God and the world are not one. The world is not made out of any Divine substance. It is made something from nothing. Ex Nihilo.

The Faith of the Torah is Monotheism. That is that God is One and has no substance or form. And He made the world from nothing. This is not the same as pantheism. God and the world are not one. The world is not made out of any Divine substance. It is made something from nothing. Ex Nihilo.

The actual verse of the Torah reads in full אתה הראתה לדעת כי השם הוא האלהים אין עוד מלבדו which says "There are no other gods besides God."
If you read the last three words out of context you come out with a false interpretation of the verse.

There is no implication here about pantheism.
 Pantheism mainly comes from the Upanishads. Spinoza also. And as I wrote else where if this point had been proved, I would not make  a big deal about it. But the Upanishads just state it, and Spinoza does not prove it. Spinoza can only get to it by making a premise that is highly doubtful in itself.
This is unlike the way things are done in, for example, Mathematics. In Math, you start with premises which are almost so trivial that there does not seem any reason to state them. For example: the shortest distance between two points is straight line. You don't start out with premises that are highly doubtful, and then go on to prove even more doubtful conclusions.

Besides this, no one held from pantheism. Not Saadia Gaon, the Rambam, Ibn Gavirol, Crescas, Joseph Albo, the Ari, the Ramban (emphasis on last syllable). Abravenal [Not Abarbenal].  Certainly not the Torah Oral or Written.

The idea of Israel Salanter --to learn Musar [ethics] seems to me to be a good idea from the point of view of keeping Torah properly. If fact, I would have to agree that in order to understand how to keep Torah, Musar plus the basic works of Jewish Philosophy from the Middle Ages is enough. I mean in theory to understand what the Torah requires of us does not really require much more than to know what the Torah consider to be good character, and good world view, and to be able to identify and stay away from people with bad character and bad world views.

[Just for background for the public when I say Jewish Philosophy I mean you start with Saadia Gaon and go up until Crescas, Albo  and Abravenal, (not Abarbenal) אברבנל comes from the Spanish and is pronounced Abravenal.]

The thing about Musar which is a bit hard to figure out is the Kabalah connection. I do not mean specifically the Ramchal [Moshe Chaim Lutzatto.] I mean rather that all Musar after the Ari borrows heavily and depends on Kabalah and especially the Zohar. And that tends to lead people off into all kinds of crazy directions. Yet it is standard fare in almost all Musar.--For Example, Sefer HaCharaidim, Reishit Chachma, the Shelah. If fact name me one book of Musar after that that does not depend on Kabalah? Only the books of the disciples of Israel Salanter himself.


Not that there is anything wrong with this Kabalah connection in itself. The Ari after all is good to learn when one is ready for it. But as a rule who learns Kabalah and is improved? No one that I have heard of except  Bava Sali and people that were anyway into "Avodat Hashem" in a way that the Kabalah just added a bit to the intensity.

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Kabalah of the Ari I see as simply a continuation of the Neo Platonic approach of all Jewish Philosophy from Saadia Geon until Crescas and Abravenal. Not only that but I see him as building a bridge between the Neo Platic approach of  Jewish Philosophy and the Aristotelian Philosophy of the Rambam. This seems very good. What I object to are the cults that came afterwards. The Gra did well to excommunicate them.     Not because of false opinions or character. Though both are evident. Lying and fraud are like bread and water to them. Rather the Sitra Achra is their essence. But not just any Sitra Achra but a very specific kelipa.

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When I say the Ari was building a bridge I really mean the Reshash [that is Shalom Sharabi] the author of Nahar Shalom. Without his approach to the Ari, it is very hard to see any connection with Aristotle. The Ari at first glance seems totally Neo Platonic. It is only when you learn the Ari in connection with Shalom Sharabi that you can start to see how this approach incorporate Aristotle and the Rambam's Aristotelian philosophy along with it. If fact you see this clearly in the order of the worlds that the Reshash sets up after the revival of the dead. Right there he is switching from Plato's ideas to Aristotle's forms

a7 A Minor

You can't use science to prove the existence of God. The only two ways that I am aware of is the one I put on the top on my blog:  

 Everything has a cause. So unless there is a first cause, then you would have an infinite regress. And then nothing could exist. Therefore there must be a first cause. 

