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<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" face=Arial color=#000000
size=2>From: Michael Makovi <A
href="mailto:mikewinddale@gmail.com">mikewinddale@gmail.com</A><BR></FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" face=Arial color=#000000
size=2>>>R' Rich Wolpoe asked about the difference between yad hashem
being<BR>metaphorical and eiyin tachat eiyin (hereafter ETE) *not*
being<BR>metaphorhical, within the confines of Rambam's own
philosphy.<BR><BR>I'm not sure I fully understand the question, however, but I
will<BR>respond to what the question appears to be. As far as I can tell,
the<BR>question appears to be: why can we allegorize yad hashem but not
ETE?....<BR><BR>....But the point is that the Torah's peshat yields only when
reason is<BR>certain. If anything, reason declares that ETE cannot be literal;
as<BR>Hazal note, what if a one-eyed man blinds a two-eyed man, etc.?
If<BR>anything, then, ETE *is* metaphorical, based on both reason and<BR>Hazal's
Sinaitic tradition that ETE is not literal. <<</FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" face=Arial color=#000000
size=2>Michael Makovi</FONT></DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent"
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<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" face=Arial color=#000000
size=2>>>>><BR>I'm behind in Avodah and others may have made the
point I want to make here, but anyway. I want to say that there are
different ways of translating the word "tachas" and that in this case it is not
that one translation is literal and the other allegorical. It is that
there are simply different ways of translating or understanding the word
"tachas." I'm going to say that it means "instead of" and please
indulge me while I point out that there are also different ways of understanding
"instead."</FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" face=Arial color=#000000
size=2>Suppose somebody broke your favorite vase and there was a law,
"a vase instead of a vase, a vase for a vase." Some people would say that
means, he broke your vase, now you get to break his vase -- simple revenge,
which to many human beings is satisfying and makes them feel that at least a
rough justice has been done. If I can't have my vase at least I have the
satisfaction of knowing that he can't have his, either.</FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" face=Arial color=#000000
size=2>Now other people would peer at that same law, "a vase instead of a vase"
and could quite logically understand it to mean, "He broke your vase and now he
has to give you another vase, and if he broke an irreplaceable 14th century Ming
vase, or a Faberge egg, then he has to do the next best thing, which is--pay you
the monetary worth of the article that he destroyed."</FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" face=Arial color=#000000
size=2>Neither of these two understandings of "a vase for a vase" is
allegorical.</FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" face=Arial color=#000000
size=2>To me it just seems so clear and so obvious that the Torah understand
"ayin tachas ayin" the second way -- the person who destroyed something of yours
has to replace it, or give you the nearest equivalent in value. That
is not allegorical. </FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" face=Arial color=#000000
size=2>What the Rambam has to say about metaphors I don't know, I'm sorry
that I have gone quite far away from the subject line, but then we always do,
here in Avodah-land. I just think that the /pshaht/ of ayin tachas ayin is
restoration, not revenge.</FONT></DIV>
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<DIV><FONT lang=0 face=Arial color=#0000ff size=2 FAMILY="SANSSERIF"
PTSIZE="10"><B>--Toby
Katz<BR>==========<BR><BR><BR><BR>_____________________</B></FONT></DIV></DIV></FONT></FONT><DIV CLASS="aol_ad_footer" ID="b7db3d29d44a9ddedb2b3e5a5365668b"><br/><font style="color:black;font:normal 10pt arial,san-serif;"> <hr style="margin-top:10px"/><B>An Excellent Credit Score is 750. <A HREF=http://pr.atwola.com/promoclk/100126575x1222377077x1201454398/aol?redir=http://www.freecreditreport.com/pm/default.aspx?sc=668072%26hmpgID=62%26bcd=JulyExcfooterNO62>See Yours in Just 2 Easy Steps!</A></B></font></DIV></BODY></HTML>