The Voice of Prophecy, Lesson 6
This transcript was produced automatically using artificial intelligence. There may be inaccuracies in the transcribed content and in speaker identification.
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Table of Contents
- Degenerated learning, and scholars versus halakhic decisors
- Talmudic study that leads to action, and action that precedes study
- Rationality, assumptions, and halakhic judgment
- The priority of action, understanding, and the connection itself as study
- The subjective and the objective, and the human purpose in intelligibles
- Moshe Rabbeinu, the angels, and the essence of Torah beyond practical translation
- Connections between branches as the central point
- “His deeds exceed his wisdom,” “everything follows the abundance of action,” and “a significant precedent in practice”
- Jewish philosophy and Jewish law: Saadia Gaon, Maimonides, Gersonides, Crescas, Albo, Arama
- Maimonides: a social instrument and refinement of character traits versus separate wisdom
- Nachman Krochmal, Azariah dei Rossi, and Hermann Cohen
- The unity of Jewish law and aggadic literature, and “Teach us, our Rabbi”
- The philosophical moral virtue versus Torah action that unites body and soul
- Torah and science: abstract and concrete in opposite directions
Summary
General Overview
The text presents a critique of “degenerated learning,” in which people study books analytically but, when it comes to practical Jewish law, rule only according to the Mishnah Berurah, and contrasts this with the ideal of Talmudic study that leads to action, where the learner is responsible for what he says, decides through judgment, and also actually carries it out. It defines rational activity as action whose mode is guided by the intellect according to principles, and argues that Jewish law is the clearest framework that connects analytic study with decision and practice within “flowing life” that cannot be mechanically computed from a text. It grounds the uniqueness of Hebrew wisdom in the connections between different branches, especially Talmud and action, Jewish law and aggadic literature, logic and morality, and brings a chain of figures in whom Jewish philosophy and Jewish law are intertwined, alongside a distinction between a philosophical approach that sees virtues only as a means, and a Torah conception of the union of body and soul in fulfilling commandments by the power of convictions. It concludes with a picture in which Torah operates in the opposite way from science: science creates abstractions in order to understand the concrete, whereas Torah creates the concrete form of commandments in order to make possible apprehension of higher worlds.
Degenerated learning, and scholars versus halakhic decisors
The text states that there is a “kind of learning today” in which, in many respects, study is degenerated because for practical Jewish law people rule according to the Mishnah Berurah and not, generally speaking, according to the very books they study, and it distinguishes between analytical scholars who make distinctions and novel insights and halakhic decisors who know the Mishnah Berurah and Beit Yosef by heart. It asks what we need Beit Yosef for if in study you can say whatever you want at no cost, but when you need to know what to do you look in the Mishnah Berurah. It argues that study should be for the sake of doing, so that the learning itself will be different, out of a sense of responsibility that in the end one will also carry out what one says.
Talmudic study that leads to action, and action that precedes study
The text presents two sides: Talmudic study that leads to action, and action that precedes study, and emphasizes that the ideal is not “I know I have to do this, so I do it” as a technical act that does not require Talmudic study. It sharpens the point that the move from an intellectual conclusion to action does not follow automatically, and that even after one decides what must be done, there is still the question of who says it will actually be done. It describes the ideal as a life in which a person weighs, decides according to his understanding, and actually carries it out, and presents this as an almost nonexistent phenomenon compared with common modes of deliberation in which people act according to “what seems right to me.”
Rationality, assumptions, and halakhic judgment
The text defines rational activity as a state in which the intellect guides how one acts according to principles, regardless of whether one agrees with the assumptions, and distinguishes between identification and rationality itself. It argues that every assumption is not dependent on reason, but one can still act rationally when there is analytic distance between the assumptions and the practical results. It states that the move from an accepted written text to flowing life requires complex judgment and is not an “analytic combination” that a computer can process into a conclusion, and that practice can serve as an indication of Jewish law in a case of doubt under the principle of “a significant precedent in practice,” but “practice” does not contradict known Jewish law.
The priority of action, understanding, and the connection itself as study
The text states that one can act without understanding, but that this is an exceptional case and not the goal; the goal is not “to move one’s hands like robots,” but to fulfill at at least a low level when there is no ability to understand. It argues that real understanding is achieved through study that leads to action, and therefore one cannot “only understand” without fulfilling, whereas one can “only act” without understanding. It brings advice from the masters of ethics that someone weak in a commandment should study the topic in depth, and describes this as a wondrous connection that links a person to a state of Talmudic study that leads to action.
The subjective and the objective, and the human purpose in intelligibles
The text presents a personal tendency that distinguishes between the subjective and the objective and argues that this is the correct approach and not merely a preference. It states that the purpose of the human being is to engage in intelligibles, and that practical action is the tool for bringing the world of thought down into the world of action, so that the commandments are the crystallization of the world of thought within matter. It emphasizes that this world was created so that ideas would not remain abstract but would be embodied, yet within the world of action the individual’s purpose is to aspire to connect upward and to act in the light of Talmudic study.
Moshe Rabbeinu, the angels, and the essence of Torah beyond practical translation
The text brings the midrash about Moshe Rabbeinu arguing with the ministering angels and explains that “You shall not murder” and “You shall not steal” are the translation of Torah into the world of action and not “the Torah” itself. It argues that Torah as substance is an ideational world and a spiritual structure that can take on different contents depending on who is looking at it, and interprets the statement that “the Torah was given as letters” as a metaphor for the fact that Torah is not only specific contents. It describes the project of this world as the world of action, in which ideals are brought down into matter, while the human being is supposed to rise and connect upward through action that emerges from Talmudic study.
Connections between branches as the central point
The text presents a kind of “work of counting,” in which philosophy was counted with Bible and action with thought, and then moves on to philosophy with Talmud and philosophy with action. It argues that this is not a collection of separate branches, but that the connection between the branches is the main point, especially philosophy as expressed in Bible, Talmudic study that leads to action, and the union of morality with logic. It describes a state in which the relations themselves are the central and unique things that characterize the whole system.
“His deeds exceed his wisdom,” “everything follows the abundance of action,” and “a significant precedent in practice”
The text asks why someone whose deeds exceed his wisdom is called “wise,” and explains that action is part of wisdom, because when wisdom leads to action, the wisdom itself is different. It interprets “a significant precedent in practice” as proof for Jewish law in situations of dispute, and contrasts this with the rule that “practice” cannot uproot known Jewish law and cannot contradict wisdom. It links the emphasis on the abundance of action to the idea that action shapes the character of wisdom and does not merely serve as an external addition to it.
Jewish philosophy and Jewish law: Saadia Gaon, Maimonides, Gersonides, Crescas, Albo, Arama
The text quotes the claim that the giants of Jewish law are the giants of Jewish philosophy at its highest peak, and mentions Rabbi Yitzchak Israeli as one who established a complete religious philosophical system, followed by Rabbi Saadia Gaon and Maimonides as the greatest of the halakhic geniuses, whose plan of Mishneh Torah is fixed in The Guide for the Perplexed, while noting that the division there into 14 does not actually correspond exactly to the fourteen books. It lists Gersonides, author of Wars of the Lord, and Rabbi Hasdai Crescas, author of Light of the Lord, as great philosophers who were also among the greatest authorities in Jewish law, and adds Rabbi Yosef Albo, author of Sefer Ha-Ikkarim, and Rabbi Yitzchak Arama, author of Akeidat Yitzchak. It emphasizes that the practical conclusion for study is not to suffice with knowing laws or with the conceptual reasoning of analysis, but to ask an additional “why” that leads into thought and thus connects the worlds.
