From Day One it has been about da’as. Actually, from Day Six once man was created. Their main test was not to eat from the Aitz HaDa’as Tov v’Ra. If God had just wanted to test their ability to follow instructions, a simple tree would have sufficed. But it was specifically a tree of knowledge of good and evil, making the test more about da’as.
Da’as means knowledge, which is probably more abundant in the world today than ever before since leaving Gan Aiden. Yet for all that knowledge, the world seems crazier today, more chaotic than it was just 10 years ago. Clearly knowledge is not enough.
What’s missing? Well, just ask yourself, “What would it take to open the eyes of mankind to the reality of God and the centrality of Torah?” Where do we start?! At the very least, God would have to come out of hiding and announce Himself to the world in an indisputable way, and so far that hasn’t happened.
It has happened for individuals, because there are many ba’alei teshuvah, some of whom were as distant from the reality of God as a person can get today. They saw something that made them consider that God is real, and pursuing that path came to believe that He is. Their da’as told them so.
But so many others have looked at the same things and come away with a different conclusion. They were not convinced that God is everything the Torah says He is, and instead went in the other direction. Same da’as, different conclusion. Why?
Distortions. People have distorted perspectives in life. We all look kind of normal and similar to one another, but it is amazing how a single conversation can show you just how different people are from you, how differently they look at the issues in life.
Sometimes the difference is minor, but other times it is shocking, even dangerous. The way many in the world today are viewing the war here in Israel is both shocking and dangerous, for the Jewish people and the world in general. And this includes many Jews as well.
It is not hard to figure out where people get their distortions from, especially in an age of out-of-control social media, much of which is controlled by opinionated people without enough truthful information. And that is after graduating from educational systems that do not deal with the whys of life, only the hows.
That was the fundamental difference between the Aitz HaDa’as and the other tree, the Aitz HaChaim, the Tree of Life. The knowledge of the Aitz HaDa’as shows you how to use this world to your advantage, like the sciences and even the Talmud. The knowledge of the Aitz HaChaim taught you why we’re here, and how to make the most of our time while we are.
There is another important difference between the two levels of knowledge. Everyone knows that evil exists, but so few understand why, or how it works. If they did, they wouldn’t be so vulnerable to its many forms, and most of Marketing and Advertising would have to shut down.
It’s like germs. They’re all over the environment and we try to avoid them as much as possible. But we know that we become more vulnerable to their effect in certain situations and certain environments, like a filthy public bathroom. Such places are lairs for germs.
The reality of evil is like a spiritual germ. It clings to certain types of people more than others, can be found in certain kinds of environments more than others, and attaches itself to certain forms of knowledge more than others. As they say, the mind, the person, and the idea all become one, which can cause the spiritual downfall of a person without them even noticing it.
We’d like to believe that truth is automatic. People may lie and distort it, but overall, we’d like to think, it is the backdrop of society. And then we go nuts when we find out just how many people are pushing and living by falsehood—as if it is the truth. And this includes world leaders as well.
But as we say in Shemonah Esrai, Da’as is a gift from God. Knowledge is free, but Da’as is not. That’s why Shlomo HaMelech told us, “If you want it as you do silver, and search after it like buried treasures, then you will understand fear of God, [and] Da’as Elokim you will find.” (Mishlei 2:4), because that is what Da’as is, a buried treasure.
A treasure for sure. You can’t live properly without it. When the Torah tells us to “choose life” (Devarim 30:19), it means choose to get Da’as. Realize its value and do whatever you can to become a Bar Da’as, which clearly is more than just becoming obligated in mitzvos.
Hidden? For sure. But unlike other things, Da’as is hidden by people’s own lack of understanding. It’s buried under layers of their own misconceptions and misperceptions. Layers upon layers upon layers, which is why nothing is going to change the situation until God does it Himself, which is the entire point of the War of Gog and Magog.
So here we are, in the final chapter of a book that was started back on Day Six of Creation with the first man and woman, while we struggle with Da’as again in the “Sixth Day” of history. Because the six millennia of history correspond to the six days of Creation, and the tenth hour in which Adam ate in his time began for us in our time in 1990.
The result of Adam’s eating was his own physicalization and of the world as well. Just before the sin, the world was on a much higher level and so was he, and truth was literally the backdrop of history. The physicalization of Creation buried the truth under layers of far more trivial knowledge, knowledge that is concerned more with the hows of life than the whys of life.
And it has only gotten more like this with time. The accumulation of knowledge over the years has been mostly the result of understanding more about the physical way we live, with the goal of gaining more control over it. The world has moved so far away from existential truth that it is hard to believe that it can ever learn them.
Especially since without them people seem to be on a course to self-destruction. But it is certainly not the first time in history, and all the previous times something major has happened to shock the world to more philosophical approaches to life. We can assume that it will happen again, and that what is going on today is all part of that.
Today, it is very lonely knowing truth. It is also very scary to see the world going in the opposite direction. Ignorance is bliss, but it is not fulfilling. You can’t be who you are meant to be by living a lie, and we need to be who we are meant to be to be happy. You can mourn for the rest of the world who can’t, but you have to be grateful that you are one of the very few who can. It is the greatest gift.