על הזיווג לשם ההשכלה (על לימודי היסוד) ט״זOn Mating with the Preliminary Studies 16
א׳
1[85] Now according to nature these are the native-lands of the two ages: Egypt, that is passion, of the age of childhood; Canaan, that is vice, of the age of adolescence. But the holy word, though it knows full well what are the native-lands of our mortal race, sets before us what we should do and what will be for our good, by bidding us hate the habits and the customs and the practices of those lands.
ב׳
2[86] It does so in the following words, “And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying: ‘Speak unto the sons of Israel, and thou shalt say unto them “I am the Lord your God. According to the practices of the land of Egypt, in which ye dwelt therein, ye shall not do; and according unto the practices of the land of Canaan, into which I bring you there, you shall not do, and by their customs ye shall not walk. Ye shall do My judgements and ye shall keep My ordinances, walk in them. I am the Lord your God. And ye shall keep all My ordinances and My judgements, and ye shall do them. He that doeth them shall live in them. I am the Lord your God’ ” (Lev. 18:1–5).
ג׳
3[87] So then the true life is the life of him who walks in the judgements and ordinances of God, so that the practices of the godless must be death. And what the practices of the godless are we have been told. They are the practices of passion and vices, from which spring the many multitudes of the impious and the workers of unholiness.
ד׳
4[88] So then ten years after our migration to the Canaanites we shall wed Hagar, since as soon as we have become reasoning beings we take to ourselves the ignorance and indiscipline whose nature is so mischievous and only after a time and under the perfect number ten do we reach the desire for the lawful discipline which can profit us.