds of things like that. So that means that apparently the Torah or Scripture itself, or even Hazal, are actually telling us: yes, use metaphysical tools. Here, they give us metaphysical signs so that we can assess whether redemption is taking place or not. Why do they give us that? If we’re not supposed to make use of it and take it into account in our decision-making, then why are we being given these signs? Yes, that too is a very common claim. People have told me that more than once when I’ve spoken with them about this matter, and it really is a good question. I’m just not sure on two levels. First, on the level of how much these signs really are—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What, the ingathering of the exiles you don’t see? It’s something you see with your eyes.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] You see with your eyes that there is an ingathering of exiles, but you don’t see with your eyes that it is necessarily a sign of redemption. In other words, the question is how certain you can be that this is the process. Who said? All sorts of things happened. Alroy also brought about a bit of ingathering of exiles. How far are you going with this?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What? What?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Alroy—one of those false messiahs we described here. Why?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] When in 2,000 years was there an ingathering of exiles?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Not as big as what we have today. Close, not close—so what? And if there was a small ingathering of exiles, is that good enough for this or not? Where exactly is the line? Who says to you that in another fifty years this won’t reverse and we’ll all scatter again to the four corners of the earth? I don’t know. There have already been—there are already about a million, I think, who dispersed from here. I don’t know. I’ll say again: I agree that if I had to bet, I would bet that this is indeed a significant sign. To tell you that this is what I build on? I don’t know, I don’t know.

[Speaker I] Where do these signs appear?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] There are signs at the end of tractate Sotah in the Talmud and in the Prophets, scattered in various places. So that’s why I’m saying: first of all, even on the level of… of the truth of the matter—I said that both levels have to be discussed—I’m not entirely sure. I’m very careful about drawing conclusions from verses. After all, the verse says “an eye for an eye” and Hazal turn that into monetary payment; so if it says, “And you, mountains of Israel, shall give forth your branches,” then maybe that means the branches of the world to come. In other words, I can make homiletic interpretations from anything to anything. And in general, making decisions from verses is, in my opinion, super dangerous. Dangerous in the sense of whether it’s true—I’m not yet even speaking on the second plane, assuming it’s true, whether it’s allowed or appropriate—but first of all, what do the verses mean at all? What are the verses intending? “Happy shall you be and it shall be good for you”—happy in this world and good for you in the world to come. “There is a righteous person who suffers”—so then what does “happy shall you be and it shall be good for you” mean? And what about “Test Me now in this,” where it says, “Bring the tithe into the storehouse”—right? That in this one matter you are permitted to test the Holy One blessed be He, with tithing. You may not test the Holy One blessed be He except with tithing. Is everyone who tithes rich? I don’t think so. If anything, perhaps almost the opposite. I think people who are strict about tithing generally do not belong to the wealthiest strata of the population. Most of them. Some do, but if I had to make correlations. And on the contrary, among those who are not strict about tithing there are also very wealthy people, and I don’t see there specifically more poverty than in the population that does tithe. So what does that mean? Fine, one can find excuses, but to tell you that I can draw conclusions from a statement like that? In my opinion that’s really not correct. I said—we once spoke about studying the Hebrew Bible—so I said that I generally recoil from studying the Hebrew Bible because you can’t learn anything from it. In other words, I don’t feel that you can learn anything from studying the Hebrew Bible. You can do whatever you want with every text there, so why study it? Either way you won’t know anything from it.

[Speaker E] There are also opposite statements of Hazal, I think, saying that the Messiah will come like a lost object or like a scorpion, something like that.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Unawares, yes.

[Speaker E] Yes, meaning that there are no signs.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right. Or in a generation that is entirely guilty, or a generation that is entirely meritorious—so now go figure. We’re not a generation that is entirely this nor entirely that.

[Speaker D] It would be better if we were a generation entirely guilty—we’re closer to that.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] More—

