RAMBAM'S INTRODUCTION TO PEREK CHELEK, THE NINTH CHAPTER OF MASECHET SANHEDRIN

THE FOLLOWING IS AN EXCERPT FROM THE RAMBAM'S INTRODUCTION TO THE NINTH PEREK. NOTE THAT HE, LIKE THE MAHARSHA, HAS VERY SHARP CRITICISM OF THOSE WHO FAIL TO UNDERSTAND
​THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN HALACHA AND AGGADATA

...You must know that the words of the sages are differently interpreted by three groups of people.
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The first group is the largest one. I have observed them, read their books, and heard about them. They accept the teachings of the sages in their simple literal sense and do not think that these teachings contain any hidden meaning at all. They believe that all sorts of impossible things must be. They hold such opinions because they have not understood science and are far from having acquired knowledge. They possess no perfection which would rouse them to insight from within, nor have they found anyone else to stimulate them to profounder understanding. They, therefore, believe that the sages intended no more in their carefully emphatic and straightforward utterances than they themselves are able to understand with inadequate knowledge. They understand the teachings of the sages only in their literal sense, in spite of the fact that some of their teachings when taken literally, seem so fantastic and irrational that if one were to repeat them literally, even to the uneducated, let alone sophisticated scholars, their amazement would prompt them to ask how anyone in the world could believe such things true, much less edifying.

The members of this group are poor in knowledge. One can only regret their folly. Their very effort to honor and to exalt the sages in accordance with their own meagre understanding actually humiliates them. As God lives, this group destroys the glory of the Torah of God and say the opposite of what is intended. For He said in His perfect Torah, “The nation is a wise and understanding people” (Deut. 4:6). But this group expounds the laws and the teachings of our sages in such a way that when the other peoples hear them they say that this little people is foolish and ignoble.

The worst offenders are preachers who preach and expound to the masses what they themselves do not understand. Would that they keep silent about what they do not know, as it is written: “If only they would be utterly silent, it would be accounted to them as wisdom” (Job 13:5). Or they might at least say, “We do not understand what our sages intended in this statement, and we do not know how to explain it.” But they believe they do understand, and they vigorously expound to the people what they think rather than what the sages really said. They, therefore, give lectures to the people on the tractate Berakhot and on this present chapter, and other texts, expounding them word-for-word according to their literal meaning.
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The second group is also a numerous one. It, too, consists of persons who, having read or heard the words of the sages, understand them according to their simple literal sense and believe that the sages understand them according to their simple literal sense... Inevitably, they ultimately declare the sages to be fools, hold them up to contempt, and slander what does not deserve to be slandered. They imagine that their own intelligence is of a higher order than that of the sages, and that the sages were simpletons who suffered from inferior intelligence. The members of this group are so pretentiously stupid that they can never attain genuine wisdom. Most of these who have stumbled into this error are involved with medicine or astrology. They regard themselves as cultivated men, scientist, critics, and philosophers. How remote they are from true humanity compared to real philosophers! They are more stupid than the first group; many of them are simply fools.

This is an accursed group, because they attempt to refute men of established greatness whose wisdom has been demonstrated to competent men of science. If these fools had worked at science hard enough to know how to write accurately about theology and similar subjects both for the masses and for the educated, and if they understood the relevance of philosophy, then they would be in a position to understand whether the sages were in fact wise or not, and the real meaning of their teachings would be clear to them.

There is a third group. Its members are so few in number that it is hardly appropriate to call them a group, except in the sense in which one speaks of the sun as a group (or species) of which it is the only member. This group consists of men whom the greatness of our sages is clear. They recognize the superiority of their intelligence from their words which point to exceedingly profound truths. Even though this third group is few and scattered, their books teach the perfection which was achieved by the authors and the high level of truth which they had attained. The members of this group understand that the sages knew as clearly as we do the difference between the impossibility of the impossible and the existence of that which must exist. They know that the sages did not speak nonsense, and it is clear to them that the words of the sages contain both an obvious and a hidden meaning. Thus, whenever the sages spoke of things that seem impossible, they were employing the style of riddle and parable which is the method of truly great thinkers. For example, the greatest of our wise men (Solomon) began his book by saying: “To understand an analogy and a metaphor, the words of the wise and their riddles” (Prov. 1:6).

