I am looking for an argument that can justify learning Torah for its own sake. (When I say Torah I mean authentic Torah. Not what is always presented nowadays as Torah. By "real Torah" I mean the Old Testament and the פירוש המקובל--the traditional books that actually explained the written law according to the way the had been understood--that is the two Talmuds). You can bet that nowadays when ever you hear about someone giving a class in Torah that it is never about authentic Torah. It is always pseudo Torah.
In any case I am still looking for an argument to present here to justify learning Torah for its own sake.--That is to learn Torah without being paid for it. As we find by a guard of a lost object that when he receives a monetary reward for it it is not a mitzvah. That is I am not trying to justify kollels. But I am also not trying to attack kollels.
Consequential-ism claims an act is justified if its consequences are good. But that is not what I am looking for here. I want to claim learning Torah is good- regardless of consequences. This can be hard to say. Do I think even if it has bad consequences that it is still overriding? That seems a bit too far to go. Still what you see in the Gra and his disciple Reb Chaim from Voloshin is that Torah for its own sake is the highest of all mitzvot.
What I am suggesting is that learning Torah for its own sake is, in fact, the highest mitzvah, but that making yeshivas might not be. For all we know someone might be learning Torah for money or some other reason. And that makes it not Torah for its own sake. But if you are learning Torah at home and not for money, then you know why you are doing it.
What is also possible to to take the local place where people congregate, and to make it a place of Torah. That means to set it aside for authentic Torah.
The religious world believes in in its superiority because stringent adherence to rituals but in the meantime forgetting what Torah is actually about.
In any case I am still looking for an argument to present here to justify learning Torah for its own sake.--That is to learn Torah without being paid for it. As we find by a guard of a lost object that when he receives a monetary reward for it it is not a mitzvah. That is I am not trying to justify kollels. But I am also not trying to attack kollels.
Consequential-ism claims an act is justified if its consequences are good. But that is not what I am looking for here. I want to claim learning Torah is good- regardless of consequences. This can be hard to say. Do I think even if it has bad consequences that it is still overriding? That seems a bit too far to go. Still what you see in the Gra and his disciple Reb Chaim from Voloshin is that Torah for its own sake is the highest of all mitzvot.
What I am suggesting is that learning Torah for its own sake is, in fact, the highest mitzvah, but that making yeshivas might not be. For all we know someone might be learning Torah for money or some other reason. And that makes it not Torah for its own sake. But if you are learning Torah at home and not for money, then you know why you are doing it.
What is also possible to to take the local place where people congregate, and to make it a place of Torah. That means to set it aside for authentic Torah.
The religious world believes in in its superiority because stringent adherence to rituals but in the meantime forgetting what Torah is actually about.
