Rabbi Yosef Gavriel Bechhofer הרב יוסף גבריאל בקהופר
of Admor Reb Tzadok HaKohen of Lublin zt"l zy"a
Simanim 54-56
The first episode in the series is in Hebrew. Subsequent episodes are linked in the comments and are in English.
There are still kelim to bring השראת השכינה today. The yein malchus flows through the four amos of halacha. Just as the neshama is primarily in the head, but causes the flow to extend to all the limbs of the body to sustain it. As the Alter Rebbe says:
ספר ליקוטי תורה - דרושים לר"ה
וא"א להמשיך אלהותו ית' כ"א לתוך כלי' דהיינו תומ"צ וכל אותיות התורה הם כלים כמ"ש וכלים מכלים שונים ויין מלכות רב דהיינו השראת השכינה ובזמן שבהמ"ק קיים היה עיקר השראת השכינה בק"ק ומשם מתפשט לכל העולם ועכשיו כשחרב בהמ"ק אין להקב"ה בעולמו אלא ד"א של הלכה עיקר השראת השכינה ומשם מתפשט לכל העולם כולו כמו הנשמה שעיקר השראתה במוח ומשם מתפשטת לכל הגוף כולו להחיותו.
And there was a Breslover Chosid at the end of the 19th century who wrote that because of the symbolism of yein malchus, linked to the statement of Chazal that wine and fragrances make a person wise, that therefore Chazal were particularly stringent in the limitations and prohibitions having to do with wine.
נחת השולחן - יורה דעה
וע"כ חמור מאד איסור שתיית יינם של עכו"ם ואפילו במגעם לבד נאסר. כי מחמת שבקדושה הוא בשרשו גבוה מאד וכלול מכל בחי' התיקונים הנ"ל. כי הוא מבחינת חכמה ומוחין בחינת חמרא וריחא פיקחין ובבחי' תירה ובבח'י מלכות בחינת ויין מלכות רב וכו' וכמובן במאמר תהלה לדוד סימן י"ב וכן בזוה"ק וזה בחי' זכה נעשה ראש. וע"כ באמת צריכןי ליזהר בשתייתו מאד שלא להיות יותר מהמדה ח"ו כי יין המשכר הוא בחי' ההיפוך מכל הנ"ל. וע"כ נאסר במגע העכו"ם ופוגם בנפש ישראל השותה אותו ומתגבר עליו היצה"ר. ביותר עד שיוכל לבוא עי"ז לכל רע ח"ו. וזה בחינת ועל יינם משום בנותיהם ועיין בספר יין המשומר שהאריך הרבה בחומר האיסור ותבין משם לענינינו. וע"פ הנ"ל תבין לפרש כמה פסוקים ומאמרי רז"ל שמדברים בענין שתיית היין לשבח או להיפוך והכל מובן ע"פ הנ"ל.
On Purim we are supposed to recognize the great potential of yein malchus and the kelim that it symbolizes, the four amos of halacha and the mitzvos aseh. And utilize them a gantz yohr to bring about in ourselves and in the world a dirah ba'tachtonim, a place for the Shechinah to dwell down here below.
This is the principle of nichnas yayim yatzah sod - through our awareness of the power of yein malchus we bring about the manifestation of malchus.
Haster, הסתר divided by seven is HaMelech, המלך. If we take the seventh sefirah of malchus and use it to break the concealment, the הסתר פנים of this world, we will bring about the ultimate tikkun bb"a!
As it is written here in the Megillah, with the vav, ויין מלכות is in gimatriya the equivalent of 572, סוד ברוך מרדכי and סוד ארור המן, or, of course, יין ברוך מרדכי or יין ארור המן - and this ties in to וכלים מכלים שונים - as we saw in the Likkutei Torah in the previous post, no matter whether the vessels and measures are good or bad, it all must be used as best as possible for the purpose of the good.
