"Anyone whose fear of sin precedes his wisdom, his wisdom is
enduring" (Ovos chapter 8, Mishna 9). Rabbeinu Yonah
has two alternative explanations for this statement. He says
as follows: "The tanna is referring to the motives of
a person. Someone whose motive in pursuing wisdom is to
prevent his soul from sinning, and he indeed acquires wisdom,
his wisdom endures. He keeps away from sins, and also fulfils
mitzvos as a result of his wisdom and understanding.
"`If his wisdom preceded his fear of sin, his wisdom is not
enduring.' If his motive at the outset was not to acquire
wisdom to put into practice, but rather just to procure
wisdom and understanding, such wisdom will not endure, and
this is only logical."
This reasoning may be challenged. Is it not possible for
someone to study Torah initially without this motive, and
still merit to have his wisdom endure, if he acquires the
correct motive in the course of time as a result of his
studies?
Rabbeinu Yonah has discovered an important point for us here:
all the wisdom that we attain makes an impression on us in
accordance with the motives and the intensity of purpose
which accompanies the process of attaining it.
Someone who studies a certain discipline because he needs it
to make a living will put more effort and will delve deeper
into his studies than another person studying the same
discipline only because he loves wisdom.
The same applies to Torah study. A person who feels that
without learning Torah it would be totally impossible for him
to keep mitzvos and refrain from transgressions, and he wants
to keep the Torah properly, will certainly study seriously
and with great effort, realizing that his life depends on it.
It is only natural, therefore, that whatever he learns will
become an integral part of him and he will not forget it.
On the other hand someone who learns without this motive,
while his studies may stir him to keep the Torah, this
feeling will eventually dissipate completely. This is because
they will necessarily remain on a more superficial level,
having in the first place not been entered into with full
determination and concentration.
It would appear that this is what is lacking in the
mussar study of a lot of bnei Torah. Although
they involve themselves with mussar, their studies
only result in -- at best -- intermittent awakenings which do
not make a permanent impression on them. This is because they
do not yet feel the deep difference between the two types of
people described, and that the mussar way enables you
to secure the correct motives, which are essential for anyone
who wants to merit the acquisition of Torah.
Rabbeinu Yonah further writes, "Another explanation is that
when a person's fear of sin precedes his wisdom, his learning
serves to instruct and encourage him to walk in the path that
he is already used to from his days of living in fear of sin;
he feels a love for wisdom and desires to acquire more of it,
since it endorses what he is already used to.
"However, when a person's wisdom precedes his fear of sin,
the wisdom he encounters clashes with the sins he has
habituated himself to, and eventually he will rebel against
it, because it will appear to him as a burden."
In other words, if someone is lacking in yiras
Shomayim before he embarks on his Torah studies, his
learning will not endure, because it is impossible to fight
the yetzer horo only with wisdom, since a person's
desires and wishes are engraved into his personality from his
youth, and will eventually prevail and be victorious.
Wisdom itself does not have a strong hold on the internal
make-up of the person studying it. Its function is to serve
as a tool and means to help the oved Hashem. Therefore
it has to be connected to an independent force inside the
heart, otherwise known as yiras Shomayim. According to
this, the possuk in Iyov (28:28), "Behold, the
fear of Hashem that is wisdom," can be easily understood.
(See also the Vilna Gaon's he'oros on
mishnayos, where there is a reference to the
posuk in Tehillim (111:10), "The fear of Hashem
is the beginning of wisdom etc.," as well as Tosphos Rabbi
Akiva Eger on Ovos d'Rabbi Nosson chapter 22.)
I would suggest that Rabbeinu Yonah's two commentaries
complement each other, since only if both aspects of fear
preceding wisdom delineated by him are combined, can wisdom
endure. Even if a person has accustomed himself to the ways
of yiras Shomayim and walks in its paths,
nevertheless, if he will not study wisdom with a
consciousness of its importance, without the knowledge that
only it can sustain him, his yiroh will not be
sufficient for the contents of wisdom to penetrate the
innermost recesses of his heart. On the other hand, if a
person will not make a point of aspiring towards yiras
Shomayim and taking practical measures to acquire it,
even if he studies in such a way that the wisdom becomes
internalized, his desires and nature will oppose and fight
him in order to banish his yiroh. In fact, a person
who makes do with acquired wisdom, is exposed to the danger
that his real knowledge on the one hand and his aspirations
and urges on the other hand, will conflict and collide with
each other with such an unbearable intensity that he will
rebel against his wisdom, as Rabbeinu Yonah says here, he
will end up becoming an apikores.
This phenomenon explains why, historically, we find some
gedolim being affected by apikorsus, even
though we also (especially so) suffer from inner
contradictions and conflicts. [So why should they do worse
than we?] The deep explanation for this is that the knowledge
and intellectual perception of the gedolim is so clear-
cut and real; that they match in intensity their human
desires and dispositions. The resulting battle inside them is
so difficult, that sometimes they give in to their yetzer
hora and fall into bad ways.
