Transcript

So in the first perek of the Navi, שאין הקדוש ברוך הוא גוף וגוויה, shene'emar כי השם הוא אלקים בשמים ממעל ועל הארץ מתחת. V'haguf לא יהיה בשני מקומות. Shene'emar כי לא ראיתם כל תמונה, v'ne'emar

ואל מי תדמיוני ואשוה, ואילו היה גוף היה דומה לשאר הגופים.

But what's the raya from the first pasuk, כי השם הוא אלקים בשמים ממעל ועל הארץ מתחת? Maybe the pasuk means like this: Hakadosh Baruch Hu is Elokim, right? Elokim means sovereign, Elokim means ba'al hakochot. Now Hashem is wherever He is. Now where is He sovereign? Where does His sovereignty extend? His sovereignty extends בשמים ממעל ועל הארץ מתחת. Place, like the Gemara in Megillah says about those who were molech b'kippah, מולך על כל העולם. So maybe that's what the pasuk means. And the punctuation is: ki Hashem, whatever his address would be, right? And where is He Elokim? Where does His domain extend? It extends בשמים ממעל ועל הארץ מתחת. So in Eretz Yisrael, one of the talmidim I think explained it very well, that if that's what it meant, so then it should have been a semichus. It should have been כי השם הוא אלקי השמים ממעל והארץ מתחת. It would have been a semichus, like you have the lashon Elokei hashamayim. And the Rambam's diyuk is כי השם הוא אלקים. It's not describing that Hakadosh Baruch Hu is אלקי השמים ואלקי הארץ. It's talking about Hakadosh Baruch Hu who is Elokim, and then therefore the בשמים ממעל ועל הארץ מתחת is takeh telling you where Hakadosh Baruch Hu is, and it's telling you that Hakadosh Baruch Hu is everywhere. So memeila says the Rambam, that's the meforash pasuk that אין הקדוש ברוך הוא גוף וגוויה. Okay, so there's obviously much to discuss here, but the only other point that we're going to discuss here in perek alef is in Halacha Yud. The Rambam discusses what exactly Moshe Rabbeinu's bakasha of הראני נא את כבדך is, v'heshivo Baruch Hu, Hakadosh Baruch Hu answers Moshe Rabbeinu in the pasuk of

כי לא יראני האדם וחי, שאין כח בדעת האדם החי שהוא מחובר מגוף ונפש להשיג אמיתת דבר זה על בוריו.

Right? And that's clearly the interpretation of the pasuk of כי לא יראני האדם וחי. So you see according to the Rambam, some of the meforshim in Chumash say like this also, maybe the Ramban on the pasuk says like this also, that כי לא יראני האדם וחי doesn't mean that oh, if you see this it will make you die. Right? It's not that I don't want to do it because you should know that the price that you would have to pay for, again, whatever the, again, the means with the yirani, with the eye of one's mind. No, it's כי לא יראני האדם וחי while he is alive, right? Not that the end is sequential and telling a consequence, but that the and, the vav here has the sense of while still alive. כי לא יראני האדם וחי while still alive. That as long as a person is murkav from guf v'neshama, as long as a person is a hybrid of physical and spiritual, physical and intellectual, so then there are certain constraints on his understanding. And it's only when the person is purely spiritual, purely intellectual, that certain boundaries are then lifted. Bechol, it's this metzius which accounts... accounts for the sort of in stories one hears about, about the Chachmei HaMesorah. So there are two types of stories. You hear the story about the Gaon, who on his deathbed was crying on Chol HaMoed Succos, about having to leave Olam Hazeh. Because Olam Hazeh is where a person can be oived Hashem, and Olam Haba a person is not oived Hashem. U'me'idach gisa, you hear the story of Rebbe Nachman Breslover, who said that he's looking forward to, like on a hot summer day you want to take your jacket off, it's too hot. So he's looking forward to divesting himself of his guf. Divesting himself of his guf. So obviously there are very different emphases there, but eiluv v'eiluv in a sense that what the story with Rebbe Nachman Breslover reflects is this reality of כי לא יראני האדם וחי, which again is muskam. Obviously it's much easier for us to relate to, not on the level that he meant it, not on the lishma and ahava level that the Gaon meant it, but on a very different level. It's much easier for us to relate to the story with the Gaon. Presumably most of us would feel that we're so far from having yet be oived Hashem and having any hasaga of what shleimus is that we're not quite ready to divest ourselves of our guf. Let's see a little bit here in Perek Beis.

