The Monks Are Right

I am accustomed to hearing that the derech of the ascetic is fallacious; that we are meant to serve Hashem through properly-channeled interaction with the material world. Indeed, in Rabbi Akiva Tatz's Letters to a Buddhist Jew, he writes (p. 204 ff.) in the name of the Sefas Emes that the radical idea of Avraham Avinu, the one that provoked a crusade to wipe him out, was not the fact of Hashem, but rather the idea of serving Hashem in this way. I took this to mean that this avodah applied and still applies to all humans. I was surprised to discover later that it may in fact not be true of the avodah of non-Jews.

In a passage of Sifsei Chayim on the inyan of sukah (Vol. I p. 320, "Avodas AKUM al yede perishus olam ha-zeh"), Rabbi Friedlander writes that the AKUM is "eino mesugal le-havin she-yesh derech nosefes le-avodas H'" ["not 'mesugal' to understand that there is an additional approach to serving Hashem," i.e. beyond asceticism]. In the context of this ma'amar, I understood this to mean that there is something intrinsic to the AKUM that does not permit him to tap into this type of avodah. It seems that the AKUM is meant to serve H' through eschewal of olam ha-zeh.

I found this idea stated even more explicitly in Ge'ulas Yisrael, the perush of Rabbi Yisrael Eliezer Kanarek of Peakskill on the Hagadah shel Pesach. In his introduction, he writes that Chet Adam ha-rishon "permanently" drove the yetzer ha-ra into man. Up through Avraham the derech avodah of tzadikim was perishus. Avraham went to a higher level by extirpating the koach ha-ra from within himself. When he said, "ba-meh eda" at the bris bein ha-besarim, he was expressing concern that his progeny would not be able to live up to that standard. The answer was galus and ge'ulas Mitzrayim, by which all of Yisrael would be forced into bitul koach ha-ra.

From this follows that the other nations do not have access to this, as they are lacking galus and ge'ulas Mitzrayim, and are thus consigned to live within Adam's limitation. It would seem that they should ideally follow the way of the first generations of man, and serve H' though perishus. Indeed, R' Kanarek writes on page 11:

והחילוק בין נפש המדבר לנפש הישראלית, דבנפש המדבר נטבע בו עוד טומאת הערלות שהוא טבע הרע מימי אדם הראשון ואי אפשר לו להגיע רק לדרגא של כבישת היצר, שזה הוא דרגת חסידי אומות העולם (וידוע מהשקפות הנוצרים שחטא אדם הראשון אי אפשר עוד לתקן בעולם, ואם אנהו לא חזו מזלייהו חזו דכך הוא מהות בן נח שלא נתגייר שיש בו עוד טומאת הערלות ואי אפשר לתקן כח הרע כלל). The distinction between the nefesh of the speaking one [i.e. man in general] and the "Yisrael" nefesh, is that within the nefesh of the speaking one is still embedded the tumah of orlus, which is the "ra" nature from the days of the first man, and it is impossible for him to reach beyond the level of conquering the yetzer, which is the level of the pious of the nations of the world (and it is known about the outlook of the Christians that [they understand that] it is impossible ever to repair the sin of the first man, and if they did not see their mazal [yitznewton: I don't know what this means], they saw that this is the essence of the ben-Noach who has not become a ger, that he still has the tumah of orlus, and it is totally impossible to repair the power of ra).

I understood from this that the human is, in fact, spiritually handicapped to the point where he cannot enter the parsha of avodah through the material world without this special segulah of yetzias Mitzrayim, unless he is an Avraham Avinu. This seemed to conflict with the notion that Avraham brought this forward as the derech avodah for mankind, which is how I understood Rabbi Tatz's words. I wrote to him to see whether these ideas are in conflict; his response:

The key is that they must be poresh to reach any transcendence, BUT their WORK is to fix the material world ie make it a perfect place for Torah.... that is Esav's twin role with Yaakov... See my shiur on Yaakov and Esav... [YN: perhaps he means this one]

I wonder now if, perhaps, Avraham brought it forth as a general derech, but inasmuch as mankind spurned it, Yisrael was chosen to experience Mitzrayim and carry this derech forward, to the exclusion of the other nations. I have not yet listened to the shiur that Rabbi Tatz mentioned; at such a time as I do, I will plan on updating this post. Read full post