[Avodah] Righteous Gentile is Equal to the Kohein Godol

[Micha Berger]

On Thu, Oct 30, 2008 at 02:19:29PM -0400, Meir Kahn wrote:
: How does this position of RSRH comport with "Rotzah HKBH Lzakos es yisroel
: Lfichach hirbah l'hem Torah Umitzvos"?
: If a non Jew can get the same Schar for performing 7 mitzvos as a Jew can
: for 613, what is the zchus?

It takes more work to get to the same point.

I think it's most accurate to say that Jews play a game with higher
stakes. A well-intended Jew is more likely to get further, because he
will have more opportunity to collect zekhuyos.

This seems to me to be a generalized form of the Rambam's peshat in that
mishnah. He holds that olam haba is a product of yedi'ah, which in turn
can come as a single epiphany -- yeish mi sheqoneh olamo besha'ah achas.
More mitzvos means, to the Rambam, more opportunities for that epiphany;
that's the zekhus.

More of us see the point of mitzvos in terms of ethical self-development
or of emotional deveiqus. And so I took the idea and broadened it to
apply to those derakhim

However, we also have more opportunities for cheit than do nakhriim,
which is why geirus isn't "zakhin le'adam shelo befanav". It's only
the well intended person who is better off.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

-- 
Micha Berger             Take time,
micha at aishdas.org        be exact,
http://www.aishdas.org   unclutter the mind.
Fax: (270) 514-1507            - Rabbi Simcha Zissel Ziv, Alter of Kelm