The only proper sex is between a man and a woman. and that sex in that way is a good and holy thing. And in any other way is bad.

It is in some sense based on Isaac Luria. The idea is that there are letters of the Torah in everything. For the Torah is what gives life to everything that exists. So in the seed of a man is a high concentration of holy letters. And these letters need to be brought to the place that is right for them that can bring new life into the world. So when one brings these letters and holy sparks to the wrong place of an empty space that gives power to the dark side.
And then the Dark Side has power to cause terrible things in the world, death and destruction and war. So this needs to be corrected by the mikveh and the ten psalms.

 That when that happens one should go to the mikveh and say ten psalms. In particular if possible one should say the specific psalms that he said were a correction for this sin. 16,32,41,42, 59, 77, 90, 105, 137, 150.

You can see this in Leviticus 18:22 in which homosexuals are said to be the cause of the destruction of the Canaanites nations and that the Jewish people should be careful to stay away from such practices so that they also do not get destroyed. You can see that in this area of values the Torah is not making distinctions between Jews and Gentiles. If the Torah would make a distinction then what it says would make no sense. Rather it is saying that the Cannaties will be wiped out because of such practices --so obviously the Torah thinks there is some kind of inherent guilt in such actions. Nor does the Torah preach tolerance about such things.


 source material  Eitz Chaim of the Ari. the Mavo Shearim .Then the basic place in the Ari that talks about sins and corrections for sin is Shaar Ruach HaKodesh which gives a lot of unifications and a number of fasts for sins.

Is "joining" שיתוף (Joining something to G-d) more serious than idolatry or less?
This is an argument between R Meir of the Mishna and R Shimon Ben Yochai

But the Rambam says one must not join the name of God and something else in an oath because one who does this is uprooted from the world.[Thus going with R Shimon and confining the law of joining to oaths. Two things that need answers.]


The argument is in Sanhedrin 63.
R Meir said, "If not for the letter vav in 'These are your gods,'
(which was said to the Golden Calf) Israel would have been liable to be destroyed."

R. Shimon said, "But anyone who joins the name of God with something else is uprooted from this world as it says 'to God alone.' Rather the vav is to tell us they desired many gods." [In Avoda Zara it is explained that that means they accepted the Golden Calf but were open to accepting other god also. But they did not join God with the Golden Calf. And if they had that would have been worse.  ]

The Maharsha says that joining is what the Rambam describes at the beginning of the Laws of Idolatry. And there the Rambam says the main idea of idolatry was they saw that God put the stars in Heaven so it is his will that we should honor them just like he honors them, and by that they will be advocates for us. [The Rambam  goes into detail about this also in his commentary on the Mishna. This is known in the  as the problem of the אמצעי intermediate. That is people know God is the creator but they feel they can't approach Him directly so they go through a middle step like a person or anything else to serve as a middle step.]
Then the Rambam says  the actual idolatry that we know came after that. It seems the Rambam is saying the later step was worse. That is the אמצעי (emtzai) (using an  intermediate) is less serious.

But then when you look at the Rambam about actual שיתוף joining --in the only place he actual brings up our Gemara-he says one who swears by God and something else will be uprooted--that is the opinion of R Shimon. Not like R Meir!

So what we have here is what seems like a contradiction in the Rambam.

Joining is not necessarily the same problem as an intermediate. But it might be.

At any rate, I thought by mistake that the Rambam  thinks that an oath is a deed. It is the same as when one exchanges one animal for another in which there is a deed accomplished by his words "this is in place of that."
But my learning partner pointed out that this really does not help. The Rambam does not mention anything about lashes in laws of oaths 11 where her brings this law about "Shituf" שיתוף joining. It matters only in laws of idolatry where one who swears by a false god gets lashes.
And  a person could bring a sacrifice to God and an idol together. For example take a regular sacrifice a person is bringing to God in the Temple and the person bringing it has intention to serve some false god along with God. Either just intention of he could say something, or have originally sanctified the sacrifice to God and to his false god. Hasidim do this all the time. There is nothing unusual about it. Hasidim do everything as a kind of service to their false god. Not just sacrifice.

______________________________________________________________________________

Post Appendix: In any case my idea that the Rambam holds swearing seems to be incorrect. The actual issue is brought up in laws of idolatry.
Rambam: "One who swears by a false god gets lashes."