Our learning, by way of contrast, is not so internalized, and
as a consequence the wisdom and aspirations we possess do not
pose the same challenge to our natures which would result in
internal dissonance and pressure forcing us to nullify and
overpower our natural inclinations because of the intensity
of our intellectual attainments. Consider this point well.
The Mishna continues, "He used to say, Anyone whose
deeds exceed his wisdom, his wisdom is enduring." Rabbeinu
Yonah explains this to mean that if a person accepts upon
himself in a free- willed and whole-hearted manner to do
everything in accordance with the directions of his rabbonim,
his reward is as great as if he had kept all the mitvos, and
his deeds are considered to exceed his wisdom. The
continuation of the Mishna, "Anyone whose wisdom
exceeds his deeds, his wisdom is not enduring" is taken to
refer to someone who says that he has to learn the
halocho and the whole Talmud before starting to keep
the mitzvos. Such a person's wisdom will not endure, "for his
character traits have first to be improved if his wisdom is
to endure." Why does Rabbeinu Yonah refer to character traits
in this context? If by accepting the yoke of mitzvos
as instructed by the chachomim, a person has fulfilled
the only condition for acquiring enduring wisdom, what
further need is there for the perfection of character
traits?
The connection between the two concepts is the following: if
a person has not improved his tainted character traits, it is
impossible for him to accept this yoke totally, his desires
and pride would be bound to stand in the way of its
unconditional acceptance.
This is also the deep explanation behind Rovo's answer to the
Zeduki (Shabbos 88a) who had accused the Jewish people
of having been rash when they agreed to accept the Torah
before hearing its contents. Rovo said to him, "We who walked
in integrity, of us it is written, 'the integrity of the
upright shall guide them.' But of others, who walked in
perversity it is written, 'but the perversenes of the
treacherous shall destroy them.' " Rashi explains, "We walked
with Him in good faith, as those who act out of love and we
relied on Him that he would not mislead us with something
with which we could not cope." Rashi is refering to what
Chazal tell us about the nations of the world who asked what
is written in it, instead of unconditionally accepting the
Torah, as opposed to Klal yisroel who had uprooted any
faulty character traits, thus enabling them to receive the
Torah immediately, without any questions, since their hearts
were faithful to Hashem, ready to obey whatever He would
command.
In our Mishna we find two conditions necessary for the
acquisition of wisdom: that wisdom be preceded by
yiroh and that deeds are to exceed wisdom.
It may be suggested that these two points refer to two
different levels. This may be seen more clearly in
Mishna 17: "Where there is no derech eretz
there is no Torah . . . where there is no yiroh there
is no wisdom etc." See Rabbeinu Yonah in his commentary on
the first phrase, where he repeats the explanation expounded
before on the Mishna about deeds exceeding wisdom, and
the commentary on the second phrase, where he gives the same
explanation as the second peirush on the Mishna about
yiroh preceding wisdom.
The tanna of the Mishna is very precise with his words
when choosing to juxtapose Torah with derech eretz and
chochmo with yiroh. Someone whose learning is
on a low level (he is given a certain description by the
tanna further on in the Mishna) aims to be a student
of others: this is the application of Torah in its literal
sense of wisdom imparted to others (as in horo'oh).
For this Torah to endure, the recipient has to undertake to
fulfil eveything he is taught, without deviating to the left
or to the right, accepting absolutely the Torah taught to him
by his rabbonim. The only precondition for study on this
level to succeed is the eradication of defective character
traits.
However, this is not enough for a person who has reached a
higher level of intellectual independence, since so far from
nullifying himself before his studies, his autonomous
personality is likely to be more accentuated and to become
more conspicuous as a result of his wisdom. This, in turn,
will awaken all his mental faculties and ambitions, including
any residual improper desires, the danger being that these
will clash with his -- albeit Torah-based -- wisdom. To be
preoccupied with good behavior (derech eretz) will not
be enough for this person, since it is impossible to uproot
completely all defective character traits. In fact, the
baalei mussar and sephorim kedoshim explain
that the origin of the sins of many gedolim such as
Korach and the meraglim is to be found in subtle
points of faulty character traits. It is therefore incumbent
on anybody about to embark on the study of "wisdom," to make
sure first that his yiras shomayim is firmly in place.
This consists of the awareness that all of a person's
endeavors and avoda in life have to be directed only
towards Hashem. If he becomes accustomed towards
derech, then chochma will serve to strengthen
him, and he will eventually attain perfection in yiras
Shomayim.
HaRav Aharon Westheim zt"l, was rosh yeshivas
Rabbeinu Yechiel of Paris. His yahrzeit is 25 Elul
and he was niftar in 5754.