Maimonides: a social instrument and refinement of character traits versus separate wisdom
The text argues that in Maimonides, philosophy does not emerge from the laws but from Aristotle, from his own intellect, and from the books he studied, while the laws serve purposes of social order and the acquisition of good traits. It interprets “a minor matter—the discussions of Abaye and Rava” versus “a great matter—the account of creation and the account of the chariot” as levels of Torah, and notes that Maimonides interprets the account of creation and the account of the chariot as physics and metaphysics. It portrays in Maimonides a split in which the commandments and the virtues are instruments to enable the absorption of wisdom, but the bodies of wisdom themselves are not inside the commandments, and sets this against another conception in which practical observance brings a person into a world in which halakhic understanding itself is perceived differently, because action belongs to that very world.
Nachman Krochmal, Azariah dei Rossi, and Hermann Cohen
The text states that the new path in historical Talmud research taken by Nachman Krochmal is embedded within his philosophical system in Guide of the Perplexed of the Time, and describes how his historical analysis is a means to decipher Jewish law itself and not an end of history for its own sake. It mentions Azariah dei Rossi and his book Me’or Einayim, over which he was excommunicated, and attributes the danger to the perception that understanding processes could lead to the thought that one can change things. It brings Hermann Cohen and Religion of Reason from the Sources of Judaism, and emphasizes that in him too one can discern a movement that singles out the moral and logical problem as emerging from the source of the Torah of Israel.
The unity of Jewish law and aggadic literature, and “Teach us, our Rabbi”
The text concludes that Hebrew wisdom is established in the unity of Jewish law and aggadic literature, just as in the unity of logic and action. It cites Midrash Tanchuma and Devarim Rabbah that every aggadic section opens with a question of Jewish law, “Teach us, our Rabbi,” and notes a phenomenon of “astonishing midrashim” in which the connection between opening and conclusion is unclear. It points to the explanation of Rabbi Aharon ben Chaim, author of Middot Aharon, and adds details about his works Middot Aharon and Korban Aharon, their printing in the year 5452, and their lack of availability.
The philosophical moral virtue versus Torah action that unites body and soul
The text distinguishes between “the philosophical moral virtue,” which is only a means to contemplation and intellect, and “Torah action,” which comes to unite the powers of the body with the intellectual soul in the performance of the divine commandments by virtue of the convictions within the soul. It describes an ideal in which “all the limbs of our body move and become sanctified by the will and word of the intellect,” and connects this to Talmudic study that leads to action. It adds the speculation that Maimonides’ confidence in rational tools for reaching metaphysical truths is connected to a more naive conception of philosophy, whereas a modern approach tends toward skepticism and places a Torah alternative of attainment through contemplation of the commandments that leads to action.
Torah and science: abstract and concrete in opposite directions
The text argues that analytical study that continues into the level of thought makes it possible to connect very abstract understandings to everyday practical decision. It presents a comparison in which science creates abstract concepts in order to understand the concrete world of phenomena, whereas Torah and creation work in the opposite direction: in order to understand the abstract and the spiritual worlds, a concrete embodiment of commandments is created. It states that complete understanding is not possible in only one domain, because to understand the concrete one needs the abstract, and to understand the abstract one needs the concrete, and emphasizes that in Torah the lower is emanated from the higher, and therefore the physical world serves as a means to understand “from my flesh I behold God” and the higher worlds.
Full Transcript
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] There is a kind of learning today, and in many respects it’s degenerated learning. Usually that shows up in the fact that when it comes to practical Jewish law, we rule according to the Mishnah Berurah and not, generally speaking, according to the very books we study. There are analytical scholars and there are halakhic decisors. The analytical scholars make all the distinctions and innovations, and the halakhic decisors are the ones who know the Mishnah Berurah and Beit Yosef by heart. So what do we need Beit Yosef for? In the world of study, whatever you do, you can say whatever you want—it doesn’t cost anything. And when you want to know what to do, you look in the Mishnah Berurah. That’s degenerated learning, because really study is supposed to be for the sake of doing, in order to improve the learning—not because action is necessarily the goal, or not necessarily because action is the goal, but because when you study in order to do, the learning is different. You feel that you’re responsible for what you say, and in the end you’ll also have to do it, so what you say also looks different. That’s one side of the equation, and the other side of the equation is action that precedes study. Here we’re talking about study that is followed by action, but action that precedes study is also something else. Of course, something entirely different is to act rationally. The only possibility of acting rationally is actually, I think, the only possibility I know of at least—the halakhic possibility, the Jewish halakhic possibility. Because there, in a very significant part at least of the acts you do, there is intellectual reckoning beforehand. You’re supposed to make some kind of intellectual reckoning and in the end arrive at the conclusion of what the intellect says should be done, and then carry that out. Meaning, not to disconnect somehow the topics you think about from the things you actually do.
[Speaker B] But rational, analytical, as assumptions underlying actions.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] There are several—once you…
[Speaker B] Accept a rational system, that’s something entirely different.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Identification can’t be rationality. Rationality is a process—dogmatic. Assumptions are not rationality in any sense. Every assumption is not dependent on reason.
[Speaker B] The whole essence is non-rational. Non-rational, like a person who isn’t Jewish.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I’m not talking right now about identifying with the assumptions. I’m talking right now about the fact that I act according to principles, and the intellect dictates the way I act. That is called rational activity, regardless of whether you agree with my assumptions or not. That manner is what’s called rational activity—when my intellect dictates the way I act.
[Speaker C] And that’s only a question of how much analytic distance there is between the assumptions and the practical outcomes. If I have a law book written out for me saying that fringes are put on this way and received this way, then there’s nothing here. Why?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That too, by the way—
[Speaker C] The assumption is that one must put on fringes.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Exactly. And that is precisely the point I’m talking about. First of all, even on the analytic plane, I think that itself is not trivial, because analytically the conclusion follows analytically from the assumption. But the action does not follow analytically from the conclusion. That is something entirely different. And I’m talking specifically about the second side. I’m not talking about deriving the practical conclusion from the assumption that appears in the Torah, in the Shulchan Arukh, in the Talmudic text, whatever it may be. Even if we assume that’s an analytic operation. I’m talking about the next level. After I’ve reached the conclusion that this is what has to be done, in whatever way I got there—now I also do it. Now, the fact that I reached a conclusion—as people always say, mathematician and triangle, right?—the fact that I reached some conclusion, who says I do it? Meaning, the character of that kind of activity is the character of rational activity, regardless of whether you agree with the assumptions. Now beyond that, I’m saying that even the mode itself is not analytic—that’s not true. Meaning, if someone will show me one thing that emerges analytically from the Shulchan Arukh when it’s not written there explicitly, I just don’t understand how to do that at all. The transition from an accepted written text to flowing life is something entirely different. Every circumstance in which you deliberate how to act is something complex and requires judgment. It isn’t an analytic combination of two or three sections of the Shulchan Arukh—mix well and the computer gives you the conclusion. Yes, fine, but the question is judgment. Fine, so you use judgment, you decide what you need to do according to your understanding, and you also do it.
[Speaker C] You decide it in such a way that it’s the reverse—that’s not good for us. Rather, we want to show that action that precedes study is greater, and that this study is not just order.
[Speaker D] I know that this is what has to be done, and therefore I do it—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That’s not Talmudic study.
