Topics in Halakhic Thought – Lecture 2
This transcript was produced automatically using artificial intelligence. There may be inaccuracies in the transcribed content and in speaker identification.
🔗 Link to the original lecture
🔗 Link to the transcript on Sofer.AI
Table of Contents
- The meaning of command according to Maimonides and commitment to Sinai
- Motivation in fulfilling commandments versus justifying the validity of Jewish law
- A comparison to secular law and Kelsen’s basic norm
- Putting on tefillin without belief in Sinai and the Chabad–Rabbi Yitzchak Hutner debate
- “Eight Chapters,” chapter 6: the virtuous person and the self-mastering person, philosophers versus the Sages
- The contradiction question and Maimonides’ methodological stance
- The distinction between natural inclination and “why” one actually acts, with the Aglei Tal as an example
- The example of Jonah and the kikayon, and the claim about interest versus reason
- Maimonides’ resolution in Eight Chapters: rational commandments versus decreed commandments
- The lecturer’s solution: good inclination and character refinement can coexist with commitment to command
- Idolatry out of love and fear: Abaye and Rava, Rashi’s interpretation, and Maimonides
- “Accepting it as a god” as the basis of acting for its own sake, and the implication for serving God
- Prayer, “a commandment of men learned by rote,” and the intention to discharge one’s obligation
- Maimonides in the Laws of Repentance: serving from fear versus serving from love as “doing the truth because it is truth”
Summary
General Overview
The lecturer connects the meaning of command with the status of fulfilling commandments, and draws a distinction between performing a commandment out of commitment to the command given at Sinai, and acting out of rational judgment, morality, tradition, or other motives—in which case, he argues, it is not a commandment at all. He distinguishes between the question of the inner motivation of the person performing it and the question of the theoretical justification by which the system of Jewish law demands obligation, and compares this to the question of validity in secular legal systems through Hans Kelsen’s concept of the basic norm. Later he resolves apparent contradictions in Maimonides’ words in “Eight Chapters,” proposes a distinction between a natural inclination toward good and the reason why one acts in practice, and develops this through the Aglei Tal, through an example from the book of Jonah, and through the dispute between Abaye and Rava about idolatry out of love or fear as interpreted by Maimonides. Finally, he formulates a conception of “accepting it as a god” as the basis of serving for its own sake, and interprets “serving from love” in Maimonides’ Laws of Repentance as “doing the truth because it is truth.”
The meaning of command according to Maimonides and commitment to Sinai
The lecturer summarizes Maimonides at the beginning of the eighth root regarding the meaning of command and the distinction between positive commandments and prohibitions. He quotes Maimonides at the end of chapter 8 of the Laws of Kings, according to whom fulfilling a commandment not out of commitment to the divine command given at Sinai is not a commandment. He cites Maimonides in the commentary to the Mishnah in Hullin, in the chapter on the sciatic nerve, according to whom commandments must be fulfilled by force of the command at Sinai and not by force of earlier events, and emphasizes that the sources are similar but not identical.
Motivation in fulfilling commandments versus justifying the validity of Jewish law
The lecturer explains that Maimonides in the Laws of Kings deals with the motivation that should accompany a person at the time of fulfilling a commandment—that is, acting because of the command of the Holy One, blessed be He. He argues that commandments do not depend on the question of whether commandments require intention, and that even according to the view that commandments do not require intention, commandments still require faith; and someone who does not recognize obligation to the command at Sinai, his commandments are not commandments, and in his view perhaps even his transgressions are not transgressions, and he is outside this entire world. He presents Maimonides in the commentary to the Mishnah in Hullin as dealing with the theoretical question of what gives the system the right to expect a person to observe Jewish law—that is, what justifies its demand of him—not what he must feel or intend.
A comparison to secular law and Kelsen’s basic norm
The lecturer argues that in state law, the legislator and the judge are not concerned with the citizen’s motivation for obeying the law, but with whether he obeyed it or not. He emphasizes that the theoretical question of validity and the justification of obligation is relevant to every legal system, and explains this through Hans Kelsen, who calls it “the basic norm.” He explains that the obligated person need not be aware of this justification, and that this is a question for the legislator or judge concerning the source of validity for making a claim against the citizen.
Putting on tefillin without belief in Sinai and the Chabad–Rabbi Yitzchak Hutner debate
The lecturer states that someone who does not believe in the revelation at Mount Sinai, or is not committed to the commandments, and puts on tefillin on the street, has not put on tefillin in the sense of fulfilling a commandment. He says that if that same person repented at noon, even though he put them on in the morning with Chabad guys and recited the blessing, he is still obligated to put them on again, because the first act was not a commandment. He formulates this as the claim that a commandment is done only by force of commitment to the command given at Sinai, and defines such an act as “bubkes, bubkes.” He uses Maimonides’ formulation about someone who performs worthy acts but does not fulfill a commandment: “You are not among the pious of the nations of the world, but among their wise.”
“Eight Chapters,” chapter 6: the virtuous person and the self-mastering person, philosophers versus the Sages
The lecturer reads chapter 6 of Eight Chapters about the distinction between “the self-mastering person,” who does good but desires evil and struggles with his inclination, and “the virtuous person,” who is naturally drawn to good and desires it. He presents the philosophers’ opinion that the virtuous person is better and more complete than the self-mastering person, because the evil inclination itself is a deficiency in the soul. He presents the words of the Sages that someone who desires transgressions and longs for them but overcomes them is better and more complete than someone who does not desire them, and cites “Whoever is greater than his fellow, his inclination is greater than his” and “According to the pain is the reward.” He emphasizes the statement of Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel: “A person should not say: I do not want to eat meat with milk… Rather: I do want to, but what can I do? My Father in Heaven has decreed it upon me,” and sets this up as a preference for acting out of command rather than out of natural inclination.
The contradiction question and Maimonides’ methodological stance
The lecturer notes that Maimonides sees a contradiction between the philosophers and the Sages and seeks to resolve it, thereby assuming that both sides appear correct in some sense and that a contradiction between them requires a solution. He says that another approach would have been to say that the philosophers are wrong in the face of the Sages and there is no difficulty, but for Maimonides the contradiction itself is a problem. He links this to the difficulty posed by the Laws of Kings, where the requirement is to act by force of command and not by force of rational judgment.
The distinction between natural inclination and “why” one actually acts, with the Aglei Tal as an example
The lecturer proposes that there is no contradiction between preferring a natural inclination toward good and requiring the motivation of obedience to command, because the question in chapter 6 is whether it is desirable for there to be a natural inclination to perform commandments, whereas the question in the Laws of Kings is why the person actually acts. He presents the Aglei Tal in its introduction on joyful Torah study, where he argues that it is a mistake to think that pleasure in learning damages acting for its own sake, because “this is the essence of the commandment of Torah study: to be happy, joyful, and delighted in one’s learning.” He cites the continuation in the Aglei Tal, which distinguishes between someone who studies for the sake of the commandment and enjoys it—which is for its own sake—and someone who studies only because of the pleasure—which is not for its own sake—and compares this to the distinction between “there is enjoyment” and “he studies because of the enjoyment.” He formulates this as the distinction between correlation and causation and applies it also to commandment observance.
The example of Jonah and the kikayon, and the claim about interest versus reason
The lecturer cites the verse in Jonah, “You had pity on the kikayon, for which you did not labor and which you did not grow, and shall I not have pity on Nineveh, that great city?” and argues that this a fortiori argument seems absurd if Jonah had pity only on himself. He presents two ways of resolving it, one through “the secret of worship for a higher need,” in which the Holy One, blessed be He, “needs” human actions, and the other through the distinction that the existence of an interest does not prove that the action was done because of that interest. He uses the analogy of a criminal investigation in which motive, opportunity, and means are circumstantial evidence and not proof, and applies this to the possibility that a person may have an inclination or an interest without the act being defined as stemming only from them.
Maimonides’ resolution in Eight Chapters: rational commandments versus decreed commandments
The lecturer reads Maimonides’ resolution that there is no dispute, because the philosophers were speaking about moral evils such as murder, theft, and robbery, where it is preferable that there be no desire at all; whereas the Sages were speaking about “decreed commandments” such as meat with milk, shaatnez, and forbidden sexual relations, where it is proper to say, “I do want to… but what can I do? My Father in Heaven has decreed it upon me.” He quotes Maimonides’ language about “the rational commandments” and notes that he also calls them “the rational commandments” as “some of our later Sages, who suffered from the sickness of the theologians, call them.” He points out that precisely then the difficulty with the Laws of Kings becomes sharper, because there Maimonides requires observance by force of command even with respect to the rational commandments of the Noahides, whereas in Eight Chapters he says that in morality it is preferable that the soul not desire evil.
The lecturer’s solution: good inclination and character refinement can coexist with commitment to command
The lecturer returns and formulates that there is no contradiction, because a person may have refined traits and a natural inclination toward good, and yet the operative motivation may still be responsiveness to command and not the inclination itself. He cites Rabbi Chaim Vital’s question why the Torah did not command character refinement, and distinguishes between the practical commandment of “to cleave to His ways” as actual behavior and a command regarding one’s inner psychological structure and the refinement of character traits. He suggests a practical implication in the question whether a person should aspire to leave the evil inclination in place and overcome it, or to refine the inclination itself, and adds that one can act both out of natural compassion and by force of command, so long as the command alone would have been sufficient to bring about action even without the feeling.
