Stage 3 · Moses Maimonides (1138–1204)

Moreh Nevukhim: Part III, Chapter 44 — Prayer, Tefillin, Mezuzah, and Tzitzit

דלאלהֵ אלחאירין — The Guide of the Perplexed

The ninth class comprises the laws of Sefer Ahavah — prayer, Shema, Grace after Meals, the Priestly Blessing, tefillin, mezuzah, tzitzit, writing a Torah scroll, and Torah reading. Maimonides declares all these self-evidently purposeful: each act inscribes in the heart a beneficial belief. No further explanation is needed, as elaborating the obvious would be mere repetition.

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Part Three · Chapter Forty-Four — Prayer, Tefillin, Mezuzah, and Tzitzit

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THE precepts of the ninth class are those enumerated in the Section on Love. Their reason is obvious. The actions prescribed by them serve to remind us continually of God, and of our duty to fear and to love Him, to keep all His commandments, and to believe concerning God that which every religious person must believe. This class includes the laws of Prayer, Reading of Shema, Grace, and duties connected with these, Blessing of the priests, Tefillin, Mezuzah, Ẓiẓit, acquiring a scroll of the Law, and reading in it at certain times. The performance of all these precepts inculcates into our heart useful lessons. All this is clear, and a further explanation is superfluous, as being a mere repetition and nothing else.

English is a working draft — alignment is sentence-by-sentence.

Scripture cited in this chapter