This is Your Mind on Lulav: The Psychoactive Properties of the Four Species (Part 2) - Ralbag

In this article we examine the effects of mescaline, as reported by Aldous Huxley and Michael Pollan, with the purpose of mitzvas lulav as explained by Ralbag. Special thanks to my paid subscribers!

The Torah content from now through Isru Chag has been sponsored by Dani Kuznicki, to honor the memory of his mother, Zisel Gittel bas Moshe (a"h), who appreciated the beauty, clarity, and inspiration of Rabbi Schneeweiss's shiurim. Tizku l'mitzvos and Chag Sameach!

A link to a printer-friendly version of this article can be found at the very end, for paid subscribers only.

Artwork: Dall-E’s response to the prompt, “impressionist painting of a lulav and etrog in psychedelic colors.” I believe this was made using Dall-E 2.0, or whatever version was available a year ago, when I started writing this article, but I decided to use it anyway for consistency.

Note: In case it isn’t obvious, Part 2 should be read after Part 1. My original plan was to write Part 2 about the Rambam’s approach, Part 3 about the Sefer ha’Chinuch, and Part 4 about the Ralbag. However, I decided to skip straight to the Ralbag, whose interpretation is the most radical—and, in my opinion, the most interesting. Since I write explicitly about the use of a Schedule I substance (by others, not me!), I’ve chosen to keep the juicy part of this post behind a paywall.

This is Your Mind on Lulav: The Psychoactive Properties of the Four Species (Part 2) - Ralbag

Ralbag’s Aristotelian Take on the Arbaah Minim

In this article, we’ll explore Ralbag’s characteristically Aristotelian explanation of the arbaah minim. At the very end of his commentary on Parashas Emor (Vayikra 24), Ralbag writes:

The esrog was chosen for its beauty, its sweetness, and because it can be found on the tree during this season. Additionally, [it was chosen] because it is composed of three distinct substances, whose differences are clearly perceived by the senses: the peel, the flesh, and the sour core. These differences point to the existence of tzurah (“form” or “formal cause”), since tzurah is the unifying cause of these disparate elements. For this same reason, the Torah grouped together different types of leaves, which vary significantly: the leaves of the lulav (date palm) are very different from those of other plants; the leaves of the hadas (myrtle) and the aravah (brook willow) differ only slightly from each other, as the leaves of the hadas have a pleasant aroma while the leaves of the aravah have no aroma at all. If tzurah did not exist—as some of the ancients believed—all composite entities would have identical and inseparable parts; there would be no difference between the parts of the fruit, nor between one plant and another, nor between the leaves of one plant and the leaves of another. We have already taught that the Torah’s objective in many of its mitzvos is to establish the truth of this concept (i.e., the reality of tzurah), due to the immense benefit it provides, for if we did not believe in tzurah, the Torah would collapse, and there would be no chochmah (wisdom) at all, as we have previously explained.

If you read this and thought, “Huh?” you’re not alone! Several concepts need unpacking to understand Ralbag’s innovative approach to mitzvas lulav, starting with the idea of tzurah.

Leon Kass: on Form

The Aristotelian concepts of form and material are foreign to most of us today. One of the clearest explanations I’ve found is in The Hungry Soul (pp. 35-36), by Leon Kass, with my emphasis in bold and the author’s in italics:

Every tangible object or being, whether of natural origin or made by human beings, both is something and is made-out-of something. Provisionally let us call the latter its "material" and the former its "form." Form and material are, in the first instance, relative and correlative terms: Form is the something made of certain materials; materials are, as materials, materials of and for the thing as formed. In fact to be material means to be potential, to be able to receive a certain form or forms, to be capable-of-being-worked-on by some process or operation that would trans-form it – that is, form it into that something whose material it then becomes. Wood is, by itself, just wood; marble is marble; cholesterol is cholesterol. But marble becomes also material for Michelangelo only because and when its capacity to be the marble David or Moses is realized through the workings of the sculptor's hand. And cholesterol becomes material for a cholesterol-requiring organism when its capacity to interact intimately with other membrane materials is realized as it is incorporated by the organism as a component of its living cell membrane. Without ceasing altogether to be or to manifest properties of marble or cholesterol, these "things" are transformed and altered by their subordination to the activity of "information." The materials, though following their own nature, are at the same time constrained by their new arrangements, which constitute a nature of a higher order.

