Halakhah zu Bereschit 3:19

And the world of souls, this is what is called ‘Garden of Eden’ (gan aden) among the sages, and they called it this by way of an allegory, using the example of how the body takes delight (mitaden) in a garden, and so it is written about the Garden of Eden in the land, ‘He set him in the Garden of Eden to work it and keep it,’ (Gen 2:5) – this heavenly Garden of Eden is the world of souls comparable but in contrast to it, and it is call ‘Garden of Eden’ too, and it is the reward for doing the mitzvot in which the soul takes delight, using the image of the body taking delight in a garden. And to the extent that the Torah does not specify explicitly anywhere the matter of the Garden of Eden being destined for the soul as a reward for the mitzvot, but does specify the bodily things destined for Israel when they return most certainly to their land, when they will have “all their rains in their season”⁹³Lev 26:4. and with the abundance of blessing and happiness – this matter is because the Torah was given to the masses of all of Israel, and the masses would not be able to understand the destined intellectual things. So even if the Torah would come to tell about this in brief, they would not find in it any way in to understand it, they wouldn’t be up to it, and it would be for them like a dream without an interpretation. And if the story of this went on at length in Scripture, wouldn’t more doubts be raised, the more was written about it? So for this reason, the Torah did not want to go down this road, neither in brief nor at length, because the masses wouldn’t believe in any of it, until they would see a sign or confirmation of it with their own eyes, and therefore the wisdom of the Torah comes in a story about physical rewards destined to come, to go on at length about them since they are preparation for the soul’s recompense, which is her “Garden of Eden,” and since they are a sign and confirmation for what they wouldn’t understand. And for this reason the Torah did not mention it explicitly in the story of the Garden of Eden, and by concealing it lest doubts multiply and confusion in understanding them ensue, but did mention openly what is the sign and confirmation of it. So this reason is correct and sufficient to all who understand and discern that the Torah was given to the masses. However, the “engaged intellectual” [maskil nilvav⁹⁴This expression from R. Bahya ibn Pakuda’s Duties of the Heart -(Hovot ha-Levavot), Sha’ar Yihud Chapter 1, plays on the connection to “heart”, and refers to someone philosophically trained but also “with a heart” – that is, emotionally engaged, not intellectually distant. He says the “maskil nilvav will strive to strip the shells of the words and their materiality from the subject.” In other words, it is out of emotionally longing to connect to God, that he will use philosophy to strip away the linguistic and material obstacles to that connection.] who delves deeply into it, will find everything in the Torah, “as milk under pressure produces butter”⁹⁵Prov 30:33. – whoever is found engaged in the Torah, the milk he suckles from the breast of his mother will produce the “butter” of Torah.⁹⁶Chavel thinks R. Bahya has in mind this midrash on Prov 30:33 in b. Berakhot 63b: “‘As milk under pressure produces butter’ – In whom do find the butter of Torah? In him who spits up the milk he suckled from his mother for it.” And so you who are an engaged intellectual – “Turn it and turn it because everything is in it!”⁹⁷M. Avot 5 (end). I think R. Bahya means by this analogy that the baby “churns” his mother’s milk in his mouth and turns it into butter, and similarly the engaged intellectual “churns” Torah by “turning it and turning it” and so turns it into “the butter of Torah.” Similarly, medieval Christian monastic educators described the active process of reading as “rumination.” You will find in the matter of Enoch that “And Enoch walked with God”⁹⁸Gen 5:24: va-yithalakh Hanokh et ha-elohim. And this “walking with God” is as the Targum translated it into Aramaic, “And Enoch walked in fear of the Lord.”