Perek 1, #2: Scientific vs. Religious Attitude Towards the Unknown.

כמה שונה היא גישת איש הדעת. כמה שונה היא גישת איש הדעת וגישת איש הנודע וההכרה התפיסה הקוגניטיבית בעולמו של הקדוש ברוך הוא.

How different is the approach of homo religiosus from the approach of a scientist, the cognitive type, HaKadosh Baruch Hu's world. Ish ha-da'at

כשהוא מתבונן בטבע ומלואו ומסתכל בהוויה הגדולה והנשגבה הרי הוא מתאווה להכיר ולהבין ולהשכיל.

But when when the cognitive type, when the cognitive man reflects on on the world and its fullness, but when he looks at this great and exalted existence, so he desires to know with the end goal of understanding. Shifat ish ha-da'at, the aspiration, his aspiration היא לגלות את סוד העולם ולפשוט את בעיות היש. Excuse me. איש השכל והמדע, this intellectual scientific type, כשהוא מציץ לתוך בירה זו, right alluding to the imagery that the Midrash famously uses in describing Avraham Avinu's search for HaKadosh Baruch Hu, that the Midrash says that Avraham Avinu was comparable to a traveler who's walking along walking along and he sees a birah doleket. He sees this palatial mansion which is which is all lit up. So the Chazal use lashon birah there referring to the beriah. כשהוא מציץ לתוך בירה זו, when he he looks, meitzitz min ha-charakim in Shir HaShirim, הרי הוא מלא חרג כביר אחד והוא. There's a strong he's he's filled with one very strong impulse, and that is טיפוס הבירור והליבון הפירוק והתירוץ. To clarify, to understand, to explain. הרי הוא רוצה לפשוט את בעיות ההכרה ביחס למציאות ve-oreg, and he he yearns le-fazeir, to scatter, to dispel את ענן הסודיות המערפל על פני סדר התופעות והמקרים. He looks to again scatter, cause the the cloud of secrecy which casts a fog over events and phenomena, he's looking to dispel that cloud of of secrecy. אין איש הדעת סובל אפלוליות. The the cognitive man doesn't tolerate darkness, obscurity... lashon choshech afelah presumably ve-ramazim be-razim ba-havayah. Hints and and secrets in in the in existence. הוא תאב לקבוע מסמרים להלכה. He desires to to establish rules, physical law, להסיר את עלטת הפלא והפתאומיות. Right? By Bereishit, am-sor, ויהי השמש לבוא ועלטה היה. Alatah is I think meforshim say means choshech. So he he looks to remove the the darkness of of something being hidden or something being sudden and unexpected. He wants to be able to predict when there's going to be an eclipse, when there's going to be a when you're going to be able to see a comet shooting through the through the sky. לבטל את הבלתי צפוי ואת הבלתי מובן to totally dismiss. the unpredictable and the incomprehensible, וההפתעה והנס בישות, to dismiss, to eliminate, surprise and miraculous and miracle in existence. איש הדעת קובע סדרי עולם. He establishes patterns, melei hechrechiyut ve-chukiyut. Everything is inexorable and everything is a function of of physical law. כל מה שאינו משתעבד לשלטונו של החוק והכלל, anything which he's not able to see as conforming to the rule, the reign of of law, of physical law and and general principles, ve-eino modeh be-mahutam, and doesn't, as it were, acknowledge, right, events, happenings, parts of the bri-ah that that don't, again, speaking anthropomorphically, that that don't acknowledge the mastery of law. הרי הוא שייך לסוג של מאוין ואפס ואין, nothingness. מבית מדרשו של אפלטון, Plato, או לכל הפחות לרשותו של החומר ההיולי, oh, hyuli, mi-yesodo shel Aristo. Ha-tzad ha-shaveh she-bi-shnehem, the common denominator of of those two categories that that Plato and Aristotle have, שאין הארעי והיחיד ראויים להסתמך בסמיכת היש וההוויה. What's seemingly accidental, that that can't be predicted as a function of a law, what's an individual phenomenon that can't be, again, subsumed under broader categories, so it's not acknowledged.

