Kabbalah, Evolution and Intelligent Design

BS"D

Chanukah, 5766 - The Israeli Center, Jerusalem

Lecture 6

Transcript of seminar by Rabbi Yitzchak Ginsburgh Shlita

 

Let's begin. Part of this evening is a continuation, but it's a new topic, there’s a new part, that even though the question of why nature prefers marriage is the unsolved question of biology. But there is a related question which is thought to be partially solved already by Darwin. That's called the theory of sexual selection, and in order to illustrate this theory the texts use one example in nature which is the peacock. So yesterday we had Jim giraffe, today we have Peter Peacock. So this is now going to be our last class, talking about Peter Peacock.

Peter Peacock has a long train, a tail which is called a train, and when it opens up it is very beautiful, it's multicolored, but it's a very disadvantageous mutation. The fact that he has this long train makes it very difficult for him to move around. It makes it more or less impossible for him to fly; because it's so colorful it makes him obvious to his enemies, so it attracts enemies, which is bad. Also to grow it requires a tremendous amount of energy that is lost in the process of his growing his beautiful tail. So it's really, from all points of view it seems to be very disadvantageous and if the whole concept of adaptation and natural selection is for the sake of survival of the fittest, it makes him very unfit for survival. So then the question is asked, so why does he have it? Why did nature choose this particular mutation for Peter Peacock?

So first of all, who is, Peter peacock is a male. That's why we call him Peter, because he's a male. Darwin's second book, which is sometimes even regarded as more important than his first book, Origin of the Species, is about sexual selection. And the premise, it was written about over a decade after he published his first book, and the basic premise is accepted throughout, unquestionably, it's just that there's a secondary question which is not, which he didn't even relate to, or begin to answer that’s what now the debate is, how to answer  the second question. The assumption is that if something you have is very disadvantageous, nature will get rid of it. So if nature doesn't get rid of it, it means that must have some good purpose that we don't know about. So what is the good purpose of Peter Peacock's beautiful tail? So the answer that Darwin gives is that, because it’s very attractive for females; it makes him very handsome, and girls fall in love with him because of his tail. So that's the reason; that overcomes all of the problems, it doesn't matter how many problems he has, how many problems it creates for him. He can hardly survive, he can hardly even move around, but the ikkar in nature is that he's handsome.

This is the general principle and it's accepted universally - that this is the reason. But it's an amazing khap of nature, what's more important? First of all we see that banei is more important than chayei, to put it immediately in the terminology of the Torah.

There are three blessings, three physical blessings that we bless everyone: banei, chayei, mazonei: children, which is marriage; life,- good life and good health, and mazonei which is parnassa, livelihood. And the order, that's the order that Chazal say: banei, chayei, mazonei, implying that the most important of all is banei, that marriage and children come before health. Yet many people confuse that and think that health comes first.

So we see in nature. Again, Darwin already wrote a whole book about it, that banei comes before chayei. So even though it makes it harder for him to survive, but nonetheless the most important thing is marriage and it makes it better for the sake of marriage meaning that it makes it better for the sake of bearing children. Since it's hard for him to get around, probably it’s not so good for mazonei either, for parnassa. So we see that banei takes precedence over both chayei and mezonei. In nature the general rule is called the competition/choice scenario, that the males of most species compete for the females and the females choose the males. It's called competition and choice.

In certain species it's reversed. But that is the general rule of nature. In the human condition it’s a question if that's true or if maybe it’s the opposite, but the general rule of nature is called choice and competition, that males compete and the women choose. Where do we see this? We see this for instance in duels. Remember there were just a 150 years ago, there were duels for women. Mesirius nefesh mamash(!) The very word war, we know that the word war in Hebrew, milchama, comes from the word lechem so it’s explained that wars are either for bread or for women,  which are also the aphorism is halechem asher ochel. That we just read in this last week's parsha [Vayeshev] in the Torah. This is a known fact that wars are either for bread or for women. Meaning that men fight for women, and women sit back and choose the most attractive men. Meaning that if the situation is not so, if it’s the reverse, it’s a little bit not natural. It means that unfortunately in some cases when there's a surplus of girls and not enough boys so the situation can reverse and then the girls are competing for the boys and the boys choose the girls. It means that boy becomes actually passive. First of all, one important point is that we said that the whole evolutionary cycle is a female cycle, because the basis of mutation is choice. It has to do with bechira  chofshit. So we see here that Darwin himself already said that choice is primarily a female attribute. She's the chooser between different possibilities and the men are in competition. Now he goes on to say these very obvious things. He says that competition can be in two ways. Competition can either be fighting, physical fighting. Again in many species they fight, they have duels, they fight. Or it can be much more subtle. That again, like in the case of Peter Peacock it's not through fighting it's through who has the more beautiful tail, the longer tail and the more beautiful tail. That's not fighting, that's just being as handsome as possible.