Idolatry out of love and fear: Abaye and Rava, Rashi’s interpretation, and Maimonides
The lecturer cites the Talmudic text in Sanhedrin: “One who worships idolatry out of love or out of fear—Abaye says he is liable, Rava says he is exempt,” and Rava’s reasoning: “If he accepted it as a god, yes; if not, no.” He explains that Rashi and most of the medieval authorities (Rishonim) interpreted this as referring to love and fear of a person and not of the idol, in order to explain how Rava exempts him, whereas Maimonides in the Laws of Idolatry 3:6 interprets it as love of the image because of its beauty, or fear lest it harm him as its worshippers imagine. He emphasizes that Maimonides rules that if “he accepted it as a god,” he is liable to stoning, but if he worshipped “out of love or out of fear” without accepting it as a god, he is exempt, even if he worshipped in its normal manner or by one of the four principal forms of worship.
“Accepting it as a god” as the basis of acting for its own sake, and the implication for serving God
The lecturer interprets “god” as the definition of one regarding whom “whatever he says, I do,” without external reasons of reward, punishment, love, or fear, and presents this as the point where “why” questions stop. He argues that serving for its own sake means acting because the command was stated, and accepting something as a god is the essential replacement that defines severe idolatry. He says that someone who serves the Holy One, blessed be He, out of love or fear serves not for its own sake, and that serving God for its own sake is commitment to the command itself, while the commandments to love God and fear God still exist but are not the motivation for the service.
Prayer, “a commandment of men learned by rote,” and the intention to discharge one’s obligation
The lecturer argues that the rebukes about prayer as “a commandment of men learned by rote” miss the main point, and presents as an excellent model someone who prays without desire, out of halakhic obligation. He states that the “first floor” of prayer is the intention to discharge one’s obligation and to act because of the command, and only afterward come “the intention of the words,” “the kavanot of the Ari,” and spiritual experiences as “floors two, three, four, five, six, all the way to tav.” He argues that someone who prays only because of love and fear has not discharged his obligation and must pray again, whereas someone who prays because of the command fulfills prayer for its own sake.
Maimonides in the Laws of Repentance: serving from fear versus serving from love as “doing the truth because it is truth”
The lecturer quotes Maimonides in Laws of Repentance chapter 10, law 1, where he rejects serving in order to receive blessings or life in the World to Come, and defines this as “one who serves out of fear,” which is not the level of the prophets and sages. He shows that Maimonides defines “one who serves out of love” as someone who fulfills commandments “not because of anything in the world… but does the truth because it is truth, and in the end good comes because of it.” He argues that the definition of serving from love here is not emotional but an expression of serving for its own sake, and distinguishes between the commandment of love of God as an emotion and “serving from love” as a motivation of truth and command. He concludes with a remark about love in the case of Jacob and Rachel as an opening to another discussion about the meaning of love that is not centered on oneself.
Full Transcript
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] All right, we’re beginning. In the previous lecture I spoke about the meaning of Jewish law—well, actually, the meaning of command, more precisely, not of Jewish law. The meaning of command. And we went through the eighth root, the beginning of Maimonides’ eighth root, where Maimonides explains what exactly the meaning of a command is, how it is divided between positive commandments and prohibitions. And just before I continue, anyone who doesn’t have some special problem, we’re really asking that you turn on your cameras. That is, anyone who can—I simply want to see who I’m talking to. It’s also the university’s instruction, so please, okay? Whoever can, unless there’s some special issue, but if not, then please turn them on. Fine. So I spoke a bit about the meaning of what a command is. After that we saw Maimonides in the Laws of Kings, at the end of chapter 8, where Maimonides talks about fulfilling a commandment not out of commitment to a divine command given at Sinai. And he says, essentially, that this is not a commandment. We saw Maimonides in the commentary to the Mishnah, in the chapter on the sciatic nerve in Hullin, and there Maimonides says something apparently similar, but I tried to explain why these things are not exactly identical. Can’t hear.
[Speaker B] Am I the only one who can’t hear? What? We can hear, we can hear.
[Speaker C] I can hear too.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Can you hear me?
[Speaker C] Yes, yes, we can hear.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay. So Maimonides in the commentary to the Mishnah in Hullin, Maimonides says that we’re really supposed to fulfill the commandments out of—Yitanel—
[Speaker D] Please mute. Whoever wants to speak can hit space, okay? Fine, I muted.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So Maimonides in the commentary to the Mishnah says that we’re really supposed to fulfill the commandments on the basis of the command at Sinai and not because of earlier events, like with the sciatic nerve or something like that. And I said that the difference between these two sources is that Maimonides in the Laws of Kings is talking about the intention that should—or the motivation that should—accompany a person when he fulfills a commandment. So he has to do it in order to carry out the command of the Holy One, blessed be He—not to discharge his obligation, to carry out the command of the Holy One, blessed be He. And I said that this is not identical with the question of whether commandments require intention or not. I make this claim even according to the one who says commandments do not require intention. Commandments may not require intention, but commandments do require faith. Meaning, someone in whose world there is no commitment at all to the command at Sinai, or who doesn’t believe at all that there was a command at Sinai—intentions won’t help him, and this also doesn’t depend on the opinion that commandments don’t require intention. His commandments are not commandments, and in my view—and maybe we’ll talk about this later—his transgressions also are not transgressions. Meaning, he’s simply outside this whole world entirely. By contrast, in the commentary to the Mishnah on the sciatic nerve, Maimonides is discussing the theoretical question: by what force do we expect a person to observe Jewish law? Not what his motivation should be when he does it, but what is the justification of the system that comes to demand from a person that he observe Jewish law. And there he says that this should be the command at Sinai. I illustrated this through the question whether we can make these same claims also in the context of state law, secular law. So the legislator, or the judge, is not interested in any way whatsoever in the motivation for why I obey the law. It’s irrelevant. As far as he’s concerned, what matters is whether I obey or not. And therefore what Maimonides writes in the Laws of Kings is not relevant to other legal systems that are not Jewish law. Because the motivation for why you obey the law is not important; the main thing is that you obey. Your thoughts—that’s your business. But the question that Maimonides raises in the commentary to the Mishnah in Hullin is a question relevant to every legal system, not only to Jewish law. The question is: by what authority does the system expect the citizen, or the person obligated by it, to be obligated? On what basis does it make claims against him? And there ought to be some answer to that. Hans Kelsen, an Austrian philosopher of law, argues—he calls this the basic norm. There is some fundamental norm by force of which there is validity to the demand that a person obey Jewish law, or the law. Okay? And that’s true of every legal system. It doesn’t derive from, and it isn’t connected to, the question of what should stand behind his action, what inner motivation he should have. That’s not the question. This is a theoretical question. What is the justification for our demanding that a person obey the law? Independently of that, he may be unaware of this justification—that makes no difference whatsoever. This is a question that the judge asks himself, or the legislator asks himself. By what authority do I expect the citizen to obey the law? That is a completely different question from what is incumbent on the citizen himself to think when he comes to obey the law, or from what motivation he ought to be driven in order to obey the law. Maimonides in the Laws of Kings, chapter 8, is dealing with the question of the person’s motivation. Maimonides in the commentary to the Mishnah on the sciatic nerve is dealing with the theoretical question of what gives this obligation to observe Jewish law any validity at all. Okay, now, someone asked this question, I think, last time, and I want to address it now. Maimonides in the commentary to the Mishnah has an introduction, an introduction to Avot, and of course it’s called Eight Chapters. Where do I find it? One second. Here. Avot. I’m sharing with you now chapter 6. Now we’re going to read it, and as we read it, remember the introduction I just gave. Meaning, that a person has to fulfill the commandments by force of the command at Sinai. A person who did it because reason compelled him to—because it seemed to him the right thing, the proper thing, the moral thing, he wants to be connected to earlier generations, to our heritage, and so on—all these motivations, if you fulfill commandments on their basis, you have not fulfilled a commandment. And I mentioned the dispute between the Lubavitcher Rebbe and Rabbi Yitzchak Hutner about putting on tefillin, because if you grab someone who doesn’t believe in the revelation at Sinai or isn’t obligated in the commandments, and you put tefillin on him in the street—the man did not put on tefillin. Meaning, if he repented at noon and comes to ask, I’ll tell him: you have to put on tefillin, you haven’t put on tefillin today yet. Even though he tells me, but in the morning, at the central bus station, two Chabad guys stopped me and put tefillin on me, I even said the blessing and everything. That is not a commandment. It’s bubkes, bubkes. There’s nothing there. You did not fulfill a commandment; you need to put on tefillin again. And the reason is that a commandment is done only by force of commitment to the command that was given at Sinai. If you do it for another reason and you do not recognize that obligation, maybe you did a good act—and even that can be debated; putting on tefillin, I don’t know why that is a good act—but it is not a commandment. What Maimonides calls: you are not among the pious of the nations of the world, but among their wise. Meaning, maybe you do worthy acts, good acts, but you are not among the pious of the nations of the world—that is, you are not performing a commandment. That’s the claim. So chapter 6—chapter 6 apparently contains a contradiction to this principle that we saw in Maimonides. Let’s read it now, and meanwhile think what you think about it. Chapter 6, on the difference between the virtuous person and the self-mastering person. There are two kinds of figures or types here that Maimonides compares. One of them he calls the virtuous person, and the second—of course this is all translated from Arabic, but this is the translation here—the second he calls the self-mastering person. So he says as follows: The philosophers said that the self-mastering person, even though he performs excellent actions, still he does what is good while desiring evil actions and longing for them. And he struggles with his inclination, he contends with his inclination, and in his action opposes that to which his faculty, desire, and disposition incline him. Meaning, who is the self-mastering person, as distinct from the virtuous person? Right now we’re defining the type called the self-mastering person. What does that mean? It’s