Repentance Matters – Lesson 4

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] You don’t need to take into account that they’ll tell you what to do. That’s all. Obviously, you’re required to do what’s right. Choosing is only the practical way that comes about.

[Speaker D] Someone who has no ability to choose—you can’t command him to do anything either. I don’t understand the discussion.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Again, you’re—

[Speaker D] talking about something theoretical, the command—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] —of the Torah assumes—I’m not talking about something theoretical, I’m talking about the question of what the Torah ought to write. Should the Torah write to me, “Be one who chooses,” or should the Torah write to me what to do? Obviously, in order to do the right thing I need to be choosing, as long as nobody is hypnotizing me. But that’s not what is demanded of me. What is demanded of me is to act; being a chooser is only the practical setup. No, because if you’re not—the Torah demands of me to choose.

[Speaker D] Because you can’t demand anything of you if you can’t choose.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What does that have to do with it? Again, I’m coming back to this—it’s irrelevant, it’s just the practical setup. You don’t need to write that; it’s obvious, it’s obvious. The Torah tells me, “Do,” while the infrastructure is of course that you choose to do it, because otherwise you won’t do it. But what is required of you is to do. What’s the difficulty?

[Speaker D] Why does the Torah say “and choose,” then?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Why does the Torah need to write, “and choose life”?

[Speaker D] It’s kind of a heading: “Do lots of good things.”

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, I don’t think the intention is a command about that—

[Speaker D] to enter into—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, it doesn’t need headings like that. The Torah says what must be done and what must not be done; it doesn’t need headings.

[Speaker D] So the Torah is commanding us to put ourselves into a test, basically?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Not to put ourselves into a test, but to choose.

[Speaker D] And that’s not the only way to choose, because in my view—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Second, that’s not true, not true. To put yourself into a test is to enter a situation where there’s a good chance you’ll fail. No. But to enter a normal situation where there is choice and there is also some chance that you’ll fail—

[Speaker D] I understand, but it’s a little hard to say that that’s okay—that’s not the only interpretation of the words “and choose.”

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The only interpretation? That’s my interpretation. You can accept it, you can reject it.

[Speaker D] No, fine. I’m saying you can’t prove from there that there’s a command of the Torah to put ourselves into a situation where we can choose. That’s a bit exaggerated.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t know. The Torah tells us to choose—that’s not interpretation, it’s written there.

[Speaker D] Yes, but it’s very easy to explain that what the Torah means is that the state of choice is forced on you, and then you should always choose the best side.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The Torah doesn’t need to tell me that the state of choice is forced on me. I know that by myself.

[Speaker D] There are lots of things it doesn’t need to tell.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No. If there’s something it doesn’t need to tell, that’s a difficulty: why did it write it? Maybe you have no answer, but it’s still a question—why did it write it?

[Speaker D] Fine. Aside from the proof from the Torah, is there another proof that a person really has to bring himself into it?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Not bring himself into it—again I—

[Speaker D] mean, bring himself into a state where choice is possible. I didn’t say into a test. Fine, the definition of test that you gave—no, there isn’t—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t have a proof. I don’t have a proof from logic.

[Speaker D] Yes, fine. But I’m saying this logic needs clarification, because I also hear a very strong line of reasoning that if a person can guarantee the result in advance, that too is an act of choice. No, but the result is not that.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] In my view, the result is not that, and therefore the reasoning is—the result is positive choice.

[Speaker D] But then you make only one positive choice instead of lots of little ones. If I resigned from this profession, you’d be right; it’s not that I—I’m not completely refraining from choosing, I’m making one choice.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If someone did that to you without—at least on this do you agree, that if someone did it to you without your asking?

[Speaker D] Then talk to him—what do you want from me? I didn’t choose.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No problem. I’m only asking whether it’s appropriate to do or not.

[Speaker D] Whether it’s good for me?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Whether it’s good for me, and whether he should do it.

[Speaker D] So that’s like asking whether it’s good for me to live. It’s really the same question.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So? I don’t know.

[Speaker D] No, but that’s a completely different kind of question. It’s not a question of what I’m obligated to do. Is it good for me to be born?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Meaning we already agree—meaning we already agree that there is value in choice. Now the whole question is how many choices need to be made. You say one is needed, but one is enough. So that’s already not what you said before. Because what you said before was that the result is what matters, basically, no matter how I get there.

[Speaker D] No, it’s—

[Speaker C] not the same thing, that’s what I’m saying, and I don’t understand why not say that.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No problem, you can say that. My simple intuition says otherwise, but granted, it’s not a proof; it’s a line of reasoning.

[Speaker C] I see it as a continuum. There’s the most extreme side, where you force yourself to choose only good. In the middle there’s a state where you force yourself not to have bad inclinations, but you could still refrain from good. And there’s an even more choice-oriented side, though still not fully choice, where for example you arrange to live in a forest and never enter any situation of test at all. So it’s a continuum, and it’s more a question of where the line is at which choice disappears.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Very good, that’s exactly what I said earlier too. Entering into a test is also a continuum. There’s a situation where I put myself somewhere I’m likely to fail in order to cope more forcefully, and there’s a situation where I simply live my life in the sense that the Torah was not given to ministering angels, but I also don’t hypnotize myself—which is a lower level. Yes, once a friend of mine asked me: after all, evil speech is a very, very severe prohibition. Why don’t people shut themselves in their houses and never go out, and then they’ll never fail in evil speech? Now, some people would say, fine, because they couldn’t stand it. I mean, how much can you lock yourself in the house? Okay, we’ll try for three weeks, but how long can you endure that? Especially when you don’t have Zoom and phones and things like that. But I think that’s not it. People don’t do that because it’s not right to do that. It’s not right to do that. You need to live within life, within the world that was created here, and within it try to do what is incumbent on you and avoid what… And what is life?

