Rambam’s Letters (Pt 10) | Rabbi Yitzchak Breitowitz | July 15 2025

Again, the share today is dedicated anonymously for the Rafu Schlayma of Okana Batuma and Eveina Batgalina. Uh may they have a Rafu LMA Israel. Uh so today will probably be our our last session on Eggerman. Then we'll move on to some other uh letters that are very interesting. Uh but in the last portion of Egaritan uh the Rambam deals with the false Messiah. As I say, this was a time of great persecution and as is often the case in Jewish history. At times of great persecution, messianic speculations are very very powerful because people are yearning for some type of hope. And uh throughout history uh we have had false uh mashiach. In fact, there's some excellent books on the history of false messianism in Claiusville. Everyone thinks Shabbait, but you know, we have a long history be well before Shabites, including of course uh Yashka, Jesus himself essentially uh had the claim of a false Moshiach. The idea of divinity of Jesus is a later development in Christianity. It was not the original uh thing. The original claim of of a Yashka was one of being Mashiach, not of being God in any way. But putting that aside, uh the Rambam addresses the idea that many people were gravitating towards somebody in Yemen in Tan who was claiming to be Mashiach. Uh and the Rambam devotes some time to explaining what are the signs that someone is Mashiach and he makes the point that just because he's from because as the Rambam said, I understand how the masses are following this guy because he's offering them hope. But the Rambam says to the rabbi, "But how could you who know the words of our sages, how could you be led astray uh by all of these false teachings?" Uh, and the Rambam of even mocks the person a little, mocks the rabbi a little bit and at least in a gentle way by saying, "Oh, you tell me he's a shay and a share mitzvot." He says, "Is that enough to make you mashiach?" the fact that you keep the mitzvot. It is of course a necessary condition but it is not a sufficient uh condition and the Rambam develops the idea that Mashiach will do many many miracles. He will be a Na'vi that is second only to Mosher Rabenu. Uh all of the nations of the world will be struck with awe and fear at his miraculous abilities. He could just declare to somebody drop dead and the person will drop dead and the Rambam says all of the Malets will see the greatness of the Messiah and they will subjugate themselves. Now that doesn't mean politically necessarily because the messianic vision of Ami Israel is not world domination and conquest. You know, there might still be a United States and an England and and all of these other United Kingdom and all of these other countries, but essentially it's recognizing the spiritual superiority of Msiach. And the Rambam says this uh individual, however fine a person he might be, uh certainly does not qualify uh on that on that level. He lacks the characteristics of Mashiach. And then the Rambam says I do not blame him because he is undoubtedly mentally ill. Uh so nobody can blame him for being crazy. Uh but the Rambam says my advice to you is put him away uh for a while because the problem would be that uh this has again happened historically many many times that if the Yumotam if the ruling authorities think that the Jews are making a messianic pretender uh a king of the Jews to fment revolution to fment revolt uh they will make many harsh gazerots not only against the pretender but against all of the Jewish people. So the Rambam says, "I'm recommending something that's good for you and good for him. Uh, put him away. Keep him out of commission for a while until you can be mafar, until you can explain to the government that this is a crazy guy and we don't endorse anything he says and then you can let him go because there are many mishugas mish mishugas in the world and it's not going to create such a such a tuml." Now the Rambam then has something it's very very interesting because apparently there are two of the letter at this point even in the Arabic original the Rambam goes through several examples in the recent past meaning within the hundred years before the Rambam quite amazing of a bunch of messianic pretenders somebody in France and somebody in Spain and somebody in Morocco and the Rambam actually goes through the different stories and the Rambam says says, "Oh, my own father warned people not to follow an earlier uh false Moshiach." So, it's interesting. There are two here in in the Nusak that we have, which is the more accepted Nusak. The Rambam alludes to these stories in a very very abbreviated way just alludes to these false Moshiachs and he said they were very very injurious to the welfare of the Jewish people. uh in the alternative gears the stories are given in great great great detail with dates and names. So for example in in my edition of Egro Rambam uh the alternative