someone who does everything exactly as he should; he does only excellent deeds, only good things, but he desires to do bad things. He doesn’t do them, he only desires them, so he struggles with his inclination, overcomes it, and does good things and only good things. Okay? But his inclinations are not all good; he also has inclinations toward evil. So he suffers in doing these good things—“suffers” meaning he struggles, it costs him effort, not that he’s sorry or regrets it. Okay? That’s the self-mastering person—that’s one type. The second type is the virtuous person. So let’s read: But the virtuous person is drawn in his action after that toward which his desire and disposition shine for him, and he does good things and desires and longs for them. What is the virtuous person? He is someone who naturally desires to do good. As opposed to the self-mastering person, who has to fight his evil inclination, the virtuous person has no evil inclination—he slaughtered it. He has only a good inclination and he does good things as a natural tendency, simply because his inclination is good. And the philosophers agreed that the virtuous person is better and more complete than the self-mastering person. Yes, the philosophers claim that the virtuous person, that person whose inclinations too are good and not just his behavior, is more complete than the self-mastering person—than the one who behaves perfectly, just like the virtuous person, but has evil inclinations and merely overcomes them. Who is better? The virtuous person is better, so the philosophers claim. But they said that the self-mastering person may stand in many matters in the same place as the virtuous person, yet his level is necessarily lower, because he desires evil action even though he does not do it; but the very longing for it is an evil trait in the soul. That’s what the philosophers claim: the evil inclination itself is something bad, not only bad behavior. Your behavior is good, but if you have an evil inclination, that is bad. And Solomon already said something like this: “The soul of the wicked desires evil.” Yes, I’m reading here: “The soul of the wicked desires evil.” And he said regarding the joy of the virtuous person in doing good things, and the distress of the non-virtuous person in doing them—this saying too is from Proverbs: “It is joy to the righteous to do justice, and ruin to the workers of iniquity.” Yes, the righteous person rejoices when he does the right thing, and “workers of iniquity”—here the interpretation pulls the verse a bit away from its plain meaning—workers of iniquity work hard in order to do good. Meaning, what are called here “workers of iniquity” are not people who actually act badly; they do good, they only desire to do evil. That isn’t the plain meaning of the verse, but that’s how Maimonides learns it from this verse. So this is what appears from the words of the Torah in a way that accords with what the philosophers mentioned. What comes out in practice? The virtuous person is better than the self-mastering person. Okay. And when we investigated the words of the Sages on this matter, we found that according to them, the person who desires transgressions and longs for them is better and more complete than one who does not desire them and does not suffer in refraining from them. So much so that they said that the better and more complete a person is, the stronger his longing for transgressions and his pain in refraining from them will be. And they brought stories about this and said: “Whoever is greater than his fellow, his inclination is greater than his.” So the Sages are apparently telling us something that contradicts the philosophers. They argue that someone who desires transgressions and longs for them but overcomes that longing is better and more complete than someone who has nothing to struggle with, whose natural inclination leads him to do good. Yes, the greater and more complete the person, the stronger his longing for transgressions and his pain in refraining from them. “Whoever is greater than his fellow, his inclination is greater than his.” By the way, just as a logical note, what’s written here does not prove what Maimonides says. Right? Do you have an idea why? “Whoever is greater than his fellow, his inclination is greater than his.” Does that mean that the self-mastering person is greater than the virtuous person? Logic.
[Speaker B] No, no, because the logic is reversed, like the connection is—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The logic is of course reversed. Maimonides is not saying that whoever has a greater inclination is greater than his fellow, but that whoever is greater than his fellow has a greater inclination. The claim is that if you are a great person, then somehow either the Holy One, blessed be He, puts it in you, or it’s nature, whatever—but a stronger inclination awakens in you. Great people have stronger inclinations. That does not mean the reverse sentence, that someone who has a strong inclination is necessarily a greater person because he overcomes his inclination. This is a factual statement. It’s not an evaluative statement. What Maimonides says here is not a normative statement about who is greater and who is lesser. Here Maimonides is making a factual, psychological statement, that someone greater has a stronger evil inclination. That’s all. Apparently it has nothing to do at all with what he says above. Here Maimonides, it seems to me, is pulling the sources a bit away from their plain meaning when he uses them—but that’s what there is. What he means is clear, yes? Not only that—I continue reading—not only that, but they said that the reward of the self-mastering person is greater according to the measure of his pain in mastering himself. They said: “According to the pain is the reward.” That already is connected to us, right? Here Maimonides is already saying: according to the suffering—however much you suffered in order to do the good thing—that is the reward. Meaning, here it really does seem that the one who suffers, the one who has to overcome his inclination, is indeed greater. And furthermore, Maimonides continues, they commanded that a person be self-mastering, and warned against saying: by my nature I do not desire this transgression, even if the Torah had not prohibited it. And this is their statement: Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel says, a person should not say: I do not want to eat meat with milk, I do not want to wear shaatnez, I do not want to have relations with a forbidden woman; rather, I do want to, but what can I do? My Father in Heaven has decreed it upon me. So here it is really stated explicitly that the self-mastering person is in fact the ideal service, not the virtuous person. You are not really supposed to do it from natural inclination, but because the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded. I do want to—but what can I do? My Father in Heaven has decreed it upon me. So for now Maimonides has brought us the philosophers’ view that the virtuous person is better. The Sages’ view is that the one who conquers his inclination, or conquers his soul, is better. Good. So now we have a difficulty. Yes? The next sentence is: And according to the plain meaning of these two sayings, at first glance they contradict one another. And it is not so. In another moment he’ll explain why it’s not a contradiction. But let’s stop here for a moment. What exactly have we seen up to this point? First of all, an interesting methodological remark. Maimonides brings the philosophers’ opinion on one side and the Sages’ opinion on the other. And then he has a problem: there’s a contradiction here. What would many people tell us today? Fine, the philosophers—with all due respect, or maybe not due respect—the Sages taught us that they’re mistaken. So what’s the question? Why is that a difficulty? If it’s a difficulty, that means Maimonides accepts what the philosophers say, but also accepts the authority of the Sages. Right? He doesn’t accept the philosophers’ authority, but he identifies with what they say. He says they’re right. On the other hand, of course, Maimonides accepts the authority of the Sages, and therefore there is a contradiction. For Maimonides, the fact that there is a contradiction between philosophy and the words of the Sages—or, doesn’t matter, reasoning and the words of the Sages—is a difficulty. Many people will tell you that if there is a contradiction between philosophy or reasoning and the words of the Sages, that means the reasoning is wrong or the philosophy is not right, and that’s all—there is no difficulty here. For Maimonides it is not like that. For Maimonides there are two things here; both seem correct in some sense, or I accept both as correct, and therefore I have a problem and need to find a reconciliation. That’s the first point, and it’s less important for our purposes; it’s just a parenthetical remark. What touches directly on our issue is, again, what I opened with. I remind you again: I opened with Maimonides in the Laws of Kings, where Maimonides said that someone who fulfills commandments not out of command but out of rational judgment, because it seems sensible to him or good or proper or decent—that is not a commandment. Right? That’s what he said there. The words of the Sages he brings here apparently fit that, right? What they say here fits what he said there. Because what do the Sages tell us here? Don’t do it because your good inclination takes you to do it—on the contrary. Your inclination can take you wherever it wants. You have to do it because of the command. What can I do? My Father in Heaven has decreed it upon me. In that sense this fits completely with what Maimonides said at the end of chapter 8 of the Laws of Kings, right? But the philosophers’ view—and Maimonides himself—that in fact greater is the one who does things because of his good inclination, not because by force of command he overcomes his evil inclination, but because he has a good inclination and is naturally drawn to do it. How does that fit with what Maimonides said in the Laws of Kings? That’s another reason I would have expected Maimonides not to see this as a difficulty, but rather to adopt the Sages’ view—as he also rules in practice in the Laws of Kings—and explain on that basis that the philosophers here are simply mistaken, and that’s all. What’s the problem? Why is there a difficulty here? Why do we need to reconcile the positions? Okay? So there’s some problem here specifically not on the side of the Sages. The side of the Sages fits what we saw in Maimonides. But the side of the philosophers, on its face, seems really opposed. And if so, then why does Maimonides make a difficulty out of it? The philosophers here are simply wrong, end of story. What’s the issue? Why is there any need to reconcile? Good. What do you say? Do the philosophers’ words really contradict what Maimonides says in the Laws of Kings?
[Speaker B] The question is what their criterion is for deciding what is greater. Like, what is the relation here really?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What do you mean?
[Speaker B] Again, if they’re measuring by one criterion, like how beneficial they are to society, then maybe the virtuous person is preferable. But if your criterion is the reward you get in the World to Come, then the words of the Sages fit better. So again, the question is what measure, what ruler each one is using.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, but Maimonides doesn’t bring in here the question of what the good is—that’s not the discussion. The discussion is under the assumption that we know what is good and what is bad. The question is: if you have an inclination to do good and an inclination to do evil and you overcome it—that’s the comparison he’s making here. So I don’t think there’s room here to divide based on the content of what is good and what is bad; that’s not the point. Especially if you remember, I also mentioned in the previous lecture that in the Laws of Kings Maimonides speaks about a resident alien. And a resident alien—wait, one second.
[Speaker F] Maybe it’s because there’s a difference between the motivation to do an act and whether you simply have the inclination or don’t?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay, that’s already starting to get closer. One second—I’m just not managing to do something here while I’m trying, sorry.
