13 Ikaraim, Rambam P’ Chelek: Yesod 4 and 5

Hakadosh Baruch Hu Metzius Hashem Hakadosh Baruch Hu is Hakadosh Baruch Hu's first. Hakadosh Baruch Hu is first. Hakadosh Baruch Hu is first.

וככה היסוד הגדול שביארנו והוא הראשון ומחודש וצור השם יתברך אתה ההדר המופלא

Hakadosh Baruch Hu created the world from the nothing.

וזה שאתה בא סימכת פה עניין קדמותו וחידשו הפילוסופים וכדי להכיר וסמכותי את מציאותו יתברך כמו שביארתי והתחלתי מאמרו.

So to summarize what we've had until now, the first four of the Yud Gimmel Ikkarim: Metzius Hashem, Achdus Hashem, Shelilas HaGashmus incorporeality, and Kadmus. So Hakadosh Baruch Hu is Rishon Lakol. Hakadosh Baruch Hu is first to everything. So here maybe at this point let's discuss a little bit. Rambam says at the end that there's no one Ma'amar Chazal which is the source of what he presents here, what he formulates: אספתי לך דברים רבים מועילים המפוזרים בדברי החכמים. But within that, it's clearly the case that one crucial Mareh Makom for the Rambam's Yud Gimmel Ikkarim is the Gemara in Sanhedrin. In Sanhedrin Perek Chelek,

דף יז עמוד א, אבל המינים והמסורות והאפיקורסים, שחננא גירסא נוא, ויש

Shekafru BaTorah, ויש Shekafru Bitechiyas Hameisim, ויש Shepirshu Midarke Tzibur,

שנתנו חתיתם בארץ החיים, שחטאו והחטיאו את הרבים כגון ירבעם בן נבט וחבריו,

Gehinnom, נידון בו לדור דורות. But all these אין להם חלק לעולם הבא. And much of the Rambam's list of the Yud Gimmel Ikkarim is actually here in this list. Only thing is, Chazal in this list don't tell us what the definition of a Min is, they don't tell us what the definition of an Apikores is. But if we can reconstruct how the Rambam knew to define Min, how he knew to define Apikores, then much, not the entire list, but much of the Rambam's list of Yud Gimmel Ikkarim is right here in this Ma'amar Chazal. So what does the Rambam in Perek Gimmel of Hilchos Teshuvah tells us that

חמישה הם הנקראים מינים: האומר שאין שם אלוה ואין לעולם מנהיג,

right? Denies the Yesod Harishon of Metzius Hashem. והאומר שיש שם מנהיג אלא שהן שניים או יותר, denies the second one. והאומר שיש ריבון אחד אלא שהוא גוף ובעל תמונה, denies the third. And וכן האומר שאינו לבדו ראשון וצור לכל that the Hakadosh Baruch Hu isn't the first and and the foundation of everything, he denies the fourth, and vechein haoveid Eloah Zulato, he violates the the fifth. So the Rambam says all of these are Minim. What what do we have in Chazal about Minim? So Tosfos here in Rosh Hashanah tells us on the Gemara of that Minim have no chelek in the Olam HaBa. But Tosfos says פליגי בה אביי ורבינא בפרק אין עומדין. If we look in the Gemara of Avodah Zarah daf vav, there's a machlokes Amoraim what the term min refers to. According to one view it refers to a mumar l'hachis, a person who does an averah spitefully. He doesn't do the averah l'teiavon, but he does the averah because the Torah says not to do it, al pi atzmo, that's why he does it. And the other says no, that a min refers to an oveid avodah zarah. So the Kesef Mishneh here in Hilchos Teshuva, so he's metzayein this same Gemara in Avodah Zarah that Chazal say that a min is an oveid avodah zarah. So so that accounts for that that accounts for just one of the of the Rambam's five, right? Rambam has a list of חמישה הן הנקראים מינים. Chazal tells us an oveid avodah zarah is a min. So where does Rambam get the other four from? So here the is as follows. If you go to perek aleph of Hilchos Avodah Zarah, perek aleph of Hilchos Avodah Zarah, I'll see if I can find this. So the Rambam in perek aleph of Hilchos Avodah Zarah traces the the history of the emergence of Avodah Zarah, Rachmana litzlan, in the world. And he writes as follows: בימי אנוש טעו בני אדם טעות גדולה. Almost all of mankind fell into terrible, terrible error. ונבערה עצת חכמי אותו הדור and and they became ignorant. ואנוש עצמו מן הטועים וזו הייתה טעותם אמרו. They reasoned as follows:

הואיל והקל ברא כוכבים אלו וגלגלים להנהיג את העולם ונתנם במרום וחלק להם כבוד.