והם נשארים בתחום התוהו ובוהו. רק הקבוע, הברור והמסודר, החקוק והמוקצב בחוקיותה של המציאות, זוכה לשמו ולתוארו של אונטוס און.

What real existence is only that which, again, is subject to all the the rules and and the clarity and and the understanding. הרגש של בוז וביטול. The the feeling, the sense of, in a minute, we'll we'll try to come into this. הרגש של בוז וביטול. It does help to try to read before you try to comment and understand. הרגש של בוז וביטול, of contempt, scorn, and contempt. כלפי הבלתי קבוע והבלתי חוקי והבלתי מסודר, that which one is one perceives as not being fixed, not being not following any law, which isn't part of, again, some some orderly functioning, שהיה רווח כל כך בתורתם של חכמי יוון, which was so widespread in the philosophy, in the thought of of ancient Greece, u-she-matza bituyo, and found its its most ha-yoter charif, its most sharp expression be-mishnatam in the thought shel Aplaton ve-Aristo, ניתן למורשת עולם לכל אנשי הדעת והמדע, is is the eternal legacy of scientists. ראשית ההוויה ואחריתה היא החוקיות. All of existence has to be understood in terms of law. Muvan, of course, she-musag ha-chukiyut, what type of law, לובש צורה ופושט צורה, when you look at the history of science or the history of thought. So what type of laws the anshei hadaat formulated varies, but the underlying goal and the underlying thrust of their system was always this chukiyut.

מובן שמושג החוקיות לובש צורה ופושט צורה בהתאם לרוחה של התקופה ובחינת ההסתכלות. חוקיות פנימות פנימית טלאולוגית של האידוס או של המורפה מבית מדרשו של אריסטו.

Right, Aristotle explains, so why, when Aristotle explained why things happened, he spoke in terms of the dalet yesodos, of the four basic elements, and he talked about how the nature of afar, right, אש מים רוח עפר, the nature of afar is that it's heavy and that therefore it falls. And the nature of ruach or eish is to ascend. That's what the Rav is describing as it's chukiyut pnimit, right, it's an internal type of law, it's something which inheres in the objects themselves. As opposed to סיבתיות מכנית של גלילאי וניוטון and in modern science, we don't say that it's because the dalet yesodos themselves are their teva is that inherent within them is to fall, we say no, it's a law of gravity. That's so it's a mechanical causation, but either way it's chukiyut. ברם כל אלה הגלגולים והמטמורפוזות בתפיסתה של החוקיות, all these cycles and metamorphoses bitfisata shel hachok,

מגלים רק מגמה כללית אחת של איש הדעת, בקשת המסודר והקבוע בהוויה.

Seeking that which is orderly and fixed in existence. Right, an eclipse is not an aberration, no, you understand from the motion, the planetary motion and lunar motion, so you can know when there's going to be an eclipse. It's not something, it's not some sudden occurrence, it's not an aberration, no, it's part of what's musdar and kavu'a behavaya. You can explain when there's what processes yield thunder and lightning and it's not something which just emerges suddenly.

הרי הוא מתעמק בחשבונו של עולם ומתווה לו תכלית מסוימת של מציאות מוקפת מחיצות הסדר והחוק.

He looks to discover again an existence which is bounded by, which is encircled by orderliness and physical law, she'ein achareihem klum. And there should be nothing which stands outside of or beyond that orderliness, that functioning according to inexorable law.

