Hello Everyone,
In yesterday’s shiur we compared the Chovot Halevavot’s idea of mitzvoth to the Rambam’s.
Rabbeinu Bachya raises the point that when we look at the תנ”ך we see that there were saintly people prior to the giving of the Torah. This raises the question of how they could achieve spiritual greatness without the guidance of the Torah or having been told about the mitzvoth which are God’s will.
Rabbeinu Bachya answers that these great figures (such as the Patriarchs) were able to rule on their own over their desires with their intellects. Therefore they did not need the guidance of the Torah in order to know how to become close to Hashem via פרישות. It was only when the Jews went to Egypt and sank into the quagmire of that society that Hashem saw that we needed a system of rules which will teach us פרישות and that was why we were given the Torah. And ever since then, as people have become more obsessed with pleasures the need for evermore demanding forms of פרישות has only grown.
This explanation of the Torah seems very striking to me ( and I may be wrong about what Rabbeinu Bachya means to say). It seems that according to Rabbeinu Bachya the mitzvoth do have not intrinsic worth. The mitzvoth are collectively the Divine tool for guiding us to avoid seeking physical pleasure since pleasures only distract us from our task which is to become close to God.
The Rambam apparently has a different view of the purpose of the mitzvoth.[1] The Rambam quotes a famous statement in the Midrash:
בראשית רבה (וילנא) פרשת לך לך פרשה מד
וכי מה איכפת ליה להקב”ה למי ששוחט מן הצואר, או מי ששוחט מן העורף, הוי לא נתנו המצות אלא לצרף בהם את הבריות
The Rambam writes that there are many people who feel that there is no reason to explore the mitzvoth for meaning. Citing this Midrash they hold that the mitzvoth were only given to teach us obedience to God. The Rambam emphatically rejects this opinion. He explains that that the Torah has meaning and that each and every mitzvah is directed to teach us important lessons. The lessons of some mitzvot are easier to find than others but we can find the meaning of all mitzvoth if we work hard enough. It may be that when the Rambam mentions that there are people who do not seek meaning in the mitzvoth he was writing about Rabbeinu Bachya.
There are certainly statements in Chazal which would seem to go against Rabbeinu Bachya’s views about the state of affairs prior to the giving of the Torah. There is a Midrash that אברהם אבינו observed the entire Torah, even Rabbinic mitzvoth such as Eiruvin. I don’t know how Rabbeinu Bachya would have explained those statements. The Ramban however was bothered by this assertion of Chazal because we see clearly that Yakov Avinu married two sisters and Amram married his aunt so it seems that the Avot did not observe the Torah. The Ramban explains that perhaps the Avot only observed the Torah when they resided in Eretz Yisrael but when outside of the land they did not. Yakov Avinu married Rachel and Leah while he was in Haran and Amram married Yochevd in Egypt. This explanation of the Ramban is part of his broader idea about the centrality of Eretz Yisrael to the observance of the Torah.
Interestingly, the Ramban provides an alternative interpretation of the verse which Chazal say teaches that the Avraham Avinu observed the entire Torah. He suggests that the pasuk means that Avraham Avinu was loyal to Hashem and obeyed the commands given to him, such the command to travel to Eretz Yisrael and to perform circumcision. The Ramban does not mention Rabbeinu Bachya, but it seems to me that he would agree with this interpretation of the pasuk.
Many great commentators and thinkers wrote about the meaning of mitzvoth, but if I am correct ( and I may be wrong) Rabbeinu Bachya is alone in saying that the mitzvoth are a system for spiritual training and that their purpose is not realized in the acts themselves but in the growth that they enable.
Thanks to everyone who participated in the shiur. Stuart Fischman
[1] Since Rav Kaffach zt”l in his edition of חובות הלבבות in footnote 1 to this chapter directs us to the מורה הנבוכים I am inclined to think that he felt that indeed Rabbeinu Bachya and the Rambam disagree about the important issue.