DEUT1731 The philosophers have already explained how the bodily forces of man in his youth prevent the development of moral principles. In a greater measure this is the case as regards the purity of thought which man attains through the perfection of those ideas that lead him to an intense love of God. Man can by no means attain this so long as his body humors are hot. The more the forces of his body are weakened, and the fire of passion quenched, in the same measure does man's intellect increase in strength and light; his knowledge becomes pure, and he is happy with his knowledge. When this perfect man is stricken in age and his near death, his knowledge mightily increases, his joy in that knowledge grows greater, and his love for the object of his knowledge more intense, and it is in this great delight that the soul separates from the body. To the state our Sages referred when in reference to the death of Moses, Aaron and Miriam, they said the death was in these three cases nothing but a kiss. They say this: We learned from the words, "And Moses the servant of the Lord died there in the land of Moab by the mouth of the Lord," that his death was a kiss. The same expression is used of Aaron: "And Aaron the priest went up into Mount Hor… By the mouth of the Lord, and died there." (Numbers 33:38. Our sages said that the same was the case with Miriam; but the phrase "by the mouth of the Lord" is not employed [Numbers 20:1-AJL], because it was not considered appropriate to use these words in the description of her death as she was a female. The meaning of the saying is that these three died in the midst of the pleasure derived from the knowledge God and their great love for Him. Maimonides.