The Rambam and the Ramban - part 1

00:01 Well, Shavuos is coming, and we received the Torah. Moshe received the Torah at Sinai. So today I want to talk about another Moshe. We talk about Moshe Rabbeinu, but there have been a few other Moshes among the Jewish people. Today we’ll talk about Moshe ben Maimon, the Rambam, and Moshe ben Nachman, the Ramban. Two Moshes who lived more or less in the same period, and whom students encounter all the time in all sorts of places, both in the revealed parts of Torah and in Chassidus. The Rambam is the Rambam—certainly no minor figure. Right? But the Ramban is no minor figure either. On the contrary, when you look in Chassidus, whenever there is a disagreement between the Rambam and the Ramban, the ruling follows the Ramban. So although in the revealed parts of Torah the Rambam’s rulings are generally followed—we approach him from the standpoint of studying the Rambam as halachah—in Chassidus it is interesting that whenever they disagree on matters of the inner dimension of Torah, the ruling is always specifically like the Ramban. So it’s an interesting subject, fascinating to learn a little about the connection between the Rambam and the Ramban and the differences between them. It can help us with many things, both in studying the revealed parts of Torah and in studying Chassidus. At the very least, we’ll cover it briefly. It’s a fascinating subject that one could discuss at length, but we’ll try to give the main points in a few minutes. The Rambam, Moshe ben Maimon, was born in 4895. That means it will soon be nine hundred years. We’re very close to nine hundred years since the Rambam’s birth. 4895. Where was the Rambam born? In Spain, in Córdoba. Córdoba is still a city today, a famous city in Spain. There’s a Córdoba here in Argentina too. Named after Córdoba... There’s Curitiba, isn’t there? What is it you have there, Curitiba? That’s Córdoba too—the Brazilians have a city called Curitiba,

02:25 which is Córdoba in Portuguese. In any case, that’s where the Rambam was born, in 4895. Everyone knows that about ten years later the Muslims came, and there were many troubles, all sorts of riots. The Rambam and his family—his father, Rabbi Maimon, who was also an important rabbi, his sister and his brother—the whole family left Spain and fled. He traveled from place to place at first; it took him several years, and eventually he reached Morocco. In Morocco he wrote some of his books. There too, there were decrees, and the Jews were forced, G-d forbid, to convert. The Rambam then wrote Igeres Hashmad, arguing in defense of Jews who had been forced to convert. There the Rambam’s strength became apparent, right? In his approach to the whole matter of a Jew raised without knowledge of Judaism, and to the whole matter of those forced to convert. Afterward, he had to flee from there as well. One of the reasons was connected with that letter too. In other words, he faced persecution and had to flee. Eventually he reached the Land of Israel, but he could not hold out there for long because of the material conditions. In the end he went to Egypt, and we know that the Rambam settled there. There he rose to prominence. Among the Jews, too, he was like a king, a leader of the entire Jewish people—not only in Egypt but in the surrounding regions, as far as Yemen and other countries. The Rambam’s influence and his leadership in halachah and Torah reached all those places. The Rambam fought against the Karaites. At that time there were Karaites, Jews who did not believe in the Oral Torah. They had a very large community in Egypt, thousands, tens of thousands of people, and the Rambam, through his influence, managed to break their hold and put an end to it. At the same time, he became prominent among the nations of the world as well. The Rambam practiced medicine to earn a living. At first he had not wanted to earn his living that way; his brother supported him. But after the tragedy in which his brother was killed—or died, drowned

04:39 at sea—the Rambam was left without a livelihood. He had no choice and went into medicine, and then became a very famous physician at the royal court. That, in a nutshell, is the Rambam’s story. At the age of seventy, on 29 Teves 4965—yes, a little more than eight hundred years ago—the Rambam passed away. So the Rambam lived seventy years. He passed away on 29 Teves 4965. He was born on Erev Pesach, which fell on Shabbos, in 4895, and passed away on 29 Teves 4965. The Ramban, also named Rabbi Moshe, was born ten years before the Rambam’s passing. Ten or eleven years—in other words, in 4954. So the Rambam and the Ramban were in this physical world at the same time for about eleven years. We don’t know exactly when the Ramban was born; it is generally accepted that he was born around 4954, based on several pieces of evidence. Where was the Ramban born? Not quite in Spain, but very close to it. Today it is part of Spain. The region was called—what is it called? Catalonia. Yes, today Catalonia is part of Spain, but back then the area was divided into several countries, and it was a separate country. The Ramban was born in a city called Girona—Girona, Gironi; it appears under various names in the holy books. That is where he was born and where he lived for most of his life. The difference between Spain and Catalonia at that time was that Spain suffered greatly under the Muslims and all the troubles that came with them, which is why the Rambam had to flee. But in Catalonia, by contrast, the Jews lived in peace and relative comfort. On the contrary, people made use of the Jews in business. Things went quite well for them, and Jewish life flourished there tremendously. What happened was that toward the end of his life, the Ramban had a problem with the Christians. The Christians began stirring up trouble and persuaded