[Speaker D] That doesn’t require Talmudic study. And then someone tells me, fine, listen, they told us that we have to put on tefillin in such-and-such and such-and-such a way, so here, I’ll put on tefillin—
[Speaker C] In such-and-such and such-and-such a way. Here’s action that preceded study, and it’ll just be bare action, even though according to the Rabbi that’s the action. Fine, not because they told me. True, hovering over everything is the statement that you’re obligated to this. And accepting that statement—without the statement there’s also nothing.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The fact that I’m obligated is also no more analytic than the fact that they told me I’m obligated, right? It’s my decision that I’m obligated; I can also decide that I’m not obligated. Even if the Holy One, blessed be He, said so, I can decide that I’m not doing it. That’s free will, right. And my decision is of course also important, but beyond that, the judgment itself. Your whole personality, all your intellect, your whole being is immersed in a particular topic. This whole thing I’m presenting right now is a somewhat theoretical picture for us, and it’s worth taking note of it, as much as possible to turn it into something not theoretical. But this is really what is supposed to be. We experience this to some degree or another, each according to his approach and his level. But in the end, I think there is really a marvelous picture here. I mean, I don’t know another reality in which a person makes intellectual judgments about everything according to assumptions, makes judgments about what is right and what is not right—judgment sometimes very detailed, with lines of reasoning, with practical differences, with all sorts of things like that—and in the end reaches a conclusion, and that is what he does in the specific case in which he is deliberating. Usually, just think for a second about the style of deliberation common today in the broader world. How do people deliberate about something? What seems right to me or doesn’t seem right to me. Meaning, it seems to me that this is right so I do this, it seems to me that it’s not right so I do that. There are occasional cases, of course, in which there’s a somewhat more detailed and deeper process of judgment, but those are very rare cases. Meaning, a person doesn’t live that way.
[Speaker C] So if I think about going to the beach, I’ll go to the beach. Am I making a judgment?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] No, now that’s exactly the— it’s true that the picture here actually… we also disagree about the form of expression: I think something or I believe something. We already discuss that in the evening classes. I sense it or just feel it or am influenced by it or something like that—that’s not really genuine judgment all the way through. It’s judgment of length one or judgment of length ten. But even beyond that, just the fact that a person’s intellect is occupied, that the whole deliberation itself matters, that my intellect is occupied with what I’m supposed to do in another moment—that’s something very…
[Speaker C] That doesn’t apply to going to the beach? A person goes to the beach, deals with private domain, public domain.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Right, in that sense it’s the same thing. Now, I didn’t say that’s the whole advantage—I want to be clear—I didn’t say that’s the whole advantage of serving God. The service itself also has meaning. I’m only listing here some content, an added value that this form of life has as opposed to other common forms of life. So I’m saying, here there’s an added value such that if someone deliberates to the same extent about whether to go to the beach and eventually goes, then he too has that added value. Right, that’s not what is revealed there, but yes, it is there.
[Speaker C] Like we said before, that this is the right thing to do because that thought pulls upward.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t know. I don’t know people—certainly not as a group—
[Speaker C] And that’s the advantage here.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What do you mean?
[Speaker C] Like Avraham Avinu. Avraham Avinu knew how to do what was right, Avraham Avinu went to the place he desired, wanted to go—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That every—
[Speaker C] Every action we do is after we have some goal.
[Speaker D] Yes, and in everything, everything—
[Speaker C] Out of a goal, and in everything and every action we do—
[Speaker D] We—
[Speaker C] Need to think about it, that it’s really out of a goal. No, and that’s fine—and what does “out of a goal” mean?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Again, the question is how much you…
[Speaker C] I don’t—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Know. Even examine yourself, leave it—let’s not talk about Avraham Avinu, let’s talk about ourselves. We ourselves are built from both types together; maybe even much more from the second type than from the first, right? So that’s exactly your secular side, just as I examine mine as a human being like all human beings, and you’ll see that it’s not true. It’s a difference in quality, not a difference in quantity. You are not intellectually engaged with what you think, even when you argue something about trans-Atlantic issues that people are already used to thinking and discussing about—they’re already equipped with some kind of one-and-a-quarter line of reasoning usually. But in everyday issues, I’m talking about what to do all the time—where, how many such judgments do you have in a day? You have two such judgments a year. There are people who all year long do only that—whether to move the rug or not move the rug, whether yes this or no that. But a life all of whose elements are determined on the basis of intellectual judgments, and in the end that’s what causes me to act—that’s something, I don’t know, to me it’s enormous. Fine, I’m trying to bring remedies, I’m not trying to… I don’t know if it’s accepted in these matters, I don’t know. Fine. In any case, let’s continue. So those were basically the two facets we talked about—that Talmudic study that leads to action is greater than both study and action.
[Speaker C] So basically after all, this study has the personal coloring—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Of each and every person? That, I already said, is my personal inclination. I said it last time too.
[Speaker C] There is the subjective and there is the objective.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I don’t know. I know there are other approaches, and I really believe in this strongly. Is it true for everyone? Yes, yes. I don’t mean that I like it and therefore it’s good for me this way, and you like something else and it’s good for you that way. No, I think this is the correct approach. A person’s purpose is to engage in intelligibles. And the person does not—he has no access to…
[Speaker E] But in the end, the action here, the practical action, it is—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The tool for bringing the world of thought down into the world of action.
[Speaker E] In the end the world of thought—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Is the higher one, and action is the crystallization of… the whole world of action is the crystallization of the higher worlds, it is the crystallization of the world of thought. When you take the form and create it and close it within matter—that abstract world of thought—what comes out is the commandments. This is a bit connected to what we once discussed about Moshe Rabbeinu, right? The famous midrash that Moshe Rabbeinu argues with the ministering angels, right? They say, why are You giving him the Torah, and so on. What do the angels want with the Torah? Moshe says to them: it says there, “You shall not murder,” “You shall not steal,” and things like that. Didn’t they know that? Were they stupid? What Torah had they been learning until that point? Moshe seemingly gave them a crushing answer.
[Speaker D] Why? Is there murder among you?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Is there theft among you? Is there this among you? What do you need this whole business for? A wonderful answer. Now the question is—wait, but the angels…
[Speaker D] Of course we heard—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Moshe Rabbeinu’s answer, but the question is: what did they think? Obviously, that is only a translation of the Torah into the world of action. “You shall not murder” and “You shall not steal” are not the Torah; they are the practical translation of the Torah. The Torah itself, the substance of the Torah, is the ideational world behind it, the structure, perhaps, as we called it last time. And even angels can engage in that structure—even only in that can they engage. There they don’t have oxen goring donkeys and none of that, but that doesn’t matter.
[Speaker C] Their Torah was not written that way.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] About what is written—that first the Torah was given as letters, and afterward the letters were arranged into words and sentences and so on. What does it mean that the Torah was given as letters? What are we, in some puzzle? What kind of lottery was going on there? The intention, at least as I understand it, is some kind of metaphor to describe that the Torah is not specific contents as we look at it. The Torah of the Torah, the substance of the Torah, is something spiritual that can wear completely different contents depending on who is looking at it. If the angels look at it, then entirely different commands will be written there. Commands—or maybe not even as commands, but rather “He looked into the Torah and created the world,” as Nachmanides says. Yes, exactly.
[Speaker D] It’s not “You shall not murder.”
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] “You shall not murder” came out of that thing at which he looked.
[Speaker D] And by the way, that’s exactly what it means that the project in this world is the world of action.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, this world—therefore it depends how you look at it. Obviously this world, right, I said that in the end the purpose of this world is action. The ideal action that emerges—
[Speaker D] But exactly—but what action?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Action that follows Talmudic study. Yes, but the ideal is not just any action; it depends how you look at it. It is true that in the end the purpose for which the world was created is so that ideas not remain in abstract worlds but also become embodied.
