Presenting a Clinic in how NOT to do Parshanus haMiqra last week DovBear pondered the Mitzvah of אהבת השי"ת= loving G-d. He began with a legitimate albeit hey pey question, one that was famously posed by the Ibn Ezra on the tenth commandment. How can G-d legislate emotions? It is understandable that there should be commandments governing our actions, speech and even thought But how can I be commanded how or what to feel?Dovie makes his first fatal error in resolving this question by turning to an ancient Assyrian Document. What is stated in the document and how it “answers” the question is something I will bl”n address later in the post. But for a Jewish mind and neshama looking first and foremost to Academia and ANE culture for an understanding in Torah would be laughable were it not so lamentable. The sadness is most profound as the post considers the meaning of not any old particular mitzvah among the TarYa”g but, arguably, the greatest mitzvah of them all, and among the few that can serve as the underpinning of all the rest.
Lashon Qodesh is muvdal qualitatively from all other languages. It is the language of prophecy, of revelation of creation itself. The first mans genius was expressed by his ability to intuit the proper Lashon Qodesh word for the בעלי חי-ים =animals, himself, his Creator and his helpmeet. If words in other languages bear similarity to those in Lashon Qodesh it is because the former was the universal language of mankind prior to the haflogah and presumably some residue of Lashon Qodesh remains in the 70 basic leshonos. But when making etymological comparisons one must never confuse the chicken with the egg nor forget that a chicken is alive whereas the egg represents a mere potential for life.
Torah and Mitzvos are muvdal qualitatively from all other disciplines and legal codes. Even when external similarity, to the point of identity, appears to obtain between a particular din of the Torah and a law of human invention we disallow being adjudicated under the latter
מַגִּיד דְּבָרָו לְיַעֲקֹב; חֻקָּיו וּמִשְׁפָּטָיו, לְיִשְׂרָאֵל.
He declareth His word unto Jacob, His statutes and His ordinances unto Israel.
לֹא עָשָׂה כֵן, לְכָל-גּוֹי-- וּמִשְׁפָּטִים בַּל-יְדָעוּם:הַלְלוּ-יָהּ.
He hath not dealt so with any nation; and as for His ordinances, they have not known them. (cp first Rashi in Parshas Mishpatim.)
We can never hope to apprehend the meaning of Torah unless we first turn to the bearers of the Mesorah who were plugged into the Sinai-given methodology for interpretation and who were acutely sensitive to the Qedusha and Havdala of the Torah.
The Rambam provides two paths to achieving Ahavas haShem; studying Torah and contemplating nature. In both cases the love begins with the spark of affinity one develops for a great author or artist when swept away by the beauty and truth of their works. Why such an approach would not resonate with DovBear and the cubbies is painfully obvious. Having accepted human, nay LATE human authorship of wide swaths of the Torah even if one is moved to ecstasy by Torah study there is now a disconnect between the Torah and it's true Author-the מלמד תורה לעמו ישראל. Having posited evolution as a fact and not as a theory many degrees of separation intervene between the בורא עולם and the עולמות that He created. I’d hardly be as big a fan of Mozart were I to discover that he’d only composed a five note basic melody for eine kleine nachtmusik but that the full orchestration was the collaborative work of a team of musicians spread out over decades or centuries.
The Ramban says that אהבה= the love of G-d is the underpinning of all מצוות עשה=positive commandments and that יראה = the awe of G-d is the underpinning of all מצוות לא עשה =negative commandments. And as love is the greater of the two modes of relating to G-d, in cases of conflict עשה דוחה לא תעשה =positive commands supersede negative commands. The Alter Rebbe (HT for correction to Not Brisk Yeshivish) explained that the Ramban is not describing psychological motivations for performance but rather the spiritual dynamic involved. Love is expansive and awe is contractive.
As G-d and His love are infinite any finite metaphor or allegory that we use to explain it will, of course, be inadequate. In Torah law and lore Yisrael’s love of G-d is, by turns, compared to that of a child for a parent, a sister for a brother or a wife/lover for a husband. When writing about the love of G-d the Rambam compares it to the obsessive, all-consuming, infatuation a lovelorn man has for a radiant woman.
The Rambam also writes that conscious erotic thoughts reside only in the hearts of Am ha’Aratzim, hearts that are devoid of Torah.
