Parashat Shemot 5785 – 01/18/2025
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 1:1-6:1
Rambam has just described the process by which right knowledge breaks down into disputes and controversies. The basic idea is that different groups have different beliefs, and they have to adjust their premises so as to be able to derive those specific beliefs. Rambam writes:
… And they considered that these were conceptions common to all and premises that everyone who accepts a Law is obliged to admit. Afterwards the kalām became wider in scope, and these people descended to other strange roads that had never been taken by the Mutakallimūn from among the Greeks and others, for these were near to the philosophers. … Furthermore, differences of opinion between them with regard to these questions made their appearance, so that every sect among them established premises useful to it in the defense of its opinions. There is no doubt that there are things that are common to all three of us, I mean the Jews, the Christians, and the Moslems: namely the affirmation of the temporal creation of the world, the validity of which entails the validity of miracles and other things of that kind. …
To sum up: I shall say to you that the matter is as Themistius puts it: that which exists does not conform to the various opinions, but rather the correct opinions conform to that which exists.
In the immortal words of the late Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan , “You are entitled to your own opinions, but you are not entitled to your own facts.” In the view of both Rambam and Moynihan, facts, observations, the objective reality we perceive, are primary, and what we derive from those observations are secondary. Our opinions, no matter how logical they may sound, have to give way to observation. Rambam lived in the 12th century, a full 4 centuries before Sir Francis Bacon, who is said to be the father of objective science, yet he seems to have presaged the basic principle of objective science in this principle that correct opinions must conform to that which exists. Themistius, by the way, lived 9 centuries before Rambam, so this was not a new principle.
This emphasis on the primacy of experimental verification of hypotheses in the objective world can be at odds with an approach that regards Scripture as the primary source of knowledge. In some cases it may appear that the statements of Scripture contradict the findings of objective science. With the rapid development of modern science, and its extension into areas, such as astronomy and biological development, such contradictions have multiplied, and concomitantly the inability of science and Scripture to speak to one another.
The Talmud (Chullin 57b) discusses this issue:
They said about Rabbi Shimon ben Chalafta that he was a “researcher of various matters.” … The Gemara asks: From what episode did Rabbi Shimon ben Chalafta earn the title: Researcher of matters? Rav Mesharshiyya said: He saw that it is written: “Go to the ant, you sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise; which having no chief, overseer, or ruler, provides her bread in the summer” (Proverbs 6:6–8). Rabbi Shimon ben Chalafta said: I will go and see if it is correct that they have no king.
He went in the season of Tammuz, i.e., summer. Knowing that ants avoid intense heat, he spread his cloak over an ant hole to provide shade. One of the ants came out and saw the shade. Rabbi Shimon placed a distinguishing mark on the ant. It went into the hole and said to the other ants: Shade has fallen. They all came out to work. Rabbi Shimon lifted up his cloak, and the sun fell on them. They all fell upon the first ant and killed it. He said: One may learn from their actions that they have no king; as, if they had a king, would they not need the king’s edict to execute their fellow ant?
Rav Acha, the son of Rava, said to Rav Ashi: But perhaps the king was with them at the time and gave them permission. Or perhaps they already had permission from the king to kill the ant. Or perhaps it was a time between kings, as it is written: “In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did that which was right in his own eyes” (Judges 17:6). Rather, rely on the credibility of Solomon, the author of Proverbs, that ants have no king.
Interestingly, Rav Acha, the son of Rava, identified very telling issues in the experimental design of Rabbi Shimon ben Chalafta, viz. the failure to consider alternative explanations. This is a very modern failing by the way, and researchers go to great lengths in designing experiments to identify alternative explanations and to design experiments that will rule them out while simultaneously testing the hypothesis in which we are interested. But more to the point, the Talmud asks why we bother checking the ants’ social structure at all, when Scripture tells us the nature of that structure. Since Scripture is inerrant, our observations are irrelevant.
This attitude that observations are unimportant is not universal in Rabbinic thought. For example, there is a halachah that meat and fish may not be eaten together because it is dangerous to one’s health. R. Moshe Tendler z’l, a leading contemporary Rabbi and expert in medical ethics, commented that if we could demonstrate scientifically that meat and fish together were not dangerous, that halachah would be invalidated. Now this halachah is Rabbinic, not Scriptural, and the reason for the prohibition is a particular fact, not a Scriptural verse. Nevertheless the experimental method is held, at least in this instance, to be effective in gaining knowledge that affects halachah. In addition, whenever questions of fact arise in the Talmud, the answer is typically Pūk Chazei / Go out and see.
Rambam’s credo is Truth is truth – it doesn’t matter where it comes from. Since he does accept Scripture as inerrant, the truths proved by science cannot contradict Scripture, and if they appear to, it is either because science is incorrect, or our understanding of Scripture is incorrect. Thus if science (i.e. philosophy) proves that Gd is incorporeal, then a literal reading of Scripture, which refers to Gd as having body parts (“hand,” “finger,” “feet”) cannot be understood literally. You will recall the many chapters at the beginning of this part of Moreh Nevukhim that dealt with the allegorical interpretations of these troublesome Scriptural passages.
There is quite a bit more to discuss when it comes to the means of gaining true knowledge, so we will take the subject up again next week, Gd willing.