[Avodah] Tiqun Olam

[Micha Berger]

On Wed, Jun 24, 2009 at 11:48:36AM +0300, Michael Makovi wrote:
: And like R' Levine, I believe the Kuzari and Ramhal are similar to the
: Rambam here. They replace knowledge with spiritual holiness, but the
: two are not really not so different...

"Aside from that, Mrs Lincoln, how did you like the play?"

That replacement is a HUGE difference.

The Kuzari, the Ramchal and RSRH himself write about the role of
halakhah is making a better person, one who is more moral and who
is closer to G-d.

The Rambam discusses things in exactly the same terms as the Rihal's
philosopher.

    1:1 ... Everything is reduced to a Prime Cause; not to a Will
    proceeding from this, but an Emanation from which emanated a second,
    a third, and fourth cause.

    The Cause and the caused are, as thou seest, intimately connected with
    one another, their coherence being as eternal as the Prime Cause and
    having no beginning. ... In the perfect person a light of divine
    nature, called Active Intellect, is with him, and its Passive
    intellect is so closely connected therewith that both are but one. The
    person [of such perfection] thus observes that he is the Active
    Intellect himself, and that there is no difference between them. His
    organs -- I mean the limbs of such a person -- only serve for the
    most perfect purposes, in the most appropriate time, and in the
    best condition, as if they were the organs of the Active Intellect,
    but not of the material and passive Intellect, which used them at
    an earlier period, sometimes well, but more often improperly. The
    Active Intellect, however, is always successful. This degree is
    the last and most longed for goal for the perfect man whose soul,
    after having been purified, has grasped the inward truths of
    all branches of science, has thus become equal to an angel, and
    has found a place on the nethermost step of seraphic beings...
    Keep just ways as regards character and actions, because this will
    help thee to effect truth, to gain instruction, and to become similar
    to this Active Intellect... the veneration of the Prime Cause,
    not in order to receive favour from it, or to divert its wrath,
    but solely to become like the Active Intellect in finding the truth,
    in describing everything in a fitting manner, and in rightly
    recognizing its basis. These are the characteristics of the [Active]
    Intellect. If thou hast reached such disposition of belief, be not
    concerned about the forms of thy humility or religion or worship,
    or the word or language or actions thou employest....
    ...
    3. The Philosopher replied: The philosophers' creed knows no
    manslaughter, as they only cultivate the intellect. ...

This parallel fits what RSRH said, having gotten into Aristotilian
mindset, the Rambam makes mitzvos about cultivating an idea. Morality
he explicitly places a step below, a function of eating from the eitz
hadaas, and life is supposed to be about knowledge and truth.

:           the final upshot is that morality in and of itself is given
: less value. Rambam and Kuzari/Maharal both believe that life's purpose
: is holiness and closeness to G-d...

I don't know about the Maharal, but the Kuzari and Ramchal define that
closeness as having a tzelem E-lokim that is a more faithful rendering
ON THE MORAL LEVEL.

...
: You draw a hiluq between practicing morality and the mission of
: mankind, and becoming the sort of person who has internalized and had
: inculcated in him morality and that mission. I don't see this
: distinction as being very meaningful. The person who internalizes will
: practice, and the person who practices does so because he has
: internalized. (Or if not yet, he will soon internalize; the heart
: follows the deeds.) They're one kit and kaboodle.

The difference is whether one shows respect to challah because it's
the staff of life. That's not moral, it's a personal morality increasing
practice. Similarly mitzvos. Are they all direct expressions of the
Divine Values, or are some of them excercises that develop the person's
loyalty to those values and the ability to follow them? Clearly RSRH
says the latter, or else his taxonomy of mitzvos would have fewer
categories.

...
: Yes, Rav Hirsch studied the Zohar, studied Maharal, and used a siddur
: with Kabbalistic notes. But as Dr. Nachum Klafter agreed with me, Rav
: Hirsch read the Zohar like we read Midrash Rabbah. Every time Rav
: Hirsch brings a Kabbalistic teaching, he rationalizes it, and removes
: all theosophy and theurgy...

As did the Ramchal, a man who writes about being visited by Eliyahu
haNavi and various mal'akhim, aside from having a maggid.

...
: As for R' Faur: yes, I agree with him. The Torah isn't concerned
: whether unicorns exist, and neither is it concerned whether other gods
: exist. And just as the sun surely exists despite the prohibition of
: worshipping it, other gods might exist too, even if we are prohibited
: from worshipping them. Of course, as R' Faur says, if other gods do
: exist, they exist only because Hashem created them, along with the sun
: and unicorns....

At some point you're abussing the word "god". After all, dor Enosh
worshipped real things, and I already posted more than once about keruvim,
the cult of Apis, the eigel, and the idolatry of Malkhus Yisrael. Nu,
so I theorize that the bulls of Yeravam's religion were representations
of qeruvim, and were the carriers of prayers up to HQBH. Since there
are qeruvim, the things they worshipped exist. No less so than sun
worshippers. But that doesn't mean it's okay to worship the qeruvim as
the Romans worshipped Mercury (their messenger god).

Where the line is between that and the "Machnisei Rachamim" is a thorny
matter. Personally, I'm more at home with the Gra's harder line.
Others draw the line elsewhere. But hakol modim -- yeish gevul.

You said that henotheism was a "kosher Torah belief for a frum Jew".
That means more than that these things exist even if I were to believe
that idolatry never got beyond the dor Enosh idea of worshipping His
entourage and into worshipping fictions. It is a denial of the 5th
ikkar, reducing it to an issur of worshipping anything else, not an
emunah/yedi'ah that there is nothing else appropriate to worship.

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