Per Khazal the love of G-d compels us to lay down our very lives rather than worship false deities yet only compels us to part with our property to avoid transgression of other sins. Per the Poskim the love of G-d prohibits us from kissing our children or anything other than a Torah Scroll in a synagogue. When pondering the meaning of the Mitzvah to love HaShem why didn’t Dovie turn to any and all of THESE Qeduhsa infused sources?
And now it’s time to set a well-deserved match to the house of straw that DovBear built. The very approach that the Assyrian document has any bearing at all on the definition of a Torah word is predicated on...
A. The notion that the word is a period based idiom addressed only to it’s “original audience” and thus has little or no relationship to contemporary meanings that we attach to the word “love” and that
B. Devarim is of later and separate authorship than the rest of the Torah.
Both these postulates are an anathema to שלומי אמוני ישראל who believe in...
A. Divine authorship of ALL the khumashim presented either megillah megillah or khasumah to K’lal Yisrael before they crossed the Yarden and
B. That the Torah is addressed to all generations of Jews :
כִּי אֶת-אֲשֶׁר יֶשְׁנוֹ פֹּה, עִמָּנוּ עֹמֵד הַיּוֹם, לִפְנֵי, יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵינוּ; וְאֵת אֲשֶׁר אֵינֶנּוּ פֹּה, עִמָּנוּ הַיּוֹם.
but with him that standeth here with us this day before the LORD our God, and also with him that is not here with us this day--
The "loyalty" definition of love that DovBear proposes here will not work for the many other places in the Torah where the word is applied; love of the peer, love of the righteous convert et al.
Nor does the “new” definition answer the question any better than the old one. Loyalty is also an emotion or set of emotions. Is the commandment to emote? Or merely to behave in a way that one actually feeling such an emotion/ range of emotions would? IMO it is the former with this caveat; if one has opened their hearts to all that would fan the flames of Ahavas haShem and avoided all that might douse them but still does not feel the love viscerally - one has fulfilled the Mitzvah. But if, as DovBear seems to think, this is not necessary then love can mean behaving as one infatuated would just as easily as it could mean behaving as one loyal would.
I’m really disappointed in DovBear. I really expected much more from an avowed fan of piyut. Or has he never sung Yedid Nefesh with any feeling?
הדור נאה זיו העולם, נפשי חולת אהבתיך, אנא קל נא רפא נא לה, בהראות לה נועם זיוך- אז תתחזק ותתרפא והיתה לה שמחת-שפחת עולם
I would paraphrase Rabbi Jonathan Rosenblatt's review of the new Koren Siddur and suggest that "[Khazal and the Meforshim's understanding of Gottleib sings in King David's key instead of [DovBears understanding ]that clumsily sags under the weight of [Academic-philological] correctness and emotional impotence." "
Finally I feel so sorry for HaShem, kavayokhol. Nebikh! Due to the Mega-J-Bloggers krumkeit and דעות כוזבותHis infinite love for DovBear will go so unrequited.
Qedusha-havdala...Have you had YOURS today???
55 comments:
I really like this post.
You presented the traditional pshatim clearly and cogently. It is a wonderful essay on the topic (worthy of publishing).
You do fail to recall the number of times that chazal use the (now defunct) languages of the umos haolam to decifer Torah words.
Two easy examples come to mind immediately - Mon and Tefillin.
It is not an anethema to use outside knowledge to complement one's understanding of Torah.
In fact, you must have notice that DovBear did not say this was the pshat, rather a possible insight the scholars subscribe to. He never said what you should think or even what he himself thinks.
The traditional (popular) pshatim do not have a monopoly on our minds and mesorah.
Very eloquently said. I would only add that we must use Mesorah (traditonal or otherwise, but Mesorah) when understanding lashon kodesh or we will become Karaites.
Only one complaint - DB is not saying not to love Hashem in the full sense of the word, he is just saying that isn't the commandment of the word.
and thus lowering the bar on what IS demanded of us, and IMO rendering Yissidhkeit a bloodless, dispassionate, emotionally impotent exercise.
The Rambam and others understood that what we were commanded to FEEL was an emotion much more intense and intimate than the loyalty a subject feels for a King.
AAMOF the loyalty interpretation strikes me as something more apropos to our relationship to HaShme as Ahvadim than as Bahnim.
