talking with God as a friend talks with another friend and pouring out ones' heart and problems to him.

Talking  with God as a friend talks with another friend and pouring out ones' heart and problems to him.


 I can suggest a general approach towards attachment with God. Talking with him in an informal setting. Let me just say I am not the first person to think of this. It looks a lot  like what King David was doing. .

People should do this all day from the morning  until evening. People should pack a lunch and a bottle of water and go out into the forest and talk with God all day long. 

 However I think that everyone in the world should learn and finish the Talmud with Tosphot and the Maharsha. However I don't want it to seem that this is because the Talmud is somehow the greatest of all books. Not at all. Rather because it is a great book and opens up a connection with the Divine.The way it does this is it examines the written word of God in rigorous logic. It does not think that it is up to every individual to decide what it means for them, but rather that it has objective meaning that it is upon us measly human beings to strive to find out with all means possible.

This might seem difficult to understand but perhaps I can make it clear. It seems to me that God has blessed humanity with a few great books. Each one is important but does not have all the truth about people and life. But rather some aspect of truth. To me it seems the one on the top of the list is the Torah (The Old Testament).

There are two approaches to Talmud. One is the present day  way which began with R. Chaim Soloveitchik. I must say that I did not learn this way personally. I heard many lessons along the lines of Reb Chayim. But when I got back to my shtender "seat" I plowed through the Talmud with the Tosphot and Maharsha and the early "achronim" (later authorities like the Pnei Yehoshua). Sometimes I would go over and over a Pnei Yeshoshua about ten or more times until I got it.
But even this way could not be called traditional. The traditional way of learning was different. The principles were these: (1) Learn Tosphot. (2) It is forbidden to add any so called principles to make Tosphot make sense. He wrote it to make sense on its own. If you have to add outside concepts, then you don't understand it. [Sadly, most people are taught that you don't understand it unless you add some outside principles. So they spend the whole day making up nonsense, and they call it "learning" and think that people that don't do this idiocy can't learn.] (3) There is a point that you get to when you understand Tosphot that something comes up almost by magic. Some thought or question. It is that magical point that is called "Learning." For me it is very hard to get to that point.
The way of Reb Chayim Soloveitchik was different. He did add yesodot יסודות or principles, but from elsewhere in the Talmud itself. And he did it in a way that does fit.
The major school of thought of Reb Chaim [Chidushei HaRambam] continued through Baruch Ber (the Birchat Shmuel), Shimon Shkop, and the most difficult  of all- Rav Eliezer Menachem Shach of Ponovitch (that is his book the Aviezri).
These four constitute a whole and complete set by which it is possible to understand the Rambam.
No home is complete without them.

psychologists provide much of the ideology justifying divorce

Professor Allen Bloom: "Psychologists provide much of the ideology justifying divorce—e.g., that
it is worse for kids to stay in stressful homes (thus motivating the potential escapees—that is, the parents—to make it as unpleasant as possible there). Psychologists are the sworn enemies of guilt. [The exact opposite of the Torah which says that without feelings of guilt there is no repentance. ] And they have an artificial language for the artificial feelings with which they equip children. Psychologists who deal with these matters simply play the tune called by those who pay the piper. The facts of the market and the capacity for self-deception, called creativity, influence such therapy. Teenagers are not only reeling from the destructive effects of the overturning of faith and the ambiguity of loyalty that result from divorce, but deafened by self-serving lies and hypocrisies
expressed in a pseudo-scientific jargon. Modern psychology at its best has a questionable understanding of the soul. It has no place for the natural superiority of the thoughtful life, and no understanding of education. So children who are impregnated with that psychology live in a sub-basement
and have a long climb just to get back up to the cave, or the world of
common sense, which is the proper beginning for their ascent toward
wisdom. and they have an ideology that provides not a reason but a rationalization
for their timidity."

