Q&A: Hello Rabbi,
Hello Rabbi,
Question
Maimonides writes in the Laws of Repentance that the punishment of the wicked person is that he is cut off like an animal (and Nachmanides, in Torat HaAdam, disagrees). The question is: what punishment is there in not existing? After all, a person does not feel that he does not exist…
Answer
The punishment is for the person who is living now, when he is told that he will cease to exist. It is not a punishment for the absent person, because there truly is no one there to be punished. For a living person, being told such a thing is definitely a punishment. By the way, regarding karet there are quite a few interpretations, and my impression is that no one really knows what it means.
Discussion on Answer
Alternatively, simply to wipe out the sinner. Not as a punishment for him, but in order to get rid of him.
It isn't a punishment; it's a reality.
Whoever does not cleave to eternity does not remain.
The body decays, and so does the soul in the absence of something to sustain it.
It is not a punishment. It is a state of not attaining the intelligibles.
In fact, this view comes from Aristotle, or more precisely from the interpretation of Alexander of Aphrodisias. The material intellect apprehends and unites with the active intellect.
Maimonides' World to Come is not a world of souls the way people usually understand it. In fact, it is not even clear that there is any distinct World to Come for each individual; rather, what remains is the apprehension in his intellect.
For example, if two people have the same apprehension, then what remains is that same apprehension.
The material intellect is only a potential.
In at least one place, in the Mishneh Torah, Maimonides puzzlingly writes the opposite: that the soul is eternal and not merely potential. Apparently this follows Themistius's interpretation of Aristotle.
It should be noted that according to Maimonides, keeping the commandments does not guarantee the World to Come, and it seems that even a person who does not keep the commandments can attain it (Aristotle, for example).
Maimonides nowhere resolves these contradictions.
That basically means that according to Maimonides, the punishment is not really a kind of punishment for the sinner or a purification, but rather something whose purpose is to bring the sinner to repentance. That somewhat empties the idea of its content, because many times the sinner also does not believe in the World to Come…