[Avodah] basis of AZ

[Eli Turkel]

I thought some more about Toby's remark:

>  >
>  > Any nation can sink to a golden calf, and many have.  You don't have to have
>  > first had an exalted relationship with G-d in order to worship idols.
>  >

>  > --Toby Katz
>  > =============

I based myself on Rambam who views idol worship as a substitute for a G-d they
cannot see. In a recent trip to China I asked the local guides about Buddha.
They also insisted that the idols represented some higher power.

However, Toby is right based on other sources that at times idol worship is
not intellectual but is instead an excuse for licentiousness (derasha
on le-mispachtehem).
As she says the wicked can get there without going through G-d.

If one accepts the derasha that connects the Golden calf with the
feared death of Moshe
then the medrash is saying that in this particular case the AZ was
more intellectual
of losing the connection to G-d and needing to somehow replace. In this case it
was not based on immorality. However, that does not exclude that in mnay other
cases AZ is connected with immorality

In the famous medrsah about the elimination of the desire for AZ by
anshe knesset
ha-gedolah I assume they meant the intellectual appeal of AZ not the
immorality excuse
which continued. I heard that in fact this was connected with the loss
of prophecy.
Again the same idea once the plus of prophecy is eliminated there is
no need for the
minus of a special appeal of AZ

shabbat shalom


-- 
Eli Turkel