The Ramban here Perek Yud Chet, Pasuk Yud Tet. Ki Yedativ. כי ידעתיו למען אשר יצוה. Lashon Rashi: הרי ידעתיו כתרגומו לשון חיבה כמו מודע לאישה וידעתיך. So Ki Yedativ means I cherish Avraham Avinu, I love Avraham Avinu, Hakadosh Baruch Hu is saying. אמנם עיקר כולו לשון ידיעה. Even when sort of practically the sense of Yedativ is this Lashon Chiba, but that derives from the basic Lashon of Yediya, of knowledge. המחבב את האדם מקרבו אצלו ויודעו ומכירו. The Yediya is an expression of the Chiba. Out of my love for him, Yedativ. ואם תפרשהו יודע אני בו שיצוה את בניו אין למען נופל על הלשון.
And the question is what Leman means, whether Leman means because or whether it means in order that, whether Leman has the sense of referencing something in the past or whether it's referencing something in the future. ואם תפרשהו יודע אני בו. That the reason I single out Avraham Avinu for special benevolent treatment and have a special relationship with him, Hakadosh Baruch Hu says, is because I know that he will. So Rashi thinks that that's not consistent with Leman. אין למען נופל על הלשון. That Leman is Mashma to the past, that it's because of. ויתכן שיהיה ידעתיו גידלתי ורוממתי. I elevated him, I exalted him, בעבור שיצוה את בניו אחריו לעשות הישר לפני. Because he has, he's, the reason I'm going to make him into a nation, the reason Avraham Avinu is the progenitor of a nation, is because Avraham Avinu lives by an ethos of transmitting belief and value to the next generation. Since he lives by that, by that ethos, so that's why it's fitting that he should be the progenitor of a nation. בעבור שיצוה את בניו אחריו לעשות הישר לפני ולכך אשימנו לגוי גדול ועצום שיעבדוני וכמו ידעתיך בשם אדם תדיעהו.
O Yomar, now the Ramban now disagrees with Rashi and says Yedativ Sheyitzaveh. No, maybe Leman should be understood as the future. וכן למען ינוח שורך וחמורך שינוח. That they will. Okay. והנכון בעיני כי היא ידיעה ממש. Right, so there are two sort of intersecting questions in the Pshat. One is, again, how Yedativ should be understood and the other is how Leman should be understood, and those two questions in the Pshat are intersecting. The Nachon Be'einai says Ibn Ezra כי היא ידיעה בו ממש. Yirmozu ירמזו כי ידיעת השם שהיא בהשגחתו בעולם השפל היא לשמר הכללים וגם בני האדם מונחים בו למקרים עד בוא עת פקודתם אלא בחסידיו ישום אליו ליבו לדעת אותו בפרט להיות שמירתו דבקה בו תמיד לא תיפרד הידיעה והזכירה ממנו כלל כטעם לא יגרע מצדיק עיניו ובאו מזה פסוקים רבים כדכתיב הנה עין השם אל יראיו וזולת זה.