07:16 the king to hold a disputation to show which side was right. There was a convert from Judaism who had connections with the royal court, and, in short, he persuaded them to hold a disputation. It became a very major disputation. The Ramban was already sixty when it happened. That means we are already in the fifth millennium. If the Ramban was born in 4954, then this was around 5020—I’m not giving an exact date, but somewhere around then. It was a very famous disputation. To this day, someone traveling to Barcelona can see the site. There is even some kind of official designation there; the government, too, recognizes the place. There is a particular area marked as the place where the Ramban held his disputation with, lehavdil, the priest, about Christianity, Judaism, Jesus, and that whole matter. The Ramban was very successful and made a tremendous kiddush Hashem. Even the king himself was so impressed by his greatness, wisdom, and sharpness, and by the great dignity with which the Ramban conducted himself, that he gave him a very substantial gift of money. But this led to antisemitism. Instead of helping, some people used it to inflame matters further. In the end, the Ramban decided he had to leave. He could have gone somewhere else in Spain, moved from one place to another, but the Ramban decided to travel to the Land of Israel. Toward the end of his life, he went up to the Land of Israel. He wrote, “I have become cruel to my children and my family.” He left his whole family, he left the entire community, and traveled alone to the Land of Israel. There he lived out his final years, about three years, and he passed away in the Land of Israel. Now,

09:28 The similarities between the Rambam and the Ramban are striking. Both were named Moshe. You might think it’s just a coincidence, but it’s very interesting that this was not a common name. If you look at the great Torah scholars before the Rambam and the Ramban, you hardly find the name Moshe. It’s remarkable, isn’t it? You don’t find the name Moshe in Tanach, or among the Tannaim, the Amoraim, or the Geonim. For some reason, Moshe was not a name people gave their children. Some say it was out of respect for Moshe Rabbeinu. People have written about this in books: Why wasn’t Moshe a common name? And suddenly, two great Torah scholars have the same name. It’s not just a coincidence; it points to something. Everyone knows the famous saying, “From Moshe to Moshe, none arose like Moshe,” said about the Rambam. Of course, you could apply it to the Ramban as well. Another thing they had in common was that both were great Torah scholars, accomplished in every area of Torah. You can find their work in every area of Torah—halachah, faith, everything. They were leaders on a worldwide scale. They belonged to different generations: if the Ramban was ten years old when the Rambam passed away, then the Rambam was the leading figure, let’s say, the leader of his generation, and in the next generation it was the Ramban. Both were leaders not just of a community, but on a global scale. Their influence reached across the world and beyond. Another similarity is medicine. Both the Rambam and the Ramban were physicians. As the Alter Rebbe says in Tanya, chapter 8, “And this is the reason that the Rambam and the Ramban, of blessed memory, and their associates engaged in them”—he means medicine. The Rambam was a physician because that was how he earned his living, rather than using Torah as a spade to dig with. The Ramban, too, did not want to earn his living from Torah; he