gears is given as a very very long several page footnote as an alternative gear even though it's not in the primary text and there's a big big makus among historians which is the authentic nusak most historians favor the shorter Nus they say the Rambam was not a an elaborate storyteller the Rambam uh was not so interested in detail tales of devian. You know, he said if false mashia are bad, he didn't have to go into names and dates and and specifics. So, as a result, many assume that these were later interpolations that somebody added to the manuscript and they were not part of the Rambam's own text. Uh others uh actually take the position that the Rambam departed from his customary brevity because he needed to emphasize the point about a false mashiach so strongly that he actually went into the types of details that he normally was not that interested interested in. But he mentions four different instances of false mashiach in different countries. I say France, Spain, Morocco, uh I think there were two in Spain, two that were in Spain. And it's interesting that at least one of those cases, this is very odd, uh he refers to the person who was not a false Mashiach, but he was a prophet about a false mashiach. He refers to him in very very respectful ways. He calls him even though he says his father warns people not to listen to him. This this it's a little funny essentially because um at least one of these not again not the false Mashiah per se but the prophets uh the Rambam seems to have had a great deal of respect for even though he said we should not follow what he is teaching. Yeah. that if he just like killed somebody by saying by saying a word or whatever then you would maybe think that is a judge say that because >> yeah I I I will address that. I I will uh come to that in a few minutes. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. Let me just uh adjust my tape here. One second. Yeah. Yeah, I'm sorry. Yeah. Yeah. >> Yeah. Yeah. I'm I'm I'm going to talk about that. That's exactly what I'm going to talk about. Just uh just give me a few minutes. I we'll get to that. Uh so now the Rambam makes another point though that's very very interesting which is not so relevant to Garrett Tman, but it's a very interesting messianic point and I alluded to it I think at the very end of last year. I want to elaborate on it a little bit more and that is uh in the book of Zakaria who was a one of the last Naveim at the beginning of the second temple and in the book of Yeskel who was at the time of the remember Yeskel and Yermo are contemporary Naveim they lived exactly the same time Yermo was in Erit Israel at the time of the Yeescale was part of the first wave of exiles that were exiled to 11 years before the but they are the same time unlike who is more than 100 years earlier yo contemporaries but in the safer zakaria and in the safer we have the great description of a great apocalyptic war against Jerusaleim that becomes that is known as the war of go and mogg now again just to be accurate Go and mog as names as nouns are only mentioned in yeeskell. Zakaria does not mention the words go but most mafam assume as a pashot although nothing is pashot in this area that the apocalyptic wars that is talking about are the same as the war of go and mog that yekel is talking about. Uh but just to be accurate uh when I say for example the war of Gog and Mog is in Zakaria tech technically the phrase go mug does not appear in Zakaria so I have to say these things because if I don't say them I'll I'll get emails that say why didn't you okay so I I got to these are my insurance policies u they don't help that much I still okay but anyway okay so uh both of them describe a notion that the um Olam are going to have a massive assembly assembly against you and there will be some very frightening things that will happen. It says half of the city will be taken captive or killed and the other half will survive uh and there'll be very dangerous times but eventually there will be a great niton against the enemies and uh they will die and it'll actually be six years in which their corpses will be buried and these are the wars of Gog and Mugg and uh who is Goen Mugg now again it's not Gogg versus Mugg actually technically The way describes it, it is the mel of Mog and all we are told is he comes from the north. These are the kingdoms that come from the north against us. And obviously over the 2,000 years or two 2500 years in which we've been dealing with this particular prophecy, there are all sorts of shitos about it. It's very kind of overlaps with the calculation of Mashiach. Each generation tries to see Gog and Mago in their contemporary time in our time. Would it be a Nazi Germany? Could it be the Soviet Union? Could it be the Arab-Israeli issue? Could it be Russia, Ukraine? Many, many, I'm not going to get into it. And the Rambam, by the way, warns us when the Rambam talks about