The other way is by a proof called the Ontological proof. That is God has all possible perfections by definition. If he would lack existence he would lack one perfection. Therefore He exists. This was put into rigorous logical form by Godel.  I saw this once in Hebrew University and later someone put it on the internet.  This seems to be good but I prefer the basic idea of the First Cause. 

The basic question on the ontological proof was stated by Kant that existence is not a predicate. But we know that "is" is in fact a predicate. But what Kant means to ask is really that logic can not penetrate into unconditioned realities. He is asking a question based on his entire way of thinking--not just a minor observation. And we know that people after Kant have tried to bridge this gap. 

However I think this goes too far into theology. I do not want to assume characteristics of God. Nor did the Rambam. It was enough for him to borrow from Aristotle's First mover to get to the First Cause and that is enough for me. In fact, I would prefer not to assume any characteristics about God at all. I go in this way like the Book of Job. In that book the friends of Job said God is just and we can not understand his ways. The normal Shabat Table Judaism standard fare. But at the end  of that book God comes along and says the friends of Job were wrong. This same point was driven home by Schopenhauer who basing himself on Kant thought that God is the ding an sich--wild, delighting in being unpredictable, with no interest in being considered good. The Will. And the world is just an expression of the Will. 

The concept of חרם (or excommunication) is not well understood. People tend to this of it as an option whether to pay attention to it or not. But in fact it is a legitimate halachic category. It has a regular classification of an איסר נדר. That is if you say about a sheep or goat "הרי זה קרבן"["This is dedicated as a sacrifice in the Temple"] it gets a classification of being sanctified for the Temple in Jerusalem and one is not allowed to use it for any mundane purpose. It becomes a חפצא של אסיר an object that is forbidden to use. The idea of a חרם gets its validity from this same idea. You can see this in the laws of oaths in the Rambam. In the commentaries on the Rambam there is a debate whether a נידוי or חרם come from the category of איסר נדר or איסר שבועה. But there is no doubt that one that transgresses it is considered as if he transgressed a נדר או שבועה and that is a לאו דאורייתא (prohibition from the Torah itself).


When the Gra made a חרם he was not inventing a halachic category but using one that already existed. The reason he wrote elsewhere. The Gra held the teachings of hasidim are from the Sitra Achra and that its energies are fallen energies--miracles given to them like the miracles done by the Golden Calf. Miracles and powers of the Dark Side.


So why is it ignored. The institutions that would normally be following the Gra were infiltrated and taken over. That is Lithuanian yeshivas. [And this also explains what many people wonder about --why are Lithuanian yeshivas  corrupt? Well now you know.]

The answer to all of this is simple. To start paying attention to what the Gra said. It could not be more simple.

The only way now is to be for or against. There is no middle road. I though before I could find one but I see now that was a failing strategy.

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Sitra Achra A.K.A. The Dark Side

Some people and some groups are possibly wrapped up with the Dark Side.
There is not good reason to eliminate this possibility, while some problems might be in fact from world views gone astray or mental illness. It has been the tendency of the West to minimize or eliminate entirely the effects of the Dark Side in peoples'  lives and to deny its existence. 

The Gra would not have put that group into excommunication if he if not think that the Sitra Achra had not become mixed up with it in some kind of hidden way.


This is an important topic and I would like to at least explain my own approach. 
Mainly it goes like this: morality and holiness are tightly bonded. It is as simple as that.
Morality here means common sense morality. When you see a person that does not have that or a group, then they are part of the Sitra Achra.  

Common sense morality is what you would think based on the Ten Commandments. Do not steal or lie etc. Once a group is involved in some kind of fraud I assume there is more wrong with it than moral wrong.I also assume there is metaphysical evil inside of it.