Let's read a little bit from the beginning here in the Perek Rishon. Perek Rishon, nefesh ha'adam umafshoseha. And again, depending on what translation you're looking at, so it's gonna be, it's not gonna be verbatim. דע כי נפש האדם היא נפש אחת ולה פעולות רבות משתנות ופעמים נקראת קצת אותן הפעולות נפשות ומחמת כן יתנו לחשוב שיש לאדם נפשות רבות כפי שחושבים הרופאים עד שפתח הגדול שבהם בפסק שהנפשות המשובשות שיש לשלשת החיות שלש נפשות ופעמים היא נקראת כחות וחלקים עד שאומרים כחות הנפש וחלקי הנפש ושם שבהם הרבה הפילוסופים ואין כוונתם באמרם חלקים שהיא משתלחת כהשתלחות הגוף אלא שהן מונין את פעולותיה השונות שהן לגבי כל הנפש כחלקים לגבי הכל המקובל מאותם החלקים.
Let me begin by unequivocally staking out the position that we're animated by a single nefesh. Again, nefesh in this context, the way the Rambam uses it, doesn't really correspond to the associations that we have with the word soul, and it should be understood as an animating life force. Right, and in that sense that we talked about animals, the Torah can describe animals also as being nefesh chaya. So the Rambam again stakes out the position that there's a single nefesh. He contrasts that with a single alternative. L'maaseh there seem to be at least two alternate positions that the Rambam is rejecting. The first one, the one that he refers to explicitly, is that there are three nefashos, that there are three, again, sort of distinct animating life forces within a person. And basically what it corresponds to are the categories of tzomeach, chai, and medaber. The view that there are three nefashos say that there are certain things that we have in common with the vegetative world, tzomeach. There are things that we have in common with a chai, with the animal world. And then there are things which are distinctly human. So the position, and again, here in the notes, they quote that the Ibn Ezra in one point quotes this from Rav Saadia Gaon, although elsewhere Rav Saadia Gaon, anyway, that's a different story. So that's one alternative that the Rambam is rejecting. In the other, I think we mentioned last week, that the Ramban al haTorah actually attributes to Onkelos that there are really two nefashos. That there's one nefesh which animates everything that we have in common with lower forms of existence, meaning both tzomeach and chai. And then there's the nefesh hasichlis which animates what's distinctively and uniquely human. And the Ramban sees it in Onkelos because on the phrase ויהי האדם לנפש חיה, so the famous part of Onkelos is that he translates nefesh chaya as ruach memalela. But the Ramban apparently has a diyuk that Onkelos says והות באדם לרוח ממללא, I think the lashon of Onkelos is והות באדם לרוח ממללא. Onkelos puts a beis in there which by way of interpreting the pasuk, which isn't there. So what it means is that adam was already animated on a lower level by some other nefesh and then when vayipach v'yeitzer, since He created, not He formed, He created, he was already animated. And then when ויפח באפיו נשמת חיים va'hava v'adam, the nishmas chayim which was infused into adam who was already animated, so then that elevated him to a uniquely human level. Point to any of these shitos if there's any delineation between goyim and Jews in terms of the nefesh? No, not in this model. The question is why this is so important. Why is this worth breaking friendships over and fighting over and arguing this point? ketzeh ma'aseh, everyone agrees that we know that we grow and have other, with other functions, biological functions similar to the plant kingdom and that there are other things that we do which are similar to the animal kingdom and there are other things that we do which are distinctly human. Nafko mino whether it's one nefesh, two nefashos, three nefashos? Why is this so important? And the Rambam then says in the next paragraph, he says: אתה יודע שתיקון המידות אינו אלא רפואת הנפש וכוחותיה. Which is the dominant theme of Pirkei Avos, hence the appropriateness of this discussion as a hakdamah to Pirkei Avos. אתה יודע שתיקון המידות אינו אלא רפואת הנפש וכוחותיה. For a person to correct, to perfect his middos, basically it means to heal, to cure the nefesh. וכשם שהרופא המרפא הגופות צריך שידע תחילה הגוף שהוא מרפא אותו בכללותו. ומה הם חלקי הגוף כמו גוף האדם וצריך שידע אלו הם הדברים המכאיבים אותו וישמר מהם ואלו הם הדברים המבריאים אותו ויזדקק להם. וכן המרפא הנפש ורוצה ליישר המידות צריך שידע הנפש וכל כוחותיה ומה מחליה ומה מבריאה.