Socrates: And if, I said, the male and female sex appear to differ in their fitness for any art or pursuit, we should say that such pursuit or art ought to be assigned to one or the other of them; but if the difference consists only in women bearing and men begetting children, this does not amount to a proof that a woman differs from a man in respect of the sort of education she should receive; and we shall therefore continue to maintain that our guardians and their wives ought to have the same pursuits.

What Socrates is saying here in plain English is that we don't start out thinking men and women are different in ability. We give them exactly the same education. But when and if an individual begins to show more aptitude or interest in one specific area then we concentrate on that.






As an introduction let me just say that I have liked woman from day one. It is only bitches that I don't approve of.




The Republic by Plato:

"Let us further suppose the birth and education of our women to be subject to similar or nearly similar regulations; then we shall see whether the result accords with our design.

"What do you mean?"

"What I mean may be put into the form of a question, I said: Are dogs divided into hes and shes, or do they both share equally in hunting and in keeping watch and in the other duties of dogs? or do we entrust to the males the entire and exclusive care of the flocks, while we leave the females at home, under the idea that the bearing and suckling their puppies is labour enough for them?"

"No, he said, they share alike; the only difference between them is that the males are stronger and the females weaker."


"But can you use different animals for the same purpose, unless they are bred and fed in the same way?"

"You cannot."

"Then, if women are to have the same duties as men, they must have the same nurture and education?"

"Yes."

(The education which was assigned to the men was music and gymnastic.)

Yes.

Then women must be taught music and gymnastic and also the art of war, which they must practice like the men?

That is the inference, I suppose.

I should rather expect, I said, that several of our proposals, if they are carried out, being unusual, may appear ridiculous.

No doubt of it.

Yes, and the most ridiculous thing of all will be the sight of women naked in the palaestra, exercising with the men, especially when they are no longer young; they certainly will not be a vision of beauty, any more than the enthusiastic old men who in spite of wrinkles and ugliness continue to frequent the gymnasia.

Yes, indeed, he said: according to present notions the proposal would be thought ridiculous.

But then, I said, as we have determined to speak our minds, we must not fear the jests of the wits which will be directed against this sort of innovation; how they will talk of women's attainments both in music and gymnastic, and above all about their wearing armour and riding upon horseback!

Very true, he replied.

Yet having begun we must go forward to the rough places of the law; at the same time begging of these gentlemen for once in their life to be serious. Not long ago, as we shall remind them, the Hellenes were of the opinion, which is still generally received among the barbarians, that the sight of a naked man was ridiculous and improper; and when first the Cretans and then the Lacedaemonians introduced the custom, the wits of that day might equally have ridiculed the innovation.

No doubt.

But when experience showed that to let all things be uncovered was far better than to cover them up, and the ludicrous effect to the outward eye vanished before the better principle which reason asserted, then the man was perceived to be a fool who directs the shafts of his ridicule at any other sight but that of folly and vice, or seriously inclines to weigh the beautiful by any other standard but that of the good.

Very true, he replied.

First, then, whether the question is to be put in jest or in earnest, let us come to an understanding about the nature of woman: Is she capable of sharing either wholly or partially in the actions of men, or not at all? And is the art of war one of those arts in which she can or can not share? That will be the best way of commencing the enquiry, and will probably lead to the fairest conclusion.

That will be much the best way.

Shall we take the other side first and begin by arguing against ourselves; in this manner the adversary's position will not be undefended.

Why not? he said.

Then let us put a speech into the mouths of our opponents. They will say: 'Socrates and Glaucon, no adversary need convict you, for you yourselves, at the first foundation of the State, admitted the principle that everybody was to do the one work suited to his own nature.' And certainly, if I am not mistaken, such an admission was made by us. 'And do not the natures of men and women differ very much indeed?' And we shall reply: Of course they do. Then we shall be asked, 'Whether the tasks assigned to men and to women should not be different, and such as are agreeable to their different natures?' Certainly they should. 'But if so, have you not fallen into a serious inconsistency in saying that men and women, whose natures are so entirely different, ought to perform the same actions?'—What defense will you make for us, my good Sir, against any one who offers these objections?"

