Hirsch on Inclination

I love it how Rav Shimshon Raphael Hirsch derives these deep and original insights from the meaning of the words, analyzing the detailed data to come to the high ideas. This is his commentary on Bereishit 6:5, right before the flood: וַיַּרְא יְהֹוָה כִּי רַבָּה רָעַת הָאָדָם בָּאָרֶץ וְכָל יֵצֶר מַחְשְׁבֹת לִבּוֹ רַק רַע כָּל הַיּוֹם And the Lord saw that the evil of man was great in the earth, and every imagination of his heart was only evil all the time.

It is unfortunate that יצר is so often translated as “drive” or “impulse”, as though there were a force in man that urges and impels him to do evil.  This is the source of that bleak view which is one of the basic concepts of a large “religion”: the dogma of the power of evil which holds man in its power and from which he can be saved only by virtue of a certain belief. Thus the word יצר is twisted into a cord of falsehood by which mankind is bound and gagged. Yet nothing could be further from this view than the very word יצר.

To begin with, the root יצר does not denote “forcing” but “shaping”.  But the form יֵצֶר is not an active form, but a passive form; it denotes not that which does the shaping, but that which has been shaped. Clearly the יֵצֶר is to יוצר as the work is to one who forms it: וְיֵצֶר אָמַר לְיֹצְרוֹ and the impulse say to the One Who formed it (Isaiah 29:16). The יֵצֶר is subordinate to יוצר - כְּחֹמֶר ביד הַיֹּצֵר like clay in hands of potter. And יֵצֶר מַחְשְׁבֹת לִבּוֹ are the formations, the designs of our thoughts.

Man’s intellect is a חושב מחשבות – like the weaver, who weaves חושב מַעֲשֶׂה.  The raw material is turned over to the intellect; all qualities – good or evil – are entrusted to it, like clay in the potter’s hands. The intellect is to combine them and mold them into shapes, צורות – i.e. our thoughts and ideals. These צורות are the הלב יֵצֶר מַחְשְׁבֹת, the designs woven by the intellect.

We can shape the material entrusted to us into any form we wish. But at the same time, G-d has given us the patterns we are expected to follow. If we follow that pattern, then everything is good. The חושב (weaver) must have every type of thread, every color, at his disposal. He cannot dispense with any of them. Used in its proper place and in the prescribed manner, everything is good.

It is true that a person is drawn after יֵצֶר לִבּוֹ, the designs of his heart. His mind fashions an idea, and he imagines what he can achieve; this idea then spurs him on to achieve his goal. But it is he himself who forms this יֵצֶר. If he forms a good idea, then he aspires toward the good; if not, then the opposite is true.  יֵצֶר is the literal equivalent of the Greek word idea: a formation or picture.