The worship of tzadikim [saints]seems to me to be not a very good idea. One reason I say this is I notice in the Obligations of the Hearts חובות הלבבות this idea that not to make up new "עבודות"--services.
The problem seems to be that the religious world has sunken deeply into the worship of tzadikm, and that I think is really not all that different from the worship of sticks and stone.
[This comes up in the Obligations of the Hearts a few times but one place that really made the point clear to me was when he talks about sticking with the path of one's parents]. There is no question that my parents and their parents and their parents before them would have thought that this worship of tzadikim that is so prevalent in the religious world is absolutely ridiculous and not the straight path of Torah at all.
The only people apparently that were aware of this problem were the Gra and Rav Shach. Other than that it seems the religious world have replaced the worship of God.
Now if I am right about this it means that the general set of rules about idolatry apply.
That is to say that one is not allowed to derive pleasure from idols nor the worship of idols. And since the worship of tzadikim is in fact idolatry that whole set of rules would apply.
I saw that the Hafetz Haim goes into the problems involved with deriving any kind of benefit from idols in section 6 of the Hafetz Haim.
[What this means is that in general one can not get pleasure from looking at idolatry, nor any other kind of pleasure.]
The problem seems to be that the religious world has sunken deeply into the worship of tzadikm, and that I think is really not all that different from the worship of sticks and stone.
[This comes up in the Obligations of the Hearts a few times but one place that really made the point clear to me was when he talks about sticking with the path of one's parents]. There is no question that my parents and their parents and their parents before them would have thought that this worship of tzadikim that is so prevalent in the religious world is absolutely ridiculous and not the straight path of Torah at all.
The only people apparently that were aware of this problem were the Gra and Rav Shach. Other than that it seems the religious world have replaced the worship of God.
Now if I am right about this it means that the general set of rules about idolatry apply.
That is to say that one is not allowed to derive pleasure from idols nor the worship of idols. And since the worship of tzadikim is in fact idolatry that whole set of rules would apply.
I saw that the Hafetz Haim goes into the problems involved with deriving any kind of benefit from idols in section 6 of the Hafetz Haim.
[What this means is that in general one can not get pleasure from looking at idolatry, nor any other kind of pleasure.]
