Even if I do not learn from the Hebrew Bible, I do explain the Hebrew Bible, and seemingly that ought to have value, just as the Talmud asks: “What practical difference does it make? For explaining the verses” [even though for us there is no practical benefit in knowing who put on the priestly garments first].

What is this nonsense? The Hebrew Bible teaches nothing? But the Mishnah and the Talmud do?
In the end, after all, you go to a rabbi and ask what the Jewish law is.
Even Maimonides said that after writing his code of laws there would be no need to study anything except the Torah and the law. Meaning, the Talmud is unnecessary.

Is reviewing a Talmudic passage not Torah study?
Let us assume there are no new insights, and it is just for the sake of remembering, for the sake of the discussion.

According to the Torah, Torah study is the study of what Moses our Teacher wrote.
According to Maimonides:
“And one is obligated to divide his study time into three parts: one-third for the Written Torah, one-third for the Oral Torah, and one-third he should understand and comprehend the end of a matter from its beginning, derive one thing from another, compare one thing to another, and understand through the interpretive principles by which the Torah is expounded, until he knows how the essence of those principles works and how to derive what is forbidden and what is permitted and similar matters from things he learned by tradition. This subject is what is called Gemara.”

Review is indeed study. Its purpose is to internalize material I already knew so it will not be forgotten. But studying values that I know and have no chance of forgetting is not aimed at acquiring information, and therefore it is not study. Beyond that, even among what does count as study, I wrote that there is a hierarchy among types of study.

With Heaven’s help, 11 Sivan 5780

To Michael, the Great Prince — greetings,

Now I understand! You are an angel! Only an angel, who is a “separate intellect,” can say: “Values that I know—there is no chance I will forget.”

But what can be done? Human beings are made of matter, full of urges and distractions—and they most certainly can forget even the loftiest values in the gray routine of life. Therefore the Torah was given to them so that they should meditate upon it day and night, remember the exalted values, and act accordingly.

And as Moses our Teacher answered you 3,332 years ago: the Torah had to be given דווקא to human beings, who are liable to fail and not live up to the Torah’s high moral demands.

Regards,
One of the People

In the language of the Hebrew Bible, musar is something you take. The Torah is not about teaching ethics. And it has already been said that proper conduct precedes Torah (and knowledge of the Hebrew language also preceded the Torah…).

So a person looking to be a robot, with some programmer ordering him how to walk down the street morally, will not find answers to those questions in the Torah.

I did not understand what is meant by saying there is nothing new in studying the Hebrew Bible. Besides values, it also describes historical events that are important to know and recognize. It is also capable of building in you a connection and living bond with Jewish nationhood, so why then do you not see value in studying the Hebrew Bible?

Yehuda,
It is like reminding a couple who have been married for 40 years about their fights in the early years. It is no longer relevant or interesting. When Jews in exile asked why we are in exile, they were told: look in the Hebrew Bible. But today, when we have come to the Land and are rebuilding it, who cares about those old quarrels? We have gone through so much with the Holy One, blessed be He, and the religious world has changed so much that today the prophets are just not so interesting anymore. One should learn Jewish law from the Torah. Psalms is always good to recite. You can study wisdom literature, but what is there to learn from the prophets?

These things have already been discussed to death here, and are spelled out very well in the second book of the trilogy.

The discussion of whether one can call the study of ethics “study” is explained very well in the book. There the Rabbi writes that seemingly the Hebrew Bible has holiness, and studying it is study of the object, because of the holiness of the wording. The Rabbi qualifies this by saying that study from which one derives Jewish law has greater importance, and in general it is hard to understand the holiness in reading the Hebrew Bible without deriving something from it [and only explaining it].
I do not understand the difference—if there is holiness in the Hebrew Bible and there is a commandment to study it, as the Talmud says, “for explaining the verses,” there is no difference between it and studying Jewish law, because even from studying Jewish law we have no practical benefit from performing it; everything we fulfill from what is written in the Torah is because of the holiness we believe in. So what is the difference???
It may be that I did not understand properly, and thank you Rabbi for everything!!

