Studies on Repentance, Lesson 5

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[Rabbi Michael Abraham] We’re getting to chapters 8 through 10; this deals with doing things for their own sake. So I had finished reading chapter 7. In chapter 7, Jewish law 1: “Since every person has permission, as we explained, a person should strive to repent and shake his sins from his hands, so that he will die as one who has repented and thereby merit the life of the World to Come.” So here there really is something a bit not for its own sake, right? “So that he will merit the life of the World to Come.” Right. So why does this open chapter 7? Because chapter 7’s role is to motivate someone who doesn’t understand on his own to repent. How do you motivate him? You tell him: this way you’ll merit the life of the World to Come. Right, that’s not for its own sake.

Now look: in chapter 8 there appears a third part of the Laws of Repentance, which we haven’t discussed at all yet. This third part has nothing whatsoever to do with the Laws of Repentance, or with the thought of repentance. Nothing. It’s a collection of things, three chapters, chapters 8 through 10. Chapter 8 deals mainly with principles of faith: understanding the World to Come, this world, Gehinnom, the Garden of Eden, what exists in the World to Come, whether there are bodies there, whether there are no bodies there, soul, spirit, punishments in the World to Come, all kinds of things like that. That’s chapter 8.

Chapter 9: “Since it has become known that the reward for the commandments and the good that we will merit if we keep the way of God written in the Torah is the life of the World to Come, as it says, ‘that it may be good for you and you may lengthen your days,’ and vengeance too is in the World to Come—what then is the meaning of everything written in the entire Torah, that if you obey, this will come to you, and if you do not obey, this will happen to you—all those things in this world, such as plenty and hunger, war and peace, etc.? Nevertheless, those goods are not the ultimate reward for the commandments, nor are those evils the ultimate vengeance taken on one who transgresses all the commandments. Rather, this is how the matter should be set out: the Holy One, blessed be He, gave us the Torah, which is a tree of life, and whoever does all that is written in it and knows it with complete and correct knowledge merits through it the life of the World to Come, and according to the greatness of his deeds and the greatness of his wisdom, so does he merit,” etc.

And then he tells us in the Torah that if we act properly, we’ll receive reward; if not, we’ll receive punishment, both in this world and in the World to Come; and we merit both worlds, or lose both worlds, and so on. “Because of this all Israel, and their prophets and sages, longed for the days of King Messiah,” etc. That’s chapter 9, and he explains reward in this world and in the World to Come as a continuation of the motivation to repent—even though it has nothing to do with repentance. It deals with principles of faith: this world, the next world, reward in this world, reward in the next world, punishment, nations, not nations, whether there are bodies or not in the World to Come—what does any of this have to do with repentance? It’s a continuation of chapter 7, which tries to persuade us to repent by means of this world and the next world, by means of the World to Come and Gehinnom.

Now chapter 10: “A person should not say: behold, I am doing the commandments of the Torah and engaging in its wisdom so that I will receive the blessings written in the Torah, or so that I will merit the life of the World to Come; and I separate from the transgressions against which the Torah warned so that I will be saved from the curses written in the Torah or so that I will not be cut off from the life of the World to Come.” I don’t understand—now for three chapters, for two chapters, you explained to me that because of this we’ll do it and thereby merit the life of the World to Come. You motivated me to repent, to keep commandments in order to merit reward in this world, in the next world, everything, and to avoid punishment. And now: a person should not say that he is doing it for the sake of the World to Come.

This is the final stage. This is chapter 10 of the Laws of Repentance, and here he speaks about serving for its own sake. So it’s clear there’s a very clear progression here. You have to return to being someone who chooses. That’s chapters 5-6. Chapter 7 motivates you to be someone who chooses. It’s worthwhile for you to be someone who chooses; you draw close to the Holy One, blessed be He, you act. Chapters 8-9 say not only that—you’ll receive enormous reward and be spared a lot of punishment, or receive much punishment if you don’t do it. Chapter 10 is already the next stage: forget everything I told you until now—that was for children. If you need those kinds of motivations, then fine. But the truth is that this is “the way of women and children,” as he writes here.

“It is not fitting to serve God in this way, 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 ignoramuses, women, and children serve God in this way; they are trained to serve out of fear until their knowledge increases and they serve out of love. One who serves out of love engages in Torah and commandments and walks in the paths of wisdom not because of anything in the world, not out of fear of evil, and not in order to inherit good, but rather does the truth because it is truth, and in the end the good will come because of it.” You do not do it for the sake of the good that will come; you do it because that is the truth. That’s the end of the Laws of Repentance: to do the truth because it is truth.

And look, there’s a very, very structured progression here. You have to understand: this is a process that is built well; it’s not some accidental eclectic collection of topics. There are Laws of Repentance chapters 1 through 3. Chapter 4 is the great repentance. Chapters 5-6: after he says great repentance, he says—we have free choice, know that. So it’s possible to go back to being choosers and return to great repentance. Chapter 7 comes to persuade us to use the ability to choose freely—in other words, to return to being choosers. See how great is the stature of one who repents, and that one who returns does so because you have the ability to choose; that’s how he opens chapter 7. But still, all this is motivation, including chapters 8 and 9 about reward and punishment in this world and the next world. And chapter 10—after you get there from doing things not for their own sake, you come to doing them for their own sake. In the end, everything I told you until now is for women and children and ignoramuses. Really, you have to do it because that is the truth. “And in the end the good will come”—the good will come, but that’s not why you’re supposed to do it. You’re supposed to do it because that is the truth: to do truth because it is truth. Okay? That is basically the structure of the Laws of Repentance.

And therefore, if I were to summarize the Laws of Repentance—we’ll try to get into a bit more detail in a moment—but if I summarize it, basically the role of the Laws of Repentance is to return us to being choosers. That’s all—that’s the Laws of Repentance. In many senses these are not really “laws” at all, because to return us to being choosers is to deal with the foundation of halakhic discussion. In other words, when we choose, then you can begin talking to us about Jewish law: obligated, forbidden, permitted. But if you’re not choosing, there’s no one to talk to. The Laws of Repentance are not laws in the ordinary sense; a certain part of them is, yes. But in their essence, the Laws of Repentance are really an attempt to build a person you can speak with, a person to whom the rest of the Mishneh Torah, all the rest of Jewish law, can speak. The Laws of Repentance deal with bringing us to that stage. And now you can start speaking to us about Jewish law. Okay?