Okay so, again this is the, this is Darwin's second book, which is all about going through nature, going through all the species that he knew about and seeing how this competition/choice scenario works in nature. So what does the modern, neo-Darwinist have to say about this? He says that what he said is 100% true but he didn't explain the basic thing. Genetic biology says that even preferences are inherited genetic properties, meaning the fact that the girl likes our Peter peacock with a big, beautiful tail, that's a gene in the girl. Where did that gene come from? Why do girls like beautiful tails in the male peacocks? So that's the problem, a perfect example of a problem that is as yet unsolved. The fact that they do, that's a fact of nature that we see, we see it in operation through out nature. But how did that come about? That's a question.

There are two theories for this, two relevant theories. One is called Fisher's Theory and one is called Zahavi's theory. (Zahavi sounds to me like an Israeli. You know Zahavi? ... Fisher also sounds like a Yid.) The more interesting one is Fisher's, that one we're going to spend more time on, but these are the two theories, Fisher's and Zahavi's.

Again, every theory is an example of using one's power of…, purely imaginary,  it's all fantasy, but they try to prove it. Zahavi's theory is called Handicap Theory and Fisher's theory is called Runaway Theory.

So there's runaway and there's handicap. Since Zahavi we're not going to spend so much time. As the Torah usually does, when something's shorter so we get through with that first Zahavi says that if nature allows for some handicap to survive, that means that that the essence of the genes are very, very positive, are very good. Because otherwise nature would not allow that handicap to survive. If there's a population of people without the handicap and there are good gene people and bad gene people so the  girl that’s choosing her mate doesn't know, she has a 50/50 chance of getting a good shidduch or a bad shidduch, it’s all 50/50. But if there is a handicap and the handicap survives, so then she can be sure that his genome, his basic genome, his basic genetic structure is good because otherwise he would go extinct, he would die. This is really a yiddishe khap.

(I imagine that he doesn't realize the fact that he's talking about the Jewish people.)

Sometimes you see a people or an individual with a handicap, but the fact that he's still alive, that means he has the best genes of everybody, and there's something in the girl that she recognizes that. This is also a phenomenon. Sometimes a girl will take a boy that has some handicap. Why would, she could choose a boy that doesn't have a handicap, why does she choose a boy with a handicap? Deep down she recognizes that the handicap itself is an indication that really, basically he has the strongest and the best genes, and it will be inherited to the children without the handicap, or without, or with, but she's choosing him because of his basic genes which are very good genes.

Once more, it's a very simple thought. That sometimes you see somebody that has a problem, but you recognize that the problem itself in a certain way is an indication that somehow he's the, really the best person. Even in Chazal we find that sometimes the greatest Sages had problems, either physical, or different types of problems. As I said before, what I believe, once more, in my imagination, is that Zahavi really got his idea from the Jewish situation, that the Jewish people in Galus, in Exile, have a handicap. But that handicap itself is a proof that they have the best genes so that in short is the handicap theory.

So handicap doesn't mean that you are in any way ugly and in fact, going back to Peter Peacock, so the handicap is that he has this tremendously long and beautiful tail. So even though it's beautiful, but it's a handicap. But it must be indicative of something good because he's still alive, even with his handicap. There are four different handicaps in his long tail. So that's Zahavi's theory, called the Handicap Theory.

But the more interesting theory is Fisher's Theory, which is called the Runaway Theory. It's a six stage theory and we'll see very, very beautifully how the six stages can be seen to correspond in direct order to the six sefirot, from chesed to yesod. It's a process, it’s not like before that we had different hypotheses, different points, and we saw how the different points correspond. This is one ongoing developmental process. Once more, what is the question? The question is, where did the girls' gene come from to like long colorful tails? So before we answer let's say our answer. Again, if you would ask the Kabbalah, what would he say, besides the fact that he looks nice? I would say that he looks nice, but he just doesn't look nice in some other respect. He looks nice, our Peter Peacock, because of his long beautiful tail, colorful tail.

Now in Kabbalah, a colorful tail is a feminine aspect, a feminine symbol, we'll call it. Now if a biologist, if he would also be a psychologist, if he would be a Freudian, so he would know that there are all kinds of sexual symbols. Now actually, Darwin himself, before Freud, said that this long tail of Peter Peacock he called it a secondary sexual character. Because it's not necessary for reproduction but it helps reproduction because it helps choice, it helps mating. Since it helps mating, but it’s not necessary for the act of reproduction, so it’s called a secondary sexual character.

But Freud would say more than that. It's very symbolic, he would say. There's something symbolic in this beautiful long tail. Now symbolism and imagery, that's exactly what Chazal is all about, what Kabbalah is all about.

What would Kabbalah say about Peter Peacock’s tail? It would say that he has a very well developed feminine side. We said before, when males compete, there are two ways of competing. One way of competing is fighting with other males. Another way of competing is just exhibiting something special. That’s the way in general, that’s called, in other contexts in Chazal, that’s called a feminine weapon. So that form of competition is a feminine form of competition and it’s especially symbolic in Peter peacock’s tail, because that’s purely a feminine symbol in Kabbalah. Also colorfulness is something feminine even though in nature, again, biologists won’t say that that’s across the board because they’ll say that in different species it changes. Sometimes the male is the colorful one, sometime the female is the colorful one, but in general Kabbalah will tell you that colorfulness, in general, even beauty in general is a feminine property. Women are beautiful. Why throughout nature are men beautiful? In order to attract women. So again, what is the answer? The answer is in truth that is the manifestation of the feminine side of the male. How is that called, how is that referred to in Kabbalah? That’s called ban d’mah. In the wording of the Kabbalah the male’s called, is called mah, shem mah, and the female is called shem ban, so the female part of the male, that’s called bon d’mah. Now, any mating phenomenon, the Alter Rebbe teaches us that, based on the teachings of the Arizal, that a marriage is (this in itself explains why nature likes marriage), because marriage is through the means of each one of the two sexes revealing his inter-inclusion of the other, that that would never happen in cloning, in asexual reproduction. So this example of competing, of male competition through the means of exhibiting beauty in general, and especially in our case of Peter Peacock, that’s a pure revelation of ban d’mah.