[Speaker C] What’s incumbent on us is to try to improve the norm relative to which you behave. Right. And maybe one of our roles is to improve it to the point that human beings stay in their homes and don’t go out. Who said the natural norm is this one?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Maybe you also have to stand on one leg every morning, so I’m saying no. You can disagree. I claim that what is incumbent on us is to implement things within life. Within life, to live correctly. But to do that within life, even though within life the chance that we’ll fail is higher. And not to go off to deserts and caves, even though there we wouldn’t fail. Because that’s not what the Torah wants. And I think that in practice people don’t do that; if you ask them and corner them, they won’t know how to answer you, so they’ll tell you, fine, because I can’t stand it. I think that’s not where it comes from. It comes from that same intuitive feeling, the line of reasoning I mentioned earlier, that Torah was given to be implemented in life, not in a monastery. And I think the point that… where is the boundary? Good question. Some things are more so, some less so; surely there are disagreements about that. I’m not entering the boundary question right now. I’m talking about the principled claim. For example, say in the Haredi world they think the boundary is set higher than in the modern religious world. In the Haredi world they sort of close you off more from other options for fear that you’ll fail. In the modern religious world they close you off less; they believe more that you need to do it out of choice, even though it’s obvious there’s more chance of failure. And therefore there is a whole outlook here, and all these arguments—for example, I wrote about this on the website not long ago—all these arguments between Haredim and modern religious people: look how many more fall among you than among us. Aside from the fact that I’m not sure that’s true, but leave that aside—even if it is true—these are arguments that beg the question. Because you assume that falling means not doing the right thing. I think falling means not doing the right thing by choice. And therefore once the definition is different, of course the measures of success are also different. And then each outlook naturally builds society as it believes. But these attempts at comparison assume some criterion that is itself disputed. And a lot of people don’t understand that, and so they get trapped in these ridiculous high-school-level arguments.

[Speaker C] Why, Rabbi? Seemingly, both falling and dropping out—whether it’s rebellion or just getting tired of the whole system—both are failures of the system and both are flawed outcomes, and both should be regretted. The Rabbi made a distinction here between people who rebel and people who simply drift away because they’re fed up—or maybe I didn’t understand correctly? Okay, so why… how does that help the liberal religious claim in this case against the Haredi one?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The modern religious person chooses more than the Haredi framework, and he also falls more. So on the one hand that’s better, on the other hand that’s worse. Now I don’t know how to weigh what matters more, and therefore I may have positions on this too, and therefore this debate is an undefined debate. Each side assumes its own premises and measures success according to its own premises. And very often this debate is conducted as though both sides agree on the criterion and the only question is who succeeds more according to that criterion. But that’s not true. The debate is over the criterion itself. Of course we’re talking about degrees; even Haredim don’t go off to deserts. Meaning, it’s a question of degree. But there is a disagreement here about degree, and the important point is that people don’t understand this point: that the fact that we don’t go off to deserts is not only because we don’t succeed, in my opinion, but because we don’t think it’s right to do that. The whole question is where the reasonable line passes—what counts as a monastery and what counts as life. What the Chazon Ish says, yes, “the world” and “the world,” or the yeshivot as Noah’s ark, yes, protecting us from the flood outside—all these are statements saying: I want to close people in a monastery because I prefer that they choose less and fail less. In contrast, the other approaches say: I prefer that they choose more, even at the price that they fail more. And now one can discuss who is right.

[Speaker C] From that standpoint, why is it forbidden to enter into business dealings with a non-Jew? Why is it forbidden to get close to a non-Jew and to the unlearned masses? Seemingly that just puts you in—it simply gives you more choice.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t think there is any prohibition on that matter. What is forbidden is to go to a place where you are tempted, not to go to a place where you deliberate. Now, in a place where you also deliberate but temptations are also involved, then there’s a dilemma here, and I think you can still go there, because in the end you also need to deliberate. My personal opinion.

[Speaker C] Rabbi, how do you get tempted to marry someone if you eat his bread? And that prohibition is what—I don’t remember whether it’s Torah-level.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That’s an explicit Talmudic text. What do you mean—what’s the problem?

[Speaker C] Yes, does the Rabbi think it’s reasonable that the moment you eat bread with someone, you immediately see his daughter and immediately run to marry her?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The Talmud says it, not me. The Talmud says: because of their daughters. What do you mean? The Talmud says it.

[Speaker C] I think the Talmud knew that this was an unlikely concern, and still imposed the prohibition even though it’s unlikely.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Very likely. The Talmud knew it was likely, and it is indeed likely. Someone who lives together with non-Jews—go and see in the United States—someone who lives with non-Jews marries non-Jews more, even if he’s secular. Someone who lives among Jews marries Jews, so it’s obvious. How is that a remote argument? It’s simple. Fine, but let’s leave that. Let’s leave it, it’s a side issue, it’s not—

[Speaker D] But there is something strange that at least in the spirit of the matter, in the commands of Jewish law we always find commands and fences whose purpose is to distance a person from a place of temptation—in other words, to take away some of his power of choice, to bind himself. It’s true that it’s a matter of temptations, but from your perspective that means narrowing the space of choice. But we never find commands whose purpose is to enlarge the—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Obviously, because you’re always fighting against inclinations. So the role of Jewish law always sees its task—by the way, today it’s actually a little different in my opinion—but Jewish law traditionally saw its task as putting on the brakes. Going outward, none of us is going to do; to stop us, someone from outside is needed. Therefore Jewish law traditionally sees its role as a brake.

[Speaker D] But inclinations are also a question—if a person is not exposed to any inclination at all, then his choice is also valueless. In your view, what?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Unrelated. Those are two different things. Maybe I’ll answer that next time, we’ll see. Those are two different things, it’s not— Fine, let’s get back to our topic. So what I actually want to claim is that the commandment of choice is not redundant—that’s what the Or Sameach says. It’s not redundant because it’s not true that “and you shall return to the Lord your God” is just a repetition of all the commandments, of what is incumbent on me to do. Rather, it tells me to do them by choice, not just to do them, period. Or in other words, the commandment of repentance is to return to being a chooser, not to doing the right thing. That’s a consequence. Therefore it adds something. True, I think Maimonides is right that even though it adds something, there is nothing to command about it because you can’t command a person to be a chooser. But what the Or Sameach says in his attack on Nachmanides—that it adds nothing at all—that’s not true; it definitely adds something. On the most basic level, I would even say this: after all, the commandment of repentance is regret, and it includes abandoning the sin, regret, and acceptance for the future. If there were no commandment of repentance and there were only the other commandments, then I wouldn’t need to do regret, or acceptance for the future, or confession. I would simply need to leave the sin, and that’s it. Why does Jewish law add these stages? It adds these stages because it is not true that the role of the commandment of repentance is to ensure that I perform commandments. That is simply not true. The role of the commandment of repentance is to ensure that I perform the commandments in the mode of choice—that I choose to perform commandments, that I return to being a chooser. And that’s why all these parameters—regret, acceptance for the future, and confession—all operate on the plane of being a chooser. That’s the essence of repentance. Abandoning the sin is entirely technical; that’s obvious. Abandoning the sin really is redundant, because in any case you need to leave the sin because it is a sin. It may also play a part in the process of returning to repentance, but clearly even without “and you shall return to the Lord your God,” we certainly would have known about abandoning the sin. But the other three parameters—absolutely not. And certainly not repentance in the larger sense, since in the end what is incumbent on us is to be choosers. And according to my earlier interpretation, that is exactly the point—not to be choosers in order to make sure we do the good, but rather there is value in our very being choosers. In a certain sense, someone who chooses evil has an advantage over someone who does not choose good. And also a disadvantage, because he chooses evil. But on one side it’s an advantage, on the other side it’s a disadvantage. He has the advantage that he chooses, and the disadvantage that he chooses evil. If such a thing exists—I’m not sure to what extent there is even a situation where a person chooses evil. Really chooses, in the mode of choice, and knows that it is evil, and decides to do it. It’s an interesting question whether such a thing can even exist; I don’t know.