Hakadosh Baruch Hu created the stars, the spheres, to to conduct all the heavenly motion in in the world, and he accorded them respect.

והם שמשים המשמשים לפניו וראויים הם לשבחם ולפארם ולחלוק להם כבוד וזה רצון הקל ברוך הוא לגדל ולכבד מי שגדלו וכבדו כמו שהמלך רוצה לכבד עבדיו העומדים לפניו וזה כבודו של מלך.

So they reasoned that the same way the melech wants you to by by honoring his his functionaries, his assistants, his you're you're thereby being mechabeid him. So they reasoned so Hakadosh Baruch Hu wants us to direct acts of worship to the kochavim, to the galgalim.

כיון שעלה דבר זה על לבם התחילו לבנות לכוכבים היכלות ולהקריב להם קרבנות ולשבחם ולפארם בדברים ולהשתחוות לפניהם כדי להשיג רצון הבורא בדעתם הרעה וזה היה עיקר עבודה זרה.

And here here's the point we'll see in a minute. It doesn't seem when you look at it initially it doesn't seem like it's so important, but but it's its implications are are extraordinary.

וכך הם אומרים עובדיה היודעים עיקרה לא שהם אומרים שאין שם אלוה אלא הכוכב הזה.

Those who worship avodah zarah who understood what the underlying philosophy of avodah zarah was: hu sheYirmiyahu omer

מי לא יראך מלך הגוים כי לך יאתה כי בכל חכמי הגוים ובכל מלכותם מאין כמוך ובאחת יבערו ויכסלו מוסר הבלים עץ הוא.

Klomer

הכל יודעים שאתה הוא הקל לבדך אבל טעותם וכסלותם שמדמין שזה ההבל רצונך הוא.

So the Rambam says that the original stage of Avoda Zara, the original philosophy of Avoda Zara, they were monotheists in the sense that they recognized Hashem echad, their terrible, terrible blunder was in thinking that one is supposed to direct acts of worship to the kochavim, to the galgalim, but they didn't deify them in the sense of thinking that they weren't polytheists, they didn't think that Hakadosh Baruch Hu had even delegated, had even given away any kind of discretionary power to kochavim or galgalim. What Avoda Zara initially, it later deteriorated into even worse, but what Avoda Zara initially consisted of was directing acts of worship again to the kochavim, to the galgalim, but with the underlying and accompanying belief that מי לא ייראך מלך הגוים שאתה הוא הקל לבדך. Now, in Perek Bet of Hilchot Avoda Zara, he has this over here, this is something extraordinary here. In Perek Bet of Hilchot Avoda Zara, so the Rambam writes עיקר הציווי בעבודה זרה. What's the definition of Avoda Zara? If someone asks what constitutes Avoda Zara, so the Rambam tells us

זהו עיקר הציווי בעבודה זרה שלא לעבוד אחד מכל הברואים.

This is the essential definition: שלא לעבוד אחד מכל הברואים, not to worship a davar hanivra. That's the definition of Avoda Zara. The definition of Avoda Zara is when a person engages in an act of worship directed to a davar hanivra.

עיקר הציווי בעבודה זרה שלא לעבוד אחד מכל הברואים לא מלאך ולא גלגל ולא כוכב ולא אחד מארבע היסודות ולא אחד מכל הנבראים מהם ואף על פי שהעובד יודע שהשם הוא האלקים ועובד הנברא הזה על דרך שעבד אנוש ואנשי דורו תחילה.

