출애굽기 33:18의 Halakhah

And in connection to this you will also find it plainly stated in Perek Helek³⁴B. Sanhedrin 100a, a well-known passage from the Talmud describing the world to come. that in time to come the human height [komot] will return to two hundred cubits, and they also taught this in a midrash likewise in Perek Sefinah:³⁵B. Baba Batra 75a. “I will lead you komamiyut,”³⁶Lev 26:13, literally, “I will make you walk erect” (JSB), but the midrash plays on the similarity between komamiyut “erect” and komot – “height.” R. Meir says: [it means] two hundred cubits – twice the height of Adam. R. Judah says: A hundred cubits; corresponding to the [height of the] temple and its walls. For it is said: ‘carved after the fashion of the Temple.³⁷Ps 144:22. But insofar as it said,³⁸B. Baba Batra, ibid. The Holy One, Blessed be He, will in time to come bring precious stones and pearls…and will cut out from them [openings] ten by twenty cubits, and will set them up in the gates of Jerusalem, as it is said, “and your gates of stones of carbuncle,”³⁹Is 54:12. it seems from this that the height will be no more than twenty cubits. So therefore it must be said that the gates of the houses are not being spoken about, for how could they enter them at that height?! But rather, it’s certainly the gates of the windows that are being spoken about. And you already knew that parashat “Im Behukotai” is a promise of what will happen in the future, for what it says there never existed in the two Temples, neither in the First nor the Second Temple. For what is destined in the Torah through its promises is not al shlemut, but will happen in time to come after the ancient sin has been atoned for, which has never occurred at any time, and this is what our sages z”l taught in a midrash:⁴⁰B. M.K. 16b. When David went out to war he killed eight hundred at one time, but was sorry for the two hundred [he would have killed], to fulfill what has been said, “How could one have routed a thousand?”⁴¹Dt 32:32, from the future promises enumerated in Deuteronomy. A voice from heaven went out and said, “Were it not for the matter of Uriah the Hittite.”⁴²1 Kings 15:5, and see the story in 2 Samuel chapters 11-12. King David fell in love with Uriah’s wife Bathsheba, and so sent Uriah off to the front lines of battle to be killed so that he could marry her.

And this was the subject of what Moses asked when he said, “Please, let me behold Your Presence!”⁵⁰Ex 33:18. Here it should be asked, was Moses asking for something possible or impossible? If for something possible, why did God refuse him and say, “You cannot see my face”?⁵¹Ibid., 33:20. And if for something impossible, why did he ask? And the answer to this strictly speaking, is that Moses sought to perceive something while he was still in a material body what he would perceive only after he had been separated from matter. And the reason that it occurred to him to ask was because he saw that he had already stood on Mt. Sinai for forty days, and the power of his flesh had attenuated and the earthy matter in him weakened with the increase of light over him, by which the beams of light shone from his face. So he asked while he was still made of matter as if he were not, that he not be hindered from perceiving what he would perceive after the separation (of his soul from his flesh). And the Holy One Blessed be He replied to him, “For man may not see me and live,”⁵²Ibid. that is to say, no matter what, because you are still a man, it is impossible for you to perceive while you’re still material what you will perceive only afterwards. And so they said in the Midrash,⁵³Sifra, beginning of Vayikra 2. “‘For man may not see me and live:’⁵⁴Ibid. while alive they do not see, but upon their death the do see.” And this is after the separation of the soul from its material form. And it is possible to specify further that “upon their death” means when they are about to die, as in the topic they discussed in Midrash Deuteronomy Rabbah Parashat Ekev,⁵⁵Though it doesn’t appear in the printed editions of Deuteronomy Rabbah (Chavel). “How abundant is the good that You have in store for those who fear You.⁵⁶Ps 31:20. ‘It happened that when R. Abbahu was about to die, he saw the gift of his reward, what the Holy One Blessed be He was going to give him in the time to come, and all the good prepared for the righteous themselves in the time to come. So when he saw all these consolations which had been prepared, he exclaimed, “All these are for Abbahu!” and immediately he desired to die, and began reciting: “How abundant is the good that You have in store for those who fear You.”⁵⁷Ibid.