Printable PDF available here. Previous pieces on Ha’azinu are available here and here.

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Rav Kook (Based on B’sadeh haRe’iah, Pg. 194)

And now, write for yourselves this song, and teach it to the Children of Israel. Place it into their mouths, in order that this song will be for Me as a witness for the children of Israel. (Devarim 31:19)

And Moses came and spoke all the words of this song into the ears of the people, he and Hoshea the son of Nun. (Devarim 32:44)

On a simple level, the “song” referred to here is the parshah of Ha’azinu. However, a deeper interpretation offered by our tradition is that the entire Torah is referred to a song. This is the basis of the mitzvah that every Jew must write their own sefer Torah. It is unclear, however, why G-d has to speak in code and refer to the Torah as a “song,” as we don’t find this usage anywhere else. There must be some deeper meaning intended, but what is it?

It seems that the answer is latent in the broader context in which Ha’azinu appears. Immediately before, in Parshat Nitzavim, the Jews entered into a new covenant with G-d at the Plains of Moav. At that time, Moshe declared:

You are all standing this day before the Lord, your G-d the leaders of your tribes, your elders and your officers, every man of Israel, your young children, your women, and your convert who is within your camp both your woodcutters and your water drawers, that you may enter the covenant of the Lord, your G-d, and His oath, which the Lord, your G-d, is making with you this day…

Although Israel was already bound by the covenant at Sinai, our Sages teach that this covenant added a new dimension of obligation. At Sinai, the people had pledged fealty to G-d as individuals. Each person assumed responsibility for their own individual spiritual successes and failures – but nothing more. However, according to the Talmud (Sotah 37b), at the Plains of Moav the people accepted responsibility for each other’s fulfillment or non-fulfillment of the Divine covenant. The Talmud refers to this is arvut, literally “guarantorship.” Just as a lender can collect from the guarantor when the borrower fails to pay, each Jew is a guarantor for his or her fellow’s loyalty to the Divine covenant. A laissez-faire policy of “live and let live” is not a Jewish concept.

Our Sages also teach (Sanhedrin 43b) that the additional covenant of arvut did not come into force until the Jews entered Eretz Yisrael. For it is only in Eretz Yisrael that Torah life is a totalizing affair undertaken by the collective (lit. הכלל), instead of the pursuit of a conglomeration of like-minded individuals.

Thus, as Moshe prepares to teach Parshat Ha’azinu to the people, the higher collective dimension of Torah stands ready to emerge, beckoning from just beyond the Jordan River. For this reason, it is only now that the Torah can be referred to as a “song.” As the Maharal taught, true song emerges from a state of wholeness and completeness (lit. שלימות). The Torah can only rise to this level in the Land of Israel, but nowhere else. Thus, it was only in anticipation of Israel’s imminent entry into the Land that Torah became a song. Only in Israel can the song of the Torah be written on our hearts.

Food for Thought

Rabbi Josh Flug (Arvut: The Responsibility to Ensure that Other Jews Observe Mitzvot): The Magen Avraham seems to be of the opinion that the obligation of arvut is more important than fulfilling one’s own mitzvah in a preferred manner. He rules (671:1) that if one has the exact amount of oil to fulfill mehadrin on Chanukah and one’s neighbor doesn’t have any oil, one should give some oil to the neighbor and both will fulfill the basic mitzvah. R. Chaim Sofer (1822-1886, Machaneh Chaim 3:19) explains that Magen Avraham’s ruling is based on the concept of arvut. Magen Avraham (658:12) also rules that if one owns an etrog in a place where the community has one available for everyone to use and there is another community that doesn’t have any etrogim, he should send his private etrog to the other community and fulfill his obligation with his community’s etrog. R. Shammai Gross (Shevet HaKehati, Orach Chaim 5:108) explains that Magen Avraham’s ruling is based on the idea that the etrog owner’s obligation of arvut demands that he forgo the preferred method of fulfilling the mitzvah in order that other people should be able to fulfill the basic requirement.

Rambam (Hilchot Tefillin, Mezuzah and Sefer Torah 8:1): It is a positive commandment for each and every Jewish man to write a Torah scroll for himself, as it says (Devarim 31:19): “And now, write down this song for yourselves,” i.e., write down the [entire] Torah which contains this song. One may not write only a few parshiot of Torah [and therefore the command to write Ha’azinu translates is in effectively a command to write the entire Torah].

