Everyman will one day have to give an account of his life.

The world to come does not get enough press. You can go through your whole day and not think about it once. You and I can completely forget about it as if it was completely irrelevant.

The trouble is that it is not clear upon what it depends.
A play from the Middle Ages brings out the urgency of the issue.
God calls to Death and Death comes and declares:
 ''Lord, I will in the world go run over all, And cruelly out-search both great and small; Every man will I beset that liveth beastly, Against God's laws, and dreadeth not folly: He that loveth riches I will strike with my dart, His sight to blind, and from heaven to depart, Except that alms be his good friend, In hell for to dwell, world without end.''

Everyman says: "Though I be a sinner most abominable, Yet let my name be written in Moses' table"

And he adds: "For fair promises men to me make; But, when I have most need, they me forsake"


But nowadays it seems largely forgotten.

To some degree I imagine I was always aware that I will one day have to give an accounting. But when I first began to think more seriously about it was when I read the Musar book (אור ישראל) of a disciple of Reb Israel Salanter [Isaac Blazer].

So upon what does the next world depend? Good Deeds. Acts of kindness.

Temple Mount. In terms of law I generally think it is OK to depend on any opinion in the rishonim

I am not sure why the Ramban [M. ben Nahman] [not the Rambam] is ignored when it comes to the question of entering into the area of the Temple [in Yerushalaim].  His opinion is stated in tracate Avoda Zara 52b.

It comes up concerning the subject of holiness of body קדושת הגוף. That is there are things like a sacrifice that can not become חולין secular. There are other things that become secular if one puts money in their place. An example is if one puts aside his lot or some object for the use of the Temple.  That can go out to be secular if one put money in its place. The question over there is the altar. It is there that the Ramban states his opinion that the Temple itself went out to be secular.

[Thus the people that go up to the Temple Mount at least have the Ramban to depend on. I vaguely recall the Raavad has a similar opinion.]

[Years ago I was definitely aware of the Raavad but not the Ramban.]

In terms of law I generally think it is OK to depend on any opinion in the rishonim.

interpretations of the New Testament

There are many interpretations of the New Testament. So I might be excused if I suggest my own.
My idea is to some degree based on the  Rav Isaac Luria. And some have suggested it beforehand. A "tzadik" [saint]. But not an average tzadik [saint]. What do I mean "not average."  In the Rav Isaac Luria you find certain tzadikim [saints] have a high source for their soul. For example Abraham the Patriarch in Kindness of Emanation.

[It would be going too far to suggest this on my own without any support. So I bring as support the Ari himself and also Rav Avraham Abulafia.]

The Rav Isaac Luria himself did not write much. What we have from him is from Reb Haim Vital. Rav Vital has about three books in which he writes the ideas of the Rav Isaac Luria on the Five Books of Moses. In the end of Genesis in all three books he hints to this idea.

Also Rav Abulafia deals with this in scattered places. [If you piece it all together the picture that comes out is clear.] ]

My basic idea is based on an idea of the Rav Isaac Luria that after the "breaking of the vessels" and the period of correction began, the light of foundation was contained in the vessel of kindness of Emanation.

[For some background, I might mention that the Rashba was very much not in favor of Rav Abulafia. But I think Rav Abulafia can be depended on as Rav Vital does bring his unifications in the end of his Musar book Gates of Holiness. [I.e. in volume four].] [Also you can find his books quoted in the Pardes.]
I might add that "son of man" ought to refer to  the son of zeir anpin זעיר אנפין.

u99 music file

U-99 F major Midi file [I can not convert to MP3 anymore. Sorry. If you can do it yourself this would be for strings, horns, flute, timpani.] In general the last part in most pieces are for strings on top with timpani. the timpani is usually saved for this last part. the beginning sections can be for flute, oboe or french horns. but since i am not writing any more music i do not know how i might have put this in orchestra form --but i just  want togive some hints to how it might be done.

Rav Shach [of Ponoviz]

Rav Shach [of Ponoviz] points [in the Avi Ezri] out that there are a lot of crazy world views flying around that are just waiting and hoping to grab young people. And he suggests that the only advice to be protected from them is by learning a lot of Torah.

So what would he say about the four fold program of the Rambam to learn the (1) Written Law, (2) Oral Law (3) Physics (4) Metaphysics?

I heard that Rav Shach held that people ought to simply sit and learn Torah until marriage, and only after marriage to worry about making a living. But that was not exactly what the Rambam was thinking about. The interest of the Rambam in Physics and Metaphysics had nothing to do with making a living. [In any case, I would have to say that Metaphysics nowadays is not exactly what the Rambam was thinking about. To me it seems clear he meant Plato, Aristotle and Plotinus. The Rambam's interest in these two subjects were because he held by learning them one fulfills the commandments to love and fear God.]


I should mention that because of personal failings  in my own traits, I did not "make it" [be successful] in the yeshiva world. These are the same traits that indicated to Reb Freifeld of Shar Yashuv that I was really not a good prospect for his daughter. Even so, from afar off, I can see the greatness of siting and learning Torah -- even though I am far from it myself.  So if  God grants to me even a minute or a second or just one word of learning Torah, I value it about rubies.

u98 music file

U-98 in midi - E Flat then A major then E flat u-98 nwc

u-2 mp3  u-2 midi

The Reformation and Enlightenment were the double headed sledge hammer to destroy. What took the place of what they destroyed was Communism and Socialism.

We do not just know about our (1) sensations or know things by (2) deductive  logical reasoning. It does not take a genius to figure out that pain is not the same thing or the same kind of thing as the point of a sword.
Thus Idealism Berkley is a non starter.

What seems to me is that after Descartes, the system of Aristotle  about the mind and sensations fell because of lack of credibility. It was hard to know what to replace it with.

At the same time Aristotle was falling in terms of some areas, the Reformation took place.

The Reformation did create a vacuum that was just begging to be filled.
The Reformation and Enlightenment were the double headed sledge hammer to destroy. What took the place of what they destroyed was Communism and Socialism.


[Thomas Reid did a good job in showing the fallacies of idealism. Hobhouse did a nice job in demolishing the socialist state. But I would not have paid much attention to either writer if I thought there was much good anyway in Idealism or Socialism.]

Allen Bloom dealt with this issue [what is human nature and its connection to politics] to some degree in his book the Closing of the American Mind. I think he was saying the the Enlightenment with its faulty understanding of human nature brought the world to what it is now,