[Avodah] The Vilna Gaon and Secular Studies

[Toby Katz]

In a message dated 4/9/2018 RYL wrote:
  >>  There was no bigger masmid than the Vilna Gaon who slept only 4 half hours in 24 and spent essentially all of the rest of his time studying Torah. Yet he found it important to master many secular subjects. The following are selections from


http://personal.stevens.edu/~llevine/rabbinic_openness_leiman.pdf


--quote--


 R. Abraham Simcha of Amtchislav (d. 1864):

 I heard from my uncle R. Hayyim of Volozhin that the Gaon of Vilna told his son R.
 Abraham that he craved for translations of secular wisdom into Hebrew, including a
 translation of the Greek or Latin Josephus,  through which he could fathom the plain
 sense of various rabbinic passages in the Talmud and Midrash….


 By the time the Gaon of Vilna was twelve years old, he mastered the seven branches of
 secular wisdom .... First he turned to mathematics ... then astronomy….


 R. Israel of Shklov (d. 1839):

 …. It took place when the Gaon of Vilna celebrated the completion of his commentary on Song of Songs. . . . He raised his eyes toward heaven and with great devotion began blessing and thanking God for endowing him with the ability to comprehend the light of the entire Torah. ….He indicated that he had mastered all the branches of secular wisdom, including algebra, trigonometry, geometry, and music. ….
 
--end quote--

 To me it seems that the only conclusion one can draw from this is that the study of secular studies is crucial for the learning of Torah.

 YL
 
>>>> 
 
 
To me it seems that a few other conclusions can be drawn:
 
[1] If you are a genius with an IQ of 180 and you only need four hours of sleep a night, you can master kol haTorah kulah AND also learn all other branches of knowledge in your spare time.
 
[2] If you can master the “seven branches of secular wisdom” before your bar mitzvah, that’s fabulous!  Because after your bar mitzvah you have to be mindful of “vehagisa bo yomam velayla.”  But before your bar mitzvah, you can play ball, roller-skate, and memorize the encyclopedia to your heart’s content.
 
[3] Funny you should quote R’ Chaim of Volozhin.  The famous Yeshiva of Volozhin did not include any of these seven branches of wisdom in its curriculum.  Anyone happen to remember why and when the Yeshiva of Volozhin closed its doors?
 
Let me add a passage written by Rabbi Dr. David Berger (who, BTW, was my Jewish history professor for four wonderful semesters in Brooklyn College):
 
--quote—
 
Although various Geonim were favorably inclined toward the study of philosophy, it is clear that the curriculum of the advanced yeshivot was devoted to the study of Torah alone….The private nature of philosophical instruction in the society at large [early medieval intellectual Islamic society] made it perfectly natural for Jews to follow the same course; more important, the curriculum of these venerable institutions [the yeshivot] went back to pre-Islamic days, and any effort to introduce  a curricular revolution into their hallowed halls would surely have elicited vigorous opposition.”
 
--end quote—
 
[Above is from R’ Berger’s essay “Judaism and General Culture in Medieval Times,” in the book *Judaism’s Encounter with Other Cultures* edited by Jacob J. Schachter.]
 
Please note these words:  “the private nature of philosophical instruction.”  The Vilna Gaon studied secular subjects on his own, as many yeshiva students have done over the years.
 
Elsewhere RYL has indicated his desire that the NY govt require chassidishe schools to provide a good secular education to their students.
 
You don’t have to impose your preferences on others, or get the government involved to force changes in school curricula.
 
I sent my own kids to normal Orthodox schools where they got a reasonably decent secular education.  That was my preference.  I never would have sent them to chassidishe schools.  But I would never lobby the government to remove from chassidishe parents the option of giving their children the education they prefer.  
 
 
 
--Toby Katz
t613k at aol.com
 
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