The Gemara in Megillah 12a says that each person was given to drink wine older than himself. This seems to be a hint to the oath that a person takes before he is born (Niddah 30b), that he should conduct himself properly in this world. This means that yein malchus should be wine that brings the middah of Malchus into the world - to be a tzaddik and not a rasha.
And the next pasuk clarifies that everyone drank as they saw fit, everyone has free will to go in either direction, כרצון איש ואיש - like the Gemara there in Megillah says, Ish va'Ish are Mordechai and Haman. Everyone has free will to follow in one direction or the other.
But ויין מלכות is in gimatriya also the equivalent of סוד תקב - the secret of 502, the 502 combined years of the lives of the Avos. The mitzvos we do are our way of fulfilling the charge of the Tanna d'Bei Eliyahu (Rabbah 25) לעולם חייב אדם לומר מתי יגיעו מעשי למעשי אבותי אברהם יצחק ויעקב - and to merit the מעשה אבות סימן לבנים.
To be continued, IYH.
ספר אסתר פרק א
(ז) וְהַשְׁקוֹת בִּכְלֵי זָהָב וְכֵלִים מִכֵּלִים
שׁוֹנִים וְיֵין מַלְכוּת רָב כְּיַד הַמֶּלֶךְ:
ספר ליקוטי תורה - פרשת בחקותי
והנה השס"ה ל"ת הן להפריד את הרע אבל רמ"ח מ"ע הן
הנק' אברין דמלכא כמו למשל אבר הוא כלי אשר בו נמשך חיות ממקור החיות אשר שורה במוח
כן הוא כאן כי המצוה היא כלי לאורו ית' הנמשך מסתימא דכל סתימין למטה להשגת האדם
השפל ואורו ית' המלובש בה הוא הנק' יין מלכות רב כיד המלך אין סוף לאורו ית' והוא
כוונת המצוה שהוא להמשיך אורו ית' למטה ע"י כלי המצוה והתורה הלזו והוא לשון צוותא
לשון חיבור. אך הם נחלקים לכללים ופרטים רבים הן בתורה והן במצות כי המשכת המקרא אינו
דומה להמשכת לימוד משנה או גמרא הלכות ואגדות וכן במצות. ועל כן נאמר וכלים מכלים שונים
בהמשכותיהם וכלל הכל הוא אורו ית' הנק' יין אשר בהכנס היין יצא הסוד והיין הוא התלהבות
אורו ית' הנשמר בלבו של אדם ע"י התורה והמצוה יצא מעצמו סוד הוא אהבה מסותרת אשר
תבוא לבחי' גילוי... וזהו ויין מלכות הוא האור שמאיר רב כיד המלך הוא בחי' היד הגדולה
חסד דאריך כו' ועל ידי שנכנס יין זה באדם יצא הסוד ואהבה מסותרת ששרשה מבחי' האבות
אשר שרשן מבחי' זו בעבר הנהר כו' כנ"ל. אך שצריך להיות בחי' כלים מכלים שונים
דתורה ומצות שבהן יומשך יין מלכות להיות רב כיד המלך. וזהו ואת מצותי תשמרו פי' מצוה
לשון צוותא והתחברות והיינו כאשר האור נמשך בכלי אז הוא בבחי' התקשרות וצוותא אלינו
משא"כ בעודו למעלה נק' חקיקה גליף גליפו וכו'.
Yein Malchus in gimatriya is 566. The same gimatriya
as אור ושמחה, light and happiness. As the Likkutei Torah says, a
mitzvah is a tool to bring down the light from the highest source down to the experience
and perception of a person in this world. It may be that this is what in the Megillah
it says V’yein Malchus, preceded by the Vav HaChibbur,
which we know connotes the connection and connectedness between the higher
worlds (the first heh in the Shem Hashem) and the lower worlds (the
second heh in the Shem Hashem – and with this you can understand
the connection to the term אורה ושמחה later in the the Megillah, when the
light and happiness are already bonded to the lower levels, the second heh).