On the other hand we have to say that that gene, that special gene... now the question is, after Darwin, what does that change in the female? So again Kabbalah would say that that gene in the female, that she prefers that, is her mah d’ban. All of nature and life, and especially marriage, is all love, and true love is manifesting something that otherwise would never be manifest, which is a tremendous tikkun, that in the female her male side is revealed and in the male his female side is revealed.

Okay so now after saying this, let’s get into Fisher’s runaway theory.

He says, in order to explain how this can possibly happen - the fact that now there’s such a great handicap. Peter Peacock has a very heavy handicap and nonetheless he doesn’t go extinct, and nonetheless and even more so the women peacocks they prefer him. So it happened like this, again, this is the way he dreamed it up, how it happened. It happened that first, so many millions of years ago, whenever it began, first our original gilgul of Peter Peacock had a mutation, that he had a slightly longer tail than his friends, his companions, a slightly longer tail and a slightly more colorful tail. And for that slightly longer, more colorful tail it was not a disadvantage, it was an advantage. It didn’t stop him from moving; his mobility was not hindered; it didn’t stop him from flying; in a certain way it maybe even made things better. It says, when it just began it was a good, positive, advantageous mutation for him. Once more, we said before biologists want something to be good for the prat in the short term, for the individual in the short term. So it all began by a little bit longer tail that was good for him, and since it was good for him so then there was a mutation in the female that that mutation resulted in the fact that females liked this because it was good. It was good for everybody, in all respects it was good.

So now we call it a mutant female arose that is attracted to our little bit just a small a small, a shortly elongated tail. But then these mutant females began to increase in the species and as they increased so the longer the tail the more they liked it. So the reaction went on that the now another mutant Peter Peacock came up with a slightly longer tail, and it worked like a snowball that there were now more girls that liked these tails so he started to prosper. It went up and up and up this way until it reached a certain peak of maximal efficiency, maximal good. Meaning that the tail was still not so long that it became a disadvantage, it was an advantage and it was and now there were many, many girls, most of the population of girls fell in love with these long tails, these long beautiful tails of Peter Peacock. But then it continued, the cycle ran away, that’s why it’s called runaway.

So if you would draw a graph, the tail went up on the graph until it reached a certain peak but then, due to the runaway, it began to descend, it was no longer advantageous, but there was nothing to do anymore because the girls were already caught genetically, they were genetically caught up with preferring long beautiful tails. So what happened? It started to get, the advantage started to descend, it got worse. At a certain point it can become so bad, that just Peter peacock, even though we said that banei is more important than chyei but it can become so bad that he just dies out, it becomes so disadvantaged.

As soon as that begins to happen, now there’s a crisis, that the girls like the long tail more and more and more, and the longer the better, but, and he also suffers the disadvantage for the sake of being chosen but the runaway can get so bad that he’s on the verge of just falling over and finishing life before he gets married in the first place. What happens at that point? At that point nature brings him back to a certain equilibrium, that his tail’s not going to grow any longer. It still is a disadvantage but the runaway phenomenon stops at a certain point. Otherwise its really going to go extinct, and when it stops that’s called equilibrium. Now this, our example of Peter Peacock is so good because biologists say that this is the state Peter Peacock has now reached in the present day and age. He’s gone through all of the stages and it almost became so bad that he was on the verge of extinction, but it now has come back to equilibrium. Now we have to understand first of all that coming back to equilibrium, which is halting the runaway phenomenon, is not coming back to the maximal length which is still advantageous and also beloved.

Ok now so let’s ourline the six stages in Fisher’s Runaway Theory

stage number one was that there was a mutation that some male had a little bit longer and a little but nicer tail and that was advantageous for him.

Then because of that, a mutant female that just happened by chance, again they talk about just happened randomly, by chance, to like these guys so that became chosen by natural selection because these guys really have an advantage. So stage number 2 is a mutation in the female. Now because there’s a mutation in the female that also is good for everybody so that mutation began to spread so that’s stage number two. Stage number one is the first mutation in the male stage number two is the mutation in the female that she prefers this male.

Stage number three is that the cycle reaches a peak that it’s still good for the male and it’s beloved by the female.

Stage number four is that the graph begins to descend. That the tail becomes too long and too colorful and becomes a big, big burden and disadvantage for the male, for his life, for his survival, but the females don’t pick that up at all they’re still prospering and thinking that the longer and more beautiful tail is still better for their choice.

