Rosh

Hashanah Evening 5773 Jewish Congregation of Brookville

Moses Maimonides, Mishneh Torah Hilchot Teshuvah, Chapter 10

1. One should never say: "I will observe the mitzvot of the Torah and delve into its wisdom in order to receive all the blessings mentioned in it or to merit life in the World to Come or I will avoid the transgressions the Torah warns us about in order to be saved from its curses and so as not to be excised from the World to Come." For its not right to serve God that way. One who does that serves out of fear, which is not the exalted way of the prophets or the sages. Only illiterates, women and children whom we instruct to serve out of fear until they will have become more knowledgeable and can serve Him from love serve God that way. 2. One who serves God with love doesnt engage in Torah and mitzvot or follow the path of wisdom for any worldly reasoneither for fear of harm or in order to inherit goodness. He pursues truth simply because it is the truth, and because goodness will ultimately come of it. This is a very, very great level, which even some sages dont merit. But it was nonetheless our forefather Abrahams, whom God referred to as His beloved because he served Him only from love. And it is the level that God through Moses commanded us to achieve. As its written: And you will love God your Lord with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might (Deuteronomy 6:5). Because when a person loves God, as he should, he fulfills the mitzvot from love as a matter of course. 3. But, what is appropriate love for Him? One should love God so very mightily and powerfully that his soul affixes itself to the love of God, and he is as absorbed in it and is as love-sick as he would be if he couldnt stop thinking of a woman he was enamored of, regardless of whether he was sitting or standing, eating or drinking. In fact, the love of God should be fastened in the hearts of His lovers even more than that, which is to say, all the time. For we are commanded: To love Him with all of your heart, with all of your soul, and with all of your might" (Ibid.). Solomon alluded to this metaphorically when he said, "For I am love-sick" (Song of Songs 2:5), and in fact, the whole of the Song of Songs is a metaphor for this.

4. The sages said: "Lest one say that he will study Torah to become wealthy, to be called Rabbi, or to be rewarded in the World to Come, the Torah tell us to love God (Deuteronomy 11:13), that is to say, one is to do whatever he does out of love alone" (Sifre Eikev 48). The sages also said: "Its written, Happy is he who reveres God, who is very happy with His mitzvot (Psalms 112:1). That is to say, "... happy with His mitzvot" rather than with the reward for His mitzvot" (Avodah Zara 19a). And as the greatest sages commanded their most astute students in private: "Dont be like servants who serve their master for reward. Be instead like servants who serve their master not for reward but simply because he is their master and deserves it" [see Pirkei Avot 1:3]. Thats to say, serve Him from love. 5. One who engages in Torah in order to earn a reward or to avoid punishment is doing so for an ulterior motive. But one who doesnt engage in it out of fear or in order to earn a reward but as a consequence of his love for the Lord of the Universe who commanded him to, instead, is doing so altruistically. Nonetheless, as the sages said, "Always engage in Torah study, even for ulterior motives. For by doing it [even] for ulterior motives youll eventually do it altruistically" (Pesachim 50b). And so when one instructs children, women, or illiterates he should train them to serve God out of fear or for a reward until they become more knowledgeable and grow wiser. And then he should expose them to this secret very, very slowly, and accustom them to it patiently until they can grasp and understand it, and serve God out of love. 6. As is obvious and known [to all], the love of God is only fixed in a person's heart after he consistently delves into it as he should, and after he forsakes everything else in the world. As its commanded and written: "...with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your might" (Deuteronomy 6:5). But the only way you can love God is through your knowledge of Him, and its your knowledge of Him that determines how much youll love Him, whether a lot or a little. So, everyone must set himself to the task of understanding and comprehending the various explanations and analyses of God [we have] to the best of his intellectual abilities, as we explained in Hilchot Yisodei haTorah ("The Laws of the Foundations of Torah").

Rabbi Steven Moskowitz rabbi@jcbsynagogue.org September 16, 2012