⁹⁹Targum Onkelos Gen 5:24: Ve-halikh hanokh be-dahalta’ d’YHVH. Enoch was a “righteous man who rules in the fear of God,”¹⁰⁰2 Samuel 23:3.as it is said, “for God took him,”¹⁰¹Gen 5:24. – it is known that the “taking” was because of his virtue and goodness, because he was a righteous man. And if so, from here we get the explanation of the matter of “the Garden of Eden” for the soul of the righteous. And you will also find in the Torah in parashat “Im be-hukotai” that it is promise for the future, the world to come, for it is written there, “I will look with favor on you,¹⁰²Lev 26:9.” and this means that “My goodwill [ratzon]will be attached to you,” and the “goodwill” of Ha-Shem (may He be blessed) is the life of the world to come. This is what is referred to in what is written: “hayyim birtzono” – “When He is pleased, there is life,”¹⁰³Ps 30:6. and thus it is also written there, “I shall walk about – hithalakhti – in your midst.”¹⁰⁴Lev 26:12 And what is destined here is not to be understood in the category of things destined for the body, but rather from things destined for the soul in the world to come, which is what is referred to when it is written: “moving about – mithalekh – in the breezy part of the day.”¹⁰⁵Gen 3:8: “They [Adam and Eve] heard the sound of the Lord God moving about [mithalekh] in the garden at the breezy time of the day.” And our sages interpreted this in a midrash:¹⁰⁶Sifra Be-Hukkotai Chapter 3.”‘Va-hithalakhti be-tokhekham -I will walk about in their midst.’ In time to come the Holy One Blessed be He will stroll around with the righteous in the Garden of Eden.” And similarly they said, “In time to come the Holy One Blessed be He will arrange a “greenbelt”¹⁰⁷Mahol- untilled land surrounding a vineyard (Jastrow). However, mahol has the additional connotation of a chorus of singers and dancers, so R. Bahya may also be alluding to the “Mahanayyim dance” he mentioned in the First Gate. In any case, the main point of this image is that it is circular, with God in the center. The “choreography” of the souls of the “Garden of Eden”, is that they will be arranged in a circle with God in the center, as R. Bahya goes on to explain. for the righteous in the Garden of Eden, and His Presence will be among them.”¹⁰⁸B. Ta’anit 3a. The achievement of this joy for the souls is compared to an endless eternal “greenbelt,” because the circle goes around a point, and the point is in the center, which is why the Talmud says “His Presence will be among them –beynahem.” And similarly the Torah specified “in your midst – be-tokhekham,“¹⁰⁹Lev 26:12. because Israel is compared to circle, and He himself to the center point. And after it said, “I will walk about in your midst,” it said, “I will be your God,” ¹¹⁰Ibid. and our sages z”l interpreted this in a midrash,¹¹¹B. Taanit 31a. “And each and every one of them will point to Him with their finger, as it is said, ‘Behold! This is our God!”¹¹²Is 25:9. The word “this” is an allegory for nearing complete intellectual conception, like someone who has knowledge of something that exists and recognizes it clearly, and understands it as distinct from other things. And you should not understand “this” literally, like what you would mean if you were standing in front of a person and pointing them out, but rather, it is like what is meant when the Torah said, “For this man Moses…”¹¹³Ex 32:1: “When the people saw that Moses was so long in coming down from the mountain, the people gathered against Aaron and said to him, ‘Come make us a god who shall go before us, for this man Moses, who brought us from the land of Egypt – we do not know what happened to him”who was not standing among them, but about whom they had specific knowledge. From here¹¹⁴From the expression “I shall walk about in your midst” in Lev 26:12. it should be clear to the enlightened that the world of souls is the “Garden of Eden” for the soul, but Scripture mixes it in the general list of things destined for the body, and depended on the intellect of the enlightened to discern it from them, that it would not be hidden from him as it would be from the masses.