[Speaker D] “You shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation”—practical life.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] That is the goal of the world of action. But now the question is: what is my goal when I am in the world of action? That is another question. What is my goal, for whose sake the world of action was created, as much as one may speak about such a thing?
[Speaker D] To bring down the ideals.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Exactly—to realize things in matter, to imprint that separate form upon matter, that it should take on form as we understand it. That is action, right. And that is the goal of the Emanator, or of the one who made the world of action. But now the question is how I am supposed to behave within this world of action. What is my goal in this world of action? That is already another question. Since the fact that this world is built in such a way is a fact. Now the question is what I need to do in this world so that it can realize its purpose. I need to aspire to connect upward. These are two different questions. Therefore I say it depends from where you’re looking. Someone who says that the goal of everything is action is not necessarily saying something different from what I’m saying. It depends from which side you’re looking. The goal of why this whole enterprise was created is obvious—so that it can be expressed in deeds. But my goal now, as an individual living in the world—how should I act, what from my standpoint should be the goal, what should I aspire to? I should aspire to do the deeds in light of Talmudic study. Meaning, basically, to try to connect the lower thing that is… He intended to bring it down, and I am supposed to raise it up. Of course, He intended to bring it down so that there would be someone to raise it up.
[Speaker D] But we need to do—meaning, action is the most basic datum, the most basic thing; if you have nothing else, it’s better to have just that—that action. Yes, the right action, the desired action, that’s the foundation. It’s also fitting, preferable, that study should come. You said, what’s the highest level in this world? It’s ideal action. An ignoramus doesn’t understand, but it’s still better that he should do it. Jewish law is the bottom line.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What do you mean, the bottom line?
[Speaker D] It’s what a person has to do—that’s Jewish law.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] If he can also understand, all the more so—he should understand and do, he needs everything. Right, agreed. If he can’t, then what do you want?
[Speaker D] Let him do it—that’s also something.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What’s preferable—just to understand, or just to do the action? Just understand, or just do the action? He can’t just understand without doing the action, because understanding—that’s exactly the point. Understanding comes only through study that leads to action. That’s exactly the point. So he can’t understand without doing the action. He can do without understanding. That’s a far-reaching novelty, but apparently it is a real novelty, that one can do without understanding. But it’s not true that this is the goal. With that I don’t agree—on that I simply don’t agree. That is not the goal. The goal is not to move hands like robots—that is not the goal.
[Speaker D] Of course that’s the lowest level of fulfillment possible, and for that reason too it’s not the goal.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It’s true that even that is better to do than to do nothing. Right, agreed. It’s better that you understand, right. Not only better that you understand—you must understand, right.
[Speaker D] If you can, you must understand.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But the goal is to do.
[Speaker C] Right, agreed.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] There’s also such advice—that if someone is weak in some commandment, then the advice suggested by the masters of ethics is to study the topic. Yes, that advice. I don’t know if it works for everyone; for me at least. You asked what I said? If someone is weak in some commandment, feels he can’t manage, he fails there, or it just doesn’t speak to him—what’s going on here? He should sit and study the topic in depth. To my mind that is a wondrous connection, really, it’s a tremendous idea. And that is exactly it. Meaning, the issue is the connection. The issue is not only the study and not only the action, but that the action comes out of study. That is something very unique. I think that you—I don’t know, I don’t see your eyes opening, I’m a bit surprised. This is enormous. You need to understand this; it’s really a phenomenon that almost doesn’t exist elsewhere.
[Speaker D] At least not with that kind of intensity.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The point is simple.
[Speaker D] What Matan said earlier—that is substantial here. Meaning, what is derived from this system of principles—that, I analyzed and ruled thus and so, that is how I live, according to what is derived from this system of principles. Meaning, it’s not that they told me what to do. No—I myself would have done something else.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Fine, so here the question is how far I manage to create my own identification with these principles—that’s the central point. Very good. But at least the possibility of living in such a way exists only in a place where there is that kind of principle-system. And whether I manage to feel identification or not—that’s true.
[Speaker D] But the ideal is the most amazing thing.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Everyone has—no, I think everyone here also feels a bit, there is something here… look at the half-full cup, not only at the half-empty cup. Be a little optimistic. There are also things that we do identify with, no? I don’t know, at least for me—I may look cold, but there are things I feel I really do identify with. I don’t know how to describe it. We’re terribly disappointed that we can’t digest everything all at once, but if we could digest everything all at once, what would we be doing here? The goal is to try to identify with this thing and to enter a state of Talmudic study that leads to action. That’s exactly the whole challenge, that’s the whole point. To be in a state not of action alone and not of study alone. There is an enormous statement here, gentlemen. You have to appreciate it; this is an enormous statement. It’s a great secret. I don’t know, we once talked about things dropping into place, Itai. Try to understand this statement—not just “I understood, because it’s study that leads to action, okay, obvious.” No. Try to experience it, understand what it means. It’s enormous. I just don’t know how to explain it any better.
[Speaker C] Now—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] We continue with the work of counting, the work of the scribe, as was required—there must be at least two counts. Up to now we counted philosophy with Bible, and action with thought, with Talmud. And now we are talking about philosophy with Talmud, and section eight—in section eight we’ll just move straight on—that is philosophy with action. Fine, almost all the combinations. I didn’t check whether all the combinations appear, but the goal is obvious. Study and action—we’ll deal with that soon—but the goal here in all these consecutive sections is, I think, exactly to show this idea of Talmudic study that leads to action. Meaning, there is not here a collection of branches, each of which we are supposed to do properly, and also from time to time make connections between them. Everything here is the connection between the branches, not the branches themselves. The branches themselves, each on its own, can exist in one way or another anywhere. But the connection between the branches is the central point in all these sections. Meaning, not the Talmud and not the action and not the philosophy and not the Bible, but the philosophy that comes to expression in the Bible, and the Talmud that leads to action, and the union of morality with logic—and all the combinations, that is the central point. Usually connections are instruments. The things, the entities, are what exist, and connections are relations between what exists. Here the relations themselves are the central things. They themselves are the unique things; they are what characterize. I think that is his whole emphasis in these sections. Did you want to ask something? I wanted to ask a question.
[Speaker D] In paragraph two, the Maharal keeps saying that the great principle is that study leads to action, and then he emphasizes that a wise person is one whose deeds exceed his wisdom, everything follows the abundance of action, and also “a significant precedent in practice.” What is he trying to express in the second half-sentence?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] A wise person—
[Speaker D] Is one whose deeds exceed his wisdom—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The deeds are greater—what exactly is that relationship? That I don’t know.
[Speaker D] Everything follows the abundance of action.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] What is he called, this one whose deeds exceed his wisdom? By what name?
[Speaker C] He’s not called righteous; he’s called wise.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Why? Because he is wise.
[Speaker C] His deeds exceed his wisdom.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] It should say: one whose deeds exceed his wisdom is preferable to one whose wisdom exceeds his deeds. But why is he the one who is called wise, and not the one who is called preferable?
[Speaker C] Because his deeds exceed his wisdom.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Because action is part of wisdom. Without getting into the question of proportions, of what is more than what, I don’t know exactly why specifically the deeds need to be more numerous. But the deeds are part of the characterization of the wise person—not the righteous person, not the preferable person, not the servant of God—the wise person. Because that is the character of wisdom. When wisdom leads to action, then the wisdom is different—then you are wise. That’s the role of action here. Also “a significant precedent in practice”—what is that? “A significant precedent in practice” is proof. It’s proof for Jewish law: this is how the Jewish law should be—there is a significant precedent in practice.