And so there really is something unusual about the Laws of Repentance, but it has its place. For example, serving not for its own sake, in order to receive reward and avoid punishment, is more connected to the lesser repentance. We talked about this—how can you persuade someone who serves not for its own sake? We did a simulation, remember? I told you that I serve not for its own sake: maximum reward, minimum punishment. Convince me to serve for its own sake. We reached the conclusion that there’s no way to do it, right? Why? Because I want maximum reward and minimum punishment. At most you can tell me: this way you’ll get more reward. But you’ll never succeed in taking me out of the loop I’m in. Those are my basic assumptions. You can’t persuade me except on the basis of my assumptions, okay? So basically I serve not for its own sake.

Therefore, when Maimonides speaks to someone at the first stage, he tells him: forget it, you’ll get maximum reward, so return to being someone who chooses and serve the Holy One, blessed be He. At the next stage, chapter 10, this is no longer persuasion. There is no way to speak to someone who got as far as chapter 9 and move him to chapter 10. There is no way to do that. All you can do is say to him: listen, what there was until now was for children and women; now think for yourself, understand that the truly great level is chapter 10. It is to do the truth because it is truth. But here this is not persuasion. He doesn’t say “therefore,” he doesn’t say “because,” he doesn’t raise arguments; he simply presents you with the picture. Who is the complete person? Now decide whether you want to be a complete person or not. There’s no systematic way to bring us there. Chapter 10 is some kind of independent unit; it’s the top floor. But there is no systematic way to move from chapter 9 to chapter 10. Either you make that leap or you don’t. He only tells you that if you don’t, then you’re among the ignoramuses, among the women and children.

Now let’s go into a bit more detail. What is there in chapter 10? Because chapter 10 actually—I’ll mention this even more, I’ll connect it even more to what we discussed—it’s all basically a summary of everything we’ve said. You remember, before Rosh Hashanah—in the previous lesson, actually—before Rosh Hashanah I spoke about the meaning of command. And I said that crowning the Holy One, blessed be He, on Rosh Hashanah basically means returning to the recognition that whatever He says, I do. To accept Him upon oneself as God, which in Maimonides’ Laws of Idolatry means: whatever He says, I do. Not because of this reason or that one, not because I love Him, not because I fear Him, nothing like that. I do it because He commanded. Period.

Like that mountaineer—Mallory—I think I brought this example. They ask him why he climbed Everest, and he says: because it’s there. There’s no explanation; it’s obvious. If someone doesn’t understand that, I can’t explain it to him. I climb because I climb, that’s it. When you reach such a recognition—that if the Holy One, blessed be He, commands, then it obligates because He commanded—not because it will lead to good and avoid bad, and not because I love Him and not because I fear Him; not even that. We talked about Maimonides’ Laws of Idolatry, that one who worships idols out of love and fear is exempt. Why? Because even serving the Holy One, blessed be He, out of love and fear is not complete service. Accepting Him upon oneself as God—that is the complete service. Afterward, one must love Him and fear Him; all that is true, those are commandments. But that is not the foundation because of which I serve Him. I serve Him because He said so. Because He’s there. That is the service. And that is chapter 10.

So in the end chapter 10 completes this whole process, and that is where we are supposed to be on Rosh Hashanah—in chapter 10. If we are in chapter 10 on Rosh Hashanah, then the Ten Days of Repentance are already a consequence; they follow naturally. Because when I understand that what He says I have to do because He said it, then why in the world should I let my impulses or my horses take me to all kinds of places? What He says has to be done. What does it mean to let someone else run me? So at that point repentance is already a consequence, it follows naturally. Okay? And then Yom Kippur comes with its atonement, but Rosh Hashanah is really supposed to bring us there.

Now I’m starting from that point about chapter 10. Basically chapter 10, as I already read the first Jewish law, is about doing the truth because it is truth. That is exactly acceptance of Him as God. Acceptance of Him as God means I do it because this is the truth—not because it gives me something, not because there is good or bad, or because I love or fear; all those are side reasons. Why do I do it? Just because. Just because.

Now what is “just because”? “Just because”—yes, Leibowitz always loved that word, “just because.” But many times I have the feeling he didn’t even understand himself, because he was trapped inside positivistic thinking. The claim of “just because” means: I cannot justify it to you. But “I cannot justify it to you” has two meanings. Maybe I spoke about this, I don’t remember—there are two meanings. There is an arbitrary “just because,” and there is an axiomatic “just because.” They are not the same thing. An arbitrary “just because” means there is no explanation; I rolled a die and that’s what came out. That’s it. There is no justification; it’s neither more right nor less right; I just felt like it, I decided. That is arbitrary “just because.”

The “just because” we are talking about here—accepting Him as God—is not arbitrary “just because,” but rather because this is what is true. Only if you ask me why it is true—I can’t explain it to you. Why can’t I explain it to you? Because every principle I would use to explain it is itself something about which you could ask me: and why is that true? Where would this stop? It would stop at those principles whose truth is self-evident, which do not need an explanation based on more fundamental principles. What Descartes called evidence, clarity—something clear in itself, that does not need something prior to it.

So for example, the assumptions, the axioms of geometry: through two points there passes one straight line—in Euclidean space, straight space—so through two points there passes one straight line. Someone asks me, who told you that? I say: just because. Does “just because” there mean I decided arbitrarily? Of course not. “Just because” means that this is what is true, and anyone who doesn’t understand that is an idiot. But I don’t have an explanation; I can’t prove it. If I could prove it, it wouldn’t be an axiom. An axiom means something I don’t know how to prove. Okay? But that “just because” is not of the arbitrary kind; it is of the axiomatic kind. Axiomatic means—well, among mathematicians there are many who think axiomatic is arbitrary—but I mean axiomatic as opposed to arbitrary. Axiomatic means it is true in itself; you don’t need explanations to establish why it is true. On the contrary, it can establish other things. That is the foundational point from which I begin. That’s the “just because” I’m talking about.

So accepting Him as God—when people ask me why you keep commandments, why we fulfill what the Holy One, blessed be He, said—I have no answer; the answer is: just because. Any answer you give is worthless. Why? Because the question that seeks an explanation already contains the mistake. Because if you ask the question, it means that you do not grasp serving God as an axiomatic value; rather, you think it is a consequence of some other axiom, one that requires no explanation, and that will explain why I need to serve God. But no—the obligation to serve God is the basic axiom. Everything else comes out of that. This is axiomatic “just because”; this is accepting Him as God.

Now this is what Maimonides here at the beginning of chapter 10 calls “doing the truth because it is truth.” “Doing the truth because it is truth” means—and not for some other reason: not the World to Come, not this world, not reward, not punishment, and not even love and fear. Now look, here there’s a point… when I say “not even love and fear,” that’s not written here. It’s written in the Laws of Idolatry. But we talked about it.