And you need to understand the statement our rabbis z”l made: “The righteous who in time to come will live again do not return to their ‘dust,’ but rather will keep on lasting, as it is said, ‘And those who remain in Zion, and are left in Jerusalem…shall be called holy.’¹⁴⁴Is 4:3. Just as the Holy lasts forever, so the righteous in time to come will live and last forever, as they explained in a midrash in the Talmud, Tractate Sanhedrin.¹⁴⁵B. Sanhedrin 92a: “Raba said: Whence is resurrection derived from the Torah? … Rabina said, [it is derived] from this verse, ‘And many of them that sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt.’ (Dan 12:2.) And in another place they taught in a midrash: “The dead whom the Holy One Blessed be He will in time to come bring back to life do not return to ‘their dust,” but rather will last forever, and delight themselves in seven huppot – wedding canopies.¹⁴⁶B. Baba Batra 75a. And this is the explanation of the matter and the secret of the statement, for the decree of Scripture: “For dust you are, and to dust you shall return,”¹⁴⁷Gen 3:19. is only from the perspective of the original sin, but when sin is taken away and “He will destroy death forever,”¹⁴⁸Is 25:8. and the day “will return to its normal state [le-eitano] in the morning,”¹⁴⁹An allusion to the miraculous parting of the Red Sea in Ex. 14:27, playing on the verbal similarity between yom – “day” and yam – “sea.” I.e., Ex 14:27: “the sea [yam] returned to its normal state in the morning.” that is, the strength of the world,¹⁵⁰Because according to Mekhilta Be-Shalah on Ex 14:27, eyn eitano ela’ tokfo, wherever it says eitano, it means “its strength” – tokfo. and no one will be able to lead into sin any work of the hands of the Lord (may He be blessed), for the Accuser will be gone in the blink of an eye – therefore they do not return to the dust forever. For when sin is taken away and cancelled, so the decree is cancelled, and so they do not return to ‘their dust.” But even though they never return to their dust, you shouldn’t understand this to mean that their bodies keep existing as real flesh and blood, with muscles and bones, as we are now. But rather, they will have earned the capacity to take on some sort of transformation, but it won’t ever be returning back to their dust. Thus, it is necessary for anyone with a clear mind to understand, and not to deceive himself with the “king’s food” of his desires and “wine he drank,”¹⁵¹An allusion to Dan 1:5. nor be seduced by the sort of things fools and those stuck in the “slimy depths”¹⁵²Ps 69:2. of their ignorance are seduced by.

For so the King ordered how we are to live because of the first sin on the day the smooth talker deceived our first father.⁹I.e., the serpent. On the day Adam was ensnared by his enemy, it was decreed for him that he would earn his bread only by the sweat of his brow,¹⁰Gen 3:19. and that man be humbled and brought low.¹¹Is. 2:9. He traded pleasure [‘oneg] for plague [nega’], got hard work instead of rest. His wisdom spoiled and his stature was diminished. It caused him weakness instead of strength; instead of wheat, thorns came forth. Instead of eternal life, death; instead of light, the shadow of death. With all this the Lord raised the power of the upper beings, and worsened the power of the lower beings. For the upper beings were fed without toiling, while the lower ones had to make do with pain and suffering. He gave the upper beings on high eternal life for all their generations, but to the lower ones short lives, days flying swifter than a runner.¹²Job 9:25. This is the striking parable that our rabbis brought in Bereshit Rabba on the verse: “the earth was unformed and void[tohu ve-bohu].”¹³Gen 1:1.

It is a general rule of healthy practice that before eating, you should engage in some strenuous activity, whether walking or working, so that your body is warmed up, and then you should eat. As the verse says, “By the sweat of your brow you shall eat bread,”³Bereishit 3:19. and “She does not eat the bread of laziness.”⁴Mishlei 31:27. You should loosen your belt before eating. This is hinted at in the verse אקחה פת לחם (“I will take a morsel of bread”⁵Bereishit 18:5.): the word אקחה in reverse is an acronym for התר חגורה קודם אכילה (“loosen the belt before eating”), and פת לחם is an acronym for פן תבוא לידי חולי מעיים (“lest you cause yourself digestive disorders”). While eating, you should sit in your place or recline on your left side. After eating, don’t move about excessively, because that will cause the food to descend from the stomach before it has been fully digested, which can be harmful; rather one should walk a little and rest. But you should not go on a long walk or engage in strenuous activity after the meal. Nor should you sleep till at least two hours have elapsed after the meal, so that the fumes will not ascend to the head and cause damage. Likewise, bathing, bloodletting and sexual intercourse are not beneficial after a meal.