There is an important commandment to learn Torah. The basic idea is that when there there is another commandment to do that no one else can do, then one is able to stop learning and then to do the other commandment, and then get back to learning Torah. ["Able" but not obligated according to the Gra]] Otherwise anything one does besides learning Torah come under the category of "Bitul Torah".[Not learning Torah when one is able comes under the category of כי דבר השם בזה הכרת תכרת הנפש ההיא הכרת בעולם הזה תכרת בעולם הבא עיין בנפש החיים ]
[However there is a large array of commandments that are in fact impossible to do by others. For example ונשמרתם מאד לנפשותיכם. פרו ורבו ויותר [watching your health. Having children, etc.]
There is however an important caveat [condition]--not to be making money by means of Torah. Using Torah for money does seem to detract from the value of the commandment. How much so is unclear to me. But in any case, it certainly is undesirable.
So Torah is not meant to be a profession. [See the commentary of Maimonides [Rav Moshe ben Maimon on Pirkei Avot chapter 4. לא קרדום לחפור בהם ... ואשתמש בתגא חלף.] [That statement of Hillel comes up in the first chapter of Pirkei Avot also but that is not where the Rambam put his long comment on it but rather in chapter 4.]
So where does Math and Physics fit in with this? I would have to say that they are in the category of learning Torah and are not just for Parnasa [making a living]. This I saw hints of in Rishonim like the Musar book Obligations of the Heart. But quite openly in the Rambam in Yad HaChazaka and the Guide.
There is however an important caveat [condition]--not to be making money by means of Torah. Using Torah for money does seem to detract from the value of the commandment. How much so is unclear to me. But in any case, it certainly is undesirable.
So Torah is not meant to be a profession. [See the commentary of Maimonides [Rav Moshe ben Maimon on Pirkei Avot chapter 4. לא קרדום לחפור בהם ... ואשתמש בתגא חלף.] [That statement of Hillel comes up in the first chapter of Pirkei Avot also but that is not where the Rambam put his long comment on it but rather in chapter 4.]
So where does Math and Physics fit in with this? I would have to say that they are in the category of learning Torah and are not just for Parnasa [making a living]. This I saw hints of in Rishonim like the Musar book Obligations of the Heart. But quite openly in the Rambam in Yad HaChazaka and the Guide.
