On the one hand we make special blessings for the pleasures of the world. On the other hand if one interrupts Torah learning to experience those pleasures he “brings death to himself.” Are these ideas reconcilable?

How are we to relate to the many pleasures the world offers us?

Our Sages command us to open our hearts and eyes to our physical world and to derive pleasure from it — in a permissible way of course. First and foremost we are obligated to bless and give thanks to the Maker of all worldly pleasures for whatever we receive. The very essence of a brachah after all is an expression of man’s gratitude for the benefit he has received.

A prime example is the blessing on trees which is recited in the month of Nisan when plants are blossoming and new sprouts begin to appear on the trees. “Blessed are You Hashem… who has not caused anything to be lacking from His world and has created good creations and good trees for human beings to enjoy.”

The text of the blessing indicates the legitimacy — even the obligation — of deriving pleasure from the material world. How then do we understand the mishnah in the third chapter of Pirkei Avos which seems to teach that appreciation of the physical world can bring calamity onto a person? “Rabbi Shimon says: A person who is traveling on the road and learning and interrupts his learning to exclaim ‘How beautiful is this tree! How beautiful is this field!’ is viewed by the Torah as one who has brought death upon himself.”

Can this be so? Is it truly forbidden to derive pleasure from the beauty of the world? To enjoy the splendor of nature? To be captivated by the charm of the cosmos?  

What of the obligation to enjoy nature’s beauty?  

What of the instruction by Rabbeinu Avraham the great son of the Rambam who writes (in his classic work HaMaspik L’Ovdei Hashem) that it is important for one’s development both on a religious and a scientific level to enjoy gazing at natural wonders? “Therefore ” he writes “all respected and important personages and all scholars even the most righteous among them derive pleasure and enjoyment from seeing beautiful meadows ornamental gardens flowing streams and the like.”

Furthermore the importance of developing a proper aesthetic sense in order to serve Hashem was emphasized by none other than Rav Yosef Leib Bloch a renowned baal mussar and rosh yeshivah of Yeshivas Telz in Lithuania who came to the following confusion:

“The way of a great man is to live with all of his abilities and to be aware and sensitive to everything. He must not suppress his feelings. Therefore the greater a person is the more his feelings are alive and alert. His appreciation for beauty will also be developed to the fullest extent so that he admires a beautiful natural tableau or the sound of a pleasant tune. When he sees a particularly beautiful object he will be filled with wonder . . . and he will know to use this feeling for a sublime purpose — recognizing the Creator. This feeling does not harm him or lower him from his spiritual station; on the contrary the emotion elevates and uplifts his spirit so that he can better ponder the might of Hashem and His greatness” (Shiurei Daas vol. 1 p. 194).

In fact the primacy of a sense of aesthetics in the development of refined spirituality began in Gan Eden itself as explains Rav Shimshon Raphael Hirsh in his commentary on the Torah:

“The garden provided all of man’s material needs. However the Torah places the attribute of ‘beautiful in appearance’ before that of ‘good for eating.’ This means that the need to satisfy man’s aesthetic sense comes before the need to satisfy his sense of taste and desire for food. This is where the appreciation of beauty was both justified and sanctified and the superiority of man was revealed. There are many beautiful things on earth and as far as we can tell man is the only being that is capable of enjoying beauty. This is proof of the importance of a sense of aesthetics to man’s ethical mission. In a society that does not appreciate beauty men will also act like wild beasts. Man’s enjoyment of aesthetic harmony is close to his enjoyment of ethical harmony.”

We can add to this the Maharal’s comment that the beauty of the physical world which elicits delight within us represents the revelation of the Shechinah in the inanimate parts of the world.

In light of the above our question becomes all the more compelling. Why did the Tanna Rabbi Shimon forbid man from admiring the beauty of a tree?

Let us take a closer look at the words of the mishnah which refers to a person who is traveling and learning then interrupts his learning to praise the tree.

It is impossible to forbid a person from admiring and enjoying the beauty of nature and its stunning colorful splendor. Such admiration is a mitzvah. But Rabbi Shimon teaches us that the value of Torah study is even greater. If you interrupt your learning in order to enjoy the sight of blossoming trees the vast blue sky the vegetation and refreshing atmosphere of a park or the sound of lapping waves — you have exchanged the end for the means.

But there is an even deeper layer which relates to the imagined artificial contradiction between Torah and “real life.”

The Tanna states that a person who interrupts his learning is considered to have brought death upon himself.

Indeed it is a mitzvah to admire the beauty of nature. It is the Torah’s will that we say “yes” to the pleasures of the world within the bounds that it has set. As we have mentioned Chazal even established a full range of brachos in order to infuse our sensory pleasures with the spiritual dimension of gratitude to the Creator.

However as Rav Shlomo Zalman Breuer (the son-in-law of Rav Shimshon Raphael Hirsch) explains if a person feels that he must interrupt his learning i.e. desist from studying Torah and fulfilling its mitzvos in order to properly benefit from all that this world has to offer — if he feels that there is some tension even contradiction between the two — then the Torah views him as one who has brought death upon himself. Such an attitude is a sign that he understands neither life nor the Torah.

Life says the Rambam is like a blazing furnace. A person who gets too close to the furnace will be badly burned. On the other hand a person who puts too much distance between himself and the furnace will freeze. The intelligent man who understands the laws of nature and the behavior of his own body will choose the ideal distance from the furnace where he can benefit from its heat without being burned.

The same is true of life. A person who distances himself from the pleasures of the world due to a fear of being overly enticed by them will stifle the natural abilities that he possesses. He will be placing himself at the North Pole in eternal cold that causes a person to atrophy and warps his soul and his sense of virtue.  

On the other hand if a person gets too close to the “furnace” of desire without calculating his position he will be consumed by those very flames. Humanity has been fluctuating from one extreme to the other for thousands of years: from the lifeless cold of complete abstinence to the all-consuming flames of unchecked hedonism from the atrophy of asceticism to the depths of gluttony.

Rabbi Shimon teaches us that in order to declare “How beautiful is this tree” it is not necessary to interrupt one’s studies. In order to live and express all the creative potential that is latent within each individual’s heart and within the soul of society there is no need to cast off the Torah its values and its mitzvos. On the contrary the Torah provides man and society with the proper boundaries that will prevent sliding down both slippery slopes: that of divesting all sense of morality to the point that every man and society itself are consumed by indulgence; and that of utter dissociation from material life.

The Torah study of which Rabbi Shimon speaks places man at the correct distance so that if he adheres to its guidelines he will be able to truly benefit from the “heat of the furnace” from all that is good in the world which the Creator fashioned just for him.

Food for Thought: The very first time that a man greets his fellow in the morning he must already seek his forgiveness in case he did not demonstrate the proper respect.

--Rabbi Yisrael Salanter