Rabbi Fink-
A. Where no Lashon Qodesh etymological precedents are extant Khazal turn to other leshonos. The word "ahava" did not stump Torah etymologists. It's not exactly a word that
אין לו חבר במקרא and IMO incomparable to totofos.
B. Khazal taught us the sanctity and primacy of lashon HaQodesh even as they shed light on many of it's obscure words by comparing words from other languages. It is patently obvious to one reading DB for more than a week that he lacks, nay mocks, this sensibility.
C. I read the thread. DB defended the academic position in the most convoluted and tortured way as if he were despertae not only to justify himself but because he felt that NO OTHER p'shat could resolve his question.
To borrow from him. Please stop running interference for Apikorsim and defending the indefensible.
There are around 100000 bible scholars around the world,give or take 50000, American, Jewish, German, Scandinavian even Japanese, a few(hundreds) are Orthodox Jews. Nobody says what you say. For the most part they believe that Hebrew is a Northwest Semitic language similar to others in the area and derived from earlier languages. They have gone over all of tanachh, posuk by posuk, and provided readings for thousands of words that we do not understand. These ideas are revised by competing hypothesis and new data just the same as philological work everywhere.
At the U. OF Chicago they offer courses in Proto Hebrew, a language which may never have existed but which is contructed to explain how we go from Ugarithic syntax to Hebrew syntax.
Your comment like your comment about psychology at NB is embarrassing (to me). The illiterate frum don't need this and the educated frum become angry at the way you dismiss the hard scientific work of so many people without having evaluated or looked at the data.I understand the need to raise the flag and make the appropriate havdalot, but I fail to see the audience.
If you ran this yahoo line on medicine or engineering it wouldn't fly. And if c'v you were trying to help a schizophrenic you would be banging down the walls trying to find psychiatrists.
Perhaps you know all this and you say what you say because it feels good and right and why not, to which I say more power to you. Those who disagree will get over it.
Bray
It might be wise to cite the Rambam regarding the love (for Torah) being a total infatuation that is constantly on the mind..
Also, the Ahava to the Eibeshter is similar to the father-son relationship which is not solely based on commonalities or thought processes, but because it is inherently connected; part of the same whole, etc..
There are around 100000 bible scholars around the world,give or take 50000, American, Jewish, German, Scandinavian even Japanese, a few(hundreds) are Orthodox Jews.
I find this utterly unimpressive.
תורה בגוי-ים אל תאמין as for the few "Orthodox" Jews scattered among them, they naivley beleive that which Kahzal taught us to be skeptical of. This speaks to the very essence of havdala consciousness and Qedushas HaTorah. These Goyim lack the sensory organ to apprehend Torah. It is an innate difference between Jew and gentile. It's like telling me to back down from my undersatnding of the color red because 150,000 blind PhDs using braille books for resaerch have arrived at a more scientific undresatnding of the color.
And so although it sounds smug I dismiss their "hard scolarly work" out of hand though I'm sure that the vast majority of them have finer minds, better educations and superior analytical skills to me. Their pronouncemnets about Torah are like the bleatings of flat-earthers at an Astrophysicists convention.
Call me a yahoo if you like. I am a maamin and a qofer. I am a mmamin in TMS including TSBP, I am a maamin in the Mesorah of khakhmei HaDoros and I am a Qofer in תורה בגוי-ים
If you ran this yahoo line on medicine or engineering it wouldn't fly. And if c'v you were trying to help a schizophrenic you would be banging down the walls trying to find psychiatrists.
I never would in medicine and engineering as I am also a maamin in חכמה בגוי-ים . Psychology gets a little dicier as it presumes to either deny the existence of the nefesh or ascribe to it kokhos that differ from those described in the Torah. Sight unseen and with doing little or no research on my own I'm sure that between Torah in all it's streams including Qabbalah, Mussar and Khasidus and Psychology including Freud, Jung, Skinner, Piaget (and Twerski!) and others there exists confluence, congruence and conflict. In cases of irresolvable conflist I will bet on the Torah and be as dismissive of Psychology as I was of academic etymology.