The issue is not whether the study is useful to me, but whether it teaches me something I did not know. Halakhic study teaches me that it is forbidden to eat pork and that there is such a principle as migo, the strength of a legal claim. Those are things I would not know without study and for which I have no other source from which to learn them. In the Hebrew Bible I learn values (that one should be humble) or historical facts. In the first case there is no novelty, and in the second, even if there is value, in principle one can learn it from other historical sources (and even if in practice I have no such sources, that is just an incidental technical matter).

What is gained by knowing that it is forbidden to eat pork?
That in practice I do not eat it.
What is gained by not eating pork?
That we believe there is something in it that causes harm, even if we do not understand it.
Studying or reading the Hebrew Bible, even if it teaches me nothing—if there is holiness in the text and the study is of the object, there is no reason to diminish its value just because we do not understand how studying the Hebrew Bible helps when we derive nothing from it.
[This is without entering the discussion about studying ethics.]

Nur, did you read what I wrote? I explained that I am not talking about the gain. My claim is that studying the Hebrew Bible is not study, and not necessarily that it is unimportant (which in my opinion is also true)…

But there is still the commandment of Torah study in it?
If so, in what sense is it not considered study?
From the Rabbi’s book it seemed to me that there is study of the object. If I was mistaken, I retract everything above. If I was not mistaken, I do not understand in what way “explaining the verses,” from which no benefit at all is derived but there is still a commandment, is inferior to taking the lulav.

There is a commandment of Torah study in it, because you are uttering words of Torah (as an object). But in my opinion, that is not study. I explained it there. What does that have to do with taking the lulav?

Even if it is not study, that does not reduce its importance compared to study.
What is the benefit of study? The knowledge that one must take a lulav, the required size of the lulav, and the other details. What is the benefit of taking the lulav? A benefit that we do not know, but we trust the Giver of the Torah that it exists. If there is a commandment in studying the Hebrew Bible, why should its value be less than the study of Jewish law?

[As opposed to study from which one derives moral benefit, where one could argue that there is an understandable benefit and perhaps its level is greater than the level of Hebrew Bible study—in the study of Jewish law, where the benefit of the knowledge is also not understood, I do not see a reason for the superiority of Jewish law over the Hebrew Bible.]

Everything was explained well here and in the book. I do not know what else needs to be added. There is study whose benefit you may not understand, and there is something that does not teach you anything at all. Decide for yourself which is preferable and which is not, but that difference between them exists.

I feel the argument is becoming sterile, but maybe I did not express myself properly:
if there is a commandment, I do not see a difference between study for the sake of something not understood, and study that itself is not understood,

[The statement “there is a need, only I do not understand it” is like that teacher who said the world stands on three elephants, and when a student asked what the elephants stand on, he said, “Right now we are talking about the elephants, not the world.” I do not see a reason for a difference in importance between something that is a commandment and we do not understand it, and something from which we derive a commandment that we do not understand.]

Ben Bag-Bag says: “Turn it over and turn it over, for everything is in it. Look into it, grow old and worn in it, and do not move away from it, for you have no better portion than it.”

Haramada says: Turn it over and turn it over, for nothing is in it. Look into it, and you will not find in it anything I do not already know. For you have no better quality than me.

We are not talking about study whose benefit is unclear. We are talking about something that is not study. It teaches me nothing. This really does seem like a dialogue of the deaf, and I do not understand what the problem is or what is unclear. The points are as plain as day. I will repeat myself one more time, and with this I will finish.
When I study the Hebrew Bible, the lessons never teach me anything new. It is always what I thought beforehand (to be humble, feminist, conservative, bold, use judgment, etc. etc.). And even if there is a disagreement between people and outlooks, it will never be resolved through the study (everyone will interpret the verses in his own way). The socialist will “learn” socialism from there, and the capitalist will learn capitalism. The Haredi will “learn” anti-Zionism from there, and the Zionist will learn Zionism. The Hebrew Bible is a Rorschach blot. If that is so, then essentially there is no study here. Study is extracting information from the text. That does not happen here.
By contrast, in the context of studying Jewish law or Talmudic analysis, you are constantly learning new things. Maybe you do not understand why that is good or what use it has, but there is study here.

And if it is not “study,” is there a reason that it should be less important?

If both involve a commandment, what is the reason for the difference in importance? Because from the “study” I derive something whose importance I do not understand, whereas from reading the Hebrew Bible I do not derive anything? But surely the Hebrew Bible also has importance; I just do not know what it is.