So the Rambam says you have to understand, you have to, the same way a doctor has to in medical school, you have to study anatomy. You have to know how the body works and then I think someone told me that first year medical school you learn everything how the body functions when everything is right and then second year medical school is often everything that can go wrong. So that's basically what the Rambam already wrote that. Correct me if I'm wrong. First you have to understand, you have to know anatomy and then you have to know what causes sickness Rachmana litzlan and what's therapeutic, what cures sickness. So apparently understanding one, two, three for the Rambam, it's not only an abstract yedi'ah which inherently, intrinsically is important, apparently the Rambam certainly thinks that it has repercussions practically in terms of tikkun hamiddos. It may be taken as follows. Again, so first before we come to the practical applications, again, to understand why this is and again as we continually learn, we'll hopefully refine, correct, deepen our understanding בלי נדר אם ירצה השם. But just preliminary comments. So first of all, without looking for the practical applications, there's obviously something very intuitive about what the Rambam is saying. You know when you think of the scheme of two or three nefashos, so it's almost as if you're thinking of a person as a talking horse which, all things being equal, is not necessarily a description that we're necessarily inclined to embrace. In other words, on one level a person is a plant and on another level he's a ba'al chai and then he has another tzad also. That's why the Rambam goes on to say, it's not clear what he means, it's not clear what he means at all, but if you the Rambam says in light of what I'm telling you, that the nefesh adam is nefesh achas and even those biological processes or systems which we seem to have in common again with the Right after the the paragraph that we just read about the the need to to understand the nefesh, Rambam says על כן אמר שחלקי הנפש הם חמישה. There are the five different types of activity which the nefesh animates. Again, he calls it cholkei hanefesh, but he already said chalakim, parts, doesn't mean that it's divisible. You're talking about one indivisible force. Chalakim just means again that there are five spheres of of activity that the nefesh animates. And what are those five? Hazon, which basically corresponds to again the, he'll describe in a minute, but taking in what what we need in terms of ich veiss, oxygen, nutrition, etc. Margish means the five senses. Hamedameh is both memory and imagination. Ha'miso'rer is actions again which stem from from desire, from emotions, etc. ve'ha'higyoni and then the the capacity to to think and to understand and and to relate to abstract notions as well. וכבר הקדמנו בפרק הזה. The next few lines I don't really have pshat in, but just to at least at least present the question. וכבר הקדמנו בפרק הזה שדברינו אינם אלא בנפש האדם. I'm not, this is not a crash course in animal psychology, human psychology. Ki hatzuna lemashal, again nutrition, אשר לאדם איננה התזונה אשר לחמור ולסוס. Ki ha'adam nizon, a person is nourished בחלק הזן של הנפש האנושית. The human nefesh, the human animating life force is what makes it possible for a person to be, to take in and to absorb nutrition. Vehachamor and and a donkey nizon בחלק הזן של הנפש החמורית. And it's a different animating force which is responsible for the animal taking in and absorbing nutrition. Vehadekel and and the and a date tree, a palm tree, again which is taking in oxygen and and nutrients from the soil vechulu vechulu. So again, even though we we use the same vocabulary but it it can't be the same process because it's being nizon בחלק הזן של הנפש אשר לו with its vegetative animating force. And here the Rambam says fascinatingly ואין אומרים על כל אותן הפעולות ניזון אלא בשיתוף השם בלבד.
When we speak about all of these as as processes of of of taking in nutrients, of being nourished, so it's it's not the same process. We're using the same word to describe again what maybe superficially seems similar but but fundamentally is is different. ולא שהוא אותו ענין עצמו. וכן אומרים על פרטי אדם ובעלי חיים מרגיש בשיתוף השם בלבד.
Again, the Rambam insists when we talk about the five senses, so there's a sense of touch, there's a hearing or or sight, etc. He says it's not the same. It's not the same what the five senses mean for a human being is not the same as what they mean for a horse. לא שההרגש אשר באדם פלוני הוא ההרגש אשר בסוס ולא ההרגש אשר במין זה הוא אותו הרגש עצמו שבמין האחר אלא כל מין ומין שיש לו נפש יש לו נפש ייחודה שאינה נפש האחר.
