1) It looks like the religious world as a movement directs people away from God and towards their own leaders. Graves of tzadikim tends to be a major theme by the religious world. And it seems that at least Elijah the prophet did not think it was possible to serve God and any other being at the same time. Otherwise the simple answer to him would have been: "We serve God and Baal," or "We serve Baal as a means of getting to God."
To Elijah that would not work.
And now we can understand what it was that the Gra was seeing when he put his signature on the cherem (excommunication). He saw pure and simple idolatry. No if's and's and but's. And he saw it was idolatry that was using mitzvot and Torah as a disguise and a mask. And that made it infinitely more dangerous and evil than open idolatry.
2) Eliyahu [Elijah] the prophet in Mount Carmel told the Jewish people, "If the Lord is God then go after Him; and if the Baal is god, then go after him." And they could not answer him. And then fire came down from heaven and they cried out, "The Lord is God; the Lord is God." The implication is, "The Lord is God, and the Baal is not God."
Why did they not simply answer him, "When we need a blessing from heaven, we pray to God. When we need a blessing from the earth, we pray to the Baal, or we go to some Tzadik?"
Elijah would not have been satisfied with this. He would have said, "If the Lord is God, then go after him; and if the Tzadik is God, then go after him."
3) But to me it seems that we have to look at what the philosophy of the Torah is and and then the philosophy of other groups. And also to look at their prime directive. The prime principle of faith that ones entire portion in the next world depends on. And we can see that the philosophies of each are different.
Believing in some person seems to be inherent in other groups and this is not what the Torah tells us.
While it seems on the surface the Torah itself is fairly straightforward that one should keep Torah and mitzvot and there are no short cuts.
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Appendix
1) The fact that one can find examples in Torah or Talmud of importance of closeness with a Tzadik is along the same lines that we find in Torah of elements of polytheism. And the Rambam says in fact that many mitzvot were given to wean people from polytheism. For example the Rambam said God knew he could not command people not to bring sacrifices. So instead of eliminating sacrifices he said people should bring them to God alone. And so we many other mitzvot. The Torah makes allowance in going to a true tzadik because it knows if it would forbid such a thing people would go to false tzadikim. So instead it allows one to go to true prophets and tzadikim even for blessings and guidance even though it know it would be better to go to God directly. And it hopes the true tzadik will then guide people towards God and to depend on God alone.
2) When people believe that is is allowed to worship one tzadik, they tend to downgrade other tzadikim--as if this gives them an excuse to be worshiping one and not the other.
You see this often by people that are devotes of any particular person.
3) In polytheism you can find conflict between kinds of services that are required. A devote of Venus will be required one thing and a devote of Artemis something else. But the point of Elijah was that there is an essential conflict in worshiping God and also being a devote of any other being, the Baal or any Tzadik.--even if they are real tzadikim.
4) In Torah believing that any person is Divine is idolatry. (That is either a part of G-d or G-d himself.) Pure shemad שמד . Only God is Divine. But believing God is Divine is sadly not enough to get one into the Garden of Eden. There are mitzvahs also, and learning Torah too.
5) In any case for a Jew, no matter how afraid one is from hell or tortures of destructive angels, believing in idolatry is not an option.
"Woe to so and so who rebelled against the Torah and against its commandments," is what the angels cry out when they bring the body to the grave. Who wants to hear that? Not me.
6) So my suggestion is to keep the Torah. And though I realize that in Torah there are moral dilemmas. There is a kind of tension in knowing what one must do. And that is characteristic of keeping Torah. And yet the basic framework is simple. learn Torah keep Mitzvot, and let God worry about your portion in the next world. "And don't worry about worries of tomorrow." אל תצר צרת מחר
7) I am trying to point out that belief in some person's divinity is a problem but I was not trying to go into the details because it was simply to point out that such a belief can't be the condition of getting into the Garden of Eden. This seems to relate to Christianity because it is the fundamental tenet of Christianity to believe in the Divinity of Jesus. (Not that he ever said such a thing.) But I will leave that to Aquinas and Anselm. My interest here is simply to approach the question from the viewpoint of the Oral and Written Law.
For Christians interested in these topics let me say that even though belief in the Divinity of Jesus is the most central tenet of Christianity in Torah thought, belief in anyone's divinity is wrong and idolatry. This is mainly treated in Saadia Geon. Maimonides treats the issue of an intermediate. And these are separate issues. Maybe I could get into them someday. But right now I wanted to concentrate on the Torah aspect of these things.
