{"id":204,"date":"2014-03-13T05:09:49","date_gmt":"2014-03-13T13:39:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/derechhashem.wordpress.com\/?p=204"},"modified":"2014-03-13T05:09:49","modified_gmt":"2014-03-13T13:39:49","slug":"derech-hashem-139","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/2014\/03\/13\/derech-hashem-139\/","title":{"rendered":"Derech Hashem 1:3:9"},"content":{"rendered":"

The class can be found here<\/a>.<\/p>\n

1:3:9<\/span><\/p>\n

Our having to experience death — and the universe itself having to go through a form of it too — is also due to Adam and Eve\u2019s sin. For neither any one person nor the universe in its entirety can attain perfection while wrongfulness prevails over goodness as it does now. That state of affairs has to be transcended through (each individual\u2019s) death and (the universe\u2019s) destruction [1].<\/p>\n

It\u2019s also true that the soul can\u2019t purify a body [2] until it\u2019s first separated from it at death and the body decomposes. Only then can a new edifice [3] that can achieve perfection be set up. That explains the need for The Resurrection of the Dead, and for the eventual destruction of the physical universe and its own \u201cresurrection\u201d in the course of the seventh millennium [4].<\/p>\n

Notes:<\/p>\n

[1]\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Ramchal is clearly drawing an analogy between the body-soul combination and the universe. But, what is the universe\u2019s \u201csoul\u201d? There\u2019s a rather erudite answer to that which is far beyond our concerns here, put let\u2019s offer a short explanation here.<\/p>\n

We depicted how the Kabbalists describe the pre-creation stages (see our first note of 1:3:8). The point here is that at a certain moment G-d then projected a \u201cline\u201d of His Being back downward toward what would eventually be the space within which the universe would be created so as to animate it. That \u201cline\u201d (kav<\/i> in Hebrew) is the soul of the universe, as it animates the universe and gives it \u201clife\u201d. Ramchal speaks about this in a number of places: see Klach Pitchei Chochma<\/i> 27-29 and Klallim Rishonim<\/i> 6 for example.<\/p>\n

[2]\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 See 1:3:7 above.<\/p>\n

[3]\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I.e., a new combination of body and soul.<\/p>\n

[4]\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 See Sanhedrin<\/i> 97 a-b as well as Rosh Hashanah<\/i> 31a; also see Ramchal\u2019s Ma\u2019amar<\/i> HaIkkurim<\/i> (\u201cb\u2019Geulah<\/i>\u201d and \u201cb\u2019Gemul<\/i>\u201d), Adir Bamarom<\/i> (p. 188), Da\u2019at Tevunot<\/i> 92, and Klallim Rishonim<\/i> 9 for a full explication of the events involved.<\/p>\n

(c) 2014 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman<\/span><\/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 can be found here. 1:3:9 Our having to experience death — and the universe itself having to go through a form of it too — is also due to Adam and Eve\u2019s sin. For neither any one person … 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-204","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-3i","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204","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=204"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/derechhashem\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}