(I am trying to avoid saying that Hegel was positivist but he sure was on the slippery slop towards it. And his thought led to disastrous consequences in the twentieth century. Despite his depth of thought, it is hard not to see all the tendencies of Nazi and Communist totalitarianism in his thought.

In Western Civilization following the Enlightenment, there is supposed to be a connection between Man's Laws and Natural Law [Natural Law is not what people do naturally but rather do what is their "telos" to do. That is at any rate how natural law was understood by its originators the Stoics, Saadia Geon Maimonides and Aquiness]. Man's laws are at least supposed to have as a goal to come to Divine Law. This started with Saadia Geon who defined many of the laws of the Torah as Laws of Reason. The Rambam (Maimonides) took this process further. It ended up with John Locke. The attack of on this Natural Law concept was from Austin. This is what is called legal positivism.

After this introduction, we can understand Germany. Hegel was the most popular and powerful influence in Germany during the entire 1800's. His idea of the individual being an insignificant part of the State is what led Germany to a radical Legal Positivism. Sadly, this same process is happening in America. (I am trying to avoid saying that Hegel was positivist, but he sure was on the slippery slope towards it. And his thought led to disastrous consequences in the twentieth century. Despite his depth of thought, it is hard not to see all the tendencies of Nazi and Communist totalitarianism in his thought.
This does not bode well for systems based on Hegel today or Legal Positivism. (In fact, taking a glimpse of Supreme Court decisions in the U.S.A. it is hard to see any connection at all with the U.S.A. Constitution. It looks to me like pure Legal Positivism. I mean, for Bruce's sake, what does someone growing vegetables in his back yard have to do with interstate commerce? Why would the Supreme Court think they have any right to rule in such matters- except that they want to?

[Just to be clear- Hegel still sees the "Absolute" as the standard. And to him, the Absolute is rational. To to have it embodied in "The State" does not in theory equal Legal Positivism. This is because there is a prior source of authority. It could be that he would even agree that the Absolute might not be embodied automatically in all government resolutions.]

So you don't want to hire criminals? Hmmm...

In April, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission signaled that it would begin to crack down on employers who use the criminal histories of job applicants to discriminate against them illegally. ...

So you don't want to hire criminals? Hmmm...

(1)The God of Maimonides and Aristotle

(1)The God of Maimonides and Aristotle tends to lack personality. (2) The omnipotence and benevolence of God, while happy and comforting to contemplate, generates the Problem of Evil, that the evidence of the world and of events frequently would seem to contradict an omnipotent and benevolent agency.
(3) It seems to me that Yaakov along with Job and King David [עד אבא למקדשי אל אבינה לאחריתם in Psalm 73 ] found some way of dealing with these issues. The way they did this was to project God's goodness out over a longer period.
To me it seems that this was the opinion of Job and God himself who agreed with Job.
The friends of Job said: "God is just". God said they were wrong. Point blank. At point blank range. There is no way to misinterpret this because the entire Book of Job shows this.


 The first statement is that Job was without sin. So trying to fudge the variables here does not work. Trying to make it that there were other faults is clearly not what it says. Then the whole story of how God caused him to suffer in order to win a debate with Satan just shows the point. Because you want to win a debate with someone does not give you cause to make someone else suffer. This is the clear position of the narrator of The Book of Job 



What enrages people is that the Rambam understands the Torah thorough the eyes  and world view of Aristotle. And that he is not embarrassed about that makes it worse. At least he could try to hide where he gets his ideas from like everyone else. And what makes it even worse is that no one can claim to understand the Torah better than the Rambam unless they want to seem like an arrogant, ignorant fool. Thus people just ignore the Rambam when it comes to the world view of Torah.

My approach is different than the generally accepted approach. I say the Rambam was right, and everyone else simply does not understand the Torah.

