For the source text click/tap here: Avodah Zarah 46
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Our Gemara discusses a case of avanim she-nidaldelu – rocks that broke off of the mountain (Rabbeinu Ḥananel suggests that they did not break off entirely but are now only partially connected to the mountain). If someone were to pray to these rocks, would they become forbidden, or will we argue that they still have had no human intervention and as such will remain permitted? The Gemara presents two opinions on this matter – Rabbi Yoḥanan and Rabbi Ḥiyya’s sons, Ḥizkiyya and Yehuda. According to one of them the fact that there has been no human intervention is most important, and we are not concerned with the fact that the rocks are no longer connected to the mountain, since animals, too, are not connected, yet they cannot become forbidden.
We explore the demythologization of nature in the TORAH and the remythologiation in kabbalah and chassidut.