[Speaker C] But we’re not talking about someone choosing the good of another system that is evil according to Judaism, right?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I’m talking about someone choosing evil according to his own view. Yes, okay. If he doesn’t believe in this, then he believes in something else—he’s compelled. I’m talking about someone who knows what the truth is. We talked about that. Fine. In any case, the point really is that there’s an emphasis here on what I said earlier: the concept of choice is not just another way of saying “perform commandments.” The concept of choice is something more fundamental; it is the infrastructure for performing commandments. It is basically: be a chooser. The concept of repentance—sorry—is basically: be a chooser. And the practical consequence, of course, is that after you choose, you should choose the good. Usually that also happens. If you are already choosing, then you choose the good. But the command of repentance, or the essence of repentance—even if it is not a command—the essence of repentance is not “perform commandments and leave transgressions.” That is an incorrect conception. Maybe that’s the small repentance. The essence of repentance is: take the reins back into your hands, and of course do with them what should be done, and steer the horses to the right place. But ultimately the whole matter of repentance is not on the plane of the commandments at all; it is on the meta-plane, prior to the commandment. By the way, on this I’ll say very briefly: in Maimonides’ Laws of Repentance, all sorts of things appear there and it’s not clear what they’re doing there. The world to come and this world and reward and punishment and Torah study for its own sake and two chapters on choice. What is all that doing there? What is all that doing in the Laws of Repentance? It seems to me that once Maimonides understands that the concept of repentance is basically the infrastructure for the whole Torah, he is essentially telling you: return to being a chooser. Maimonides includes in the Laws of Repentance all kinds of elements that are foundational rather than halakhic / of Jewish law, things that are the infrastructure of Jewish law and not Jewish law itself. And all the things that appear in the Laws of Repentance—Torah study, love of God, and certainly reward and punishment and the world to come, which are not connected to Jewish law at all. But even love of God and Torah study, which have their own legal collections dealing with them—the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah, the Laws of Torah Study—still Maimonides also needs them here. So my claim is—and this needs more expansion, I won’t do it here—my claim is that when Maimonides brings it here, he brings the non-halakhic / of Jewish law aspect of it, the foundational aspect. Therefore when he speaks here about love, he speaks about doing the commandments out of love. He is not speaking about love of God as a state. Love of God as a state belongs in the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah. But the motivation to do the commandments out of love appears in the Laws of Repentance. Why? Because in the Laws of Repentance we are dealing with motivations and the drive to perform commandments, not with performing the commandments themselves. Choice, love of God. By the way, what is love of God according to Maimonides? In chapter—at least I’ll say a word about this. One second. In chapter 10 of the Laws of Repentance there is a really fascinating opening. “A person should not say: I will fulfill the commandments of the Torah and engage in its wisdom so that I may receive all the blessings written in it, or so that I may merit the life of the world to come; and I will separate myself from the transgressions against which the Torah warned me so that I may be saved from the curses written in the Torah, or so that I may not be cut off from the life of the world to come. It is not proper to serve the Lord 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 unlearned masses, women, and minors serve the Lord in this way, for they are trained to serve out of fear until their knowledge increases and they serve out of love.” So first of all, you have fear of God and love of God here, even though fear of God and love of God are discussed in their own right in the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah. He returns to them here. Here it is not about love of God and fear of God. Here it is about serving out of love and serving out of fear. It’s about the question why you perform the commandments, not whether you love God or fear God. There is value in love of God and there is also value in fear of God. Both are commandments. How can Maimonides deny the value of fear of God? Maimonides is not denying here the value of fear of God; he is only claiming that commandment-performance, service of God, should not be done from fear but from love. As motivation for performing commandments, Maimonides says you need love and not fear. So that’s an indication that when he speaks here of love of God and fear of God, he is not talking about the commandments of love and fear of God. Those commandments are discussed in the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah. Here he is talking about the infrastructure—how I approach things, why I perform the commandments—because that is the meaning of the Laws of Repentance. All the Laws of Repentance deal with is the drive, choice, the question why to perform commandments or how to perform commandments, not with performing the commandments themselves. What I said about the Or Sameach. But look, even more than that—how does he define love here? “One who serves out of love”—law 2—and this is a fascinating law—“occupies himself with 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, but does the truth because it is truth, and in the end the good will come because of it. And this level is a very great level, and not every sage merits it. It was the level of Abraham our father, whom the Holy One, blessed be He, called His beloved, because he served only out of love. And this is the level which the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded us through Moses, as it says: ‘And you shall love the Lord your God.’ And when a person loves God with the proper love, he will immediately perform all the commandments out of love.” And the emphasis here is not on love of God, but on performing the commandments out of love. Love as a motivation for performing the commandments, not the state of love itself. But how does he define the state of love? Notice, it’s fascinating. “Does the truth because it is truth.” Truth… wait, there’s some noise here… wait, close that phone over there in the back, guys. What, is that how you would define the concept of love? To do the truth because it is truth? The opposite—love: I love someone, so I do it in order to benefit him, to do his will, so that he’ll be fond of me or I’ll be fond of him. No: to do the truth because it is truth. The coldest, most Lithuanian-style concept there is—that’s what Maimonides here calls love.

[Speaker E] Seemingly there’s no connection here to another person. What? Seemingly there’s no connection here to another person.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] To do the truth because it is truth—that truth is truth because the Holy One, blessed be He, commanded it, so there is a connection there. But you do it not because you love the Holy One, blessed be He. This is not about some emotional dimension or anything like that. You do the truth because it is truth. That is called serving out of love.

[Speaker C] But seemingly that’s exactly like romantic love, marital love. Love at the highest level is not dependent on anything—not even on a temporary feeling you happen to feel toward her.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Romantic love is that you—

[Speaker C] Okay yes, it is based on—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] emotion. That is not doing the truth because it is truth.

[Speaker C] Look at the continuation.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Wait, look at the continuation.

