translated and annotated by R. Simcha Coffer
The following is a letter written by HaRav Shlomo Miller, the
rosh kollel and av beis din of the Kollel
Avreichim of Toronto. The letter was written in loshon
hakodesh. Accordingly, its colloquial form has been
maintained wherever possible in an attempt to preserve its
original flavor.
The additions found in this paper between square brackets
and in italics are entirely those of the annotator and are
not to be imputed to the author of this letter. Please note
that in order for this letter to meet the space limitations
of Yated, more extensive explanatory material had to
be eliminated. For the original version of this letter with
expanded notations, please contact the Yated at:
editor(at)shemayisrael-dot-com.
Protest Against the Opinions of Slifkin
As is well-known, the books authored by Slifkin have already
been banned by the gedolei Yisroel. When I initially
came in contact with his writings, I sensed an aura of heresy
emanating from them. Indeed, upon further investigation I
discovered that his opinions on the Six Days of Creation are
definitely heretical. Furthermore, they are boorish in
content; he fails to comprehend that all of the laws of
physics which prevail today were first established at the end
of the Six Days of Creation when Hashem terminated the
creative process as represented by Shabbos when, "He said to
His world, enough" (Chagigah 12a).
In reality, the laws of physics which existed during the Six
Days of Creation have no parallel to those which we perceive
today. Our Sages have already stated, "two arose on the bed
and four descended" meaning that the birth of Kayin and Hevel
happened immediately after their conception on the Sixth Day
of Creation (Sanhedrin 38b). Thus, Slifkin's opinions
in these matters are absolute heresy.
[In other words, Creation is not a process that finds
expression in current laws of physics and thus cannot be
defined by it. During the Sheishes Yemei Bereishis,
the laws of physics were entirely different from those that
prevail today. This is self-evident from the Torah and can be
gleaned from Chazal. Furthermore, this has been the
collective mesorah of all Jews throughout the ages and
in fact was uncontested even by gentiles. When a Jew makes
kiddush on Friday night, he is specifically
proclaiming the truth of this idea and rejecting that of
Slifkin's approach. Since Chazal have portrayed the
Sheishes Yemei Bereishis in terms of accelerated
processes that have no parallel in our experience, there is
no room to interpret Maaseh Bereishis in terms of what
may look to us like millions of years of biological
development. Anyone doing so is undermining the Torah and
Chazal and is therefore espousing kefirah. Cf. Rambam
Hilchos Teshuvoh 3:8.]
The truth is that he has followed the ways of those who scoff
at the Sages, like the maskilim who ridiculed the
exegeses (droshos) of our Sages while considering
themselves all-knowing, assuming that only they were able to
understand the precise meaning of words in loshon
hakodesh, until the Malbim ztvk"l appeared and
composed an incredible work on Toras Cohanim to
clarify the words of our Sages, based on the deepest, most
fundamental imperatives of loshon hakodesh, thereby
demonstrating the wonders of Hashem's Torah and the profound
grasp of biblical grammar which our Sages possessed.
So too in our time, Slifkin advances questions against our
Sages from current theories and in place of honoring the
words of our Sages, he denigrates their opinions. If he
encounters a question for which he possesses no answer, it
would behoove him to say, "I have not merited to understand
the words of the Sages" — just as all of our great
scholars have done through the ages whenever they encountered
a question on a subject in Talmud. "For it is not a thing
that is lacking, from you" (Devorim 32:47) and our
Sages comment, "For if it is lacking, it is from you" (Cf.
Rashi ad loc) who lack the ability to comprehend. If
we approach the Torah and its Sages with awe and humility,
then we will traverse confidently and not stumble in the
fundamentals of our religion as Slifkin has done; the
Rambam's words at the end of the laws of me'ilah
(Hilchos Me'ilah 8:8) are well known: "One's
thought processes in Torah should not be the same as his
thoughts in mundane matters," see there the remainder of his
pleasant words.
Words of Encouragement and Support for those who were
influenced by Heresy
The Haggadah delineates the question of the
rosho: "Of what purpose is this work to you?"
(Shemos 12:26) "It is because of this that Hashem did
for me when I went out of Egypt" (Shemos 13:8).
And the author of the Haggadah comments, "For
me, but not for him — had he been there,
he would not have been redeemed." The commentaries note that
the answer given in the Torah is, "and you shall say it is a
Passover offering to Hashem" (Shemos 12:27) which
differs from the answer in the Haggadah. The
commentaries explain that when one hears words of heresy, he
should not contend with them. However to himself, he should
respond with words of encouragement, "and you shall say"
(Ibid.) but, "not to him" (the baal
haHaggada's comment), "it is a Passover offering
etc." (Shemos 12:27)
Therefore, I have decided to expound upon some matters in
order to strengthen the hearts of those who have been exposed
to heretical doctrines which claim that our holy Torah is
contradicted by the knowledge of scientists. On the contrary,
"delve into it, and delve into it, for all is encompassed
within it" (Ovos 5:22).
[There are obviously some differences in
weltanschauung between certain groups in Orthodox
Jewry. Rabbi Miller is aware of this. He is also aware that
unfortunately there are certain elements that will spare no
effort to malign Orthodox leadership in an attempt to
undermine their words. Just as the teachings of the
Haggadah are meant for us but are not directed towards
the wicked, due to their unwillingness to acknowledge them,
so too, the comments in the letter are directed only towards
people who are open-minded and are willing to listen, as
opposed to those who choose to maintain preconceived notions.
Those in the latter group invariably fall prey to spurious
depictions of Orthodox dogma effectively eliminating their
partiality and thus their ability to countenance the
pronouncements made by gedolei Yisroel.]
