So maybe in lieu of the Ramban today we'll yesterday we looked a little bit at the Ramban's Hakdama. So both sort of somewhat apropos of that in terms of being a Hakdama and relating to what we spoke about in terms of the Rambam in Hilchos De'os how he understood the גנאי הוא לתלמיד חכם שיספר עם אשה בשוק. We'll take a look at the beginning of the Ksav Vehakabbalah's as serving as an introduction to his peirush al hatorah. So he has a maimar that he entitles Maimar Hatorah and where he writes as it were speaking in the name of Torah. So the first person is Torah speaking. Right, this is the Ksav Vehakabbalah as it were putting the words, personifying Torah and Torah is speaking. אליכם קהלות יעקב אקרא. Right, I call out to you the communities, the congregations of Yaakov. וקולי אל בני ישראל. כי נחלת שדי ממרומים לכם אני.
I'm your inheritance, I'm your from up high. ועליכם לבדכם למורשה אנכי. And I'm your exclusive inheritance, legacy. לכם בית יעקב אל חי דבריו הגיד בי. Right, Hakadosh Baruch Hu the living God communicated to you through me, again this is Torah speaking, his words. חקים ומשפטים בי הודיע. He made known chukim umishpatim through me. ואלה העדות והחוקים והמשפטים אשר הוא שם בי לפניכם. כלם אמרות טהורות מזוקקות שבעתים.
They're all pure, every pasuk, every mitzvah is a pure saying, you know sevenfold or seventyfold purified. כי רוח ה' דבר בי ומלתו על לשוני. Right, what when I Torah speak, so I speak with the words of Hakadosh Baruch Hu. וכל מדברותי רוח אלהים מרחפת. Right, the ruach of Hakadosh Baruch Hu hovers over everything I say. אין מלה בלשוני אם מפי ה' לא יצא. There's not a word on my tongue which Hashem didn't speak. ואין רוח בשפתי אשר רוח ה' לא נשאתו והן כמוצא פי ה' כלם הם גם יחד.
Everything is min hashamayim. Now here comes sort of the thematic connection to what we spoke about in Hilchos De'os yesterday. Al kein, because the Torah is devar Hashem verbatim, so על כן אמרי מעטים הם. That's why the wording in Torah, again Torah speaking, that's why my words are very sparing. They're very few. ולרוב דברים לא יפרצו. And they don't break forth into being expansive. הלא גם לאנוש עלי ארץ לא נאוה שפת יתר. Even, right, this is the ultimate kal vachomer, even a person it's not becoming to him to speak unnecessarily more than he needs to. גם לאדם על פני האדמה לא לא יאות הרבה דברים.
Again even for lowly man it's not appropriate that he should be unnecessarily expansive or elaborate in speaking. כי נפש המדברת מלאה לה תבונות אין. Let me just read the two lines and then try to understand. Maybe a lot, we'll see. We'll see, I don't know. I don't know. Ki nefesh, ki nefesh, כי נפש המדברת מלאה לה תבונות אין חקר אין מספר לגדודי מדעותיה. לכן כלי הבשר יכבדון על הנפש המה עליה לטורח.
So what did he just say here? The soul is replete with so much with inestimable understanding and innumerable areas of knowledge. לכן כלי הבשר יכבדון על הנפש המה עליה לטורח. So what did he just say here? The idea here apparently, again I think let's go back to understanding it a little bit. The idea here apparently is ideas and thought are spiritual, right? Ideas are are are spiritual. Knowledge is is spiritual. Speech is physical. Speech is physical. When spiritual knowledge is expressed through speech so that's a comedown for you're there's there's an element of lowering of bringing it down from a higher realm to a lower realm in speaking these tvunos and these gedudei madosia. Kli habasar, the larynx, yichbedu al hanefesh, they weigh down right because of their physicality which makes it something lower they weigh down the nefesh, they're burdensome. ואין טובה לנפש בחברתם. לא ישוו בעיניה רוב רכבי מרכבת המשנה אשר לה עמהם.
