Parsha Kedoshim
By Rabbi Dr. Michael Leo Samuel in Chula Vista, California
A few years ago, a friend told me about his young son who discovered the game of “No Exit.” The boy had just read a simplified version of Jean-Paul Sartre’s famous play No Exit, where three damned souls are locked in a room together for eternity—each one’s personal hell created not by fire or brimstone, but by the inescapable gaze and judgment of the others.
“Daddy,” the child asked with wide eyes, “is hell really just other people?” My friend smiled and replied, “Sometimes it feels that way, kiddo. But in real life, the hardest room to escape isn’t filled with strangers—it’s the one inside our own heads, where our desires argue with our conscience all day long.”
That little anecdote captures a profound truth about the human condition. We often imagine morality as a peaceful, harmonious state where good flows effortlessly. Yet real life—and real Torah—teaches us something far more dramatic: the greatest moral victories are won in the noisy, uncomfortable inner room where temptation refuses to leave.
Maimonides, in his Shemonah Perakim (Eight Chapters), poses a penetrating question that has echoed through centuries of ethical thought: Who is more moral—the saint who never experiences temptations, or the ordinary person who feels powerful cravings for forbidden things yet exerts self-control and chooses the good anyway?
Philosophers, following Aristotle and others, have long asserted a clear answer: The person who possesses self-control performs exemplary deeds while simultaneously battling intense desires and cravings for illicit pleasures. He feels the constant vexation and irritation of base inclinations pulling him in the wrong direction, yet he subdues them through conscious effort and chooses morality despite the psychic storm raging within. In contrast, the saintly person acts in perfect alignment with his refined, noble disposition; goodness flows naturally from his innate longing for what is right, without inner conflict.
For the philosophers, there is near unanimity: the saint is superior, more perfect in his very soul. His character is harmonious, unmarred by the presence of evil desires. The struggling individual, though admirable for his victories, remains on a lower rung of virtue because the desire to do wrong still lives inside him. Even when he resists, his base inclinations point stubbornly in one immoral direction, revealing an imperfect psychic disposition. King Solomon seemed attuned to this dilemma when he observed the constant tug-of-war within the human heart, reminding us that unchecked passions can lead even the wise astray.
Yet when we turn to our Sages, the Rabbis offer a radically different perspective—one that elevates the human struggle to the highest level of praise.
The Talmud teaches, “The greater the person, the greater his yetzer hara—his evil inclination.” Far from viewing inner conflict as a flaw, the Sages see it as the very arena where true greatness is forged. They assert that the person who refrains from evil despite longing for it is more praiseworthy and more perfect than the one who feels no inner torment at all. In fact, they go so far as to suggest that even seemingly perfect people secretly experience that inner irritation when forcing themselves to resist temptation.
This is why the Sages declare: “In accordance with the effort exerted is the reward” (Avot 5:23). The reward is commensurate with the inner torture overcome. Every human being is encouraged—indeed, commanded—to conquer his impulses. No one may say, “My nature is such that I would never desire to commit such-and-such a violation, even though the Torah prohibits it.” Such a claim misses the point of moral life entirely.
Rabbi Simeon ben Gamliel expressed this most succinctly in the Sifra (Kedoshim 4:9) and echoed by Maimonides: “Don’t say, ‘I do not want to eat meat together with milk,’ or ‘I do not want to wear clothes made of a mixture of wool and linen,’ or ‘I do not want to enter into an incestuous marriage.’ Rather, say: ‘I really want to do these forbidden things, yet I must not—for my Father in Heaven has forbidden it.’”
This teaching transforms the entire framework of mitzvot. The chukim—those statutes that seem to defy human logic, like shaatnez or kashrut—are not meant to be followed with effortless indifference. They are invitations to confront desire head-on and declare allegiance to God precisely in the moment of craving. The struggle itself becomes sacred.
This rabbinic view finds dramatic expression in a famous Midrash about the giving of the Torah. When Moses ascended Mount Sinai to receive the Ten Commandments, the angels protested vehemently: “What is this mortal doing among us? Leave the Torah in heaven where it will be properly cherished!” They argued that pure, spiritual beings like themselves were far more worthy guardians of divine law.
Moses, however, challenged them directly. He recited the Ten Commandments one by one and asked pointed questions: “Did you go down to Egypt? Do you have parents to honor? Do you experience the pull of covetousness? Do you have an evil inclination that you must subdue?” Of course, the angels had none of these experiences. They have no bodies, no physical desires, no daily battles with temptation. The Torah, with its commandments addressing human weakness, jealousy, dishonesty, and lust, simply does not apply to them. The angels conceded immediately. The Torah was made for human beings precisely because we do struggle.
This Midrash beautifully underscores the Jewish preference for the wrestler over the effortless saint. Angels may be flawless, but they cannot truly fulfill mitzvot that demand overcoming desire. Only flesh-and-blood people, locked in Sartre’s No Exit with their own cravings, can achieve the profound moral heroism the Torah celebrates.
The philosophers see the struggling person as incomplete. The Torah sees him as magnificent. His very conflict testifies to a soul that refuses to surrender to its lower nature. Each victory, born of effort and discomfort, carries a reward proportional to the struggle. And in the world to come, the Sages teach, the yetzer hara itself will be slaughtered before the righteous—not because desire is evil in its essence, but because the righteous have so thoroughly sanctified it through lifelong conquest.
My friends, this coming Shabbat, let us stop wishing for a life without temptation. That is the life of angels, beautiful but limited. Instead, let us embrace the noisy inner room where desire and duty wrestle. Let us say with honesty and courage: “I want this forbidden thing… but my Father in Heaven has commanded otherwise.” In that honest admission and courageous choice lies the path to true greatness.
The struggle against one’s own nature is the most demanding field of human endeavor, for the world is saturated with immediate temptations that pull the soul toward short-term gratification and egoistic gain. In Maimonidean thought, the mark of true greatness is not found in the absence of struggle, but in the cultivation of the Golden Mean—the deliberate training of the intellect to master the “negative impulses” (Yetzer Ha-Ra) that would otherwise lead to excess. This internal discipline is what elevates a person from a creature of instinct to a being of divine character.
By consistently choosing the higher path in moments of desire, an individual performs a spiritual “surgery” on their own character, transforming raw impulse into refined virtue. Ultimately, self-mastery serves as the foundation of all ethical and philosophical perfection, proving that the conquest of the self is a far more heroic feat than the conquest of any external empire..
May we all merit to transform our inner No Exit into an entrance—a doorway into deeper connection with God, greater self-mastery, and the profound joy that comes only from hard-won moral victory.