[Speaker G] There’s the idea that if someone has something that is difficult for him and he works very hard on himself and brings himself to a place where it becomes habitual and is no longer difficult for him, then he continues to receive reward even when it’s no longer hard for him. He continues to receive reward as if it were hard for him because he brought himself to the place where it’s no longer difficult, where now he’s used to it. So the ideal state, really, is like how we don’t ask the Holy One, blessed be He, for tests. We don’t want tests, even though if there is a test and we overcome it, then we’ll receive reward and that’s good.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The question is, assuming this is in our hands: am I supposed to work on it so that I won’t have an evil inclination, or on the contrary, leave the evil inclination there and overcome it? Who is better?
[Speaker B] Maybe again it’s the distinction between a sage and a righteous person. If we’re talking in terms of righteousness, then it’s worthwhile to work on yourself; but if it’s just a matter of behaving wisely, why do I need this work?
[Speaker G] It’s like asking—there’s this statement that in the place where penitents stand, complete righteous people do not stand. So then what’s preferable—to start out as a sinner and then become a penitent because that’s what it says? Even though it’s true, this thing about the penitent, that doesn’t mean that we want to be first of all—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But a penitent versus a complete righteous person is not exactly the same thing, because the penitent at first was wicked; he wasn’t someone conquering his inclination—he was just wicked. And after he repents, he can become someone who is virtuous and not someone conquering his inclination. These are two independent questions. The comparison between a penitent and a complete righteous person is not—
[Speaker G] A comparison between the virtuous person and the self-mastering person. I’m comparing regarding this issue of— not praising—I’m comparing more in the sense that there are situations where after they happen we say they are very good, but that doesn’t mean we’re supposed to aspire to them from the outset.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] In practice, he tells you who is better.
[Speaker G] So the question is who is better—a righteous person who was always righteous, or a penitent? I don’t know.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So I’m saying: on the one hand Maimonides says in chapter 8 of the Laws of Kings that better is the one who masters himself—you have to do it because of the command, not because of rational compulsion—and here he tells me, at least in the name of the philosophers, that the one who is better is the virtuous person. So whichever way you look at it, there’s a contradiction here. Telling me that sometimes it’s like this and sometimes like that doesn’t resolve the matter. Then let him say both here and there that sometimes it’s like this and sometimes like that. But he doesn’t say that. Look, the point is very simple.
[Speaker H] Rabbi, can I ask something? Yes. Why does it matter at all who is more and who is less? Just asking.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It has practical implications for betrothal. Just kidding. Just in order to know who is more excellent. A practical implication, for example: if I can work on my inclinations, should I try to do that, or on the contrary leave the inclination there? Is there no point in refining the inclination? Is the point simply to do the right thing—indeed, to overcome the inclination? And of course you can say—and I think that’s what Shimon meant earlier—that it may be that even if the person who overcomes his inclination is better, it’s still preferable to refine the inclination because maybe you won’t succeed in overcoming it. Meaning, even if in principle, if you really did overcome it, you’d be better, who says you’ll manage? So maybe as a safety measure you should try to reduce the inclination or destroy the evil inclination and become someone who is naturally good. That still doesn’t mean that essentially the virtuous person is better than the one who conquers his inclination. Okay? So there are practical implications here. Meaning, I’m remembering now, there’s a famous question by Rabbi Chaim Vital, who asks why the Torah did not command character refinement. There are various answers to this—some more interesting, some less—but what interests me is the question. Why? Because the Torah did command character refinement. The Torah did command it. It says to cleave to His attributes: just as He is compassionate, so you be compassionate; just as He is gracious, so you be gracious. This is a counted positive commandment according to all the enumerators of the commandments. So what kind of question is that—why didn’t the Torah command it? It did command it. There isn’t some addition here like in the famous story about Rabbi Chaim. I think what he means to ask is: when the Torah tells me to cleave to the attributes of the Holy One, blessed be He, what are the attributes of the Holy One, blessed be He? Does the Holy One, blessed be He, have attributes in the same sense that human beings have attributes? Is He kindhearted in the same sense we speak about human beings? That doesn’t seem likely.
[Speaker B] No, but the attributes by which the Torah describes Him are good attributes.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That is, the way He appears or conducts Himself in the world. Right? Those are the attributes of the Holy One, blessed be He. When we cleave to the attributes of the Holy One, blessed be He, the intention is to behave the way we see Him behaving, or the way the Torah describes Him as behaving, right? Meaning, to cleave to the attributes of the Holy One, blessed be He, means to do what He does. It’s a practical commandment. It’s not a commandment about inner character traits. It’s a commandment about what to do in practice. To conduct oneself in practice the way the Holy One, blessed be He, conducts Himself, as much as possible. And about this Rabbi Chaim Vital asks: but there’s also the issue of correcting one’s inner traits, and the question is why the Torah doesn’t command that. The Torah commands conduct, but why doesn’t the Torah command that I correct my traits, that I be humble, that I not be arrogant, that I not be too stingy, right? All of Maimonides’ laws of character traits. Why doesn’t the Torah command that within its system of commandments? And in fact it doesn’t command that. The Torah commands modes of behavior; it does not command the psychic structure, the correction of the traits themselves. And that’s what Rabbi Chaim Vital is asking. Fine, so there are answers, but I was suddenly reminded of this distinction just now because it somewhat resembles what we’re talking about here. The question is: to what extent are your traits corrected? That basically means that when you behave well, you do it because your natural tendency is simply to do good; you’ve corrected your traits. That’s what Rabbi Chaim Vital asks: why doesn’t the Torah command that? What does the Torah command? It commands you to do what needs to be done regardless of what your traits are saying. A person may have bad traits, be corrupt in his character, and have urges to do bad things, but he overcomes them because he does the right things and cleaves to the ways the Holy One, blessed be He, behaves; on the practical level he cleaves to Him, okay? But his traits are corrupted. So here this is really parallel to “one who conquers his inclination” versus “the excellent person,” right? Rabbi Chaim Vital’s correction of traits is to become excellent, to become someone who does things because his traits are corrected, so he does what his inclinations tell him to do, his good inclinations. By contrast, if he hasn’t corrected his traits, but he walks in the ways of the Holy One, blessed be He, without correcting the traits, then he is basically conquering his soul, right? Because in fact he has an evil inclination, he hasn’t corrected his traits, but he does the right thing, he overcomes his inclination. Okay? So this is really parallel to that distinction. Look, I’ll tell you why in my opinion there’s no contradiction at all. When Maimonides speaks in the Laws of Kings about the motivation for why one must do commandments, he’s speaking about the question: why am I doing the commandment? When he discusses here, in chapter six of the Eight Chapters, who is better, he’s not speaking about the question of why I do the commandment. He’s speaking about the question of whether it is proper for me to have a natural tendency to do the commandments or not. I’ll give you an example. For instance, there may be a person whose traits are completely corrected—let’s return to Rabbi Chaim Vital’s example—his traits are completely corrected, he naturally aspires to do only good. Now you ask him: and why do you do the good? So he says: not because of my natural aspiration; I do it because the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded it. There is no principled obstacle to such a state, right? That is, a person can have a natural tendency to do good, but the motivation for why he does the good is not because of that tendency. His traits are corrected, but when he does the act, he does it because of the command of the Holy One, blessed be He, not because of his natural tendency. There is no contradiction in such a statement. Look, as an example of this, I’ll leave Maimonides for a moment and go to the famous introduction of the Eglei Tal. The Eglei Tal says as follows: “While speaking, I recall what I heard—that some people err from the path of reason concerning the study of our holy Torah, and they said that one who studies and develops novel insights and rejoices and delights in his learning, this is not Torah study so fully for its own sake, as it would be if he learned simply, deriving no pleasure from the learning, and learning only for the sake of the commandment.” You see, really parallel, right? To Maimonides. That is, there is a difference between one who studies and rejoices in his learning, and one who studies only for the sake of the commandment; he takes no delight in the learning. So those people who err from the path of reason claim that learning for the sake of the commandment is greater than the learning of that person who rejoices and delights in his learning. The one who conquers himself is greater than the excellent person, right? “But the one who studies and delights in his learning,” I continue reading, “after all, his own pleasure is mixed into his learning.” And therefore they argue that this is learning of lower quality; the superior commandment is to study only because of the commandment, not because of pleasure or joy or anything like that. The Eglei Tal says: “And in truth this is a well-known mistake.” It is simply a mistake to think that way. Why? “On the contrary, this is the essence of the commandment of Torah study: that one should be joyful and glad and delight in his learning, and then the words of Torah are absorbed into his blood, and since he derives pleasure from the words of Torah, he becomes attached to the Torah.” Yes, and he brings the Zohar and so on. “And in the holy Zohar, both the good inclination and the evil inclination grow only through joy. The good inclination grows from the joy of Torah, and the evil inclination from joy in transgressions. And if you say that through the joy he has from the learning it is called not for its own sake, or at least partly for its own sake and partly not—a kind of intermediate state—then this joy would actually diminish the power of the