All students of rhetoric know the real concern of a riddle is with its hidden meaning and not with its obvious meaning, as: “Let me now put forth a riddle to you” (Judges 14:12). Since the words of the sages all deal with supernatural matters which are ultimate, they must be expressed in riddles and analogies. How can we complain if they formulate their wisdom in analogies and employ such figures of speech as are easily understood by the masses, especially when we note that the wisest of all men did precisely that, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit? I have in mind Solomon in Proverbs, the Song of Songs, and parts of Ecclesiastes.

It is often difficult for us to interpret words and to educe their true meaning from the form in which they are contained so that their real inner meaning conforms to reason and corresponds with truth. This is the case even with Holy Scriptures. The sages themselves interpreted Scriptural passages in ​such a way as to educe their inner meaning from literal sense, correctly considering these passages to be figures of speech, just as we do. Examples are their explanations of the following passages: “he smote the two altar-hearths of Moab; he went down also and slew a lion in the midst of a pit” (II Sam. 23:20); “Oh, that one would give me water to drink of the well of Bethlehem” (ibid. 23:15). The entire narrative of which these passages are a part was interpreted metaphorically. Similarly, the whole Book of Job was considered by many of the sages to be properly understood only in metaphoric terms. The dead bones of Ezekiel (Ezek. 37) were also considered by one of the rabbis to make sense only in metamorphic terms. Similar treatment was given to other passages of this sort.

Now if you, reader, belong to either of the first two groups, pay no attention to my words nor to anything else in this section. You will not like it. On the contrary, it will irritate you, and you will hate it. How could a person who is accustomed to eating large amounts of harmful food find simple food in small quantities appealing, even though they are good for him? On the contrary, he will actually find them irritating and he will hate them. Do you not recall the reaction of the people who were accustomed to eating onions, garlic, fish, and the like? They said: “Now our soul is dried away; there is nothing at all; we have naught save this manna to look to” (Num. 11:6).
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But if you belong to the third group, when you encounter a word of the sages which seems to conflict with reason, you will pause, consider it, and realize that this utterance must be a riddle or a parable. You will sleep on it, trying anxiously to grasp its logic and its expression, so that you may find its genuine intellectual intention and lay hold of a direct faith, as Scripture says: “To find out words of delight, and that which was written uprightly, even words of truth” (Eccles. 12:10). If you consider my book in this spirit, with the help of God, it may be useful to you. 

​הלהות מלכים ומלחמותיהם
 Rambam's sefer shoftim - last section, perek 12

This is an extremely important place to learn a central aspect of Aggadata​. If one is not familiar with Rambam's strong statements above and dives into this section of his Sefer Shoftim, what might he make of Perek 11 in which Rambam brings extensive material on Melech Mashiach - what he will do and not do. One might believe, and worse teach, that these are the views of the Rambam. 

Yet, if one is knowledgable about Rambam's views, he will not be surprised when he arrives at the final perek - Perek 12. 
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״אל יעלה על הלב שבימות המשיח יבטל דבר ממנהגו של עולם, או יהיה שם חידוש במעשה בראשית אלא עולם כמנהגו נוהג, וזה שנאמר בישעיה וגר זאב עם כבש ונמר עם גדי ירבץ משל וחידה ענין הדבר שיהיו ישראל יושבין לבטח עם רשעי עכו״ם המשולים כזאב ונמר...
וכן כל כיוצא באלו הדברים בענין המשיח הם משלים...

We also saw this stressed in the writing of Shimshon Rafael Hirsch:
    "I admit unashamedly that I never made an effort to get to the root of these matters just as I never found myself curious to inquire about the nature of olom ha-bo, the world after the resurrection of the dead, and related matters. For the reality of these matters is of those  hidden from human vision and it is impossible to know them with absolute clarity. Whatever is said about them is no more than a guess - however close - at what may be the truth; and there is no obligation upon Jews to know these and related matters."