Rabbi Zushe Greenberg: In the ‘60s, a rabbi from Connecticut had a personal audience with the [Lubavitcher] rebbe. This rabbi had been very instrumental in establishing the local Jewish day school and was well respected in his community. He asked the rebbe if he should make aliyah to Israel. The rebbe responded, “If you made up your mind to go, you have my blessing. But if you ask my opinion, I think you should stay in Connecticut.” The rebbe concluded, “There are plenty of rabbis in Israel. Connecticut needs you!” The rebbe inspired generations of young couples to leave their hometowns and go off into the world to share their Jewish experience with others. In my own family, many of my siblings moved to far-flung corners of the world just to be part of the building of a new Jewish community.

Rabbi Ezra Bick: We have all been brought up in an extremely individualistic ethos, which pervades the western world today. Man is responsible for himself. Of course, most of us – and most western societies – accept that I should help my fellow man. This is called altruism, and serves to moderate extreme individualism to some extent. But altruism is very different from the ethos that lies behind arvut; in fact, it is almost the opposite. Arvut declares that I am responsible for others just as I am responsible for myself. It is not goodheartedness to help others, it is collective self-interest. The failure of my neighbor is not merely a lost opportunity for me to have practiced philanthropy, it is simply my own failure.

For the forty years in the desert each Jewish individual had a relationship with G-d based on the fact that he too had received the Torah. At this point, before entering the Land of Israel (i.e., before entering on the road of national destiny), G-d molds these disparate individuals into a nation, a collective, a community. … The covenant is not between the individual and G-d, but between the metaphysical entity called Israel and G-d. The nation as a whole and as a unity is given the Torah this time; hence the conclusion of arvut – if the nation as a whole and as a unity does not keep the Torah, the covenant has not been fulfilled…

In the beginning of this week’s shiur, I began with the application of “arvut” to a ritual matter, in order to demonstrate that the concept should be taken seriously and not merely as a sort of metaphor for a general obligation to look out for others. But of course, the concept has immediate applications in many other areas as well. My attitude towards other Jews is one of obligation – mutual obligation and responsibility. If another Jew is in trouble, I will go to help him, not merely because I think that helping others is an ethical imperative, and I am a generous and helpful soul, but because we both belong to a greater unit which binds us and defines my own identity. Were I not to help him, I would not only sin against him, but I would be untrue to myself, to my identity as a Jew. I do not mean to belittle generosity, not at all. Giving to others, “chesed,” is itself a powerful and essential trait, one defined halakhically as basic to the image of G-d in which all of us are created… The concept of arvut is a parallel one, based not on love and giving, but on responsibility. Think of it as family – above and beyond, and totally separately from the obligations of giving and feelings of love, one takes care of one’s children because one is responsible for them, because one belongs to a unit – the family – that is part of one’s individual personality and identity. I think that if we knew a mother who took care of her children, in a perfectly wonderful manner, only out of the pity and love that one has for one’s fellow man, or even out of the love that one naturally has for one’s offspring, there would be something missing. The practical difference perhaps is what happens when one is tired or grouchy, or if the child is unworthy or unwilling, but I think the point is true even if there is no immediate practical difference at all. Arvut seeks to raise the responsibility of family to a higher level.

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks (Covenant and Conversation, Ha’azinu 5777): Music has extraordinary power to evoke emotion. The Kol Nidrei prayer with which Yom Kippur begins is not really a prayer at all. It is a dry legal formula for the annulment of vows. There can be little doubt that it is its ancient, haunting melody that has given it its hold over the Jewish imagination. It is hard to hear those notes and not feel that you are in the presence of G-d on the Day of Judgment, standing in the company of Jews of all places and times as they plead with heaven for forgiveness. It is the holy of holies of the Jewish soul… Faith is more like music than science. Science analyses, music integrates. And as music connects note to note, so faith connects episode to episode, life to life, age to age in a timeless melody that breaks into time. G-d is the composer and librettist. We are each called on to be voices in the choir, singers of G-d’s song. Faith is the ability to hear the music beneath the noise. So music is a signal of transcendence. The philosopher and musician Roger Scruton writes that it is “an encounter with the pure subject, released from the world of objects, and moving in obedience to the laws of freedom alone.” He quotes Rilke: “Words still go softly out towards the unsayable / And music, always new, from palpitating stones / builds in useless space its G-dly home.” The history of the Jewish spirit is written in its songs…