Consider word X say #3048 in Job, which in all likelihood you have never read pasuk by pasuk, and where you have never seen X before, nor has anyone else since it occurs only once in all of tanach, and where ivre taitch took a guess.It has the same consonants as the word Y in Aakadian where it means Z, and where saying X means Z makes an otherwise incomprehensible sentence clear al pee pshat. The world would at least consider that X means Z, even if the idea originated with a little Japanese guy who learnt Hebrew for the first time at age 25.
Not so you. You are saying if a goy thought it up and a rabbi didn't, it should not even be looked at. And you say this without ever having personally looked at the thousands of words at issue.
I in turn say, BoF way to go.Reb Leib would agree. If Jews didn't say it first it is either not lamitiyus shel torah and/or cannot be allowed to enter the corpus of Jewish knowledge. But notice if a kosher rabbi looks at the Japanese guy's paper, rips it off and says it over as his own ...hey then the pirush is as kosher as can be, Jastrow is a famous example, as are other cases including Schottenstein, Kisvei Ramchal, ksiv ukri, Beryl Wien etc. But what begins with Art Scroll stays in Art Scroll.
Meanwhile you words of chizuk sound great.
fascinating stuff. I'm meqabel the Lashon Hara on Professor Marcus but could you provide damning evidence against the other alleged ripoff artists?
Great essay. There is only one element of mistake. You imply that we as Torah believing Jews believe that dvarim is qualitatively the same as the other 4 chumashim. This is inaccurate as the gemara states in several places that Moshe wrote dvarim m'daato. What this means to us maaminim is that he wrote the words and chose the phrasing as opposed to the others which were dictated.
and besides EJ as I already commented to E. Fink Where no Lashon Qodesh etymological precedents are extant Khazal turn to other leshonos. The word "ahava" did not stump Torah etymologists. It's not exactly a word that
אין לו חבר במקרא . Sefer Iyov, which the Gemara in Bava Basra argues about it's historical time reference, authroship and the religious status of Iyov himself is a far cry from Khumash Devarim.
and if these later scholars "ripped off" gentile etymologists in the spirit of Khazal who taught us the sanctity and primacy of lashon HaQodesh even as they shed light on many of it's obscure words by comparing words from other languages, I'd have littel problem with it. The lack of attribution would be troubling though.
Fine MM. The posuk of "es asher yeshno etc." appears in Devarim though.
Do we believe (in your case halfway is OK ;)) that it was meant ONLY for an "original audience" and that Moshe was influenced in his use of so a common a Torah word by Assyrian Akkadian etymology?
ej
You don't need to be as extreme as R' Leib to think like that...
Even if you want to argue that Hebrew was the Original Language, isn't it important to understand what the words in that language meant to the people of that time?
For example, the word "family" is likely universal, but it means something different in each culture. If I come from a culture where one lives with extended family or is perhaps tribal, "family" may include 2nd or 3rd cousins and they likely wouldn't be called "2nd" or "3rd" but just "cousins" or maybe even "brother" and "sister." Compare to another culture where families are spread out and people don't even know or keep track of cousins beyond a first cousin. The word "family" is the same, but it means different things to different peoples.
Compare over time as well. Consider the word "message" even 50 years ago it likely only included written text. Over the last 50 years it's come to include answering machine messages, voice mail messages, email messages, text messages, etc.
The word "love" is an evolving word as well and, as you point out in the post, means different things in different contexts. One loves a child differently than a spouse and differently from a parent or a friend or one's country, etc.
Why is it therefore wrong to try to see how people at the time understood and used a word?
because the people of that time were unlike any other people and the love being commanded to/demanded of them was, and still is, something other than the love /loyalty other ANE peoples had for their flesh-and-blood princes.
Right. And I imagine the Torah holds better answers for the treatment of schizophrenia than psychiatry too.
Even assuming those people were fundamentally different than any people since (this is now two assumptions including Hebrew being the original language), how do you think any subsequent commentator, such as Rambam, understood "ahava" if not using the definition his society used?
Do you think part of the mesorah included what the words of tanach meant not just literally, but also for the special people of that time?
Even if you believe this, do you think the mesorah was faithfully transmitted? Clearly this is not true as different commentators explain "ahava" and its command differently.
I am going to have to disagree with you regarding loyalty being a feeling or emotion. It is a behavior. People don't "feel" loyal. They are loyal. They behave in a manner that reflects loyalty. To be loyal to god or another human being is quite the high form of love.