not calculating Mashiach. The Rambam includes not trying to identify the wars of Goen Maga. But the point I want to make is the following. There is one unique that the Rambam says that is really not accepted by most mort understands that the war of Gog and Mog is part of the Mashiach part of the birth pains of Mashiach and it will preede the revelation of Mashiach Mandavic. Certainly if we look at the Holocaust or the Arab-Israeli conflicts or Russia Ukraine, we're following the Mahale that whatever goes, it precedes the revelation of Mashiach and it is identical uh or at least it overlaps with the phrase Mashiach which means birth pains of Mashiach that before Mashiach comes there will be the labor pains. The Rambam has a very unique which you know might be a little disheartening. The Rambam says yeah before Mashiah comes there'll be Mashiach but that's not Goku Mog will be a final struggle that will take place after Mashiach Benavid comes after Mashiach. So then the Rambam has to backtrack a little bit because the Rambam just said right right before this he just said oh Mashiach all the nations will fear Mashiach all the nations will accept Mashiach all the nations will go down to Mashiach. So the Rambam says, well I mean after the war of Gen Mag meaning to say the Rambam actually learns that Gou is a post messianic war right so when people think oh when Mashiach comes that's the end of our problems well not quite there'll still be some mopping up to do even after Mashiach comes now that's a very bigish and again I just want to say that most and even Kazaw Kazo seem not to view it that way. It's hard to know exactly what the Rambam's source is. He must have had some source. But certainly the mainstream view is that I'm not identifying Goumog, but whatever Go Magog is. And of course, by the way, the description of the half half of the city uh gets captured, half survive. I mean, that actually fits the period between 1948 and 1967 where the city was was split. But whatever it is, I'm not again I don't have an interest right now to identify go as the Rambam says we shouldn't identify it. I'm simply interested in noting that the Rambam looks at this as a post-meianic struggle and all of the ideas that the nations will accept Msiah is after the Gog and Mog. While most maforum understand goenog to be pre- messianic and they identify it with the parallel term of kab mashiach the birth painans of of of of mashiach. Now I will say that the Gomorrah and Suka uh has an interesting maybe intermediate view of the positioning of Gog and Mog and it's based on the very mysterious and underdeveloped idea that there's actually two Mashiach that before Mashiach Ben Davidid reveals himself there will be an earlier Messianic figure who is descended from Shvet Ysef specific specifically Ephraim. Uh in fact some in some sources he's called Mashiach Ben Ephraim but Mashiach Ben Yoseph is the more common designation and uh Mashiach ben Yoseph will reveal himself. Again this is based on a Nva and Yzke that talks about the reunification of Yoseph and Yehuda as the leaders of Ami Israel. Mashiach Ben Yoseph comes from Yoseph. Mashiach ben Davided comes from Yehuda and it is said Mashiach Ben Yoseph will be killed in the wars of Gog and Mog. So we'll have a great but coupled with a great tragedy in the book of book of zakaria notes uh it talks about that in the aftermath of the war that is typically identified as goen mog although those words are not used it says there will be a great great great eulogy the women will cry and the men will cry and the children will cry and it seems to be describing having a eulogy amongst the Jewish people and the Gmorian suka discusses why will there be such a eulogy? What is being described here? After all the war of goenog is an so the garra gives two answers f but both answers are very fascinating. Answer number one is this is the hespetate for the death of Mashiach Ben Yoseph who will be killed in the war of Gog and Mog. The Gomorrah gives a second answer which is uh maybe even more fascinating. The second answer is this will be a hespit over the death of the har. Now you might wonder why should the har get such an honorable funeral? But we said when msiach comes the gets killed but we're going to cry over that because we no longer have to struggle. Meaning the interesting point is that the mitzvot that you do without a yates are not as valuable and treasured as the mitzvot you do when you have a that is kazal's teaching agra according to the suffering is the reward quite amazing so when we finally lose the har which is such a blessing in a way that we don't gets pulled at least to the same degree, we're going to miss it a little bit. He says, "I miss the struggle." It's like sometimes, you know, you even see a person struggle to build up a business and then it gets easy. I usually it doesn't, but you know, theoretically it might get easy and just