Stage number five is that it becomes so bad that the male just can’t make it, he’s through. It becomes too burdensome.

Stage number six is that it goes back to a state of equilibrium.

once more the equilibrium is not the same as the maximal peak of the process. Now let’s see if we can write this, our six stages. The six stages correspond to the six sefirot in the most beautiful way and we can learn a lot of mussar and chassidus from this Runaway Theory of Fisher.

chesed	mutant male; longer, more colorful tail advantageous
gevurah	mutant female; begins to prefer longer tails
tiferet	cycle reaches peak; still advantageous to all
netzach	longer tail becomes disadvantageous to male; females continue to prefer longer tails
hod	longer tail becomes destructive to males
yesod	return to equilibrium

Stage number one is something positive that happens in the male which is good for him and its obviously going to be good for him in competing for females, at least in the future its going to be. That good, we said that all good mutations, we said this in our previous session, an initial good mutation, is chesed because that’s what nature is all about that’s what evolution is all about, positive mutations. So it all began with a positive mutation in the male. Now the male, also, relative to the female, is chesed to her gevurah. The mutation in the female to like this, in one of our books we have a concept called thirteen loves that there are 13 types of love, the very word love ahavah equals thirteen, in gematria. The love of man for woman, male for female, husband to wife is chesed, and the love of female to male, wife for her husband, is gevurah, it’s called el ishech tshuchatech. So that mutation that the female begins to love this property in the male, that’s the love of gevurah, ahavah k’aish. Reaching the maximal level of being advantageous plus beautiful plus attractive that’s tiferes, ki tiferet adam lashevet bayit. Once more, tiferet is reaching the maximal point of beauty and being good and being lovely and attractive.

What happens then? The graph begins to descend. And the first descent, already it becomes so big the tail so clumsy that it becomes a disadvantage. Why is that netazach? In all the Chassidic understanding this is the most important point. Both netazch and hod are called dvar m’gufa they are symbolized in the body as two feet that descend out of the body. In one concept, one term for this in Chassidut is blita chitzonit, that both of these sefirot, beginning with netzach, but becoming worse in hod are expressions its called serach ha’odef.

Where do we find this very concept in Torah that the train becomes so long, when women get married, IY”H, everyone should be married soon so you have a long wedding dress, again the tail’s called a train, for Peter peacock it’s the male when a woman gets married it’s the female that has this long [train] its good for her and good for him that she doesn’t wear it after the wedding night cause it’ll be a total disadvantage because she’s going to continuously trip over the train. She just has to make it step by step throughout the celebration but then she can Baruch H’ change her wardrobe and never have to wear that again.

That, whenever something, whenever clothes, a particular type of clothing is too long for the wearer, it becomes a burden, it becomes very, very clumsy, that’s called serach odef, extraneous matter. In fact it says that disease always begins with serach haodef, something extraneous. It’s also, it’s the opposite of tznius. We talked before about isha tznua, something, it’s called sticking out. So at a certain point the maximal, the optimal mutation here, of stage number three, tiferet, becomes serach haodef, but still people, still the society, its now something built into the society that people are attracted to serach haodef. Where do we see that? We see that, we see that like in the movies. A movie star, all kinds… everything in our society, all kinds of blitot chitzoniot, it’s all extraneous matter, it’s all just sticking out, it isn’t necessary, it’s disadvantageous b’emet, in truth, and still people, still spend all their money on the movies and all kinds of blitot chitzoniot. So the beginning of that is netzach. When it reaches the level of hod it becomes hodi nehepach  alaiy lemashchit  Then it becomes self-destructive altogether. At the level of netzach it is not yet totally destructive it’s just become a disadvantage because its extraneous matter and it can give rise to disease. When it gives rise to disease that’s already moving into the hod-mode. Eventually it can be so bad that it’s self-destructive altogether and then nature obviously can not, if it would continue in that direction he would just go out of existence.

So then what happens? It comes back to a state of equilibrium. Or it stops at a certain point. Once more, what we said before, it’s not coming back to the optimal level. Equilibrium is called yesod, foundation means well-founded, which is stable, balanced. So it comes back to a certain balance that it’s not in danger of extinction. The difference between tiferet and yesod, they both lie on the middle axis of the sefirot, is that tiferet tends to the right whereas yesod tends to the left, meaning that the optimal level, the tiferet level, is advantageous. It means that it tends to the right in the terminology of Kabbalah whereas the final equilibrium…once more, scientists say that our present Peter Peacock, in his present gilgul, he has reached the level of yesod, but still as we said before his tail is really cumbersome, it’s really a big disadvantage, but he continues to exist. Why? Because banei overrides chayei, so that also, the final statement, what’s called the chatima, the seal of that truth that banei overrides chayei, is also very matim for the sefirah of yesod because yesod is banei, even though it’s also called tzaddik chai, chai olamin, but primarily and essentially yesod is banei. So the equilibrium comes to a state that its clear that banei overrides chayei, but he lives to reproduce, he lives to be chosen.

