Parashat Ki Tisa 5784 — 03/02/2024
Beginning with Bereishit 5781 (17 October 2020) we embarked on a new format. We will be considering Rambam’s (Maimonides’) great philosophical work Moreh Nevukim (Guide for the Perplexed) in the light of the knowledge of Vedic Science as expounded by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. The individual essays will therefore not necessarily have anything to do with the weekly Torah portion, although certainly there will be plenty of references to the Torah, the rest of the Bible, and to the Rabbinic literature. For Bereishit we described the project. The next four parshiyyot, Noach through Chayei Sarah, laid out a foundational understanding of Vedic Science, to the degree I am capable of doing so. Beginning with Toledot we started examining Moreh Nevukim.
Shemot 30:11-34:35
In Chapter 55 Rambam sums up the work of the previous chapters and gives an introduction to further investigation into the nature of Gd.
It has already been said before in a number of passages of this Treatise that anything that entails corporeality ought of necessity to be negated in reference to Him and that all affections likewise should be negated in reference to Him. For all affections entail change, and moreover the agent who effects those affections is undoubtedly not identical with him who is acted upon [or affected]. Accordingly if He, may He be exalted, were subject to affection in any respect whatever, someone other than He would act upon Him and effect change in Him.
Rambam here sums up his basic argument. Gd is One, Unity, not composed of parts. Therefore Gd cannot be corporeal, with different physical limbs, nor can Gd have “affections,” which are changeable, and therefore incompatible with Gd’s Unity. Rambam further points out that for Gd to be the one, unified basis of creation, He must be beyond the possibility of any change, because change must be effected by an outside agent, and of course there can be no agent outside Gd.
The latter point reminds me of the slogan of the David Lynch Foundation, “Change comes from within.” Something can change because of its own internal dynamics, even if it is cut off from the environment. In fact, an isolated system will change in the direction of thermodynamic equilibrium (“heat death”), according to the Second Law of Thermodynamics (Law of Entropy). Of course this can only happen if the system is composed of parts that can be rearranged, which is not the case with Gd, so Rambam’s point still holds. As we have discussed in earlier entries, the problem that we need to solve is how a transcendental, unbounded, eternal, unchanging Gd can be active in creation, which is the realm of change. We have speculated that the Vedic Science paradigm of creation’s being the virtual fluctuations within the silent, unbounded, unchanging basis of life. Even this is all just a manner of speaking of course, an analogy to a reality that does not really fit into words.
Rambam continues:
Likewise all privation ought of necessity to be negated in reference to Him; it should be negated that He sometimes lacks a certain perfection, while that at other times it exists in Him. Fir if this should be supposed, He would be only potentially perfect. Now privation is necessarily attached to all potentiality, and everything that passes from potentiality to actuality cannot but require some other thing existing in actuality that causes the former to pass to actuality. For this reason, all His perfections must exist in actuality, and nothing may belong to Him that exists potentially in any respect whatever.
I think Rambam’s logic here is clear: if there is a potentiality in Gd, then it can change into an actuality. But since Gd is unchanging this is impossible. Alternatively, a potentiality implies a lack (“privation”) because it points to something that is not yet in existence. Since no lack can be ascribed to Gd, no potentiality can be ascribed to Him either. Gd must be what He is in actuality. Furthermore, Rambam argues, change from potentiality to actuality requires an outside agent to perform the change, and, as he will show, there is nothing outside of Gd.
Rambam lived about 800 years before the development of quantum mechanics. I think quantum mechanics can give us a different perspective on the issue of potentiality. We discussed early on in this series a novel approach to quantum mechanics and quantum field theory that is based on the Law of Least Action. This is the Path Integral approach pioneered by Richard Feynman in the late 1940’s. I will not give a complete description here; please refer to the Wikipedia article I have linked above, and yes, you can just read the first few paragraphs and skip all the hairy math in most of the article!
In brief, there is a multidimensional space, called “phase space,” in which the entire state of a system is described by one point. As the system changes from one state to another, it moves (classically) along a particular path. It could, theoretically, move along any one of an infinite number of paths. Now each of these paths has a number associated with it, which is calculated based on the movement of the system’s components and the forces acting on each one, the details of which don’t concern us here. This number is called the “action” and the path that we actually see in reality is the path where the action is a minimum – the path of Least Action.
The Path Integral approach posits that there is a wave associated with every single path, and the number of wavelengths in that wave is equal to the action divided by a constant, Planck’s constant. In other words, nature takes all paths, all of the time. The reason that we only see one path is this: near a minimum, the parameter that we are dealing with does not change (to first order). If you are at the bottom of a valley (minimum elevation) your elevation doesn’t change hardly at all until you start climbing out of the valley. Similarly, all the paths close by the path of least action have just about the same action (to first order) and therefore the same number of wavelengths. They are all coherent with one another and we therefore perceive that as the path that nature is taking. In the case of paths farther away from the minimum action, the number of wavelengths varies considerably, so some are in phase while others are out of phase, and the waves all cancel each other out. We don’t see nature taking those paths.
