RAMBAM

Dear Family,

I hope everyone is well.

We wish Mommy long life on the yohrtzeit of Meme. We were very fond of Meme who was a gutte neshamah. Her neshamah should have an aliyah Happy birthday to Esther Miriam on her 8th birthday today BH. Have a wonderful year filled with many mitzvos and joy. Mazal Tov to Chanan and Naomi on their Anniversary next week. Your year should be filled with lots of simchos and nachas. Mazal Tov to Hirshy on passing an important exam in his Nursing course. Michayil el chayil Hirshy. I was amazed at the medical knowledge that you are amassing BH. And last but not least, hot news from Pesach and Chanie, who have closed on the sale of a beautiful home in Longbeach. This should be with much mazal and brocha for your whole Family BEH. MAZAL TOV.

Shavuos is only 2 days Yom Tov but we are still within the Shavuos zone of Matan Torah until the 12th of Sivan, in 2 days time. So we are very much still in 'high gear' with TORAH STUDY.

And so I thought that I would dedicate this week to one of the TORAH giants of our People, the RAMBAM, (Reb Moshe ben Maimon - Maimonides) who has enscribed at his tombstone in Teveria 'From Mosheh to Mosheh there has not arisen another as Mosheh'. This has especially also been encouraged by Uncle Chanan jumping in 'a bit early' last week advertising my Rambam project I have been working on since 23/12/03, which started out as an innocent sitting down together with Hirshy and Zalmy to learn a chapter a day of Rambam's Mishneh Torah, and that is when I decided to summarise each chapter in English! (hand written). Ie to explain what he 'blasted' onto our group.

But first, more about Rambam.
I am sure everyone has seen the huge volumes of 5 Books of Moses, Talmud (Babylonian and Jerusalem), Mishnayos, Shulchan Aruchs, books of Commentaries ad infinitum, Customs, Philosophy etc etc. of Judaism Besides the massive volume, Torah is filled with multiple variety of views of different Sages on each subject. So how is one supposed to navigate through this forest in one lifetime, AND KNOW HOW TO CARRY OUT WHAT HASHEM IS EXPECTING US TO DO?! And it is a mitzva upon us to study the entire Torah!

And this was the first brilliant thing that the Rambam did in his Mishneh Torah (he lived 1135 to 1204) He compiled the entire Oral Law, including deriving the 613 mitzvot from the Written Law, plus decrees from the time of Mosheh Rabeinu, plus Rabbinic Law, plus Cutoms, and set it out in the most magnificent ordered fashion in the Mishneh Torah in a concise form. And in a fashion that it was a Book of Laws that scholars or simple people alike, COULD CARRY OUT PHYSICALLY, IE A BOOK OF HALACHAH In his own words he did this work so that 'a person will not need another text at all with regard to any Jewish Law. A person should first study the Written Law (5 Books of MOSES), and then study this text, and comprehend the entire Oral Law from it, without having to study any other text between the two.' And now it became a possibility for everyone to 'study the entire Torah in a life-time.'

As we all know the Rambam was also the Physician in the Turkish Court, an Astronomer and a Philosopher! All in a life which included persecution from the Muslims! How was this possible? As one works through the Mishneh Torah one gets a glimpse of these Masteries in the full spectrum of Torah, human anatomy, medicine, animal anatomies, botany, astronomy, philosophy etc

The Rambam has always been known as a reference for Torah Scholars, but in 1984, the Lubavitcher Rebbe did something very new and interesting which no one had ever thought of doing before! He called on every man, woman and child to study The Mishneh Torah!

He suggested 3 tracks ie 3 options:

1. 3 chapters a day over 1 year (there are 1000 chapters in Mishneh Torah)
2. 1 chapter a day over 3 years
3. Just learning the mitzvos (of the 613) which come up in the 3 chapters per day track from another Book of the Rambam - Sefer Hamitzvos.

And so as I now started summarising these 1000 perakim, I kept getting newer and better ideas, and the summaries developed into a series as follows:

1. Concise Summary - Its aim is 2-fold

1. Because the summary of each chapter is so short, it allows us to see the Rambam's magnificent framework, and where each of the 613 mitzvos have been placed
2. Because the mitzvos have been marked with an icon, it is easy, even for children, to follow the 3rd track as recommended by the Rebbe It is this Book which has just been published and is now available on Amazon and other outlets ( it is only about 400 pages, and not 4000 as Chanan mentioned!)

1. Comprehensive Summary - This uses the exact framework as the Concise Summary, but there is much more explanation of each chapter. It is in 8 volumes and is on the verge of completion, but not yet available. This is the main work

1. Key Facts Summary - Here there are no longer the 1000 chapters, but rather summaries of each of the 83 sets of halochas. It is more in story form and draws out the philosophy aspects which the Rambam includes - Not yet published but complete

1. Tabular - The main purpose here was to provide hyper linking within Rambam (Reminders) - not yet published but complete

1. Index - This has been published and is also available on Amazon.

So the purpose of this English set of summaries was to help make Mishneh Torah more accessible for my Family, extended Family, and anyone else who is interested, including myself.

Our website has developing nicely at the same time as each series is being produced at https/rambampress.com.

Gut Shabbos to all, and success in learning kol HaTorah (the whole of Torah) which is in reach BH