The question is well what does the Rambam think is is uniquely human about the digestive system? What what exactly do do these lines mean? Is is he thinks it's true on a, he's telling us on a on a biological level? On on what level is the Rambam telling us that that fundamentally everything about a human being thing is uniquely human. Right? That's the poel yotze, the corollary, not the corollary, the it's the substance of the Rambam's understanding that there's one single animating force for our entire physical, psychological, biological, intellectual composition. That there's one indivisible animating force. And that obviously that force is unique to people; animals don't have it, plants don't have it. So that means that everything about a person is different. Everything about a person is different. And the way we take in oxygen, there's something which is fundamentally singular and unique, and you can't compare that to what animal life does or to what plant life does. הבן את הענין הזה כי הוא נפלא מאד. Okay, so I know, what's pshat in that? Why is this so important, again, besides whatever importance it has just inherently in terms of having correct understanding? Itachen for the Rambam as follows. Mention two possible practical implications that perhaps the Rambam, lav davka that others would concede this point, but the Rambam thinks, hinge, depend upon there being a single nefesh. One is, if whatever we seem to have in common with let's say with the animal kingdom is really a different nefesh, so then when you talk about, let's say, curbing physical desires or physical instincts, so be'emes it's really a battle between two different forces, right? The nefesh ha-sichlis has to put on its boxing gloves and you know, and try to prevail over the nefesh ha-behemis. And that's what it would be because there's an animating force within us which generates instincts, the same instincts that animals have, the same physical, many of the same physical urges and instincts that animals have. But unlike the animals that have no countervailing force and therefore they just live and exist instinctively, so we have a nefesh ha-sichlis, a nefesh ha-medaberes, however that third nefesh would be described, which can prevail against this nefesh. According to the Rambam, that's not the case. It's not, you know, take your paces and let's see which nefesh will prevail, but it's all one again, single indivisible animating force. And it's not a battle between the nefesh ha-sichlis and nefesh ha-behemis. Itachen that the absolute bechirah chofshis that the Rambam posits in Perek He of Hilchos Teshuva that we've had occasion that שרצה להטות עצמו לדרך טובה להיות צדיק הרשות בידו ואם רצה להטות עצמו לדרך רעה להיות רשע הרשות בידו הוא שכתוב בתורה הן האדם היה כאחד ממנו לדעת טוב ורע כלומר הן מין זה של אדם היה אחד בעולם ואינו דומה לו בזה ענין שיהא הוא מעצמו בדעתו ומחשבתו יודע טוב ורע ועושה כל מה שהוא חפץ ואינו מי שיעכב על ידו מלעשות טוב ורע וכיון שכן הוא פן ישלח ידו
kol adam hu me'atzmo mi-da'ato נוטה לאיזה דרך שירצה. So that absolute sovereignty that a person has over himself, yitachen that for the Rambam that's because there isn't, it's not two forces which are, which are constantly in conflict. No, there's one single nefesh and, and the person can make of it what, what, what he wants. And mah she-ein kein, yitachen that the Rambam would tell us again, lav davka that the Ba'alei Pelugta of the Rambam disagree with the Rambam's maskana. They just disagree in terms of whether or not this maskana has to be anchored in thinking it's a single nefesh. kol zman that you conceive of it as a nefesh ha-sikhli having to prevail over a nefesh ha-behemit, so at the end of the day there's only, there's only so much you can do. I think they tell the story, I don't remember exactly, somehow or other the Rebbe, Reb Yonasan, Yonasan Eibshitz had to debate a galach in the presence of the king on the following point. And the galach said that by training you can train an animal to overcome its basic nature. Sort of a little bit of a nature-nurture debate but about animals, not, not about people. And apparently the Rebbe, Reb Yonasan was mevattel that. So the king gave them 60 days to prepare an argument and said you have to come back in 60 days and you're going to debate it in my presence. So the galach spent 60 days preparing, took a sabbatical, took a leave of absence for 60 days for this debate. Comes back in 60 days, comes back with a cat. And I think maybe that was prearranged that the test case would be a cat. Comes back with a cat and the cat is dressed up in a waiter's outfit, you know, black and white, and the cat is walking on its, in an erect position walking on its two back legs and with its two front legs it's carrying and it's waiting on tables. And so he, and what's more the cat takes orders, it knows which table to go to and Rebbe, Reb Yonasan was busy learning, he was busy, I don't know whether he was writing the Tumim then, he was writing Kreisi U-Pleisi, but he wasn't, for two months he forgot about the whole thing. And then his alarm went off that day, bo bayom, he remembers he has to go. Whatever, he just slips something into his pocket and goes off to the palace. So after the galach makes this whole performance, so Rebbe, Reb Yonasan reaches into his pocket, he takes out a mouse, and drops the mouse on the floor and all of a sudden the cat drops the crystal goblets that it was holding on the tray, gets down on all