But look—in this sense there is a very confusing formulation here in Maimonides. I’ll read the Jewish law again, and you’ll see that the matter is a bit confusing. “A person should not say: behold, I am doing the commandments of the Torah and engaging in its wisdom so that I will receive the blessings written in the Torah, or so that I will merit the life of the World to Come; and I separate from the transgressions against which the Torah warned so that I will be saved from the curses written in the Torah or so that I will not be cut off from the life of the World to Come. It is not fitting to serve God in this way, 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 ignoramuses, women, and children serve God in this way; they are trained to serve out of fear until their knowledge increases and they serve out of love.”

You see? There’s some transition here that you can’t persuade them through. You work and work and work, and at some stage you come to an understanding, and then you move to serving out of love. But notice: the distinction here is between love and fear, not between love and fear on one side and accepting Him as God on the other, as it was in the Laws of Idolatry—which seems to be a contradiction. In the Laws of Idolatry Maimonides put love and fear into the same basket. Love and fear—both are side motivations. Opposed to that stands religious service whose basis is accepting Him as God, “just because.” Love too is basically a side motivation, like fear. Maybe higher, but still the same principle. There is still something here that is me, and not subjugation to God’s will or to the command of the Holy One, blessed be He.

So why does Maimonides here contrast love with fear, rather than contrasting love and fear together with accepting Him as God? So look at the continuation. “One who serves out of love”—that’s Jewish law 2—“engages in Torah and commandments and walks in the paths of wisdom, not because of anything in the world, not out of fear of evil, and not in order to inherit the good.” Up to here that’s fine, right? Because he does it out of love of God, not because of reward or punishment or anything like that. But no—Maimonides doesn’t write that way. Rather… what would we have expected? Rather, he serves because he loves God, right? That’s the contrast. He says: don’t serve out of fear, serve out of love. Who is one who serves out of love? Someone who doesn’t do it because of reward or punishment or the World to Come or this world. No. Rather… if I asked you to complete the sentence, you’d say: rather because he loves God with great love, right? But no. Rather, “he does the truth because it is truth.” Is that what is called love? To do the truth because it is truth is to do what is right. What does that have to do with love? Love is an emotion, right? That’s what you said before—love is an emotion, no? What is “to do the truth because it is truth”? It’s the opposite.

In the Laws of Idolatry, Maimonides said that if you serve out of love, it is service not for its own sake. And here Maimonides—very consistently—continues with that. Because the love he calls “love” here is not the love he was talking about there. Here what he defines as love is “to do the truth because it is truth,” the coldest thing there is. Love here is not some feeling, some strong emotionality. No. To do the truth because it is truth—the coldest thing possible. To be some sort of autistic person without emotions who does only what is right and that’s it. With all due respect to—today you’re not allowed to say things like that. Right.

So he says: “And this level is a very great level indeed, and not every sage merits it.” A sage—notice. What does sage mean? One who loves God, a righteous person? What is sage? No—to do the truth because it is truth. To recognize the truth—that is wisdom. The criterion here is wisdom, not eruptive love of God, not the emotional dimension. “And it is the level of Abraham our father, whom the Holy One, blessed be He, called ‘My beloved,’ because he served only out of love.” But again, what is love? To do the truth because it is truth. Not love in the emotional sense. “And this is the level that the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded us through Moses our teacher, as it says, ‘And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.’ And when one loves God with the proper love, immediately he will perform all the commandments out of love.” Earlier he already defined what love is. Love means to do the truth because it is truth.

[Speaker D] Why does he define it as love?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] One second. And even more than that—you can already see how this is the foundation for the whole rest of the book. Because after you reach this stage of doing the truth because it is truth, you’ve finished the process of repentance; you’ve returned to being someone who chooses, to doing what is right because it is right, and not letting the horses take you all kinds of places. Not even to the good places. We talked about this—that going after the good impulse is also basically an animal soul, because you’re letting the impulse take you; it’s not you deciding where you’re going even when you do good. That still isn’t a complete person. “And immediately he will perform all the commandments out of love.” This is the foundation for all the other commandments. Therefore, the Laws of Repentance are the foundation that builds a person with whom you can now start speaking about commandments, because he does the truth because it is truth; he is a choosing person. He understands that if he comes to understand that this is the truth, then he will do it. Not because of everything Maimonides told us until now in chapters 7, 8, and 9. Now we are speaking about the higher level. Okay?

Now look at something interesting. “And what is the proper love?” Jewish law 3. Seemingly a complete reversal. “That he love God with an exceedingly great and very intense love, until his soul is bound up in the love of God, and he is continually obsessed with it.” Very emotional, right? More than that. “Like one lovesick, whose mind is never free from love for that woman, and he is constantly obsessed with her.” Okay? Really Greek tragedy. “Whether sitting, whether rising, whether eating and drinking. Even greater than this should the love of God be in the hearts of His lovers, obsessed with Him continually, as He commanded us, ‘with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your might.’ And this is what Solomon said metaphorically: ‘for I am sick with love,’ and the entire Song of Songs is a metaphor for this matter.”

So seemingly Maimonides is turning the whole picture upside down here. Until now you told me that the love under discussion here is not the love you spoke of elsewhere; it is doing the truth because it is truth; it is accepting Him as God. So how did you suddenly get to love of a woman, when your heart is full of it and you can’t detach from it and it accompanies you every moment? That is already clearly an emotional description. How is that connected? Now it contradicts the previous Jewish law—I’m not talking here about some grand difficulties in Maimonides’ thought. In the previous Jewish law you said something else: love means doing the truth because it is truth. And of course I’m completing this from the Laws of Idolatry, where he places love and fear on the side of not for its own sake—both love and fear. Accepting Him as God is the opposite side. So therefore I say: I think this is what is written here.

In Jewish law 3, Maimonides intends to bring a metaphor. He says, “the entire Song of Songs is a metaphor for this matter.” Just as in emotional love, the love of a woman, you can’t get rid of it and it accompanies you every single moment, so too the love of the Holy One, blessed be He, should be. Not that it too should be emotional. Not that it too should be some eruptive feeling and things like that. Rather, it should be doing the truth because it is truth. But that drive to do the truth because it is truth—not the drive, the decision to do the truth because it is truth, holding tightly to the reins and not letting go—has to be present at every single moment exactly like emotional love. And that explains why Maimonides calls this thing love, even though it is not the love he talks about in the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah.