It is also the gimatriya
of ישרון, which is written chaser in the
Torah, exactly as is written the similar word in Aramaic, which means to dwell,
as in השראת השכינה. The performance of mitzvos leads to the dwelling of the
Shechinah ba’tachtonim.
It is also the gimatriya
of כי ישר הוי"ה and of כל דעביד רחמנא לטב עביד. Hashem is straight and everything He does
is for the good. This is as the Likkutei Torah writes further, that the by
the light of the mitzvah one can perceive the rav k’yad haMelech – the Chesed
that inheres in all that is in this world. This cannot always, indeed, perhaps
only rarely can be understood, intellectually and logically. It must be
experienced, טעמו וראו כי טוב ה' – tasted to be seen.
It is also the gimatriya of מִצותיך – not of mitzvos, but of mitzvosecha
- Your mitzvos. Only
when mitzvos are perceived and performed as the Mitzvos Hashem will they
bring the light and happiness. (It is also the gimatriya of עצות,
which is reminiscent of the Zohar’s calling mitzvos עיטין.)
And, for now let us conclude that it is also the gimatriya of תיקון,
because the mitzvos bring about the real tikkun olam.
To be continued,
IYH.
Yosef Gavriel Bechhofer is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.
Topic:
Inner Space by Rabbi Aryeh Kaplan
Time: Thursdays 10:00 PM Eastern Time
To Continue Every week on Thursdays
Subsequent Shiurim in the series will be linked in the comments to this Post.
First Shiur:
Join the Weekly Zoom Meeting
https://us04web.zoom.us/j/75898676456?pwd=lFZPTu5ByjbOawUGf797vf67Mshm30.1
Meeting ID: 758 9867 6456
Passcode: 431304
Weekly Link:
Please download and import the following iCalendar (.ics) files to your calendar system.
נהמת הגאון
A Talmudic Reading of the Transcript of
Rav Dov Landau shlita against the Medinah
The article follows my comments.
Yes, it isn’t human, and it may be useful to let your negative feelings out. But it may have unintended negative effects.
Artificial intelligence can be incredibly annoying. Like when you realize the customer-service chatbot has you in a reply loop. Or when your voice assistant keeps giving you irrelevant answers to your question. Or when the automated phone system has none of the choices you need and no way to speak to a human
Sometimes when dealing with technology, the temptation to unleash anger is understandable. But as such encounters become more common with artificial intelligence, what does our emotional response accomplish? Does it cost more in civility than it benefits us in catharsis?
We wondered what WSJ readers think of this emerging dilemma, as part of our ongoing series on the ethics of AI. So we asked:
Is it OK to address a chatbot or virtual assistant in a manner that is harsh or abusive—even though it doesn’t actually have feelings? Does that change if the AI can feign emotions? Could bad behavior toward chatbots encourage us to behave worse toward real people?
Here is some of what they told us.
There is no excuse for bad behavior. If we claim to be civilized then surely we must act so, regardless of provocation or fear of oversight. One consequence of being harsh or abusive in a virtual setting is that it inevitably leads to similar behavior in the physical world, and that is where the greater damage lies.
Is this a real question? These notions are preposterous. Of course it is OK. In fact, this is another potential therapeutic use of AI. We all feel the need to let loose to relieve stress. Having a reactive robot take it in place of a spouse or a child is exactly the kind of life-enriching tool a machine is supposed to be. That’s like asking, would it be OK to send a robot into a nuclear reactor to retrieve a contaminant if it had a name like Billy. Of course it’s OK. Better than sending the real Billy!
Since people are ultimately behind all these systems and my interactions with AI are training the algorithms, abusive behavior should be avoided.
The native assumption here is that AI doesn’t have feelings because it doesn’t work like us. This assumption will lead to issues down the line when AI systems are even more advanced. Do we have the right to abuse people who don’t have conventional feelings because of a medical or mental-health condition? No. What’s buried in the subtext is an assumption that machines can be abused because they are not human. But as a species, we’ve given rights to animals and even the environment. So when does it make sense to do so for machines?