fours and goes scampering to try to catch the mouse. nefesh ha-behemit is a nefesh ha-behemit, you can do what you want, but sofo shel davar a nefesh ha-behemit is a nefesh ha-behemit. So yitachen that's what the Rambam says. No, we don't have a nefesh ha-behemit. Even what superficially seems to be the same, but it's human. It's human. It's not that we have animalistic urges. No, we takke do, we have urges, we have instincts, we do, but they're not animalistic, they're human. And because they're human, so it's not a question of 'oh, we're just dressing up the nefesh ha-behemit to act like a person'. yitachen that that's one thing the Rambam has in mind. yitachen that another, and again all these ideas we'll have to again try to refine, hopefully not discard, but if need be that as well as we continue b'ezrat Hashem. But the other thing yitachen that this lays in for the Rambam, and obviously those who disagree with the Rambam don't think that there is such a teliya. It's not that they think that you know we go through life as cats walking on their two hind legs. The other thing yitachen that the Rambam's assertion, the Rambam's conviction that נפש האדם אחת היא is the Rambam is going to tell us later as we make that a person's character is relevant to again it's relevant to nevuah but it's even relevant just to intellectual attainment. A person's character whether or not he's a baal taiva so that interferes with intellectual attainment. So we sort of think okay that makes sense sort of as a sechar va'onesh that should be true. But how does how does it make sense naturally? How does it make sense naturally? The guy's got a good head he's got a good head so what does it, so what if he is maybe he's a mushchas in certain areas? He's got a good head he's got a good head. And sometimes we seem to see that at least in a limited in a limited sense. Baruch Hashem there are wonderful frum bnei Torah scientists and then there are also scientists who are mushchasim. So we certainly do seem to see that in a certain limited sense but the Rambam would say only in a limited sense because it does place a cap. The fact that again the fact that it's ultimately one nefesh again doesn't at this stage we're not connecting the dots but you see where there are two dots that are waiting to be that are waiting to be connected. The Rambam now elaborates a little bit he identified again he calls them five chalakim again with the caveat that chalakim doesn't mean separable divisible parts but it means five sort of spheres of activity that the nefesh animates and now he sort of elaborates each of these to give us a little bit better of a feel ועתה לענייננו בחלקי הנפש ve'amar hachelek hazan the vegetative nourishing side aspect of the animating force ממנו כוח המושך המחזיק המעכל הדוחה המוסרות המגדל המוליד בדמות
so the whole digestive system the whole reproductive system המבדיל הסלוליות עד שמפריש הראויים ניזון בו והראוי לדחות לחוץ
the way the body filters what it absorbs as opposed to what is rejected as human waste so all this is that's one area of again of which the nefesh animates. Hachelek hamedameh says the Rambam הוא הכוח הזוכר רשמי המוחשים is the memory that preserves mental images of tangible visible objects that it's seen לאחר העלמם מקרבת החושים אשר השיגום even when it's no longer in front of us right the fact that the fact that we remember what the blackboard looks like what the picture looks like so that's part of the hachelek hamedameh and the other thing which is hachelek hamedameh is the imaginative faculty the fact that we can then conjure up images that we never saw by combining different images that we have seen so the Rambam gives an example of something that can't be such as an iron boat such as a fly such as an iron boat which is which is flying in the air. That was a common example when Ibn Ezra also the famous Ibn Ezra about Lo Tachmod and the Ibn Ezra says how can the Torah tell us not to not to not to covet isn't it just an instinctive reaction? So the Ibn Ezra says that a person doesn't instinctively desire or crave what he knows is impossible what he knows is beyond the realm of and to go flying. He says if you imagine a Ba'al Chayim with a thousand eyes or whatever, so all that is the Koach Hamedameh. The Koach Hamedameh is memory, the fact that we have mental images of things that we have seen that are stored in our memory, and again the fact that we then use the imagination to combine these things and we can conjure up the images of things not only that we've never seen, but that can't and will never exist. So that's a second sphere of, I guess, mental activity. Hachelek Hamesorer. I'm sorry, I skipped Hachelek Hamargish. Again is the five senses and all actions that we do with the five senses - seeing, hearing, smelling, touching, etc. Hachelek Hamedameh is the third. The fourth is Hachelek Hameorer. Hachelek Hameorer, again, are actions which stem from desire, that stem from emotions. If a person has an emotion of fear, so he runs away. A person wants something, so he takes it, he eats it, he, whatever, actions which stem from desire, from emotions, etc. And the fifth is the Koach Hachelek Hahegyoni. Again, the intellectual capacity that a person has. Now here, the Rambam actually says something that we already had occasion to discuss a little bit. I think it was the first Thursday after Yom Tov, that the Rambam writes as follows: ודע שזאת הנפש האחת אשר קודם תאור כוחותיה או חלקיה היא כחומר.