Questions for Discussion

1. How is Jewish life in Eretz Yisrael different than in the Diaspora?
2. Read the story about the Lubavitcher Rebbe in “Food for Thought” above. How did arvut shape his relationship to Eretz Yisrael differently than Rav Kook’s?
3. What can you do to take responsibility for the spiritual or physical welfare of other Jews?
4. Rav Kook’s teaching is based on the Maharal, who writes that “True song emerges from a state of wholeness and completeness.” What do you think this means?
5. In what way is it true that “a state of wholeness and completeness” is only attainable in the Land of Israel? Conversely, are there things that the Jews can accomplish in the Diaspora that they can’t accomplish in the Land of Israel?
6. What are some other ways that the Torah can be considered a “song”?

Printable PDF available here. Last years’s piece on Ha’azinu is available here.

Rav Kook (Eder haYakar)

For so many years, the Jewish People have stumbled along, groping in the dark for newfound “solutions” on behalf of our people and our Land. But seeking to impersonate the culture of other peoples is a dead end. We should instead work to realize our own uniqueness. We should realize that no other nation in the world is like us, and thus our historical development cannot be propelled by imitating the ways of other nations. The desire to do so indicates a profound lack of self-confidence.

For this reason, it is incumbent on Israel to gird itself with vigor and return to its Source. This does not mean that Israel has nothing to learn from other peoples, but only that their ways cannot be grafted onto us outright. Their individual and collective heritage can only serve as a rough model, an approximation to guide our own unique path.

Therefore, the foundation of our activities and the basis of our vigor must be our own essential Source. To become aware of our uniqueness, it is incumbent on us to honor the uniquely spiritual personalities within our midst, to seek out the men and women whose lives express our particular qualities, to familiarize ourselves with their ways and provide channels for their influence to spread.

“The Lord alone will guide them, and there is no foreign power with Him.” (Devarim 32:12)

Rav Kook (Orot haTeshuva 15:10, as translated in Song of Teshuva Vol. 4)

When a person forgets the nature of his essential soul, when he distracts himself from looking at the core of his inner life, then everything becomes confused and uncertain.

The primary type of teshuvah, which illuminates areas of darkness immediately, consists of an individual returning to himself, to the root of his soul. Then he immediately returns to G-d, to the Soul of all souls. He proceeds and strides forward, ever upward, with holiness and purity. This applies to an individual, to the entire nation, to all of mankind, to the rectification of all existence – whose imperfection is always due to the fact that it forgets itself.

If a person or a collective will say to Hashem that it wants to return to Hashem but it is not prepared to gather in the scattered components of its own being (lit. “its outcasts”) that is a deceitful teshuvah, one that takes the name of Hashem in vain.

Therefore, only with the great truth of the return to oneself do the individual and the nation, the world and all worlds, all existence, return to the Maker of existence, to be illumined by the light of life. That is the secret of the light of Mashiach, who is the appearance of the soul of the world. When that light will shine, the world will return to the root of existence. (1) And light of Hashem will be revealed upon it. And from the source of this great return, a person will draw forth the authentic holy teshuvah.

(1) In Orot haKodesh (Vol. 3, pg. 140), Rav Kook invokes the pasuk in Eichah (4:20) where Mashiach is referred to as “רוח אפינו,” “the breath of of our nostrils.” This conveys the idea that the spiritual power of Mashiach is not something foreign to us, but the inner essence of who we truly are.

Food for Thought (Rav Moshe Weinberger, Song of Teshuva Vol. 4)

A person’s return to G-d is only the second stage of teshuvah. The first stage is his return to himself. Very often, a person is distracted from who he is, and this can occur on different levels. For instance, a person might live in a realm of complete materialism and never think about G-d, his soul, and the purpose of his creation. But even a person living a religious life can be living in a state of distraction from who he is… [T]here can be a person who, although he is committed to Torah in general, does not think about his individual connection to Torah and to G-d. He performs mitzvos, works on his character, performs acts of kindness, davens, guards his tongue, learns Gemara, and has faith in the tzaddikim. He may learn the inner Torah – the teachings of R. Tzadok, Sefas Emes, the Vilna Gaon, and Ramchal. He may read about pious practices and implement those that appeal to him. His service of G-d may consist of thousands upon thousands of wonderful elements. But they remain disparate bits and pieces, lacking an organizing principle. He does not know how to tailor them the depth of who he is — because he does not know the depth of who he is.