כל מהותו של הכרת איש הדעת היא גילוי הסוד ופתרון החידה הטמונים וגנוזים בישות מתוך הנהג מנהגו וטבעו של עולם

by discovering... Laws of nature. מעשה איש הדעת היא גילוי וחשיפה. The activity, the action of the ish hadaas of the cognitive man is that of revealing and uncovering. This depiction, just we should realize that I think my father zecher tzadik livracha made this comment already earlier in Ish Halacha because already in the opening pages it was warranted. But to write this page, the mastery of basically all, I don't know, of all fields is staggering. The depiction here very much conforms, I mean the Ramban is not, doesn't develop it as much, he doesn't say it in as sweeping a way, but the Ramban has in Parshas Acharei Mos the following comment. He also talks about Greek culture. It's פרק טז פסוק ח, Goral Echad la-Azazel. So at the end of that Ramban, the Ramban says v'lo uchal l'faresh, I can't explain any more than what I've said כי היינו צריכים לחסמו, to do so we would have to v'lachsos shor b'disho, we'd have to stifle pi hamischakmim b'teva, those who often when you find whether it's le-hischakem or le-hispalsef when you find the shoresh chochma or I'd say with philosophy in the hispail means those who presume to be wise. It doesn't mean those who are wise. Those who are wise are chachamim. Mischakmim are those who sort of make themselves wise. A person's wise, he doesn't have to make himself wise, right? So when a person makes himself wise, it means that people who are in truth they're ignorant and they're sort of very arrogantly overstepping their boundaries and making themselves wise. That's what the sense of the hispail has here. V'lo uchal l'faresh, excuse me, כי היינו צריכים לחסמו pi hamischakmim b'teva, again that we'd have to stifle those who arrogantly presume to be wise about teva, hanimshachim acharei hayevani. The Ramban doesn't even like to use his name. Ramban was not a fan of Aristotle's. He doesn't even use his name, just calls him the Greek. V'nimshachim acharei hayevani asher hikchish, he, the Yevani, Aristotle, he denied כל דבר זולתי המורגש לו. He denied anything beyond that which he was able to sense. I guess lachshov, yeah, v'higis daso lachshov, and he had again, hagasa is when you stir, right? On Shabbos hagasa is when one when when you stir a pot. So v'higis daso again means that instead of a person recognizing limitations so he when you stir, you kind of in one way it's sort of agitating what's in the pot, right? You're moving it around, you're agitating what's in the pot. So v'higis daso means that he that literally means he agitates his mind in a sense that he was arrogant. V'higis daso lachshov.

והגיס דעתו לחשוב הוא ותלמידיו הרשעים כי כל עניין שלא השיג אליו בסברתו איננו אמת.

Again, I think I skipped one word by accident.

כי כל עניין שלא השיג אליו הוא בסברתו איננו אמת.