[Speaker D] What does that phrase mean, “and also a significant precedent in practice”? Significant precedent in practice. They saw what the rabbi did; that’s how the Jewish law should be.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] A significant precedent in practice is an indication of Jewish law. There’s a dispute, and we saw that some rabbi, one of the rabbis, acted this way—a sign that this is the Jewish law. As they also say, regarding a practical act that would contradict. They say in a number of places: we don’t say that a practical act contradicts. What does that mean? In several places, if we have a law fixed in our hands, the fact that someone else performed an act does not uproot the law fixed in our hands. If we don’t know and there is a dispute, then a significant precedent in practice matters. But an act in itself—if we have a particular law, then we do not say that a practical act contradicts. Practice has no power to contradict wisdom. It can perhaps decide what the Jewish law is, but not… Fine. The geniuses of Jewish law are the geniuses of Jewish philosophy at its greatest height, in the words of the author of The History of Philosophy in Israel. The first philosopher in Israel who established a complete religious philosophical system after Rabbi Yitzchak Israeli—
[Speaker B] Who is Rabbi Yitzchak Israeli?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yitzchak Israeli wrote Foundations of the World, I think.
[Speaker B] Do we have that? Do we have it?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Does it exist today? In book form—not in a new edition, some very old thing like that.
[Speaker C] I think, I—
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] I think I saw this once. He was a sage who lived in the ninth century, and he was basically the first Jewish philosopher after Philo. Philo and Aristobulus, if he really existed, are perhaps considered the first ones, although they’re kind of half-impure, external figures. And Rabbi Yitzhak Yisraeli is much more of a philosopher than they were, but even so he still wasn’t accepted among us. I think that’s because of this: it isn’t a fully formed philosophy like Saadia Gaon and Maimonides. It’s still a somewhat more midrashic language; there are still remnants of Philo there, I think. Though everything depends on luck, even a Torah scroll in the ark. There are things that get accepted and things that don’t. You don’t always have control. I think I told you about the Ketzot, right? The Ketzot, where once some author came and said: how did you merit that your books… how did it happen that your books were accepted so widely in the yeshiva world? I think I wrote a book no less good, and nobody knows me, and nobody cares about me. So the Chatam Sofer asked him, tell me, when do you write the book? He said, in the morning, when I’m fresh, I get up and write a book. So he said to him: in the morning, when I’m fresh, I erase. And in the evening I write, and in the morning I erase. That’s why my book was accepted. Maybe that’s why your book wasn’t accepted. Fine. And there is Beit Shammai, where Jewish law follows them, and there is Beit Hillel, where Jewish law follows them because they were gentle of spirit, and you see that sometimes things are accepted for all kinds of reasons that are apparently not intellectual, even though in light of what we said earlier I think it’s hard to divide the fields. Because the wisdom here isn’t intellectual wisdom in the usual sense; it’s wisdom born of life experience. Yes. Today “life wisdom” is an insult. If they want to say someone is a complete idiot, they say he has a lot of life wisdom.
[Speaker C] He’s a nice guy, life wisdom.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] After Rabbi Yitzhak Yisraeli, the first philosopher was Rav Saadia Gaon, head of the Yaaqov academy. The greater philosopher in Israel, Maimonides, is the giant of Jewish law of all generations, and the plan of the Mishneh Torah is fixed in the Guide of the Perplexed. By the way, this sentence is a bit emphasized here; I don’t know if that’s a mistake. I assume this and also the earlier one are sentences meant to bring the essence of the passage.
[Speaker B] And where is that fixed? Maimonides writes that this is the plan of the Yad HaChazakah?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes. And it says below in the note: this is in Part III, chapter 35 and onward. Here, actually, anyone who looks there sees that it’s not exactly the plan of the Yad HaChazakah. It’s a division of the commandments we have into 14. And that division into 14 does not overlap with the division of the books. There’s a certain sector, I think, that appears both in the Book of Temple Service and in the Book of Offerings regarding the commandments connected to the Temple. There are other sectors that are found in two books. Somehow it comes out to a division into 14, but it doesn’t parallel the 14 books. Rabbi Kapach notes down there that interestingly, with Maimonides too, the number 14 was very dear to him. Also in the Book of Roots there are 14 roots of Maimonides. And that’s interesting; I don’t know exactly why he chose that number, but in any case this is not exactly the plan of the Mishneh Torah. I think that statement is somewhat exaggerated. But maybe the principles, some of the principles, or I don’t know exactly, the principles in classifying the commandments, do appear there. He discusses there in great detail the principles in classifying the commandments, and we’ll get to talk about what those principles are. But let’s keep reading for a moment, then we’ll come back. The great philosophers in the post-Maimonidean period, Rabbi Levi ben Gershom, the Ralbag, author of The Wars of the Lord, and Rabbi Chasdai Crescas, author of The Light of the Lord, they too were among the great masters of Jewish law of their generation and beyond. For the Ralbag’s commentary on the Torah is distinguished by linking Jewish law to the text, and he brings down below two laws, actually, that are cited in the name of the Ralbag. One of them is very famous, yes: that the master cannot sell a Hebrew slave to someone else. A Hebrew slave cannot be sold the way a Canaanite slave can. That is what the Ralbag claims in his Torah commentary, and there is no other source for it. The source is from there; that’s how the Mishneh brings that law. I think this is a dispute among the medieval authorities (Rishonim); at one point it came up for me that it was a dispute. But there are laws that really are cited in the name of the Ralbag, even though he didn’t write a halakhic work. Ostensibly he is a commentator on the Torah, and there are various philosophical ideas in his Torah commentary, and he has a philosophy book, but inside all that there are also laws embedded. And The Light of the Lord was intended as an introduction to the Book of Commandments and their laws. And also the student of Rabbi Chasdai Crescas, Rabbi Yosef Albo, author of Sefer Ha-Ikkarim, and Rabbi Yitzhak Arama, author of Akedat Yitzhak, the last of the Spanish philosophers, were among the great masters of Jewish law. Do they have halakhic works? I don’t know of any, not for Rabbi Chasdai Crescas and not for Rabbi Yitzhak Arama. There are responsa addressed to Chasdai Crescas. Also the Rivash. Not Novellae of Our Rabbi Crescas; I don’t know if that is The Light of the Lord. The Light of the Lord is not a halakhic work. There is Novellae of Our Rabbi Crescas, and there, it seems to me, there are discussions in the introductions about who this Rabbeinu Crescas is. Is it him? We’ll look later. The Ritva, and this was printed here together with the Ritva in its time. Together with the Ritva, and you can see that it got mixed up with the Ritva or something like that. Yes, and of course we continue this chain, although he somehow stops with the philosophers. Notice, he doesn’t continue the chain. What about the Maharal? He doesn’t continue this chain; somehow he stops it with Rabbi Yitzhak Arama. It’s quite clear that he is referring only to philosophy,
[Speaker C] And he
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] comes to show some kind of novelty, that even the philosophers too have to be connected with Jewish law, because Jewish thought, that goes without saying. You remember, we talked about the difference between philosophy and Jewish thought, and Jewish thought obviously is more connected with Jewish law; that’s the character of Jewish thought, that it is not detached philosophy like all those philosophers, but rather something that grows out of the Torah, and of course a cardinal part of the Torah is the laws, and maybe even the main part, you could say, is the laws, and from there all kinds of conceptual principles also emerge. So it’s clear that what he wants to claim in this passage is that even the philosophers, their philosophy is somehow connected to Jewish law. And the conclusion we are somehow supposed to draw from here, of course, with practical implications for us today as well, is that our study today should not be exhausted merely in knowing the laws, and not even only—and we’ve spoken about this more than once—not even only in the analytic reasoning of the laws, but to ask at least one more “why” question. A question that leads us into thought, into philosophy, in order to connect these two worlds. He’s not just mentioning this as a novelty so we shouldn’t think these philosophers were ignoramuses. He means to say that apparently they too bring some aspect that belongs to Torah. Meaning, when we study Torah, when we study laws, somehow we also have to arrive from that at this aspect.