11:28 earned his living from medicine. Those are some similarities. Then there was the great controversy over the Rambam. It’s well known that the Rambam faced tremendous opposition. The opposition was because he was a philosopher and wrote books on philosophy. His major work was Moreh Nevuchim, and there was even a claim that in Sefer Hamada he had brought a great deal of philosophy into Judaism. The opposition was very, very strong. It came mainly from France. The sages of France were the Tosafists, and the Tosafists were very much against philosophy; they argued that it caused problems with faith. It’s really very interesting to look at those periods and the parallels, but in short—I won’t go into all the details now—the Rambam suffered a great deal. They issued a ban against him, banned his books, and forbade the study of his halachic works. Some went to the extreme of banning all his books; others banned only some of them. There were even great Torah scholars who burned Moreh Nevuchim and Sefer Hamada. This happened in Girona, too, in the area where the Ramban lived. Rabbeinu Yonah was there; he was the Ramban’s cousin, a relative. Rabbeinu Yonah was one of the truly great Torah scholars. He is famous for his work on teshuvah, Shaarei Teshuvah. We also know Rabbeinu Yonah from his halachic writings on the Gemara. In any case, he was one of the Rambam’s fiercest opponents. And here we find something to the Ramban’s credit: he worked to make peace between the opposing sides. He was the one who defended the Rambam’s honor. Now, what’s interesting is this: What gave the Ramban that ability? Apart from his own greatness, he was accepted by everyone. On the one hand, he was one of the sages of Spain; on the other, he had studied with the Tosafists, so they knew him as well,

13:45 and that also explains the Rishonim we have on the Gemara. The Ramban is one of the Rishonim whose approach is closest to Tosafos. When people study Gemara in yeshivos, after Rashi and Tosafos, the Rishonim they turn to are the Ramban and his whole school. The Rashba was a student of the Ramban; the Ritva was a student of the Rashba; the Ra’ah was a student of the Ramban. So many of the well-known Rishonim we study are the Ramban and his students. Where did the Ramban get his method of learning? From the Tosafists. That’s why his method is very similar to Tosafos, though he developed an approach of his own. So the Ramban had ties to the sages of France on one side and to the sages of Spain on the other. He was the right person in the right place. He wrote letters defending the Rambam, explaining to the sages of France that the Rambam was not what they thought: he was truly a great Torah genius. The Ramban speaks of the Rambam with great respect. He also explains why the Rambam needed to write those books: the circumstances demanded it. In the regions where the Rambam lived, in Egypt and Yemen and all the places he reached, there were problems of faith. The only way to help Jews, to save Jews, was to engage with philosophy, because Arab philosophy was then spreading throughout the world. It’s like science today. As science advanced, someone had to answer the questions it raised. We saw this in our own generation with the Rebbe. Many people abandoned faith because science had become so prominent in the world. Who would fight Torah’s battle in the face of science? It was

15:44 our Rebbe, who wrote letters and showed that science is not as formidable as people think. And, boruch Hashem, the Rebbe broke the hold of science as a klipah. So imagine: a thousand years ago, that was the Rambam’s task. Through the books he wrote on philosophy, he was able to help Jews. The Ramban—sorry, Rabbi Moshe ben Nachman—explained to the sages of France that they should understand the Rambam rather than fight him. Later, the Rashba carried this forward with even greater force. In the Rashba’s time, people wanted to [unclear], and the Rashba stood very firmly for [unclear]. There were also some among the Rambam’s students who fought against the Tosafists over this. The Ramban explained the Tosafists’ position; he was the one who managed to make peace between the approaches. Okay, that gives us a little background on the points of comparison between them. We’ve run over time, so I’ll just touch on one point. Perhaps, one day, when Hakadosh Boruch Hu gives us the desire, we’ll devote a class to the differences between them. One of the most significant differences between the Rambam and the Ramban—and this deserves a lengthy discussion—is that the Rambam was a philosopher, while the Ramban was a kabbalist, a scholar of Kabbalah. Did the Rambam also know Kabbalah? That’s a whole discussion in itself. In his writings, the Rambam does not explicitly mention Kabbalah anywhere. The Ramban was one of the greatest scholars of Kabbalah, so much so that the Arizal writes of him that he was the true kabbalist. And because the Rambam took the approach of philosophical inquiry while the Ramban took the approach of Kabbalah, several of their most fundamental disagreements followed from that. In Chassidus, we encounter a number of very, very fundamental disagreements between them. They concern the Beis Hamikdash and the manner in which the Shechinah rested there; the time to come, the resurrection of the dead, and Gan Eden; and angels—whether or not they have a material form. There are several

17:49 very, very fundamental disagreements discussed in Chassidus as disputes between the Rambam and the Ramban. We’ll see that Chassidus rules in accordance with the Ramban, because when philosophical inquiry and Kabbalah differ, the ruling follows Kabbalah. So that’s a subject of its own, and with Hashem’s help, we’ll find the time to discuss it in detail.