YESHIVAT HAR ETZION
ISRAEL KOSCHITZKY VIRTUAL BEIT MIDRASH (VBM)
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PHILOSOPHY OF HALAKHA
By Rav Chaim Navon

LECTURE #15a: Reasons For the Mitzvot (Part I)

Thus far we have dealt with ideas relating to the world of Halakha as a whole. We opened with inquiries regarding the realm of practical Halakha and continued with investigations in the realm of the study of Halakha. We now turn to the second half of this course in which we shall be dealing with the meaning of specific mitzvot. In this and the following lecture, we shall give a short introduction to this question and deal with the issue of the reasons for the mitzvot. We shall then turn to the mitzvot themselves.

1. Do the mitzvot have reasons?

We shall first discuss the question whether or not the mitzvot do in fact have reasons. What exactly are we asking? In order to properly understand the problem, we turn once again to a famous passage from Plato's dialogue, "Euthyphro." Plato raises a fundamental question: Does a religious world-view leave room for morality and good as independent standards? Plato formulates the problem as follows: Does God desire good because it is good, or is something good because God desires it? In other words, do good and evil exist independently of God, and God chooses that which is good? Or perhaps there is no such thing as independent good, and the term "good" merely represents that which God has arbitrarily chosen.[1] According to the second possibility, there is no inherent difference between the morning prayer service and murder. Neither act is "good" or "evil" in and of itself. The sole difference between them is that God chose the one and not the other, but He could just as well have made His choice in the opposite manner. This question leads us directly to the issue whether or not the mitzvot have reasons. If good and evil exist independently of God, then the mitzvot may have reasons. But if good and evil have no independent existence, God's commandments are arbitrary, having no rhyme or reason. According to this understanding, "piety is piety," solely because "it is loved by the Gods."

The question raised by Plato has no simple answer from a religious perspective. On the one hand, it is difficult to say that good exists independently of God's will, for that would in essence mean that God is subordinate to something outside of Him. On the other hand, it is no less difficult to assert that good and evil do not exist, and that God charges us with arbitrary commands. Both approaches find expression in Christianity and Islam. But no Jewish thinker seems ever to have argued that that good and evil have no existence apart from God's will. This may, perhaps, be due to the fact that already the book of Bereishit presents us with an unequivocal stand on this issue in the dialogue between Avraham and God: 

And the Lord said, Because the cry of Sedom and Amora is great, and because their sin is grievous; I will go down now, and see whether they have done altogether according to the cry of it, which is come to me; and if not, I will know. And the men turned their faces from there, and went toward Sedom; but Avraham stood yet before the Lord. And Avraham drew near, and said, Will You also destroy the righteous with the wicked? Perhaps there are fifty righteous within the city; will You also destroy and not spare the place for the fifty righteous that are therein? Far be it from You; shall not the Judge of all the earth do right? And the Lord said, If I find in Sedom fifty just men within the city, then I will spare all the place for their sakes. (Bereishit 18:20-26)

One cardinal point stands out in Avraham's exchange with God: Avraham assumes that God acts according to moral criteria. And furthermore, God's moral criteria are understandable to man. The argument might have been made that absolute standards of good and evil do in fact exist, but they are incomprehensible to man. Avraham, however, does not accept such a position. Avraham approaches God with a moral claim: "Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?" God does not reject Avraham's contention, but rather He accepts his argument. This appears to be the primary source for the Jewish position that assumes the existence of an absolute moral good that is not determined arbitrarily by God.

An alternative position may be proposed, one that denies the existence of reasons for the mitzvot. Rav Aharon Lichtenstein, Rosh Yeshiva of Yeshivat Har Etzion, often cites the Christian author and thinker, C. S. Lewis, in his book, "The Problem of Pain," who argues that while the commandments as a whole have a reason, there is no rationale for each and every particular mitzva. There are two possible reasons for the existence of the system of mitzvot: 1) The subjugation of man and heightening of his submission to God; 2) The intensification of man's sense of connection to God in all areas of life. God does not act arbitrarily, and these two reasons explain why He instituted the system of mitzvot. Little importance, however, is attached to the specific content of each and every mitzva. God could just as well have ordered us to don tefilin on our feet, for the most important thing is the very fact that we are fulfilling God's will.