living off the income coming in. But a person might say, you know, I miss the days when we struggled. We had to balance the books over the kitchen table, you know, after uh after supper, you know, and the kids were doing homework in one side and we were balancing the books and paying the bills. Now, at the time, you went through those experiences. Maybe they weren't that pleasant. But in retrospect, you look back and you're saying those were the good years. So, in a sense, right? So, in a way, God never wins, right? I mean, he he gives, you know, he gives us the horara, we complain about it. He takes away the we complain about it. But the thing is uh so so the gor gives two the hespit is either the death of mashiach ben yoseph or the hespid is the death of the zahara. By the way, as a little aside, the Gmorrah uses this PK as the whole origin of the of remember the Mishna in Suka, the fifth peric of Suka describes the great great celebration during sukos called the simas base hasheva, right? that Ansukus unlike the rest of the year when the only libation that was poured on the Msbayak was wine. On sukos, in addition to pouring the wine, they would also pour water. And every morning at the crack of dawn, they would draw the water from the shilak, right? The shilak and pour it on the misbeh. And then after these services of the whole day, starting at night really, they would have great great celebrations that were called base hasha, the joy of the drawing of the water. And I'll say anyone that did not see the did not see joy in his life because it literally was all night. In fact, Rab Yeshua, one of the great Tanayam says, "When we were young, maybe the older people probably did go to sleep, uh, we literally did not really sleep for seven days because we celebrated the entire night and then in the morning it's time for all of the services in the BA mikdash and by the time that finished, it was time for celebration again. Uh, we slept standing up or whatever it would be." Now the Talmud mentions that at the sima the men and the women were separated. This is why there's an area of the of the basikdash that is called the esat nashin. But you have to understand it doesn't really mean it was a woman's section. Actually men were there on the ground level but in the room or the chamber that's called the ezras nashim there was a balcony. Right? And so the whole room was called Ezraat Nashim. But really the part that were for Nashim was a balcony. The women were lala, the men were lamata in order that there shouldn't be what is called kos rush uh mixing frivvality and the like. Now it's interesting there is nothing in the talmud about requiring a makita in d. The only mention of Makita is or you know Ezra Nashim is that in the women's section during the sukus celebration they had separation and the source of that is and that is if even at a funeral where people are somber and serious and unlikely to engage in frivolous behavior there is a requirement of separation. How much more so at a time of great great celebration where people are more Lebedic etc. there ought to be a celebration. So the only kesher the Gomorrah makes is it makes the kesher between the eulogy. Oh yes how do you know that was separated? I I didn't give you the derivation because the puss says uh the women in a separate group and the men in a separate group implying that they were not and then it makes a now so the only that theor makes is from the funeral to the bik it does not make the jump to a banesscent and in fact it's a little bit of a mystery on one hand the notion of a separate women's section in the basicet is a very very old min uh in the oldest shs you can find it and the schuls that didn't have an Ezra nushroom we just it's just assume women didn't go although I'm not sure if you could prove that necessarily and it's also interesting if you look at the old pictures of the kotel from the 19th century uh of course the area was much much smaller but you see men and women doing next to each other there was not necessarily Makita because that wasn't a base kesset kabua but in a b kesset kabua makita is very well established but the sources for it are very obscure there is no source in the garra for a makita between men and women in there's not even a source in the strangely enough you know if you were to ask me where in the does it say that men and women have to be divided in the base kesset that during I would not be able to show you because the source is not there. Nevertheless, it it is very makub in Israel but the sources are obscure and the original source of makita is the leva of mashia. Yeah. Yeah. Well, well, again, uh number one, even though the the the kingdom of the 10 tribes disappeared, uh there were members of all of the tribes that were in AmIrael. So, so there can theoretically be identified people. >> Yeah. Well, truth is, none of us know our tribe. I mean most of us do not