[Speaker G] To be in that elevated state of awareness. Exactly.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Exactly. And indeed “the entire Song of Songs is a metaphor for this matter.” Not only because it speaks about a woman and not about the Holy One, blessed be He, and the Jewish people, but because the love there—and the love he speaks of here—is what the later authorities call the intellectual love of God. Meaning: to do the truth because it is truth. Because to generate emotional love toward the Holy One, blessed be He, seems to me a very strange thing. You don’t even know what He is, who… How can you really form some bond with Him like you form with a person? It’s strange. There are people who say they have that; I don’t know, maybe. But I don’t think that’s what Maimonides is talking about here. Maimonides is talking about doing the truth because it is truth, but with the same level of intensity as someone who acts on the basis of a drive or feeling of love. Therefore the Song of Songs is a metaphor for this matter—not only because there it’s a man and woman, and here it’s the Holy One, blessed be He, and the people of Israel or the Jewish people, but because the love there is emotional and the love here is cold love, intellectual love. To do the truth because it is truth.

And therefore there is no contradiction between Jewish law 2 and Jewish law 3. In Jewish law 3, when he says that one must be continually obsessed with it and that it should occupy you all the time, he does not mean emotionally. He means the opposite: precisely because it is so rational, it is hard to maintain it all the time. If you love, then it bursts out from within you, so of course it occupies you all the time—say, if you love a woman. But if you love the Holy One, blessed be He, in the sense of intellectual love, doing the truth because it is truth—how do we sin? We let go of the reins for a moment, right? We don’t always maintain that tension of doing the truth because it is truth. That’s what we repent for. What is Maimonides telling us? Think of it as with love of a woman: at every moment, make sure not to let go of the reins. I was saying earlier that sometimes we choose and sometimes we don’t—that is exactly what he is saying here: return to being choosers all the time, just as you are occupied with love of a woman all the time. Not because love of God should be emotional.

Now of course these are the Laws of Repentance. Why is Maimonides dealing with love of God at all in the Laws of Repentance? There is a chapter on that in the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah. Look in the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah, in the same book, the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah, I’m opening—

[Speaker B] the Mishneh Torah.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Commandment 3, to affirm His unity; commandment 4, to love Him; commandment 5, to fear Him. And there is a discussion there of love of God and fear of God in the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah. What is the definition? What must one do? And what is the path to get there? It’s all there. So why are you suddenly returning to love of God in the Laws of Repentance? What does it have to do with anything?

Because in the Laws of Repentance he is not dealing with the laws of love of God at all. That isn’t the subject. The laws of love of God belong to the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah. And there you really do need to arrive probably also at an emotional dimension of love toward the Holy One, blessed be He. But the Laws of Repentance are not dealing with that. The Laws of Repentance deal with returning to being someone who chooses. When Maimonides deals with love of God in the Laws of Repentance, this is not the laws of the commandment to love God. It is serving God out of love. That is not the same thing. The commandment to love God is one commandment, one of the 613 commandments. More important, less important, you can debate it, but it is one of the 613 commandments. Maimonides in the Laws of Repentance is talking about the foundation for keeping all the commandments. I perform all the commandments out of love. So this is not a category within the commandment to love God.

If someone does not perform all the commandments out of love, does he fulfill the commandment to love God? Obviously yes. If he loves God, then he fulfills the commandment to love God. To perform all the commandments out of love of God is something else, an additional thing. It’s another topic; it has nothing to do with the laws of the commandment to love God that are discussed in the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah. More than that: here too it is not about love in the emotional sense as he speaks of in the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah, because here this is not the commandment to love God. Here it is about doing the truth because it is truth, the foundation of being a servant of God. That is the subject of the Laws of Repentance.

That is why he returns to a discussion of love of God in the Laws of Repentance even though he already dealt with it in the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah—because it is not the same aspect. In the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah he deals with the commandment to love God; each collection of laws deals with a number of commandments and spells out the laws related to those particular commandments dealt with in that collection. In the Laws of Repentance he deals only with the commandment of repentance. So what is the commandment to love God doing here? Again, you see there is also Torah study here and all sorts of other things—what are they doing here? Everything Maimonides writes here duplicates laws that are listed explicitly elsewhere. So why does it return here? That’s my third comment on the Laws of Repentance: what are all these things doing here? And the answer is the same answer, or the explanation is the same explanation. All these things are listed here because they deal not with the specific commandments discussed in those other places—in the Laws of Torah Study, the commandment of Torah study; in the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah, the commandment to love God, or things like that. It is not dealing with that. It is dealing with those aspects of love of God and Torah study that are relevant to building the person as a servant of God—not with the commandment of Torah study and the commandment to love God as one commandment among the 613. It is something else. Therefore the concept of love is also interpreted here differently. It is not love in the emotional sense; it is love in the sense of doing the truth because it is truth. And emotional love is a metaphor for this matter: that you have to be occupied with it all the time and not let the reins slip from your hands, just as you are occupied with love of a woman, where of course that is natural.

You once asked here—you always told me, you always say that you can’t move from what is found—

[Speaker E] to what is proper. That’s basically a concept that… But—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But what is truth? Truth here means the proper in the value sense. Not truth in the sense of what the correct facts are. To do the ethical truth because it is the truth.

[Speaker E] Yes, but once I studied the article on sociology, and you grounded the idea of serving God in gratitude. Meaning, why serve? Right, to ground it in gratitude.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That is ontic gratitude. To do truth because it is truth.

[Speaker E] Yes, but gratitude—you’re

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] grounding it in some emotional place. No, no, no. Just as you called it love here, there I called it gratitude; there too it is not emotional. It has nothing to do with emotion at all. It is obligation toward the source from which you came.

[Speaker H] Yes, but it does give a reason. A person has a feeling of gratitude, so—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That is ethical gratitude. Ontic gratitude is exactly the difference. Exactly like the difference between love as doing truth because it is truth and emotional love. Ethical love is that feeling that you need to give back to whoever gave to you. Ontic gratitude is not obligation of that type at all. Ontic recognition is a logical or intellectual or value recognition that says: if I came from the Holy One, blessed be He, then I have an obligation toward Him. What He tells me, I have to do, because He is my source; I came from Him, I was created by Him. That exactly parallels the distinction here between two kinds of love. Exactly the same thing.

[Speaker E] And does that remain in force even if He starts behaving wickedly? What do I mean? There are those for whom after the Holocaust, their obligation to the commandments collapsed. So apparently what we said here, what you’re saying here, is not self-evident.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If they think the Holy One, blessed be He, did it, then maybe they’re consistent. I think the Holy One, blessed be He, did not do it, so therefore that’s not—

[Speaker E] But let’s say even if He did do it, you’re saying but—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I still came from Him, so I still need to be obligated to Him regardless. Correct—but in this case ethical gratitude, or ethical ingratitude, probably overrides that, or else they simply do not recognize the principle I proposed. I don’t know. There are many people who disagree with what I wrote there. So I’m not sure that’s a proof. If they’re right, they’re right; if I’m right, I’m right. But it’s not a case of comparing one person to another, as they say.

