Thursday, January 6, 2011

Rabbeinu Tam - the dangers of seeking truth through philosophy


from Daas Torah - translation copyrighted

Rabbeinu Tam (Sefer Hayashor Shaar 6): Damage from learning non-Torah wisdom:  Tenth Midah -  Wisdom which is no good. There is wisdom which destroys faith for example external wisdom, heretical wisdom and philosophy. There is no need for one who serves G﷓d to be involved in them rather he should distance himself from them with all his strength. Because before he receives any benefit from them he will have lost his faith. It is like one who loses his possessions in the attempt to acquire other possessions and ends up having nothing. There are many who think they are wise who think this is an exalted wisdom and they think they will acquire profound and esoteric secrets – but they don’t realize they are going away from their faith. It is like a healthy person who accustoms himself to eating unhealthy foods because they taste good but he ends up destroying his health and complexion without realizing the changes. He considers himself healthy when in fact he is close to death. When a person associates with a heretic, he destroys his faith little by little without being aware. Similarly a person who studies philosophy becomes alienated from his faith little by little without being aware. While the intent and concern of philosophy is to understand the unity of G﷓d - but when you learn it you suffer a loss. Philosophy has words and axioms which from the very beginning weaken faith. No one can be certain that when he engages in its study that he won’t lose his faith – except if he has an expert and pious teacher that will guide him and protect from the places which weaken his faith. In such a case then he will be able to avoid the pitfalls of philosophy and accomplish the goals he desires. But if he reads books of philosophy on his own or has a teacher who is not completely pious – then there is no doubt that his faith will be destroyed and he will lose more than he gains. This is the general situation that stands before all those who fear G﷓d and therefore he has to be very careful.

3 comments :

  1. If I'm not mistaken, this anonymous sefer is mistakenly attributed to Rabeinu Tam bc of its shared title with Rabeinu Tam's hiddushim, Sefer HaYashar.

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  2. There is a Gilyon Hashas to Pes. 94b, attributed to Rabbeinu HaTam.
    Here, he even suggests That Rebi Yehuda Hanasi was led astray by philosophy:
    Rebi accepted the proof of Gentile philosophers against that of Jewish ones, whereas Rabbeinu HaTam says that this was only by in argument, but not in actual fact!

    If this is the case, then Rabeinu HaTam is denying Daas Torah (of R' Yehuda HaNasi)

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  3. Notice that the author (and I also heard the true author is unknown) in this middah isn't rejecting Scholasticism or Greek philosophy, but the entire enterprise of seeking machshavah amuqah -- deep understanding [of theology].

    This is an old problem: there is a dialectic between whether we view Hashem as Immanent ("Hashem is here, Hashem is there") or Transcendent ("Just one Hashem in heaven"). The more one studies /about/ G-d, the more one gets involved the the Transcendent perception of the Almighty.

    The Rambam had no problem -- to him, a Personal G-d is simply a concept for the masses, and the intelligentsia should only relate to the Transcendent notion.

    Rav Nachman miBreslov took the opposite approach -- having a personal relationship with G-d is so important, one simply should avoid studying theology.

    Briskers don't have this problem either, they don't study aggadita altogether. (I'm exagerating, but not much.) The whole question isn't really in their worldview -- just go learn more halakhah!

    Lub takes a mystical way out, involving the notion of a particular person having a soul that comes from the nation's soul's Yechidah. In other words, this rebbe (Moshe, Yehoshua, ... Yiftach, ... Shemu'el ... David ... Rav Yehudah haNasi ... Rav Ashi ... and so on to the Besh"t and the Lubavitcher Rabbeim) has a soul from the level at which Israel, G-d and the Torah are one.

    Therefore, their Torah unifies.

    And that's why Lub teaches Tanya to newcomers. From within Chabad thought, Tanya is the only philosophical approach that enhances rather than distracts from the notion of a personal relationship with the Almighty.

    Mussar taught a different "out", based on its tenet (as well as psychology's) that there is a huge gap between what we know, and what we internalize. Machshavah amuqah is an intellectual pursuit; emunah peshutah is a middah. They are inculcated through different routs. Yes, in theory the two conflict. In practice, man is very capable of living with such dialectics.

    -micha

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