האל הנכבד והנורא הזה מצווה לאהבו וליראה ממנו שנאמר ואהבת את ה' אלהיך ונאמר את ה' אלהיך תירא.

I think the Rav comments, later in Perek Vov, the Rambam has a lashon, Perek Vov, Halacha Aleph, כל המאבד שם מן השמות הקדושים הטהורים. So there he talks about, he uses the adjectives kadosh v'tahor. In the Avodah, right, we say

כשהיו שומעים את השם הנכבד והנורא מפורש יוצא מפי כהן גדול.

So he said that the kedoshim v'tehorim refer to any of the שבעה שמות שאינם נמחקים. Nichbad v'nora either refers to HaKadosh Baruch Hu or to the Shem HaMeforash. And that's meyuchad, those to'arim are meyuchad again either talking about HaKadosh Baruch Hu or the Shem HaMeforash. But when one is talking not only about the Shem HaMeforash, one's talking about all the שבעה שמות שאינם נמחקים, so then it's only kadosh v'tahor. Al kol panim.

האל הנכבד והנורא הזה מצווה לאהבו וליראה ממנו שנאמר ואהבת את ה' אלהיך ונאמר את ה' אלהיך תירא.

Halacha Beis. היך הוא הדרך לאהבתו וליראתו וכולו. So there's something very, very remarkable here in leshonos haRambam. Very remarkable. And that is it's certainly not the Rambam's usual style to, as much as the Rambam economized on words, to compress two mitzvos into a single halacha. Rambam gives every mitzvah its own due. Every mitzvah gets its own moment. In the spotlight. And here the Rambam bedavka both in Halacha Aleph and Bais wants the takka talk about Ahavas Hashem and יראת השם בנשימה אחת. Mitzvah to love and to fear from Him. היאך הדרך לאהבתו ויראתו? The pshat l'chora is as follows. Obviously on one level Torah is miksha achas. On one level if a person is nizhar in one mitzvah, not so nizhar in another mitzvah, on one level obviously there's a stira because מי שצוה על זה צוה על זה. But on another level every mitzvah is an independent mitzvah. Every mitzvah is an independent mitzvah. The Rambam seems to be communicating here that the mitzvos of ahava and yira have to be twin mitzvos. You can't have one genuinely without the other. A person can be nizhar in mezuzah without bentching. Again obviously on a certain level there's a stira in that behavior. Like what are you putting up a mezuzah for and not bentching? Obviously there is a stira on a certain level, but lemaiseh you can have mitzvas mezuzah without birchas hamazon. You can have birchas hamazon without bentching. The Rambam is saying but ahava without yira, yira without ahava, the imbalance is one that can't be. You can't have that imbalance. Why is that? So l'chora pshutus is as follows. Yira, real yira, whatever that means, without any sense of ahava would be just totally overwhelming. I don't know that a person could live with only a sense of yira without a sense of ahava. Just a sense of mora shamayim without any sense of ahava, just overwhelming. I don't think again to the degree that it was real yira I don't think a person could be sovel. On the other hand ahava without yira is a distortion. Ahava without yira is a caricature. משל למה הדבר דומה. Let's say you have a father and son, very very close. Very very close. And a tremendous kirva, tremendous intimacy, something wonderful to behold. Ad k'dei kach that the father's name is Yakov, the son calls him Yanko. That's how close they are, mamash just so. So obviously here the closeness is wonderful, the closeness should be, but that it translates into the son calling the father Yanko is that already is a distortion of the relationship. Achrei k'chol hakol with all the kirva, with all the intimacy, it has to be clear that Yakov is the father and that Reuven is the son. And it distorts the relationship if again that doesn't preclude tremendous kirva and intimacy. But the kirva and intimacy without epes a shemetz of mora, of yira, distorts the relationship, it becomes a caricature. So that's what the Rambam says, האל הנכבד והנורא הזה, I can talk about birchas hamazon and I can talk about mezuzah separately. I can't talk about ahava and yira, ahava and yira separately. There's an imbalance, there's a distortion in talking about one without the other.