It's not really interested in partnering with the imahem, the the kli habasar. Ki hi, the nefesh, migavhei meromim mekora, the the nefesh is from its source its hewn from the, again speaking figuratively not not physically, from the highest of places. Vehem, whereas the kli habasar, gush afar yesodam, right, their foundation is in clump of dirt. היא מנשמת שדי חצבתה ויפח באפיו נשמת חיים והם, again the physical faculties of which speech is one, עם שוכני בתי חומר מעמדם. They they stand, their position with chomer with material. ומה לה לבת מלך כמוה, the nefesh again with its knowledge, its understanding, so a princess like as she is, ma la, what reason does she have, lehorid kavod nafsha, to lower her dignity, lechabek cheik amahoseha, to embrace the bosom of her maidservant. from the who's in the lowest position. Right? Again, the the bas melech and the the amosah being being mashalam, where the nimshel is the nefesh and the guf. And therefore מה לה להנעים דברים yessodassam beharerei kodesh עם שפחתה אשר על אדמה טמאה תשב. So it's an extraordinary idea here, Rabbosai. As it were, the chochma that the nefesh has, again which is ultimately chochma Elokis and therefore kal v'chomer when Hakadosh Baruch Hu himself is imparting or sharing the chochma, is as it were, again, it's lowered, almost demeaned by being translated into spoken words because then you're casting the spiritual in physical form because again speech is something physical. Skipping at least for the moment, maybe more than that, to the second page, the end of the third line. ואם שפת אדם לא נכון הכבר מלין. And if as the foregoing illustrates and explains, that even when a person is speaking, it's inappropriate that he should be marbeh devarim because again it belittles the chochma, אף כי לאלקי עולם ה'. So how much more so is that true when Hakadosh Baruch Hu speaks. אם לילוד אשה אמרי מצער נאוה תהלה. If, right, for for a human being, right, born of a woman, speaking sparingly, right, mitzor means za'ir, small, speaking sparingly nava tehilla, it's praiseworthy, so certainly אף כי לאלקי הרוחות לכל בשר. It's a little ironic how this critique of language is so exquisitely beautiful and moving. Okay, but ironic but not contradictory. And therefore this is what the Torah, again remembering that the Ksav Hakabbalah here personifying Torah, so Torah is speaking, that's why we have to understand that Torah is written, again, very, very sparingly and to therefore adequately understand Torah, one has to realize that the maximum, again the maximum being limited by human comprehension because the Torah is intended for us, the maximum is distilled, the maximum content is being distilled into the minimum number of words. אמנם בדברי המעט אשר לפניכם in my few words which you have before you are engraved pure and profound concepts. I don't know if he means it in the same sense, but but it's lichora at the very least there's an affinity between the ideas, maybe maybe it's the same idea, not just an affinity, right? Nefesh HaChaim in Sha'ar Aleph what what he explains to us how machshava is higher than dibbur, that where a person sort of, where his machshavas reverberate and that reaches higher than then where a person's speech reverberates. Which is why there's there's always a tension you know for for if if we're learning the sefarim of of the Chachmei HaMesora. So there's always a tension, you know, so sometimes we wish, you know, why couldn't the Ramban have, you know, given us a couple of extra sentences? And the morning seder would have been much easier, you know, if, you know, an extra sentence was thrown in the Milchamos, you know, morning seder would have been easier. So part of it obviously is just a major part of it is the the gap between the level on which the Ramban is thinking and writing and explaining and where we're holding. And on his level, you know, things are much more explicit than they appear on on our level. But part of it also is that the Chachmei HaMesora, if you can say it in two words, they won't say it in three words. This yesod, that that the divrei Torah are, I don't know if this is too strong a word, that they're demeaned by ribbui devarim, if it can be said in two words, it won't be said in three words. Baruch Ber has in a few places in Kovetz Shiurim questions that he asks to Reb Chaim. He writes, you know, I had a discussion and I asked מורי ורבי הגאון החסיד and the answers were all two or three words. This sugya, this is the sugya, this sugya. דיני פדיון בהקדש מעשר שני, hekdesh is the mechitzah, Reb Chaim answered him in two three words and that's why he wrote his sefer also. That's why it says in the in the hakdama to Reb Chaim's sefer that that it's the sefer is nikna beamal viyegia because it's written bidvarim meatim. And and it's an important it's important that that we recognize that that yesod and again and and that's why again in addition to the first factor obviously of you know just the the gap between libam shel harishonim and and and and where we are. But but it's also this yesod that divrei Torah are expressed in as sparingly as as possible. The Rambam has this idea in a more in an exoteric vein. Here it's more more esoteric. Again it's not too esoteric otherwise we wouldn't have understood it, but but... The Rambam has two halachos here in Hilchos De'os, if you have a take a look over there, Perek Beis, Halacha Daled and Hey. לעולם ירבה אדם בשתיקה. And that's such a gevaldike phrase, you can't translate that literally into English, right? To be marbeh b'shtika? How-you can't translate that literally into English, no, can you? I don't think so. That's not coincidentally either. לעולם ירבה אדם בשתיקה ולא ידבר אלא או בדברי חכמה או בדברים שצריך להם לחיי גופו. אמרו על רב תלמיד רבינו הקדוש שלא שח שיחה בטילה כל ימיו וזאת היא שיחת רוב כל אדם. ואפילו בצרכי הגוף לא ירבה אדם דברים ועל זה צוו חכמים ואמרו כל המרבה דברים מביא חטא. ואמרו לא מצאתי לגוף טוב אלא שתיקה. וכן בדברי תורה ובדברי חכמה יהיו דברי החכמה מעטים ועניניהם מרובים. אבל אם היו הדברים מרובים,
I'm skipping a line, והענין מועט הרי זו סכלות ועל זה נאמר כי בא החלום ברוב ענין וקול כסיל ברוב דברים.