[Speaker C] According to the Sages’ definition that love which depends on something is inferior, then the best love is one that depends only on the fact that you are you, and I feel an attraction that can’t be explained specifically toward—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So we’ve returned to doing the truth because it is truth instead of the emotional dimension, right? Granted.

[Speaker C] Right, and that’s the most exalted thing—what’s so surprising about that?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Nothing surprising at all. I once gave a whole lecture on this; I don’t want to get into it. There are also posts on my website about it. But look at law 3: “And what is the proper love? It is that one should love the Lord with a very great, exceeding, intense love, until his soul is bound up in the love of the Lord, and he is continually enraptured by it, like one lovesick, whose mind is never free from love of that woman, and he is enraptured by her constantly, whether sitting, rising, eating, or drinking. Even more than this should the love of the Lord be in the hearts of His lovers, enrapturing them constantly, as He commanded us: ‘with all your heart and with all your soul.’ This is what Solomon said metaphorically: ‘For I am sick with love.’ And the entire Song of Songs is a metaphor for this matter.” Here suddenly he retreats 180 degrees backward—the opposite. Suddenly he’s talking about emotional love, like love of a woman that fills your heart all the time. Where did “doing the truth because it is truth” go? I think what Maimonides writes here is really a remark, but what Maimonides writes here is: “the entire Song of Songs is a metaphor for this matter.” What does that mean? You have to be careful not to take the metaphor too far. My claim—one second, okay. Fine, my claim is that what is being discussed here is indeed a metaphor. It really is not about emotional love for the Holy One, blessed be He. It is about doing the truth because it is truth. Maimonides just wants to tell us that this is supposed to accompany us all of life and be the motivation for our action at every moment. And as a metaphor for that, he takes love of a woman, where on the emotional level that indeed accompanies us all the time. But not because love of God too needs to be emotional. The metaphor has to be taken with limitations. In one respect it is similar, not in every respect. And therefore the claim is that Song of Songs is a metaphor for this matter—a metaphor also in this sense, that love of God is not emotional; it must accompany us at every moment as emotional love accompanies us at every moment. It must be a motivation for everything we do, just as emotional love is a motivation for everything we do. But it’s a metaphor, not an identity. Otherwise you have one law after another that are really 180 degrees contradictory: “do the truth because it is truth,” and then suddenly romantic love that fills your heart and because of which you do everything. It doesn’t seem to me that this can be reconciled any other way. So what I basically want to say for our purposes is that love—the Laws of Repentance in general deal with motivations for serving God, motivations for performing commandments, where repentance itself, which is the core of the Laws of Repentance, is being a chooser. That is the first basic motivation. After that there is love and fear of God, but even there we are not talking about the love and fear of God of the Laws of the Foundations of the Torah, but about love and fear as motivation for service, for performing commandments. Serving out of love and serving out of fear. These are not the commandments of love of God and fear of God. Again, it returns to motivation—why perform commandments. And there too Maimonides explains that love does not mean emotional love, but rather the motivation of doing the truth because it is truth—or in other words, returning to being a chooser. Returning to being a chooser: when you choose, you choose what is true in your eyes. When would you do what is not true in your eyes? We talked about weakness of will. Only when you are not choosing, when you let go of the reins. To do the truth because it is truth is basically just to return to being a chooser. And that’s why he brings in the whole world to come and all that, and says that this is the service of women and children and that it is not proper to serve God in that way. Why? Because it is an external motivation for serving God, not because that is the truth. And to do it because of external motivations is not right, or not complete. Again, it’s better than what might otherwise be, but it’s not complete. The complete state is to do it because of choice. And therefore it seems to me that this whole strange structure of the Laws of Repentance—A, that so much aggadic literature, exhortation, and thought are woven into it, how is that connected to legal rulings? And B, the insertion of all kinds of topics that seemingly have nothing to do with repentance: serving out of love, serving out of fear, the world to come, Torah study for its own sake, choice, two chapters on choice—why does all this appear there? I think the picture I’m describing here explains all these strange things in, I think, a good way. Fine. Now I want to move to the next stage.

[Speaker C] Rabbi, I’d like to ask about one possibility of explaining that a person thinks something is wrong and still does it, because human beings are not rational, not always at least, and there could be a person who ignores a moral standard. He does what he does because he wants to do it, and he has no objective justification for it, not even one that pretends a little to be such.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Because of the problem of weakness of will. Again, it’s the same thing. What you tell him is: return to being a chooser. It’s the same thing; I don’t see the difference. Fine, come on, I want to sharpen this a bit more. There’s a saying of the Sages: “In the place where penitents stand, the completely righteous cannot stand.” And not because of the crowding and not because of the smell and not all the other jokes. So the conception of the Talmud on this matter is that what is written here is that a penitent is preferable to a completely righteous person. And it seems from the Talmud that there is some amoraic dispute whether the penitent is preferable or the completely righteous person is preferable. But among the medieval authorities (Rishonim), for example, and also the later authorities (Acharonim) who bring it, they always bring: a penitent is preferable to a completely righteous person. In other words, that view is basically brought as the conclusion. Let’s try for a moment to think what this thing actually means. How can one even say that a penitent is preferable to a completely righteous person? What possible explanation could there be for that? After all, a penitent—even if he is a complete penitent—in the end at most he reaches being completely righteous. Even if he repented perfectly and came all the way back in everything, so now he has become completely righteous. How is a penitent preferable to a completely righteous person? Why is the penitent better than that? Now of course one could say that maybe he deserves more reward, maybe he deserves more reward because he worked harder or something like that—not in the sense that his condition is better, but if he worked harder maybe he deserves more reward. But even with that I’m not sure that it’s a correct distinction between a completely righteous person and a penitent. A completely righteous person works very hard. On the contrary, he works harder than the penitent, because he works all his life to make sure he is completely righteous. Rabbi Elazar ben Dordaya—after all, that’s what Rabbi cried about in the Talmudic passage we brought—Elazar ben Dordaya acquired his world in one hour. He enjoyed himself all his life and acquired his world in one hour. Rabbi says: I work all my life; I didn’t fall, so I’m not a penitent, and I’m not on the level of Rabbi Elazar ben Dordaya. In other words, I don’t think it’s right even to say that the penitent works harder than the completely righteous person. That’s a common illusion, but I don’t think it’s true. On the contrary. Why, Rabbi?