היאך הדרך לאהבתו ויראתו בשעה שיתבונן האדם במעשיו ובברואיו הנפלאים הגדולים ויראה מהן חכמתו שאין לה ערך ולא קץ מיד הוא אוהב ומשבח ומפאר ומתאוה תאוה גדולה לידע השם הגדול כמו שאמר דוד צמאה נפשי לאלוקים לקל חי. עומד בדעת קלה ומעוטה לפני תמים דעות כמו שאמר דוד כי אראה שמיך מעשה אצבעותיך מה אנוש כי תזכרנו ולפי הדברים האלו אני מבאר כללים גדולים ממעשי ריבון העולמים כדי שיהיו פתח למבין לאהוב את השם כמו שאמרו חכמים בעניין אהבה שמתוך כך אתה מכיר מי שאמר והיה העולם.

So this the Rambam there is an interesting sort of difference in the depiction of Ahava and Yira, and that is the depiction of Ahava is that a person recognizes or senses something about Hakadosh Baruch Hu, whereas Yira a person recognizes or senses something about his relationship to Hakadosh Baruch Hu. Ahava doesn’t say anything about my relationship with Hakadosh Baruch Hu. Right? There is no self-awareness which is involved in Ahava in Ahavas Hashem according to the Rambam. Yiras Hashem involves a self-awareness that part of the recognition of Yira is the recognition that a person is a בריה קטנה שפלה אפלה. Shefala afela is the Rambam’s lashon for physical for chomri and in the last halacha in perek aleph that we didn’t look at together in

פרק א' הלכה י"ב כל הדברים האלו אינם מצויים אלא לגופים האפלים השפלים שוכני בתי חומר שבעפר יסודם.

So ofel shofel, that combination is the Rambam’s allusion to being chomri, to being physical. So Yiras Hashem involves understanding a certain relationship, the ultimate contrast, whereas Ahava there is no self-awareness, there is no self-understanding. It’s not something relational in the sense that Hashem is A and I am B, it’s just that Hashem is A. There is no Hashem is A and I am B the way there is in Yira. And again that’s something which if we sort of lower it on the level of a mashal, so we understand that. Right? Let’s talk about, the Rambam here is obviously talking about yiras haromemus, but for purposes of the mashal, so if you’re afraid of a bully when you’re walking down an alleyway, so if he’s five foot three and 120 pounds and you’re six foot two and 200 pounds, I mean unless he’s a judo expert or something, so you’re not going to be afraid of him. It’s gonna, but ela mai he’s, it’s reversed, so Yira is something relational. Ahava isn’t relational. Ahava is you see the, we see the middos in people. We see the refinement, the goodness in people. Not necessarily relational. A person doesn’t, when you love someone, it doesn’t have to be oh because the person’s better than me. Okay. So that that’s... Could be, could be, I’m not sure. There is a fascinating he’ara of the Tosafot HaRosh in Kiddushin. Right? We’re all familiar with the gemara about Shimon HaAmsoni who was being doresh kol esin. When he came up to את ה' אלהיך תירא so then he withdrew, and

כשם שקבלתי שכר על הדרישה כך קבלתי שכר על הפרישה עד שבא רבי עקיבא

and said lerabbos talmidei chachamim. So where’s the pasuk of את ה' אלהיך תירא? It's a pasuk in Parshat Eikev. So he was going keseder. So he first encountered ואהבת את ה' אלהיך in Parshat Vaetchanan. So how did he get beyond ואהבת את ה' אלהיך? He should have folded his tent when he got to ואהבת את ה' אלהיך. So the Tosefos Rosh says, no, that by ואהבת את ה' אלהיך he held that maybe it's l'kavod aviv v'imo. And so it's interesting, maybe it's, maybe that's l'kavod talmidei chachamim. We don't know exactly what he darshened, but the Tosefos Rosh says he was ready to darshen. But when it came to את ה' אלהיך תירא, so there he held I can't, there isn't anything that you can mention in the same breath as Mora Shamayim. There is something you can mention in the same breath as Ahavas Hashem, but there's nothing that you can mention in the same breath as Yiras Hashem. And question why is that true? Why is that true? So the Tosefos Rosh doesn't, doesn't really spell out what, what he has in mind. L'kaureh, this diyuk in the Rambam would be one way to understand it. That heyos that what Yiras Shamayim means is understanding this contrast, that a person understands that

בריה קטנה שפלה אפלה עומדת בדעת קלה ומעוטה לפני תמים דעות.