[Speaker D] But it is still giving a reason. We do what God says because He created us—so that gives a reason for what we do.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, but what is a reason? When you say this to someone, I’m not sure he’ll grasp it as a reason. Because it’s obvious that whoever makes me thereby obligates me by what he says. Why is that obvious? Just because. I have no explanation for it. Someone who doesn’t understand that—I don’t know how to explain it to him. But that’s just how it is. It seems to me—and I also wrote about this there in that article—that often when you ask a person, why do you serve God, the person often doesn’t really give himself an accounting of why. He was raised that way, or he doesn’t know, he came to that conclusion—doesn’t matter, each one however he got there—very often he does not really give himself an honest accounting of why he does it.

But when you ask him the question, you push him into a corner, and then you start hearing all kinds of excuses: gratitude, or because it’s best, or because of the World to Come, or because of Gehinnom—each one with his own explanations. None of these explanations is correct. I don’t believe anyone who says that. I don’t believe them—not just that I disagree with them; they themselves also do not really think that way. They do it just because, because they understand that that is what is right. Except that many, many people are not aware of this option of “just because.” “Just because” sounds merely arbitrary. What do you mean “just because”? A rational person needs explanations for what he does, justifications for what he does. So once someone corners you, you have to produce some explanation. Now you try to conceptualize for yourself why you do it, and you start thinking, where will my help come from—maybe gratitude? Maybe… You try to rationalize what you feel. But that’s a mistake; there’s no need to do that. You do it because that is what is right, period. That’s all. Because if He created me, I must do what He says. No explanations are needed. If I give you an explanation, then you’ll ask me about the explanation too: and why is that? Where does it start? It starts at the point where it is clear to me that it is true. Well, here too it is clear to me that it is true. I don’t need prior explanations. Like an axiom? Yes, exactly as I said—this is the axiomatic “just because,” not the arbitrary “just because.” Yes, exactly the same thing.

[Speaker E] It doesn’t seem to me persuasive to people.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I didn’t say it was persuasive; it’s the truth. Whether it persuades them or not is a technical problem.

[Speaker E] But on the other hand you also said that you do it “just because,” because in the end you can—where’s the boundary here? There’s no boundary.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Whatever you think is right to do is what you do. What boundary? What boundary?

[Speaker E] And why can’t you explain it logically, why? I don’t know.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If you can, good luck. I don’t know how to do that. How can you convince someone that he must keep commandments because the Holy One, blessed be He, created him? If he doesn’t understand that on his own, I don’t know what to do with it. You can bring him examples. I also brought some examples there in the article about parents, about our obligations toward parents. Suppose parents did no kindness to their children. Their child was taken from them in infancy, okay? Not their fault. If it was their fault, then again, perhaps ethical ingratitude overrides it, but not their fault. The Yemenite children, okay? They discovered their parents again. Do they have an obligation? Of honoring parents? If the feeling is yes—then someone who doesn’t have that feeling, again, I can’t do anything about it. But someone who does have such a feeling—ask him why. Those parents invested nothing in you; why do you owe them? Not their fault. Again, not that I have a complaint against them. But why do I owe them? I received from them. And there is a kind of human intuition here. I can bring analogies; I cannot persuade someone who does not feel it. Analogies help a person identify within himself that he too feels this way. But if he won’t identify it within himself, then no. Like any axiom. If someone comes and says that through two points pass three and a half straight lines—can you persuade him that it’s only one? No. There’s no way to persuade him because I have no proof. Fine—so does that make it untrue? It’s true; I just have no way to persuade him, what can I do?

[Speaker E] The problem is that he says that yes, you don’t have…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No—he says it’s true. I know it’s true. What do you mean? Just because. How do you know there’s a wall here? How do you know there’s a wall here? I see it. So what? Maybe your eyesight deceived you. How do you know? Because I see. And that’s it; you don’t have a better answer than that. How do you know murder is forbidden? Because you know murder is forbidden. Every value is like that. You can’t—whatever explanation you give, I’ll always ask you about the explanation too: why? In the end you’ll stop with “just because,” right? Where do you stop with “just because”? Again, not “just because” in the arbitrary sense, but “just because” because it is self-evident. If someone doesn’t understand that, I don’t know what to do with him. Where do you stop? At the place where it really is self-evident. Now I think serving God is supposed to be there—that is accepting Him as God. Accepting Him as God means I don’t need explanations for why to serve Him. Love and fear are also explanations. Therefore Maimonides says accepting Him as God is not love and fear. One who worships idols out of love and fear is exempt.

