Q&A: Explanation of “Study and Understanding and Life Experience and Length of Days…” — Help Understanding a Passage from Sefer HaYashar
Explanation of "Study and Understanding and Life Experience and Length of Days…" — Help Understanding a Passage from Sefer HaYashar
Question
In Sefer HaYashar (fifth section, in the pillars of service) it says:
"And the lowly level is study and understanding and worldly experience and length of days. These, then, are four pillars through which a person acquires intellect."
Could you perhaps help explain what each pillar is (study, understanding, worldly experience, length of days)?
It would help me a lot; there’s a general feeling of vagueness when reading this passage.
Answer
I don’t know. Maybe “study” means basic facts, “understanding” means understanding one thing from another (drawing conclusions from the basic facts), “worldly experience” is practical experience, and “length of days” is old age, which indicates that you have a lot of experience. Maybe.
Discussion on Answer
Thanks—together, from the two responses, some general picture of the author’s intention is starting to take shape for me.
As an aside—does the Rabbi have a particular opinion, or any sense of probability, regarding the controversy over who wrote Sefer HaYashar?
No. And it also doesn’t sound especially interesting to me—neither the author nor the book.
That’s more intriguing than before…
Did you read the book and decide it wasn’t interesting? Or does the title of the book not sound interesting? (“Babylonian Talmud” sounds more interesting? Or “Mishneh Torah?”)
And Rabbeinu Tam, as one of the medieval authorities, also isn’t interesting?
One of the greatest of the Tosafists, who influenced the world of Jewish law to this day (Rabbeinu Tam nightfall, Rabbeinu Tam tefillin, and the list goes on…)
Just out of plain curiosity.
Maybe length of days improves the intellect not as a sign of experience, but because an intellect that has aged is more successful, like elderly Torah scholars, whose minds become more settled with them—less jumpiness and fervor.