So ein hachi nami, after all the

עפר אנחנו תחת רגליהם של תלמידי חכמים וגדולים וכולי וכולי, לא יעלה על הדעת

unless Rabbi Akiva had told it to us that you could say that there's another contrast that could be mentioned in the same breath. But maybe just the fact again Ahavas Hashem to appreciate, again l'mayseh what do we see in Hashem? We don't understand Hashem Himself. We see middos of Hashem. Middos of Hashem, so the Torah tells us that a person is supposed, the Sifrei darshens, right? Kol hanikra bishmi, that a person is supposed to emulate middos of Hakadosh Baruch Hu until מה הוא נקרא רחום אף אתה היה רחום, that a person is supposed to personify those middos. So by Ahavas Hashem eppis that there could be a ribuy. So that, that's something that Shimon Ha-Amsoni could understand. But by Yiras Hashem, no. Okay, maybe. Now the Rambam describes that the derech l'ahavah and yirah is one and the same. One and the same. At the end of the halachos, I think we might have expected that the Rambam to read, if you have it in front of you take a look at what the actual lashon is while we edit it.

ולפי הדברים האלו אני מבאר כללים גדולים ממעשה ריבון העולם כדי שיהיה פתח למבין לאהוב ולירא את השם.

Heyos that the derech that the Rambam blazes, that the Rambam describes l'ahavaso v'yiraso is one and the same, yet the לפי הדעה תהיה האהבה is tihiyeh ha'ahavah. It's not לפי הדעה תהיה האהבה והיראה. Again, the contrast that we commented on before between the relational nature of yirah as opposed to the more absolute nature of ahavah, itachen is a direction on this question. That to the extent that the ahavah is inspired by glimpsing חכמת הקדוש ברוך הוא שאין לה ערך ולו קץ, so then the more chochmas Hashem... Hashem a person understands, the more chochmas Hashem a person is able to see, the greater the ahava's going to be. So that we understand. And somehow the impression you get in the Rambam and I don't know that this is being adequately explained though. The impression you get in the Rambam is that when it comes to yira in terms of the relation, the contrast of a beriah ketanah shefelah vis-a-vis Hakadosh Baruch Hu, so one doesn't necessarily need to know more and more in terms of the חכמה שאין לה ערך ולא קץ to appreciate that contrast which is the essence of the yira. So I don't know if that's really adequate. The Rambam here is quoting a Sifrei

כמה שאמרו חכמים בעניין אהבה שמתוך כך אתה מכיר את מי שאמר והיה העולם.

Right? So that's the Sifrei on ואהבת את ה' אלוהיך with the following pasuk v'hayu hadvarim ha'eleh. That if you want to know how you can attain ואהבת את ה' אלוהיך, so that's what the Torah follows up and says it's by means of v'hayu hadvarim ha'eleh. Ela mai, the simple pshat in the Sifrei and mistama the way the rov minyan u'binyan learn pshat in this Sifrei is v'hayu hadvarim ha'eleh is talking about what we would conventionally define as Talmud Torah. The Rambam says that the dvarim ha'eleh are those things which I'm going to discuss with you in the next three perakim.

אני מבאר כללים גדולים ממעשה ריבון העולמים כדי שיהיו פתח למבין לאהבת ה'

and when you look in especially in perek gimmel and perek daled, so he's talking about again what was the medieval understanding of science. So this is one of the places where you see reflected this very, very novel view of the Rambam that he considered scientific knowledge to be part of Torah and that's how he understood the term ma'aseh bereishis in Chazal. The Kesef Mishneh when the Rambam says even something even more radical at the end of perek daled, so he quotes a lashon I think it's from the Ritva that הרמב"ם כתב מה שכתב והלוואי שלא נכתב. I think it's the Ran's lashon. But that's what's implicit in this citation of the Sifrei in this context also in the Rambam. V'lich'ora the pshat here is as follows: When the Rambam says

היך היא הדרך לאהבתו ויראתו בשעה שיתבונן האדם במעשיו וברואיו הנפלאים הגדולים ויראה מהם חכמתו שאין לה ערך ולא קץ.