So leaving aside for for today how to integrate this with let's say the famous Ramban at the end of Parshas Bo, but leaving that to the side, what the Ramban here says is the following. Ki yedativ means that Avraham Avinu I I exercise a hashgacha pratis for Avraham Avinu that most people don't enjoy. Most people don't have the hashgacha pratis that I provide Hakadosh Baruch Hu, that I Hakadosh Baruch Hu provide to Avraham Avinu. That's what what yedativ means. And why is that? So the Ramban says that בחסידיו ישום אליו ליבו לדעת אותו בפרט. That Hakadosh Baruch Hu knows the chasid as a prat, not as not as not as a klal. What does that mean? So the Rav has in the end of Ish HaHalacha, he's talking about the Rambam, but the Rambam he's talking about says the same thing as as this Ramban. So he explains as follows. Let's say, take in the ich veis in the I don't know, the animal world, you can do it in in the world of vegetation as well. So when you look at an individual tree, when you look at an individual animal, an individual ba'al chai, you can explain everything about that in terms of the general klalim of which which govern vegetation, which which govern the reproduction in in the animal world. And in that sense, even though if you look at dogs, so dogs look different, you know some you know this dog looks like this, and this one's big, and this one's small, and this one's this color, this one's that color, but that you know sort of superficial variety notwithstanding, there's nothing individual about a dog. Every every dog is just a byproduct of the general laws of nature which were operative and and generated this dog. And in that sense, the dog is not a prat, the dog is just an instance of a klal. Do you hear the Rabosai? The same way we, I don't know, so if you look at people, right? So people have different eye color, and people have different hair color, and people are different different height, etc. But all of that again And even though when we look at a person, okay, so then those are all characteristics which we superficially think of help identify him as an individual and if I guess it does if you're looking through the peephole on your door and you're trying to recognize someone, so they do. But there's really nothing, it doesn't express individuality because all of that you can trace back to the laws of genetics as to why the person has this hair color and why the person is this height, et cetera. It all traces back to the laws of genetics. So there's nothing, okay, so the laws of genetics allow for this phenomenological diversity as it were. But there's nothing again, these are individual instances of just general rules, but there's nothing individual about the person's eye color even though it may be an unusual eye color doesn't reflect that he is an individual. It's just part of the diversity in the laws of genetics. If a person goes through life and for the most part sort of just reacts instinctively to physical instincts we have and there's nothing, he doesn't really live as an individual because again there's nothing. Again, so it's true that this person likes meat and doesn't like fish and this person likes fish and doesn't like meat, but again all those differences are differences which are part of the klal of genetics and there's nothing. When a person is an Oveid Hashem on the highest degree, so then that person is an individual. Everything he does is not just a response to instinct, because again instinct is genetic, there's nothing individual about that, and even the variety of instincts, again one person likes meat, one person likes fish, but that's also just part of the variety which is in the klal, it doesn't reflect that the person lives as an individual. No, he's just living as a byproduct of general klal. The person who's Oveid Hashem consciously, deliberately, so he lives as an individual. So to the degree that a person lives as an individual, Hakadosh Baruch Hu knows him as an individual. And to the degree that a person just lives as an instance of a klal, so then that's all he is also. And that's what the Ramban says בהנחם בעיני כי היא ידיעה בו ממש ירמוז כי ידיעת השם שהיא השגחתו בעולם השפל.
Hakadosh Baruch Hu in sort of in what capacity as it were does Hakadosh Baruch Hu know things in this world? So he knows things again in terms of the klalim. So as long as that's the extent of what a person is, so then he's not an individual, right? He's not an individual. The distinguishing hair color, eye color, tastes in food notwithstanding, none of that makes a person an individual. So Hakadosh Baruch Hu again, so Hakadosh Baruch Hu in the world is interested not in the individual instances of the klal, but the klal. Right, so that's what all the Rishonim have, that other than people, not all the Rishonim, but certainly many many Rishonim have that other than people so there's no hashgacha pratis. There's no hashgacha pratis for this cat, for this bird, for this, there's no hashgacha pratis because again, because the hashgacha is on the klal. And the cat, the bird, has no way of distinguishing itself. It never is anything other than an instance of a klal. וגם בני אדם מונחים בו למקרים עד בוא עת פקודתם. ואבל בחסידיו ישים אליו לבו לעשות בו בפרט.
That's what the Rav explains, that what again he says in the Rambam and the Ramban is saying the same thing, is because he lives as an individual. He lives as an individual. When a person lives as an individual, so then Hakadosh Baruch Hu quote knows him as such. And when the person just lives as simply an individual instance of a clal, so then Hakadosh Baruch Hu is interested in the clal. There's no there's no interest in in a particular cow. There's a hashgacha in the min of cows. There's a hashgacha in the min of cats. There's a hashgacha in the in the in the min of of of dogs. There's no hashgacha for individuals because there is no such thing as an individual. Right, and that's what it means ki yedaitiv, that Avraham Avinu is is completely an individual. There's nothing, he's he's not he's not an instance, he's not an individual instance of a clal, he's an individual. And therefore so ki yedaitiv. So therefore I know him in in that sense and Hakadosh Baruch Hu's yediah represents hashgacha. Okay, maybe we'll talk a little bit about this more tomorrow morning.