Emunah Basics, part 1

So Moshe Rabbeinu was sent by the Kadosh Baruch Hu to go to the Bnei Yisrael and deliver the message that the Kadosh Baruch Hu appeared to him to lead them out of Mitzrayim, so Moshe Rabbeinu says, והן לא יאמינו לי. So the Gemara says in Shabbos that the Kadosh Baruch Hu rebukes him and says, no, Klal Yisrael ma'aminim bnei ma'aminim. So it seems at least in an aggadic context that emunah is our self-definition. It's what it means to live authentically as a Jew. But the emes is that what Chazal say there is not only true al pi agadda. The Rambam writes in the hakdama to Perek Chelek after he lists the Yud-Gimmel Ikarim, so the Rambam writes as follows. He says,

ובזמן שיהיו ביד האדם כל אלה היסודות ואמונתו נכונה בהם, הרי הוא נכנס בכלל ישראל וחייבין לאהבה ולחמול עליו וכל מה שצונו השם על אהבה ואחוה זה עם זה.

For a person to be considered to have the prerogatives of being treated as a Jew, the whole spectrum of mitzvos bein adam l'chaveiro, for a person to have the prerogatives of being treated as a Jew, so he has to have the correct emunah. And if, Rachmana litzlan, יפרוש האדם מיסוד מאלה היסודות הרי יצא מן הכלל. He forfeits the prerogatives of being Jewish. Where did the Rambam get that from? Where did the Rambam get it from, that on a certain level, again in terms of the prerogatives, in terms of the zechuyos, that on a certain level that emunah is necessary for the person's maintenance of the status of Yisrael? So b'acharon, I think the Tiferes Yisrael points this out, and this is the lashon hamishnah is very interesting. The Mishnah says, כל ישראל יש להם חלק לעולם הבא. So unqualified, right? כל ישראל יש להם חלק לעולם הבא. And then the Mishnah, toch k'dei dibbur, says,

ואלו שאין להם חלק לעולם הבא האומר אין תחיית המתים ואין תורה מן השמים ואפיקורוס.

So then what did you mean that כל ישראל יש להם חלק לעולם הבא? So that's what the Rambam learns pshat, that the person who doesn't have the correct emunah, the person who is kofer in one of the yesodos ha'emunah, so it affects in terms of the prerogatives, in terms of the zechuyos, it affects the shem Yisrael. It's another introductory comment before we start talking about the substance of this incredibly important topic. The Rav has a profound perspective here, which is that when we talk about emunah, it's crucial that we understand that we're talking about something which belongs to the realm of halacha, something which has halachic definition, something which has halachic parameters, and all the discussion about whether one paskin halacha b'agadda, one doesn't paskin halacha b'agadda, that whole discussion is not relevant. To be a ma'amin is a halachic category and as such, again, it belongs to the realm of halacha. Where do you see it? Again, the emes is we already saw it in that statement of the Rambam, when the Rambam says that if a person, Rachmana litzlan, is kofer, so then yatza m'klal Yisrael and all the mitzvos bein adam l'chaveiro don't pertain to him. But it's not the Rambam's chiddush. You have it in Chazal. Chazal say there's no hashavas aveida minim v'apikorsin, you don't have the Rambam quotes the dinim in Hilchos Aveida, shechitas min is neveila, and there's no hashavas aveida to minim v'apikorsin. מינים ואפיקורסין מורידין ואין מעלין. So there are many halachos which are a function of whether a person is a ma'amin or a person, Rachmana litzlan, is a kofer. is not. So clearly what we're talking about is again an area of halacha and as such it has halachic parameters it has halachic definition. Okay let's begin with the topic itself. יסוד היסודות ועמוד החכמות is the belief in Hakadosh Baruch Hu. Here it's again it's vitally important to clarify what we mean when we speak of belief in God. So what does that term mean in traditional Jewish terms? It's a term that many people bandy about and many people profess to believe in God but different people mean different things by that phrase when they say it. So let's try to understand what our conception of Hakadosh Baruch Hu is what we mean when we say that we're ma'aminim bnei ma'aminim that we believe in Hakadosh Baruch Hu. So let's again not necessarily touching on things in the most important sequence. The Rambam as you know Mishneh Torah consists of fourteen sefarim hence it's its name Yad Hachazakah and the Rambam in the hakdamah describes defines what the subject matter of each of the fourteen sefarim of the Yad Hachazakah is. So the Rambam says Sefer Rishon is

ספר ראשון הוא כולל כל המצוות שהן עיקר דת משה רבנו.