According to the classic Jewish position, however, the individual mitzvot have specific reasons. A clear example of the Jewish attitude may be found in the words of Rambam, who directly relates to the question regarding the reasons for the mitzvot:

There is a group of human beings who consider it a grievous thing that causes should be given for any law; what would please them most is that the intellect would not find a meaning for the commandments and prohibitions. What compels them to feel thus is a sickness that they find in their souls, a sickness to which they are unable to give utterance and of which they cannot furnish a satisfactory account. For they think that if those laws were useful in this existence and had been given to us for this or that reason, it would be as if they derived from the reflection and the understanding of some intelligent being. If, however, there is a thing for which the intellect could not find any meaning at all and that does not lead to something useful, it undoubtedly derives from God; for the reflection of man would not lead to such a thing. It is as if, according to these people of weak intellects, man were more perfect than his Maker; for man speaks and acts in a manner that leads to some intended end; whereas the deity does not act thus, but commands us to do things that are not useful to us and forbids us to do things that are not harmful to us. 
But He is far exalted above this; the contrary is the case … on the basis of its dictum: "For our good always, that He might preserve us alive, as it is this day." And it says: "Which shall hear all these statutes [chukkim] and say: Surely this great community is a wise and understanding people." Thus it states explicitly that even all the statutes [chukkim] will show to all the nations that they have been given with wisdom and understanding. Now if there is a thing for which no reason is known and that does not either procure something useful or ward off something harmful, why should one say of one who believes in it or practices it that he is wise and understanding and of great worth? And why should the religious communities think it a wonder? Rather things are indubitably as we have mentioned: every commandment from among these six hundred and thirteen commandments exists either with a view to communicating a correct opinion, or to putting an end to an unhealthy opinion, or to communicating a rule of justice, or to warding off an injustice, or to endowing men with a noble moral quality, or to warning them against an evil moral quality. (Moreh Nevukhim III, 31)

Earlier, we mentioned the view of C. S. Lewis that a reason exists for the mitzvot as a whole, but not for each particular mitzva. Rambam adopts an intermediate position. He argues that a specific reason exists for every mitzva, but not necessarily for all of the particulars of a given mitzva:

But no cause will ever be found for the fact that one particular sacrifice consists in a lamb and another in a ram and that the number of the victims should be one particular number. Accordingly, in my opinion, all those who occupy themselves with finding causes for something of these particulars are stricken with a prolonged madness. (Moreh Nevukhim III, 26)

If this is the case, why then according to Rambam are the particulars at all necessary? Rambam answers: "In order to refine mankind through them." It is here that the arguments raised by Lewis enter into the picture. When we discussed the importance of the realm of Halakha, we took note of the following two factors: Halakha establishes an awareness of submission to God, and it anchors the general ideas in practical details, thus ensuring that they become deeply implanted in man's consciousness. The particulars of a mitzva are necessary in order to intensify the mitzva's effect upon our lives, particularly with respect to the first factor – assimilating the awareness of obligation and submission. For this purpose, it is of no consequence whether, in and of themselves, the particulars are arbitrary. The approach of the Kabbalists is the exact opposite: they maintain that each and every particular of a mitzva has mystical and metaphysical meaning. This approach is taken to the extreme in Rabbi Nahman mi-Bretzlav's "Likutei Halakhot," where a mystical-kabbalistic reason is offered for every particular of the mitzva, in total disregard for the halakhic reasoning that led to that particular.

Maharal strongly objected to Rambam stand on this issue:

And there is certainly no justification for this explanation, for it is about the entire Torah that the verse states: "And what nation is there so great, that has statutes and judgments so righteous as all this Torah" (Devarim 4:8); and it says: "Keep them therefore and do them; for this is your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the nations, who shall hear all these statutes [and say, Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people]" (ibid., v. 6). Surely then every matter in the Torah, general rule as well as particular, are all words of wisdom. And it is not as he [Rambam] thought that the particulars have no reason whatsoever, for that would not be a Torah of wisdom. (Tiferet Yisra'el, chap. 7).

footnote:

[1] According to the extreme versions of this position, God is subordinate neither to logic, nor to the "truth," and His actions are absolutely arbitrary.

(Translated by Rav David Strauss)