[Speaker B] Yes, of course the difference with the Maharal is that the connection is
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] direct. With Rav Kook the connection is direct. I’ll get to that in just a moment.
[Speaker C] Meaning, Maimonides is the first swallow, that’s clear.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] He emphasizes Maimonides because in contrast to everyone we studied before him, and also those after him, for whom this is obvious and self-evident, Maimonides did not understand things that way. Maimonides would not say this. Maimonides did not derive his philosophy from the laws; on the contrary. In those chapters—I said we’d return to those chapters in the Guide of the Perplexed where he lays out the classification of the commandments—anyone who looks sees that he writes about the benefits that emerge from each sector of commandments, from each class of commandments. The benefits are always benefits in the sense of political order, or acquiring good character traits, the Laws of Character Traits—yes, you know, in Maimonides “de’ot” means traits; “de’ot” isn’t opinions like we say today. There is a section called the Laws of Character Traits in Maimonides; there is no philosophy there. The Laws of Character Traits is how to behave. So that is what emerges from the laws. But in Maimonides, he does not derive philosophy from the laws. He derives philosophy from Aristotle, from his intellect, from the books he studied—yes, Aristotle as a representative—from various books he studied or from his own intellect. He does not derive it from the laws. In Maimonides there is no such connection. If we understand Maimonides that way—if that’s what he means; I don’t know whether he means it—then with Maimonides it’s not like that. It doesn’t work that way. Maimonides sees halakhic study, traditional Torah study, on two planes. One, as some kind of social instrument, to organize social life; and two, as an instrument—and not that… some commandments are responsible for this and some for that. Usually these are not two roles of the same commandments; he actually divides the commandments according to their functions. And there is a group of commandments whose role is to create a good substrate, a good vessel, so that you can then continue on to study the things that are really important. The Talmud says: a small matter is the debates of Abaye and Rava; a great matter is the Account of Creation and the Account of the Chariot. And Maimonides interprets the Account of Creation and the Account of the Chariot—in at least two places that I remember—as physics and metaphysics. That is the Account of Creation and the Account of the Chariot. Now that does not emerge from the laws. You study the small matter, one, so there will be social order and society will be properly ordered, because otherwise nothing can function; and two, so that your character traits will not interfere with your ability to grasp wisdom, because good character traits are the acquisition… they are your capacity to acquire wisdom. But there is no wisdom—at least in Maimonides I don’t remember such a thing; in Maimonides it seems very clear to me that he did not learn this way—there is no wisdom within the commandments themselves. Meaning, the commandments themselves do not contain bodies of wisdom. The bodies of wisdom are a different branch, a different branch that is also handled in other ways and reached through the intellect. After you’ve refined yourself by means of the commandments, now you have a good intellect, and now with your intellect you will grasp the Account of Creation and the Account of the Chariot under the inspiration of Aristotle’s thought. This is the clearest of all of them, and Maimonides also wrote this very clearly in several places. The others I know less well, but it’s fairly clear that they too are more or less there, I don’t know. In Maimonides there is a kind of split in his soul: the Book of Commandments on one side and Eight Chapters on the other. Jewish law on one side and thought on the other, as we discussed after the previous class, I think. There there is this issue of perfection. Yes, but the intellectual truths Maimonides talks about, the metaphysical intelligibles—I don’t know, my friends, but the truth is that Maimonides talks about this,
[Speaker C] and not only Maimonides. There is a great tradition among the medieval authorities (Rishonim) about these intelligibles. With Maimonides I think there is also that aspect. The Torah is also some kind of rubbing and marking, to make sure you pass through the sieve in order to reach the things that really matter. And that means Aristotle’s Organon and the Poetics and the Rhetoric and so on. This is a view said with a bit of irony, and I waive the honor of Maimonides,
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] but I think educationally one has to say it with irony. I think it isn’t correct. Fine. I think that when people speak about Torah study and in the laws of Torah study, there are completely different things there.
[Speaker B] Meaning, then in the laws of the Sabbath and in the laws of Torah, that one’s occupation should be with Torah, and that’s something far greater than bundles of documents.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] The question is what is called Torah. But the Account of Creation and the Account of the Chariot are also Torah.
[Speaker B] And that’s the difference in Maimonides.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, yes, certainly. It is involvement in Torah. That is the important thing, the higher part of Torah. The Account of Creation and the Account of the Chariot, which are not revealed to many people, and therefore they don’t really appear in the Talmud. Or maybe they are hidden in the aggadot. In the aggadot, yes. Maimonides writes this explicitly, and his son writes it even more explicitly, that within the aggadot words of wisdom are indeed hidden. And Maimonides really does bring from midrashim; he does insert philosophy from time to time. But in Maimonides, explicitly, the conceptual part of the Torah and the halakhic part of the Torah are not talking about the same thing. The halakhic part is the instrument, and the conceptual part is where the wisdoms are hidden. And it is also clear that beyond these two kinds of study that we find in Maimonides, observance too, in Maimonides, in some place occupies a lower status than what we are describing now. In Maimonides, observance is simply some kind of condition for becoming a proper human being so that you can also engage in intelligibles. What we are saying now is that observance has two layers. First, observance—really in two layers. What we said earlier, beyond what Maimonides says, which is also true of course, that it orders social life and also refines character traits—all true—but I don’t think that exhausts the whole essence of practical observance. Practical observance is meant to bring you into a world in which the intelligibles are grasped by you better. As we said: when you wave a lulav, then when you deal with the laws of the lulav, it says something different to you than it does to someone at the university studying Native Americans who wave a lulav. Meaning, he can study all the clauses of the laws of lulav, assuming he even gets to that, and it won’t say anything to him because he doesn’t wave a lulav; it doesn’t belong to his world. So it’s a different perception of the laws of lulav when you wave a lulav. Observance is not only some sort of technical instrument; it brings you into the world. You have no grasp of things if you don’t do them. The new way in historical Talmudic research of RNaK—RNaK is Rav Nachman Krochmal, yes, we talked about him—in Guide for the Perplexed of the Time, is situated within his philosophical system in Guide for the Perplexed of the Time. And that is his approach. RNaK was really perhaps the first, or among the first, of Wissenschaft des Judentums, Jewish studies scholarship. While he still remained, to a large extent, among the faithful of Israel. Fine, some kind of scholar, but a scholar, a scholar—I don’t know what to call it—positive. That was his method of studying Torah. Yes. And basically the historical analysis of Jewish law in RNaK was an important instrument for deciphering Jewish law itself. Meaning, again, the difference between him and ordinary academics is that they are interested in history, but he is interested in Torah. By academics I mean—not, there are many fine Jews who are academics; I don’t want to slander anyone—I mean those who represent that mode of research, people whose interest is the history of Jewish law. With RNaK, the history of Jewish law was a means for deciphering Jewish law, because in the end what mattered was what Jewish law says. The methods he chose, which he thought should be used, were among other things historical methods. The founder, I think, of Wissenschaft des Judentums, Rabbi Azariah of the Edomites, from the fifteenth or sixteenth century, terrible, Me’or Einayim. The book Me’or Einayim, which was later banned and excommunicated. As far as I know he was observant, he was a rabbi in Italy, as far as I know. I’m not 100 percent sure, but I think so. And in light of what he wrote in his book, some of the sages there excommunicated him and issued bans and threats against him. He wrote everything that any beginning student today in a minus-two degree in historical research and investigation of Jewish law and all sorts of things writes. There was a dangerous religious outlook there: once you understand the processes and it all seems to you at eye level, then you can also think that maybe it doesn’t look right to you, so let’s do something else. They thought that was dangerous, and therefore they excommunicated him. I don’t know the details, and I don’t know the book either; I saw it once. I don’t really know Me’or Einayim. I think I once saw it down there in that volume.