In the first of the fourteen sefarim I'm going to include those mitzvos which are the mainstay the foundation of the religion that Moshe Rabbeinu came down from Har Sinai and taught us.

וצריך אדם לידע אותן תחילה הכל כגון ייחוד שמו ברוך הוא

v'issur avodah zarah וקראתי שם ספר זה Sefer Hamada. So Sefer Hamada deals with ikarei hadas. Ikarei hadas. Why is Hilchos De'os in Sefer Hamada? Ein hachi nami that question can and should fruitfully be raised not only with regard to Hilchos De'os it should be. So Hilchos Yesodei HaTorah we know why that's there. Sefer Hamada is about ikarei hadas. Hilchos Avodah Zarah we know why that's there also. Why is Hilchos De'os there? Hilchos De'os don't look to make too much money but on the other hand don't be so disinterested in money that you can't even pay the rent or you can't even pay the grocery bill. Okay those are takeh important things to know but how does it belong in Sefer Hamada? When the Rambam describes Avraham Avinu's search Avraham Avinu looked out into the world and was searching. Ultimately after thirty-seven years of relentless searching exploring ultimately

ליבו משוטט ומבין עד שהשיג דרך האמת והבין קו הצדק בדעתו הנכונה.

So when the Rambam describes Avraham Avinu's discovery of Hakadosh Baruch Hu the Rambam says he not only discovers Hakadosh Baruch Hu but he discerns a kav hatzedek. And that's further reinforced later in this halacha here in א ג עבודה זרה when the Rambam describes how Avraham Avinu then passes the torch to Yitzchak Yitzchak to Yaakov and Yaakov to all his sons but especially

הבדיל לוי ומינהו ראש והושיבו בישיבה ללמד דרך השם ולשמור מצוות אברהם.

So Avraham Avinu didn't just discover monotheistic belief. That was a Mitzvas Avraham, there was a moral code which monotheistic belief dictates and the Rambam says this again what he really makes mefurash, what he makes explicit what that Mitzvas Avraham is that Avraham Avinu discovered as an integral part of his discovery of Hakadosh Baruch Hu when the Rambam talks about Perek Aleph of Hilchos Deos about the Deos Hamemutzoas, he says that

לפי שהשמות האלו שנקרא בהן היוצר הן הדרך הבינונית שאנו חייבין ללכת בה נקראת זו דרך השם והיא שלמדה אברהם אבינו לבניו.

