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<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial>From: Meir Rabi <meirabi@gmail.com><BR>Subject: [Avodah]
Humanoids, Who Cares? What Difference Does it Make?<BR> Probably
not Talmud Torah.<BR></FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT style="BACKGROUND-COLOR: transparent" color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial>>>The new book Echoes of Eden by Rabbi Ari Kahn .... that Adam
Harishon<BR>>>co-existed with non-human humanoids. This says Rabbi
Moshe Eisemann, is the<BR>>>position of the Ramban.<BR><BR>Who
Cares?<BR>What Difference Does it Make?<BR>Angels dancing on the head of a
pin.<BR>Must I accept/believe these positions?<BR><BR>Why does anyone bother
with these types of inquiries?<BR>Is it Talmud Torah? and I don't accept that
the Ramban's including it (if he<BR>did indeed include it) as a comment proves
that it is TT.<BR><BR>Best,<BR><BR>Meir G. Rabi</FONT></FONT></DIV>
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<DIV>>>>>></DIV>
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<DIV>Certainly you are not required to accept or believe these positions!
And what doesn't interest you -- you should not waste your time with. I
think it says in the Gemara somewhere that a person should study those aspects
of Torah that appeal to him.</DIV>
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<DIV>However, you are making a couple of dubious assumptions here. </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Dubious Assumption #1: that if some area of study is not "Talmud
Torah" it is of no use and of no interest and should not be studied. Yet
there are many pesukim that could be quoted to indicate that the study of the
world, of nature, is or can be part of Talmud Torah. Maybe the most famous
is Yeshayahu 40:26, "Lift up your eyes and see, who created these?"
Another would be Tehillim, "Mah gadlu ma'asecha Hashem." There is a huge
difference in depth and appreciation between a child's knowledge that "the world
is amazing" and a scientist's knowledge of the same. The more you know,
the higher and deeper is your awareness of "mah gadlu ma'asecha."</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>Now you may argue that this does not apply to those things of which we
cannot have certain knowledge -- what happened before the world was created, for
example -- but in principle, the attempt to study what happened in the distant
past is not different in principle from the attempt to study the vast distances
in the universe that we can "lift up our eyes and see" each night, but will
never be able to traverse.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>You may also argue that a child's awareness -- "There sure are a lot of
stars and they sure are pretty" -- is all that Yeshayahu or Dovid Hamelech had
in mind. I would disagree with that position but it is not an unreasonable
position.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>But then there is your dubious assumption #2: that just because the
Ramban wrote something in his commentary on the Torah, does not prove that what
he wrote is Talmud Torah.</DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>This becomes a sticky wicket indeed -- if you hold that what is not Talmud
Torah should not be studied, and also that whatever the Ramban wrote is not
necessarily TT -- because you would have to wade through a LOT of meforshim
all over the margins of your Chumash and Gemara, penciling out all of the things
that are "not Talmud Torah" so that you don't waste your
Torah-learning time accidentally studying
that-which-should-not-be-studied. You might begin, if you like, by
crossing out all the French words in Rashi. As for Abarbanel, Hirsch and
Malbim, I'd skip them entirely if I were you.</DIV>
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<DIV><FONT color=#0000ff></FONT><BR><FONT color=#0000ff><STRONG>--Toby
Katz<BR>================</STRONG></FONT><FONT lang=0 color=#000000 size=2 face=Arial FAMILY="SANSSERIF" PTSIZE="10"><BR><BR><BR><BR><BR>_____________________</FONT></DIV>
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