[Avodah] why stop learning?

[Micha Berger]

On Thu, Feb 16, 2012 at 07:53:55PM -0500, David Riceman wrote:
> The model I'm used to is that doing mitzvos refines one's soul, and  
> having a more refined soul enables the receipt of schar, both in olam  
> hazeh and in olam haba.

I just realized the models I mentioned in my previous post touches on
this too. That essay makes the thesis "We are not judged for what we did, we
pay the consequences for who we are." As Yishma'el was assessed "ba'asher
hu sham".

If the topic is of interest to you, see the booklet. (You only need to
print the first 49 pages; I have to remove the second copy of the same
text from the PDF.)

That appendix has a number of essays emphasizing the causal connection.
After all, if we are assessed for who we are, teshuvah, a decision to be
someone else would *logically* avoid punishment for what one did in the
past. One removed the resulting flaws.

Then in the last essay ("The Gift of Justice") I ask:

    And yet...

    Avraham pleads with Hashem to show pity on Sedom and Amora. Moshe
    repeatedly begs (and in one case demands!) pity for the Jewish
    people. We ask Hashem to reward the righteous and punish the wicked in
    separate berakhos of Shemoneh Esrei three times every weekday. Doesn't
    all this presume that Hashem is personally meting out reward and
    punishment, that we can ask Him to temper it with Divine Mercy?

    The two perspectives co-exist in the Torah's description of the
    generation of the flood.
    ...
		- Bereishis 6:5-7,11-13

    The "end of all flesh" is described as occurring on its own, something
    which Hashem observes -- punishment as a consequence. And yet, the
    actual destruction is something Hashem declares He will do Himself,
    due to His "regret" -- meting out punishment.

    The chapter asks us to hold both perceptions simultaneously, neither
    to the exception of the other.

    ...
    Hashem is the both the One Who created the system of supernatural
    law that would cause any automatic sechar va'onesh, as well as the
    One Who would be imposing it personally. When he set up the law,
    Hashem did it cognizant of every outcome of it. The law would include
    knowledge of each instance, no less than if Hashem intervened at each
    instance. The difference is merely when the decision was made. And
    since Hashem has no time, no "when", do they really differ?

:-)BBii!
-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