While I see where you can't generalize it to loving the convert, etc. perhaps being loyal, or the reverse, to never betray, is not such a bad thing to aspire to and is certainly treating another person with kindness, if not love.
it is true. It is a word with many definitions all of which were included in the Mesorah
In terms of TO's point, it's one thing to say "havdala" for Torah issues that are really not falsifiable. But, I don't understand how you can say it for tangential issues that are falsifiable such as psychology. I don't know what Torah says about this field, but it would seem very easy to just test out a Torah theory of the mind versus a scientific theory of the mind and see which works better on average (leads to greater understanding of the mind, better treatment of patients, etc).
It just smacks of arrogance and ignorance (a dangerous combination) to sit on the sidelines of a field and cast aspersions on it when you're not willing to back up claims and refuse to learn, understand, or contribute to the field.
TO-
was there ever an effective non-pharmacological treatment of Schizophrenia? We're talking biochemistry here.
I've already allowed that I bow my head to the scientific method in all things medical.
So throwing Occam's razor aside, you believe the various commentaries that have different explanations of "ahava" have each picked up on a portion of the multi-faceted definition of "ahava" that was passed down through the generations?
I am going to have to disagree with you regarding loyalty being a feeling or emotion. It is a behavior
I don't get it. Why can't it be both? if not mandated don't loyal behaviors flow from feelings of loyalty? And isn't it possible that such feeling derive not from tender, loving emotions but form senses of gratitude, guilt, debt or reciprocity?
you believe the various commentaries that have different explanations of "ahava" have each picked up on a portion of the multi-faceted definition of "ahava" that was passed down through the generations?
yes and no. Your formulation is a tad too simplistic. the hearts and minds of Khakhmei Yisrael are the vehicles for the revlation of TSBP. Some conduits worked with uninterrupted mesorah while others were the result of ameilut B'Torah epiphanies AKA Khidushei Torah.
Think of the 3000 Halkhot forgotten during the mourning period for Moshe and restored by Otniel ben K'naz with his pilpulic scholarship.
Bray,
If you look at religion through my atheist eyes, what you see is "religion" as an ever evolving system that works with psychology and sociology, not against it. It is a system that is no longer useful when people have changed in a way that no longer fits with a system that won't change with them.
Blacks and whites sitting side by side on buses in this country reflected the changing collective psyche of the people of the country. Laws change as people change.
And Bray, we have established that you know nothing about psychology. And any comment that the Torah has on human behavior is psychology. Psychology is the study of human behavior.
Bray: was there ever an effective non-pharmacological treatment of Schizophrenia? We're talking biochemistry here.
Oy. Take some classes. Your question with a follow up comment about "biochemistry" is like me having read only the first pasuk of Bereishit and expecting you to explain to me the Torah Kulo in a comment on a thread.
Loyalty is not an emotion or a feeling. There are feelings behind why a person would be loyal to someone but there is no such thing as "feeling loyal."
DB's distinction in this case between a feeling (love) and an operationally defined behavior (loyalty) is correct. You can command loyalty of your subjects (whether they love, hate or fear you), but you can't command them to love you.
I don't know what Torah says about this field, but it would seem very easy to just test out a Torah theory of the mind versus a scientific theory of the mind and see which works better on average (leads to greater understanding of the mind, better treatment of patients, etc).
A non-starter as one of the baseline Havdalos between Torah and Science is that Torah is not subject to validation or rejection through experimentation or empiricism. As the Ramban writes in Milkhamos: שאין מופת חותך בתורתנו
It just smacks of arrogance and ignorance
Hey I'm a Kharedi...it's what we do! ;)
to sit on the sidelines of a field and cast aspersions on it when you're not willing to back up claims and refuse to learn, understand, or contribute to the field.
the Baalei Mussar did not sit on the sidelines. In their wrtings they contributed much to the understanding of what makes people, particularly Jewsih people, tick. And in their Yeshivas they fomented a revolution of meditation, introspection, self-awareness and behavior modification and spoke about the subconscious ego,id and libido before Freud.
Sadly there are precious few baalei Mussar left.
we have established that you know nothing about psychology
where and when? This is overly harsh. You are a mental health care professional who recievd an Ivy education in the field wheras I am a lay person. But meheykhee teysee that I know nothing? Or was that just long-hand for "you're a moron...tyhe stupid...it burns"? ;)
Not really sure what else I can say, you've closed on the loop on your closed system.