[Speaker C] If we’re talking in terms of investment of, say, units of energy—if we measure it that way—and say, I think in a theoretical psychological measurement, I don’t know if there are practical ways to do it, but say a righteous person invests one unit of energy every day throughout his life, and a wicked person who repents, like Rabbi Elazar ben Dordaya, invests ten thousand units of effort in one hour.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t think there is a way to measure that, and if there were a way to measure it, I’m fairly convinced the righteous person invests more energy. But that’s another discussion. The wicked person does it once, so he does it the way the Talmud says in Tractate Ketubot, on page 33 I think, something like that. The Talmud says there that had Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah been beaten, they would have worshiped the idol. But to throw themselves into the fiery furnace—no problem. So the Talmud learns from here that lashes are worse, or more painful, than death. So what is that? After all, in the Torah’s system of punishments, the death penalty is more severe. How does that fit? So they explain there—Tosafot and Ritva, not important—there are interesting explanations there, interesting disputes. But they explain there that lashes are constant; even though the level of pain is lower, if lashes keep going, in the end you won’t withstand it, you’ll fall. But to throw yourself once into the fiery furnace and finish the whole business in one one-time heroic act—that’s easier. And therefore Hananiah, Mishael, and Azariah were willing to throw themselves into the fiery furnace, but to withstand lashes over time, constantly, and not worship the idol—they wouldn’t have managed. In other words, there is something about ongoing investment, even if small, over time, that is much harder than a one-time heroic deed. Fine, but I’m saying it’s impossible—it’s hard to measure this. I think it’s hard to hang the relationship between a penitent and a righteous person on effort. I don’t think that’s the issue there.

[Speaker C] It’s hard to say we’re speaking only about the dramatically extreme returnees like Rabbi Elazar ben Dordaya; you could also say someone who returns—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] —to repentance after half a year, say, compared to a righteous person. No, you assume they’re speaking only about not such cases, and I’m saying no—they’re speaking about everyone. And if they’re speaking about everyone, that means it’s not a function of effort, but that there is something in the penitent that is better than the righteous person. And the question is how that can be, how to understand such a thing. So my claim is that this continues what I said earlier. That the penitent—we assume, this question assumes, that the penitent repents in order to arrive at the state of righteousness. And once he succeeds, then he becomes completely righteous, and therefore the question arises how one can say that the penitent is preferable to the completely righteous person. At most, if he succeeded, then he arrived at being completely righteous. But I say that’s not true. Repentance has value not as a means to becoming completely righteous. There is value to the process. At most, if he succeeded, then he arrived at being righteous. But I say no. Repentance has value not as a means to becoming completely righteous. There is value to the process of repentance itself. There is value—what I said earlier—there is value in your very being a chooser. The fact that afterward you also choose the good—excellent. But it’s not that choice is merely a practical consequence—sorry, merely the practical setup—so that you will do the right thing. Choice has value in itself, aside from the fact that it also brings you to do the right thing. Therefore, if I ask myself what the value of a penitent is, he has a double value. First, he arrived at being completely righteous—let’s say a perfect penitent, yes? He arrived at being completely righteous. Besides that, there is also value in the very path he took, in the very fact of his self-perfection. And therefore he is greater than the completely righteous person. Not because his final state is better, but because he is better than him on the parameter of the path and equal to him on the parameter of the state. And this is another indication that repentance is not exhausted by returning to do the right thing. Because then a penitent would be just like a completely righteous person. Rather, repentance—the essential value added in repentance—is that I come to do the right thing by choice. The essence of repentance is to return to being a chooser. And the advantage of the penitent over the righteous person is on that plane, not on the plane of what he does. Or really what I want to claim here now—and this is one step beyond what I said earlier, based on what I said earlier, but one step beyond—the claim is that not only is it required of me to be a chooser and not merely to do, not only to do the right thing, but my spiritual state is measured—or I am good, my spiritual level is measured—by these two parameters. It’s not that I choose and then I do the good thing, and once I do the good thing then I’m righteous. No. My very being a chooser is also part of my being good. And that is really the essence of repentance: to return to being a chooser. And if after that you choose evil, you are still a penitent in a certain sense. Not complete, but you are still a penitent because you returned to being a chooser; you just didn’t choose the right thing. But—but—but there is still something there from the repentance you did.

[Speaker C] Is the Rabbi saying that the “penitent” they’re talking about refers only to someone who had sinned out of appetite and was swept after his desire and then repented? And someone who was a communist and became convinced of the truth of Judaism has no such advantage?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What today is called a returnee to religion. Correct. What today is called a returnee to religion is something else. Now the point is—I want to sharpen it a bit more—there is a beautiful passage in Rabbi Kook, Orot HaKodesh, part 2. It’s a fairly well-known passage dealing with perfection and perfecting. He writes as follows—look here: “In the Infinite is laid the negation of the possibility of addition.” Yes, the Holy One, blessed be He, the Infinite, cannot add anything to Himself. He has nothing to add; He is already infinite. Yes, if you are at x equals infinity, you have nowhere to progress, let’s say in rough mathematical language. Okay? “The negation of the possibility of addition”—if you are infinite, you cannot add anything to your condition, you cannot improve if you are already perfect. Okay? For what can be added to infinity? “To the perfection that rises above every depth of splendid might.” “And there is a centered royal tendency to establish an unceasing ascending perfection.” Fine, there is a kind of Kook-style language here that even I don’t fully understand, but his claim is that there is another type of perfection in the very act of self-perfecting. Your being in the process of perfecting yourself is one of the perfections. Exactly what I said before about the penitent versus the completely righteous person. The penitent’s advantage over the completely righteous person is in the fact that he is perfecting himself. In the derivative, not in the function. Okay? In the fact that he is progressing, not in the state to which he arrives because of the progress. In that state he is similar to the completely righteous person, but in the very fact that he is progressing—that itself is also one of the perfections.

[Speaker H] Rabbi, so why is there basically a transgression in putting yourself in a place where you won’t have choice?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Being compelled, say. In principle there is no transgression in that—putting oneself into compulsion. There are disputes among the medieval authorities (Rishonim) on this matter. On the fundamental level, even one who says there is a transgression says that it is because you chose in advance to enter the state of compulsion. But at the stage where you are compelled—fine, but why is there—so—

[Speaker C] why is there a transgression in not using your choice? After all, they’re giving it to you all the time.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Not in not using your choice. The transgression is the transgression that you did. It’s just that you did it by your choice, because you chose—what Binyamin said earlier—because you chose to put yourself into a situation where you would be compelled to commit a transgression. So that is the view of the Chatam Sofer, that someone who puts himself into compulsion—that itself is a transgression. One who says that putting yourself into compulsion is not a transgression really says no, you won’t receive—

[Speaker C] punishment. A transgression—it’s not. What? If you chose to put— I’m only talking about what we spoke about in the previous lesson. You chose to do that as a result of a system, or you chose to refrain from choice in the sense of sin.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It could be this way and it could be that way—what difference does it make?