know our tribes unless you're ken or ley. Uh but I I don't know. I mean alohani has a role in Mashiach Benovit. Perhaps he also has a role in Mashiach Benose. I don't know. Now I I do want to point out one thing. So according to the Talmud go is before Mashiach Benavid but after the revelation of Mashiach Ben Yoseph. So in a sense we have three different opinions here. One is go and mog is part of the general mashiach and it precedes all messianic revelation. According to the Rambam it is a postmiach struggle. According to the Gmorian suka it is premiach bendavid post mashiach ben yose. Now I want to point out that apparently the Rambam does not accept either premise of the Gummoran Suka although he doesn't address the Gammoran Suka. It's very very notable that when the Rambam describes Mashiach both in Egar Tan and in the the last two of the Mishna Torah the Rambam does not mention at all Mashiach Ben Yoseph. Mashiach ben Yoseph is literally not mentioned by the Rambam anywhere. The safe assumption is that he did not necessarily consider this to be a fundamental principle of Judaism and maybe yes, maybe not. I mean, who knows? Uh Mashiach the Rambam says is it is the 12th fundamental principle of faith. Hamashiach but Mashiach apparently the Rambam did not consider a necessary part of the messianic process just as the Rambam in no nowhere mentions the notion of 6,000 years right everybody everybody knows that Mashiach has to come by the year 6000 and Bashem we're already 5785 so we're close and the anal analogy would be just as there were six days of creation followed by Shabas so too there will be six uh millennia of followed by Yamote Mashiach that is Yom Shakulo Shabas and based on that idea we are in we are late Friday afternoon and you could be Makab Shabas early so Mashiach could come and this is a well-known teaching that everybody knows right everybody's heard this and of course let me add if you put in a speculation of Rav Schwab that he recanted but he recanted I don't think he really recanted he recanted because he got a lot of flack Rav Schwab had a very famous argument if you remember I'm digressing a little bit one of the most difficult problems in Jewish chronology is what is called the missing uh 163 I don't It's a little over 160 years. What's the problem? Because we uh we believe that the first temple was destroyed and 70 years later the second bas was rebuilt and that's 420 years later it was destroyed. So from bias reish toben bay sheni is 490 years. And this is actually based on an interpretation in safer dono that talks about 70 weeks will pass. A week means seven years. 70 weeks is 490. Now there is a huge problem. Forgive the digression. Uh trying to match that with secular history based on Heroditus for the following reason. The standard date that is given for the destruction of the first temple is 586 BCE. The standard date that is given for the destruction of the second basikdash is 70 CE. So 586 plus 70 uh basically gives you like over 600 years between the bay and to the bay sheni and yet according to kazal you only have 490 years so you I didn't I didn't prepare the math and I always forget exact numbers but there is a little bit more than 160ear discrepancy. how you answer this. Rabbi Barl Wine writes in his book on Jewish history. He alludes to the question and he says he's not going to answer it. Books have been written to try to reconcile this. Some say kazal are wrong. Some say secular history is wrong. Some have tried to coordinate it. Rav Shiman Schwab many years ago had a very daring thesis that he later withdrew but it's you know it's still in the books and that is he basically said Khazal deliberately concealed 160 years of Jewish crediology for various reasons and therefore this year is not really this year is 160 years further whatever that's going to going to be. Again, he later withdrew it because obviously people criticized him because uh if if whatever reason Khazal concealed a certain number of years, you have a problem about Shmita observance. Yeah. That that throws off a lot of different different things. Okay. Uh be it as it may, uh says we're much closer to Mashiach than we think. But the point I want to make is to shame that the Rambam does not bring Mashiach ben Yoseph. The Rambam does not bring anywhere that the 6,000 years is a is an end point. He considers that to be aish an attempt to calculate the end of days. And he says we have no idea when that would be. He means according to the Ra it might be 10,000 years from now. We hope every day but according to the Rambam it's not a dracotta which means basically this is consistent with the Rambam's point that he never wants us to be too specific about the details of messianic revelation. Uh he warns us not to calculate dates. Uh he does not bring in Mashiach Ben Yoseph. He does not bring in the 6,000 years. Uh he considers those to be individual opinions. So