Parashat Bechukotai 5782 — 05/28/2022
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.
Vayikra 26:3-27:34
In Chapter 17 Rambam takes a break from analyzing different roots and turns to a more general topic. Here is the chapter:
Do not think that only the divine science should be withheld from the multitude. This holds good also for the greater part of natural science. In fact, we have repeatedly set down for you our dictum: The Account of the Beginning (Ma’aseh Bereishit) ought not to be taught in the presence of two men. This is not only the case with regard to people adhering to Law, but also with regard to the philosophers and learned men of the various communities in ancient times. For they concealed what they said about the first principles and presented it in riddles. Thus, Plato and his predecessors designated Matter as the female and Form as the male. Now you know that the principles of the existents subject to generation and corruption are three: Matter, Form, and Particularized Privation, which is always conjoined with Matter. For, were it not for this conjunction with Privation, Matter would not receive Form. It is in this sense that Privation is to be considered as one of the principles. However, when a form is achieved, the particular privation in question, I mean the privation of the form that is achieved, disappears, and another privation is conjoined with matter; and this goes on forever, as has been made clear in natural science. Now as even those upon whom the charge of corruption would not be laid in the event of clear exposition used terms figuratively and resorted to teaching in similes, how much all the more is it incumbent upon us, the community of those adhering to Law, not to state explicitly a matter that is either remote from the understanding of the multitude or the truth of which as it appears to the imagination of these people is different from what is intended by us. Know this also.
If we remember back to our general discussion (based on the introduction to the translation), we saw that Rambam divided knowledge into “Divine science” and “natural science.” Natural science is the study of the physical world (although it differs substantially from what we consider to be “natural sciences”), while “Divine” science is the study of the non-physical world. In fact, Rambam associates natural science with the Kabalistic field of study called Ma’aseh Bereishit, “the Work of Creation.” While Divine science corresponds to Ma’aseh Merkavah, “the work of the Chariot,” referring to Ezekiel’s vision of Gd sitting in the Divine chariot surrounded by angels and other divine beings.
This division between the knowledge of the sublunary realms and the heavenly realms dates from a time when it was thought that the heavens and the earth worked on totally different principles. Therefore, there was a sharp distinction between “natural science” which could, theoretically at least, could be experimentally verified, and “Divine science,” which could not. The only way to gain knowledge of “Divine science” is through revelation, which is a direct, inward knowledge, on the level of the knower’s awareness.
According to modern physics, the “heavens” – the stars, galaxies, other planets – are all physical objects that obey the same physical laws as do earthly objects, albeit sometimes under extreme conditions that are not found on earth (except sometimes in the laboratory). For example, the element Helium was first discovered on the sun (hence its name) by analyzing the spectral lines of sunlight and applying perfectly ordinary, terrestrial laws of spectroscopy and atomic theory to sunlight. At the same time, as physics has probed deeper and deeper into the nature of matter, the laws of nature seem to become less and less concrete, more and more abstract. The solid, bounded entities we thought were fundamental have been replaced by abstract fields, and we are approaching an understanding where everything in physical nature is, in fact, a complex pattern of vibration of one, underlying Unified Field.
All this is to say that from the side of physics, the boundary between natural science and Divine science is getting more and more blurred. From the side of Vedic science, there really never was a boundary. Vedic science begins and ends with the Wholeness of Pure Consciousness, and everything in between is actually the internal, virtual dynamics of Pure Consciousness. This dynamic behavior is structured in layers, from the most subtle to the grossest, and the entire structure and the laws that govern its behavior are known to Pure Consciousness within itself, since those dynamics are within its own nature.
The dynamical nature of consciousness produces individual units which have the quality of consciousness themselves, from very low levels of consciousness (e.g. a rock, which we don’t think of as being conscious, because its level is so far below ours) to higher levels (e.g. animals) to human consciousness, which has a very high ability to be self-aware. There are also beings that exist on a more subtle, abstract level than human beings. They are often thought of as spiritual beings, closer to Gd and existing in the heavens with Gd. These are angels, for example, and Ezekiel’s vision of the Chariot (of Gd and Gd’s retinue). Since these beings can’t be seen, and don’t appear to be physical in any way (and Rambam writes elsewhere about the angels’ eating when they came to visit Avraham that it can’t really mean real physical eating as that would be impossible for a purely spiritual being), their nature and behavior belong in the Ma’aseh Merkabah.
I believe that the Vedic perspective would find this division somewhat arbitrary. Manifestation occurs on a continuum from subtlest manifestation to gross, material substance. But this is only the perspective from the point of view of limited consciousness. Even the most solid object is just vibrating fields, and the fact that we can’t poke our finger through a brick wall is that the different modes of vibration interact in specific ways that exclude, under normal circumstances, such a phenomenon. In the Vedic perspective, once our awareness has become fully expanded, Divine science is fully revealed to us and we realize that Divine science is the only science there is, because everything is, in its true nature, divine!
Chazak! Chazak! V’Nitchazeik!
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Commentary by Steve Sufian
Parashat Bechukoteai
“Bechukotai” means “By My Decrees.”
Gd declares that if we read His Torah and do the mitzvahs — the right actions — commanded in It, we will be blessed wonderfully; if not, we will be cursed, and the curses will get worse until we listen. But nonetheless, Gd will not abandon us.
Our congregation seems to doing mitzvot because every time we congregate, I experience that each of us and all us radiates great joy, love, friendliness.
Our world, not just our congregations, seems to be doing better and better: Steven Pinker researched the incidence of violence and crime and finds that it has been decreasing. since 1400 CE.
As inspiring as this is, do people globally feel happy — a contemporary word that seems to mean what “blessed” means, in religious terms.
The World Happiness Report for 2022 shows that Americans are getting happier:
World Happiness Report reveals the US has gotten happier in 2022 Finland took the top spot again this year, for the fifth year in a row.
Global Happiness also seem to be increasing:
https://nypost.com/2022/03/22/world-happiness-report-reveals-the-us-has-gotten-happier-in-2022/
The pursuit^of^happiness.org mentions a number of different scientific questionnaires that seek to measure happiness and notes that wording and emphasis vary.
Their own quiz seems to focus on the common core to all the questionnaires; it considers such measures as: sharing, kindness, fulfillment in using one’s abilities to a greater purpose than simply personal achievement, participating in a spiritual group.
These actions are definitely the central focus of our religion, definitely seem to be very alive in our congregation, seem to be the core of all religions. and they seem to be the taken-for-granted behaviors of everyday life-a reality that is deeper and more lasting than the news we see in mass media.
Our world seems to be getting better, even good, at “loving the Lord, thy Gd, with all thy heart, all thy soul, all thy might” and “loving thy neighbor as thyself [thy Self].
Whether we know anything about Torah or not, our hearts seem to be listening to Gd.
A very great blessing!
A very great blessing.
Baruch HaShem