 Raavad: "Only to R Yehuda who holds lashes are given to one who does a prohibition even if there is no act. But we (and the Rambam) hold lashes are given only when there is an act except for swearing, replacing, and cursing."
And our case of swearing by a false god is not in the list of three exceptions.
_____________________________________________________________________

At any rate, I just wanted to say that my learning partner decided that we should not spend any more time on this Rambam. And I would not have said anything about it if I did not have this idea of an oath being an act which I think is wrong now. but when I had the idea I thought it might provide a hint to understanding the Rambam. [It is a fact that the Minchat Chinuch does say that that is how the Rambam holds but I don't think it could be right.]
See Rav Elazar Menachem Shach's Avi Ezri  on laws of idolatry  about teh halacha where teh rambam says one who swears by an idol gets lashes.

This idea is based on his general concept that the only proper sex is between a man and a woman. and that sex in that way is a good and holy thing. And in any other way is bad.

It is in some sense based on Isaac Luria

. The idea is that there are letters of the Torah in everything. For the Torah is what gives life to everything that exists. So in the seed of a man is a high concentration of holy letters. And these letters need to be brought to the place that is right for them that can bring new life into the world. So when one brings these letters and holy sparks to the wrong place of an empty space that gives power to the dark side.
And then the Dark Side has power to cause terrible things in the world, death and destruction and war. So this needs to be corrected by the mikveh and the ten psalms.


 nocturnal pollution. That when that happens one should go to the mikveh and say ten psalms. In particular if possible one should say teh specific psalms that he said were a correction for this sin. 16,32,41,42, 59, 77, 90, 105, 137, 150.

You can see this attitude reflected in Leviticus 18:22 in which homosexuals are said to be the cause of the destruction of the Canaanites nations and that the Jewsih people should be careful to stay away from such practices so that they also do not get destroyed. You can see that in this area of values the Torah is not making distinctions between Jews and Gentiles. If the Torah would make a distinction then what it says would make no sense. Rather it is saying that the Cannaties will be wiped out because of such practices --so obviously the Torah thinks there is some kind of inherent guilt in such actions. Nor does the Torah preach tolerance about such things.

What it seems  to me after looking at the Talmud and the Rambam is that worship of a tzadik is a problem.  This you can see in a most direct fashion in the 13 principles of Faith of the Rambam in principle 5. But what the Rambam is saying there seems to be accepted across the board. At least that is what it looks like to me from what I have seen in Sanhedrin 60b until 63a, and from what my learning partner has told me about Nachmanides' idea of what the Golden Calf was about.
And it is this approach of the Rambam, Nachmanides, and the Talmud itself that I think should be considered as the basic Torah approach.  And given the most weight. So when  closeness with a tzadik is important, we will have to take that in the general context of the world view of the Torah,--not as something that can outweigh the 'Rambam, Ramban' and the Gemara itself.

In other words--there is a fine line between closeness to a tzadik and the things above mentioned that one is not allowed to do, like praising him or asking him for help to come close to God.


Appendix :
1) Principle five: It is not proper to praise or ask help from or ask any created thing to bring one close to God.
[The Rambam lists there everything from the angels, constellations and stars to things created from the four elements.] [It is in his commentary on the Mishna. You can also see the the same basic idea in his Yad HaChazaka (Mishna Torah) in the beginning of the laws of idolatry.]

