#RebChaim #5 part 1

#Rebchaim #05 part 1 version 2, DATE: 8/14/18
לזכות רפואה שלמה של מינא חנה בת שרה פייגא
Objective: To explain a goy’s ability in having kavana lishmah
Quick summary: goy is removed from the mitzvos and as such can’t do it lishmah even if he wanted to.
Mareh makom: http://www.hebrewbooks.org/pdfpager.aspx?req=39831&st=&pgnum=12
(or page 12 in the Reb Chaim pdf)
Full Summary:
I.
A. Rambam in Hilchos Tefillin (Ch. 1 halacha 15) says that if you write the mentions of Hashem’s name without kavana, then the Sefer Torah, Tefillin or mezua is pasul. He doesn’t mention lack of kavana for writing the rest of the Torah. Later on as well, in Ch. 10, he only mentions lack of kavana for the mentions of Hashem’s name as a psul but not the lack of kavana for writing the rest of it.
B. This is because the Rambam holds that you need special kavana for writing the name of Hashem, that you’re doing it for the sake of the holiness of the names (Gittin 20). However, you don’t need kavana at all for the writing of the rest of the Torah.
II.
Reb Chaim has a question from a gemara in gittin 45.
A. The Gemara mentions how Rabbi Shimon Ben Gamliel allowed people to purchase Sifrei Torah from a goy. The gemara asks, Rabbi Shimon Ben Gamliel requires even the preparation of the parchment skin (ibud) for the Torah to be done lishmah. So how could he allow the kesiva to be done by a goy whish isn’t lishmah since goyim don’t have kavanos lishmah? The implication is that kesiva requires lishmah even more than ibud.
B. The Gemara concludes that the case was a Jewish convert who acted like a goy out of fear. But if it was a real goy, Rabbi Shimon Ben Gamliel would agree that passul.
C. The Rambam paskens like Rabbi Shimon Ben Gamliel that the skins of the Torah require preparation lishmah (Rambam Ch. 1 halacha 11 and in Ch. 10). So how could the Rambam require the ibud to be lishmah but not require the kesiva to be lishmah?
III.
Reb Chaim begins to answer by first changing his view of kavana by writing a Sefer Torah according to the Rambam from “You don’t need it” to “you need it but you have it”. He does this by saying there are 2 kinds of kavana.
A. When you do a maaseh like skin preparation which is only a hechsher mitzva, and not the main writing of the Sefer Torah, for that you need the standard active kavana like the Rambam says. The active kavana turns the mere preparation into a significant act.
B. When you are writing a Sefer Torah, you are doing a significant act since writing the Sefer Torah is how you end up with a Sefer Torah. As such, the kedusha is chal automatically. Granted, you do need kavana. However, there is a certain automatic kavana called “stama lishman kai” (Zevachim 2B)- as long as you don’t have negative kavana, it’s as if you had positive kavana and the kavana is automatically credited to you.

IV.
A. Reb Chaim now has to explain what happens by a goy. Since a goy is removed from kedushas yisroel, a goy is also removed from the whole parsha of creating a Sefer Torah, which includes the idea of writing it lishmah. As such, he can’t have kavana for lishmah even if he tried. So it comes out that for a goy who can’t do anything lishmah, writing has an even bigger requirement for lishmah than skin preparation, since writing is the actual act of making a Sefer Torah while ibud is only the hechsher mitzvah. However, for a Jew, ibud is more chamur since kesiva gets the automatic kavana, while ibud requires actual kavana to make it a significant act.
B. Tosfos on gittin 45 tries to knock off the question on Rabbi Shimon Ben Gamliel From ibud to his psak on kesiva by saying that for writing we can say Stama Lishman kai. However, the Rambam has his ready answer as per Reb Chaim- the goy is removed from writing a Torah and as such is removed from lishmah as well.
V.
Reb Chaim now asks from the Rambam in Ch.1 Halacha 11, who says that since the ibud of parchment needs to be done lishmah, goyim are passul for working the parchment. The Rambam adds in a line that “Even if we tell him to do it, it’s passul since he did it for himself and not lishmah”. The implication of the Rambam is that the psul of a goy is not that he’s categorically removed from doing things lishmah, just that we judge his intentions negatively. But if we could somehow ascertain his intentions as positive, he would be fully in the category of doing things lishmah. This refutes Reb Chaim’s teretz above that a goy is removed from the whole parsha of lishmah!
VI.
Reb Chaim answers that what the Rambam means is that you might think that if we stand over his shoulder and tell him to write lishmah, then in such a case it does work. (Reb Chaim will prove a case in #5 Part 2 where a Jew standing over a goy’s shoulder is enough to make it kosher)Comes along the Rambam to say, still it doesn’t work because in this case you need full lishmah and since the goy categorically can’t do preparation lishmah, then he is doing things for himself. In other words, the idea that he’s doing things for himself is not a cause (He’s doing things for himself so therefore his ibud is bad), but a result of him being excluded from lishmah ( he’s excluded from lishmah, so therefore his actions automatically become he’s doing it on his own accord. Reb Chaim goes on to quote a certain Rav Shlomo Zalman, who proves from the Rambam in hilchos gittin (ch. 3 Halacha 15) that when we say a goy is writing the get for him own intentions and not for the baal, it is a din of being excluded categorically, not a judgment call. His proof is that the Rambam compares a mumar to a goy for this halacha. If it’s just a judgment call what’s the comparison? Must be it’s a din of being categorically excluded, and a mumar is categorically excluded as well.