So there is a very profound yesod that the Rambam is telling us. Again, speaking in anthropomorphic terms, a person can't really describe, define Hakadosh Baruch Hu, but speaking anthropomorphically, what Avraham Avinu discovers when he discovers Hakadosh Baruch Hu, Avraham Avinu discovers Hakadosh Baruch Hu as someone who's the author of a moral act of Berias Ha'olam. Let's explain what that means. The Rav, zecher tzadik livracha, used to mar'geela befumeh, he used to explain as follows. A person absolutely cannot understand and therefore absolutely should not speculate as to why Hakadosh Baruch Hu created the world. We can't understand that. We can't understand that. But we can descriptively say the following: Hakadosh Baruch Hu is perfect, totally self-sufficient, he has no need for anything, for the world. The creation of the world was an altruistic act. We're not assigning motivation to it, we're not understanding why it happened, we can't, but we can descriptively say Hakadosh Baruch Hu didn't and doesn't need the world. Hakadosh Baruch Hu is self-sufficient. And that's what the posuk means, Olam chesed yibaneh. There are for the most part amongst the ummos ha'olam and inevitably even amongst the Jews, amongst those שלא זכו לאורה של תורה and there are those who come to a belief in Hakadosh Baruch Hu based on science and their conception of Hakadosh Baruch Hu is of a great infinite mind and their belief in a God is totally divorced from any moral implications or moral code. So one of the major major yesodos to understand is that for us when a person discovers the Ribbono Shel Olam, so the Ribbono Shel Olam, a person can recognize Hakadosh Baruch Hu from the world and he's recognized not just as the, again speaking anthropomorphically, not just as this infinite mind with infinite chochma that created the intricate vast universe, but as a moral being. And for us emuna is inseparable from its moral implications and it's a contradiction in terms for a person to be ma'amin but not to subscribe to the moral code which that emuna dictates. And that's why Hilchos Deos is in Hilchos Yesodei HaTorah, Hilchos Deos is in Hilchos Yesodei HaTorah because in Avraham Avinu's discovery of Hakadosh Baruch Hu was inseparable from his discovery of the Ribbono Shel Olam who created the world, he created the world, Olam chesed yibaneh, as a moral, it's a moral act. Not only a natural act, but it's a moral act, and not only is there natural laws of physics embedded in the universe, but the moral laws as well. And you see how Hakadosh Baruch Hu, you see the rachmanus and chanina, how Hakadosh Baruch Hu created the world with a maternal instinct that the mothers take care of the newborns, etc., etc. Belief in Hakadosh Baruch Hu dictates morality. That's one element of our emuna, of our conception. The Rishonim, Chazal already and the Rishonim in their footsteps, attach great weight to sechel and svara, whether it's in dinim d'oraisas such as המוציא מחברו עליו הראיה and הפה שאסר הפה שהתיר which don't need a pasuk as the svara. Whether it's the Gemara in Yuma telling us that mishpatim, even if they weren't written, so would be binding because that afilu lo nichtevu, so we know that hayu reuyim lekaseiv, whether it's the Gemara in Eruvin that elmalei nitna Torah, even if the Torah hadn't been given, so היינו למדים גזל מן הנמלה and tznius mechasul. So all these things that we naturally could figure out. So Chazal attach a lot of weight to sechel and svara, and again, the Rishonim after them as well. Rav Saadia Gaon, Chovos Halevavos, the Rambam of course. All the the reason sechel, the reason svara carry so much weight is because it's God-given. Hakadosh Baruch Hu again, A, is a moral being and B, is the source of morality. Human sechel is only a source of morality because it's given by Hakadosh Baruch Hu. A person's moral intuition is only valid because it's divinely given, and for that reason, obviously, when a person finds his sechel, his intuition out of sync with what Hakadosh Baruch Hu says in the Torah, it's not a שני כתובים המכחישים זה את זה, it means that the person is not this isn't part of the intuition that was God-given. Okay. Our conception of Hakadosh Baruch Hu, it's a pasuk in Ha'azinu, again the Rambam elaborates slightly in the Yud Gimmel Ikkarim, hatzur tamim po'olo. Hakadosh Baruch Hu is perfect. Our belief is in a perfect God, a God who doesn't make mistakes.

היסוד הראשון מציאות הבורא יתברך והוא שיש שם מצוי בשלימות ביותר שבכל אופני המציאות.