[Speaker H] easier,

[Speaker D] it’s easier to get to a generation entirely guilty; we’re closer to there.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] We’re in a good enough overdraft that we could be called a generation entirely guilty—and thereby entirely. So that’s why I’m saying: first, there’s the question on the level of whether that’s true. But I’m saying that’s not the interesting discussion right now. I’m saying that even if it is true, it’s not clear that one should make use of it. So why was it written? That’s the question. Hazal wrote it and the prophets wrote it. For no reason? I don’t know—yes, maybe so that you should know where you stand. No, and then I say: “know where you stand” can itself be said on two levels. First, simply to tell people: know what will be at the end of days; we study it “study and receive reward.” Second, it may even have been written as a present diagnosis. In other words, so that you can see that you are now in the process of redemption. But even that still doesn’t mean you are allowed to take it into account in decision-making. Those are two different things. In other words, it may even be that I’m allowed to use it as a diagnostic tool to determine that I’m now on the road to redemption. That has no practical consequence, but if someone finds it interesting, fine. But that still doesn’t mean—and in my view it has no practical consequence, because I say that it still doesn’t mean I may take it into account and make use of it when I make decisions. That’s something additional. Okay? That’s with regard to forecasts.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Suppose, suppose now that you think you are in a process of redemption, all right? The beginning of redemption. But there’s a point here: and suppose that the Temple, whether it comes down from heaven or human beings build it—don’t we need to prepare for that? Have priestly garments ready, know the laws of the Temple that we haven’t dealt with for, I don’t know, the last two thousand years?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Like I said before: if you do things that there’s no problem doing—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] they’re sensible if you think we’re in a process of redemption. Exactly, so then there’s no problem.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I, for example, think that what Rabbi Yisrael Ariel is doing at the Temple Institute—there’s no problem with it at all. He’s simply preparing for the coming of the… I’m not sure one has to do it—that I don’t know—but it’s certainly not something problematic because he is not… because it does not contradict either Jewish law or sensible and realistic considerations, so there’s no problem at all. That’s why I say, that’s why I made all those introductions. In a place where you make these calculations and, because of them, you deviate from the path you otherwise should have taken—there the question of taking metaphysics into account arises. I’m not talking about people who, as I said earlier, learn Torah all day in order to bring the Messiah—I have no problem with that. In other words, I’m not sure it will help them, but it’s certainly not problematic to do that; it’s not a messianic issue. That’s why all the introductions were meant to say that this has to be an act that is somewhat problematic in some respect, halakhically or otherwise, before we even begin discussing it. Otherwise it’s not… Now, I mentioned—we already discussed a bit the question of how problematic Zionism is. So it’s hard to put your finger exactly on it, but still, there are problematic dimensions here. You cooperate with secular people, you pay heavy prices for this. So is it a halakhic transgression, or just something we would not have been supposed to do were it not for the messianic considerations? But at least in the second formulation I think it does enter. Going to secular courts—and I spoke about all those aspects. Okay, that is basically the end of the messianic discussion. What I want now is just to make one more concluding remark that intersects with this point. The messianic discussion, really, we dealt with on two planes. On one plane, skepticism about the reliability of the metaphysical source—whether in the Hebrew Bible or in a dream or prophecy or evaluations, whatever it may be. Maybe what you think is not true; maybe it’s an incorrect interpretation of the metaphysics, of the verses, or whatever. The second plane: even if the interpretation is correct, are you allowed to take it into account in your reasoning when coming to formulate decisions or policy? There’s a broader question here: to what extent is the Holy One blessed be He involved in history at all? When you assume that the Holy One blessed be He’s involvement in history stands behind these processes, and then you draw conclusions and say what is incumbent on me to do or not to do—am I allowed to make such a calculation, should I make such a calculation, am I forbidden to make such a calculation—all that assumes in the background some assumption that I now want to put on the table. And the assumption is that the Holy One blessed be He is involved here in these matters. In other words, that He is moving things around here. Until now I assumed yes, and the question was how much I’m allowed to interpret what He’s doing and take what He’s doing into account in my decisions. Now I want to raise the question whether He is doing anything here at all. Because I’m not at all sure. I’m sure. Okay, then apparently we see this differently. The claim I want to make, really, and I’ll say it on several levels: my basic problem is that it seems to me that our intuitive way of looking at things is not like that. Our intuitive way of looking at things is that things happen because of realistic causes, not metaphysical causes. In other words, if I have a fever and I take Acamol, then I recover not because the Holy One blessed be He helped me, but because the Acamol performs the chemical action it performs and lowers my fever. Or if I take another medicine for an illness, I recover because the medicine works; there is chemistry, there is biology, and that is the explanation for why this thing works. Not because the Holy One blessed be He healed me through the medicine. “He healed me through the medicine”—again, maybe I should sharpen this. It may be that He healed me through the medicine in the sense that He created chemistry and biology, and He sees to it that the world operates according to the laws of chemistry and biology. That’s not what I mean. I mean that the Holy One blessed be He intervenes here and heals me. In other words—and no, that is to say, it wasn’t supposed to happen according to the laws of chemistry and biology; it’s only because of the Holy One blessed be He. Here I would say that even when someone says, as Yitzhak said earlier, very emphatically—I’m often inclined not to believe him. I have to say. It’s a bit…

[Speaker C] Not believe someone who says it, or in general?

[Speaker D] No, even someone who says it—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t believe that he—

[Speaker D] believes—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] it.

[Speaker D] Not that… no, sometimes he isn’t aware that he doesn’t believe it.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes,

[Speaker C] yes—not that he’s lying, but that he doesn’t interpret himself correctly. Yes. I very much believe in naivete. No, but the fact is that… in the simple sense, without being sophisticated.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Fine, but try to be a little sophisticated and think. When you take Acamol and it lowers your fever, do you think the Holy One blessed be He—

[Speaker C] lowered your fever, or that the Acamol did?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I think that right now every breath I take—every breath—I think the Holy One blessed be He is involved in it. No, what does “involved in it” mean? I say “involved” in the sense that He operates the chemistry and biology—no problem. I’m talking about involvement in the sense of a deviation from natural functioning. Otherwise it isn’t involvement.

