70 panim latorah | Imamother

TranquilityAndPeace

Wed, Nov 30 2011, 9:16 am

Here's what I learned, many years ago - if my memory serves me properly.

You can find a lot of this in the Maharal's Derech Hashem, which comes with an English translation in a pocket-sized sefer by Feldheim.

God created the Olam Hamachshava, the World of Thought prior to creating this physical world in which we live - called Olam Hama'aseh - the World of Doing.

In the Olam Hamachshava, things didn't have to be concertized into just one form: Multiple forms of one idea could exist, because they were thoughts.

So, in Olam Hamachshava, for example, Yisro could have come to Klal Yisrael in the Midbar EITHER BEFORE OR AFTER Matan Torah. (That is one example of 70 panim LaTorah that used to bother me a lot: Either Yisro came before Matan Torah, or afterwards, but both can't be true unless he came twice, and it seems that he came once!)

And Olam Hamachshava is all truth. Here in this world, we live in an Olam Hamachshava, as that is the nature of physicality, all physical things die or decay and do not last. Truth is eternal.

So, things go down tzinorim (pipes) from Olam Hamachshava until our world. Whichever features are dominant are the features they take in this world. But that does not mean that their recessive features don't exist; we just don't see them existing in this world!

That's why you can say "eilu v'eilu divrei Elokim chayim" and have a machlokes where Hillel holds that X is the truth, and Shamai holds that Y, the opposite of X, is the truth.

They are both true in Olem Hamachshava. Hillel and Shamai agree on that! They are simply arguing about which features are dominant, and what the physical manifestation of this concept is in this world, and what the practical halachah is.

Our souls are in the Olam Hamachshava. They go down and down and down through various level of worlds, until they finally reach this world and have a physical manifestation as our body. Every item we see here in this world is a physical manifestation of its essential essence, which can only exist in Olam Hamachshava.

Hope this made some sense!

TranquilityAndPeace

Wed, Nov 30 2011, 10:01 am

Maybe the first shiur can be about what I wrote above: How 2 seemingly contradictory things can both be true.

Then, you can talk about how different groups do different things, as you mentioned in the op.

Then you can talk about the practical implications of that: not being judgmental when people do things that are different from the way you do things. Being tolerant and accepting of all types of people, even if you don't approve of their actions.

baba

Wed, Nov 30 2011, 10:06 am

TranquilityAndPeace wrote:

Thanks, those are great ideas.
I need to make about 6 shiurim on this topic. Tolerance is a great idea and can go so many ways. Thanks!

amother

Rose

Mon, May 25 2020, 3:54 pm

TranquilityAndPeace wrote:

I realize this is an old thread. This post seems to be reconciling how 2 contradictory opinions can both be true. I don't understand it. If someone can explain further I'd appreciate it.

PinkFridge

Mon, May 25 2020, 4:14 pm

Rabbi Yitzchak Breitowitz spoke about this today on the Ohr Samayach Memorial Day program. I'm sure it'll be on the ohr.edu by tomorrow.
Rabbi Reisman also spoke about this a few weeks ago. He said that the letters in the Torah could form all sorts of meanings. (This is pretty mystical.) Which it explains a lot, in a way.

In a kind of related vein, Rabbi Shraga Kallus has a TorahAnytime shiur called, Did the Rabbanim Make a Mistake Regarding Corona about the process of psak.