Since he is a stranger to his spirit, even the deepest teachings and practices remain on the surface of who he is. They do not change him; after years of effort, he has not reduced his desires, evil inclinations and foolishness that he always had. As a result, everything in his life is confused and uncertain. But when Mashiach comes, each person will hear the Torah speaking directly to his soul.

A person who does not know who he is cannot cling to the Creator of the world. The beginning of teshuva consists of a person gaining an understanding of who he is. As soon as he returns to himself, the dark places within him are illuminated and become a vehicle for G-dliness. It is true that when he first comes back to himself, he may be disappointed and even shocked at the trash that he be finds there. But as he casts that away, he reaches his holiness and purity. In order to come to G-d, a person must pass through progressively deeper layers of who he is — each level, as it were, preceded by a door with his name on it. And then he comes to a door on which is inscribed, “Creator of all worlds, blessed be He.”

From that point on, he is no longer living somebody else’s life but his own. He is no longer engaged in somebody else’s Yiddishkeit but his own. Now he no longer experiences confusion and uncertainty, but focuses instead on his connection to G-d, the Soul of all souls, and he can reach higher and higher levels of holiness and purity… If a person has not forged a connection between himself and the Creator, then his life is false. He may try a new mitzvah project, but he soon loses interest. He may try a variety of ways to serve Hashem, but in a patchwork manner. This is because the initiative is not coming from who he truly is. He is only imitating other Jews.

The root of a person’s Yiddishkeit is the trait of truth. So important is this that in only one instance does the Torah warn a person to distance himself from sin: “Stay far away from falsehood” (Shemos 23:7)…

The Rebbe R. Bunim of Peshischa said (and this is recorded as well in the name of the Kotzker Rebbe) that in addition to not lying to others a person should not lie to himself. Instead, a person must seek the truth of who he is. That may hurt, because he might discover that he does not possess positive qualities that he had thought were his, and he may find ugly traits within himself that he had not heretofore acknowledged.

When a person discovers who he truly is, he can discover G-d, Who is the Soul inside his soul and Who is associated with truth, as in our Sages’ teaching that “the seal of the Holy One, blessed be He, is truth” (Shabbos 55a; Yerushalmi Sanhedrin 64a). This person sees that getting in touch with G-d is not an accomplishment that only tzaddikim such as the Baal Shem Tov, the Chasam Sofer, or the Chofetz Chaim can achieve, but that he himself can do so. And when he meets up with the Soul of all souls, he begins to see everything in his life differently: the Gemara that he is learning, his spouse, his children, his friends, the flowers. Now he is not just talking or thinking about Hashem. Now he knows Hashem. And now he no longer experiences any confusion about what he should or should not do. In addition to that, now that he is in touch he can be in touch with the souls with his own soul, of other Now he can see how good and beautiful every Jew is — as the Yiddish expression, “a sheiner Yid — a beautiful Jew.” He does look down on others. He has no complaints about them. And furthermore, he can see what is hurting them… Sometimes a tzaddik embraces a lowly person, and onlookers think that he is naïve and does not know who this person is. But just the opposite is true. It is exactly because the tzaddik knows who this person is deep down that he is so fond of him…

As a people we do not know ourselves. We have lost our way. We lack self-confidence. Related to that, the Baal Shem Toy taught that forgetfulness characterizes exile and remembering indicates redemption. That is why Israeli politicians are involved in a game of appeasing, appealing, and pretending. They cannot stand up and state the truth. They lack the strength to tell the world, “We do not care what you say.” A person who is in the place of the Soul of all souls does not worry about upsetting some politician or the anti-Semitic architect of some so-called peace plan. He stands up and states the truth….

The only way that a person can meet Hashem… is by recognizing his own life-force. To that end, he must gather in all of the elements his life that have been in exile. Otherwise, he is only imitating the lives of other Jews. And then, although his way of life may seemingly proclaim Hashem’s name, that is a misrepresentation, a subtle violation of the command “Do not take the name of Hashem your G-d in vain.”