[Speaker C] But the Rabbi says both are a sin, because in the previous lesson we said that only if you refrain from making a moral decision are you really sinning.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What’s the difference? In both cases it’s refraining from deciding.

[Speaker C] Ah, okay, I’m talking about refraining from deciding. So refraining from deciding is a sin because apparently we see here that He’s giving you a wonderful opportunity for repentance.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right, if so, correct, but it’s still a sin. Afterwards you can repent, but it was still a sin. You know, there’s a Talmudic text in Yoma that says there is repentance out of love and repentance out of fear. Repentance out of fear turns intentional sins into unwitting ones, and repentance out of love turns intentional sins into merits. People don’t notice, but there’s a very interesting point here. No repentance erases what happened. What happened remains; you can’t erase what happened. What you can do is color it differently. Either the intentional sins become unwitting sins, or the intentional sins become merits. But they’re still there; you can’t erase them from the record. In other words, the process of repentance colors what you did in a different way. Okay? But first of all, what you did was of course a transgression; afterward you can fix it. That’s a different matter. Okay, let’s get back to Rav Kook. Then he says: What do we think about the matter of the divine purpose in bringing existence into being? Yes, in the creation of the world. We say that absolute perfection is necessary existence itself, and in it there is nothing potential; everything is actual. A bit like Anselm. But there is a kind of perfection that consists in adding perfection, and that cannot exist in divinity. Right? The perfection of becoming perfected, of improving, of process, what I spoke about before. The perfection of the fact that you improve—not that the improvement brings you to a more perfect state, but that the very improvement itself is a perfection. That perfection cannot exist in divinity. Why? Because divinity is already perfect—how can it improve? For infinite absolute perfection leaves no room for addition.

[Speaker C] But I have to say that again he’s assuming that his God is subject to logic. I don’t get it. I’m just saying it jars for me that he assumes God is subject to logic. I know this starts with Maimonides, it’s not that he started it, but—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It doesn’t start with Maimonides, it starts with logic. Anyone who says otherwise is talking nonsense. The Holy One, blessed be He, is subject to logic, and you can’t say anything else.

[Speaker C] But I don’t know how to talk—I don’t impose my logic on everything that—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It’s the only thing guiding what you say. If you’re talking about something else, you’re just moving your lips.

[Speaker C] No, that’s why I never talk about God; I only talk about what—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] You believe in Him, you attribute all kinds of things to Him—what do you mean you never talk about Him? We’re talking about Him right now.

[Speaker C] I don’t attribute anything to Him; I attribute things to what will happen to me if I don’t listen to Him.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay. Do you say that He created the world? He says, “I regret that I made [them],” as the Torah says; there are many descriptions of God.

[Speaker C] No, fine, but from the standpoint—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] From that standpoint, these are descriptions that are subject to logic, and therefore the Holy One, blessed be He, is subject to logic. And when we say that He is perfect, that statement is a statement subject to logic. And anyone who talks differently is just moving his lips and saying nothing.

[Speaker D] Just as a provocation—but to put it that way, it’s not that He is subject to logic; it’s just that we have no understanding whatsoever of anything that isn’t subject to logic. Otherwise it’s gibberish. No, no, no, absolutely not, that’s not right.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] There is no such thing as something not subject to logic. Right, no—that’s what I’m saying. Because when someone says something not subject to logic, I simply haven’t understood him, that’s all. I have no problem saying that the Holy One, blessed be He, is not subject to logic—but then explain to me what that means; otherwise it’s just lip movement. Yes, okay, the formulation is provocative. In my opinion, speech about God Himself really is lip movement. It’s not that He is subject; there isn’t anything behind this wall that I can understand. Exactly—that’s precisely the claim. The laws of logic, unlike the laws of physics, are not laws imposed on something that could have been otherwise, like the laws of the state or the laws of physics. The laws of logic are the very nature of the thing itself; it cannot be otherwise.

[Speaker C] Rabbi, you’re directly assuming that something we’re unable to grasp necessarily doesn’t exist.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, no, I’m not assuming that. I see no reason to say that something we’re unable to grasp certainly can exist. I can’t grasp the Holy One, blessed be He, and I assume that He exists. But a thing that does not exist does not exist—not a thing that I can’t grasp. And something that is a logical contradiction does not exist; it’s not that I can’t grasp it. And how do you say that—

[Speaker C] How does the Rabbi know that? Is that from Torah from Sinai?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Something that is a logical contradiction is a round triangle. There is no round triangle. Because if it’s a triangle, then it isn’t round.

[Speaker C] You haven’t seen a round triangle, and I believe that theoretically you could. Besides, a round triangle is a matter of linguistic definitions.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I’m not going to argue with sentences I don’t understand; I simply don’t understand what you’re saying.

[Speaker D] You don’t know what a round triangle is?

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] You don’t understand what you’re saying, so what is there for me to say?

