Q&A: What Is the Definition of Words of Torah?
What Is the Definition of Words of Torah?
Question
Honorable Rabbi,
Surely you’ve already spoken about this a lot, but I can’t find it, and I’d be glad if you could point me to it.
What, in your view, is the definition of words of Torah? That is, since every assumption rests on an earlier assumption, when I study the organs of a cow in order to understand a Talmudic passage about cases of non-kosher defects, is that considered words of Torah? And if so, then when I study that one plus one equals two in order to understand a passage, is that also words of Torah? In short—is it dependent on my intention?
And if it is not dependent on intention—then where exactly is the line between recognizing facts, or asking a factual question, and “words of Torah”? For example—when I ask about “two people holding a cloak,” is that still only the question, and only at the stage of the answer—“liable or exempt”—does it become words of Torah?
A practical implication: at what stage should one recite the blessing over Torah study? 🙂
Answer
As I understand it, facts are never Torah. Torah is the normative instruction that applies to the factual situation under discussion. Everything else—facts, mathematics, and the like—are instruments for a commandment and are not Torah in the full sense. Plainly, one does not recite a blessing over instruments for a commandment (even though the blessing over Torah study is not necessarily a blessing over commandments, since, as is well known, the halakhic decisors disagree about this).
When one studies mathematics or other fields of knowledge for enrichment and the shaping of one’s worldview—that is more in the realm of Torah, though even that is Torah in the person, not in the object, and in my opinion one should not recite a blessing over that either.
In my view, the study of aggadic literature or Jewish thought is also not Torah in the object, and one should not recite a blessing over it.
Rabbi Kook, in Collection A, 904, discusses the issue of the boundary between Torah and wisdom:
Sometimes we find the light of Torah דווקא in a distant place. When it happens that thought has become contracted and narrowed, that contraction keeps intensifying until many numerous and fundamental parts of Torah are removed from it, and we then have to seek them in a distant place. In general, the barrier between Torah and wisdom is not properly defined. We need to know almost all the sciences in order to clarify Torah properly, and when these were excluded from Torah—we have no clear criterion. The practice of medicine is included in Torah, for the aggadot of the Talmud incorporated it, and concern for the life of a created being was the main reason that required Rabbah bar Rav Huna to instruct his son to go before Rav, even more than the reason of sharpening his learning. In Proverbs we find praise of wisdom. In general, it may be that the moral failings of some scholars caused the idea of the difference between Torah and wisdom to be exaggerated. In general, all the sciences lead to divine knowledge and the love of God; if so, they are included in the commandment of “Hear” and “And you shall love,” around which revolve “And these words that I command you today shall be upon your heart” and “You shall teach them diligently to your children.” If there is a need to know what action should be done, and wisdom does not suffice for that, that distinction is enough also for the other areas within Torah that are not practical. And it is obvious that knowing what to do must come first, and also that familiarity with the spirit of Torah, which comes through everything one engages in within it, elevates a person toward practical perfection. And this quality also exists in every branch of wisdom in certain respects, and every wisdom is truly the light of God, and a clear definition that distinguishes between Torah and general wisdom is a great question.