What this approach tells us is that the paths we had only considered as potential paths are, in fact, actual paths, and in order for us to perceive what we consider the one, “actual” path, all paths need to be actual, in order that the cancellation of the non-least-action paths be complete. Our whole idea of potential vs. actual is actually turned on its head. We see that the difference between potential and actual is very much a function of our perception and its limitations, and is not something that exists in reality – at least not in quantum mechanical reality.
I’ll attempt to apply this to Rambam’s problem. In Gd, all potentialities are actualized if they weren’t, Gd would be “missing” a piece, and would have to change to actualize some of His potential. But if all potentialities exist as actualities, as the path integral approach suggests, the very question falls away. Gd has infinite potential to project any reality, and that potential is always, eternally, actualized. It is only the projection onto the screen of our awareness that can change, and thus we perceive Gd to act in the world, where all that is happening is that our view of reality is shifting.
For homework, think how this might apply to the TM-Sidhi program. Next week we’ll proceed to the next Chapter, Chapter 56.
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Commentary by Steve Sufian
Parashat Ki Tisa
“Ki Tisa” means “when you take.” The parshah begins with “The Lrd spoke to Moses saying, ‘When you take the sum of the Children of Israel according to their numbers, let each one give to the Lrd an atonement for his soul when they are counted so there will be no plague among them when they are counted.’”
This brings us several important points about our drawing on Torah as a help in our return to Oneness, Teshuvah.
The first is that taking a census is a way of revealing that a community is not just a mass of people: each one matters, each one is to be known.
The second is that taking is not just something that Moses was commanded to do so that he would know the community in detail but also something that showed to every member of community that they mattered.
The third is that this principle of knowing the details of the community applies to knowing anything, anyone, including knowing Gd—and it applies not only to Moses but to everyone at all times.
Fourth is that, having shown they matter to Gd, they need to show that Gd matters to them: they need to make a donation as “an atonement for their soul,” a donation to dissolve any impurity that clouds their soul so they can experience “at-Onement,” Oneness with Gd. The donation in this parshah is a half-shekel and this is symbolic of our relation with Gd: we do our part and Gd does the rest. It is extremely kind of Gd to suggest to us that we are doing half and Gd is doing half. The reality, of course, is that we do our maximum and it is only a tiny drop of the Unbounded Doing that Gd does.
If impurities are not dissolved, then they will distort our perception of Gd’s Presence and the Eternal Blessing that is Gd will be experienced as a plague. As always donations to charity with an open heart help us to stay pure and get purer.
Fifth is that the half-shekel will go to provide oil.
In the previous parshah, we presented the view that the oil intended to provide fuel for the Eternal Flame is by our Sages considered symbolic of wisdom and that wisdom and eternity belong to Gd so the Eternal Flame is symbolic of Gd.
The oil people bring will be enhanced by the “art of the perfumer” with various spices and will be used in anointing the Tabernacle, the Ark, the priests and various parts of the Tabernacle. This anointing oil will be holy and everything anointed becomes holy as does everyone who touches the holy objects. “Holy” means “Whole”, Teshuvah, Full Restoration of the Awareness of One beyond the duality of Gd and individual.
One way to look at this is that the enhancing brings out qualities in the pure oil that were latent without the enhancement. This is like the census that revealed details within the community. My guess is that not only were these qualities perceivable in the anointing oil but they also began to be perceivable in un-enhanced oil and in Gd’s Presence not only in the Tabernacle and the Tent of Meeting but everywhere and in everyone. These qualities would be not only that of fragrance but of visibility, audibility, touch-ability. Gd would be experienced as Concrete and Detailed: The reality that Gd is All and Everyone, Everything, everywhere would be perceivable in the Eternal Flame and the Eternal Flame would be perceivable everywhere in everything. Our ancestors would be gaining Omniscience, they would be making significant progress to complete Teshuvah, complete restoration of the Awareness that all is One, beyond the duality of Gd and persons, Gd and things.
The fact that enhancement of the oil and the enhancement of perception was needed is suggested by the fact that in this parshah we are also told that when Moses came down from listening to Gd at the top of Mt. Sinai, he found the people worshiping the Golden Calf, dancing around it. Despite hearing Gd’s voice, and seeing Gd in flame and smoke, our ancestors needed something concrete to trust in.
To make Gd Concrete in our lives, we need to offer not only abstract wisdom, symbolized by pure oil, but also something we ourselves create, not some way to worship Gd concretely, not like the Golden Calf created by Aaron from vessels brought by our ancestors but something to enhance our worship of Gd, to make it personal, like the enhancements of the pure oil with the spices and the art of the perfumer. “Loving our neighbors as ourself, Self” is a way to give love to Gd concretely because everyone and everything are roles Gd plays.
Living our daily life with such Love. Gd becomes more perceivable to us, and we do not need a Golden Calf to substitute for Gd: we perceive Gd by Direct Experience sufficiently to trust that Gd is Real, Almighty, Omnipresent, Omniscient, Omnipotent, Omni-Joyful. Omni-Compassionate, Omni-Loving and to realize that Gd disguises Gd as us and all, Gd plays the important roles all individual lives have in the Divine Story.
The cheerful respect and competence that our Congregation displays not only at services but on the street, at the gas stations, supermarkets suggests we are doing well in our lives to be pure, loving, generous, simple and making our relationship with Gd, concrete and personal. This makes me very happy.
Baruch HaShem