Here he’s called a bachur he doesn’t necessarily live to become a zakein, but the word bachur literally means a chosen one. This is also a very deep indication that in the Torah…there’s no ‘bachura’ in the Torah. Nowadays in Modern Hebrew they talk about bachurot, which would imply that the boy chooses the girl- that doesn’t exist, that form doesn’t exist in the Torah, there are only bachurim in the Torah and betulot.

So once more the boy is the chosen one, is the bachur, and if he’s chosen and he reaches the age that he’s a bachur and he gets married and he has children, that’s his tachlis even if he doesn’t become a zaken muflag.

Again that very linguistic phenomenon is a beautiful example, it’s an indication of this principle that the boy is chosen. A bachur is also identified very often in Tanach with a gibor, with a fighter, which also, itself indicates the other side to this, its called sexual selection according to Darwin, that he is basically in competition.

We’ll give another support for this idea. In Parsha Vayeshiv so it begins ‘vayeishev Yakov b’eretz m’gurei aviv b’eretz Cana’an”, and Chazal say that Yakov Avinu tried to sit in serenity, in peace, but Hashem said to him, as Rashi quotes, he said it’s not good enough for tzaddikim that they’re going to have peace in the world to come they want to have peace in this world, kafatz alav rogzo shel Yossef. so what happened? War began between the brothers and that  rogez, that war, that animosity, that anger around Yosef jumped on him, is the idiom of Chazal, and didn’t allow him to sit in peace.

Sitting in peace, once more, is an idiom for the world to come that’s what Chazal say, it’s not enough for you that you’re going to have the world to come you want to have it right now? This world is not the world of sitting in peace. One of the things it says about the world to come is that there’s no longer any sex in the world to come.

That’s a phenomenon of this world and not of the world to come. Yosef is the epitome of rectified, of kedushat habrit. He was the one that stood the trial, the nisayon of ot brit kodesh. But he’s fighting the war of standing that trial. That’s exactly what happened. First he withstood the trial with his brothers, and that also had to do with tikkun habrit, even the problem with his brothers, and then he stood the trial in Egypt with eshet Potiphar and he became Yosef HaTzaddik.

So if that Midrash, that Chazal is read deeply it means that Yosef HaTazaddik, with all of his trials and tribulations, that is like teaching Yaakov what that tachlis of this world is. That your very son, your very beloved son with all of his trials and tribulations that what this world is about you can’t yet aspire to achieve the world to come in this stage.

What does that mean for us? Once more it means that the tachlis in this world is the state of equilibrium. It’s reaching the final sefirah of yesod and in that final sefirah of yesod things are not perfect. This is a very, very deep thought. That even when you here the word equilibrium you think everything is nice and fine, balance, can’t be better than that, but now we see that equilibrium here means that you make it, you’re standing the trials and you make it, especially you make it because banei is chosen over chayei. That’s the secret of banei over chai and over mezonei. Yosef haTzaddik, it says that, chayei, definitely he lived the least, he lived 110 years (halevi if alle men gezoicht), but he lived the least of his brothers because he was a ruler and a ruler has a shorter life. As far as mezonei, so he had the greatest mezonei of anyone, that he provided his family, he provided the whole land of Egypt with mezonei even in the years of famine. He achieved that because he withstood the trial, but his basic trial, his basic inyon was eile toldot Yakov Yosef, that all of the toldot, all the generations and the children of Yakov are through the channel of the soul root of Yosef Hatzaddik that’s his inyan

Alright, so once more this is a very very simple but very nice process of taking a biological theory which is once more a pure imaginative sequence that someone dreamed up and this is apparently a Jew, Fisher, and seeing how very, very nicely it fits in with flow of the sefirot, also at the same time teaching us new chiddushim, especially the chiddush of blitot, the two sefirot of netzach and hod, that are outside the tzniut of the body.

Okay, so now let’s conclude. I’ll read another Midrash.

Maybe before this, I think we’ll have enough time, we’ll say a short word about the evolution of man according to the evolutionaries.

According to the evolutionaries there are four stages in the evolution of man. It all began 2 million years ago, not too long ago. Number one, all the forms of man are called hominids. There are four types of hominids. The first one is Homo Habilis. Then comes Homo Erectus, then comes Homo Neanderthalis, or more simply Neanderthal Man, and then comes Sapiens.

In some way they existed, all of these four types because there are fossil records for all of them so in some realm or in some world they existed so there must be truth that there are these four levels of man. The Homo Habilus, lowest level, the only thing that makes him a man was that he took rocks, or flint stones and a little bit sharpened the stones, and if you would see one of his flint tools you wouldn’t ever know that somebody did something to it. But so he took flint stones, and he made tools. His period of time is called the old, the Stone Age. He was still a little more apelike.

