Educating the Jew: Mandatory or Voluntary?

After Nekius comes Prishus - beginning what we can call Mesilas Yesharim volume two. "Everything we explained until this point is what is necessary for man to become a Tzaddik. From here on is what is necessary to become a Hasid" (chapter 13). (Please note that this work predates the Hasidic Movement.)

Mesilas Yesharim I defines our obligations as Jews. We are obligated to be naki - clean of sin. But there is (potentially) more to our relationship with God than just obligations and so we have Mesilas Yesharim II on the value and the method of going beyond the letter of the law. This is the author's definition of "Hasid." Nonetheless, what R. Pinchas ban Yair said remains true: Nekius leads to Prishus.

In an earlier post we noted that the author attributes a of lack of Nekius to "foolishness" (sichlus; "stupidity" is probably a more accurate translation; according to Feldheim it's "silliness"). Surprisingly, Luzzatto has the same to say for Prishus as well:

"...This is the only thing this man needs to learn: to educate his mind to recognize the tenuousness and deception of these pleasures until he is instinctively repulsed by them... When he gets used to constantly focusing on this truth, little by little he will be freed from the shackles of stupidity that the darkness of materialism chained on him and he won't be seduced by the temptations of the false pleasures..." (Chap. 15)

Although Prishus brings us into a new world of voluntary Hasidus, it turns out that it is acquired by simply following through on the obligatory education of Nekius: The awareness that the Yetzer HaRa leads man not only to sin, but also to self-destructive, illogical behavior. The education of the Jew which began with Nekius thus leads directly into Prishus. Just as R. Pinchas ben Yair promised.

(See chapter 8 and this post on how Zehirus develops into Zerizus. The author deals with the development of Zerizus into Nekius in chapter 12.)

The stupidity and the danger of following the Yetzer HaRa is well-known. It is the journey from intellectual awareness to human behavior that gives us trouble. In a word: maturity (see this post). Ultimately, it is his level of maturity that separates the man from the mouse, the Zahir from the Zariz, the Zariz from the Naki, and the Naki from the Parush.