So again the hisbonenus, the study and reflection במעשיו וברואיו הנפלאים הגדולים. So the pashtus in the Rambam is that the Rambam means that this is not only sort of a hechsher mitzvah, but the Rambam means that the process itself is part of the mitzvah of ahavas Hashem. That the pursuit of the knowledge that will yield ahavas Hashem, the pursuit itself here, it's not like building a Sukkah, it's not like buying daled minim. But the pursuit, the process itself is a part of the mitzvah. The Chinuch certainly says that meforesh. Take a look in the Chinuch, so the Chinuch on the mitzvah of ahavas Hashem... Again kedarko the end of every mitzvah he tells you what how you're guilty of being over or mevatel hamitzvah. Okay, so for krias shema how are you mevatel hamitzvah? You don't read shema. For tfillin how are you mevatel hamitzvah? You don't put on tfillin. So for mitzvas ahavas Hashem how are you mevatel hamitzvah? You don't love Hashem. That's what the Chinuch should have said. But the Chinuch actually does say like this: he says that a person who's koveya machshavoso for pursuit of kavod and taiva and isn't looking to come lidei ahavas Hashem, he was mevatel hamitzvah. So it's quite clear in the Chinuch that the bitul hamitzvah is if a person is not striving for ahavas Hashem. And the pashtus is that the Rambam means that as well. Smuchim l'kach because otherwise the Rambam here in Perek Beis of Yesodei HaTorah introduces the mitzvah of ahavas Hashem but doesn't tell us what ahavas Hashem entails until Perek Yud of Hilchos Teshuva. Lefi ha-amor, no, the Rambam is telling us part of what the mitzvah is about. Okay, that part of the mitzvah which provides a context for the ensuing discussion. But it's midinei hamitzvah, it's not stam a hechsher mitzvah, it's midinei hamitzvah. Halacha Gimmel tells us among other things that malachim, there's nothing, there's no physical aspect to malachim. שהמלאכים אינם גוף וגוייה but they're purely again spiritual or intellectual beings. And when and in Halacha Daled he explains that when in a nevuah so a malach appears in a certain physical form or shape, so again that's part of the mareh nevuah, that's part of the fact that all neviim with the exception of Moshe Rabbeinu that when they had nevuah they see visions and it's not a purely intellectual experience. The Rambam has an interesting comment on this in Iggeres Techiyas HaMeisim. He says that again he repeats again this what as he understands it that malachim have no body and says if you meet someone and he's determined to think that a malach has a body, so nisht geferlach. You don't have to fight him, you don't have to argue with him. He says if he wants to go through life with that ta'oh, it's okay. It's not one of the yesodos ha-emunah. He's not going to be a kofer. He's going to be a toeh. He's going to but lo nora. That's what he wants to think, let him think it. He says rachmana l'tzlan a person thinks that Hakadosh Baruch Hu is a baal guph, so then that's then he's a kofer b'ikar. He says but not everything that's true he says is a yesod. And this is the example he gives. And if he wants malachim to have bodies and wings, so zol zain azoy. He says you can leave him alone, he says you don't have to break your head trying to straighten him out on that. That's all, we'll continue. Let's look further. Page one hundred thirty-eight, middle of the page, the second paragraph. In de hanochah, this is the shvach of the Tanya, that the Tanya is the torah sheba'al peh of chassidus. The Tanya is the torah sheba'al peh of chassidus, and the Tanya brings down the pnimiyus hatorah to be mushag in sechel. The Arizal is l'ma'alah me'hasechel. The Besht, the Magid, toras hachassidus of the Besht and the Magid was l'ma'alah me'hasechel. The Tanya made it mushag in sechel. אין זו הנחה המקובלת. That's not the accepted hanochah. He says what the hanochah is, but this hanochah is the hanochah that Tanya is torah sheba'al peh. That is the accepted hanochah. But that the shvach of the Tanya is that he brought it down into sechel, that's not the hanochah. What is the hanochah? This is very important. Pnimiyus hatorah is l'ma'alah m'hagvuleh, l'ma'alah m'hagvuleh, it's bilti ba'al gvul. And even when it comes down into sechel, even when it's mislabesh in sechel, it remains bilti ba'al gvul. That's the hanochah. The hanochah is not that he was metzamtzem it, he was maspil it, he was morid it into sechel. The hanochah is that it is mislabesh in sechel and it remains pnimiyus hatorah. If it remained pnimiyus hatorah, then it's l'ma'alah me'hasechel. So even when you understand it, you have to understand that what you're understanding is l'ma'alah me'hasechel.