[Speaker C] How can one even discuss such a thing?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I’m asking you: what do you think?

[Speaker C] I think you can’t discuss it. Meaning, you take the same Acamol—one person it helps, another it doesn’t help. The same Acamol, the same Acamol, and there are people who die.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Obviously people die, but the fever goes down. If you take Acamol, the fever goes down.

[Speaker C] The fever goes down and that’s not…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If it doesn’t go down, you’ll start checking with a stethoscope and go to a doctor—

[Speaker C] and check the tubes and check the… whatever. In principle, the same treatment helped one person and didn’t help another.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That’s because you’re not giving me a scientifically—

[Speaker H] precise—

[Speaker C] account. Not because chemistry—there’s at least one percent—it’s not…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Chemistry is not exact science! But I’m saying again, you’ll look for…

[Speaker C] I’m saying someone intervened and decided that this one would live and that one would die.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] And I’m saying that if your fever doesn’t go down, you—

[Speaker C] will go to a doctor, not pray more.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] you go to a doctor. But after all, if someone intervened and did this, what can the doctor help?

[Speaker C] It’s like that story about the guy when there was a flood, it was raining, and the fire department came and said, we’ll help you, and he said no, no, the Holy One blessed be He—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] and then He says to him, I sent you the fire department and the boat and the car and all that, and you didn’t want it.

[Speaker C] Right, that—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] is a nice joke, but basically… it’s a nice joke, and I’ll tell you why. Because in the end, when we talk about the Holy One blessed be He’s involvement in the sense I’m talking about here, we mean a deviation from the laws of nature. If you’re talking about the operation of the laws of nature, which the Holy One blessed be He runs, I have no problem with that. That’s not what I’m talking about. The Holy One blessed be He can operate the laws of nature, no problem. I’m talking about the question whether there is involvement that causes a deviation from the laws of nature. In other words, what is the routine conduct of the world?

[Speaker D] I’ll ask a simple question: do you believe that there is one case in a billion—not in a million, in a billion—where a person walks under some building and a brick falls from there straight onto his head, and out of a billion such cases, in one case that brick will not fall according to Newton’s laws but move aside so that he won’t be killed?

[Speaker C] No, it will fall according to the laws. Fine, so either you’ll be killed or you won’t be killed—the Holy One blessed be He will decide.

[Speaker D] No, it will fall on your head! Why?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Why do you prefer the laws of gravity over the laws of chemistry and biology? I don’t understand.

[Speaker C] No, no, both—the same thing.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So if the brick falls according to the laws, why shouldn’t your biology also work according to the laws?

[Speaker C] No, same thing. Fine, so the Holy One blessed be He isn’t involved and deciding what will happen.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If He decides, then He can do it in gravity too.

[Speaker C] The question is whether you—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] really—

[Speaker D] believe there can—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] be one case—

[Speaker D] like that, where the stone won’t fall according to gravity but will move aside so as not to hit the head.

[Speaker C] No, no, there isn’t. Today there are no open miracles—you’re talking about miracles.

[Speaker D] No, no—

[Speaker C] if it falls, there are no miracles; everything goes according to nature, so to speak. And then… but someone decides whether the stone will fall on you.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Then He doesn’t decide—then it doesn’t go according to the laws of nature. If He decides, that’s not the laws of nature. The laws of nature mean that the circumstances determine what will happen—that’s what the laws of nature are.

[Speaker C] But I’m saying, that’s sort of the laws of nature. What?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That’s—

[Speaker C] like the laws of nature.

[Speaker H] Why—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] is it “like”?

[Speaker H] Either—

[Speaker C] it works or it doesn’t work—that’s what I’m asking.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If He wants, of course He can. The question is whether He wants to, whether He actually does it. I’m not talking about whether He can. Of course He can. He created nature, so He can also freeze it.

