{"id":547,"date":"2011-03-30T11:18:36","date_gmt":"2011-03-30T15:18:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ramchal.wordpress.com\/?p=547"},"modified":"2011-03-30T11:18:36","modified_gmt":"2011-03-30T15:18:36","slug":"ramchals-final-words-on-reward-and-punishment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/2011\/03\/30\/ramchals-final-words-on-reward-and-punishment\/","title":{"rendered":"Ramchal\u2019s final words on reward and punishment"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ramchal offers a fundamental statement at a number of junctures, which is that everything is heading toward one thing alone: \u201c(universal) rectification … (and) universal perfection\u201d (comments to Petach<\/em> 69, also see Da\u2019at Tevunot <\/em>47, 170 and elsewhere). That\u2019s to say, everything is contributing toward the aforementioned revelation of God\u2019s Yichud<\/em>.<\/p>\n

But he then raises the point that that seems \u201cto contradict reward and punishment, and free will\u201d (Da\u2019at Tevunot<\/em> 44). After all, if universal perfection is sure to come about, come what may, what then do our actions matter?<\/p>\n

So he goes on to offer that there are various and many ways of bringing universal perfection about, many of which are unfathomable to us (Da\u2019at Tevunot<\/em>, 170), but that at bottom it will surely come about; in the meanwhile, though, the system of reward and punishment, which \u201cis (God\u2019s) overt form of governance\u201d, does indeed play itself out in the world (Ibid.). In the end, though, \u201cthe governing system of (i.e., that will eventually bring about universal) rectification will eventuate\u201d. But it will follow on the heels of \u201cthe ways of reward and punishment\u201d (Ibid., and Da\u2019at Tevunot<\/em> 53), which functions in the meanwhile (Ibid., 56).<\/p>\n

According to Ramchal, then, that\u2019s to say that there are two systems at play at the very same time: the overt<\/em> one of reward and punishment (i.e., of universal progression and regression, depending on our moral and spiritual standing), and the covert<\/em> one of oncoming perfection (i.e., of universal progression, come what may). It\u2019s nonetheless true that the two systems interact, as he\u2019ll go on to explain later on in Klach Pitchei Chochma<\/em>; so our moral and spiritual standings do<\/em> matter.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s return to the Sephirot<\/em> now.<\/p>\n

(c) 2011 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":"

Ramchal offers a fundamental statement at a number of junctures, which is that everything is heading toward one thing alone: \u201c(universal) rectification … (and) universal perfection\u201d (comments to Petach 69, also see Da\u2019at Tevunot 47, 170 and elsewhere). That\u2019s to … 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":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-547","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/547","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=547"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/547\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=547"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=547"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rabbiyaakovfeldman.aishdas.org\/ramchal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=547"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}