In any case  the Rambam's approach to Torah is I think about as close to the actual Torah approach as possible. In another approaches there are strong elements of polytheism. They may not reach pure polytheism but they certainly come close. Today  Torah practice often contains polytheist beliefs. In fact it is almost an axiom that the more strict one is in practices the more likely there are underlying polytheistic beliefs. Monotheism is not the same as polytheism except in number. There is more than a quantitative difference. There is a qualitative difference. A difference in world view. And the world view of Torah could not be further away from what people think it is today. It presents a reality that is radically different than what people think the Torah is about.

A Rambam Yeshiva would not be anything like the yeshivas we see today. The books there would be the Mishne Torah and Aristotle's encyclopedic work, Physics and his other encyclopedic work, the Metaphysics.   In the beginning of Mishne Torah he writes that the Mishne Torah contains all the Oral Law and take a good look at his language there when he says "One does not need any other book from among them."  "One reads the Old Testament and then the Mishne Torah and one does not need any other book from among them for any law," i.e. the books that he just mentioned in that paragraph. However he says one needs no other books to know what the law is (that is what among the laws of the Talmud is the halacha. But that does not mean that one understands the meaning of the law without knowing the Talmud. That is how all sages of Israel after him understood him. That is without the Talmud one can not know the meaning of any law in the Mishna Torah of the Rambam. Just like the Guide require background in Aristotle and Plato so the Mishna Torah requires the background of the Talmud.



So you can ask then what to do after you have read the Mishne Torah? You can finish it in two weeks easily. Start at 9:00 AM and go until 5:00 PM. A normal working day. You can finish it in two weeks. Then he explains you learn "the work of Creation and the Divine Chariot which are the Physics and Metaphysics of the ancient Greeks." Here too he explains this clearly in several places in the Mishe Torah and  Guide. And he not ambiguous in any way. You can see what enraged people about the Rambam. He says after one has finished reading the Written and Oral law (as he defines Oral Law to mean his book the Mishne Torah) then he spends all his days learning Physics and Metaphysics.



So clearly a Rambam approach to Torah  would be a radical departure from what people think today compromises a Torah approach. And he writes in a letter that the only reason that his book was not accepted as the final decision is because of the arrogance and pride of people wanting honor and power. So when the final redemption comes and arrogance and the evil inclination will be eliminated from the world then his book will be accepted as the objective truth. In the future the Mishne Torah of the Rambam will be considered as the truth and final decision. The son of the Rambam who became the Rav of the city after the Rambam in fact taught the Mishna Torah instead of Mishna or other things that had been customary to teach between the afternoon and evening prayers.

 My personal opinion is that Physics today (and Metaphysics) has gone considerably beyond Aristotle and that today the Rambam would hold to learn the Old Testament, then the Mishne Torah and then modern Physics and Kant. (I must admit I  have not gotten far in Mathematics or Physics. My impression is they both need about the  same amount of time and effort as knowing the Talmud even at the most amateurish level.  That is about 20,000 hours each. That is you have the normal 10,000 hours for just barely scratching the surface. Then the next 10,000 hours for gaining expertise. That was in any case my own experience with Talmud and it seems to me that Math and Physics are not all that different.)

And I should mention that this is the way I have accustomed myself to be learning for some time now. The only thing is I admit I do learn Talmud as I thing it is the only way to understand the Mishne Torah. Without knowing from where the Rambam gets his decision, people always misunderstand what he is saying. [And they think they understand.] For that reason, one should also learn Talmud and Rav Shach's commentary on the Rambam together with the Rambam..

[I should mention that this is not how Litvaks go about learning. And for myself if I have any time for learning at all I go straight to the Gemara. Being limited to what you can get I would say get a Bava Metzia (one full Talmud Tractate with Tosphot Mahrasha and Rif.). One Musar book and one of Jewish world view like the Guide for the Perplexed.