[Speaker E] If there’s, say, Aristotle and all that, then that shows that God has no interest in what happens here. So you see it wasn’t commanded; it’s unrelated.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The point is that this is a factual dispute. The factual dispute is the question whether the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded us or not. If He did not command, then obviously there’s nothing to do. That’s clear. Even someone who agrees with my approach, that commands do not obligate—well, that’s if there are commands. If there aren’t, then there aren’t. But assuming that He does care and that He did command, then it’s self-evident that one must do it. To argue whether He commanded or not—that is already a factual question. Again, it’s not easy to clarify, but in principle it’s a factual question, not a value question. So the claim is that chapter ten is really the peak of the Laws of Repentance. The peak of the Laws of Repentance means reaching the most abstract, purest, most refined state possible: a person who does the truth because it is true. That is a true penitent. He erased all the… he took the reins into his own hands and doesn’t let go of them. He is in full control. That is a true penitent. That is why chapter 10 concludes the Laws of Repentance. Now look at the continuation of chapter 10, law 4. After saying that the whole Song of Songs is an allegory for this matter, he finishes speaking about serving God out of love—so that is love of God. And now suddenly, Torah study. What does Torah study have to do with this? There are Laws of Torah Study; everything is spelled out there. Why are you getting into that here? “The early sages said: Lest a person say, I will study Torah so that I will become wealthy, so that I will be called Rabbi, so that I will receive reward in the World to Come—Scripture therefore says: to love the Lord. Whatever you do, do only out of love.” Again, this is not about the Laws of Torah Study here. Maimonides is not discussing some detail of the laws of Torah study here. There are Laws of Torah Study, and there he discusses all the details. Here Maimonides continues to discuss the meaning of serving out of love, love in the sense relevant to the Laws of Repentance—that is, doing the truth because it is true. And this has aspects in love of God, as we saw earlier, because that is the essence of the matter, and also in Torah study. In a moment I’ll expand on that. “And the sages also said: ‘In His commandments he delights greatly’—in His commandments, and not in the reward for His commandments. Likewise, the great sages would command the understanding students and the enlightened among their disciples in particular: Do not be like servants who serve the master on condition of receiving benefit, but be like servants who serve the master on condition of receiving nothing at all, but only because he is the master and it is fitting to serve him. That is to say: serve out of love.” What does “that is to say” mean? It’s not “that is to say.” He is the master, so they must serve him—not “that is to say.” And to love him. No, no—the “that is to say” is the explanation. The explanation of “to love him” is to do things because he is the master. And that is exactly the same thing he said above. The meaning of the word “love” in this context here is to do the truth because it is true. And that also applies to Torah and commandments. Here he expands the concept of love as he defined it here to the whole concept of Torah and commandments, which is really the foundation of all serving God. Okay? So therefore this is not a repetition of the Laws of Torah Study or the Laws of Love of God, which were detailed very well elsewhere. “Anyone who engages in Torah in order to receive reward, or in order that calamity not come upon him, is engaging not for its own sake. But anyone who engages in it not out of fear, nor in order to receive reward, but out of love for the Master of all the earth who commanded it—that one engages in it for its own sake.” And again, in my opinion, the love here is not emotional love, but love as he defined it in the previous two laws. “And the sages said: A person should always engage in Torah even not for its own sake, for from not for its own sake one comes to for its own sake.” And that is why chapters 7, 8, and 9 precede chapter 10, because you begin with service not for its own sake, and from not for its own sake one comes to for its own sake. What does this mean, that from not for its own sake one comes to for its own sake? This is a tremendous novelty. Because there is no systematic way to get from serving not for its own sake to serving for its own sake, as we discussed with the simulations of serving not for its own sake. There is no way to do that. Rather, there is some natural process: if you do things not for their own sake, for the sake of reward, slowly you will understand what the truth is, you will internalize that one must act because that is the truth, and you will arrive at the level of one who serves for its own sake, or out of love, as it is called here. Which is exactly the inversion I spoke about when I discussed the great repentance. I said there is no way a person can transform himself. If I am serving not for its own sake, how do I transform myself into someone who serves for its own sake? If I think one ought to serve for its own sake, then I don’t need to transform myself—I’m already there. It isn’t defined. I said that the Holy One, blessed be He, somehow has to carry me over, or help me somehow cross that strange, undefined transition. That is exactly what he says here: from not for its own sake one comes to for its own sake. He comes—he suddenly finds himself in “for its own sake.” There is no systematic way to do it. Okay, that is really exactly what you said earlier. Raavad?

[Speaker D] What? Say a person serves out of fear, and then there is a commandment to love God, so then you…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The commandment to love God is not connected to this issue. The commandment to love God is to produce emotional love. I am talking in this case about serving out of love, meaning doing the truth because it is true.

[Speaker D] So that too is gradual. You work on yourself to love God, and then you reach…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, but you can’t do that in a systematic way. As I said before, because if you are serving not for its own sake, then your axiom is that you want maximum reward, minimum punishment. How do you suddenly get from that to not serving at all for reward and punishment? How do you make that transition? How? How do you persuade yourself?

[Speaker D] And how do you make the transition to loving God?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What do you mean?

[Speaker D] If you are serving only for reward and punishment, then you can’t love someone in order to receive reward.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Why not? Of course you can. Why not? I can convince myself that it is fitting to love the Holy One, blessed be He, right? To love Him not for its own sake—for reward. In that sense I can work on myself and reach a state where he loves someone, yes? Where he loves the Holy One, blessed be He. Yes, I don’t see what the problem is. What do you mean, what’s the problem? Not that it’s easy, but yes, it can be done. This whole assumption that it is a feeling and therefore… what are you talking about? If feelings were not in our hands, there would be no commandment about them. Clearly the feeling is in our hands. The commandment is to produce a kind of work that in the end will culminate in such a feeling. That—that is the commandment, and it can be done.