[Speaker H] I’m talking about whether He makes use of that ability, not—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] whether He has—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] that ability.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I claim that at least almost never. Maybe here and there, yes, but… What is the meaning of what you’re saying? The meaning of what I’m saying is that the Holy One blessed be He is not involved in the world. He is involved in the sense that I said—that He arranged the laws of nature, He created nature and its laws. There’s the phrase “my power and the might of my hand” in the verse—where it says “my power and the might of my hand,” the supervisors always cite “my power and the might of my hand,” saying: “my power and the might of my hand”—you think the army wins the war for you? The Holy One blessed be He wins the war for you; prayers win the war. But the verse says, “for it is He who gives you the power to achieve valor.” Meaning, the verse says that we win the war, not the Holy One blessed be He; rather, the Holy One blessed be He gives us the power to win the war, but in the end we win with that power, not with something else. In other words, the Holy One blessed be He operates the laws—that’s how the Derashot HaRan explains it, by the way.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That is, Derashot HaRan says that everything goes according to natural processes. The Holy One, blessed be He, operates nature, fine; He gives you the power to succeed. So of course you win the war. If you don’t fight properly, you’ll lose. It’s not the Holy One, blessed be He, and nothing else; rather, you receive from the Holy One, blessed be He, the power to succeed. So really, saying that He’s not involved is saying that He operates the laws of nature. I’ll give you another example. The Talmud at the end of Berakhot, in the Mishnah, at the end of Berakhot, says: “May it be Your will that these not be my household members,” when there’s a fire in the city—then that is a vain prayer. Why is it a vain prayer? Because it already happened. It already happened; there’s already a fire, so what do you want—that the Holy One, blessed be He, should move the fire from here to there? Now I ask you, what’s the problem? What, can’t the Holy One, blessed be He, move the fire from here to there? Can’t He do miracles? So why shouldn’t I pray to the Holy One, blessed be He, that He move the fire so that it not be my household members? Let it be wood—not, no, not on other people, but that the tree next to the house should burn, not the house. You’re saying we don’t want open miracles, right? Meaning, we don’t want—the Holy One, blessed be He, says that He doesn’t do open miracles, He does hidden miracles. The Talmud brings another example there. The Talmud brings prayer that a child should be male. A woman is pregnant, and the Talmud says one does not pray, because that too is a vain prayer. That too is prayer about the past. Now I ask: there the miracle is no longer open. There was no ultrasound in that period, right? So you don’t know whether you have a boy or a girl. What’s the problem if the Holy One, blessed be He, now switches it from male to female? What’s the problem? Why can’t one pray for that? Things that are against the laws of nature. Ah, so you can’t pray against the laws of nature? Meaning the Holy One, blessed be He, does not intervene in the laws of nature. Well, then I rest my case. No, let it be clear. Every prayer you pray, you want the Holy One, blessed be He, to intervene in the laws of nature and do something that wasn’t supposed to happen, right? That’s the meaning of prayer. But if you can’t pray that the Holy One, blessed be He, act against the laws of nature, then what are you asking for? So were those who got angry at the commander of the Givati Brigade before entering the operation right? Hear O Israel. No, no. Why were they right? Because his goal wasn’t—he wasn’t doing theology there. His goal was to encourage fighting spirit. If he had prayed to the Holy One, blessed be He, to help, no one would have complained. But he tried to encourage the people who were going to fight, to instill fighting spirit in them—that was the problem. What does that have to do with anything? Theoretically, it could be that there is heavenly assistance in certain things, and the doctor will succeed more in a certain situation here because of heavenly assistance. So why can’t one pray for the fetus? But wait, what’s the difference between a fetus and an illness? The fact that the doctor succeeds more is not against the laws of nature. God will guide things so he succeeds more within the laws of nature. Not against the laws of nature? Everything is laws of nature. Meaning in the end it’s only that you don’t see it; everything is laws of nature. But why do we pray every day, three times a day, for all this—“Heal us” and “Bring us back”? Even if you’re dying to kill yourself, you still have to say “Heal us.” I’ll comment on that in a moment. First of all, I want to make clear: you’re leading to Leibowitz exactly as he should be understood. Yes. I’m saying again: I can’t say this categorically, meaning that it never happens. I only want to claim that this is not the regular mode of conduct. It may be that there are cases where He intervenes—you can’t know. You can’t know whether every single thing happens exactly according to the laws of nature. You can’t know, so what is there to discuss? No, there is something to discuss because we’re talking about something that either is so or isn’t so. Meaning, I could be right and you could be right. No, you can’t be right. I’m definitely right. Okay. Maybe right, but you can’t be certain. No, I’ll tell you—the point is like this, look. If we really thought that day-to-day conduct—I’m talking about day-to-day conduct, I’m not talking about sporadic interventions from time to time that can’t be felt—if in day-to-day conduct what happens is, after all, when we take the result of a medical study, okay? So a medical study—even a God-fearing Jew who is a medical researcher and tests some medication—takes a sample group