ספר שמות

The Talmud in Shabbat 63 interprets the words of ‎Solomon, speaking of the Torah in Proverbs 3,16 by describing it ‎as follows: ‎ארך ימים בימינה בשמאלה עשר וכבוד‎, “lengthy days is her ‎right hand; in her left hand riches and honour,“ anyone reading ‎this forms the impression that Solomon assures people keeping ‎the Torah of worldly rewards, and at least when the reward hoped ‎for is material, i.e. worldly riches etc., it is considered as belonging ‎to the left side of the emanations, i.e. is a negative. This would ‎contradict our statement that even though one keeps the ‎Sabbath for such reasons, it is a positive accomplishment, though ‎of a lower order, i.e. is not the kind of service that the Creator ‎would prefer from His creatures, and that optimally, G’d prefers ‎for His creatures not to serve Him for physical material rewards. ‎Some righteous people completely eschew any recognition of ‎their service to G’d as long as they have attained a more profound ‎understanding of the essence of G’d while on this earth. Some go ‎so far as to renounce the claim to a “name” in the world to come ‎so as not to appear as looking for personal recognition of their ‎accomplishments. This is what the Talmud in B’rachot 64 ‎and in Moed Katan 29 had in mind when it stated that the ‎Torah scholars have no “rest”, ‎מנוחה‎, either in this world or in the ‎world to come, but they keep progressing spiritually from one ‎level to another. [“Rest” in this context is clearly ‎considered as a negative, instead of as a positive quality as in ‎connection with the Sabbath rest. Ed.] According to the ‎way our author understands the prayer quoted, the repeated ‎insistence that in all sections of the universe there is no One that ‎has a name bar the Creator, reflects his view that the perfect ‎‎tzaddik feels that being singled out (by a name) would ‎detract from his selfless service of the Lord. When the author ‎refers to the world to come in that prayer, he means that he does ‎not desire “to rest on his laurels,” even after he (his soul) has ‎been admitted to the celestial regions. The author of that prayer ‎continues by stating that even if one serves G’d with the objective ‎of experiencing the arrival of the messiah and the additional ‎insights we will all be granted concerning the nature of G’d at ‎that time, this too is not the ultimate optimal kind of service of ‎the Lord. ‎[I must confess that I have difficulty in understanding ‎the above prayer as anything but having G’d as its subject, not ‎the author himself or his yearnings for a ‎דבקות ה'‏‎ at the expense ‎of any individuality of his personality. Surely, G’d does not wish ‎to be worshipped anonymously, but wishes to point out to us ‎lesser mortals how great men such as Avraham, Yitzchok, ‎Yaakov, etc, whose names matter, can serve as models for us. ‎Ed.]‎‎