מדרגת האדם The Levels of Man, by the Alter of Navardok a disciple of Israel Salanter

1) Trust in God I want to decouple from faith in God. That is I want to get to trust in God but when things don't go the way I want them to I do not what my faith weakened. I what to retain faith that there is  a first cause and that he is not the world, but that he made the world something from nothing and he does run it in a way that has a purpose.  I do not want that faith to be weakened even if nothing would go my way.

2) But if I could get to this point in which my faith is secure, I would like to add trust in God to it. This is a more difficult issue than the first. It means to have trust also when things don't go my way. I still would like to believe that even when everything goes wrong this still is his will either as punishment for things I do wrong or as a warning or because of some good that will arise from it.

3) If then I could get to step two I would like to find some kind of aspect of trust where I in fact believe in God enough and strongly in the way that the Madragat Haadam was talking about "from here we learn that one needs no effort at all but what is decreed from Heaven will come to one automatically without any effort at all."

For this kind of thing see מדרגת האדם The Levels of Man, by the Alter of Navardok a disciple of Israel Salanter

Saadia Gaon was the first to write specifically on Jewish philosophy and set the stage forever after for Jewish philosophy to be neo Platonic.

  Saadia Gaon was the first to write specifically on Jewish philosophy and set the stage forever after for Jewish philosophy to be neo Platonic. Even though the Rambam did move into the orbit of Aristotle still the later people like Crescas and Albo try to move the pendulum back to Plato. [Even  mystic people like Avraham Abulafia and the Ari were building on a Neo Platonic framework.]

This is relevant for me because out of my own reading of philosophy I came out with a  Kantian (of Kelley Ross) which is really a modification of Platonic thought.   I wrote in some essay what brought me to this approach. Mainly it was experience plus seeing some of the problems in other approaches.  [There was a lot of time that I spent on Hegel and Spinoza and the Intuitionists, and some time on John Locke. ] I am not saying I am any kind of philosopher myself. Rather I was just looking for a coherent world view to be able to deal with reality.

I mean that even though I have a neo Platonic point of view there are significant modifications and improvements that this needs. That is I don't think everything in Kant and Kelley Ross is automatically included in the Jewsih Philosophers of the Middle Ages. This is unlike Dr. Feser who I believe holds that all true insights of later people were included in the Scholastics. 

The Sidur of Saadia Gaon tells us some things that we might not know. I thought for a long time the basic blessing in the morning before the Shema was  elongated. But I was not sure about what part. The reason is that it seemed to me there was something in it that was essential besides the first sentence and last. That is I did not think it was like a simple Bore nefashot with a חתימה
[ending]. Someone showed me that in the sidur of Saadia Gaon, the first blessing is, in fact, just the first sentence, then the one sentence after that, and then the last חתימה [ending].

At any rate, my opinion is that the writings of Saadia Gaon are important because Yidishkeit has gone way off the path already for too long.

I see the attempts to undermine the Constitution of the USA to be the rise of the Dark Side.

Democracy was criticized by Herodotus. He said in it the wicked make strong alliances to destroy society, but the good simple people are suspicious of each other. Thus it is destroyed from within. This is clearly what is going on in the USA. This is a reason that the founding fathers of the USA said it can not survive unless the people are moral. \
Though the type of system that Herodotus critiqued was a pure democracy, still the same applies to a republic as we can see from Rome.

 Just so my opinion should be clear--I see the attempts to undermine the Constitution of the USA  to be  the rise of the Dark Side. 

My learning partner is allergic to Musar. [Books of Medieval Ethics and of Israel Salanter's disciples] He thinks it is painting by the numbers.To some degree you can see this in things like the small Musar book of the Rosh "(1)To go away from pride as much as possible (2) Also from lying (3) also from ... (4) also from ..."



My opinion is Musar is important and I think that I can see the results of not learning it.  You certainly do not see anything like the moral standards of places that do learn Musar. This is a s clear as the sun at high noon. 

Once you walk away from some aspect of holiness you can never return. You can try to go through the motions but the inner essence never returns.
 I walked out of the Mir in order to go to Israel. Though I succeed and even did well in some ways--still  the essence of the Mir --the light of inner holiness of learning Talmud in depth I was never able to catch up with again.  Even the fact that God granted to me a few ideas in Talmud here and there only came about because of my learning partner. Same thing when I left Israel. Though I tried to return but I never could and that light and holiness that was part of my first stay there also never returned. The lesson is: if you have something good, hold onto it with all your might. Don't think it will follow you around. [That is at least the lesson for my kind of soul. There are several different types --so my advice here might only apply to me and similar kinds of people.]