[Speaker C] Which can be compared to the new Kuk in some place. Oh really?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Is there an edition of Me’or Einayim?
[Speaker C] Ah, actually interesting.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Also the general philosophy of the new Jewish philosopher, Hermann Cohen—Hermann Cohen was, certainly Hermann Cohen
[Speaker C] was not
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] observant, that is clear. And his famous book is Religion of Reason Out of the Sources of Judaism. It’s found here, translated into Hebrew, and it has introductions by Hugo Bergmann and Rosenzweig. And he was one of those German humanists, those humanists, the Jewish humanist philosophers, but proud Jews. Just proud Jews; their Judaism, in a certain sense, was personal. He was not in favor of establishing a state or nationalism and so on; he was against it, first and foremost. There were many such people; there were also many Orthodox Jews like that in that period. In any case, in its essence the healthy movement, including the basic core of the truth contained in the unity of the moral and logical problem, derives from the source of the Torah of Israel. Notice the wording, yes? So the question that arises here is: until a moment ago you were explaining to me that all the giants of Jewish philosophy were also giants of Jewish law. We had this last time too,
[Speaker B] and you
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] somehow, without batting an eyelash, moved quickly from Maimonides and Saadia Gaon and the Ralbag to Hermann Cohen. And this happens a lot in this book, and even more in the notes. And I think that if you pay attention, you still see that the relation is different. So look: “derives from the source of the Torah of Israel,” yes? Not that this itself is Torah. But you also see in his case that since his philosophy is Jewish and is influenced by the Torah of Israel, even with him you see traces of the unity of morality with logic. He too is not like non-Jewish philosophers who detach these two realms from one another, as the philosopher himself notes in his essays on Jewish philosophy, and especially in his final book Religion of Reason Out of the Sources of Judaism. So this combination—the healthy movement, the unity of the moral and logical problem. Fine. The unity of theory and practice—what time is it now? Five to three. What? Five to three. Hebrew wisdom is fixed in the unity of Jewish law and aggadah, just as in the unity of logic and practice. Theory and practice. This is basically what we discussed earlier. You see, here this is really a kind of summary section. We saw the unity of logic with morality, of theory and practice, and of Jewish law and aggadah. Now he speaks about Jewish law and aggadah; he opens up Jewish law and aggadah. He does bring down below a really interesting point. Notice the Midrash Tanchuma, the midrash we studied—so that also appears in Devarim Rabbah. Interesting, I hadn’t noticed that. Every aggadic section opens with a halakhic question: “Teach us, our rabbi.”
[Speaker B] There are all kinds of valid theories, I heard. Because this was some kind of model for a Torah teaching that would have practical implications, so they would open with a law.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] But in our midrash, here there is a connection.
[Speaker B] This
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] is what are called puzzling midrashim, where there is no connection.
[Speaker B] But in Sifrei, and especially in the section on ritual hand-washing, I don’t
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] remember exact examples right now, but many times there is a clear connection. There are puzzling midrashim; various preachers make a living from them, puzzling midrashim. There’s a book like that—you know it? Puzzling Midrashim, a collection of all those midrashim that begin—at least a large part of them—with something where there seems to be no connection between the beginning and the end. And it’s a collection; it’s not a midrash in itself, but an old anthology that samples such midrashim with all kinds of pilpul-style passages about what the connection is between the beginning and the end. This was explained especially by a supreme sage in the hermeneutical principles by which the Torah is expounded, Rabbi Aharon ben Chaim. Rabbi Aharon ben Chaim is the author of Middot Aharon. Anyone who doesn’t know that book—it’s truly a wonderful book, highly recommended, on the Sifra, on Leviticus. In what edition? In the year 452 according to the minor count. I don’t know if there are earlier editions, but the print is more or less reasonable. The print is not like that of the philosophers of the Middle Ages, where the print is such that you don’t even know whether it’s handwriting or print. But this book has reasonable print, small Rashi script, a bit hard to read, but… what, the yeshiva doesn’t have it? A wonderful book. No, they don’t have it in the yeshiva, and I don’t believe it can be obtained today. If someone manages, let me know because
[Speaker B] I’m also looking for it.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Is it an introductory book? No, no, it’s a book. There are actually two books there. There is Middot Aharon and Korban Aharon. Really the book is Korban Aharon. I know Middot Aharon; that’s what I looked at more. Korban Aharon is the book on the Sifra, on Leviticus, the tannaitic midrash on Leviticus. And in the introduction to the Sifra there is the baraita of Rabbi Yishmael on the 13 principles by which the Torah is expounded, and on that there is a broad commentary called Middot Aharon. It is really a book in its own right. And there he performs wonders, really an extraordinary Jewish book. One of the last of the medieval authorities (Rishonim), one of the first of the later authorities (Acharonim), something on the seam; I don’t know exactly. They write, after all—the Megaleh Amukot, I think, writes, and really even before him—that the earlier one was lucky enough to be counted among the medieval authorities (Rishonim); somehow he got swept in together with them, but in fact he is a later authority. There is this kind of treatment of him as a Rishon, even though he is later; I assume even before him there was that. Exactly where they placed the dividing line—he is more or less on the seam of the Shulchan Arukh, before the Shulchan Arukh. We spoke about these books. To distinguish between the philosophical moral excellence, which is only a means to contemplation and intellect, on the one hand, and the Torah-based action that comes to unite the powers of the body with the intellectual soul through performing the divine commandments by the force of the ideas within the soul, so that all the limbs of our body will move and be sanctified by the will and word of the intellect. This is really what we said earlier. Study that leads to action, such that our limbs move by the will of the intellect. We don’t make impulsive decisions from some random intuition. Today we decide “a woman’s right over her body,” so they go out to demonstrate against abortions; tomorrow they feel it should be something else, so they do something else. Somehow there is some kind of judgment; the limbs move by the will of the intellect, and thereby become sanctified. Which is brought in the Torah literary form unique to Hebrew wisdom. As opposed to philosophical moral excellence—what is that? Philosophical moral excellence… no, sorry. No, no. “The philosophical moral excellence, which is only a means to contemplation and intellect”—that’s what we discussed in Maimonides earlier. Maybe this is even exactly the distinction I spoke about earlier between Maimonides’ approach and what we find here. In Maimonides, moral excellence—the traits, he called it earlier “philosophical moral,” so I’m not—maybe, of the philosophers. Right, the moral as the philosophers understood it, philosophical moral excellence, is only a means for acquiring contemplation and intellect. That’s what we discussed; that is basically Maimonides’ method, that character traits, action, commandments, and also good traits, are some sort of means for entering wisdom, bodies of wisdom, refining yourself a bit. He distinguishes between that and a view that says the conception of Torah action is that it comes to unite the powers of the body with the intellectual soul. Through performing the divine commandments by the force of the ideas in the soul, all our bodily limbs will move and be sanctified by the will and utterance of the intellect. This is really a continuation of what we said in section 8. In section 8 he had not yet entered into the details of which of the two approaches is correct, but he says that in the end all of them also arrive at practical study, at laws and at observance, all the sages of philosophy. But here he says one must distinguish between the conception of the sages of philosophy, who see moral excellence as a means, and his conception, that of Rabbi Aharon ben Chaim—and I personally also identify with it, little me, and perhaps the Nazir as well, who tends in this direction—that action is really the final expression of will and of contemplation and intellect. And that is what is demanded of us: not study or action, but study that leads to action. “So that all our bodily limbs will move and be sanctified by the will and word of the intellect.” I think this distinction also touches somewhat on the difference between the conception of philosophy in Maimonides’ time, and in his examination, or in the Middle Ages, and a more modern conception of philosophy. In Maimonides and his circle, in some place there is a somewhat naive conception of philosophy, in my humble opinion; sometimes I have to say things that one sometimes feels. A somewhat naive conception of philosophy. In some place Maimonides believed that by means of rationality—we might even call it analytic rationality, some kind of intellectual thinking—you can arrive at all truths; you don’t need anything else. Therefore, from Maimonides’ perspective, Torah is only needed in order to refine me so that my intellect will work properly. If it works properly, it can grasp everything by itself. There is full trust there in the ordinary rational tools.