Rambam says, and even if the one who's engaged, rachmana litzlan, in Avoda Zara, again, he subscribes to the original Avoda Zara philosophy שאתה הוא הקל לבדך, the issur Avoda Zara is to direct an act of reverence and worship to a davar hanivra. Do you hear what I'm saying? Now, in that same passage what we were looking at last week where the Rambam effectively responds to the hassagot haRavad about a person who believes Hakadosh Baruch Hu is a ba'al guf, so the Rambam says as follows. The Rambam gives himself a cross-reference to here, to what he wrote in the Yad Hachazaka, and he says, we see how the Torah in the most, in the strongest terms possible, how the Torah condemns Avoda Zara, how the Torah says that Avoda Zara triggers charon af, it triggers כי קל קנא השם אלקיך in the strongest terms imaginable, so the Torah condemns Avoda Zara. Says the Rambam, but the emet is that a person who is oved Avoda Zara is much less than a person who has a distorted belief of Hakadosh Baruch Hu. The person who is oved Avoda Zara, again, the Rambam, given his havana of Avoda Zara, that the original Avoda Zara, and it's this which the Torah assar, it doesn't have to be worse than this, everything the Torah says is even about that initial stage of Avoda Zara b'yimei Enosh, is even if the person has a proper belief, he believes in the first four of the yod-gimmel ikkarim, he has a proper belief, but just he thinks, just in quotation marks, he thinks that the Hashem echad wants us to direct acts of worship to the kochavim and the galgalim, so the Torah says וחרה אף השם בכם, and the Torah says כי קל קנא השם that it triggers these reactions, kavyachol, so the Rambam says it's so much, so much worse, and the aveira is magnified so much if the aveira is not just about what to, how to be oved, but is a distortion of Hakadosh Baruch Hu Himself. The Rambam begins, he gives a mashal as follows. An error represents a greater distortion, is more egregious the higher the subject of the falsehood is, so then the worse the falsehood is, right? To make a mistake and to think that a centipede has, a centipede doesn't have a hundred, I don't know, I don't count, but to make a mistake and think that a centipede has 98 legs, okay, so it's an error, it's an error. Okay, but l'maiseh, what does your error concern? It concerns a bug. It says you make a mistake about a person in terms of having a distorted sense of who or what a person is, so that's an error of much greater magnitude because of what the error focuses on. So mimaila the Rambam says that a person who believes, there he's talking about Hakadosh Baruch Hu, a person who has a corporeal conception of Hakadosh Baruch Hu, he says, is so much worse than a person who's oved avodah zarah. I don't know if I'm saying it correctly, did you hear the so, so mimaila that's the answer. Where did the Rambam get the first five of the Yud-Gimmel Ikkarim? How does the Rambam know that the term minim includes not only oved avodah zarah, which Chazal say, but includes the other four? Because if avodah zarah means even though a person believes in Hashem Echad, so קל וחומר בן בנו של קל וחומר if that person is a min, if that person loses his helek in olam haba, so how much more so a person who distorts the conception of Hakadosh Baruch Hu himself as opposed to the oved avodah zarah. How did the Rambam know that avodah zarah would be even if a person just believes it, doesn't actually do any act of avodah? Ein hachi nami, the Ramban for instance, the Ramban doesn't agree. The Ramban in Parshas Yisro, he gives his history of avodah zarah, so the Ramban says and again he also, I mean everyone thinks based on the pasuk in Bereishis of אז הוחל לקרוא בשם whether it's kodesh or chol, but b'shem Hashem, so everyone dates avodah zarah to dor shel Enosh. So the Ramban, take a look at the Ramban in Parshas Yisro, so it's clear from the Ramban that the oved avodah zarah always thought that there was some discretionary power that according to the Ramban it began with malachim, it didn't begin with the kokhavim u'mazalos, but it began with the malachim, the sarei ha'umos, the kokhavim v'galgalim, they had this, they thought that these intermediaries had discretionary powers and that's what motivated avodah zarah. So ein hachi nami, not everyone agrees with this havanah of the Rambam and that's why, again coming back to what we talked about last time as to whether or not someone who's terribly, terribly wrong and thinking that Hashem is a baal guf, so that's minus, is he a min? So for the Rambam it's muchuach that he's a min because he's so much worse than an oved avodah zarah. For the Ramban, I don't know what the Ramban would say, the Ramban could be l'maiseh what he thought, I don't know, but he could be open to the shitas HaRa'avad because you don't have that hekhre'ach of the kal v'chomer, so ein hachi nami it is shomeia l'machloket. Could you please explain, I don't understand what's the connection between having a correct perspective in terms of the delegation of power so to speak or the higher powers and whether or not God is a guf? Meaning, it could be much more egregious to think that than a person who believes in the sole power, why is that connected to whether or not God has a guf? Do you see what I'm asking? We're just explaining the Rambam's svara. Chazal say that one of the categories of the people who have no helek l'olam haba are minim. Chazal tell us... Let's streamline things, just take the view that the Rambam is operating with that a min is an oved avodah zarah. Eich she-hu in the Rambam, that mushrooms from one definition of min, oved avodah zarah to including all five of the first Yud Gimmel Ikkarim: אומר שאין שם אלוה, v'ein ha-olam manhig,