To Elijah that would not work.
And now we can understand what it was that the Gra was seeing when he put his signature on the cherem (excommunication). He saw pure and simple idolatry. No if's and's and but's. And he saw it was idolatry that was using mitzvot and Torah as a disguise and a mask. And that made it infinitely more dangerous and evil than open idolatry.
2) Eliyahu [Elijah] the prophet in Mount Carmel told the Jewish people, "If the Lord is God then go after Him; and if the Baal is god, then go after him." And they could not answer him. And then fire came down from heaven and they cried out, "The Lord is God; the Lord is God." The implication is, "The Lord is God, and the Baal is not God."
Why did they not simply answer him, "When we need a blessing from heaven, we pray to God. When we need a blessing from the earth, we pray to the Baal, or we go to some Tzadik?"
Elijah would not have been satisfied with this. He would have said, "If the Lord is God, then go after him; and if the Tzadik is God, then go after him."
3) But to me it seems that we have to look at what the philosophy of the Torah is and and then the philosophy of other groups. And also to look at their prime directive. The prime principle of faith that ones entire portion in the next world depends on. And we can see that the philosophies of each are different.
Believing in some person seems to be inherent in other groups and this is not what the Torah tells us.
While it seems on the surface the Torah itself is fairly straightforward that one should keep Torah and mitzvot and there are no short cuts.
\
Appendix
1) The fact that one can find examples in Torah or Talmud of importance of closeness with a Tzadik is along the same lines that we find in Torah of elements of polytheism. And the Rambam says in fact that many mitzvot were given to wean people from polytheism. For example the Rambam said God knew he could not command people not to bring sacrifices. So instead of eliminating sacrifices he said people should bring them to God alone. And so we many other mitzvot. The Torah makes allowance in going to a true tzadik because it knows if it would forbid such a thing people would go to false tzadikim. So instead it allows one to go to true prophets and tzadikim even for blessings and guidance even though it know it would be better to go to God directly. And it hopes the true tzadik will then guide people towards God and to depend on God alone.
2) When people believe that is is allowed to worship one tzadik, they tend to downgrade other tzadikim--as if this gives them an excuse to be worshiping one and not the other.
You see this often by people that are devotes of any particular person.
3) In polytheism you can find conflict between kinds of services that are required. A devote of Venus will be required one thing and a devote of Artemis something else. But the point of Elijah was that there is an essential conflict in worshiping God and also being a devote of any other being, the Baal or any Tzadik.--even if they are real tzadikim.
4) In Torah believing that any person is Divine is idolatry. (That is either a part of G-d or G-d himself.) Pure shemad שמד . Only God is Divine. But believing God is Divine is sadly not enough to get one into the Garden of Eden. There are mitzvahs also, and learning Torah too.
5) In any case for a Jew, no matter how afraid one is from hell or tortures of destructive angels, believing in idolatry is not an option.
"Woe to so and so who rebelled against the Torah and against its commandments," is what the angels cry out when they bring the body to the grave. Who wants to hear that? Not me.
6) So my suggestion is to keep the Torah. And though I realize that in Torah there are moral dilemmas. There is a kind of tension in knowing what one must do. And that is characteristic of keeping Torah. And yet the basic framework is simple. learn Torah keep Mitzvot, and let God worry about your portion in the next world. "And don't worry about worries of tomorrow." אל תצר צרת מחר
7) I am trying to point out that belief in some person's divinity is a problem but I was not trying to go into the details because it was simply to point out that such a belief can't be the condition of getting into the Garden of Eden. This seems to relate to Christianity because it is the fundamental tenet of Christianity to believe in the Divinity of Jesus. (Not that he ever said such a thing.) But I will leave that to Aquinas and Anselm. My interest here is simply to approach the question from the viewpoint of the Oral and Written Law.
For Christians interested in these topics let me say that even though belief in the Divinity of Jesus is the most central tenet of Christianity in Torah thought, belief in anyone's divinity is wrong and idolatry. This is mainly treated in Saadia Geon. Maimonides treats the issue of an intermediate. And these are separate issues. Maybe I could get into them someday. But right now I wanted to concentrate on the Torah aspect of these things.
