What the Rambam must have thought. If we look in to the book of Numbers ch 34 verses 18-19 we see that Kalev was the head of the tribe of Judah. To the Rambam that must be considered in the category of a king.

As I mentioned that most Rishonim [Mediaeval authorities] allow one to have a girl friend. [e.g. Ramban/Nachmanides, Raavad] The only question on this  is the Rambam [Maimonides] who allows a פילגש girlfriend only to a king.
The question of the Gra [Rav Eliyahu from Villna] on this is Kalev ben Yefuna who had a few wives and a few girl friends and was not a king. [See Chronicles I ch 2:46] [You can see that this is in fact Kalev ben Yefuna from the fact that his daughter is Achsa the same as we know Kalev ben Yefuna had in the book of Judges right at the beginning.]]
In any case the achronim [later authorities] on the Shulchan Aruch itself right there on the page say that to the Rambam there is no לאו [prohibition] involved,  but rather an איסור עשה [a prohibition that comes from the lack of doing a positive command].

In any case, today I just wanted to share what I think the Rambam must have thought. If we look in to the book of Numbers ch 34 verses 18-19 we see that Kalev was the head of the tribe of Judah.
 To the Rambam that must be considered in the category of a king.

The problem however that the Rosh brings up and his son, the Tur, is the mikveh issue. Not everyone is near a river. or an ocean. And even those that are- have a problem in the winter where the rivers are frozen. One thing I wanted to mention about this problem is this: even in winter in places where the water is rough [--like the areas after a waterfall--] the water does not freeze over. So one can go there even without an ax to break through the ice.

[Of course the best thing is to be married, however nowadays that does not seem to be possible for a lot of people for reasons that are well known. Women nowadays  tend to devolve into selfish bitches right after they are married. Besides that, it is that it is always better when you come home to be greeted by  kiss rather than a nag and complaints. Human flourishing does not usually happen in such conditions. For that reason it is almost always better to have  a girl friend rather than a wife.]

there is a commandment to have children.

We know in the Torah there is a commandment to have children. That is  a male and female. When does one fulfill this mizvah? When the children are born or by sex? It seems to me that Tosphot holds the later opinion. The reason is this: There is n argument between th house of Hillel and the house of Shamai [that is the students of Hillel and Shamai]. Let's say you and another person  own a slave. So half is owned by you and half by another. Then the another lets the slave go. [That is he write for him a שטר שחחרור]. Then at that point half the slave is a regular Jew and half is still a gentile. [I forgot to mention that a slave that is let free becomes automatically Jewish and obligated in all the mizvot of the Torah] . So at that point the slave can not have sex with  a Jewess because he is still half a slave, and he can not have sex with  anyone else because he is half a Jew. Thus the House of Shamai says the court of law forces you to let the slave go free so that he becomes a full Jews. The question of Tosphot is, "Why do we not say עשה דוחה לא תעשה the positive mitzvah of having children פרו ורבו pushes off the negative command of not having sex with a שפחה כנענית? " (Since the general rule is always a positive command pushes off a negative command.] Tosphot answers because the mizvah is fulfilled at the end of the sex while the negative command is violated right at הערה--the beginning.
To me it seems clear that Tosphot is thinking that be fruitful and multiply applies to every act for otherwise the question would not even begin.

The reason Bitachon [trust in God]comes up in Litvak yeshivas  is because it is relevant to the question should one be sitting and learning in a full time Litvak yeshiva of should one go to university or college to learn a profession. This makes the question of Bitachon enormously relevant.
My own experience with this is that I just went along with the system without thinking much into it. I got married and sat in kollel and got the kollel check at the end of the month. Then I went to Israel. At that point the thing that got me out of kollel was not the issue of trust in God but the fact that the kollel system in israel is set up in such a way that to be part of it one has to be using Torah to make money קרדום לחפור בו. [It is set up as a 9-5 job that if you come in you get the money. It is not set up as a kind of charity that is the only permissible way of  doing this at least according to Rav Joseph Karo]  That however still ignores the question of trust.

In Litvak yeshivas the issue of trust is boiled down to the argument between the חובות לבבות  [Obligations of the Heart by Ibn Pekuda] versus the רמב''ן
This is not anything new so far. Everyone knows all this

The reason I bring this up is I notice that the place where this comes up in the Bible is the Story of King Asa.who got sick in his feet and the verse says he sought help from the doctors instead of from God and therefore he died. The obvious question is what does this mean? Could he have sought help from God but also gone to doctors and that would have been OK?

What is interesting is that that was not the first time that King Asa was criticized for not trusting in God. It turns out that before that time, he had been attacked by the king of Israel [the ten tribes] and he had taken all the gold and silver from the Temple in Jerusalem and sent it to the king of Syria asking him for help. The king of Syria then in fact attacked Israel and King Asa was criticized for that action also. Kings I ch 15. Chronicles II 16.

