Mishlei 2:5- Yirah & Chochmo, Binah & Da’as

Good morning rabbosai, hope everyone's well. We're trying to work our way through the Gaon on Posuk Hey here. Posuk Hey, אז תבין יראת ה' ודעת אלקים תמצא. So so far the Gaon again as as background to explaining our posuk is commenting on the Mishna in Avos of

אם אין יראה אין חכמה אם אין חכמה אין יראה.

That's one sort of symbiotic relationship between yira and chochma. And the second is

אם אין דעת אין בינה אם אין בינה אין דעת.

So we tried to understand a little bit yesterday the Gaon's explanation for that relationship between yira and chochma that the most elementary form of yira is the impetus for seeking and thus acquiring chochma. But the real expression of yira is when a person acts with yiras shamayim, is when he has yiras cheit, and אין בור ירא חטא. If a person doesn't know, if if a person doesn't have the the knowledge base, he he can't he can't actualize the yira, he can't implement the yira, and in that sense אם אין חכמה אין יראה. It's interesting, I don't know, it's confusing, but in this context, v'zehu shene'emar והבור ריק אין בו מים ואין בו ירא חטא. Excuse me, let's actually go back one line earlier rabbosai. ואם אין חכמה אף שיהיה לו יראה. So a person has an impetus, he he he wants to be, he he feels a sense of yiras Hashem. But but if there's no chochma is eino klum. כי יראה לית לה מגרמיה כלום. Yira is not self-sufficient. Like on on its own, it it it can't translate, it doesn't translate. v'zeh shene'emar והבור ריק אין בו מים ואין בו ירא חטא. So now comes a line which is l'chora confusing rabbosai. כי היראה אינו רק אוצר לחכמה. So what do those words mean? So they seem to me to mean that the yira is the is the is the treasury where chochma is stored, right? The yira is the is the is the is the vault and and and the chochma is is what is secured in in in the vault. kemo shene'emar יראת ה' היא אוצרו. dehainu shehayira noldes meihachochma. That yira comes about because of chochma,

אם אין חכמה אין יראה. לכך אם אין חכמה אין יראה.

But how is that the same as saying יראת ה' היא אוצרו? No, יראת ה' היא אוצרו on the contrary seems to say that the... that the yira is just there as a prop for the chochmah, but אם אין חכמה אין ירא says on the contrary that the yira is what's building on the chochmah. So how does yira building on the chochmah correspond to the posuk of יראת ה' היא אוצרו? The question is clear, rabosai? So I'm not sure, but maybe what it means is as follows: Let's say you're I don't know, you're Mr. Morgan, or you're Mr. Chase, or you're Mr. Morgan Chase, and you're building a building for your bank. So you first put up the building. So at this point, the building isn't really a bank. The building is really an empty shell. If there are no accounts and there's no supply of silver and gold in the vaults, so the building is really just an empty shell. It's something that now allows you to have the substance of a bank, the services of a bank, and once you'll have those services of the bank, so then that also transforms the building. And maybe that's what the Gaon means that יראת ה' היא אוצרו, that the Yiras Hashem becomes the otzar, it's not just that it's the building, it becomes the repository of chochmah in the sense it's how the chochmah translates. It's how the chochmah is implemented. The same way that an empty shell is transformed into something once you have the tochen. This goes the posuk goes further than the moshel. And maybe that's what it means that שהיראה נולדת מהחכמה means that יראת ה' היא אוצרו means it's not only, again here the nimshal goes much further than the moshel. It's not only that this is sort of the vault in which you store the chochmah, that Yiras Hashem is a vault in which you store the chochmah, but Yiras Hashem is the repository, it's where the chochmah becomes embodied. It's where the chochmah translates. A person, again let's take the example in terms of halacha. So a person learns Hilchos Sukkah. Okay, but then when Sukkos comes and through the person's Yiras Hashem that את האלהים ירא ואת מצותיו שמור, then the person implements it. So now the Yiras Hashem is serving as the otzar in the sense of the repository, the embodiment, the application of the chochmah. Okay, now, so then the Gaon also quoted the Mishna of

אם אין דעת אין בינה אם אין בינה אין דעת.

Okay, this is also just rather challenging to understand here. והדעת נמשך מבינה. So the Gaon is now commenting on

אם אין בינה אין דעת. שאם תהיה לו בינה אז אין מיוותר לו שום דבר מהחכמה. ואז אפשר לו לידע חכמה ובינה על בוריה כפי השגתו. אולם אם אין לו בינה אי אפשר לו לידע על בוריה כי יש דברים מסופקים הרבה וזהו אם אין בינה אין דעת.