Hakadosh Baruch Hu is perfect. The Rambam says also, it's interesting when you look in Hilchos Yesodei HaTorah, so how did the Rambam sort of decide what he includes in Perek Alef and what's included in Perek Beis? So in light of what the Rambam says elsewhere, it's clear that what's in Perek Alef is the baseline for emunah. De-hainu, it's not just for a person to begin to be ma'amik in ma'aseh merkavah, to begin to go beyond the minimum that's necessary. Those things are very base. Perek Alef is what all of us uniformly need to understand about Hakadosh Baruch Hu. And the Rambam says what that means besides the fact of yichud Hashem, besides the fact that there's only one Hashem and that he is one. Right? There's only one Hashem, but that there could be one Hashem and that one Hashem could be made up of parts. There's one Hashem and he is one. There's no multiplicity or anything whatsoever in him. But in addition, the Rambam says it's crucial, critical that we understand the following: A, Hakadosh Baruch Hu's incorporeality. Hakadosh Baruch Hu is not physical. B, Hakadosh Baruch Hu's total, total and absolute uniqueness and singularity. The reality of Hakadosh Baruch Hu, everything about Hakadosh Baruch Hu is entirely unique. We have a tendency to sort of think of Hakadosh Baruch Hu in superhuman terms. So we're mortal, ימי שנותינו בהם שבעים שנה, but Hakadosh Baruch Hu lives forever. We know things, but our knowledge is finite, and Hakadosh Baruch Hu's knowledge is infinite. So we sort of have this tendency that we work off of our own experience and then we sort of extrapolate from there and Hakadosh Baruch Hu becomes this superhuman being. And what the Rambam stresses time and time again is that everything about Hakadosh Baruch Hu is absolutely unique. He's, again, holy this time with a W at the beginning, wholly other and different and unique. So that's what the Rambam tells us אין אמיתתו כאמיתת אחד מהם. There's no point of resemblance. It's not that we know so much and Hakadosh Baruch Hu so imagine multiplying that by a factor of infinity. And it's not that we're potent, we can do so much and now imagine multiplying that by a factor of infinity and Hakadosh Baruch Hu's omnipotent. And we live so many years and now imagine extending that to infinitely. No, Hakadosh Baruch Hu's reality is entirely different than what the reality of anything and everything else is. A person needs to know Hakadosh Baruch Hu is incorporeal, a person has to know that there's no point of resemblance between anything and Hakadosh Baruch Hu. And third, and maybe this is the most challenging for some, but the Rambam insists that it's something which is universally required, part of the pasuk in Malachi says אני ה' לא שניתי. Hakadosh Baruch Hu is unchanging. That means Hakadosh Baruch Hu doesn't have emotions and Hakadosh Baruch Hu doesn't have moods and Hakadosh Baruch Hu isn't happy one day and he isn't sad the next day. אני ה' לא שניתי. There's no what in the translation the word the Rambam is using is there's no hitpa'aluyos. There's no Hakadosh Baruch Hu is not affected, he's not responding to stimuli. There's no change. That's a function of physicality. What does that mean? It's a little bit hard for us to relate to that. But imagine the following. Maybe this is a little bit of a again obviously anthropomorphic mashal to help us get a handle on that. Let's say a person has two friends and as things happen two When he interacts with them, he's going to have to change, right? The somber sense of solidarity and empathy that he's going to show his friend who's an onen and then will be an avel is obviously not the way that he can is not the way that he's going to be mishtatef in the simcha of his friend who's marrying off a child. So he's going to have to choose, be in one place, not in the other place. He's going to have to shift. When you think about it, when you think about it, being the same all the time is a chisaron in a person because a person is limited. So I'm either rejoicing with someone or I'm commiserating with someone. I can't do both simultaneously. If I'm always the same, that's a chisaron. I'm either on the East Coast with one chaver or I'm on the West Coast with the other chaver. And if I don't go from place to place, if I don't change, that's a chisaron because it means that I'm only I'm only being there for one friend, not for the other friend. The need to change, the need to adapt, the need to shift gears is a response to limitation. But imagine, imagine that I could be in both places simultaneously. Imagine that the person could be simultaneously at one friend's chasana, at the other friend's levaya. And imagine that simultaneously he could empathize with the avelus and be mishtatef in the simcha. Imagine he could do that simultaneously. So there would be no need for him to change, and the fact that he doesn't change doesn't doesn't imply chisaron, it implies perfection. You hear that vossa? Kitzur a maise, maybe just to summarize for today, well, l'sof, maybe we'll add one more point before that. Our belief in Hakadosh Baruch Hu has moral implications, as seen by Avraham Avinu, as reflected in the Rambam's inclusion of Hilchos Deios in Sefer Hamada which deals with ikarei hadas. We believe in a Ribono shel Olam who's totally unique, perfect, incorporeal, and אני ה' לא שניתי and unchanging. Our perspective on our emuna is that our emuna is not only rational but compellingly so. Whether from the tradition of miracles or whether based on looking into creation. So our perspective on emuna is that our emuna is not only rational but compellingly so. The phrase which you might have heard that one of the umos ha'olam once said that I believe because it's absurd is... Whether one is in the role of learning or one is in the role of teaching, despite the fact that again our belief is compelling, you can't compel a person to believe. A person can't ask to be forced to believe; as a talmid and as a rebbe, we have to know that a person cannot force someone else to believe. And the kushya hashlishis is as follows. On the one hand, again, the basis for emunah is compelling. But m'idach gisa, you can't force someone to believe. Why is that? Because the Ribbono shel Olam created the world that he wants us to have bechira chofshis. And he gave us bechira chofshis to be able to deny the truth also. If we didn't have a capacity to deny truth, so then there would be no bechira chofshis when it comes to emunah. HaKadosh Baruch Hu wills that the definition of the person be that a person is a ba'al bechira, which means that if a person's a ba'al bechira, that means he has to be a ba'al bechira even when it comes to truth. He has to be a ba'al bechira to be able to deny truth. That's why we also have a capacity for self-deception. It's part of being a ba'al bechira. A person can always choose not to believe. He doesn't have to make a leap of faith to believe. There's compelling reason to believe, but a person does have to be willing to believe. He does have to be open to it; he does have to be receptive to truth. If a person wants to, so then kol ruchos shebaolam cannot—you cannot coerce a person into belief. There's always a cynical pretext that a person can avail himself of not to believe, and that has to be available in order for us to be ba'alei bechira even in the realm of emunah. Where's the line? Should we speak in terms of emunah, should we speak in terms of yediah? Which is the correct? We know with conviction and compelling reason there's a Ribbono shel Olam. We know with conviction and compelling reasons that the Ribbono shel Olam gave us the Torah. One doesn't need emunah in the sense of, again, faith which isn't rooted in knowledge; one doesn't need emunah for that. We know that. By definition, we can't and never will understand everything HaKadosh Baruch Hu does. And that's where a person based on his yediah is called upon to have emunah. Why is it that by definition we can't and never will understand everything HaKadosh Baruch Hu says? Rav Chaim says that even when Moshiach comes, it's not true that in retrospect we'll now understand everything HaKadosh Baruch Hu did. דרכי הקדוש ברוך הוא will remain to a degree nistarim and inscrutable. And that's true for two reasons. The simpler of the two to understand is the following. Take the following mashal. You have parents with a two-year-old child. If the parents will limit themselves to doing for the child what the child can understand and appreciate, so what that means is that they'll be parenting on the level of a two-year-old intelligence. So the two-year-old doesn't understand why he needs shots. The two-year-old doesn't understand why he can't have four cups of ice cream for breakfast every day. And if parents will only do what's intelligible and therefore amenable to the two-year-old, so practically what that means is that instead of parenting according to their mature, developed intelligence, so they'll be abdicating responsibility and they'll be parenting according to the undeveloped, immature understanding of a two-year-old. To imagine that we could ever understand everything HaKadosh Baruch Hu does would be to limit HaKadosh Baruch Hu and to assume that instead of HaKadosh Baruch Hu governing and steering the world based on his חכמה שאין לה ערוך ואין לה קץ, so he should be steering the world based on on what we, the daas kalos, can understand, which is ludicrous to think that such a thing should be or would be. There is a second reason, though, also, which cuts even deeper as to why it has to be that there are things that are going to happen in the world that are inscrutable and they in no way shake belief in HaKadosh Baruch Hu. Part of HaKadosh Baruch Hu's—when the Rambam says אין אמיתתו כאמיתת אחד מהם—that HaKadosh Baruch Hu's reality is totally different and totally other and totally unique. So he then repeats the same idea that the way HaKadosh Baruch Hu—what knowledge means for HaKadosh Baruch Hu is not the same as what knowledge means for us.