2) So Christianity has one good point-- it has a tzadik who said right things. And we know there is a great deal of importance in believing in a tzadik. But that does not mean to believe that that tzadik is divine.  Or to worship that tzadik, or even to praise him. While praise of humans is OK, but when Divinity is attributed to some person - then it becomes a problem.
Or at least that is the way it looks to me from Tosphot [Sanhedrin 63a]. But we find countless of tzadikim to whom divinity is attributed. When Bava Sali said that his son Meir is a soul from Emanation which we know is all Divine, no one objected. The Ari devotes to entire Shaar HaGilgulim to many tzadikim whose souls were from Atzilut. But then no one prays to them. So we seem to have hit a road block.
 It seems to me that the problem that Christianity ought to deal with is this: worship of a tzadik is not good, but belief in a tzadik is good. It seems this distinction ought to be be made, and even sharpened.
3) What I am assuming here is that the Torah has a point  of view. That is maybe a little hard to see. We know that people have points of view, but can you say a certain document has a point of view? I think you can. So when I look at the Talmud or the 'Rambam or the Ramban' I am looking not for their point of view, but I am looking for help in understanding what the Torah itself might be thinking about a certain issue. The worldview of the Torah or Daat of the Torah.
I know this sounds like cheating. When Christians want to understand what the Torah holds, they go to the C.S. Lewis or Chesterton.  Why is my going to the Rambam any different?  Mainly because the Middle Ages were more careful not to indulge in circular reasoning. So any modern author is not  valid as far as I am concerned, because it is just a matter of time until you find fatal flaws in their reasoning. So any debate about the OT or NT can't be based on post medieval authors. So we are left with the Rambam, and Nachmanides verses Aquinas.  Or you could go to the NT and OT yourself to figure out the one rigorous self consistent world view in each. But that is usually beyond the capability of every person. My feeling is that Aquinas is stemmed in by the fact he has to get the OT and NT to correspond.  So I feel free to say that the Rambam was the most accurate and won the debate.
Plus Dr Kelly Ross noticed that Aquinas did not get Aristotle and the NT to fit. Judging by that he would have had to have gone back to the Neo-platonists. And that would have left him in the same soup he was trying to get out of.
4) The Torah worldview is monotheism, not pantheism. But what kind of Monotheism? Rambam's Aristotle's? Or Nachmanides' Neo Platonic? And the Torah does have a world view about commandments. That is that they exist. They are not nullified as soon as someone keeps them. And such an idea seems absurd anyway. For example the Torah says to bring the daily burnt offering in the morning and one in the afternoon. [A male sheep]. Let's say in theory I would keep that commandment perfectly one day. Would that mean I don't have to keep it the next day?  Surely not because the Torah says explicitly to do this every day.

I think I must have written this on my blog before but I wanted to just restate the issue because of some added clarity I gained today.

This came up in Sanhedrin page 62 but the major sugia is in Shabat 69.

I was looking at the Rambam about the 39 types of work on Shabbat and I noticed that there is a lot of discussion about a problem that the son of the Rambam addresses and Rav Shach also.

R. Yochanan holds if one does an act of work on shabbat and knows it is forbidden but forgot the penalty it is considered an accident and so he can bring a sin offering. Reish Lakish holds that is considered that he did it on purpose--and so can't bring a sin offering.
R Yochanan asks why does the Mishna say 39 types of work are forbidden? It listed them all. What is the point of giving us the number? Answer: To tell us if he did all 39 in one span of forgetfulness he brings 39 sin offerings [goats or sheep.]
The Talmud asks, "But what could Reish Lakish do here? If he forgets all thirty nine, then in what way did he remember Shabbat?" [The idea is if he forgot about Shabbat completely, he brings only one, and if he never knew about Shabbat at all then he brings only one for all Shabats.]

My learning partner noticed that the reason the Gemara did not ask the same question on R. Yochanan is because with R.Y. we start with a case he remembered that one act of work is forbidden and forgot the penalty. So all we did was to expand the case to 39. And in that case we are dealing with the case he knew all 39 are forbidden, but forgot the penalty. It is only to R.L. alone that this can't work- because it would be considered doing the work on purpose.

But the Rambam seems to be saying if one forgot all 39 kinds of works and also their penalty, he brings 39 sin offerings. And so what worked for the Gemara, does not  work for the Rambam.
And that is the reason the son of the Rambam, and all the commentaries and even Rav Shach are looking for ways of answering for the Rambam.

That is all I have to say. But in case you are curious I might as well mention what the son of the Rambam answered and also Rav Shach. Reb Avraham [the Rambam's son] said that the Rambam does not mean he forgot both the 39 and their penalties, or he remembered the toldot [non principle types]. Rav Shach said he remembered 12 miles is teh boundary of Shabbat to all opinions from the Torah. [The Talmud answered the boundary of Shabbat  according to the opinion of Rabbi Akiva for Reish Lakish. Why the Talmud needed to do this I am not sure.]