and a control group. I have never in my life heard of a Jew who makes sure that the distribution of people praying is equal in the two groups. And on the other hand, I have never in my life heard of a God-fearing Jew who doesn’t use the results of those studies even though nobody balances the prayer factor between the two groups. Why not? After all, if in the end we are healed by virtue of prayer and not by virtue of medicine, then such a study has no meaning. What does this study say? It says nothing. In a certain medication, in a certain group, more recovered because there were more people praying there, or more righteous people, or people with greater merit, or something like that. Who knows—you can’t draw conclusions from any experiment about anything. So why do we draw conclusions? And again I say, medicine is not an exact science. Obviously we can’t draw deterministic conclusions, but we do attribute importance to it, and we don’t even try to neutralize this dimension of prayer. Why? Because we don’t really believe in it—let’s be honest. You can say that the percentage of righteous people is uniformly distributed in both groups. Okay, then make sure of it. Make sure it’s uniformly distributed. All the other things you don’t verify are uniformly distributed, but this—you verify that it happens? A righteousness-meter? You’ll do it with the doctors using a righteousness-meter? And this is the most—maybe the most influential thing supposedly, the only thing that influences. So that you won’t neutralize? If you don’t neutralize that, then what remains? I would give up on the study altogether—after all, only prayer helps. So why do the study? You don’t even need to balance the groups. There are lots of things here that are—now you’ll say, but what, the Sages themselves said yes to praying? After all, if you can’t pray even about a fetus, which is a hidden miracle—after all, as I said earlier, every prayer is prayer for a hidden miracle. When you pray, what are you basically saying? Nature is going to do something like this to me, and I ask the Holy One, blessed be He, that it not happen, right? Because if naturally it would happen anyway, then what is there to pray for? Meaning, prayer is by definition prayer for intervention in the laws of nature, right? But if prayer for intervention even hiddenly in the laws of nature is forbidden, then what is prayer? So my claim was—and I say again, this is quite far-reaching, but to me it’s a matter of one plus one—and my claim was that the Sages really did not see it this way, but they were mistaken. Because the Sages were not equipped with the spectacles of modern science; they didn’t know it. So they really thought what many people still think to this day, those who aren’t immersed in the scientific way of thinking. To this day people think that basically the laws of nature don’t really determine what happens. After all, sometimes you recover from the medicine and sometimes you don’t. But if you ask a doctor or a researcher or a scientist or someone immersed in scientific thinking, he’ll say, what are you talking about? There’s no such thing. The laws of nature do everything; except that we simply don’t know the laws of nature completely. Meaning, because we still don’t know all the relevant medical information. Especially in biology. Biology maybe we’ll never know completely either, okay, it doesn’t matter. But on the principled level there are laws of nature, and if we knew all of them then everything would be deterministic. And therefore, for example, if a certain medicine doesn’t work, we don’t say, ah okay, fine, here it didn’t work. No, we immediately begin research to check why it didn’t work, because there must be some natural reason that explains why it didn’t work. Because everything is conducted according to the laws of nature—that’s exactly the point. And how do you relate to psychosomatic aspects? Those are laws of nature—what’s the problem? A person’s psychology according to all accepted knowledge—is that something that works disconnected from laws of nature? Psychology itself and the influence of psychology on the body are a clear scientific fact. The placebo, by the way, is one of the proofs. When doing an experiment with a sample group and a control group, you have to neutralize placebo. Therefore the experiment has to be double-blind, controlled and double-blind. Meaning, there has to be a control group and a sample group, but the two groups cannot know which is control and which is sample. Because if the group knows whether it is control or sample, that itself will affect the results. Why will it affect them? It will affect them because of psychology. So in experiments today we neutralize the psychosomatic factor, the placebo. Why? Because placebo is a scientific fact. Why don’t we neutralize prayer? Because we don’t believe it has an effect. And by “we” I mean even God-fearing doctors—I’m not talking about doctors who don’t believe; of course I understand why they don’t neutralize it. It’s just that then God-fearing Jews should not have been using their studies, because their studies would be worth nothing. But we all use them. And if it doesn’t work, we’re very surprised and go to the doctor again to see why it didn’t work. What’s the problem? Because you didn’t pray? What kind of question is that? Meaning, there’s a kind of double life here, in my view. With the Sages, what happened is that the Sages lived in ancient science. That’s how they thought; in the scientific world they were no more advanced than their time. And in ancient science people thought there were things that were open-ended; they didn’t grasp that nature is deterministic, because they didn’t have enough information. Today we know the laws in much greater detail, and therefore today we have—again, not completely, but today we have some very strong conception or intuition that basically if we knew the laws completely then everything would proceed according to the laws; it’s just that we don’t know everything. The Sages understood not only that we don’t know—they understood that we don’t know everything—but they also did not grasp that there is at all a system