The Nefesh which has just been described, its various faculties or its various parts, is Chomer, is the equivalent of matter. Vehasichel, not the Seichel of the IQ, of the intellectual capacity we have, but Hasichel that a person attains is Tzurah. That, that is the sort of transcendent defining aspect of a person. וכשלא תושג לה הצורה נמצא שמציאות ההכנה שבה וקיבול אותה הצורה לבטלה.
Remember how we said that according to the Rambam, that basically Tzelem Elokim, there's two levels of Tzelem Elokim. Tzelem Elokim is a potential, and then Tzelem Elokim, if we actualize that, becomes a reality. Tzelem Elokim is a potential that we have to understand and thereby connect with incorporeal truth, meaning ultimately Hakadosh Baruch Hu. But that's a capacity, it's a potential. So a person, a person is born innately with a capacity for Tzelem Elokim. Whether or not we become a Tzelem Elokim depends upon whether or not we go through life only thinking about Devarim Gashmiyim, or whether we go through life and we exercise and cultivate that capacity. So when the Rambam says that in the animating life force there's a Koach Hasichli, again, that's the potential Tzelem Elokim. That's the Tzelem Elokim on the level of potential. But the Rambam says if a person doesn't actualize it, he says, then the whole thing was Levatalah. וכאילו היא מציאות לשוא. And the whole existence was in vain. Remember we saw the Lashon of the Rambam in Perek Ches of Hilchos Teshuvah, that the person who doesn't have Olam Haba, again, which he doesn't actualize the Tzelem Elokim, so he dies like a Beheimah. And we understood what the Rambam was getting at. The same idea he's putting forward here as well. Vehu Omro, a Pasuk in Mishlei, גם בלא דעת נפש לא טוב. Again, Shlomo Hamelech says, גם בלא דעת נפש לא טוב, that without Da'as even a Nefesh is Lo Tov. lo tov. כלומר שמציאות נפש שלא הושכלה צורה אלא היא נפש בלא דעת לא טוב
that the nefesh ha-adam if its potential isn't realized, isn't actualized, so even as potentially great as it is, but lemaise it's nothing if it's not actualized. Okay. The Rambam continues now in Perek Sheni, let's begin Perek Sheni. And the Rambam discusses he says in terms of mitzvos and issurim, so mitzvos and issurim, the Rambam says relate to the chelek hamargish. Again, chelek hamargish is utilizing the five senses, right? So there's an issur to listen to lashon hara. So how you use the five senses. Ve-ha-chelek hamisoer, chelek hamisoer, again, are actions that we do based upon desire, based upon emotions. He says all the taryag mitzvos are concentrated in these two areas: chelek hamargish and ve-ha-chelek hamisoer. U-beshnei hachalakim halalu, around four-five lines into Perek Hashani, ובשני החלקים הללו יהיו כל העבירות והמצוות. Chelek hazon and chelek hamedameh, again, chelek hazon is what's responsible for taking in for how the body is nourished, whether it's taking in oxygen, whether it's the way the body digests, the digestive system, etc. He says אין ציווי בהם ולא מרי. You don't control our digestive system to determine whether or not the digestive system breaks down the food and processes it or not. And for that matter, the koach hamedameh, a person can't control, I mean, if he sees something, so then that image is recorded, right? The sort of the brain takes the picture, a person doesn't have to press a button to take the picture. The Rambam has an interesting raya. He says לא יוכל האדם על פי מחשבתו להשבית פעולתם או להגבילם באיזו פעולה.
A person can't control, again, you can't control his digestive system. You can't control the chelek hazon of the nefesh, you can't control the chelek hamedameh either. He says הלא תראה ששני החלקים האלה כל מה שהזן והמדמה פועלים בעת השינה.
You see that they function even when a person is asleep. So you see that they're involuntary processes. Question is, what if people talk in their sleep also? So that's a shtikl, I don't know, maybe a stira, people talking in their sleep. So that's a tzarich iyun kal, what the Rambam has in mind with that, without gillei milsa. Then the Rambam says, and maybe we'll pick up with this next time, bli neder, a very very yesod'dige point. Rambam says the fifth area, the fifth chelek of the nefesh, again, the fifth one is the intellectual activity, what a person thinks, the capacity to think. So the Rambam says it's true that there can be compliance or failure to comply, but nevertheless, there are no mitzvos and aveiros in this realm, which doesn't mean what it seems to mean, doesn't mean what it seems to mean at all, but be-ezras Hashem we'll pick up with this point next time.