Then came Home Erectus, a different species. He was still, he just made very very simplistic tools. That’s what made him ‘Homo’, manlike, and he was erect, which means that he was upright, a straight posture. Then, now these two guys, Habilis and Erectus, they had very small brains relative to a modern human being so they were really much more like apes than like men. In fact the biologists say that also chimpanzees and other monkeys also use stones, they don’t maybe sharpen the stones, but actually there are cases even of monkeys that do something to twigs or to stones to use them as instruments so it’s not something that’s purely, exclusively human. But, when we reach Neanderthal man, that’s already a tremendous leap, a tremendous quantum leap, because his brain is not only the same size as modern man’s brain, for the most part it’s even a little bit bigger. It’s even a little bit bigger than Homo Sapiens brain. Not only that, the previous two, Habilis and Erectus, so they did not have the flexibility of motion of using their hands and their feet as does modern man. But Neanderthal man is just as flexible, just as gamish, as is modern man. So the two things that would seem to prevent civilization taking on, and man progressing, that maybe physically he’s not so good as modern man or maybe mentally he’s not so good as modern man - Neanderthal man has both advantages to him. He’s physically just as adept. Not only is he just as flexible, but he’s stronger. He has a stronger grip. He doesn’t have an ape grip, but he has a much stronger grip than does modern man. So he has physical advantages, and he also, from his brain, has mental advantages. There’s no reason... he lived, how long did he survive? He was European, by the way, he was a Frenchman and an Italian, he was a very, very deeply ingrained European, Neanderthal Man, he lived for a long time, he lived for 60,000 years. Sixty, our world is 6,000 years old, he lived ten times that amount of time. He lived 60,000 years from 100,000 years ago to 40,000 years ago. So why over those 60,000 years he didn’t do anything, he didn’t accomplish anything? He has the same brain, and the same body, and he didn’t accomplish anything during a period of 60,000 years. Then, what happened to him? Suddenly, he disappears, and genetically, (that’s one of the big problems) Homo Sapien is closer to Homo Erectus than to Neanderthal Man. Not only is there no link between him, and this is one of the great disproofs of the whole theory of evolution, in the evolution of man. That not only is there no link between the two but all of sudden Neanderthal Man just disappeared from the face of the Earth and spontaneously, suddenly appeared modern man.

Now modern man for the first 30,000 years was still in an ice age, it was still very cold, so it was hard to expect him to do too much, but starting from 10,000 years ago when the climate, the climate cooled down, so then there was a tremendous surge in activity.

For the first 30,000 years, he painted caves. There are paintings. Neanderthal Man didn’t paint caves. He didn’t know how to paint caves, but our Modern Man began painting caves and doing other very, very sophisticated things; making musical instruments, simple musical instruments, and things like that. From 10,000 years ago, then began the real surge of what’s called the beginning of civilization, which is building cities, living communally.

Alright, so this in very, very short is the picture of the evolution of man. So once more, this picture is taught in the textbooks. The problems are only brought out very very strongly of course by the Intelligent Design people that are against the evolution, and even use this itself as one of the great proofs that evolution does not work because, again, there are missing links here. Even the normal biologist doesn’t understand why in 60,000 years of Neanderthal Man nothing happened, purely stagnant. Okay, so now let’s give it a very simple model and the simple model is yud-kay-vav-kay, to our four ‘Homos’ here.

The fact that Homo Sapiens and Neanderthal Man have the same brain size means, and also the same body flexibility means that in a certain sense they’re trein reiyin primarily because they have the same brain size. They should have the same capability of using their brains. Only Homo Sapiens are chochmah, it’s all relative of course, Neanderthal Man is Binah.. Homo Erectus is obviously the vav of Hashem’s name, because that’s erectus. Habilis is the final hey. So in the two lower levels, that there’s no brains at all, and again this is a, like a total new khap, then the two lower levels, its hard to even recognize that this is even part of the human race.

Neanderthal Man already appears, you think that he’s human but he doesn’t do anything, he doesn’t progress. On the other hand, he’s very, there’s tremendous similarity between the yud and the first hey, those are mental powers, that’s what man is all about. You can say that man is about his mental powers. What this teaches me is that to be a Homo Sapien, obviously this can then be extended. In our Homo Sapien itself there is a yud-kay-vav-kay, and we have to reach the Jewish people. But just in this crude four stage evolution of, of the human beings, so to be a human being is the creativity of chochmah. Chochmah is koach mah. Mah is Adam.

Once more, Neanderthal Man had a brain but he was not creative. He was very similar to Homo Sapien in every way, but there was one thing that was missing, creativity. Now, chochmah...   Now we’re going to go back to our Midrash that we spoke about before, about Hashem deliberating how to, from where to clone Eve. He said that “I’m not going to create her from the eye,” in the body the eye is wisdom, “because if I create her from the eye she’ll be a sakranit.” She’ll be too curious. Then there are all kinds of other things, but now we’ll try to say in short, sakranut, is the motivation of human progress. The most basic property of Homo Sapiens’ mind, this is even where the creativity comes from, is because he’s curious. Again, this is even written in the books, this is not our chiddush.

In all of Chazal this is the only time that this term for curiosity appears, in this Midrash, sakranut. In modern Hebrew it’s a very common word, sakranut. But in the Sages, in other words you might think that the very concept of sakranut, which is curiosity, is a modern concept, but no, it appears in the sages in this Midrash that we just quoted- ayin sakranit.