ואומר שיש שם מנהיג אלא שהוא שנים או יותר, ואומר שהוא בעל גוף, ואומר שאינו לבדו ראשון לכל,

right? So the Rambam adds an extra four onto Chazal. Chazal say min has no chelek l'olam haba, a min is an oved avodah zarah. Rambam says yes, he's an oved avodah zarah, he has another four as well. So the question is: where does he get that from? Where does he get that from? So we're just explaining the Rambam l'shitato. The Rambam l'shitato thinks that avodah zarah, whenever you're talking about avodah zarah, lav davka that you're talking about anything more than this. Again, historically avodah zarah did become more than this, but lav davka that the Torah is ever talking about more than this because the Torah already assurs this and everything the Torah says is even about an oved avodah zarah who believes שאתה הוא הקל לבדך. He believes אתה הוא הקל לבדך. So says the Rambam: which is the more serious error? The more serious error is, let's say you have a king. So it's the more serious error to have some distorted conception of the king himself, or is it to think that the king allows you to pledge allegiance to someone else as well? The king allows you to prostrate yourself in front of someone else as well? Says the Rambam: it's pashut that the more serious error is the error which is a distortion of the king himself. So then whatever Chazal meant to tell you about oved avodah zarah, so the Rambam says is בן בנו של קל וחומר is going to be true of anyone whose distortion touches not on just how to relate to Hakadosh Baruch Hu, but his distortion touches on Hakadosh Baruch Hu. You understand? Look in the Inyan. When Chazal say that oved avodah zarah is a min, they're talking about someone who does a ma'aseh avodah zarah, or is it just the belief or saying that it's im guf, that it's im shnayim, is that even this kal vachomer of oved avodah zarah, oved avodah zarah? So you're saying maybe the min is not ma'aseh, it's not just, you can't have a kal vachomer. Well, because the significance of the ma'aseh avodah zarah, the ma'aseh avodah zarah is so chamur because the ma'aseh avodah zarah says that even though there's Hashem Echad, so he's directing an act of worship toward a hanivra. So that ma'aseh, that ma'aseh can't be, says the Rambam, it isn't more chamur than the belief which denies or distorts Hakadosh Baruch Hu. Even though, but that's like, more kal vachomer means that that's a ma'aseh. But who says that a machshavah is as bad as a ma'aseh? Now, a machshavah, it depends in what realm. A machshavah, even trayfes, machshavah is not the same as eating trayfe. Because but in Emunos V'Deios, the avodah is knowing, machshavah is not less than a ma'aseh. If a person will just stam, if a person will think it's a good idea to be oved avodah zarah, wait though, I'm not doing anything, so that would be nothing. I mean, that would be, then you wouldn't classify him as a min because that would just be a very dangerous... again, if he shared it with anyone, he'd be a meisis u'madiach, but if he just kept it to himself, it would be a terrible, dangerous error, but it wouldn't be... but the point of the Rambam, if a person just believes in avodah zarah, he wouldn't be violating the... what do you call it? He wouldn't be... again, it depends what you mean by belief in avodah zarah. If you're talking about again, the... substantially avodah zarah deteriorated into what we know avodah zarah as, just crude polytheism. But at the first stage, there's no such thing as a belief in avodah zarah. Belief in avodah zarah is like... if he has that p'gum, that p'gum path, that p'gum approach, and he doesn't act on it, so then he's not a min. He's not a min because he believes Hashem up there and he believes אתה הוא אלוהינו עד דאתא and he believes kadmon and he believes everything. He has this dangerous, very dangerous p'gum idea about what religious life should be, but if he never acts on it and never tells anyone else to do it, so he's not a min. He's not a min. avodah zarah. A person is guilty of avodah zarah in machshavah alone when the avodah zarah deteriorates into what the Ramban has as avodah zarah, which for the Ramban it did. But at the initial stage it's not, it's the act which is idolatrous, it's not the belief which is idolatrous at that first stage. The Rambam's formulation's not talking about belief in this case? I don't think it means that belief. Enosh, Enosh said twelve of the thirteen Ani Ma'aminim and the fifth one, the fifth one is violated. I think he commented on this once, that the fifth one, the lashon haRambam there in Perek Gimmel. Do you have a Rambam? The lashon haRambam in Perek Gimmel of Hilchos Teshuvah when he lists the חמישה הן הנקראים מינים. So the Rambam says:

האומר שאין שם אלוה ואין עולם מנהיג האומר שיש שם מנהיג אלא שהם שניים או יותר האומר שיש שם רבון אחד אלא שהוא גוף ובעל תמונה וכן האומר שאינו לבדו הראשון וצור הכל וכן העובד אלוה זולתו.

The Rambam's mefurash, the fifth one on the level of Enosh's generation, it's not the belief because the belief is p'gum the same way... it's p'gum to think that you can think that a certain diet which is very unhealthy, you can think it's a good idea. As long as you don't go on the diet, then it's not... it's a p'gum idea and it's a foolish idea and it's a dangerous idea, but kol zman that this remains an idea and you don't act on it, it's stahm gornisht. At the stage of Enosh's generation, that's true. At the next stage where the ovdei avodah zarah think that there's some discretionary powers that tzava ha-shamayim possess, at that point so even the machshavah is avodah zarah. And at that point a person Rachmana litzlan would become a min even just by virtue of a machshavah. Is that clear enough so? Yes. I think the Chazon Ish says if a person will be oveid something that doesn't exist and never existed, the Great Pumpkin. Okay. Ain sheilah d'rabbanan. But if a person will be oveid the Great Pumpkin, so the Great Pumpkin is not a davar hanivra. That wouldn't be an act of avodah zarah. Ella mai, if he believes in something that doesn't exist, that would be a machshavas avodah zarah, but the act wouldn't be an act of avodah zarah. What's the nafkamina? Obviously, not nafkamina in terms of that a person can believe such a thing, but in terms of teshuvos and things like that, it does have nafkaminas al pi din. Let's look at the Yesod haChamishah:

וראוי לעבדו ולגדלו ולהודיע גדולתו ועבודתו ולא לעשות כן למי שלמטה ממנו במציאות.

That worship should be reserved exclusively for Hakadosh Baruch Hu. And nothing lower than Hakadosh Baruch Hu should be an object of worship. And again, as we just discussed, even if the underlying belief is Hashem Echad.

כגון המלאכים והכוכבים והגלגלים והיסודות ומה שהורכב מהם לפי שכולם הם מוטבעים בפעולותיהם אין להם יכולת ולא בחירה אלא לרצון יתברך.

They're all programmed. They're not baalei bechira. ואין לעשות אותם אמצעי להגיע אליו. A person is not supposed to make them into intermediaries to reach Hakadosh Baruch Hu אלא למעלה יתעלה יכוונו המחשבות. We're supposed to direct ourselves without any intermediaries to Hakadosh Baruch Hu

מניחים כל מה שזולתו וזה היסוד החמישי הוא אזהרה על עבודה זרה ורוב התורה היא באזהרה עליה.

So the pnimiyut haTorah, as is well known, the pnimiyut haTorah, the piyuttim like Machnisei Rachamim where we are addressing malachim, the pnimiyut haTorah violates the yesod hachamishi of the Rambam in Yud Gimmel Ikkarim. But there's something very, very, very curious. Those who agree with Rambam not to say it, but the way they express their agreement, for instance you have the Maharal in Netivut Olam, excuse me in Netiv haAvoda within Netivut Olam

אבל שיתפלל ויאמר למלאכים אל תהיו צרים עמדי זה אין ראוי.

He says

אבל אנו נוהגים לומר מכניסי רחמים מכניסי רחמים השמיעו רחמים.

The prevalent custom is to say it.

ואין זה ראוי כי דבר זה כאילו מתפלל אל מלאכים שיכניסו רחמינו ולא מצאנו זה.