Form and material are interdependent not only in definition but usually also in fact; though distinct as ideas and separable in speech, they are, especially in living things, grown-together in the enmattered form or the informed matter that is the given thing; the dog and its flesh, the oak and its roots, no less than the desk and its wood, are as inseparable, related and mutually interdependent as the concave and the convex. The relativity and interdependence of material and form persist also at multiple levels of organization: the oak wood that is material for the table itself is a special form, say, of xylem and phloem, which are in turn special formations of cells, which are special formations of carbohydrates, lipids, and proteins, and so on and on. At the "lowest level" some least or ultimate material would be reached (if any such there be) that could not be analyzed further into its form and material (and whose parts, if it had parts, would be homogeneous with the whole). Such an ultimate "material" would be more than material relative to some other form; it would be matter …

If material is material relative to a form, what then is a form? Form is often connected with shape and figure. But when we think of form with regard to living beings, we mean more than shape or figure, and more than an aggregate of corporeal parts. A pile of rocks has shape but not form; it is a heap, not a whole. Form is what makes a being a unity and a whole, in the world and through time. Form is that order or ordering that makes a one of the many components, giving it an integrity the components by themselves do not have. It is, I confess, extremely difficult to say just what this unifier is (if it is a distinct "what"). It cannot be the outside surface or skin; although the boundary defines the limits of the organism against everything it is not, it does not define what it is. The boundary is not the cause of unity but rather one of its manifestations. We begin to suspect that form is not primarily something visible or tangible—in short, that there is, in this sense, some immaterial "thing" that unites and informs the absolutely corporealized organism—but what it is we cannot define. Yet we may continue to discern its meaning and its work.

In short, “form” or “formal cause” refers to the structure or design of a thing—that which it is, or that which gives it unity—while “material” or “material cause” refers to what the thing is made of.

This is an appropriate place to mention that Aristotle spoke of two other causes: the “efficient cause,” or agent of change, and the “final cause,” or purpose. Thus, the four causes are: material (what it’s made of), formal (what it’s made into), efficient (what makes it into that thing), and final (what it’s made for). For example, in a shoe, the material cause is the leather, the formal cause is its shoeness (expressed in its shape), the efficient cause is the shoemaker, and the final cause is to provide comfort and protection for the feet.

When the Ralbag said that one of the Torah’s primary goals is to instill belief in the reality of form, he really meant it. He prefaces his commentary on Parashas Bereishis by stating that this is why the Torah begins as it does:

It is clearly evident to anyone who has surveyed the views of the people living in the time of Moshe Rabbeinu (peace be upon him) that philosophy was extremely deficient in those days. Most people did not acknowledge the existence of anything beyond what they could physically sense. They were completely unaware of the concept of the formal cause. Instead, they thought that all material substances existed exactly as they appeared. Some thought that the differences between things were solely in the arrangement, shape, or number of parts … The majority of people in that era shared a common belief that there was no efficient cause behind anything. They claimed that everything came into existence purely by chance, without any efficient cause …

Given this situation, and because the Torah’s purpose is to bring those who practice it to true perfection—as I mentioned in the introduction—it was proper for the Torah to first establish the fundamental truth that an efficient cause exists for all things, and to demonstrate the reality of the formal cause, for without this foundation, it would be impossible to acquire any perfection of the soul, as is clear to anyone who has studied the natural sciences.

For Ralbag, perfection of the soul lies in comprehending chochmas ha’Borei (the wisdom of the Creator)—i.e., the forms—manifested in creation. By definition, chochmah cannot exist without form, which is why the Torah begins with its account of the Creation: to demonstrate that the universe is melachah (craft), formed by a Craftsman. And to the extent we understand the efficient causes within the natural world, which is the chief aim of modern science, our recognition of chochmas ha’Borei will be even more enhanced.

At this point, I could elaborate on Ralbag’s explanation of the arbaah minim, but if that were my only goal, I wouldn’t have titled this series the way I did. So, let’s set aside the Ralbag for a moment and talk about mescaline.