[Speaker I] Why not? Can I pay someone to start loving someone he doesn’t love?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Why not? Yes. It doesn’t contradict anything. What do you mean? This thing you call pure… no, the opposite. It is the purest thing there is. The love that you call pure is one big forgery. Because love, what you call pure, is just an impulse, which has nothing to do with my decision. We talked—I don’t remember if we talked about this—the famous example I often give. Once I was asked to speak in Sde Boker; I think I mentioned it here. So I said that… I asked them there whether when I come… yes, I talked about it. I asked them there whether when I come and… I hurt someone, and I come to ask forgiveness because I have pangs of conscience. So I ask him for forgiveness. That’s real forgiveness, right? Now if I say: I have no pangs of conscience at all, he doesn’t interest me in the slightest. But I know I hurt him, and I know that’s wrong, and I know that someone who did such a thing should ask forgiveness. That’s all—I know it intellectually. He does not interest me in the slightest on the emotional plane. I have no stomachache over him in any way. Fine? Now I come and ask forgiveness. And let’s say he knows that this is what’s in my heart. Does he have to accept my request for forgiveness? There they answered me: of course not, it’s fake, it’s not authentic, it’s not real. Exactly the opposite—it’s the most authentic request for forgiveness there can be. Because he is really doing it because he understands that he was wrong. The first one is doing it in order to support his own stomach pains. Because he has pangs of conscience over the bad thing he did to you, so he wants to quiet the… quiet the stomach pains, so he goes and asks forgiveness. That’s authentic? What is authentic is someone who feels nothing and goes to ask forgiveness. Because he goes to ask forgiveness not because it’s a social convention, but because he truly thinks it is wrong. And this is what is incumbent on him to do because he was wrong—with no feeling at all. That is the most authentic thing there is. “Therefore, when teaching children, women, and the general masses, they are taught only to serve out of fear and in order to receive reward. Until their knowledge increases and they become exceedingly wise, this secret is revealed to them little by little, and they are accustomed to this matter gently until they attain understanding and know and serve out of love.” And that is what Maimonides does in chapter 10. He takes us from the stage of the ignorant masses, women, and children, carries us through the whole process, tells us: look, you have free choice, and let me tell you that you should make use of it because there is a great deal of reward and punishment, and see what a great level you will attain—wonderful, everything is marvelous, the World to Come, everything is fine. And then suddenly in law 10 he says: okay, and at some stage your knowledge will increase… and you will come to understand that this whole business is not really the true thing. The true thing is to do the truth because it is true. Period. And here he has no way to persuade us. Either we are there or we are not there. Either we have reached that insight or we have not reached that insight. “It is well known and clear that love of God is not bound in a person’s heart until he is constantly obsessed with it as is proper, and abandons everything else in the world aside from it, as He commanded and said, ‘with all your heart and with all your soul’—and this is only through the knowledge by which one knows Him; according to the knowledge, according to the love, whether little or much.” Here perhaps he returns to emotional love; I’m not even sure about that. But it is clear that he makes it depend on knowledge. According to the knowledge, so will be the love. Maybe in this law I’m not even sure—perhaps here too he is still talking about love in the sense of doing the truth because it is true. But even if here he is talking about the emotional dimension, this is the law that concludes the Laws of Repentance. And in the end emotional love too is a result of intellectual understanding—knowledge—of doing the truth because it is true. That is really the conclusion. And to say that someone has some emotional deficiency—he doesn’t have the emotional dimension, it’s switched off in him, he doesn’t have it, the neurons there aren’t functioning, they’re shut off—there’s no problem, everything is fine, as long as he reached the right conclusion. The fact that this has no emotional expression is not important. A person who is built properly—the emotional expression simply testifies that he did the work correctly on the intellectual-value plane. So that is why it is the right indicator: if you reached love in the emotional sense, that is a sign that apparently you did the work correctly. Is there perhaps a person for whom this does not happen? Nothing happened. At most he lacks the indication that he did the work correctly. But that is not really the thing of value; it is only a sign. It is a result. “Therefore a person must set himself apart”—notice this—“to understand and gain wisdom in the sciences and forms of understanding that inform him about his Creator, according to the capacity that a person has to understand and attain, as we explained in the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah.” Again we have returned to knowledge, the intellectual dimension. Okay? The intellectual dimension determines love. If you meet a woman, then you may fall in love with her. But you do not meet the Holy One, blessed be He—there is no way to fall in love with Him; that’s ridiculous. What you can do is understand who He is intellectually. Maybe that will also produce some emotional dimension in you—possibly. It may even be that this is the commandment, to reach that situation. But that is a byproduct. In the end what you need to do is do the work leading up to it. If the emotional result emerged, that means you did the work right. But the work is the important thing, not the result. And therefore if someone does not have that wing of his personality, nothing happened, everything is fine. As long as he did the work and reached this insight—to do the truth because it is true—then everything is fine. I just want to complete the… What? Also the matter of a feeling called awe of exaltedness? That is already almost—yes, I think that is almost this. What you are standing… I don’t know, you can also relate to awe of exaltedness on these two planes. On the emotional plane, you stand before something great and you are somehow simply overwhelmed, you understand? But that is an emotional response. You understand that you need to acknowledge its greatness, and you have some emotional response that is instinctive. And you can build awe of exaltedness—that is, understand exaltedness very deeply on an intellectual level, and that will produce some kind of awe in you. And then it is really almost like… the difference between awe of exaltedness and love is very slight, if there is any difference at all, hair-splittingly slight. One last point in this context: why does Maimonides choose here specifically the commandment of Torah study in order to demonstrate this idea? So of course that is a topic for a whole lecture in itself; I’ll just say it briefly. In the commandment of Torah study one sees in a very clear and unequivocal way this dimension Maimonides is talking about—doing the truth because it is true. And in that sense it is very similar to what is called here the commandment of repentance, where according to Maimonides there is no commandment, no directive, to repent. But it is very similar. Why? In several places in the Talmud it says that according to Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, one fulfills the obligation of Torah study with one chapter in the morning and one chapter in the evening. The Shema—ideally, you don’t need another chapter. You recite Shema anyway in the morning and evening, and you have fulfilled the obligation of Torah study. Everything else is unrelated to the commandment of Torah study. That is what is brought in the Talmud in Nedarim. The Talmud says: Rav Giddel said in the name of Rav, one who vows, “I will arise and study this chapter,” has taken a great vow to the God of Israel. The Talmud asks: but is he not already sworn from Mount Sinai? And it answers that these are vows of encouragement, not important now, so it does not take effect—yes, an oath cannot take effect upon an oath. Here it says “vow,” but in the Talmud they interchange the terms; it means an oath. There is no object here. So can an oath take effect upon an oath? The Talmud says no, because this follows Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, who says that with one chapter in the morning and one chapter in the evening he fulfills his obligation. And if he vows concerning an additional chapter, then on that he is not already sworn. So there is a dispute among the medieval authorities (Rishonim). Some explain that in that too he… the Ran, for example, there on the spot—there is the Ran on the Talmud itself, not on the Rif; in Nedarim there is a Ran on the Talmud itself—he says that everything beyond the chapter in the morning and the chapter in the evening is a commandment derived from the exposition of “and you shall teach them diligently to your children”—that the words of Torah should be sharpened in your mouth, so that if someone asks you, you will not stammer and say, etc. And he says that because of that, an oath can take effect on it. It is Torah-level, but it is Torah-level not written explicitly in the Torah—it comes from exposition, and regarding a Torah-level matter that comes from exposition, an oath can take effect on it. That is a major novelty of the Ran, and that is what he writes there. But then it turns out there is an obligation to do it; only the obligation does not come from the commandment of “when you lie down and when you rise,” meaning morning and evening, but from “and you shall teach them diligently to your children,” or from an exposition on that verse. But the Rosh and the commentator there on the spot—it’s not Rashi there, it’s another commentator, apparently Riban—they say no, there really is no obligation. There is no obligation to study beyond one chapter in the morning and one chapter in the evening. So