[Speaker D] You can say something in a language you don’t understand too. “Round triangle” is a phrase you don’t understand. You don’t understand it, so you can’t say either yes or no about it. For you it’s just gibberish.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] So what are you saying? Let’s leave this debate; it’s a different debate, and we’re getting into too many corners here that shouldn’t take up our time. On my site, if you want, I’ll send links to anyone interested, dealing with logical contradictions and God. Anyway, Rav Kook argues that if He is perfect, then there cannot be in Him the perfection of added perfection, of elevation. And then he says: so apparently He lacks a certain perfection. So He lacks one of the perfections, so He isn’t perfect—it’s a kind of oxymoron. In other words, He is perfect, therefore there cannot be in Him an addition of perfection. And if there cannot be in Him an addition of perfection, then one of the perfections is lacking in Him, because the addition of perfection, the becoming-perfected itself, is itself one of the perfections. Or in other words, the Holy One, blessed be He, cannot be a penitent. Because the value of a penitent is not that he becomes completely righteous. Because if that were the case, then the Holy One, blessed be He, not being a penitent would not be a deficiency; He doesn’t need to be a penitent, just as being completely righteous is not a deficiency. But if we see that repentance has value in itself, not only as a search to become perfect, then the Holy One, blessed be He, cannot be a penitent. Something is missing in Him. By the way, this is what I once heard Hasidim say about “I will sin and repent.” Why? What’s this idea of “I will sin and repent”? “I will sin and repent”—he is not given the opportunity to repent. So there’s an initial assumption here to say “I will sin and repent”—why? So that I too will be a penitent; that’s better than being completely righteous. So he sins intentionally in order to become a penitent and be greater than the completely righteous. They tell him not to do it because it’s dangerous, because it’s problematic, but it’s definitely an initial assumption worth addressing. Okay, but for our purposes, that means that the Holy One, blessed be He, is not complete. How can that be? And then he says: And for this purpose—that the addition of perfection too should not be absent from existence—the worldly existence had to come into being, and therefore it had to begin from the lowest and most degraded point, that is, from a state of absolute deficiency, and constantly continue onward and upward toward absolute ascent. And existence was created with such a quality that it will never cease rising forever, because this is an infinite process. Fine, that’s really the main paragraph. He says it before, and he says it afterward as well. And even though there is no end to the elevation of complete perfection, which has no elevation on its own account because of its infinity, nevertheless this exalted power of constant elevation is also included in it. And this is considered as though absolute perfection is perfected through the becoming-perfected that comes by the appearance of smallness coming into greatness. And in this work there is a divine need. What is he saying? He means the following: the Holy One, blessed be He, cannot become perfected, so in effect there is a deficiency in Him. There is a deficiency in Him because becoming perfected is itself one of the perfections. So he says: for that reason He created us, and for that reason He created us deficient. He created us deficient and demanded of us that we become perfected, so that through our becoming perfected, He Himself would in fact become complete. I’ll explain this in another moment, but He Himself becomes complete through our becoming perfected. Because He Himself cannot become perfected. He has the capacity—the capacity for this absolute perfection of becoming-perfected—but its realization, its passage from potential to actual, happens through us. And this is what is called by the medieval authorities (Rishonim) the secret of “service for a divine need.” “Service for a divine need” means—this is always called a secret because you’re not supposed to say it. Why? Because “service for a divine need” means that what we do is intended for the Holy One, blessed be He. He lacks something, and we make Him complete. That is “service for a divine need.” I once said that you can see this in Jonah’s a fortiori argument. In Jonah’s a fortiori argument, it says there that Jonah was with the kikayon plant, then the worm came and the kikayon withered. I once said to the guys in Yeruham—it was the morning after Yom Kippur, so we prayed at sunrise there in the desert—I told them: I have two answers to this matter. One answer is that the fact that our criminal minds interpret Jonah to mean that Jonah didn’t really care about the kikayon, only about himself—the fact that the kikayon shaded him is true, but who says Jonah didn’t also care about the kikayon itself? We have this kind of criminal mindset that if someone has an interest, then obviously he is acting only for the sake of that interest. That isn’t true in life either. When someone has an interest, that’s true, but it doesn’t mean his action is only for the sake of that interest; that’s a logical leap. It could be that he is also doing it sincerely and not only for the sake of his interest. So with Jonah too, it’s possible that the Holy One, blessed be He, diagnosed in him that he really cared about the kikayon and not only about himself, and therefore He made the a fortiori argument about Nineveh.

[Speaker C] Yes, Rabbi, but the a fortiori argument works best—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Works best if he only cared about himself. Wait, wait, Elikim, don’t be such a criminal. Let me finish the picture. Afterward, when we’re done, maybe I’ll give more room for comments. The opposite possibility is that just as Jonah needs the kikayon, the Holy One, blessed be He, needs Nineveh. That’s why I brought this here. We assume that the Holy One, blessed be He, doesn’t need Nineveh; He does it for them. Not true. The Holy One, blessed be He, needs Nineveh. He wouldn’t have created them if He didn’t need them. “Everything I created for My glory, for My name I created it, formed it, even made it.” In other words, the Holy One, blessed be He, created the world for Himself. He needs it. Without the world He would be lacking. And therefore He created the world so that we would act, and that action is a divine need. He needs us because without us He will not be complete. And here Rav Kook explains the basic logic of how this happens. How can it be that the Holy One, blessed be He, lacks something? That’s what everyone asks. Here he has a brilliant way out. What does he say? He basically says that this kind of perfection—becoming perfected—cannot apply to the Holy One, blessed be He, because He is already perfect. So in effect there is a deficiency in Him that is built into Him by virtue of His being perfect. It can’t be overcome. The only way to overcome it is to create beings who by definition will be deficient—utterly deficient—and to create an infinite path of progress and ascent so that there will constantly be improvement, and thereby the Holy One, blessed be He, becomes complete through our work. Because it is a divine need. That is basically the only way for Him to become complete—through us. His hands are tied. In other words, He cannot be complete because He is already perfect. And therefore He does not have becoming-perfected. He was compelled to create us, because without that He would not be complete. This thesis of course sounds very subversive and radical, and that is basically the claim. Now, to explain this a bit more, I need a somewhat longer move—

[Speaker B] Longer, and I hope to start that now.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] You know what, let’s leave it. I’ll stop here and open things up for your comments and questions, because I need a bit of time to explain this point. Maybe I’ll just explain what needs explaining. In the end, after all, we become perfected, not Him. In what sense does that complete Him? Why does that complete Him? He created deficient beings, and those deficient beings are required to become perfected. Why does their becoming perfected constitute any completion of something He Himself cannot do? He doesn’t do it—we do it. Notice that this difficulty is almost a mirror image of the difficulty with which I ended the lesson before last. How can I fix myself? If He fixes me, then it has no value. I cannot fix myself. Right? That’s what I asked—how can the great repentance be possible? Here I’m asking the same question, but in its mirror-image form, about the Holy One, blessed be He. If the Holy One, blessed be He, lacks the possibility of becoming perfected, then He Himself cannot become perfected. So He cannot fix Himself. If we fix Him, what does that help? We fix Him—so it’s not that He fixes Himself, it’s not that He becomes perfected; we become perfected. So again, apparently it still does not complete Him. So what did He gain from this? Rav Kook really does suggest a nice move here, but he didn’t fully close this gap. He has one sentence where he says something that I think… “And even though there is no end to the elevation of complete perfection, which has no elevation because of its infinity, nevertheless this exalted power of constant elevation is also included in it.” The Holy One, blessed be He, has the potential for becoming-perfected. It just cannot go from potential to actual. But He does have the potential for becoming-perfected. The bringing of that potential from potential to actual is done through us. Now in order to understand this better, I’ll talk about it in the next lesson. I’ll expand a bit again on several philosophical issues—philosophical and a little mathematical. Okay, so now this is the place for comments. By the way, I’m doing this deliberately—I assume there are people bothered by the involvement of people here in the middle of the lesson, but just yesterday we did a Zoom training session for all the rabbis and teachers in the seminary, men and women. And somehow I also heard feedback from people that the lesson is too frontal. And it’s hard, a bit hard, to stay focused on a frontal lecture for an hour and a half. So I am trying, after all, to have people participate a bit, in what I hope is not too large a dose, but maybe that can improve things a bit. I’d be happy to get feedback about this, by the way. So send it to me if you want, I’d be glad. WhatsApp or email or whatever you want. Okay, if there are comments or questions about the lesson, now is the time. There was something earlier—Elikim, I think, wanted to say something, no?