Okay, so in the manuscript this is two halachos, but this is-but-but they are connected, right? The Rambam has a v'chein. Fine. Then the Rambam seemingly begins again to talk about the advantages of speaking sparingly. Halacha Hey. Siyag lachochma shtika. לפיכך לא ימהר להשיב ולא ירבה לדבר. וילמד לתלמידים בשובה ונחת בלא צעקה בלא אריכות לשון. הוא ששלמה אמר דברי חכמים בנחת נשמעים.
So the Rambam has two different halachos here. First he says לעולם ירבה אדם בשתיקה and then he-and in that context he didn't quote Siyag lachochma shtika. Then he begins all over again, Siyag lachochma shtika. What's strange is that in Halacha Hey where the Rambam is talking about Siyag lachochma shtika, what's that got to do with that he should, when he talks, he should talk בשובה ונחת בלא צעקה? One thing is how many words you say, the other is, you know, do you speak them softly or do you scream them at the top of your lungs? And in the Rambam it sounds somehow or other that-that there's a flow here, right? That it's all stemming from the same-from the same root. So my father, alav hashalom, had a gevaldike pshat. He said the Rambam has two halachos. Halacha Daled is talking about that if a person talks too much he gets into trouble. So he gets into trouble. If a person talks too much, eventually-eventually כל המרבה דברים מביא חטא. A person talks too much, eventually he's gonna, I don't know, he's gonna-he's gonna embarrass someone, rachmana litzlan, he's gonna say lashon hara, he's gonna-a person talks too much, eventually the-eventually the person is gonna cross-cross lines in terms of-in terms of his speech. And even in learning, at a certain point if a person overexplains something, so it becomes confusing, right? If-if you kol hamosif goreia even in teaching and explaining. At a certain point if something is clear and you keep on going, you'll-you'll confuse it. So that's what Halacha Daled is. Halacha Daled is again ribbui shtika as a safeguard to the potential harm that can be caused by ribbui devarim. But then in Halacha Hey, the Rambam is not talking about avoiding chet. Not talking about-no. The Rambam is talking about that effective use of speech. When a person speaks... speaks and measures his words so then his speech is more effective. He's not talking about avoiding cheit, he's talking about maximizing the potential of dibbur. Syag, not in a sense of avoiding aveira, but syag in a sense of of an enhancing kiyum. And that's why the Rambam says that ילמד לתלמידים בשובה ונחת is is the same theme as speaking with measured words because the point here is not avoiding cheit and and it's not not gezeirat hakatuv of of miyut dibbur, but it's rather how to employ the the faculty of speech in in the most effective manner. So that's a function partially of choosing one's words carefully. It's also a function of lo yemaher lehashiv that a person should stop and collect his thoughts first so that that what he says is organized and to the point. And it's also part of it is that it's belo arichut lashon. And and the pshat in the pasuk when the Rambam quotes דברי חכמים בנחת נשמעים, so davar nishma is not only saying that it's the mida of a chacham to speak softly, but what it means is, right, the way Chazal say, for instance, כשם שמצוה לומר דבר הנשמע. Davar nishma means something that that's heard in the sense that people, people aklat, people accept it, that that it it registers and hits the mark. So divrei chachamim benachas, because they're said benachas, that's why they're nishma'im. Again, nishma'im, not just in the sense of heard in an auditory sense, but heard in the sense of of hitting the mark of of registering upon the levavot hashome'im. So again, so this is a sort of an exoteric reason for economizing in in speech, and the Ksava Vekabalah is telling us more of a metaphysical and therefore somewhat esoteric reason, but they halacha lema'aseh they they they converge. The world of the Ksava Vekabalah says why, why by so many mitzvos, if machshava is a much more spiritual thing, why by so many mitzvos are we required to dibbur when it can be done belev? So, so two parts to to the answer. One part is that ein hachi nami, I mean the goal, the goal is is the machshava, and and the same way I think we we discussed let's say the Ramban, that really on Shabbos, what the Torah is interested in is that we should be, right, the you know the, before, before