"Rabbi Jacob said: 'One who walks on the road and studies [Torah], and interrupts his study and remarks, 'How beautiful is this tree! How beautiful is this landscape!' Scripture considers it as if he were guilty of a mortal sin."
-- Mishnah, Ethics of Our Fathers, 3:7 -- studied throughout the Jewish world on this Sabbath.
 
The question is obvious.
 
The person who interrupts his Torah study to marvel at the beauty of nature is essentially celebrating the workings of the divine creator of our magnificent and brilliantly designed universe. Why would this be considered a grave sin?
 
 
Some have erroneously deduced from this that Torah rejects nature, that focusing on the splendor and exquisiteness of our world is nothing short of vanity.
 
This is a profoundly mistaken view. Much of Scripture enjoins human beings to contemplate the workings of nature as a tool to appreciate the divine reality behind nature. A major part of our daily morning prayers consists of just this exercise: to marvel at the diversity and artistry of our physical universe as witnesses to the underlying reality of G-d.   
 
"G-d led Adam around the Garden of Eden and said, 'Look at My works, see how beautiful they are! How exquisite! For your sake I created them all. See to it that you do not spoil or destroy My world -- for if you do, there will be no one to repair it after you," the Midrash states (1). Maimonides writes in his legal code (2) that the way to achieve love of G-d is by contemplating the extraordinary brilliance and dazzling beauty of His universe.
 
What is more, according to Jewish law (3), there is a prescribed blessing that is to be recited at the sight of beautiful creatures and beautiful trees. This means that when an individual who is traveling and learning encounters a particularly beautiful tree he is, perhaps, obligated to take a break from the learning and recite a blessing to G-d for this creation. If anything, this individual may be performing a Mitzvah, not a sin.
 
Three answers

Various commentators over the ages have presented different answers to these questions. Some argued that the Mishnah was not attempting to ridicule or denigrate an appreciation of nature's majestic empire, but rather to make clear that one ought not to equate its significance with the study of Torah. Notwithstanding the importance of developing an appreciation for G-d's awesome world, it pales in comparison with the study of Torah which, as the Kabbalists put it, captures G-d's most essential and intimate wisdom and will (4).
 
Other commentators suggested a more pragmatic approach. During Rabbi Jacob's days, most of the oral tradition of Judaism had not been transcribed. The students needed to memorize lots of material and they typically enjoyed memorizing their lessons while strolling outdoors. (Such peripatetic memorization is still practiced today in some parts of the Middle East.) Since they were, naturally, tempted to shift their attention from studying to the surrounding scenic views, the Mishnah specifically warned against this.
 
The art of integration

One of the most profound and powerful metaphors of the Baal Shem Tov (1698-1760), founder of the Chassidic movement, illustrated this point in a dramatic way.
 
Once, while lecturing to his students on the genesis of the love-sensation, the Baal Shem Tov employed the following metaphor.
 
A great king once craved to build a profound and loving relationship with one of his subjects. Knowing that a direct visit by him might overwhelm his subject, the king sent an emissary to communicate a message of friendship and love.
 
The man became so excited over the visit of the king's personal emissary that he would not let him leave his home. He was completely intoxicated by the presence of the king's messenger.
 
Do you know the end of the story? The man remained with the king's messenger for the remainder of his life. He never made it to the king himself.
 
This is a strange story, yet according to the Baal Shem Tov, it captures the story of many a life.
 
G-d craves to reach out to each of us and build a profound and meaningful relationship. However, knowing that we might be incapable of grasping G-d's direct metaphysical language, He garbs His passion in a vernacular we can readily relate to.
 
Every existing reality is, in truth, an aspect of G-d's reality, a messenger of G-d. Therefore, when you experience an attraction to people or things, they are essentially the divine messengers to inspire you with a love toward G-d. What seem at first glance to be mundane, brute and even profane attractions or temptations directed toward material and coarse entities are external appearances of a spiritually divine core. G-d is communicating through a messenger.
 
Sometimes this means we should neglect the messenger and instead go to the source. Why spend time with the king's messenger when we can embrace the king himself? At other times this means we ought to see the divine via the messenger (6). 
 
The tragedy is that some of us remain infatuated with the messenger and we never notice the message. We become consumed by the external dimension of the attraction, and fail to pay heed to its inner resonance.
 
The serpent's perspective
 
This was the mistake Adam and Eve made in the Garden of Eden. The forbidden tree was very attractive, desirable and delicious. The serpent explained to Eve that the tree was the substitute for G-d. Either you can submit to G-d's orders and remain subdued, subservient and meek, crushed under the burden of the Lord's "tyranny" or you can, once and for all, assert your independence and become your own god. Either you live a life of surrender to G-d or you achieve autonomy, pursuing your pleasures and attractions notwithstanding G-d.
 
 
The serpent was persuasive but wrong. Desire and attraction -- even lust -- are not servants of the devil; they are divine communication to us. We and the entire universe are a "part" of G-d, an aspect of His reality. By eating from the attractive tree, contrary to G-d's instructions, Adam and Eve fell prey to the perception that attraction to physical beauty is not part of our relationship to G-d. They failed to recognize that all attraction and temptation was an attempt by G-d to initiate a dialogue with His beloved children. They allowed the temptation to define them, rather than ensuring that they would define the temptation and its ultimate meaning.
 

the living presence of G-d saturates all of reality! What appears externally as secular pulsates internally with spirituality and G-dliness.