DB's distinction in this case between a feeling (love) and an operationally defined behavior (loyalty) is correct.
I disagree. It is an unproven and un-falsifiable assertion, little more that a semantical game. He impugned an unproven meaning/definition to the English word "loyalty" i.e. that it expresses behaviors exclusively and not feelings just as He impugned an unproven meaning/definition to the Lashon Qodesh "Akkadisn derived" word "AHB" i.e. that it expresses loyalty exclusively and not love.
I'd still like proof that the English word love ONLY means an emotion while the English word loyalty means only a set of behaviors. In my Lexicon both words can convey feelings or behaviors.
JS- say nothing accept the existence of Qedusha-Havdal and work your way forward from there.
Ok. So I established it. You have told me that you never took a psychology class in your life. I thought we were on the same page here. And don't put those dovbearism on me. I never talk to you that way and this is not the first time you have said something like that. A little hakarat hatov wouldn't kill you. See how you would react if I started talking gemara to you after never having taken one class in the subject.
There is no separation of psychology and biology. They are one in the same. Our genetic blueprints, our experiences, our interactions and our enviornments affect our biology. The food we eat, the muscles we use, the sleep we get all affects biology and at the same time affects our psychological makeup.
We know that the probability of one developing schizophrenia is heavily correlated with having others in the family with schizophrenia. Genetics are certainly a major factor here.
Some medications alleviate some of the positive symptoms of schizophrenia. Other interventions, such as social skills training, help with some of the negative symptoms such as poor social adjustment and withdrawal. Meds don't help there.
Tell me that you know what I am even talking about when I refer to positive and negative symptoms of schizophrenia and I will happily retract my assertion that you know nothing about psychology.
Bray,
How about this. Ask 10 people if they could love a king if commanded to do so.
Then ask 10 people if they could be loyal to a king if they were commanded to do so.
You can't love what you don't love even when being held at knife point. You can, however, make a choice to be loyal.
Oh, I'm happy to be person no. 1. My response, I couldn't force myself to love someone even if I wanted to or someone, even god himself, commanded me to do so. I love who I love. I didn't choose it and it wasn't commanded of me. I do however choose to put in an effort to maintain loving relationships but not to feel the love in the first place.
I can and am loyal to a select few people in my life because I choose to be. And I could be if commanded to be.
Oh, I know, I know!
From psych 101:
Positive experiences are those that are in addition to what "normal" people experience. In this case, hallucinations, hearing voices, etc. Negative experiences are those that are taken away from what "normal" people experience. In this case, depression, social anxiety, etc.
In general, even "normal" people have negative symptoms, but don't have positive symptoms. In other words, having negative symptoms alone doesn't make one schizophrenic, but positive symptoms might.
JS - I was asking the ba'al hablog, not you. Stop being the student who shouts out the answer in the classroom before the rest of the students even have time to think the question through.
I did NOT know that! :lol:
Sorry, Professor. :(
You can't love what you don't love even when being held at knife point.
You can fake it. Which is what loyal behaviors are absent feelings of love or gratitude. Or did it never happen in human history that someone made love to another, convincingly, to avoid pain, death or humiliation or to gain lucre or social validation?
I love who I love. I didn't choose it and it wasn't commanded of me.
the Baalei Mussar disagree. They say we love those who we give to. AAMOF while we're on the subject of etymology and ANE languages IIRC the seforim say the root of the word Ahav in Hebrew is the two letter verb Hav, Aramaic for "give"
There is no separation of psychology and biology.
Try to see things through my homo-religioso theist eyes and you'll find this formulation incomplete. While it's undeniable that biology impacts psychology and vice versa you are not factoring in the impact of the soul/soul-root.
I know that you may take offense at the next thing I write but I am not trying to either insult you or to manifest ingratitude, but it is this non-recognition of the souls existence and impact that is the reason why although you are a highly educated and skilled practitioner I would not pay to see you professionally nor would I refer any frum people I know grappling with psychological issues to you.
"Which is what loyal behaviors are absent feelings of love or gratitude. Or did it never happen in human history that someone made love to another, convincingly, to avoid pain, death or humiliation or to gain lucre or social validation?"