Avraham Abulafia [a mystic who wrote many mystic books in the Middle Ages] held Jesus was Messiah ben Joseph.

Avraham Abulafia [a mystic who wrote many kabalistic books in the Middle Ages] held Jesus was Messiah ben Joseph.  The issue of Messiah son of Joseph is a totally different issue than Messiah son of David as we see in the end of the Talmud Tractate Suka, the Ramchal and many other sources.

The main idea is that messiah son of Joseph is a kind of preparation for the redemption in which there will be the Temple in Jerusalem rebuilt and the sacrifices of the Torah will be brought again. This later stage has not happened.
Still being Messiah son of Joseph according to Rav Abulafia is not a bad thing. In theory it is good to believe in a great person and bad to follow or believe in wicked people. So if some people believe in a tzadik --even if they overdo it--why complain?

Merry Christmas

So for one day I suggest we all lay down our hatreds and animosity. Let's have the equivalent of the 1914 Christmas truce between the allies and the Germans. Sure we all have good reasons to hate each other. Christians have doctrines and beliefs we can't accept. Many Christians have beliefs about Jews that makes them think us bad people. Let's for one day forget all this. We all believe in One God, the God of Abraham Isaac and Jacob,  though we worship Him differently. We all believe in the Ten Commandments. So for one day, let's aspire for peace on earth and good will unto men. If we can manage that for one day, who knows? Maybe we will be able to manage it for two? Or three?






Post script: This is not to imply anything in terms of theology. Just it is information for the record.
Clearly Rav Abulafia disagreed with Catholic theology. He went to debate the pope. The pope ordered him arrested when he reached the gates of Rome. The story is mysterious but it seems that no one could touch him.

Plus I might add that Chaim Vital borrowed the unifications of Avraham Abulfia in the last vol of Shaari HaKedusha. And his works were translated completely for the first time in history the 1990's until 2005. [Before that I read some of the microfilm copies in the basement of HU]

 I must add than none of this has anything to do with our basic obligations in the Oral or Written Law. Nor does it have anything to do with theology.] That is because of reasons I have not understood some people think that there is no reason to keep mitzvot plus  they think a messiah must have something to do with theology. None of that makes sense to me. Mitzvot are still mitzvot and Monotheism is still monotheism.


The whole issue is a Midrashic kind of thing. Still the basic sources for the messiah son of Joseph type of issue are in the Talmud at the end of Suka, the Tikunim Chadashim of the Ramchal. the Kol HaTor of the Gra.]

Appendix the problem with all this is this gives to Jews for Jesus or any of their different varieties an excuse to try to convert Jews to Christianity. And that is not my intent. The reason is that Jews for Jesus exaggerate the importance of  the issue of the messiah. They think that if one accept a particular person as their "lord and messiah" that that means they are going to heaven. They accept the Trinity. These doctrines are mistaken. But not necessarily bad. The best thing is to be a simple Jew and learn the Oral and Written law and not follow any person but God alone. Judaism is not about worship of any person but worship of God according to the Written and Oral Law, {Old Testament, and two Talmuds}

The positive side is that everyone needs some picture of human perfection to aspire to. If they don't have Jesus, they  find often someone that is evil, or a mixture of good and evil. So following Jesus as Christians do is a lot better option than what the vast majority of what people do and whom they follow. Still in my opinion it is best to sit and learn Talmud and have  a kosher vocation and be a simple Jew. If I have any ideal of human perfection, it is my two parents

I mentioned the basic idea of the above essay to my learning partner and he opened up the Rambam in the 13 principles of faith and after that the last two halachot in Mishne Torah. On most of the above he wrote the exact same thing that I wrote. That is even if one would believe in Jesus as a Messiah son of Joseph   that would not be any reason to worship him nor would it have anything to do with keeping the commandments of the Torah. However he does have  negative opinion about Jesus himself. And I am sure most rishonim would agree with the Rambam. However on the opposite side there is Rav Abulfia and Yaakov Emden.
There is a practical side to all this. I often find that when I need help, Believing Christians are the only ones that will help me. Others of my own people ignore me or throw me from the top of the staircase and then there are Muslims who try to kill me.  I am certainly not the only one with these kinds of experiences.