Once a person finds himself, G-d is with him wherever he goes. Sometimes a Jew who had a Torah upbringing no longer wants to keep mitzvos. This is not because he has experienced a dramatic change in his faith but rather because he has grown distant from himself. Many people are afraid to look at their inner being. Sometimes this is because a person had a difficult childhood and he is afraid that gazing into himself will cause him too much pain. And sometimes this is because a person’s spouse is not spiritually growing, and so he is afraid that if he re-unites with his soul, his marriage will he challenged.

Questions for Discussion

1. What movements do you think Rav Kook is criticizing for their “solutions” on behalf of the Jewish people and the Land of Israel?
2. What do you think Rav Kook means when he talks about Israel returning to its source?
3. Is it counterintuitive that teshuva involves a return to the self? Why or why not?
4. Rav Kook talks about national/collective teshuva? What does that mean? How is it different than individual teshuva?
5. What can a person do to get in touch with who they truly are?
6. What influences in our contemporary society present a false picture of who we truly are? How can we work against their negative influence?
7. How does Rav Kook read the pasuk that he cites from Ha’azinu?

Printable PDF available here.

Rav Kook (Orot Yisrael 8:6)

When the Most High gave nations their lot, when He separated the sons of man, He set up the boundaries of peoples according to the number of the children of Israel. (Devarim 32:8)

According to our Sages, this verse is a reference to the seventy nations of the world, which correspond to the seventy souls who descended to Egypt with our forefather Ya’akov. Clearly, the Torah does not regards the division of humanity into nations as an arbitrary or purposeless convention. On the contrary, nationhood is part of Divine order. Each nation lives within Divinely drawn ‘boundaries’ – with its own distinct culture, mindset and special talents – and makes a unique contribution to the world. Each nation expresses a different dimension, a different facet of man’s stature as a tzelem Elokim. Of course, there is a common humanity that all nations share in common. But there is also an irreducible national ‘essence’ that belongs uniquely to each nation and remains foreign to all

Israel, however, is unique. Unlike the other nations, our spirit is not manifest in any bounded ‘form.’ There is no single discrete attribute that is uniquely ours as a nation. Instead, the unique attributes of all seventy nations are incorporated and subsumed within us. This is the deeper meaning of the above verse that G-d “set up the boundaries of peoples according to the number of the children of Israel.”[1]Within the soul of Jewish nation is a spiritual dynamism, a yearning to give expression to every holy value and every true facet of spiritual 

This explains why the Jews are prone to fractiousnessand factionalism, more than any other nation. Yes, it is true that much of our history of machloket isan ethical aberration and a spiritual failing. But that failing is rooted in a deep and fundamental spiritual reality (even if we are not consciously aware of it). Jews cannot be satisfied with a one-dimensional approach to G-d’s world. In a clash between competing values – the physical and the spiritual, chesed and din, outwardness and inwardness, truth and peace, universalism and particularity, yirah and ahavah, etc. – other nations can settle on a national consensus. They can leave peacefully and prosperously with each other, content to ignore, or at least minimize, one or more competing perspectives. But Israel must give expression to and harmonize every true facet of G-d’s complex creation. This deep-felt spiritual urge raises the stakes of every clash in values, and accounts for much of the machloket in Jewish history.[2]

Ultimately, it is only through the Torah –through its supernal might, transcendent holiness, and Divine pathways –that competing perspectives can ever be properly refracted and harmonized. Only the Torah can unify Israel, empower it to avoid machloket and guide it to fulfill its supra-national spiritual purpose.

[1] In the Hebrew, Rav Kook also references the following teaching from Gemara Chullin 56b (which, incidentally, is also expounding a verse from Ha’azinu: “Has He not made you, and established you?” (Devarim 32:6). This teaches that the Jewish people is a city with everything in it. Out of it come its priests, out of it come its prophets, out of it come its chiefs, out of it come its kings, as it is stated: “Out of them shall come forth the cornerstone, out of them the stake, out of them the battle bow, out of them every master together” (Zecharia 10:4).

[2] In Midbar Shur, Rav Kook writes as follows – “The Sages noted that ‘The greater the person, greater his evil inclination’ (Sukkah 52a). This insight is true not only for the individual, but also for the nation. When a nation is blessed with great talents, it has a greater potential for internal strife.”

Food for Thought

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks: What the entire episode shows is the destructive nature of argument not for the sake of Heaven – that is, argument for the sake of victory. In such a conflict, what is at stake is not truth but power, and the result is that both sides suffer. If you win, I lose. But if I win, I also lose, because in diminishing you, I diminish myself. Even a Moses is brought low, laying himself open to the charge that “you have killed the Lord’s people.” Argument for the sake of power is a lose-lose scenario.

