Parashat Pekudei 5784 — 03/16/2024
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 38:21-40:38
This is a leap year, so Vayakhel and Pekudei are read on separate Shabbatot; Vayakhel was last week and Pekudei is this week.
Rambam continues his analysis of “likeness” and its inapplicability to Gd. Although we ascribe qualities to Gd, such as life, power, etc. in the same way that we ascribe them to ourselves and other creatures, Rambam’s point is that those words have very different meanings in the two cases. Gd does not have life in the same way that we have life, and similarly with all the other attributes.
Know also that any two things that fall under the same species – I mean to say thereby that their essences are the same – even if these things differ in regard to bigness and smallness or strength and feebleness or in other similar ways, are all of them necessarily alike even if they differ in this kind of way. An example of this is that a mustard grain and the sphere of the fixed stars are alike in having three dimensions; even though the latter is exceedingly big and the former exceedingly small, the notion of the existence of the dimensions in both of them is the same.
This expands the point Rambam made in the previous paragraph, that for there to be any kind of comparison, or “likeness,” between two things, there must be one or more axes where there are differences only in amount or size, rather than type. I’d like to make a point here. All the examples Rambam gives appear to involve axes of some kind of size. The mustard seed and the vault of the heavens differ in size, for example. Now size involves measurement and measurement involves finite quantities. The infinite can be experienced, but it cannot be measured, at least not in finite terms. Therefore the infinite can never share any axis having to do with size or number with anything finite. This is of course the point that Rambam is leading up to.
Similarly it behooves those who believe that there are essential attributes that may be predicated of the Creator – namely, that He is existent, living, possessing power, knowing, and willing – to understand that these notions are not ascribed to Him and to us in the same sense. According to what they think, the difference between these attributes and ours lies in the former being greater, more perfect, more permanent, or more durable than ours, so that His existence is more durable than our existence, His life more permanent than our life, His power greater than our power, His knowledge more perfect than our knowledge, and His will more universal than our will. In this way both notions’ would be, as they think, included in the same definition.
Since there is no axis of likeness between Gd and creation, including human beings, it is clear that any descriptive terms used for both must be used in different senses in each case. In fact, these attributes are only ascribed to Gd to give us a way of talking about something that is totally out of our range of understanding. Differences between Gd and us are not differences in size, but in type. This, according to Rambam, contrasts with the common belief that Gd is just humans writ large – perhaps this idea is behind the various mythologies where gods are simply more powerful humans. But that puts the gods in the realm of created beings, while Gd is the Creator, Who transcends all of creation.
Rambam goes forward and supports his argument:
According to the opinion of those who consider that there are essential attributes, His essential attributes, may He be exalted, in the existence of which they believe, must not be like the attributes of other beings and must not be comprised in the same definition, just as His essence, may He be exalted, is necessarily not like other essences. However, they do not act upon this opinion. Rather do they think that the divine and human attributes are comprised in the same definition, however clear it is to all those who understand the meaning of being alike that the term “existent” is predicated of Him, may He be exalted, and of everything that is other than He, in a purely equivocal sense. Similarly the terms “knowledge,” “power’ “will,” and “life,” as applied to Him, may He be exalted, and to all those possessing knowledge, power, will, and life, are purely equivocal, so that their meaning when they are predicated of Him is in no way like their meaning in other applications.
The thrust of the argument is that the terms describing the different attributes of man and Gd are used equivocally, meaning that the same word has very different meanings when applied to humans and Gd. The details have been discussed in some of the previous chapters. Basically, all the attributes that we apply to human beings are things that are different from our essence. For example, one attribute is power. Our power depends on things outside ourself – our allies, our physiological state, our mental acuity, etc. Therefore, our power is an accident, meaning something not essential, something that is dependent on factors external to ourself.
But Gd’s power is not an accident. It is not possible for anything to be external to Gd, because Gd is all-encompassing. Gd’s Power, Gd’s Life, Gd’s Will, are all coextensive with Gd Himself; they are, so to speak, aspects of Gd’s essence. If Gd knows something, it is not like our knowing. We know things that are outside ourselves. There is nothing outside of Gd, so Gd’s knowledge is always inner knowledge, Self-knowledge. Gd is beyond space, time and causation, so questions or paradoxes regarding Gd’s knowledge and free will don’t even get started. The list goes on and on, and it is a theme that Rambam keeps coming back to in one way or another, over and over again. “As high as the heavens are above the earth so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts are above your thoughts.” (Isaiah 55) The transcendent is radically different from the manifest creation, even though the manifest creation is nothing more than the transcendent vibrating within itself.
Chazak, Chazak v’Nitchazeik!
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Commentary by Steve Sufian
Parashat Pekudei
Those who Gd has filled with wisdom create the parts of the Mishkan, the Tabernacle, and they bring them to Moses who assembles them into a Whole. They also create the Priestly Garments. Gd’s Presence fills the Tabernacle.
We may have wisdom and a vision of the Whole that allows us to create each part according to the plan, human or divine. but to assemble the parts into a whole, a Whole, we must have a higher level of wisdom, a higher level of harmony with ourself, with our surroundings, with Gd, so that we assemble from a level of Wholeness.
“Moses” is a quality of Wholeness, connectedness, that is within each of us, within everybody.
Through our innocence, our faith, our service this level of Wholeness becomes more and more functional in our lives; we gain the Support of Nature, of Gd, to complete our tasks in a way that is lasting. Our personalities, bodies, homes become Tabernacles, Temples within which Gd’s Presence is experienced as the Eternal Reality.
How fortunate we are, to be innocent, to trust, to serve and to be blessed and live as a blessing so that Gd’s Presence becomes more and more and fully visible to all of us, to everyone! Soon! Now.
How fortunate we are!
Baruch HaShem