commandment and dull its light. So how can the good inclination grow from this? How can it be that the good inclination grows from that joy? On the contrary, that joy makes the commandment less excellent. And since the good inclination grows from it, certainly this is the essence of the commandment.” One might add, after all, every morning we bless: “Please make the words of Your Torah sweet in our mouths, Lord our God,” right? In essence our expectation is that the Holy One, blessed be He, will let us enjoy the learning. Will let us enjoy the learning. So how could it be that enjoyment of the learning detracts from the quality of the commandment of Torah study? Therefore he says: it cannot be; that is a mistake. Up to here, very well-known words of the Eglei Tal. But now there is a sentence that he adds, and it is less well known. He says as follows: “And I admit that one who studies not for the sake of the commandment of study, but only because he takes pleasure in his learning, this is called learning not for its own sake, like one who eats matzah not for the sake of the commandment but only for the sake of pleasure and eating. And about this they said: a person should always engage in Torah even not for its own sake, because from not for its own sake one comes to for its own sake. But one who studies for the sake of the commandment and delights in his learning—this is learning for its own sake and entirely holy, for the pleasure too is a commandment.” So what is he saying? On the face of it he says two contradictory things. On the one hand he says learning should be accompanied by pleasure, and the pleasure is part of the commandment, it is important. On the other hand he says one who studies because of the pleasure, that is learning not for its own sake. Why? Because the fact that you have pleasure does not mean that you are learning because of the pleasure—those are two different things. The fact that you have pleasure is excellent; it improves the learning, it becomes more absorbed within you, you identify with it more, you understand it more, so joy is an excellent thing, it is part of the commandment. But it cannot be the motivation for why you study. If the joy is the motivation—if because of the joy and the pleasure you study—then that really is learning not for its own sake. A subtle distinction, but a clear one. That is, there is a difference between saying: I enjoy the learning, and saying: I study because of the enjoyment; the enjoyment is my motivation. The practical difference will be what happens on a day when I have no enjoyment. Will I study or not? So if I generally have enjoyment, but I don’t study because of the enjoyment, I merely have enjoyment, while the motivation is that I study because it is a commandment, then even if one day I have no enjoyment, I will continue to study, right? But if someone studies because of the enjoyment, then if one day he has no enjoyment, he will have no motivation to study, so he won’t study. That is, there is a difference between these two people. There is a difference between saying: I study and enjoy it, and saying: I study because I enjoy it. This is all those statisticians’ jokes about the relationship between correlation and causation. When there is correlation between two things, that still does not mean there is a causal relationship between them. Two different things. Okay? So therefore here too, the Eglei Tal says: let there be correlation; if I have joy from learning, if the joy accompanies the learning, excellent. Causation—no. That is, the learning should not be out of enjoyment for the sake of enjoyment. That is something entirely different. The same thing I want to claim for you here: there is no contradiction between what Maimonides writes in the Laws of Kings and what he writes in chapter six. What he writes in the Laws of Kings concerns the question of why you do the commandments. You do them because of the command. The question whether you should have a natural tendency to do commandments—the answer is yes, maybe yes; the philosophers say yes. But not to do the commandments because of the tendency. These are two different things. The question he discusses in chapter six is whether it is proper that my natural tendency be to do the commandments or not. So it is proper that I have a natural tendency to do the commandments; that is what the philosophers say. In the Laws of Kings Maimonides asks why to do the commandments, not whether it is proper to have such a tendency. Should one do the commandments because of the tendency? The answer is no. One must do the commandments because of the command, not because of the tendency. Therefore there is no connection, no contradiction, between what Maimonides says in chapter six and what he says in the Laws of Kings. These are two different things. Fine, as I said in the previous class, we’re in the middle, so we’re stopping for a few minutes. I’m taking a four-minute break just so there won’t be an hour and a half of Zoom that exhausts all of us. Wash your face, get yourselves a cup of coffee, and in four minutes we’ll continue. Okay? Fine, let’s get back to our topic. There are a few participants here who were dark the entire time until now. I’m asking everyone who can to turn on. Whoever can’t, let him tell me he has some problem, that’s fine, but in principle I’m really asking to be with cameras on. Okay, is everyone with us? Whoever didn’t turn on a camera—what, is he not with us? Well? Or, are you with us?
[Speaker C] Yes, yes, I’m with you.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay. And Elihai? I just can’t tell who’s here and who isn’t. Elihai, are you with us?
[Speaker C] Here, here. Okay.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Good. So I want to give an example of the distinction I made earlier, just as an anecdote, an amusing example. The verse in the book of Jonah says there, yes, when the Holy One, blessed be He, dries up the gourd, Jonah complains, and then the Holy One, blessed be He, says to him: “You had pity on the gourd, for which you did not labor nor make it grow, and should I not have pity on Nineveh, the great city?” Right, people and many animals and so on. It is a kind of a fortiori argument. If you had pity on the gourd, then you cannot expect that I should not have pity on Nineveh, the great city. Now, what is this a fortiori argument? What is the meaning of this comparison? On the face of it, this is a completely baseless a fortiori argument. Jonah did not pity the gourd; Jonah pitied himself. He needed the gourd because it gave him shade. What does that have to do at all with the question of how much he worked on it or didn’t work on it? This is not about pity at all. So once I said to the guys in the yeshiva in Yeruham, when I taught there at sunrise after Yom Kippur—they prayed there on Har Avnon, I still remember—so I told them there are two ways to resolve this. One possibility: we are basically assuming that the Holy One, blessed be He, does this for the sake of Nineveh, while Jonah needs the gourd for himself, so there is no room for comparison between them. But this can be resolved in two ways: either by giving up the first assumption or the second. That is, one possibility is to say that the Holy One, blessed be He, is not doing this for Nineveh; He is doing it for Himself. What is called the secret of divine service for a higher need. The things we do are done for the sake of the Holy One, blessed be He; He needs us. And it is not true that He needs nothing and everything is only for us. The medieval authorities (Rishonim), or in certain books, call this the secret of divine service for a higher need, because somehow it seems a bit too sensitive to say out loud that the Holy One, blessed be He, needs us. That is one possibility for resolving it. And if that is so, then there is a comparison between Jonah and the Holy One, blessed be He: just as Jonah needed the gourd, the Holy One, blessed be He, needs Nineveh. So there is room for comparison. The second possibility is of course to say the opposite. Jonah needed the gourd, and this is what concerns us here—Jonah needed the gourd. Does that mean that when he asked the Holy One, blessed be He, regarding the gourd, it was not because he pitied it but because of self-interest? Who says so? He had an interest, I agree. But who says that the request was because of the interest? Two different things. Exactly what I said regarding the Eglei Tal and Maimonides, right? The fact that you have an interest, or the fact that you have a motive, does not mean that you did what you did because of the motive. You know that in criminal law, very often the investigator and the judge need to be convinced that there was opportunity, motive, and means, right? Those are always the three things in thrillers; they always tell you what you need in order to prove a crime is opportunity—possibility, what is it called?—and means and motive. Okay? Means and motive. Now, one needs to understand that all these things are circumstantial evidence. The fact that I had opportunity, motive, and means does not mean that I did it because of the motive, or that I did it at all. They are only circumstantial evidence in the end. These are conditions for conviction, but they are not sufficient for conviction. To convict, you also need testimony or to see that it really happened. All these are conditions that say that if they are present, then the suspicion is more well founded. One can begin investigating. But that is not the end of the investigation; it is the beginning of the investigation. And here too, the same thing. The fact that Jonah had an interest in having a gourd because it gave him shade—does that mean that he did not pity the gourd at all and did everything purely for himself? No, no. It may be that I have an interest, but I do it not because of the interest; I do it for the sake of Heaven or for the sake of the gourd. At least logically that is certainly possible. Does it happen in practice or not? That depends on whether you have a generous eye or a less generous eye when you look at Jonah. Yes, like political commentators, who every time a politician does something immediately translate it into the question of what he is trying to gain, what his interest is. There is a possibility, at least hypothetically, that he also does things because he really thinks they are right. And that is not contradicted by the fact that he has an interest, even if he does have an interest. It is still not certain that he does it because of the interest or for the sake of the interest. Those are two different things. There is some sort of leap here, right? One needs to pay attention; sometimes one may think that this leap is indeed justified, but one has to understand that there is a leap here—it is not the same thing. So likewise, one moment—in the same way, I want to claim that the fact that you have an inclination to do something, even a good inclination, to do something, does not necessarily mean that when you do it, you do it because of the good inclination, because of the impulse to do good that is in you; rather, you do it because of responding to the command. That can definitely be the case. And Maimonides’ model is basically the one he places before our eyes: on the one hand we should have a good inclination, but the act itself we should do because of the command. Okay? Did someone comment earlier? Who wanted to comment earlier?
[Speaker G] So say that both can be true. The two things don’t contradict each other; they can exist together too.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Of course, that’s exactly the claim. I can have a good inclination, but I do it not because of the good inclination but because of responding to the command. That is exactly the claim.