Whatever Aristotle couldn't determine, couldn't understand, couldn't be true. So that's very much what the Rav is depicting here, right? When the Rav says that whether it was in Plato's system of thought or Aristotle's system of thought, that whatever couldn't be subsumed under their logical system, under the laws of existence that they formulated, so that was, they had a sense of, what did the Rav say here? Buz ubitul, of scorn and contempt. That's the same depiction that you have here in the Ramban. That's why the Rav elsewhere talks about, I don't think he has it in Ish HaHalacha, but elsewhere the Rav talks about that the Greeks denied בריאת העולם יש מאין. So Aristotle believed that there was nothing. Aristotle believed that the world as is has always existed. And Plato believed in that there was pre-existent matter, which Hakadosh Barukh Hu, he believed in yetzira yesh miyesh, he didn't believe in briya yesh me'ayin. We believe in briya yesh me'ayin, that Hakadosh Barukh Hu created the world from nothingness. Hakadosh Barukh Hu, again, it really shouldn't even be said in temporal terms, that Hakadosh Barukh Hu has always existed and Hakadosh Barukh Hu in terms of physicality, in terms of anything, Hakadosh Barukh Hu brought the world into being yesh me'ayin. So yesh me'ayin is not something that a person can sort of, there's no logical category of yesh me'ayin, right? Yesh me'ayin is the ultimate miracle. There's no, you know, you can explain how a caterpillar becomes a butterfly. You can explain how something becomes something else. You can explain how there's a chemical reaction and one thing leads to something else. But that nothing becomes something isn't a logical category, right? It's the ultimate miracle. Okay, so it's the ultimate miracle. That doesn't mean the fact that it can't be contained within a logical category just means that it's beyond us. But it doesn't mean that it can't exist, that it doesn't exist, it doesn't mean that that's not what happened, that's not how Hakadosh Barukh Hu created the world. But that's what the Ramban is saying that כל עניין שלא השיג אליו הוא בסברתו איננו אמת. If he couldn't understand it, it couldn't be true. And he couldn't understand it meaning logically. How can something emerge from nothing? So again, so it isn't a logical process. It's a miraculous process. It's a miraculous process. But the whole what the Rav is describing, again, this mindset of the ish hadas, that's where the Rav is describing this איש הדת קובע סדרי עולם מלאי הכרחיות וחוקיות. So something that defies, where was the line about how he's looking to eliminate nes? Where was that line? You know we had such a line? Yeah, again, if you're looking in this edition on page sixteen, לבטל את הציפוי והתמהון את ההפתעה והנס שבישות. Again, which is why, again, that's what the Rav elsewhere explains, why the Greeks didn't have a concept of yesh me'ayin. Le'umato, ish hadas, the man of religion, Homo religiosus, כשהוא ניצב על יד עולמו של הקדוש ברוך הוא, when he stands... at the side of HaKadosh Baruch Hu's world umistakel bo and looks into it eino sho'ef he doesn't desire להפוך את הרז שב-יצירה לתופעה פשוטה. He's not looking to convert to transform the secret within the creation to a simple phenomenon שבה ברב דחד יומא יתפסנה that a first-year high school physics student can understand. Klapai laya on the contrary retzono le-hadgish literally translate right his desire is to emphasize את המסתורין שבהוויה Mysterium Tremendum ule-hat-im את הסוד שבבריאה. So here every line is important to understand and not misunderstand but especially here when the Rav writes retzono le-hadgish את המסתורין שבהוויה the point is he's not looking for mystery unlike the ish ha-da'as who dismisses it and is maysi'ach da'as from it so the ish ha-das he insists that we should also be acutely aware and focused upon everything that we don't understand. Again it's not that he's looking for mystery it's not that he's looking to oh how can I make this mysterious no the point is it is mysterious and it's retzono le-hadgish את המסתורין שבהוויה the mistorin is objectively there ba-havaya that's what the Rav is going to explain in os gimmel and the ish ha-da'as wants to be fully aware and cognizant of that. הוא מסתכל במופלא ממנו he looks at what's hidden from him she-lo menaseh lepotro he doesn't think that it can be solved ודורש במכוסה שלא על מנת לקבל פרס הביאור. Hayachas hadinami the dynamic relationship השולט בין הסובייקט המכיר לאובייקט העומד להיתפש between the subject who's looking to understand and the object that is going to be understood

מתגלה לאיש הדת לא באפשרות ההכרה הגנוזה בזיקה זו אלא אדרבה בקסם נצחיות התעלומה השורה על פני הנסות.

There is an eternal mystery which will always hover above existence. Here the Rav very crucial

אין זאת אומרת כי איש הדת מבכר את התהו ובהו על פני היצירה המשוכללת או שהוא בוחש כביכול בבלבול מעשה בראשית ומכניס ערבוב למציאות.

It's not that the ish ha-das that the Homo Religiosus rejects reason no he doesn't reject reason chas veshalom גם הוא מבקש את החוקיות ואת הסדריות subsequently the Rav is going to is it here? Yeah on page 21 if we get there today the Rav's going to he refers to that there's such a very pronounced strain in Christian thought which rejects reason which is no that's not what's being described here. גם הוא מבקש את החוקיות ואת הסדריות the presence of law literally the lawfulness and the orderliness את הקביעות ואת ההכרחיות the inexorability of nature אבל גילוי החוק ותפיסת הסדר וההשתלשלות שב-יש but revealing laws of nature. Grasping the orderliness of nature, it's not just a bunch of random occurrences, how things unfold, מגבירים ומעמיקים את השאלה ואת הפרובלמה אצל איש הדת. But that doesn't result in answers and in solutions, it only magnifies the question. B'sha'ah she'ish hadat, and in a minute now we'll try to understand what that means, a little bit.