[Speaker C] Just some point—that the simplest plain meaning, when you look at it with first-glance eyes, is that the difficulty still stands, that God seemingly intended that He cared only about the kikayon.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What I asked just now?

[Speaker C] No, no, a much simpler question. About the literal matter of the kikayon. But I understand what the Rabbi said. Makes sense. Anyone else? Also, in principle you could give another solution: if you care about how much the kikayon benefited you, think how much Nineveh benefited the world. That’s a solution a lot of little Torah interpretations like to give.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Benefited you and the world, but the Holy One, blessed be He, compares Himself to Jonah, not to the world. “And shall I not spare Nineveh, just as you spared the kikayon?”

[Speaker C] No, come on, “And shall I not spare”—you spared the kikayon whose benefit was small—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I should not—

[Speaker C] Spare Nineveh whose benefit is great? It doesn’t say its benefit is great; it says there are many people in it—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] And many animals. “And many animals”—it doesn’t say it benefited the world tremendously; there’s no hint of that there. And doesn’t that automatically mean He put a lot of effort into creating it? It could be that it means there is great good in it. Right, therefore I say—not because He put in effort; He didn’t put in effort. But the great good is good for Him. Because He wants these many animals and these people; that’s why He made them. The fact that they are many—that is the great good, not that it is a great good for the world. What did Nineveh contribute so much to the world? The point is that their existence contributes to the Holy One, blessed be He.

[Speaker C] I maybe find that really strange. Okay. It seems a little strange to me to say that there is good in the very existence of something.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] In the very existence of something that improves, that they repent. After all, the Holy One, blessed be He, sends Jonah to bring Nineveh to repentance. So the Holy One, blessed be He, says to him: what will I gain by destroying them? I created them deficient on purpose so that they would repent and thereby complete Me. I’m maybe using Rav Kook now. The repentance of the people of Nineveh is the benefit. Now it doesn’t benefit the world; it benefits the Holy One, blessed be He, exactly like Rav Kook’s idea of service for a divine need. Anyone else? Okay.

[Speaker E] Yes. This last description we gave in the last 10–15 minutes of God—that wasn’t from Rav Kook’s paragraph—wasn’t it a bit too physical, too anthropomorphic? Anthropomorphic.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Why is that anthropomorphic?

[Speaker E] It could be that there isn’t really a problem with it, but maybe this whole matter of need and perfection and becoming-perfected—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What is anthropomorphic here? Is there anything material here? A need to become perfected—a need to become perfected is something completely abstract. Just as the Holy One, blessed be He, is compassionate and gracious, He also becomes perfected. What’s the difference between saying that and saying this? It doesn’t make Him a body.

[Speaker E] Maybe I’ll connect it to the point about logic, that maybe you could sharpen for a moment this matter of why exactly God is subject to logic, because apparently I understand you’re trying to say there’s some kind of something here.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t know. What I’m talking about is within the framework of what I’m talking about. Beyond that are just various oxymorons that maybe have some meaning somewhere else—though even saying that is an oxymoron. What do I care? When I believe in the Holy One, blessed be He, I’m talking about the Holy One, blessed be He, in whom I believe. The Holy One, blessed be He, in whom I believe has no contradictions in Him. If He has contradictions in Him, I do not believe in Him.

[Speaker E] So basically the language we used here is by definition, or within the bounds of logic, because that’s what we’re using to talk about it.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right, there’s nothing besides that. It’s not… You have to understand that there’s a difference between something I don’t grasp—which is no problem, there are many things I don’t grasp—and something that contains an internal contradiction. Likewise, the Holy One, blessed be He, who can create a stone He cannot lift and all those tricks. What is the meaning of that? When you say that the Holy One, blessed be He, is above logic—that’s it, problem solved. It’s not solved; it solves nothing. When you say He is omnipotent, what does that mean? It’s an escape from a solution. Rudolf Otto writes in the introduction to his book The Idea of the Holy, in the introduction to the English edition I think, he writes there that the unity of opposites is the refuge of the lazy. Taking refuge in the unity of opposites as some ultimate excuse for every problem regarding the Holy One, blessed be He—that’s simply laziness; he doesn’t want to think. Unity of opposites—it sounds terribly deep and it solves all the problems. It solves nothing; it’s just an escape.

[Speaker D] It can solve other things, but okay, that’s not… No, the question is in what sense one uses it. In the sense of a logical contradiction there’s another problem with it, namely that we don’t understand it. Whoever understands it, good for him. Nobody—no, okay, if someone claims he understands, then fine.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] There are no non-logical opposites, so there’s no need for a unity of opposites; it’s just a mantra.

[Speaker D] There are, it’s not exactly… okay, fine, I don’t think that touches the issue. I think you can explain this idea even without getting into logical contradictions, but then you’ll say that’s not the unity of opposites you meant. Fine. I don’t know exactly whether those who coined the idea meant a logical contradiction.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, no, I think they did not mean logical contradictions, and that’s why I say: don’t use the term “unity of opposites”; give the explanation.

[Speaker D] Fine, they found… that’s already a pedagogical question, how to explain it. For example, my pedagogical comment is—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] They didn’t explain—it’s not pedagogical. They didn’t explain; they escaped.

[Speaker D] No, they gave analogies. Cusanus gives analogies, and some of them are reasonable and don’t involve any logical contradiction.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Say—say what you have to say. Why do you need to say “unity of opposites”? Everything I can say about the Holy One, blessed be He, I can also say about myself.

[Speaker D] It’s a question of form, of how to express an idea. For example, when you say that the Holy One, blessed be He, is subject to logic, I also have criticism of the form of that idea, because it pokes people in the eye, and the main point here is not that. The main point is not to say “subject” or “not subject”; the main point is to say that we cannot understand what the other claim even means.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That’s just connotation; it doesn’t interest me. I’m talking about the content.

[Speaker D] That too is connotation; when I say “unity of opposites”—

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, no, no. The use of the concept “unity of opposites” in many places—I haven’t done research—in many places, is to escape having to present the explanation. Say: unity of opposites—in the Holy One, blessed be He, both are together—and wave your hands a lot, and that’s it. If you have an explanation, say it. Don’t tell me “unity of opposites.”

[Speaker D] Fine, I don’t think we’re arguing. Okay, when it serves the purpose of escaping an answer, then that’s definitely no good.

[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Okay. Well then, goodbye friends. May it be a good year, may you be inscribed and sealed for good, with health and without corona. Amen.

[Speaker D] Amen.