Q&A: A Passage from Ein Aya
A Passage from Ein Aya
Question
“And Rabbi Ishmael took as proof the nature of a human being, whose spirit grows short if he engages only in intellectual matters continuously and does not also alternate, for some amount of time, with involvement in social affairs; if so, this is proof that the nature of a person’s perfection also demands practical activity.”
Thus he wrote in Ein Aya on Berakhot 35.
I didn’t understand at all: where did Rabbi Ishmael bring proof from a person’s social needs?
Thank you very much.
Answer
In the future, it’s best to bring the full quotation.
Rabbi Ishmael says that one should conduct oneself according to the way of the world, and he learns this from “and you shall gather in your grain.” That is, from the fact that this is the way of the world—that people occupy themselves with sustaining themselves and sustaining the world—he concludes that this is also the proper way.