*
Until 400 years ago, scientists were not aware that the light
which appears to radiate from planets is not inherent light
but rather light reflected from the Sun. Then Galileo
appeared and demonstrated that the light emanating from the
"shining" planet Venus is merely reflected light. However, to
my mind, this observation can already be gleaned from our
Sages who referred to this planet by the term "nogah"
(Shabbos 156). The word "nogah" (shining) differs
from the word "ohr" (light) as the Malbim has
explained in his commentary on the verse in Chavakuk
3:4, "and nogah will be similar to ohr."
The Malbim writes that nogah is a term that denotes an
object that does not possess inherent light but rather emits
a reflected light just as the moon [and other planets such
as Venus] receives the light of the sun and subsequently
reflects its rays.
Thus, the fact that our Sages have assigned the term
"nogah" to the planet Venus demonstrates that they
understood that this planet did not possess inherent light.
If so, we see that knowledge discovered by scientists 400
years ago was already known to our sages over 2000 years
ago.
[See the commentary of the Gra in Aderes Eliyahu on
the verse in Chavakuk 3:4 who interprets the
posuk in the same manner. Malbim himself brings
several proofs from all over Tanach to demonstrate the
grammatical accuracy of this point.]
Regarding the essence of light, scientists first thought that
light was composed of particles i.e. the Corpuscular Theory
of Light. Later, they showed that light was emitted in waves
i.e. the Wave Theory of Light. A hundred years ago,
scientists demonstrated that light does possess particle-
like qualities [In 1905, Albert Einstein provided a
remarkable explanation of the photoelectric effect, a
hitherto troubling experiment which the wave theory of light
seemed incapable of explaining. He did so by postulating
photons, quanta of light energy with particulate
qualities.] and subsequently scientists proposed the
Quantum Theory that sometimes light appears as waves and
sometimes as particles.
[This is referred to as the Wave-Particle duality. The
modern, theoretical resolution to of the wave-particle
paradox is described by the theoretical framework of quantum
mechanics.]
Now behold, the Yad Halevi, written by the av beis
din of Wurtzberg, has written that the word "ohr"
has its roots in the word "yoroh" (to fling) and
denotes the flinging of light particles. There is another
word which denotes light "naharoh" (see Iyov 3:3:
"ve'al tofa olov nehoroh"). To my mind, this word has its
roots in the word "nahar" (river) which signifies the
concept of waves. If so, these two grammatical
representations of the word "ohr" represent the two
differing forms of the phenomenon of light respectively.
The Gra's words in Aderes Eliyahu (Bereishis s.v.
Boro) are also noteworthy and are brought down in his
name in the book Gevi'i Gevia Hakesef [written by
HaRav Binyomin Rivlin] as follows: Darkness is not an
absence of light but rather a creation unto itself as it
states "who forms light and creates darkness" (Yeshayohu
45:7).
[In addition, there are other pesukim which
indicate that choshech is a positive creation such as
"eiy zeh haderech yishkon ohr vechoshech eiy zeh mekomo"
(Iyov 38:19) or "yoda mah bechashocho unehoro imei
sharyo" (Daniel 2:22). For a kabbalistic view of these two
pesukim, please see the opening ma'amar of
Maseches Atzilus — Ya'areshyah ben Yoseph posach
and the peirush Ginzei Meromim by R' Yitzchok
Isaac Chover, a talmid of R' Menachem Mendel of Shklov
who was one of the premier talmidim of the
Gra.]
Darkness is the substance upon which light operates.
[Although the Gra seems to say that ohr is also a
bri'oh as it no doubt seems to be, Yeshayohu still
refers to it as yetziroh in comparison to
choshech.]
[The following is a quote from The Emperor's New
Mind (Roger Penrose, Oxford University Press, 1990 page
385) in a section titled "Quantum Magic and Quantum Mystery:"
"I have made no bones of the fact that I believe that the
resolution of the puzzles of quantum theory must lie in our
finding an improved theory. Though this is perhaps not the
conventional view, it is not an altogether unconventional
one. (Many of quantum theory's originators were also of such
a mind. I have referred to Einstein's views, Schroedinger
[1935], de Broglie [1956], and Dirac [1939] also regarded the
theory as provisional.) But even if one believes that the
theory is somehow to be modified, the constraints on how one
might do this are enormous. Perhaps some kind of `hidden
variable' viewpoint will eventually turn out to be
acceptable. But the non-locality that is exhibited by the EPR
type experiments severely challenges any `realistic'
description of the world that can comfortably occur within an
ordinary space-time — a space-time of the particular
type that has been given to us to accord with the principles
of relativity — so I believe that a much more
radical change is needed [emphasis not in the
original].]
In this area, the scientists err, not taking into account
what the Gra has written [with respect to
choshech]. Based on these theories, it might be
possible to resolve the conundrums that plague Quantum Theory
and to comprehend the existence of Non-Local Reality which is
evident from Bell's Theorem.
[John S. Bell (1928-1990) was a physicist who became well-
known as the originator of Bell's Theorem, regarded by some
in the quantum physics community as one of the most important
theorems of the 20th century.]
However, these theories have still not been fully clarified
as yet. I have stepped outside my normal boundaries to
expound upon things that are essentially unnecessary for
Torah Jews who believe in the Torah and in its Sages. But the
truth is that in today's climate, it is necessary to make
known that we have no concept whatsoever of the greatness of
our Sages or the veracity of their words.
Signed here in Toronto 27 Marcheshvan, 5766
Shlomo Eliyohu Miller
