על שהרע נוהג לארוב לטוב מ״וThat the Worse is wont to Attack the Better 46
א׳
1[167] “He” it continues, “that slayeth Cain shall loosen seven punishable objects” (Gen. 4:15). What meaning this conveys to those who interpret literally, I do not know. For there is nothing to show what the seven objects are, nor how they are punishable, nor in what way they become loose and unstrung. We must make up our minds that all such language is figurative and involves deeper meanings. It would seem, then, that the thought which Moses desires to convey is of this nature.
ב׳
2[168] The irrational side of the soul is divided into seven parts, seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching, speaking, begetting. Were a man to do away with the eighth, mind, which is the ruler of these, and here called Cain, he will paralyse the seven also. For they are all strong by sharing the strength and vigour of the mind, and with its weakness they wax feeble, and by the complete corruption brought on them by wickedness they incur a weakening and slackening.
ג׳
3[169] These seven in a wise man’s soul are found to be pure and undefiled, and herein deserving of honour, but in the soul of a foolish man unclean and polluted, and, just as Moses said, exposed to punishment which is equivalent to “deserving of penalty and retribution.” Let me give an illustration.
ד׳
4[170] When the Creator was minded to purge the earth by water, and determined that the soul should receive a cleansing from its unutterable wrongdoings by washing away and purging out its defilements after the fashion of a sacred purification, He charges the man who proved righteous, who was not swept away by the oncoming of the deluge, to bring into the ark, which was the body or the vessel that contains the soul, “from among the clean beasts seven, male and female” (Gen. 7:2), for He deemed it right that the goodly reasoning faculty should find all parts of the irrational side clean for its use.