So it has its disadvantages, because you’re looking at everything, maybe things you shouldn’t be looking at, but this itself is the motivating power of man, and that’s what Homo Sapiens have over Neanderthal Man. That’s why he begins to do something, to progress. After we get to our Homo sapiens, we said that we have another yud-kay-vav-kay, and then we have another yud-kay-vav-kay in the yud. Hashem b’chochmah, in every yud there’s a whole yud-kay-vav-kay. You reach the Jewish people which is also one level of the yud that a Jew is in a certain way more curious than anybody.

Curiosity is either good or bad. Where do we see that curiosity is really bad? In the primordial sin of Adam, the Zohar says something that its hard to find in the text of the Torah. Now there are all kinds of answers, what was the essence of his sin. One answer is that Adam was so curious about the world that he’s now just been created in this world around him that he looked into the heichalot hatumah. And when he looked into the heichalot of tumah, he was nifgah, he became spiritually injured.

By the way, …that’s the idiom of the verse, that’s curiosity, that’s what the Zohar says.

Without curiosity, nothing would happen. What is science all about? So either its very pragmatic, this it also says, this is a definition now. The definition of real curiosity is that you want to know about things that you don’t have to know about. It’s not going to help you in any immediate way. You’re just curious, for the sake of curiosity. So again, that was the origin of the Fall. But just like that is the origin of the Fall, even the simple thing, the curiosity, what is good and evil, Adam didn’t know what good and evil was so he looked at the good and he looked at the evil. The fall is also the origin of civilization. That is civilization itself.

When man is created it says vayehi lenefesh chayah. Also about the animals it says nefesh chayah, this is the third time it appears, this phrase nefesh chayah. What does Rashi say? The nefesh chayah adds an extra measure of a living soul, and what was that extra measure? Dei’ah v’dibur, an extra measure of knowledge, of understanding, intelligence, and dibur. The beginning of intelligence is this sakranut, of the eye, of chochmah. It’s really wanting to look, it’s like, once more this is a good place to conclude because this is the scientist. The scientist is either Adam HaRishon falling, it says that Adam HaRishon apikores hayah. So he also, he was nifga, he became an apikores. Why? Because of his curiosity, looking at things he shouldn’t look at. He’s not able to cope with, to really cope with. On the other hand, as we said, what happens after the sin? Who began, where did civilization begin? According to Torah it began from the children of Cain, they began building cities. Civilization literally means city building. Who began that? Not just the children of Adam, the children of Cain. A double sin, the sin of Adam and the sin of killing his brother, and he began building cities. That’s where civilization starts. Now, once more, we said it’s very rare this root sakar is rare in Chazal, in the sense of curiosity, but its common in another sense, the same root, which is actually the same thing, but it just appears to be something else. When you view, a whole panorama, its called an liskor. Where is that used in Kabbalah? It’s used in reference to Adam Kadmon. Now we’re going back to the link with Adam Kadmon, now we’re going back to the beginning.

It says that Adam Kadmon sees in one glance, in one moment, all of reality. It’s called kulam niskarim biskirah achat. That same word that means to be able to see a lot at one time, and it’s a word that is used davka, particularly in reference to Adam Kadmon, who as we said is the program of the universe, so when it appears in Adam Tachton, in the lower man, he doesn’t see the whole, he just wants to see it, he would just like to see. Again, this is a beautiful example that the Adam Tachton... edameh la’elyon. He wants to be in the same state as Adam Kadmon. Just as Adam Kadmon sees everything, everything is open for him, kulam niskarim biskirah achat so when that translates itself into Adam Kadmon [Tachton??] that becomes sakranut, he becomes curious about everything.  Curiosity is itself the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil, there’s nothing that has more good and more evil to it, potentially, than curiosity. Together with curiosity, also is linked dibur. In fact we’ll even say that the secret of mankind, the word sod, so we’ll make now an acronym for sod, sod is sakranut v’dibbur, curiosity and communication, that’s what defines Homo Sapien and now they use the term Homo Sapien Sapien, it’s a double Sapien. And for us there’s Homo Sapien Sapien Sapien, which already becomes the Jewish People, and so forth and so on, so the many interinclusions of Homo Sapiens.

In any event what defines the secret of man, aspiring and on the peak of returning to G-d is sakranut and dibbur. Especially dibur that you can use dibur also to speak back to Hashem.

But yesterday we said that Yaakov consulted with his wives. Where do we find G-d consulting with someone in the Torah? We find G-d consulting with Abraham, the first Jew, before He’s about to destroy Sodom and Gemorah. What does he say? Ki yeda’ativ…this is a tremendous support for what we said yesterday that consulting is really always consulting with your wife. When G-d comes to consult with Avrohom Avinu, the first Jew (with Noach G-d doesn’t consult because Noach is a righteous Gentile but he isn’t a Jew so for G-d that’s intermarriage. He can’t marry Noach, , it says that in general a non-Jew is not supposed to find favor in your eyes, you’re not supposed to say how beautiful is that goy. Even if, if he’s an avod avoda zara. But heer we find a proof in the Torah that if he is a righteous Gentile you can, he can find favor, you can like him, but not marry him. That’s called Noach matza chein b’einai Hashem, but he just, there was no conversation between Hashem and Noach. It was all one way communication. He communicated to Noach and He told him what to do and Noach did it, but there was no, no communication back.)