[Speaker G] I’m saying, for example in the case of Jonah, it doesn’t have to be either he did it or wanted it for his own interest, or he wanted it for the sake of the gourd. Why should it be?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That situation brings us into the topic at the beginning of tractate Zevachim: someone who does things for the sake of a Passover offering and for the sake of a peace offering. That is, there are situations in which you have double motivation. You do it both for this reason and for that reason; there are two reasons. But it isn’t precise, because one has to define what a reason is. That is, if the question I am asking is this: suppose I didn’t have a good inclination—would I still do it? If yes, that is called doing it because of the command. I don’t care at the moment that when I do have a good inclination, I also do it for that reason. Therefore, for example, when I give charity to a poor person, and I really do feel compassion, and I give charity so that overall the sense of compassion is part of my motivation to give charity, that does not mean I did not perform a commandment. Whether I performed a commandment or not will be measured in the place where I do not have that feeling of compassion—would I still give? If yes, then even where I do have that feeling of compassion, and even if I did it because of that feeling of compassion, then clearly I did it also because of that feeling, but also because of the commandment, because the fact is I do it even when I don’t have that feeling. Therefore even when there is double motivation, it doesn’t matter. The question is whether the command is a sufficient condition, not whether it is necessary—whether it is a sufficient condition. That is, whether the existence of the command by itself would be enough for me to do it. The fact that in practice right now I also have other motives and I am acting because of them as well—that is perfectly fine, there is nothing wrong with it, it’s fine. As long as the command is enough to cause me to fulfill it. If that is so, then it is a perfect commandment. Okay? That is basically the claim. Now just to complete the picture, let’s only move on to Maimonides’ answer for those who don’t know it. We read the difficulty, right? Between one who rules over his inclination and the excellent person. So Maimonides says: “According to the apparent meaning of these two statements at first thought, the two statements contradict one another”—yes, that sentence. He says: “But this is not so.” It is not true, there is no contradiction between the philosophers and the sages of blessed memory. “Rather, both are true, and there is no disagreement between them at all. The evils that are considered evils by the philosophers are the very ones about which they said that one who does not desire them is better than one who desires them and masters himself away from them. And these are the things universally recognized by all human beings as evil—such as bloodshed, theft, robbery, fraud”—meaning moral things—“and harming one who has not harmed you, and repaying evil to one who did good to you, and disgracing parents, and the like. And these are the commandments about which the sages, peace be upon them, said: had they not been written, they would have been fit to be written.” Okay? In essence, even if they had not been written, I would know these things by reason. “And some of our later sages, who were afflicted with the disease of the dialecticians, called them rational commandments. And there is no doubt that a soul that desires one of these things and longs for it is a deficient soul, and that the excellent soul will not desire any of these evils at all and will not be troubled by refraining from them.” In moral intelligibles, there it is better that your natural impulse also leads you in that direction, and that is better than someone who has a corrupt inclination but overcomes it and does the good thing. This was said about the rational commandments, about the moral commandments. “But the things about which the sages said that one who rules over himself concerning them is better and receives greater reward are the revelational commandments.” And that is true, because “had the Torah not existed, they would not be evils at all. Therefore they said that a person should let himself desire them and should have no deterrent from them except the Torah.” The revelational commandments—there it is preferable to fulfill them only because of the command and not because of developing some inclination that says I recoil from eating pork, or an inclination to eat Sabbatical-year produce, to eat things one is commanded to eat, or matzah on Passover. Okay, no, no need. Those things that are revelational commandments and not rational ones—there there is no issue at all that I should have a natural inclination to do them. There I should do them because of the command. Where are the philosophers right? In the rational moral commandments. And indeed one must understand that when philosophers speak about good and evil, they obviously are not talking about eating pork. Philosophers do not deal with Jewish law; they speak about good and evil in the moral sense. Maimonides says: if so, they really are right, because in the moral context the excellent person really is preferable to the one who conquers himself. But the sages of blessed memory—within Jewish law there are both rational commandments and revelational commandments. These sayings of the sages deal only with the revelational commandments, because only in them is the person who acts by conquering himself preferable, that is, one who has an evil inclination over one who is restrained by a good inclination. And that is what he says: “Consider the wisdom of the sages, peace be upon them, and what they illustrated, for they did not say: a person should not say, ‘I do not wish to murder, I do not wish to steal, I do not wish to lie’; rather, ‘I do wish to, and so on.’” No, they did not say all that. “Rather, they brought examples that are all revelational: meat and milk, wearing shaatnez, and forbidden sexual relations. And these commandments and the like are those which Scripture calls ‘My statutes,’ as in: ‘statutes that I have decreed for you, and you have no permission to question them.’ The nations of the world challenge them and Satan prosecutes about them,” and so on. What is Maimonides saying? Maimonides says that even the examples the sages bring when they say that the one who rules himself is preferable to the excellent person—those examples are examples of revelational commandments, not rational commandments. Why? Because indeed this principle, that the one who rules himself is preferable to the excellent person, is true only regarding revelational commandments. Now notice that the point I made earlier becomes even sharper, because what Maimonides is actually telling us here is that specifically in the moral commandments, there it is preferable that you have a good inclination to do them. Right? But when Maimonides says in the Laws of Kings that one must fulfill things not because reason compels it or because of a natural tendency, but because of the command—what is he talking about? What kind of commandments? The commandment for a resident alien, the seven Noahide commandments. What sort of commandments are those? Rational ones. Rational moral ones. Maimonides himself writes that these are commandments toward which reason inclines. So with regard to those very commandments, Maimonides writes there that these are the commandments in which one must do them because of the command and not because of the natural tendency. And here Maimonides says no, no—in rational commandments, there specifically it is preferable that you have a natural tendency and not that you overcome an evil inclination. So this really is a contradiction. After I presented that contradiction in the difficulty—but in Maimonides’ solution it is much worse. In Maimonides’ solution it is a frontal contradiction. Not only does Maimonides not resolve what I am saying, but after he resolves what he resolves, the difficulty remains in his words in a completely frontal way. Because regarding rational commandments, in the Laws of Kings Maimonides says to do it because of the command, while in the Eight Chapters Maimonides says it is preferable that you have a good inclination to do it, unlike revelational commandments. And therefore I repeat what I said earlier: there is no contradiction. There is no contradiction. It is true that it is preferable that you have a good inclination to do it naturally, but your motivation for why to do it should be because of the command. Like there in the Eglei Tal with enjoyment of learning. Okay, it is important that you have enjoyment. A more perfected person is a person whose traits are corrected, and therefore Rabbi Chaim Vital asks why the Torah did not command that. Because it is true, it is fitting that I have corrected traits, not only corrected behavior but also corrected motivations—in the context of traits, in the context of morality. And still, the action itself should come because of responding to the command and not because of my natural tendency. Okay, therefore there is no… Can I ask a question?
[Speaker I] Yes. If you have motivation for the moral—for the rational commandments—will that count for you as a commandment?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If you do it because of the commandment—the motivation—then that is a commandment not for its own sake. But if you do it, and again, if you do it the way—who was it earlier who said this? Ohad, right? What Ohad said earlier, that one can do it from both motivations, both the moral motivation or natural tendency, and also the command—then I answered that: there is nothing wrong with it at all. We have no interest in extinguishing our good inclination so that the commandment will be more excellent. That is neither relevant nor helpful. What is required is only to make sure that the action is not because of the good inclination. That is, if one morning I wake up on the wrong side of the bed, my commitment to the command at Sinai should still be enough to cause me to do it in practice even then. If that holds, then it is a commandment, a perfect commandment. Even if I have moral motivations and natural tendencies, and even if I act because of them, there is no problem. It is perfectly fine. It is permissible to give charity to a poor person, and perhaps even proper to give charity to a poor person because of the natural feeling that one needs to, wants to, do good to him. That’s fine. As long as I know that I would do it even without that, by virtue of the command itself. That is, once again, there is no point in extinguishing the good inclination—on the contrary, there is value in correcting the traits so that the traits are corrected, as Rabbi Chaim Vital noted. But one must ensure that the command stands in the background. That is, even if I act—even if I have a good inclination, and even if I act because of the good inclination, that is my motivation—even that is still fine, as long as I also have the motivation of the commandment, and the motivation of the commandment, even when it appears by itself, will be enough for me to fulfill the commandment. Then that is perfectly fine. Okay? Now I want to go one step further, and I want to claim the… to learn the next Maimonides. Today we’re dealing with Maimonides. Let’s start with the Talmud. The Talmud in tractate Sanhedrin says as follows: “It was stated: one who worships idolatry out of love or out of fear—Abaye said he is liable; Rava said he is exempt.” Yes, if someone worshiped idolatry and did so out of love or out of fear, the way one serves the Holy One, blessed be He. Abaye says he is liable; that is idolatry in the strictest sense. Rava says he is exempt; this is not idolatry, at least not idolatry in the strictest sense—it is idolatry not for its own sake. Okay? Abaye said he is liable, “because he worshiped it.” After all, he worshiped; why should I care why he did it? Rava said he is exempt. Why? “If he accepted it upon himself as a god, yes; if not, no.” Rava says he is exempt: one who worships idolatry out of love and fear—fine, that is not a full prohibition of idolatry. Only if he accepts the idol upon himself as a god, only then is he liable—sorry, according to Rava. And in the dispute between Abaye and Rava, we rule like
[Speaker G] Rava, right?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Except for the six cases indicated by the mnemonic. Now look what Rashi writes there. What does it mean to worship idolatry out of love or fear? Rashi says: “out of love of a person and fear of a person, and he did not consider it in his heart to be a deity.” Yes, that’s the “if he accepted it as a god” that Rava mentions. That is, Rava says as follows: if you worship this idol because you want to please some friend of yours or some other person, no matter who, or because you fear him, or because you love him, and therefore you worship the idolatry, this is not idolatry in the strictest sense. You do not violate the prohibition; you are not liable to death for this idolatry. There may be a prohibition here, but there is no death penalty. As long as “he did not consider it in his heart to be a deity.” As long as you do not worship this idol as if it were your god, but rather do it only in order to please another person, this is not the plain meaning of the Talmud. The plain meaning of the Talmud, “one who worships idolatry out of love and fear,” means out of love and fear of the idol, not of another person. Why does Rashi take the Talmud away from its plain meaning? Why doesn’t he interpret it as love and fear of the idol? And by the way, all the medieval authorities (Rishonim) interpret it that way except for one—Maimonides. All the medieval authorities I know at least interpret the Talmud this way, that it refers to love and fear of a person. Why? Because they apparently assume that if I love and fear the deity, that is called accepting it as a god. Just as I love and fear the Holy One, blessed be He, so I love and fear the idol. And just as I serve the Holy One, blessed be He, out of love or fear, so I serve the idol out of love or fear. This is religious worship directed to an idol instead of to the Holy One, blessed be He; you can’t have a greater idolatry than that. How can Rava say that one who worships idolatry out of love or fear is exempt? Therefore there is no choice but to say that when he says exempt—when he says one who worships idolatry out of love and fear is exempt—he means exempt when he worships out of love and fear of another person, not out of love and fear of the idol. Love and fear of the idol are idolatry in the strictest sense. Up to here, that is the view of most of the medieval authorities (Rishonim). Now let’s move to Maimonides. You know that if something is reasonable, that’s usually an indication that Maimonides will probably say the opposite. So here you go, Maimonides before you. Maimonides, Laws of Idolatry, chapter 3, law 6: “One who worships a star or constellation out of love, for example because he desired this form due to its workmanship, which was especially beautiful; or if he worshiped it out of fear of it, lest it harm him, as its worshipers imagine.” Yes, as idol worshipers imagine that it benefits or harms. So if he does such a thing, then this is how it goes: “If he accepted it upon himself as a god, he is liable to stoning. But if he worshiped it in its normal way of worship, or by one of the four services, out of love or fear, he is exempt.” Here Maimonides interprets worship of idolatry out of love and fear as meaning love and fear of the form, of the idol, not of a person. What is “its normal way of worship”? What?
