The Fundamentals of Knowing G-d (3/6) On Rambam's Yesodei Hatorah יום א' לפ' משפטים, כ"ג שבט, תשע"ז – שיעור 3/6 Special Thanks to Yehudith Dashevsy for some of the translations

The “Commentary” on the Rambam 1:3 “Because all the beings”

Because all the beings require Him but He does not require them etc. He [Rambam] first said the nullification of their existence would not nullify His existence, but the nullification of His existence would nullify their existence. [Because] all [other] entities that have a cause of their existence - the cause of their creation is not the cause of their continued existence. [For example] the builder is the cause of the building, but if the builder were to die - the building would not be lost, because the continued existence of the building has a cause other than the cause of its creation. Yet the Holy One, Blessed be He, brings all beings into existence, and He is the One who sustains their continued existence with a abundant flow of that He bestows on them continuously, and because of that, they require Him, but He does not require them, and therefore the truth of His [being] is not like the truth of any one of their [beings], for all entities are possible [circumstantially existent] whereas He is necessary for existence [inherently existent], and one Who is inherently existent is incomparable to those who are circumstantially existent.

Adnei Yad HaChazaka (Rabbi Adoniyahu Kraus. His father was Rabbi Yehudah, a student of the Maharam Shik and Rabbi of Lakenbach): He brings all beings into existence. Our Rabbi [Rambam] was careful with his wording and does not say that He, the Holy One, Blessed be He, created everything, against [in order to combat the] the different opinions about creation of existence from existing material. The phrase “He brings all beings into existence” also means that Hashem brings everything into existence without stopping and upholds their continued existence, always. Even after He created, he will never, for all eternity, cease to make and do just as in the original Creation. He is the One who does and He is the One who upkeeps in order that it not collapse. [As is says,] He commanded and it stood.

Tanya: Sha’ar HaYichud V’haEmunah Ch 1

The verse says "forever G-d do your words stand in the firmament". The Baal Shem Tov z”l explained the words that "your words" here are refering to when you said “Let there be a firmament in the midst of the water” etc. These words and letters [themselves] stand eternally within the firmament of the sky and are enclothed in all the heavens forever, in order to enliven them, as it says, “The word of our G-d will be established forever and His words are alive and established, eternally” etc. For if the letters were to leave for a moment, G-d forbid, and return to their Source, all the heavens would turn into complete nothingness, and they would be as if they never were at all, as in [the state] before the saying “Let there be a firmament” was said, and so too for all the creations in all the worlds, upper and lower, and even this physical earth, which is totally physical, non-living [domem], if the letters were to leave it for a moment, G-d forbid - [that is,] the letters from the Ten Sayings with which the earth was created in the six days of Creation - then it would return to absolute nothingness, completely, as in before the six days of Creation.

Rabbi Isaac Abravanel Rosh Amana Chapter 5 “Behold if it is so”

Because this is a figment of the imagination, and is impossible, therefore the Rav [Rambam] said “If it were to be conceived” because this is something that man can imagine, but it is impossible for it to be so.

Rambam, Yesodei Hatorah Halacha 2

"If one would imagine..."

Halacha 7:

"If there were many gods, they...

Were the Creator to have body and form, He would have limitation and definition...

Rambam, Laws of Megillah and Chanukah, 4:14

If [a person has the opportunity to fulfill only one of two mitzvot,] lighting a lamp for one's home [i.e., Sabbath candles] or lighting a Chanukah lamp - or, alternatively, lighting a lamp for one's home or reciting kiddush - the lamp for one's home receives priority, since it generates peace within the home.

[Peace is of primary importance, as reflected by the mitzvah requiring] God's name to be blotted out to create peace between a husband and his wife. Peace is great, for the entire Torah was given to bring about peace within the world, as [Proverbs 3:17] states: "Its ways are pleasant ways and all its paths are peace."

Genesis Rabbah 11

That G-d created to make - to fix.

Likutei Torah Shlach 37:4. V’eschanan 2:3.

[The Hebrew word for] “world” comes from the word for concealment, hiddenness.

Tanya, Chap. 20:

It is well known that the commandment and admonition concerning idolatry, which are contained, in the first two commandments of the Decalogue— "I am" and "Thou shalt not have any other gods," comprise the entire Torah. For the commandment "I am" contains all the 248 positive precepts, whilst the commandment "Thou shalt not have" contains all the 365 prohibitions. That is why we heard only "I am" and "Thou shalt not have" directly from the Almighty, as our Sages say, "Because these two are the sum-total ot the whole Torah."

Torat Menachem Hadranim on the Rambam, p48

...the content of every Halacha is double: a proactive action - that the things in the world be according to the laws of... the Torah (in our case - [that] man - should know that there is a Being): a passive act - that they not be in the same way as they are in their own right (man before he contemplates and comes to the recognition etc.)

And these two matters, the “positive” and “negative” [aspects of the commandments] are also included in every positive mitzvah, itself. That is, because all things in the world (with which it is necessary to perform mitzvot) are in existence prior to the fulfillment of the mitzvah through them, and are then in a state and form that is not fit and therefore are (subtly) in opposition to the mitzvah, hence, the fulfillment of the mitzvah through them includes a passive act [a “negative” commandment] - that there not [continue to] be that form which exists prior to the mitzvah.

According to this, it is clear why in the positive commandment “to know that there is a Primal Being etc.” (which is “the foundation of foundations” etc.) the Rambam adds “If one would imagine that He does not exist, etc.”. Because in the mitzvah “to know” there are these two aspects: the obligation - to know that there is a Primal Being and He brings everything into existence etc. - and the negative aspect - that if man were to imagine that “He does not exist” (and that the existence of all beings is inherent, G-d forbid), it is upon him to negate that supposition and to know that if He does not exist “no other being could possibly exist.”

Additionally, the negative aspect of the mitzvah of knowing G-d [“If one would imagine that He does not exist, etc.”] is a detail of “the foundations of foundations”, in the way that the commandment “you shall not have [other gods]” is an aspect of the “general principles of the Torah”.

Accordingly, it is evident in the Rambam’s use of the particular language “If it were to arise in the mind.." [and not “If He were to not exist etc.”] that the Rambam’s intent here is not to explain the principal itself, that if He does not exist, then “nothing else could possible exist”. Rather, it is to make known to us a second detail in the mitzvah that is the “foundation of foundations” which is the mitzvah “to know”, and that is the negative aspect of the commandment “to know.”