Monthly Archives: November 2014

So we’re told that this root — i.e., the interactions of MaH and Ban — cannot be revealed, which is why it will also be referred to as Radlah, i.e., Reisha d’La Ityada, “The Unfathomable Head” [1]. It can’t be revealed because it’s rooted in God’s “hidden agenda” [2]. In fact, Divine governance is entirety dependent on its being concealed, for when it’s concealed people engage in their affairs out of free will while God carries out His own hidden agenda in the background which is based on His foreknowledge. As such, it’s the concealment itself that allows for Tikkun, i.e., the revelation of God’s Yichud.

Accordingly, there is on one hand the overt order that God Himself displays which involves the order of Atzilut with its various Partzufim Erich, Abbah, Imma, Zeir Anpin, and Nukveh which are all rooted in free will, right and wrong and the like, while on the other hand there’s the concealed root i.e., Radlah that’s based on the fact that MaH is conjoined with BaN, which is covert and rooted in Divine foreknowledge [3].

So we now have a deeper understanding of Ramchal’s viewpoint on free will versus foreknowledge. It comes to this.

Footnote:

[1]       See Petachim 85-89 below especially for more on this.

[2]       Ramchal is commenting here on the fact that, as is shown in Eitz Chaim (Sha’ar Attik, Ch. 1), the layout of the interplay of MaH and BaN is decidedly neither linear nor straightforward, and he explains that as indicating the hidden inexplicable Divine agenda. See his own comments here for more on this.

[3] See 1:4 above for a discussion of the two agendas,

(c) 2014 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman

Feel free to contact me at feldman@torah.org

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AT LONG LAST! Rabbi Feldman’s translation of Maimonides’ “Eight Chapters” is available here at a discount.

You can still purchase a copy of Rabbi Feldman’s translation of “The Gates of Repentance” here at a discount as well.

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

Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes on www.torah.org entitled “Spiritual Excellence” and “Ramchal”.

Petach 81 expands on yet transcends the previous one and states that the aforementioned phenomenon of the conjunction of MaH and BaN — that functions in Attik we mustn’t forget — is truly the root of God’s governance of the universe.

The Petach will go on to say that there are two sorts of Divine governance: an open-and-aboveboard overt sort, and a behind-the-scenes covert one. Given that this section is entitled “The Source of (Divine) Covert Governance”, we’ll obviously be concentrating on the latter.

This covert type of governance plays itself out in the complex interactions of the arcane MaH and BaN elements of the Partzufim, while the overt sort takes place within the Partzufim themselves: in the governance found in Atzilut (though it too is rooted in and  ultimately “takes its orders from” the covert governance). This touches on the apparent contradiction between foreknowledge and free will we spoke of above.

(c) 2014 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman

Feel free to contact me at feldman@torah.org

———————————————————-

AT LONG LAST! Rabbi Feldman’s translation of Maimonides’ “Eight Chapters” is available here at a discount.

You can still purchase a copy of Rabbi Feldman’s translation of “The Gates of Repentance” here at a discount as well.

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

Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes on www.torah.org entitled “Spiritual Excellence” and “Ramchal”.

In any event, the Petach ends quite straightforwardly with: in the end it will be understood that all of this served to bring about the overall perfection through the manifestation of the mystical phenomenon of God’s Yichud.

(c) 2014 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman
Feel free to contact me at feldman@torah.org

———————————————————-

AT LONG LAST! Rabbi Feldman’s translation of Maimonides’ “Eight Chapters” is available here at a discount.

You can still purchase a copy of Rabbi Feldman’s translation of “The Gates of Repentance” here at a discount as well.

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

Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes on www.torah.org entitled “Spiritual Excellence” and “Ramchal”.

Ramchal’s statement above that this phenomenon — the fact that all … defects … are rooted in BaN; that all … repairs … are rooted in the conjunction of MaH and BaN; and that everything that was and will be is rooted there too … — is tied into the mystical notion of God’s foreknowledge versus human free will comes to this, in his own words.

He says about this in his comments to the Petach itself simply that “God peers (with His foreknowledge) into all that will happen in the future (as a consequence of man’s acts of free will) and based on that He sets in place all the repairs that would be needed for that all in this (conjunction of MaH and BaN)”.

That’s simply a statement to the effect that whatever apparent conflict there’d be between God’s foreknowledge and our acts of free will eventually be resolved in the mechanism that is the conjunction of MaH and BaN. But he’ll explain more in later Petachim as we’ll see.

(c) 2014 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman
Feel free to contact me at feldman@torah.org

———————————————————-

AT LONG LAST! Rabbi Feldman’s translation of Maimonides’ “Eight Chapters” is available here at a discount.

You can still purchase a copy of Rabbi Feldman’s translation of “The Gates of Repentance” here at a discount as well.

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

Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes on www.torah.org entitled “Spiritual Excellence” and “Ramchal”.

There’s an apparent paradoxical relationship between God’s foreknowledge and our free will, as we’ll soon see. A number of explanations have been offered about it by the Medieval thinkers, the Kabbalists, Chassidim, and others, but nearly all of them hearken back to Rambam’s (either explaining it or arguing for or against it), so we’ll present Rambam’s own comments and explain it. He says in Hilchot Teshuvah 5:5:

“Perhaps you’ll then say, ‘Isn’t it true that God knows everything beforehand? [It follows then that] He’d either know if someone will be righteous or wrongful or He wouldn’t. [Accordingly,] if He knows that someone will be righteous, then that person can’t not be righteous, whereas if you claim that even if He knows a person will be righteous that person could be wrongful [anyway], then [you’re saying that] God wouldn’t have known something fully [from the first, which is absurd]’.

“Understand that the response to that is as boundless as the earth and as wide as the sea and that many fundamental principles and lofty mountains are suspended upon it. But just know and understand what I’m about to tell you.

“As we explained in the second chapter of Hilchot Yesodei HaTorah, God doesn’t know with a knowledge that’s external to Him as does man, whose knowledge is separate from his being.  God and His knowledge are one [and the same], which is something humankind can never fully understand.

“For just as we can never hope to fully understand God’s Essence, as it’s written: ‘No man can see [or grasp] Me and yet live’ (Exodus 33:20), so too can we never hope to fully understand or grasp God’s knowledge. The prophet referred to this when he said: ‘For My thoughts are not your thoughts, and your ways are not My ways, says God’ (Isaiah 55:8). Since this is so, we consequently don’t have the power to understand how God can know all created beings and their actions.

“But know without a doubt that man’s actions are in his own hands, and that God neither impels nor decrees what he’s to do or not do… “ [1].

In short, God does indeed know what you’re going to do before you do, yet you’re free to do as you will at that moment. Don’t be confused by the seeming contradiction inherent to that, as in fact God’s knowledge isn’t what you think it is. Thinking you understand God’s knowledge would have you infer that you’re impelled to follow what He knows you will do, but disregard that logical leap: you simply have no point of reference when it comes to God Himself of His knowledge. Simply accept the tradition that you’re free to act as you will, which is a reference you can accept as air-tight.

Note:

[1]       Also see Moreh Nevuchim 3:20 and Sh’mone P’rakim Ch. 8.

(c) 2014 Rabbi Yaakov Feldman
Feel free to contact me at feldman@torah.org

———————————————————-

AT LONG LAST! Rabbi Feldman’s translation of Maimonides’ “Eight Chapters” is available here at a discount.

You can still purchase a copy of Rabbi Feldman’s translation of “The Gates of Repentance” here at a discount as well.

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

Rabbi Feldman also offers two free e-mail classes on www.torah.org entitled “Spiritual Excellence” and “Ramchal”.