I have a basic set of attitudes about current day issues. But I try to base my attitudes as much as possible on the Written and Oral Law (the Torah and Talmud).

So what I think about Islam, or discrimination or Christianity or personal issues or even the Russian invasion of the Ukraine is going to be predictably based on the Talmud.

So in essence I don't have to write anything. Just open up the Talmud and you will see what I think.

Of course the Talmud can be hard to understand so it is helpful to go to Rishonim medieaval authorities.  [Achronim are a waste of time, except for the few outstanding ones like R. Akiva Eiger and the school of Chaim Soloveitchik and Rav Shach on the Rambam.

But I realize that people are not learning Talmud very much. Especially Christians barely touch the book.  So I might as well say over a few of my opinions based as much as possible on how well I can grasp what the Talmud is saying.

1) Islam. The Talmud says one has aright to self defence.  הקם להרגך הקדם להרגו "When one person is getting up in the morning to kill you, get up earlier and kill him." Israel has a right to self defence. And it does not need to wait until it is attached. It can attack as long as the intentions of its neighbors are clear. And the intentions of the  Arab population living in Israel are clear. Israel does not need to wait until every Arab attempts to murder a Jew.

2) Blacks deserve to be treated with honor and respect as any human being. But when the intentions of whole communities becomes clear, the same above mentioned right to self defense applies to whites. Wasps (White Anglo Saxon Protestants) have a right to self defence.

3) Russia does not have a right to support the separatists. This is based on the Rambam who gets it from some place in the Talmud. In the Rambam there is a concept of a country מדינה, and one country is not allowed to invade another country. If this was just an issue of right and wrong it would be simple to tell the separatists to lay down their weapons and get back to everyday business.

4) Sex changes are not valid.  A woman remains a woman and a man a man.

5) Male Homosexuals. If the act is done in front of two witness. it is liable the death penalty. But you can bake a cake for them.  If the act is not done in front of two witness, but still done on purpose, there is not much anyone can do. If the act is done accidently, they both need to bring a sin offering to the Temple in Jerusalem,--a she goat or a female sheep. If there is no Temple, they need to build it, and then bring the offering. They can't depend on the death of any Tzadik to take their place. The Torah requires a sin offering and that is that.

6) Christianity has two things,  one is right and one is  wrong. One thing right is  a tzadik. One thing wrong is worship of a tzadik. You can look up Avraham Abulafia and Yaakov Emden who have the same opinion. [Professor Moshe Idel made a career of studying Avraham Abulafia, and his first PhD thesis brings this opinion of Avraham Abulafia.] Some people think that it is a mitzvah to fight Christianity and block it and stamp out every last remnant of it in the USA and the whole world. That is not my opinion. And for those that think this way I recommend learning the essay if Yaakov Emden and the books of Moshe Idel and Rav Abulafia. So when I see the Supreme Court and the  homosexuals and   Democrats and Muslims intend to wipe Christianity off the face of the Earth, my feeling is that Christians ought to fight back. Fight evil.  Don't let them win.

Sometimes people believe in a tzadik [righteous person] too much. That is they overdo it. And that I think is a problem.
We know from the Gemara that an intermediate is forbidden according to the Torah. As the Rambam puts it, we must not worship or praise or pray to any being besides God himself in order that that being should be an intercessor between us and God. But that is better than believing in a bad person.


We find people that are not strictly Monotheists in the sense of the Rambam and yet  believe in some tzadik  and that seems to be helpful. And we find other people that are monotheistic and yet believe in some bad person and that seems to affect them also to become wicked.

From what I can tell this idea of belief in  a tzadik [that is that it is important to find a true tzadik] is highly plausible. Even Litvaks try to find the most righteous Rosh Yeshiva to learn from.The truth is it is hard to argue with this premise.
That problem is -as many people already are aware- that once a person gets the idea that belief in a tzadik is important, he or she will most often attach themselves to some charlatan and plays the role of a tzadik with great expertise.

There are groups that I think are on the wrong path, and I am thinking it is usually because of some issue with their leader, rather that how monotheistic they are.
For example Muslims. It seems to me that the issue is that their false prophet was a bad man. Also I see people get involved in some charismatic leader that is teaching values that are highly questionable and that in fact seems to affect them to act in bad ways.