the idea that the what is being described in the Navi Zakaria is the eulogy of Mashiach Bose the Rambam does not accept. Now I also want to add that I think theologically and philosophically the Rambam does not accept the second premise of the Gomorrah. Right? What is the second premise of the Gomorrah? It's more of a the theological issue that we will be mourning the demise of the Yates Harah. But that's the second answer of the Gomorrah. And uh why will we mourn the demise of the Yates? Because we will no longer have the privilege of doing mitzvos with struggle and doing mitzvah without struggle doesn't count as much. I mean that's the premise of the Talmud. So I would suggest that I believe that the Rambam would not accept that premise philosophically because the Rambam raises a fascinating question and that is it is a very good question. What is the purpose of Mashiach? Like who needs Mashiach? Because here's the problem. The Rambamita is that when a person dies after they get whatever they need, the reward for their commandments is the reward of the soul in Habah. Now, Mashiach is not aba mashiach is in this world. In fact, the Rambam writes very specifically, olam, even when Mashiach comes, life is going to be normal. You're going to have to go to work, wait for the buses. So, like who needs it exactly? Me meaning what would we be missing if we live our lives and then eventually we die and we have the eternal reward with God. Why do you need this world to kind of become a better world? So the Rambam's answer is quite surprising. The Rambam's answer is it is a of God to give us a world where doing mitzvot is easier and easier and easier and in that way we will get more olabah than we otherwise would get. In other words, according to the Rambam, the purpose of the messianic era is to increase olhabah. Now, isn't that exactly the opposite of what the Gummoran suk is saying? The goran suk is saying, "Hey, wait, once mashia comes, it's not really going to help your mahaba that much because you're doing mitzvah without struggle." So the point I'm making is that I think the Rambam would disagree with both answers of the Gomorrah regarding the the husband. Um one other thing about Mashiah Yoseph, you know there is a again a very controversial little book called Cohat. Kol means the voice to is with a tough the voice of the turtle dove. And this is based on a puzzim hat nishma right in the in the naturalistic passion of Shirim we hear the couping of the doves in our land and darian that's a reference to the coming of Msiach etc. So there was a little contress uh that had been published ascribed to a rabbi Rabbi Hillel of Shiklav who was a disciple or a disciple of a disciple of the vilong in which he records cababalistically the vilagon's teachings about mashiach go and mo and veritra. So it's not the actual words of the vil nagon it's Rafilov writing it down. Now this book book is around you know I would say 30 40 pages was in manuscript for over over 200 years and it was was it was well known though it was widely known among the rabanim in Lithuania kola but it was not made accessible to the public. In recent years it has been published uh but to this day not completely and is a very controversial book surprising because there are many many things in the book. Number one it's hard to read it's cababalistic but but its bottom line is very practical and uh it is controversial. Uh number one, the vil nagon talks about the idea of the physical and material rebuilding of erat Israel must be part of the messianic process. Now he doesn't necessarily talk about statehood. He does not talk about statethood explicitly. But he does say one has to understand that the Mashiach comes into the world by the yearning that the Jewish people have for Erit Israel. And the yearning for Eritrell includes not only the yeshivos and the kolin and the benot but it includes the factories, the fields, the businesses, the physical building of the infrastructure of the land is part of what brings Msiah. Meaning one does not say as some might say we'll wait for Mashiach to come and then we'll come. rather you bring Mashiach by your physical building of the land and in fact it's well known that many of the uh first shikunotes outside of the old city whether it's Nakalat Shiva Maya Sharim by the way Mayarim used to be called the uh the Paris of of the Middle East it's hard to understand I'm telling you the truth at one point it was kind of like a luxury a luxury place uh but whatever it would be uh Yamin Moshe the those early neighborhoods outside of the old city walls were built by Talidum of the Vil Nagon who came to Erit Israel. They were part of what was called the Hayashan the pre Zionist Zionists and they were very very mockbbit that these greatim did the physical work. They laid the bricks they put in the heating systems whatever it would be because they felt that this was holy work. this