of laws that determines everything. Rather what? There are things that the Holy One, blessed be He, really determines whether they will work or not work, and for that, pray. The fetus, no; if it’s already male then it’s already male, so there’s nothing to pray about there. But if today we have changed our scientific outlook, and in this matter I don’t see any reason not to disagree with the Sages—in scientific outlook we know science better than they did—then if in my scientific outlook today I’ve reached the conclusion that the laws of nature basically determine everything, on the macro level I mean, leave quantum and all those issues aside, then now I need to go back and say anew: okay, if the Sages say I am forbidden to pray for a change in the laws of nature, even a hidden change, and today I think that every intervention is a change in the laws of nature, then indeed there is no longer room for requests. Rather what? Since I can’t say categorically that this is how it is, that the Holy One, blessed be He, never intervenes and the laws of nature always work—that would be a presumptuous statement, and I don’t think I can say such a thing. So I say: maybe what should be said is something a bit more moderate or more balanced. Say: look, if you have no natural solution, then pray—what can happen? Maybe the Holy One, blessed be He, will intervene after all; sometimes maybe He does intervene. But whenever you have a natural solution, there is nothing for you to pray about. Take the pill and go home. That’s all. Take the pill, plain and simple. Why are you shaking up all kinds of laws? For example, we say about an unintentional murderer, “and the Holy One, blessed be He, brings them together at one inn”—that’s my next comment. So He brings them together—one moment, I’m getting to that comment too—or all kinds of things like that. So I would ask, for example, the synagogue trustees that anyone who asks for prayer for a sick person should give a shekel—if he’s willing to pay two hundred shekels or five hundred for a specialist doctor, then at least let him give one shekel to charity. It would solve our synagogue budget problems. Yes, exactly—five minutes of a doctor costs how much? And still all of you pray; you come and pray. Or if you don’t pray, you come to synagogue. I pray because it’s… because because what? Because I’m obligated to pray. Why are you obligated? You say “Heal us,” you say “Bring us back,” you say “May there rise and come.” Why? Even if I’m dying to pray… Why? It doesn’t help; it’s just empty. But most of prayer is not requests, Yitzhak. That’s not true; most of prayer is not requests. Most of prayer? No, most of prayer is requests. No. The whole Amidah of Yom Kippur is half requests. Prayer is prayer—it’s the main part. When you come to synagogue, you don’t come for the Amidah—so what does he come to synagogue for? He comes to synagogue with Pesukei DeZimra, with the blessings of Shema, Shema, the blessings after Shema, prayer, Ashrei and Uva LeTzion, Aleinu LeShabeach. Friends, when people say “prayer,” they mean the Amidah, and in the Amidah you can say whatever you want, but when you come to synagogue you come for half an hour, of which three minutes are requests. Wait, so three minutes of requests—we’ll give that up? So I say, right, all right then, the requests need analysis. Come on, the requests need analysis? Why? This shakes the very foundations of Judaism. All right then, let’s see Judaism differently. They obligated you to pray. Enough, enough—they obligated you to pray. Also most of the Shemoneh Esrei is prayer for the community, for the community’s concerns. If that’s your approach, I’m telling you, if that’s your approach, don’t come pray. Why? That’s not true, what are you talking about? What for? Since there is a commandment to pray. What commandment? A commandment to pray. Not to make requests? No, to serve Him. For no reason? What kind of service of God is empty requests? Not requests. But prayer is not requests, Yitzhak. Those three minutes are requests, three minutes are requests. What are you doing? Friends, this is semantics too—what difference does it make now? I come to synagogue for half an hour, of which three minutes are requests. Can you say those three minutes are empty? And what is the most important blessing in the Shemoneh Esrei, such that if you didn’t say it with intention, according to Maimonides, if you didn’t say it with intention, you have to repeat the prayer? Not Maimonides—everyone, all the halakhic decisors. Avot. The first blessing? Avot, yes. What’s there? No request, nothing. Then don’t say the rest, don’t say it. No, but that is the important thing. But what you’re saying is empty. But that is the important part of prayer. Then don’t say the prayer because it’s empty. That was already without intervention. Why do you pray at all? If you said “Heal us” without intention, there’s no problem at all. If Tannaim and Amoraim told me that when I get up in the morning I should do such and such, I do it. What are you saying? The sacrifices, I’ll say it, I’ll always say it, no, always… What does that mean? The daily offering. Why are you answering me with that? What does it mean? It means that if you said the requests without intention, while meanwhile thinking about your business, you don’t need to repeat. But if you said the first blessing without intention, you need to repeat. Fine, so there is a structure to the prayer. It seems to me the prayer… the first three blessings are praise, the last three… I’m not talking about the structure. I’m not talking about the structure, I’m talking about the importance. Forget the importance… No, I’m talking about the importance. What does it mean? It’s in the middle. And because of the importance you don’t pray? That’s not true that I pray. Why do I pray for things that are less important? After all, I also say Aleinu LeShabeach. Why? By the way, why do we say Aleinu LeShabeach? Master of the universe, us? Not the world. Because He intervenes all the time. Who said He intervenes? For what He did before? Yes, certainly. No, what He did and continues to do today. Why does acetaminophen work? Because