בשעה שאיש הדת יוצא ידי חובתו בקביעת שלטון החוקיות הסיבתית שבהוויה,

he thinks that his intellectual enterprise is complete, again when he understands the basic laws of physics, the basic laws of nature. איש הדת אינו מסתפק בתיקון העולם במלכות החוק, he's not content with that because in truth, כי עצמה של החוקיות היא תעלומה סתורת רז שברזים. The very existence of this system of natural law itself is the biggest mystery. What what does that mean? So so maybe as follows, to give a mashal as follows. So let's say you you come to some deserted place and to the best of of what's known it's never ever been inhabited. And you see a car, a car. And and you you you open the hood of the car and you study and you see with what tremendous wisdom the the car has been designed. You see that it's designed to be able to move as efficiently, as safely, as comfortably, as ecologically friendly as possible. So on the one hand, okay, so now you understand, you have an understanding of the car. And you can sort of walk away at this point, or you can wonder all this chochmah, all this intricate design for what? There is no one here, no one lives here. So what's the purpose of the design? Why is there a car bechlal? So science understands a tremendous amount about the world HaKadosh Baruch Hu created, but ultimately in terms of why there's a world, so not only can't science address that question, it's beyond not only human knowledge, it's beyond angelic knowledge as well. So כי עצמה של החוקיות היא תעלומה סתורת רז שברזים. The fact that that everything is so so intricately designed, but for what? Again, so in the car, so we say, okay, so if it's in a neighborhood where people live, so then we understand. But in in the analog to the car, we don't understand, can't understand, and and never will understand. So the again the mystery is not because of some kind of primitive rejection of reason, but aderaba, the more reason discovers and uncovers, so then the greater the mystery is. Now let's continue a few more lines here. Havanat hayachasim hafuntziyonalim, functional relationships, השולטים בין תופעות הטבע. Havanat hayachas hafunctionalian, functional relationships,

השולטים בין תופעות העולם הזה הוא האימננטי התמוה והנסתר ביותר

mikol gilui tofa'ah. Now let's try to maybe try to give an example to concretize this next sentence bezrat Hashem. mikol gilui tofa'ah, from every, from every discovery of some phenomenon, חידות חדשות בוקעות ועולות. There are new riddles which arise. So entomologists can tell you, and it's mind-boggling, how many different types of ants there are. That's not again, that's just one type of insect. It's extraordinary. It's extraordinary. But why? So astronomers now, I don't know, think they know, who knows whether they do know, they don't know, who knows? You know, so our solar system is just one solar system of many solar systems, and our sun is one sun of many suns, and the beriah is so much more vast than what was thought throughout history. So the beriah is so vast that no one has the slightest idea, conception of how vast it really is. So what's the point? mikol gilui tofa'ah

חידות חדשות בוקעות ועולות. כשאתה מגלה טפח הנך מכסה טפחיים.

Right? If you literally, if you, again, this is an idiom from Chazal. Everything is so extraordinary here. כשאתה מגלה טפח הנך מכסה טפחיים, when you reveal a tefach, you thereby cover two tfachim.

איש הדת רואה את כל העולם המסודר את כל הבריאה המסוימת והמוגבלת על ידי החוק.

This orderly world, this creation which is bound by chok, kegilat starim. The fact that we have everything physics can tell us, but the beriah remains something which is kulo pele,

שאי אפשר לעמוד על תוכה כקושיה דלא אשתניג בה נהגא דלא פרקינה. חידת החידות היא עצמו של החוק. המעשה הקוגניטיבי של איש הדת היא,

he is, he's rational to the core, but if you're rational to the core and you don't sort of egotistically dismiss and ignore and deny what you can't understand, so המעשה הקוגניטיבי של איש הדת hi kisuy veha'alem. Okay, I thought maybe we'd get gimmel with this, but so we'll end at vov, pick up gimmel next time.