The Rebbe's Rambam | Marking the completion of the entire set

Hilchos Melachim | Ch 12

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eage and thus qualified for marriage, nor to qual ify those who have mistakenly been established as having improper lineage and therefore disquali fied, rather to bring peace to all Jews throughout the world, as it states: “And he shall return the heart of the fathers through the children.” And there are those Sages who say that Eliyahu the prophet will come before the coming of the Moshiach. [152] And all these matters, and others like them, no human knows how they will happen until they happen, for they are secret matters of the prophets. Even the Sages have no tradition in these matters, but rely on interpre tations of the verses. Therefore, they have dis agreements on these matters. And in any case, neither the arrangement of these matters nor their details are an essential part of religion. A person should never engage in the stories about Moshiach , nor should he delve into the midrashim that speak about these matters or the like, i.e., one should not make them a primary focus, because they do not lead to fear of G-d

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 the Messianic age. Here, for example, the Rambam writes that a special prophet will arrive to prepare the Jewish people for Moshiach’s arrival. No doubt, preparation is needed for the most central element of the Messianic age: the engaging in the study of the Torah’s deepest secrets. Therefore, the revela tions of Kabbalah and Chassidism were necessary — not only to illuminate the negative forces of the exile, but to prepare us for the positive developments of the redemption. In fact, such a preparation seems absolutely crucial: The Rambam writes in the final sections of this chapter that the Messianic age will not include a change to the fundamental nature of the world. How ever, he also writes that the entire world will be engaged in the pursuit of “knowing G-d.” If such a change will happen suddenly, it would be

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Pardes Hamelech

impossible to describe it as “not a fundamental change to the world’s nature.” Clearly, if the Messianic age is not going to bring immediate and drastic change, we need to prepare ahead of time for his arrival, and that is accomplished through studying the inner dimensions of the Torah. Likkutei Sichos vol. 30 pg. 172 & fn. 29 152. “And all these matters, and others like them, no human knows how they will happen until they happen” This uncertainty applies only to what the Rambam discusses in this chapter. Everything in the previous chapter, however, is written definitively. This is also evident from the fact that these details are stated by the Rambam twice. Likkutei Sichos vol. 19 pg. 533