He created biology and chemistry—that’s why acetaminophen works. So I thank Him for that. There’s in that… it’s not so central; after all it’s only a rabbinic enactment. Meaning, the Patriarchs instituted… The Holy One, blessed be He, shot an arrow such that for billions of years… But according to Maimonides, prayer is Torah-level, this enactment isn’t… not the three daily prayers. In addition to that, but since I can’t abolish the requests—let it be noted, I would abolish them. No, no, not for everyone, abolish them for yourself. For myself I can’t abolish them; I’m also subject to Jewish law. But what? Jewish law is to pray, what? Right? Obviously. The wording that the Sages established. Yes. So what? So I say that these requests—I make them for those who are in such distress that they have no practical solutions, and God willing the Holy One, blessed be He, will intervene there, although the chance is probably small. I don’t think that the Holy One, blessed be He, renews every day continually the work of creation. Yes, certainly, renews every day continually the work of creation, certainly, certainly, all the time we are, כביכול, operating, certainly. What, before that they didn’t have laws? There is no law that these laws have to be these laws. I’m saying again, look, you can rebel against this—this certainly contradicts… Not only rebel; you can’t prove what you’re saying. I can’t prove what I’m saying, but let’s see who agrees with it. No, I don’t. I’m showing you that you do agree with it. You behave this way in day-to-day life. You behave this way all the time. No, no, no—I’ll tell you, in my opinion, humbly, you’re mistaken. When I pray, okay? When I pray, I do not pray that the Holy One, blessed be He, change the laws of nature. That really is something terrible—and wait! Not true, not true. Suppose now, like Shmuel gave the example, with the brick that falls. The brick falls because there’s gravity and so on. I pray that the Holy One, blessed be He, cause me not to pass there at that moment—not me and not moving the laws of nature. Why? Why is that a contradiction to the laws of nature? Why should the Holy One, blessed be He, cause you not to pass? Because without His causing it, you would pass, right? Otherwise what are you praying for? You don’t know, so you pray. You’re praying only regarding the possibility that without His intervening you would pass there; otherwise you have nothing to pray for. So that means the laws of nature are causing you to pass, and you want Him to intervene and cause you not to pass. By definition, that’s always the case. Prayer by definition—there is no other kind of prayer. There is no other request, no other prayer. There is no other request, only intervention in the laws of nature. There is no request that is not a request for intervention in the laws of nature. There’s no such thing, there never was and never will be. No, in principle it could be. There’s no such thing. Every request is a request for intervention in the laws of nature. And that is exactly the mistake of people who are not aware of this scientific mode of thinking. And if by ten seconds I delayed the brick from falling on me because my wife asked me to take out the trash, okay? So what? She asked about the trash without your having prayed to the Holy One, blessed be He? I don’t know, so I say that the Holy One, blessed be He, caused it to happen that she asked. No, so what are the possibilities? No, then you’re praying that the Holy One, blessed be He, remove her free choice—that’s what you’re praying for. There—you see, there are a million ways. If He had intervened and she would ask, now He intervened so she wouldn’t ask. Every one of those ways—since what you’re saying is that this would have happened even without the prayer anyway—then you have nothing to pray for. Rather what? You’re praying regarding the possibility that without the prayer it would not happen, right? But regarding the possibility that without the prayer it would not happen, then that the Holy One, blessed be He, should cause it to happen is intervention—that is a change in the laws of nature. But this very area is not deterministic because of free choice, which you presented on the website, a person’s choice. So that is actually Oren’s suggestion on the website, where he says that perhaps I can pray, although I told you there too that I think that that too is intervention—it is intervention in a person’s free choice. And to me also, I don’t know whether that’s a great gain over intervention in the laws of nature, because you simply said that you don’t notice that it’s happening. You said it just happens. No, I’m saying—but the assumption is that in the laws of nature too He can intervene without my noticing. Therefore I say: I can pray requests, because I say, look, sometimes it may be that He intervenes and I don’t notice. So I say, I pray regarding the possibility that maybe He will intervene. If someone is in trouble, I ask that the Holy One, blessed be He, intervene for him. Either it will work or it won’t work; probably it won’t, but maybe it will. So on that level I’m willing to say the same even regarding the laws of nature; I don’t need free choice. And on the principled level, intervention in free choice is as difficult for me as intervention in the laws of nature, so I don’t see such a great gain here. Fine, I see that it really is softer than intervention in the laws of nature. But again, it’s softer only because you see it less; that’s not the point, that this too is in nature. This too is intervention, because He gave us free choice, so that means we are supposed to choose and not Him. So He intervenes. You actually want Him to intervene. Part of the laws of nature is that people have choice. That too is part of the nature of the world, let’s call it that. So in any case this is intervention in the nature of the world. That’s what people don’t understand, and in my opinion, by the way, that’s what the Sages didn’t understand. Therefore the Sages spoke about prayer in this sense, while on the other hand they forbid prayer that is a request to intervene in the laws of nature, as with the fetus, changing