אינו יודע בדעה שהיא חוץ ממנו כמו שאנו יודעים שאין אנו ודעתנו אחד אבל הבורא הוא ודעתו וחייו אחד מכל צד ומכל פינה.

So without trying to even translate those words, HaKadosh Baruch Hu knows in a different sense and in a different way than we know. Which means that the reality that we perceive is not the reality that HaKadosh Baruch Hu perceives. A totally, totally inadequate mashal is the following: let's say you have two people, one of them is colorblind, rachmana litzlan, and the other one isn't. The one who's not colorblind, so he's driving; the guy who's colorblind is behind him. The one with the full vision, so he sees the light changes to yellow as he's approaching an intersection, and it's a judgment call whether he should try to get through or whether he should slam on the brakes. He slams on the brakes. The guy behind him goes right into him and starts yelling at him, "What are you doing? Why did you stop so abruptly and so suddenly for no rhyme or reason?" The guy in front perceived a different reality than the guy behind him. Because the guy behind him is colorblind, because he doesn't perceive the same reality as the one in front, so he can't understand and therefore can't expect to understand everything that the guy in front of him is going to do. That's a little bit of a very, very inadequate mashal. Okay, maybe we'll stop here for today. The inyanim that we're trying to discuss are so important, and correct understanding and clarity is so important that if anything is unclear, so I would very much appreciate if you come over and please tell me or you can email, and when we, be'ezras Hashem, next week I will try to clarify if, chas v'shalom, anything didn't come across the way it was intended. I would very much appreciate the feedback.