So it's a pela of the Maharal. Sometimes the Maharal comes in, you know where I go every Sunday morning. The Maharal says in this passage אין ראוי לאמר אין ראוי לעשות כן. He's very kayfeh, a very tough bit. What do you mean אין ראוי לעשות כן? He says ein raui ze. He says it's not appropriate, it's not appropriate. A shaila of min hanigleh under the Maharal ve'ein ze raui. Chasam Sofer also. Chasam Sofer also says not to be poresh from the tzibur. I think the Chasam Sofer writes in his teshuvos, he says פרק ו מלאכי רחמים שושאי עליון. He said that. And then the way he gets out of Machnisei Rachamim, he says, he says tachman, everything moved so slow, so then he falls behind and then he has to skip to catch up, so he skips the Shalom Aleichem and vdilugo alay ahava Chasam Sofer says. But by מלאכי רחמים שושאי עליון, so there he doesn't really have an eitza, so he says it with them. But Chasam Sofer also, he's following this Maharal. He also thinks you're not supposed to say it. So what do you mean, you can't be poresh min hatzibur? Because lichora the vort is as follows. If you reread the Rambam here, so the Rambam is presenting yesod hachamishi, and again, what is the yesod hachamishi, rabosai? The yesod hachamishi is that acts of worship should be reserved exclusively for Hakadosh Baruch Hu. Why does the Rambam seemingly digress to tell us that malachim and kochavim and galgalim and everything else, they're all programmed? Lama nafka mina? Why does the Rambam have to explain to us here what the metzius of malachim is, what the metzius of kochavim is? Let it be whatever it is. It just seems irrelevant.

ועתה השב אשת האיש כי נביא הוא ויתפלל בעדך וחיה.