if there is no obligation, then what is the concept of neglect of Torah? If I did not recite Shema, that is neglect of Torah. Neglect of Torah is someone who could have studied and did not, right? But he doesn’t have to, so what’s the problem? What is neglect of Torah? “Neglect of Torah is equal to them all,” the beginning of the Talmud says; for that one is judged first of all. What is the meaning of this? So my claim—and there is much evidence for it, but briefly—my claim is that the commandment of Torah study really is one chapter in the morning and one chapter in the evening. There is a passage in Menachot where you can see this very nicely. The whole passage is devoted to showing that there is no commandment at all to study Torah beyond one chapter in the morning and one chapter in the evening, and they bend over backwards to show that there is not the slightest shred of commandment—not even an existential commandment—and no issue at all, nothing, absolutely nothing. Why? In order to explain to you that Torah study is not a commandment. Torah study is something much more fundamental than a commandment. Someone who does not study Torah—someone who studies Torah only because it is a commandment—does not understand what Torah is. Someone who studies Torah has to study it because he understands the meaning of Torah, not because there is a commandment to study Torah. It is not one of the 613 commandments. As one of the 613 commandments, if you want to fulfill your obligation, one chapter in the morning and one chapter in the evening—fine, you’re covered. But clearly you have to study all the time, and there is neglect of Torah for every moment that you could have studied and did not. Where does that come from? There is no command. It comes from your needing to understand: if you understand the meaning of Torah, then you understand that you need to engage in it as much as you can. Exactly as I said about repentance. That is, there is no commandment—why? Because it is a foundational commandment, a commandment such that if you do not understand it… Rabbi Israel Salanter writes—he discusses the commandment of Torah study there in an article called “Law and Judgment”—he brings the Talmud in Sanhedrin where the Talmud says that the rebellious son never was, never will be, and never will exist. So why was it taught? The Talmud says this is a dispute among tannaim; so why was it written? “Study it and receive reward.” And what does “study it and receive reward” mean? We need these three verses because I already finished everything else, and what will happen to my reward? So I need three more verses so I can have reward. A strange statement. He says no—it is there to teach you the principle of “study it and receive reward.” From the fact that one must study the rebellious son, and it was written in the Torah even though it never was and never will be—what does that teach? It teaches that when we study Torah, we are not studying it in order that if it ever happens we will know what to do. Rather, study has value in itself. And this is not just about the rebellious son—the rebellious son teaches this about the whole rest of the Torah. That is why it was written: to teach the principle of “study it and receive reward,” to teach the principle that you do not study in order to know what to do, but that study is a value in itself. Now another proof he brings for this matter—proof, well, yes, maybe you can call it a proof—there is a Talmudic passage in Menachot where the Talmud says: why is it uncommon that the sons of Torah scholars themselves become Torah scholars? And one explanation the Talmud gives is because they did not recite the blessing over Torah first. What a strange evil inclination that is, he says. Torah scholars who devote their whole lives to Torah study—and specifically on the blessing over Torah they cut corners? And why specifically the blessing over Torah? What’s the insight here? So he says, the Talmud in Menachot says that for every commandment that is not the final commandment, one does not recite a blessing over it. One does not recite blessings over preparatory acts for commandments. Therefore they learn in the Jerusalem Talmud regarding building a sukkah—the Jerusalem Talmud says one recites a blessing over building a sukkah. Some want to infer from there that in the Jerusalem Talmud the view is that there is a commandment to build a sukkah. But that is not correct. The Jerusalem Talmud disagrees with the underlying principle itself, that one recites blessings over preparatory acts for commandments. The Babylonian Talmud says one does not recite blessings over preparatory acts for commandments. But, but, but, the claim is that one does not recite blessings over preparatory acts for commandments. So what happened? says Rabbi Israel Salanter. Why did those Torah scholars not recite the blessing over Torah first? Because they thought no blessing was needed, since studying Torah is a preparatory act for a commandment—a preparatory act so as to know what to do. And one does not recite a blessing over a preparatory act. Someone who relates to Torah study that way—his sons will not become Torah scholars. Because he does not understand what Torah study is. Torah study is not in order to know what to do. Torah study is to study in order to study. Just like that—again, the famous “just like that.” Not in order to attain something, but just like that. That is called Torah study. By the way, there is a Rashi at the beginning of the portion Bechukotai, right? Rashi says there, “If you walk in My statutes…” it goes there, “and keep My commandments… and do them,” something like that, right? I don’t remember the verse exactly. So Rashi explains there three things: “walk in My statutes,” “keep My commandments,” “do them.” What does that mean? So there is performance, there is study in order to perform, and there is “that you should labor in Torah”—that is the Rashi the mashgiach always used to quote, yes? “If you walk in My statutes”—that you should labor in Torah. What does it mean to labor in Torah? It does not mean specifically to kill yourself and work hard. It means that you should labor in Torah for the sake of Torah, not in order to know what to do. In contrast to “keep My commandments,” which means learning in order to know what to do, and “do them” is the actual performance itself. Okay? So “walk in My statutes” means learning in order to learn, not in order to know what to do. There are many more proofs there; there are… anyway. So in short, what we see here is that in the commandment of Torah study too we see a foundation very similar to what we saw regarding repentance. That the commandment of Torah study too really needs to be done מתוך recognizing the meaning of what Torah is, not because of the command. And therefore the Torah is not really careful to command it. From the standpoint of commandment, one chapter in the morning and one in the evening—you have fulfilled your obligation. But there is a concept of neglect of Torah. Why is there a concept of neglect of Torah? Because clearly you have to study as much as you can. If you don’t study, that is neglect of Torah, and you will be held accountable for it. But they do not want to command it. Why? Because you need to do it out of recognition of what Torah is, not in order to attain something. Once in Yeruham, when I taught in Yeruham, there was some discussion in the yeshiva—why study Torah? So I argued that the question is invalid from the outset. The moment you give an answer, you’ve lost. Meaning, you’ve shot yourself in the foot. Because you acknowledged the legitimacy of the question. And if you give an answer to why study Torah—because it improves my character, because it, I don’t know, makes the world better—maybe all that is true and maybe not, I don’t know. But those are certainly not the reasons why one studies Torah. Because if those are the reasons why one studies Torah, that means that the real values are character improvement and repairing the world, and Torah study is a preparatory act for a commandment. But no—Torah study is the commandment. And the reason we study Torah is because we understand what Torah is, and Torah must be studied. Torah is the basic thing with which I can explain other things; it itself does not require explanation. Just like that. Why study Torah? Just like that. Because if you… just like that, axiomatically, not arbitrarily. Just like that because you understand what Torah is and you understand its meaning, so you study Torah. Not because it will bring this benefit or that benefit. It is not for benefit. That is study not for its own sake. And that too is a form of study not for its own sake: to study in order to improve one’s character.

[Speaker D] So why is it not a commandment in itself? Because then you would study in order to fulfill the commandment and not in order…

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, because they do not want you to do it because of the commandment. They want you to do it because you recognize the importance of the thing. In that sense it is somewhat similar to repentance. In repentance you cannot command at all, because repentance is to be one who chooses. But clearly the idea is that you have to be one who chooses because you understand that a human being ought to be a choosing creature. Not because there is a commandment to be a choosing creature. Okay? That is also why Maimonides brings Torah study here as an illustration in chapter 10 for his whole move of doing things just like that. Because I take the reins and decide what to do, and not for all sorts of side reasons. I don’t think it is accidental that he chose Torah study. Torah study means, in essence, that this is the clearest example of a commandment that you do just like that. And if you study Torah because of that, then you really are someone who holds the reins in his own hands. You don’t even need a command. You understand that it is right, and that is what you do. After that he moves on also to commandments, but with commandments it is clear that you are commanded, so it is weaker than in Torah study. Commandments you do because you are commanded, and even in commandments you need to do it just like that. But after you learn that through Torah study, you can also apply it to observance of the commandments. Good, that’s it. Have a good week, and may you be sealed for good. Thank you very much.