the sex of the fetus. Because sex reassignment surgery—what, the Holy One, blessed be He, can’t do sex reassignment surgery? Today even a doctor can do that. So what’s the problem? No, because one does not intervene, the Holy One, blessed be He, does not intervene in the laws of nature. But before she became pregnant he can pray. What? Before she became pregnant? Certainly; according to the Sages, yes. And I ask: according to the Sages, if the Sages had known the mechanism of egg and sperm, would they have said that for that too it is forbidden to pray? Before? No, so I’m saying, even before—everything, all of it, is deviation from the laws of nature. If the Sages had understood that everything is basically determined according to the laws of nature, not only the obvious things, then basically the required conclusion is that in fact you can’t ask the Holy One, blessed be He, for anything. Because every request is a request for intervention. Okay? That’s the point. Now again, it needs analysis. The prayer was instituted by the Sages; we are obligated by what the Sages instituted; the Talmud has authority. I find for myself some kind of way out that I’m not comfortable with. This realization clicked for me—or yes, at least began to click for me—with Nachshon Wachsman. Because that was a traumatic event for me, the event of Nachshon Wachsman. There were—do you remember?—for a few days they were searching for him. It was a few days in which I thought I was in a dream. I mean, I couldn’t believe that I was seeing the reality I was seeing around me. All of the Jewish people prayed. Secular, religious—it was unbelievable. I mean, people really organized mass prayers on the radio, at the Western Wall—things that just didn’t happen at all. Today it happens a bit more on the radio, there’s already a bit of Judaism on the radio, things have changed somewhat. But then it was simply absurd. Unbelievable. I said: if the Holy One, blessed be He, now does not cause Nachshon Wachsman to be saved, then there is no prayer that helps—don’t sell me stories. But it happened. So you’ll say—and people always tell me—yes yes, prayer never returns empty, and you can’t do the Holy One, blessed be He’s calculations, and what Racheli Shapira said, yes, that He doesn’t work for us. All true, all nice consolations. But when we do the calculation, let’s be honest, we don’t believe it. We—I believe it. We really do. Wachsman—why don’t you go to the Holocaust? What is Wachsman? One little pawn. No, Wachsman not because of the horror of the act, but because of the prayers that were said to prevent the act. I don’t know how much people prayed during the Holocaust, but here we also see in general that there are processes. Just as there was the Holocaust, now there is redemption—we, that is, whether you believe it or not, but there is some process. You see certain changes in the world, you see certain things. Of course—what causes those changes? The law of gravity is a change in the world. Here, this falls downward; if you now take the cup and drop the cup, there’s a change in the world—it fell. That’s the question, exactly the question. There was an interview with the police commissioner on the program Uvda; he was the one who sat and was responsible for locating the house and everything, and the planning was absolutely perfect. It was simply completely clear that they were going to save him. There was full information—they had caught one of the terrorists and got from him all the information about the plan of the house. Everything was completely organized, and he was simply just waiting for it to happen. And when it didn’t happen, it was simply the greatest trauma of his life. Meaning, what did prayer do here? I don’t know. But whoever needed to act acted—again, this is not proof, of course, one case—I’m only saying that it made me think again about this whole issue. Didn’t you read Elie Wiesel’s books before that? I did, but it’s not strong, it’s not strong enough. Rabbi, when my grandson was sedated and on a ventilator in intensive care, and it was going around on Facebook, and the rabbi also found out that the grandson was in serious condition—then the rabbi sent me a WhatsApp asking how the child was, and I said there was improvement. And then the rabbi answered—how do you say it—anyway, he said the word “we’re praying.” Then my family members said, if the rabbi is praying, then apparently things will be okay. No, but fine? Now I can also say that the hospital director, by the way, who is Arab—I know from my daughter—he was there twice a day. And then when the staff there sees that the hospital director is there twice a day, my daughter said that the head of the ER ran for four days and didn’t leave the hospital, slept there in the ER, didn’t leave the department. What does that mean? No, so I’m saying, then one can say, well, that’s how nature works: He sends an Arab doctor who pressures the Jewish doctor to stay by the child all the time. But that’s what I said regarding those who wanted to save that fellow when there was a flood, and he went up and said the Holy One, blessed be He, will help me. And he went up onto the roof of that place, and a helicopter came—no, no, the Holy One, blessed be He, will help me—and he drowned. Then he got up above and asked—he says, I believed in You, I waited for You to help me. He said, I sent you the rescue team, I sent you a boat, I sent you a helicopter—you didn’t use them. That’s exactly it. Yes, that explains why we need the first three and the last three, because it is a person’s way, before he asks, to give praise beforehand and to give praise afterward. That’s not a problem, but prayer is request. I don’t agree, but it also doesn’t matter, as you said. Because even if so, it won’t help. No, fine, I’m saying it doesn’t matter. Don’t say that half an hour—go complain to those who lengthened the prayer; they lengthened it. You could also say it quickly in seven minutes, and it’s half an hour. He is currently optimistic and everything was fine. By the way, I’m left-wing. And three or four years after the Yom Kippur War, the doctor, who in the meantime had become a professor.