The opposite is the case when the argument is for the sake of truth. If I win, I win. But if I lose I also win – because being defeated by the truth is the only form of defeat that is also a victory. 

In a famous passage, the Talmud (Eiruvin, 13b) explains why Jewish law tend to follow the view of the School of Hillel rather than their opponents, the School of Shammai:“[The law is in accord with the School of Hillel] because they were kindly and modest, because they studied not only their own rulings but also those of the School of Shammai, and because they taught the words of the School of Shammai before their own.

They sought truth, not victory. That is why they listened to the views of their opponents, and indeed taught them before they taught their own traditions… Judaism has sometimes been called a “culture of argument.” It is the only religious literature known to me whose key texts – the Hebrew Bible, Midrash, Mishnah, Talmud, the codes of Jewish law, and the compendia of biblical interpretation – are anthologies of arguments. That is the glory of Judaism. The Divine Presence is to be found not in this voice as against that, but in the totality of the conversation.

In an argument for the sake of truth, both sides win, for each is willing to listen to the views of its opponents, and is thereby enlarged. In argument as the collaborative pursuit of truth, the participants use reason, logic, shared texts, and shared reverence for texts. They do not use ad hominem arguments, abuse, contempt, or disingenuous appeals to emotion. Each is willing, if refuted, to say, “I was wrong.” There is no triumphalism in victory, no anger or anguish in defeat.

Maharal (Be’er haGolah, 1:5-6): Hashem is the Master of all entities, and from Him comes a composite world made of opposing properties. The world is not simple; it is composed of disparate aspects. G-d created everything, and everything has multiple aspects to it. But for halacha l’ma’aseh, one aspect is unquestionably more significant than the others… Even though any single issue has disparate aspects to it, all given by Hashem, one of them aspect is most significant, and that is determinative of the halacha.

Sometimes, the disparate aspects are absolutely equal, in which each halachic conclusion derived from the Divinely created reality is equally valid. And this was the nature of the disputes between Beis Hillel and Beis Shamai…

Rabbi David Wolkenfeld (contemporary): In the time of Rav Kook, he saw these forces expressed in three competing factions. Orthodoxy, Zionism, and Humanism. The yishuv ha-yashan, the ancient Orthodox community of Jerusalem, attacked Rav Kook mercilessly because of his willingness to accommodate modernity and to cooperate with Zionist pioneers. The most prominent Zionist activists were notable for their loyalty to their people, and also for their rejection of Jewish tradition and their scorn for the Jewish religion. All the while, enlightened Jews in Europe organized behind the principle that freedom for Jews was inseparable from freedom for all the world’s peoples and attainable within a modern democracy.

Rav Kook wrote that these factions, these parties, were expressing three ideas or were the product of three forces. These three forces were the force of the sacred, the force of the nation, and the force of humanity. Kodesh. Umah. Enoshiut…

Rav Kook wrote with pathos and passion that the salvation of Israel and our flourishing as a people depends upon the unification of all of these ideals. Each ideal, (1) holiness and tradition, (2) the nation itself and its renewal, and (3) the common bonds that connect all human beings to one another, is a profound truth.

“We would be miserable,” Rav Kook wrote, “if we were to allow any of these three forces to suppress another since they must become united.” And yet, as he wrote those words, the Jewish people were divided between Orthodox Jews, Zionists, and Humanists. Instead of uniting and forming a perspective that was informed by each of the three movements, adherents of each movements saw, as Rav Kook understood things, only the flaws of the other movements rather than the ways that the other movements were expressing something indispensable.

Questions for Discussion

1. Are you convinced by Rav Kook’s understanding of where machloket comes from? Why or why not?
2. Where in the upcoming holiday of Sukkot does the number 70 figure prominently? Is that connected to the concept of there being 70 nations?
3. When does the Torah regard nationhood/nationalism as positive? When does it become a force for evil?
4. Our Sages (Bamidbar Rabbah 13:16) teach that there are “seventy facets (lit. פנים) to the Torah.” How does this connect to Rav Kook’s insights above?
5. Read the Maharal above in “Food for Thought.” How is he similar to Rav Kook in his understanding of machloket? How is he different?