Loyal behaviors have can have all sorts of feelings behind it. But you are either loyal or your aren't. If you are faking loyalty you are not actually loyal, you are simply hiding stuff.
As for "making love," give me a break. That is simply a euphemism for sex. Sex is not love. And sure you can fake "love
' but is that what you are arguing that god is commanding you to do?
"They say we love those who we give to. "
And psychologists would agree that you are more likely to experience positive feelings toward someone you give to.
However, I give to many people everyday as a part of my chosen profession. And while I might care for all of them, even like 99% of them, I certainly don't love all of them.
"I would not pay to see you professionally nor would I refer any frum people I know grappling with psychological issues to you."
Right, yet you have had no problem taking hours and hours of services from me for free for at least a year.
Do you love your kids because you give to them or do you give to them because you love them.
Right. Because as a kharedi I'm a parasitic ingrate.
That is simply a euphemism for sex. Sex is not love.
It should be.
Night is falling and Elul is calling. Please help me to do T'shuva.
And don't put those dovbearism on me. I never talk to you that way and this is not the first time you have said something like that.
Honestly I have no idea what you are referring to with this and if reasonable I will aplogize and maybe even behavior modify.
When I wrote something offensive before at least I knew what I was doing...but this? What in the world is this all about? Waht's a DovBearism?
well this post certainly made an impressive comeback. To drive late night traffic even more I present you with something posted over at DBs place in reaction to my post
Fondly,
The Baal HaBlog:
It is not an excellent response at all. What it does is show the Bray has no grasp of ths issues at hand.
1. He attempts to rebut the argument using something from the Rambam. This is absurd. The point DB stole from Kugel is that the word AHB had a meaning that has since been lost which is reflected in D's use. Nothing the Rambam thought or wrote can address that that.
2. He makes lame and incorrect assertions about Hebrew. It wasn't the first language. We know this.
3. We also makes unprovable assertions about the Torah and its intention. If he believes it fine, but I'm not going to believe it on his say so. The fact that his whole approach rests on things that can't be proved makes his whole approach very weak.
4. The writing is longwinded and bad. Typical Bray.
Kugel | 08.19.09 - 2:16 pm
Here's the difference in thinking between you and those who would turn to extra biblical sources.
You feel that everything is contained within the Torah itself, and that looking to an ancient document, archeology, or modern biblical scholarship detracts from one's study of the Torah and contaminates it in some way.
Others, like myself, feel that it illuminates and beautifies the Torah, gives us a deeper understanding of the nuances, and of the way things really were and how the Torah and Judaism evolved. It actually enriches our Judaism.
Those are 2 different perspectives at looking at Judaism. Therefore, it's only natural that you would see DB's turning to an ancient Assyrian document as a "fatal error" and I would see it as fascinating and a hidur of my Judaism.
How does reducing love of G-d from something passionate , all consuming and requiring constant mesirat nefesh and, sometimes the actual last full measure of devotion, to a set of "loyal behaviors" enhence your Judaism in any way shape or form?
How does posing a question that applies to many mitzvos of the Torah (the legislation of emotions) and then proposing an answer that is both intellectually dishonest and, at best, localized to one specific instance, deepen or broaden your understanding?
If you feel that your Judaism and understanding of Torah need enrichment, and whose does not after all? And/or that th eeducation that you recieved in Yeshiva, while OK for a child and an adolesecnt leave you cold now and hungering for more, then broaden the seforim and miktzaot B'Torah that you learn, or get training from sophisticated lamdonim and meforshei Hamiqra but don't have the hubris to say that nothing deeper, subtler or more profound exists within the Torah itself or that you ought to turn to non and anti-Torah disciplines oblivious as they are to Qedushat v'havdalat HaTorah for "hidur".
In so doing you will be "looking for love in all the WRONG places"
As Boaz said to Ruth so says haShem and the Torah to us:
הֲלוֹא שָׁמַעַתְּ בִּתִּי, אַל-תֵּלְכִי לִלְקֹט בְּשָׂדֶה אַחֵר, וְגַם לֹא תַעֲבוּרִי, מִזֶּה; וְכֹה תִדְבָּקִין, עִם-נַעֲרֹתָי. 8
Go not to glean in another field, neither pass from hence, but abide here fast by my maidens.
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