was kadosh work and it shouldn't be given to Arabs or whatever it would be. Uh we want to lay down the bricks. We want to dig the ditches and this is very consistent with the cohat. Now the second point that's made in kolator is a very interesting observation about mashiach and yoseph. The vagon says that the messianic revelations can take different directions. There are different tracks that are taken and the notion of a mashiach ben Yoseph getting killed is only one specific scenario that plays out if we're not za. But there's an alternative scenario he says in which Mashiach ben Yoseph is not even seen as a person but it's seen as a movement just as we find in Mitzim that Yoseph created the economic infrastructure by the distribution of grain that allowed his brethren to survive as well as the rest of Egypt. And then Yehuda came and established the yeshivot. Mashiach Ben Yoseph whether it's a person or a movement creates the physical infrastructure which will then allow Mashiach Ben to do the spiritual work and therefore well well let me put it this way. I mean the GR was writing before the hersel the GR was writing before modern Zionist Zionism took over. But people see in the GR's work kind of an endorsement of some of the objectives of Zionism and could even see Zionism as some type of revelation of Mashiach Ben Yoseph in that way which means it doesn't have to be a person it could be a movement and indeed I mentioned last week some people thought Herzel was Mashiach Benavid but other people said Herzel's Mashia Benos there was such such an idea and maybe being killed in a war might refer to Herzel's very early death because of the stresses right now there's all sorts of allegorical interpretations. Now you can understand why this became very controversial in the yeshiva world because they absolutely rejected the notion that somehow Dil Nagon was endorsing uh Zionism in some some way >> endorsing work that's even worse. That's where they say u okay I can make a joke here but I will I will not. Okay. Um the so the thing is that that's why people pull out their old wild card that they always use and that is it is a forgery etc. meaning it's it was forged by the mascul in the 19th century and that's why we didn't see it until then and uh it was an attempt to put into the vilon sashkafa all of these false erroneous beliefs but freeder the who was rest assured very very very themed muk of rabler carefully examined the manuscripts of kur and however you interpret the book that's always a question. He said it is unquestionably authentic. So whatever it says is an authentic teaching. Uh he rejected the notion that it's a forgery. Now there's something else in Kolar which has nothing to do with the overall thesis which is also very controversial. The vil nagon talked about the importance of knowing secular wisdoms and he says for every measure of secular wisdom that you don't know you are 10 times more deficient in your knowledge of the Torah. A person who wants to know the Torah must be conversant in particular with sciences, mathematics and the like. uh because one cannot be a true to without mastery of these as you would assume that too has drawn a lot of controversy and it is said that certainly the villagon didn't say that on the other hand the case is very weak to say that he didn't say that because we know from other sources that the gr was very very conversant in these secular wisdoms and in fact we know this he commissioned one of isim to translate the um geometry of Uklit into Hebrew. Uh and we have we have that that translation. Uh so there there now again this this does not mean go to college. Universities pose different issues. I I'm not going to address those issues now. But the notion of knowing is a very very important thing. Yes. >> Where was uh the book Khhatur? Well, you if you Google it, you'll actually you could actually get you can actually even get it in English, although the English translation is absolutely awful. Uh, so I can you can Google an English translation, but I can assure you the book will not make much sense to you. Uh, but Google it and you can at least see summaries of what the book is. So, this is a very, very fascinating book. But, as I say, this is not the Kun that the Rambam is going in. The Rambam does not mention Mashiach Ben Yosesef. The Rambam does not mention 6,000 years. And the Rambam's opinion of Goen Mog is that it is a post messianic uh struggle which is really unique among the Maporim. And again, it's hard for us to recognize that after Mashiach Benavid reveals himself, there are going to be struggles on uh now again who knows I mean other commentaries uh do not go with that. Mahalik. So I can't I can't tell you what the is. We're going to have to wait and see. But uh hopefully the wait will be very very short. Okay, I think it's we finished now. Okay, have a good week everybody. Good to see you. Take care.