[Speaker C] There is a feeling that one of the reasons people rejected philosophy is that they saw today’s world, the narrow field and the exemplary results, and that this is one of the reasons people come to failures in understanding divinity.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Yes, but on the other hand, if someone makes the demonstrations correctly, you do arrive at understanding divinity. After all, Maimonides arrives there by demonstrations. There are, there are. Maimonides himself reaches some things by means of demonstrations. Some things not.
[Speaker C] Meaning, he says that tradition—there is a limit, no? He
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] also, there is a limit to it—to everyone, in general. But what can be attained can be attained by means of intellectual demonstrations. Meaning, Maimonides arrives at a great many metaphysical truths through things he regards as valid intellectual demonstrations. And today somehow trust in that sense—actually analyticity, I think, contributed no small amount to philosophical maturity in the sense that today’s view is a little more restrained about what can be reached by purely rational means. So the conclusions of the analytic approach are of course skeptical conclusions—that you can’t reach it, period. The Torah alternative is that we have other means of arriving there. How? It is that same study that leads to action—not detached intellectual demonstrations, not like that—but contemplation of the commandments, of Torah, that leads to action and descends to the philosophical layers. That way one can indeed arrive at truths.
[Speaker C] The question is whether non-Jews can reach that. It could be, it could be.
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Fully, I don’t know exactly where to draw the line, but yes. Torah study—it seems clear that anyone who believes Torah study opens before you horizons not open to someone else is thereby saying that this is open only to Jews. It may sound like a somewhat racist epistemology, but perhaps that is how it is going to be. So in a certain sense these conceptions about the relation between action and contemplation, and the metaphysical and philosophical conclusions, are derived, I think, also from the relation and the understanding of what philosophy itself is. Today we are a bit more skeptical regarding our ability to reach truths by philosophical means.
[Speaker C] What? Have we closed that off completely?
[Rabbi Michael Abraham] Not sure. Not sure. Some of the scientific tools are philosophical too. But I’m not sure we’ve closed it off completely. I think it is much more moderate. I think there are things where one can still somehow feel their philosophical force. What he notes in the last sentence, “which is defined in the Torah literary form unique to Hebrew wisdom”—that Torah form is what he discusses in the next section, which we’ll talk about next time. So I won’t deal with that sentence right now, but we’ll need to come back to those words in order to know once again what “form” means. We already talked about what “form” is; maybe from here we’ll get a bit more light on this concept, what “form” is. One last remark, still on this relation between action and contemplation, or between the commandments and the intelligibles, where the commandments are only some sort of implementation of them. Actually, after all these books we’ve gone through here, it turns out that there is a connection between Jewish law and aggadah—or in other words, philosophy and Jewish law, or Jewish thought and Jewish law. And there is of course Jewish law and action; that is the connection between contemplation and action. In some place all this is one system. In order to decide what I will do tomorrow—now we are reaching yet another layer beyond what we said earlier. It’s not only pilpul in the method of the Ketzot and Maimonides and so on in order to arrive at the law, but actually if one investigates deeply, we are speaking about completely abstract understandings. Meaning, we have the ability, like philosophers, to take completely abstract philosophical understandings, decide what we think there, and on that basis decide what I do tomorrow morning or this afternoon. What do I do in the practical world? That is what we spoke about there. Our action is not only the result of the conventional analytic study we know, but if you really continue that analytic study to the next stage, as one should do, as he is trying to do here, and what should be done here, then really the connection is between the metaphysical world—the Account of Creation and the Account of the Chariot—and actual practice. That one has to decide what the upper worlds look like, and from that it follows what I do tomorrow morning. This connection is a very impressive connection, if I return to what we discussed earlier. What comes out here is really an opposite picture from the external world, let’s say, compared to the Torah world. In science, for example, science aims to understand the concrete world. That is its aim. For that purpose it creates worlds of abstract concepts. There are quantum spaces, dimensions, and all kinds of things like that. These are concepts, worlds of abstract concepts, and there is much discussion about whether they exist or don’t exist. But ultimately the goal is to understand the world of phenomena. So one creates the abstract in order to try to understand the concrete, the tangible. In Torah, and in the creation of the world generally, it works in the opposite direction. In order to understand the abstract, the spiritual worlds, the lofty things, we create the concrete. Not we—the Holy One, blessed be He, created the concrete. And the Holy One, blessed be He, created commandments—practical things, things that happen in the world. A lulav is an object; it is not only a halakhic concept that we discuss in the study hall. It is something that has to be taken on the festival of Sukkot. There is a question how to take it and where, and one has to go buy it and use it and so on. Meaning, these things, as we said, are a means for internalizing or understanding better the form, as we spoke about in previous sessions, of the concept lulav, of the laws that pertain to the concept lulav. So really there is here a movement opposite to the movement of science. Science creates abstract worlds in order to understand the concrete. Torah, in order to understand the abstract worlds, creates from them a concrete embodiment. And both say that complete understanding cannot exist in only one domain. In order to understand the concrete, you need the abstract, and in order to understand the abstract, you need the concrete. That is true. Meaning, it goes both ways. Just notice that the mode of operation is opposite. The mode of operation in science is naturally from below upward. Because science starts from below; is there also someone who exists above, I don’t know. Above is a concept, or conceived in some synthetic sense, yes? No. Synthetic, yes, not analytic—from the concrete data, from below. In Torah, the below emanates from the above—yes, by way of emanation. From the spiritual worlds the material world emanates. So really the way for me to understand the spiritual worlds, which are prior, which are the basic given, is by means of the material world; that is exactly why it was created, so that “from my flesh I behold God,” so that from within it I can understand the upper worlds. So the goal of understanding is exactly opposite. The goal of scientific understanding is this world. The goal of Torah’s understanding is the upper worlds. Kabbalah. What?