[Speaker I] What is “its normal way of worship”?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If
[Speaker I] it’s
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] not in its normal way of worship, then he is exempt. When you worship—say you worship Peor, but not in the normal way people worship Peor—then you are not liable to death. That is a different exemption in the laws of idolatry. Unless you do one of the four services, yes—slaughtering, receiving, carrying, and sprinkling the blood. Those four basic services—if you bring a sacrifice to one of the idols, even though that is not the way worshipers of that idol normally worship it—Peor, after all, was worshiped by exposing oneself, that was the way to worship Peor—and I came and offered a sacrifice to Peor. If I performed one of the four services to Peor, I am liable even though this is not its normal way of worship, but that is only in one of the four services by which I worship the Holy One, blessed be He, with sacrifices. But if I worship Peor in some way—I dance before it out of great admiration, okay?—but that is not the normal way people worship it and it is also not one of those four services, then I am exempt. Okay? But that is a side point; it is not related to our issue. What is important for our issue is the distinction that Rava makes, and Maimonides rules accordingly, between idolatry out of love and fear and accepting it as a god. What does
[Speaker E] accepting it as a god mean? Does it mean he actually believes in it?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Just a moment, fine, I’ll explain. So first of all, as I said before, all the medieval authorities except Maimonides interpreted love and fear as referring to a person. Why? Because they understand that if I love and fear the deity, that is religious worship in the strictest sense; that is certainly idolatry—what else could it be? The fact that I love it and fear it, and therefore I worship it just as I do the Holy One, blessed be He. So how could Rava exempt in such a case? Therefore in their opinion such a thing is certainly idolatry. But Maimonides says that such a thing is indeed exempt. What would he answer to the difficulty behind the assumption of the other medieval authorities? After all, what’s the difference?
[Speaker F] But Rabbi, according to Maimonides, “out of love” isn’t love of the idol—it’s love of the workmanship. He says there that the workmanship was beautiful, and he likes that.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, the workmanship of the idol, that is what he means; the service of the idol is beautiful—that is part of love of the idol. The alternative is accepting it as a god; the alternative is not love of the idol itself. Look there.
[Speaker F] Maybe love of the idol itself is the acceptance—the acceptance of it as a god, according to Maimonides too.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] One could say that, love of the idol itself. He says “accepted it as a god”; that is not a concept of love, it is something else. What does he mean? It seems to me Maimonides says this—and I once heard this from my friend Nadav Shenarav from physics, for those who know him—he once explained this Maimonides to me. He said this, and I think it is very correct; he once wrote an article about this in Akdamot. He said this: suppose I’m driving on the road in a car, okay? And I see a police officer. I’m driving way above the speed limit, Heaven forbid, but I see a police officer, I immediately slow down, hit the brakes, and reduce speed. And he said to me like this. And I think this is really right. He wrote an article about this once in Akdamot. Suppose I’m driving on the road in a car, okay? And I see a police officer. I’m driving above the speed limit, Heaven forbid. But I see a police officer. I immediately slow down, hit the brakes, drop to the legal speed. Have I committed idolatry? Seemingly yes. Why? I served idolatry out of fear of the police officer. I was afraid of what he would do to me, right? And therefore I served him, I obeyed what he instructed me to do out of fear. Now why is that not idolatry? Why can a statue be idolatry, the sun can be idolatry, but the police officer cannot? Why—because a human being can’t be idolatry? But Haman, in the midrash, made himself into an idol, and that was considered idolatry. When a person makes himself into an idol, that is idolatry. Is it because this is an inanimate idol?
[Speaker G] The fact that the police officer will punish you is true. It’s not like thinking that the idol might punish you. That is an actual fact.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What you are saying is because of the error. You are saying that with the police officer I am correct, but with the idol it is nonsense because it won’t do anything to me, it cannot do anything to me. That is, at the root of the prohibition of idolatry there is basically just the mistake. That is what you want to claim, right? Now let’s see. Does anyone think—he sees a statue? You know those fake speed traps? Not a real camera, but they build something that imitates a speed camera. Now I see it, I was sure it was a speed camera, so I slowed down. So now according to your view, I committed idolatry. Because here I got confused, I made a mistake. I thought it was a camera. A camera is not idolatry because they’ll catch me and indeed fine me. But this was a mistake—so idolatry.
[Speaker G] The concept of punishment for speeding is true; I just applied it to the wrong case.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So okay, then what’s the difference between this mistake and that mistake? What does it have to do with anything? There’s no punishment here. I think that’s not the difference. The difference is this, and this is what Maimonides says. If I obey a police officer because of the consequences, that’s not idolatry. Any consequence. And therefore, if I worship an idol because it might harm me, that really is not idolatry. Exactly like the police officer. It’s a mistake because it won’t harm me; that’s nonsense. But a mistake is not idolatry. It’s not not idolatry because it’s a mistake. It’s not idolatry because the religious worship I’m performing is for the sake of consequences. I’m doing it not for its own sake. That’s why it’s not idolatry. When would it be idolatry? What’s the antithesis? It already appears in the Talmud, and Maimonides copies it: accepting it as a god. What does “accepting it as a god” mean? What is a god? You know that in the Bible, “elohim” means judges, important people, right? Judges in the Bible are called “elohim.” “Whom the judges condemn.” What does “elohim” mean? From here they derive lashes, right? “Whom the judges condemn.” “Elohim” means the judges. Why? What’s the idea? A god is someone whose word I obey. Not because he’ll punish me, not because I love him, not because I fear him, and not because of anything else. Rather, whatever he says, I do. That is the definition of a god. In a certain sense—and we’ll get to this later—when someone comes and asks me, “Tell me, okay, I understand that the Holy One, blessed be He, is God, but why do you obey His commandments?” in my eyes that is a meaningless question. It testifies to the questioner’s lack of understanding. The questioner doesn’t understand what a god is. A god, by definition, is someone such that if he says something, I do it. That is called a god; otherwise he is not a god. It’s a definition. I don’t need explanations for why, if he commands, I have to obey. Because otherwise, for any explanation, you can ask: so I should obey him because I owe him gratitude. Then ask me: and why is gratitude a binding value? After all, you can always ask why, right? Where does it stop? Where do the “why” questions stop? Where do I finally say, “that’s just how it is”? You ask why that’s how it is. The point where it stops is where I’ve reached the conclusion that the one who commanded me is God. God is the being whose word has authority in and of itself; you don’t need external explanations for why it has authority. And if I fulfill the command of the Holy One, blessed be He, because of love or fear, I am serving not for its own sake. Notice what I’m saying. If I serve the Holy One, blessed be He—not idolatry now, I mean I serve the Holy One, blessed be He—out of love or fear, I am serving not for its own sake. So how should one serve the Holy One, blessed be He? Because He is God. That’s all. Whatever He says, I do. I don’t love Him, I don’t fear Him, I’m not anything. It’s not relevant at all. That is serving God for its own sake. The same thing, Maimonides says, applies to an idol. If you worship the idol because you love it or fear it, because it will do something to you, or because it will reward you, or because you enjoy it—whatever it may be—that is idolatry not for its own sake. You are exempt. Full-fledged idolatry is when you accept the idol as your god. That is idolatry, and you do what it says not because you fear it and not because you love it, but because it said so. For you, it is god. Replacing the Holy One, blessed be He, with another god—that is idolatry. That is what Maimonides says. In my opinion, this is the true plain meaning in the Talmud, the simple plain meaning in the Talmud, and the true plain meaning both in the Talmud and in Maimonides. And all the medieval authorities (Rishonim) who went toward love and fear of a person—that’s an unnecessary forced reading; there’s no need to say that. But this has enormous implications, because notice: basically it goes back to what we were talking about the whole class. Because what am I really saying? When I serve the Holy One, blessed be He, and fulfill His commandments, and avoid the transgressions He warned me about—why do I do it? Because it’s harmful? Because I’ll be punished in the World to Come? Because I love the Holy One, blessed be He? No. I do it because He said so. There was a mountain climber named Thomas Mallory, I think, British, who climbed Everest. They asked him, “Tell me, why do you climb Everest?” So he said, “Because it’s there.” If someone is looking for explanations of why to climb Everest, you can’t give any explanation. There is no explanation. No rational person does this; there are no explanations. He does it because it’s there. It’s some kind of basic given—I can’t explain it—it’s something so fundamental for me that that’s why I do it. Okay? So basically Maimonides’ claim here is the same claim. Serving God, and by contrast idolatry, is service for its own sake; its foundation is accepting as god. When I worship someone because he is god, not for any other reason—not because he’ll harm me and not because he’ll benefit me, not because I love him and not because I fear him, none of those things, but because he is god—then if it is the Holy One, blessed be He, that is serving God for its own sake; if it is an idol, that is idolatry for its own sake, for which one is liable. If this condition is not met, then it is serving God not for its own sake, and idolatry not for its own sake, for which one is not liable. That is what Maimonides says. Now look, this does not mean—and here I return to the whole move I’ve been talking about in the class—it does not mean there are no commandments to love God and fear God. There are two such commandments counted by all the enumerators of the commandments: “And you shall love the Lord your