{"id":123,"date":"2013-08-20T05:45:23","date_gmt":"2013-08-20T14:15:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/derechhashem.wordpress.com\/?p=123"},"modified":"2013-08-20T05:45:23","modified_gmt":"2013-08-20T14:15:23","slug":"derech-hashem-122","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/2013\/08\/20\/derech-hashem-122\/","title":{"rendered":"Derech Hashem 1:2:2"},"content":{"rendered":"

The class is still not posted on torah.org, I\u2019m afraid.<\/em><\/p>\n

Derech Hashem 1:2:2<\/p>\n

We come upon a most astounding fact of Divine intent and human purpose here. Ramchal declares that it was G-d’s intent that the recipients of His goodness — that we — be personally responsible<\/i> for His benevolence rather than just passive recipients of it!<\/p>\n

That’s to say, we’re to earn it rather than inherit it or “get it in the mail” so to speak — to be proactive in our growth and ascent, initiators of our own spiritual well-being, and we\u2019re to use our freely made decisions to do good things in order to earn G-d\u2019s favor [1]. Otherwise, Ramchal adds, G-d’s goodness would be flawed on some level, when we learned that G-d wanted to grant us perfect goodness [2].<\/p>\n

He then goes on to point out that by indeed making use of our free will and playing an active role in our own growth, we thus achieve something<\/i> of G-d’s perfection, and become closer to Him accordingly.<\/p>\n

That is, we ourselves thus become free agents like Him. Now, there\u2019s a whole order of difference between our free will and His, to be sure. Ours had to be implanted in us by G-d, while His is inherent. And we\u2019re only free to make ethical and mitzvah-based choices (i.e., we can\u2019t decide to fly for example, or disappear, etc.) which does indeed have a profound effect upon the course of things here and beyond, but it nonetheless doesn\u2019t compare to G-d\u2019s absolute freedom of choice.<\/p>\n

Nonetheless the fact that only we humans and G-d are free agents — while angels, animals, vegetables, minerals, etc. are not — points to a unique kinship between G-d and ourselves. And it enables us to be holy and righteous, and to derive credit for having made the right choices.<\/p>\n

G-d thus created a system of achieving either perfection or settling for flaws (by doing right or wrong things) [3]; a being who\u2019d be able to choose either option (i.e., ourselves); and a system to achieve perfection or accrue flaws (i.e., the mitzvah system thanks to which we achieve a degree of perfection by following through on the positive mitzvot or we accrue flaws by engaging in prohibitions). And He thus granted us the means to be free agents and thus emulate Him to a degree, and to attach onto His presence and fully enjoy His benevolence.<\/p>\n

Notes:<\/p>\n

[1] \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 See Ramchal\u2019s Da\u2019at Tevunot<\/i> 18,\u00a0 Klallei<\/i> Pitchei Chochma v\u2019Da\u2019at<\/i> 1, Kinat Hashem Tziva\u2019ot<\/i>, Klach Pitchei Chochma<\/i> 4, and Adir<\/i> Bamarom<\/i> p. 393. Also see Emunot v\u2019De\u2019ot<\/i> (introduction to Ch. 3); Zohar 2, 163b; Pardes<\/i> 2:5:3, and Ari\u2019s Likutei Torah<\/i>, Ha\u2019azinu<\/i>, p. 28.<\/p>\n

Our free will is to be discussed again in 1:2:4 and in some depth is the 3rd<\/sup> chapter of his section.<\/p>\n

[2] \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 See 1:2:1 for G-d\u2019s utter and perfect benevolence.<\/p>\n

But, why would G-d\u2019s benevolence be less-than-perfect if we weren\u2019t free agents? While Ramchal doesn\u2019t explain it here, he does in some of the other works cited in note 1. He says that if we were granted out-and-out charity we\u2019d experience what\u2019s termed \u201cthe bread of shame\u201d (based on the statement in T.J. Orlah<\/i> 1:3 that \u201cOne who eats something that isn\u2019t his own [i.e. that he himself didn\u2019t earn] is ashamed to look in his [benefactor\u2019s] face\u201d; also see Tosephot<\/i> on Kiddushin<\/i> 36b, Ritvah<\/i> on Rosh Hashanah 9b, and R\u2019 Yoseph Karo\u2019s Magid Maisharim<\/i>, Breishit<\/i>, 14 Tevet<\/i>).<\/p>\n

The point is that we\u2019re to proudly and justifiably earn our reward rather than receive it shamefacedly as charity. Otherwise G-d\u2019s generosity would be malevolent to a degree rather than wholly benevolent.<\/p>\n

Ramchal defines \u201cshame\u201d in Adir<\/i> Bamarom<\/i> p. 252 as the experience of perceiving something as either being above oneself or beneath him: see his remarks there.<\/p>\n

[3]\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 This begins to explain why there\u2019s wrong and injustice in the world. The subject of wrong comes up in very many places in Ramchal\u2019s writings including but certainly not limited to Klach Pitchei Chochma<\/i> 30, 33, 37, 44, 45, 47, 53, 63, 83, and 108; Da\u2019at<\/i> Tevunot<\/i> 96-133; and below in 1:2:5, 1:3:6, 1:5:7-9, 3:2:8, 4:1:3, 4:4:1,9, and 4:9:1.<\/p>\n

(c) 2013 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman<\/p>\n

Feel free to contact me at feldman@torah.org<\/a><\/p>\n

———————————————————-<\/p>\n

AT LONG LAST! Rabbi Feldman’s translation of Maimonides’ “Eight Chapters” is available here<\/a> at a discount.<\/p>\n

You can still purchase a copy of Rabbi Feldman’s translation of “The Gates of Repentance” here<\/a> at a discount as well.<\/p>\n

Rabbi Yaakov Feldman has also translated and commented upon “The Path of the Just” and “The Duties of the Heart” (Jason Aronson Publishers).<\/p>\n

Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes on www.torah.org entitled “Spiritual Excellence<\/a>\u201d and \u201cRamchal<\/a>\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The class is still not posted on torah.org, I\u2019m afraid. Derech Hashem 1:2:2 We come upon a most astounding fact of Divine intent and human purpose here. Ramchal declares that it was G-d’s intent that the recipients of His goodness … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2,3,4,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-123","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-jewish-thought","category-kabbalah","category-ramchal","category-torah"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7iqof-1Z","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=123"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/123\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=123"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=123"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=123"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}