The first one that there was communication was, (communication is a two-way street, it’s not a one-way street, meaning that if communication is just one way then it’s really no different from an animal because we said that animals also you talk to, even in the Chazal you talk to animals. Animals follow your verbal instructions so it means  once more that Noach, a Gentile, even a righteous Gentile, it’s a very high animal level, as biologists will tell you. But a real man is someone that G-d talks to and talks back to G-d, there’s actually a conversation, it’s a marriage. That’s why, in that context, in talking with Abraham, is ki yeda’ativ, the second time that the verb ya’ada is used in the Torah. The first time is haadam yada et Chavah ishto, that Adam knew Eve, and the second time it’s used as a verb v’da’ativ, asher yitzave   I know him because he’s going to command his children. The deep secret is that his children are our common children, that I am marrying him because his children, which is our children, are going to follow the path of Hahsem.

But, yet, he was not successful in this debate with G-d, because he didn’t have total mesirus nefesh.

Who did G-d know afterwards, and was successful, Moses, Moshe Rabbeinu, because he had total mesirus nefesh.

So, once more there’s a lot more to be said but I want to say something about human curiosity and about the relationship between sakronut and dibur, that that’s the secret of the, we’ll call it the secret of the human condition, which is the epitome of the aspiration and the return back to the Creator.

The Torah gives us the channel, our curiosity has to be channeled properly. That’s what the Torah and that’s what this Midrash and every part of the Torah is all about, is how to channel properly our innate curiosity.

We’ll now end with a, sometimes you start with a joke, sometimes you end with a joke. For us this is a very interesting gematria or milta d’bdichuta   … Somebody, he isn’t here right now he was here the last two days, he would have enjoyed this the most but you can tell him. When a wife, again, a person, when someone talks back it’s usually the wife, the husband says something and she says something back, so there are two ways that she says. It’s all loving, she either says, first in English, “yes, my dear”, or, she’s still a loving wife “no, my dear”. It’s all my dear, it’s either yes my dear or no my dear, one of the two. How would we say that in Hebrew? It’s ‘cain yikiri’ or “lo, yikiri”, that’s the, this is an elevation a ha’ala’a from loazit. It’s one of the two. “lo yikiri’, no, my dear, equals Chavah b’ribua, which is 19 squared. Lo yikir, Chava is 19 so 19 squared is a perfected state of Chavah. Lo yokiri, in other words its lo, but lo, no, my dear, that’s a perfected Chavah statement. Ken yikiri equals twenty squared, which is one more.

Once more, these are two successive squares, this a sha hashua for people who are into our different figurative numbers. Lo yikir is 19 squared and cain yikiri is twenty squared. When you put two successive squares together that becomes an inspirational number, its called a mispar hash’rah, and it becomes the inspirational number of twenty. The definition of inspirational twenty is 20 squared plus 19 squared. For instance taryag, 613, is the inspirational number of 18 because its 18 squared plus 17 squared and so forth. Alright, that inspirational number, which is lo yikiri cain yikiri, 20 squared and 19 squared, which is 761 is the last phrase in the Torah. The concluding phrase in the Torah,  equals, its called the inspirational twenty, because it equals 20 squared plus 19 squared. For our purposes, what does Rashi say? What is l’einai kol Yisrael? He broke the Tablets. Yishar kochacha that he broke the genetic code, the Tablets are the genetic code and he broke it. He broke the Tablets. He did it k’einei kol Yisroel.

As we say, he was the first one to successfully say lo yikiri to HaKodesh Baruch Hu. No, my dear, to Hashem. But at the same time deep down, he also said ken yikiri, because he knew what the true will of HaKodesh Baruch Hu is so at the same time simultaneously it’s lo yikiri plus cain yikiri which is   that’s he revealed, he revealed the secret of how to do it. To receive the ability to communicate with G-d, as a wife speaks to her husband, the most natural, candid sense. That’s what Moshe came to teach us and once more the whole Torah that he gave us is the ability to use our imagination properly, to rectify our imagination, and to, also to give, to stimulate, even, our curiosity, so that’s the bottom line of all our trying to unite Torah and Science. Because Torah people that don’t like talking about science its because they think that Torah just limits curiosity, like, don’t be like Adam HaRishon who’s looking into those chambers of impurity. But we’re saying that the Torah, especially now, just before the advent of Moshiach Tzidkainu, endorses and says that now is the time to widen our curiosity and to make the Torah reach and extend and embrace everything. Even in Chassidut, it says that the fact that Adam HaRishon looked into the heichalot hatumah and was nifgah, that that was the sin, that’s because he wasn’t a rebbe. That’s the Chassidic statement. That if he would have been a rebbe, shat nit it wouldn’t have damaged him at all. That’s the chassidishe vort. What’s the proof that Adam HaRishon wasn’t a rebbe? The proof is that he looked into the heichalot hatumah and he was damaged by it. Because if he had been a rebbe, he wouldn’t have been affected by it.

Now our rebbe tells us that each of us has to be a rebbe. One of the signs of being a rebbe is the ability to open up your curiosity to look into everything, l’sheim shamoyim, to return it to its source. Okay, you should have a Happy Chanukah.