God,” and “The Lord your God shall you fear.” The commandments are explicit in the Torah and were counted by all the enumerators of the commandments. And by now we’re already skilled in this logic, right? We’re not bothered by this question; it isn’t a question at all. I have to love the Holy One, blessed be He, and I have to fear Him; these are two very important commandments. But I do not serve Him because of love and fear. It is not because of love and fear. Love and fear exist, but the motivation to serve is that He is God, because of the command. That’s all. Not love and not fear. Think, for example, about how all kinds of spiritual supervisors scold us for not having proper intention in prayer. We know this too: “Some with chariots and some with horses, but we call upon the name of the Lord”—you know this yeshiva atmosphere. Yes, there are people who, in order to get to the United States, need to take airplanes; we, in order to get to the United States, just need to begin the Amidah, and we’re immediately in the United States. “Some with chariots and some with horses, but we call upon the name of the Lord.” Meaning, the supervisors are always scolding us that we pray by rote, by force of habit; you do it only because of habit, you don’t do it because you want to connect to the Holy One, blessed be He, because of the spiritual experience it gives, and all kinds of things like that. Nonsense. Someone who prays to the Holy One, blessed be He, because there is a commandment to pray—not because he wants to connect and be spiritual and all that—that is the finest prayer there is. That is why one should pray: because there is a commandment to pray. And that does not mean there is no value, perhaps, in spiritual experiences, or in loving God, or in all sorts of things that prayer can contribute to—certainly. That’s floor two, three, four, five, six, all the way to the top. Floor one, without which the commandment of prayer does not exist, is intending to fulfill one’s obligation. That’s all. That is the basic intention. After that there is intention of the words, and the intentions of the Ari, and if you want, also the intention to connect to my spirituality and to myself and all the nonsense they feed people from every direction. That’s all fine on the top floor. Floor one, the basic floor that defines prayer as a commandment, is that it is because there is a command. That’s all. Whether it’s rabbinic or Torah-level, Maimonides and Nachmanides—we won’t get into that now. But because Jewish law obligates it. That is prayer. Someone who does it for that reason, someone who goes every morning to the synagogue with absolutely no desire—he suppresses himself; he is not inspired. He doesn’t want to pray; it bothers him, but he does it every morning—you have no finer prayer than that. You have no finer prayer than that. That is wonderful prayer for its own sake. Because he does it because he accepted the Holy One, blessed be He, as his God. And if there is an obligation to pray, then he prays. Afterward, of course, if someone can also gain other things from prayer, very good—but not instead of it, rather in addition to it. As I said about the motivation to give charity: there can be motivation from my good inclination plus the command. As long as the command alone is enough for me to do it, there is no problem. Then I can also do it for additional motives. But if I do it only because of the additional motives, I simply have not fulfilled my obligation; I have to start praying again. Someone who prayed because he loves and fears the Holy One, blessed be He, has not fulfilled his obligation; he has to pray again. That is the claim. One must pray because there is a commandment to pray, first of all. On top of that, I say again, there are levels; one can gain many additional spiritual benefits, but that’s floor two, three, four, all the way up. Floor one: first of all, what obligates is the intention to fulfill one’s obligation. And that is what Maimonides means here. Now this thing actually tells us what a commandment is, or what serving God is. I fulfill the commandments, I serve the Holy One, blessed be He, not because He’ll give me something and not because I’m afraid of Him, and not even because I love Him or fear Him—even though, on the face of it, there are commandments to love Him and fear Him. No. I do it because He is God. Absolute obligation—that whatever He says, I do—that is serving God. Look, maybe I’ll finish with a passage that may illustrate this nicely. There’s a bit here; I don’t know if we’ll get to it.
[Speaker G] Wait, so the concept—so the concept, like, loving God, fear, or serving God out of love—is basically a mistaken concept? Because we…
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What, say that again? Serving God—if love and fear are the motivation for serving God, then it is mistaken. If serving God is done also out of love and fear, but in the background there is always the obligation to the command—even if one morning I don’t feel love and fear, I’ll still do it—then there’s no problem; it doesn’t detract. Like I said regarding moral matters. Look here in Maimonides—another Maimonides. Today we’re collecting Maimonideses. Maimonides, Laws of Repentance, at the beginning of chapter ten. Give me another five minutes, okay? We also started a bit late. “A person should not say: I will perform the commandments of the Torah and engage in its wisdom in order to receive all the blessings written in it, or in order to merit life in the World to Come; and I will separate myself from the transgressions about which the Torah warned, in order to be saved from the curses written in the Torah, or in order not to be cut off from life in the World to Come. It is not proper to serve God in this way.” Yes, that is serving not for its own sake. “For one who serves in this way serves out of fear, and this is not the level of the prophets nor the level of the sages. And only the ignorant, women, and children are made to serve in this way, out of fear, until their knowledge increases and they serve out of love.” Notice that here he contrasts serving out of fear with serving out of love. But now look what serving out of love is. Surprise. “One who serves out of love occupies himself with Torah and commandments and walks in the paths of wisdom not because of anything in the world, not because of fear of evil, and not in order to inherit good, but does the truth because it is true, and the good will ultimately come because of it.” Would you define serving out of love that way? To do the truth because it is true? Serving out of love is to serve the Holy One, blessed be He, because I love Him. What does that have to do with doing the truth because it is true? It has nothing to do with emotion; love is an emotion. To do the truth because it is true is a cold intellectual matter. To do the truth because it is true. This parallels, by the way, accepting as god, which I spoke about earlier: I do what the Holy One, blessed be He, said because He said it, because He is God, accepting as god. Here, “to do the truth because it is true” is exactly that, and that is what Maimonides calls serving out of love. Meaning, the opposite of serving out of fear is not serving out of the emotion called love. That is not— that is not the opposite of serving out of fear. Serving out of the emotion called love is like serving out of fear; it’s the same thing, there is no difference. Serving out of love and serving out of fear are both forms of serving not for their own sake, because they are forms of service whose foundation is really to sustain my own emotions. I do it in order to satisfy some drive of mine, whether a drive of love or a drive of fear. Serving God for its own sake is to do the truth because it is true, because He commanded. That’s all; for that reason. Without any side reason, not even these exalted reasons of love and fear. Whenever there is a side reason, it is not serving for its own sake, and therefore here too. In the Laws of Idolatry, Maimonides called idolatry out of love or fear—love and fear in the same sense. So one has to understand what Maimonides means by serving out of love, and I won’t get into that here; that’s another whole topic. If you look in the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah, you’ll see that when Maimonides speaks there about love, he speaks of love as in the Laws of Idolatry—service as love in the sense of an emotion that I feel toward the Holy One, blessed be He. But in the Laws of Repentance, when he speaks about service—in the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah, he is not speaking about serving out of love. He is speaking about the commandment to love God. The commandment to love God is a feeling of love toward the Holy One, blessed be He. Serving out of love is something else, because serving out of love speaks about the motivation for why I serve, not about the emotion of love. The motivation must not be emotion—not even the emotion of love. The motivation has to be acceptance of the yoke. And therefore, when Maimonides speaks about serving out of love—not the commandment of loving God, but serving out of love—then serving out of love means to do the truth because it is true. Exactly parallel to what he said in the Laws of Idolatry.
[Speaker F] And in that context Maimonides fits well with the Talmud in tractate Avodah Zarah, with its plain meaning, but in general he doesn’t fit with the expression “serving out of love.” It’s simply not the plain meaning of the expression.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Why not? It is the plain meaning of the expression.
[Speaker F] Because serving out of love is just simple love.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay, come on—for that we need another class, but I’ll tell you briefly. Even the emotion of love can be distinguished in two—in two—you know the well-known comment about our forefather Jacob: “And they seemed to him but a few days because of his love for her.” The commentators there ask: usually for us it’s the opposite, right? If we love something and want it to come to us, and it takes a few days, it feels like eternity. But for Jacob it took seven years, and they seemed to him but a few days because of his love for her. How does that make sense? If you love something, then every day you wait feels like eternity—not that eternity feels like a day. So they say that our forefather Jacob loved Rachel, not himself. Someone who loves himself wants to take hold of the thing, bring it to himself; he can’t wait for the moment when it’s already his, because he is at the center. So if it takes a day, it feels like eternity. But if you love, you act for the sake of the thing, not for your own sake. So what difference does seven years make? Seven years—if that’s what it takes, then that’s what I’ll do. And that is the true concept of love. And understand that this concept of love is a completely different concept of love from the ones people write all the novels about and sing all the love songs about—emotional loves. This kind of love is much more connected to love in the sense of doing the truth because it is true. But I’ll leave it there, because that would already take us into a completely different field. One can give a class on love, but that’s a class in itself. Okay, we’ll stop here. Goodbye, good night.
[Speaker E] Thank you very much, Rabbi, thank you very much.