Avodah She’Ba’lev, Part 3

We were trying to understand what the Rambam understands by Chazal's phrase which defines the mitzvah of tefillah, avodah shebelev. So the first indication is in what the Rambam doesn't say when he describes and defines the d'oraita of tefillah,

על פי מצוה זו כך הוא שיהא אדם מתפלל ומתחנן בכל יום ומגיד שבחו של הקדוש ברוך הוא ואחר כך שואל צרכיו שהוא צריך להם בבקשה ובתחינה ואחר כך נותן שבח והודיה לה' על הטובה שהשפיע לו.

So there's no reference kehu zeh l'avodat korbanot. It's totally, totally absent. The Rambam doesn't begin to talk about the relevance of korbanot to tefillah until he talks about the d'rabanans of tefillah. So that was indicator indicator number one. Another indication that we didn't mention yesterday, when the Rambam in Sefer HaMitzvot,

המצוה החמישית היא שצונו לעבדו יתעלה וכבר נכפל צווי זה פעמים.

Then at the end of this mitzvah in Sefer HaMitzvot, the Rambam quotes a drashas Chazal, ve'amru, avdehu besorato, avdehu or ivduhu be'mikdasho. So if you find Chazal saying, darshing, that you have to be oved Hashem in the Mikdash, so what does that mean? So obviously it means you go to the Mikdash and you're makriv korbanot. So the Rambam says, no,

כלומר ללכת שם להתפלל בו ונגדו כמו שביאר שלמה עליו השלום.

What it means, what Chazal have in mind when they say you have to be oved in Mikdash is that they're saying that the din of davening nokach HaMikdash is a din d'oraita. So the Ramban says, what we would have thought, the Ramban says,

וכן זו ששנויה שם ואותו תעבודו עבדו בתורתו עבדו במקדשו פירושו לומר שיעבדו אותו במקדש בעבודת הקרבנות.

And the Rambam very, very conspicuously doesn't give that pshat. So what we began to try to explain is that what allows, not what dictates, but what allows for the Rambam's havana in avodah shebelev is that the term lev, the Rambam says, has as many, many words in Lashon HaKodesh do, has multiple meanings. And of the meanings of lev, besides its primary meaning of the organ of the body, the heart, it also is a term for machshava and for sechel. The Rambam tells that explicitly when he defines the terms lev. The Rambam is quoted, so he says, כמו כן הוא שם למחשבה. Lev is also a noun which means thought. L'libi halach, על פי משמע זאת נאמר, and this is what we saw in the Yad yesterday, ולא תתורו אחרי לבבכם. Then the Rambam says that לב הוא גם שם לשכל. And that's what it means in the pasuk in Kohelet, lev chacham mimino. So again, that was the, again, it doesn't dictate the Rambam's havana in avodah shebelev, but it allows for it, that lev doesn't only mean heart. And that yitachen, what we suggested yesterday for the Rambam in the phrase avodah shebelev, it means avodah not in the sense of avodat korbanot, not with that association, but avodat Hashem with the ikar of the avodat Hashem is through the machshava, is through thinking about Hakadosh Baruch Hu. That's what the essence of tefillah is, not its equivalence to avodat korbanot. That's not what Chazal were talking about for the Rambam. That the essence of tefillah is, it's a mitzvah that consists, it's an avodat Hashem that consists not of an netilat lulav, not of achilat matzah, not of hanachat tefillin. It's the essence of it is thinking about Hashem. It's done with the sechel, thinking about Hakadosh Baruch Hu. L'ma'aseh, the Rambam actually says it mefurash. It's not only that it's ניתן להאמר לפי דרכו של הרמב"ם. He says it mefurash. But he says it in a way that we're not going to fully understand today, but bli neder we'll try to amplify this a little bit. The Rambam writes again, this is also much quoted, hatorah hivhira, the Torah makes clear, sheha'avodah ha'achronah hazot, the ultimate avodat Hashem, שהסבנו תשומת הלב אליה that we've been focusing on, b'perek zeh, לא תהיה אלא אחרי. is only after a person has apprehended, has understood Hashem in whatever sense, in whatever degree human capacity allows for.

הוא אמר לאהבת השם אלוהיכם ולעבדו בכל לבבכם ובכל נפשכם.

So listen to these next two lines of rabosai. וכבר הבהרנו כמה פעמים we've explained several times שהאהבה לפי מידת ההשגה, right, לפי הדעה תהיה האהבה. Ahavas Hashem ensues, Ahavas Hashem follows on the heels of yedi'as Hashem. אחרי האהבה תבוא אותה עבודה after a person attains ahavah comes the עבודה שהחכמים ז"ל העירו עליה ואמרו זו עבודה שבלב. So now the Rambam is going to come and tell us what עבודה שבלב is. Again, it confirms what we're talking about and it's confusing. So take the confirmation for today, hold off on the confusion for tomorrow. Ve-hi le-da'ati, what is עבודה שבלב? Haf'alas ha-machshavah. עבודה שבלב means activating, focusing, directing one's thoughts, הפעלת המחשבה על המושכל הראשון, on Hakadosh Baruch Hu. So omer meforash, the definition of עבודה שבלב again, what allows for that definition, it doesn't dictate that definition, what allows for it is that lev means machshavah as well, it also means machshavah, it also means seichel, and the definition of עבודה שבלב is avodas Hashem through machshavah, the instrument for which is machshavah.