Now I would argue, if biological aliens landed on this planet tomorrow in peace, then we would offer them some kind of rights. But what if they were mechanical? We still should. Why do we hesitate with our own creation?
I would worry about people who abuse chatbots in much the same way that I would worry about people who abuse small animals. I don’t think that such behavior would encourage bad behavior so much as it would indicate something perhaps not quite right about the person’s inner state.
Also, I have always addressed chatbots as I would address real people because I find the interaction more natural. When using speech and natural language I find that using the same sort of language across the board is easier and more consistent. Since chatbots are mostly trained on natural human interactions it is likely that they will perform better on human-to-computer interactions that are similar.
People are very abusive to other people. Much of the time this is due to a lack of understanding, frustrations or misdirected anger. So yes, it is OK to talk to a chatbot that way…provided that the chatbot doesn’t pick up on this and become abusive as well.
This is a place where a chatbot can become a solution to this societal problem. Train the chatbot in the ways of mental-health counseling so it can deal with the abuse in a constructive way and help the person learn that abusive behavior is neither productive nor appropriate.
As we’ve seen on social media, it’s very easy for two people who don’t share the same beliefs and aren’t physically in the same room to be insensitive or even hostile to each other. This seems to have carried over into offline interactions, especially in politics. Personally, I assume that since a chatbot code was written by a person, it might have some inclination toward rewarding good behavior by the user or punishing bad behavior. So I use favorable and positive dialogue in my own chatbot prompts and responses. I figure, why take the risk?
Chatbots are so badly designed and so frequently employed to let companies off the hook for communication with people that they increase frustration and so probably merit more than their share of the behavior that they create.
Would the answers change if AI feigned having emotions? It would increase people’s sense that they are being lied to or “played,” and in that way increase the ire of folks responding to them when they discovered it. AI’s fake emotions would just come across as sarcasm or worse.
It is not OK to abuse chatbots or virtual assistants. Even if we are able to draw a line and keep our abuse in the virtual world, all indulgences with abuse weaken our ability to grow in love and empathy.
I strongly believe we should find every opportunity to practice patience and, it seems to me, AI is a perfect training ground. I don’t believe kindness, patience, morality or even basic politeness come naturally to any of us. They are practices that are developed over a lifetime, but that development requires significant effort and attention.
A harsh or abusive response to a chatbot or virtual assistant isn’t going to affect the chatbot, until or unless the bot is programmed to read and react to emotional responses from humans. A person with transient pent-up anger and frustration may feel better being able to vent freely to a machine, and thus to some extent obviate the need to vent anger onto other people.
But should we consider the feelings of the various humans likely to be reviewing the chatbot’s communications? “That’s the dumbest idea I ever heard, you’re just a stupid bot” would usually not affect such human reviewers, assuming that their ordinary boundaries and judgment functions are intact. However, we all know personalities who tend to readily react to others in a harsh or abusive manner (social misfits, angry, miserable, cynical Grinches).
Bad behavior toward inanimate and animate objects should be frowned upon. Our character is defined by the way we treat others regardless of whether they have feelings or can comprehend.
As somebody who used to work on AI, I would not be the least hurt by insults against my product. Software engineers are accustomed to scathing comments, and we try to use them constructively. Cursing can actually hurt only people. That said, a computer can be programmed to respond to abuse just as an insulted person might.
Bad behavior toward chatbots could encourage us to behave worse toward real people. Any action that is used becomes “well practiced” and then may come out more frequently.
I am a generally polite person. We have Google Assistant in our home, and I always thank her (our choice of gender identification) for her help. She is always appreciative!
Demetria Gallegos is an editor for The Wall Street Journal in New York. Email her at demetria.gallegos@wsj.com.