Hakadosh Baruch Hu says to to Avimelech, go to Avraham Avinu actually, and he'll daven for you and and you'll you'll recover, you and all all your household will recover. So it's muttar to ask someone to muttar to ask someone to to daven, Ramban says, Ramban understands differently than Rashi, ותלך לדרש את ה' doesn't mean to look for nevuah. Rivka's not looking for nevuah, she's going, she's going that they should daven for her. She's having such an incredibly difficult and and painful pregnancy, so she wants they should daven, lidrosh es Hashem means to daven. So you're allowed to ask someone else to daven for you, allowed to ask someone else to daven for you. So what's so terrible if I ask the maloch to daven for me? Why is it to ask the maloch to daven for me, no, so that's that's minus v'kefirah? And to ask to ask someone else to daven for me, so that's not only muttar, it's it's recommended. And when Brochos says yodia tzara l'rabim, so at times a person is supposed to, at times a person isn't supposed to say anything, but then there are other times when a person is supposed to, is supposed to try to get, enlist the rabim to daven in his behalf. So why is this, why is this such an incredible gulf, the gap between the two? So l'fi what the Rambam is saying, the understanding is you go to a person, a person's a ba'al bechirah. So you can go, you can go to your neighbor and you can knock on the door and ask to borrow a cup of sugar. It doesn't mean that you think he's זן ומפרנס את הכל, it just means you're you're making a cake and you ran out of sugar. No theological implications to to knocking on the door. You can go to your neighbor and you can ask your neighbor to daven for you. You can ask your neighbor to daven for you. You can ask your neighbor, so the the zchus tefillas rabim is greater than the zchus of tefillas yachid. And and if he's a tzaddik so then he's a Chanina ben Dosa so then avadeh his koach hatfillah is is very great. You're not making him, you're not, you're not deifying him, you're not making him intermediary, you're asking him to add his zchus hatfillah to your zchus hatfillah. You can ask him for a cup of sugar, you can ask him for his his zchus hatfillah. You're not making him, there's no again, there's no theological implications to that request. But malachim are not ba'alei bechirah. Malachim are not ba'alei bechirah. So so what what do you mean? You don't go knocking on the door of, some of us kick our computers if they don't work, but it doesn't really accomplish too much. If you're dealing with something which isn't which isn't a ba'al bechirah you can't, you can't make requests, you can't ask. So what's pshat that we would address malachim, that we would address kochavim, that we would address galgalim? So being that they are not ba'alei bechirah, the only pshat is if we somehow or other, no, that's the way to talk to Hakadosh Baruch Hu. So when I ask my neighbor to daven for me, says the Rambam, that's not because I think that's the way to talk to Hakadosh Baruch Hu. No, that's because I think if I have two people talking to Hakadosh Baruch Hu then there's a greater zchus tefillah than if there's one person talking to Hakadosh Baruch Hu. That's true. That's true. But you you address yourself to the maloch, so the maloch's not a ba'al bechirah, the maloch doesn't, the maloch can't react. The maloch is mutba b'peulato. He's he's programmed. So the the what what addressing yourself to the maloch bespeaks is that I can't relate, I can't jump and relate directly to Hakadosh Baruch Hu, I have to relate via the intermediary. O.K. kommt oys, what would the Rambam say if a person davens to malachim, but it's rooted in the fact that he has according to what the Rambam is a mistaken understanding of malachim? Let's say he thinks malachim are ba'alei bechirah. And you know that not everyone agrees with the Rambam's conception of of of malachim. Let's say he thinks that malachim are ba'alei bechirah. And when he asking him that he should he should he should daven for us. So the Rambam would set that off as as narishkeit and and maybe even a dangerous narishkeit, but what it means that's what it means. And and that lichora is the pshat in the Maharal and and the Chasam Sofer. It's ain ra'uy. The whole thing is wrong. The whole thing is a bilbul. The whole thing is wrong, the whole thing is a bilbul, but it's not kefira because if the person is davening to Malachim based on a wrong conception of Malachim, so then מכניסי רחמים מכניסי רחמינו is no different than Rebbe, daven for me. So it's not fundamentally different than that. Okay, is it a bilbul, maybe a dangerous bilbul, is it ain ra'uy, it's ain ra'uy, but that's why seemingly the Maharal and the Chasam Sofer's objection is is understated. But isn't there also another implication by by calling an angel machnisei rachamim, aren't you implying that without that Malach my rachamim wouldn't be machnis? That's that he's the one who who does it and implies that I need this Malach to machnis my rachamim. See, that might be true in in a non-discretionary sense, it might be true in a programmatic sense, and whatever the Ramchal has his description about how how things work and and and you'd say that that's pshat in the Rambam gufeh. That's why the Rambam says that it's so chamur because if a person understands what a Malach is, what a kochav is, what a galgal is, if he understands what the the essence of the metzius of all these things is, so then it's it's a way of not relating directly to the Hakadosh Baruch Hu. Lemayseh lemayseh, again, would the Rambam also understate (in quotation marks) his objection the way the Maharal Chasam Sofer do? I'm not I don't know but lichora it is clear that the minus that shebo is linked to is linked to the conception of of Malachim, and that's gufeh why the Rambam has to include it here in this Ikar. But does this Ikar only have a problem with asking Malachim to daven or or a bakasha directly of our behalf or does it also have a problem with, let's say, saying Barchuni, asking the Malachim to directly bless? I think they cite from Reb Chaim Volozhiner or something that the that he said Barchuni is also the same is equally problematic as as the other view, and you do the same same question. Others say that in Barchuni, again, the whole song of Shalom Aleichem is just sort of a dramatization of the Gemara Chazal that a person comes home on Shabbos he's accompanied by shnei Malachim. We're dramatizing that. If you can say bo'achem leshalom, tzeis'chem leshalom, you can say it derech tzivui, barchuni leshalom. So the kavana in Barchuni Leshalom would be not asking the Malach but you're, as it were, you're commanding the Malach that he has to look, table's set, everything's set for Shabbos, now you're obligated to to do what Hakadosh Baruch Hu Hakadosh Baruch Hu requires you to do. But I think those who base it on Reb Chaim Volozhiner skip the stanza of Barchuni Leshalom. Ditto. What what violates the Aseres HaDibros is somewhat contextual in the following sense. If a person would be mishtachaveh, again, hishtachavaya means... pishut yadayim v'raglayim, prostration. If a person would be mishtachaveh to a malach, to a kochav, so then it is pashut that that would be a violation of the issur hachamishi. On the other hand, we find in nach, right in bais, vatishtachu la-melech, prostrates herself before the king Dovid lo. So the explanation is clear that it's contextual in the sense that hishtachavaya can represent an act of worship. As an act of worship, it's a violation of the issur hachamishi. hishtachavaya can also represent just a recognition of שום תשים עליך מלך שתהא אימתו עליך. So to a certain degree, it's contextual. The same act in one context can be a violation of the issur hachamishi and in another context would be perfectly okay. Whether it's because he had a getzka on him and whether it's because he was promoting himself as an avodah zarah, but he wasn't interested in the type of loyalty or expression of loyalty that a subject is supposed to demonstrate to a monarch. He's not the monarch anyway and he clearly was wanting in an avodah zarah sense, again whether it's because he actually had an avodah zarah on his person or whether he was promoting himself as the avodah zarah, but again it's contextual when it is and when it isn't.