To me today it looks like the Obligations of the Heart was correct when he said that the trouble with King Asa was he sought help from the doctors only. What he should have done was to trust in God but also do the necessary steps according to the way of the world to go to the doctors and listen to their advice. And that seems to have been the conclusion of Reb Israel Salanter also.

The thing which muddles the issue is that yeshivas are often geared towards making money by getting donations. In itself this does not seem so bad but then there should not be any talk about trust in God. Rather they ought to say they are using the Torah as a means to make money and then claim that it is OK to do so. But the last step is impossible. No one can believe that there is any source for such a permission. Thus there is an inherent inconsistency in the system itself.
Great tzadikim like Bava Sali however never had this kind of trouble because of the fact that people wanted to give him money because of his obvious tzidkut righteousness. They counted it as a great privilege to be able to give him money. So he was not using Torah to make money.

In most of the books of Musar [Mediaeval Moral Principles] from the school of thought of  the Geonim and Rambam [Maimonides] learning natural science and metaphysics comes up as the way to come to love and fear God.

This fact gets hidden in Musar books based on the Ramban [Nachmanides]

And later on Musar books will quote the Rambam but attempt to absorb him into the world view of the Ramban.

On one hand in the years when I was in the Mir and Shar Yashuv in NY I did not want to be distracted from learning Gemara and I feel that learning Gemara exclusively did help me in remarkable ways.
However that does not change the fact that the Rambam did see Physics and the Metaphysics of Aristotle as an essential part of Torah learning.
The way to understand the Rambam I think is this: By being exposed to the wisdom of God as revealed in his creation automatically love and fear of God are awakened in one's soul.The Rambam says this openly more or less but still it is a hard concept to grasp after that the general opinion is the reverse.

Empirical evidence seems to show is that the Rambam [Maimonides] was right since the opposite opinion when it is followed seem to lead to religious fanaticism and loss of good character. 

Education: Stop feeding the kids garbage

People like Maimonides, Aristotle, Plato, and Allan Bloom concentrated a lot on education. That is a major theme in The Republic and also in The Closing of the American Mind. The natural thing to restore Western Civilization then would be to look at education.
Stop feeding the kids garbage would be the first step.

The next step would be to take the advice of the Rambam to learn Physics and Metaphysics. That is to restructure education completely by throwing out the worthless subjects and putting in things of value. 

Everything called science nowadays outside of Physics, Chemistry, and Biology is just pseudo science. Allan Bloom was critical of the Humanities and Social Studies departments in universities but still I would have to say they do good work in terms of Music and the Arts.

[Metaphysics in the terminology of the Rambam clearly includes Aristotle's book The Metaphysics. But I think one would have to include also Plato, Kant and Hegel.] 

Torah as a cure

The Sages of the Gemara in Bava Batra bring down that Job said  that God created righteous people and evil people. Therefore what can man say to Him? He does what he likes. [That is the problem of Theodicity. The problem with evil. That is there are evil people and they do get punished for their sins even though it seems they had no choice but to be evil as they were created.]

His friends answered ברא יצר הרע ברא לו תורה תבלין God created the evil inclination but he also created the Torah as a cure. So there still is free will. One can choose to learn and thus be saved from the evil inclination.

To the Rambam this would have to include learning Physics and Metaphysics as he includes both in the category of th Oral Law in the Mishne Torah. [And he expands on this in the Guide.]
Obviously other rishonim like the Ramban and the Rashba disagree with the Rambam on this point  but to me it seems the Rambam was correct. Not that I am in any position to decide between giants like the Rishonim but rather I had to decide for myself what approach to take.

So Torah as a cure would include the Written Law, the Oral Law, Physics, and Metaphysics.
The last two clearly refer to Aristotle, but more than Aristotle. {The Rambam specifically says he is referring to there subjects as understood by the ancient Greeks.}

My humble opinion is that Physics would include String Theory and Quantum Mechanics. Metaphysics I think would include Neo Platonic approach which came after the Ancient Greeks. Also Kant an Hegel. (That is my opinion.)

The Rambam as is known has an approach towards Midrashim that they are much deeper than meets the eye. The Gra also said the secrets of the Torah are contained in the Midrashim. So here too I think there must be some deeper meaning.
One thing I did notice is that God in the end of the book of Job does not agree with the friends of Job. Rather He said they had sinned in what they said. So the fact that the sages of the Talmud bring the words of Job's friends must mean something beyond the surface meaning..  That is another reason I think the Rambam is looking at the idea of Torah from a wider perspective. That is as including Metaphysics and Physics and objective moral law.

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