On the other hand, im ein da'as. שאינו משיג החוכמה והבינה על בורייה, ein binah, כי הם דברים סתומים לו. Binah, again, is the davar mitoch davar. Whether the davar mitoch davar is in the example the Gaon gave us earlier, the pasuk min hatzon to understand what the miyut of min hatzon is, but just using that as an example. So the emes is that the binah, without the binah you don't really understand the chochma because there's something extra here, there's something that isn't fully accounted for, there's something that you can't process. It's sort of משל למה הדבר דומה, maybe some other mashal, maybe it's just saying the same thing that let's say you're learning a Rashi. So the words in the Rashi are the chochma. But Rashi, it seems like he's being ma'arich too much. So you don't really have the chochma. When you figure out what there's a difficulty that Rashi's dealing with, which is again that's the analog to the binah in the sense that you're figuring out something that's between the lines or something, it's only in light of that that the lines themselves then make sense. Right? You have an arichus in Rashi that seems out of place, you have an arichus in the Rambam that seems out of place. So basically, even until—I'm sorry about that, I don't know what happened there. So that's where the Gaon says אם אין בינה אין דעת. When you don't have the insight of binah, when you can't account for the min hatzon or something, so you don't even have, the truth is you don't really have the basic da'as, you don't have the basic understanding, you don't really have the basic chochma either. However, im ein da'as שאינו משיג החוכמה והבינה על בורייה, ein binah, כי הם דברים סתומים לו. So again, how is this not circular? So lochora as follows: when you, maybe this is the way to think of it, rabbosai, when you have a whole which consists of many parts, so on the one hand you can't know the whole without knowing the parts. Right? Before you can know the whole, you have to know the constituent parts. Im ein binah is ein da'as. But m'idach gisa, you don't really understand each of the parts fully until you can see it in the context of the whole. So again, it's similar to the

אם אין יראה אין חכמה אם אין חכמה אין יראה.

We're talking about two levels of yira and that's how it's not circular. There's yira as again a yiras shamayim, but a yiras shamayim which... is almost sterile because it doesn't know on its own how to translate, how to express itself, but it gives an impetus for chochma and then the chochma allows it to translate. It instructs it on how to translate. So too אם אין בינה אין דעת. If I don't have the chochma and then the bina, so then I can't have the da'as to see the whole. If I don't see the pasuk of tzon and min hatzon and know what this is and what the mi'ut is, so then I can't see the whole. But it's only once I see the whole that I can really understand the parts because part of the definition of the part is how it relates to other things. Right? And you think about that in any body of knowledge, it's like that. You have to know what the each part of the cell is. You can't know what a cell is unless you know what each part of a cell is. Okay, so I need to know the parts, I need to know the bina, I need the chochma and bina. And then that gives me the da'as to understand what a cell is. Then in the context of what a cell is, then I really understand what each of the what each of the parts is because I can understand it in terms of its function and interaction and interrelatedness, because that's part of what that's an element of what each prat is. In order to know the klal, you have to know the prat. But the emes is it's only once you can see the prat in the context of the klal, once you know the klal and you can see the prat in the context of the klal, that you can understand the pratim. ואם אין דעת, that's ואם אין דעת שאינו משיג החכמה והבינה על בוריה, when you have the klal, when you have this more of a panoramic view. ואם אין דעת שאינו משיג החכמה והבינה על בוריה, ein bina. You don't really understand the parts כי הם דברים סתומים לו. Sort of like saying again another example, another illustration of this. A person can't understand Torah without knowing individual sugyas in Torah. A person has to learn Maseches Brachos, has to learn Maseches Shabbos. A person can't if you don't have the pratim, you don't have the klal. Im ein bina is ein da'as. But mi'idach gisa, a person doesn't really fully understand Maseches Brachos or Maseches Shabbos unless he can see it in the context of kol hatorah kullah. And in that sense it's אם אין דעת אין בינה. So again, and that's how it's not circular, but because we're talking about understanding it on two different levels, the same way we're talking about yiras Hashem on two different levels. Vezhu shene'emar, now why is the Gaon talking about all this? What's the Mishna in Avos, how does it relate to us? So the Gaon says no, vezhu shene'emar because if you juxtapose our pasuk with a pasuk later in Mishlei, so you'll see that the psukim are expressing these this bidirectional connection. תחלת חכמה יראת ה' ודעת קדשים בינה. So תחלת חכמה יראת ה' means the foundation for chochma, right, the beginning, the foundation for chochma is yiras Hashem because אם אין יראה אין חכמה. And for that matter da'as kedoshim bina, that the da'as which the, I think in the note it says kedoshim are the malachim, or he's going to say it here, the da'as comes from bina. Da'as is attained mitoch bina. אם אין בינה אין דעת. If I don't know all the pratim, I don't have any kind of klalius'dike understanding either. So that's the pasuk later. However here, vekan kasuv behefech, etzel yira bina, דהיינו תבין יראת ה', over here it's im ein chochma is ein yira, right, im ein chochma and bina is ein yira. Here it's the other half of that relationship. Ve'etzel da'as chochma veda'as elokim timtza which reflects through the da'as so then timtza chochma. אם אין דעת אין בינה כי מציאה היא מאין vezehu bechochma. So through the da'as elokim so only then do you really understand all the pratim, all the initial chochma. Zehu bechochma shene'emar vehachochma me'ayin timatze. Okay, maybe we'll stop here for now. So bli neder im yirtze hashem we'll resume with pesachim around 12:30 or so. Okay, have a good productive morning everyone, be well, be safe, im yirtze hashem.