people were trying to figure out how to get people to turn off their cell phones in the Beis Medrash, disconnect so you can connect, so the Ramban had it, Ramban had it almost, I don't know what, 900 years ago, 800 years ago, he had it, he had it before, before everyone else, and that's what melachas Shabbos is according to the Ramban, right? Disconnect so you can connect. So, so part of the answer to your question is that ein hachi nami, the the point, or or the end goal of the mitzvos ma'asiyos is is the machshava, you know, in in the leshonos of the Chovos Halevavos, you know that the chovos haivarim are are to foster the the Chovos Halevavos. Number two because Again, it can be expressed in different ways, we'll express it since we were just doing the Ksav HaKabbalah and in the way he was speaking. In this marriage of nefesh and guf, in Olam Hazeh, so we begin by experiencing the guf much more than the nefesh. A newborn baby knows when he's hungry, the baby knows when he's uncomfortable, either because there's some air trapped that needs to be exhaled or because the diaper has to be changed. So we begin, and that's dam uma'ayin basar, right, so that's us, right? It's not babies, that's us. That's where we begin, right? So dam uma'ayin basar, a person begins much more attuned and therefore much more oriented towards the physical than the spiritual. So we then need to, as we get older, we need to sort of use the physical to get back to the, for whatever reason, that's the way the Ribbono Shel Olam created the world. So because of that we can't just be given mitzvos which speak only to the machshavah. No, we need to be told how to use the guf to get back there. I think maybe those are the two parts. If kavyachol, Hakadosh Baruch Hu obviously made the Torah, so Hakadosh Baruch Hu is above dibbur, he's above machshavah, and he's above all these things. So by Hashem it's not a separate thing. So how is that almost watering it down? Especially if the malachim wanted to receive the Torah. The malachim aren't shayach to the physical world. So why is it advantageous to be mema'et everything in such a bekitzur type of way if that's not even what... Because you're asking very well, because Torah is a davar hanivra. Hakadosh Baruch Hu created Torah to give us access on some level to chochmas Hashem. So because of that, even though obviously as you said entirely correctly, Hakadosh Baruch Hu is above all these categories, but these categories are applicable. The same way if you're knitting a sweater, you're knitting a sweater to the size of the person you intended for. So if you're knitting a sweater for a little child, so ein hachi nami, the sizes are not appropriate for you but you are operating with those sizes because it's not intended for you. It's intended for the child who's the recipient, who's going to be the recipient. So Torah is being lowered into, again, the physicality of words, of speech, because again, it's something being created for us. In terms of the malachim, so presumably the answer to your question is what the Nefesh Hachaim explains. Nefesh Hachaim explains that, I don't know, let's say this is not his mashal, so if you don't like it it's okay, let's say משל למה הדבר דומה, sometimes you get freezing rain. So what happens when there's freezing rain? So the meteorologist says the shtikel Toyre and explains how you have freezing rain. If it's cold enough to be freezing rain, so let it be snow. Right, the kasha we all have. So the teretz says no, that in the upper atmosphere where the condensation is forming, so there it's above 32 degrees. And then when it comes down here it's below 32 degrees, so it enters... so up there it's rain and down here it's frozen. So it sort of changes depending upon where it is, right, whether it's in a liquid form or a solid form, it changes depending upon where it is. So the Nefesh Hachaim explains that as Torah goes through the olamos, it means it translates according to that world. So ein hachi nami, I don't... I don't think we really have any hassaga of what does the Torah mean in the world of the malachim? I don't know. I guess ask Chanoch, I don't know, he can give you the differences. But ein hachi nami, so it's, I don't know, so we can't really ask because we have Torah as we have the frozen rain, we have Torah as it appears in this world. Yeah, okay. So, limud HaTorah.