Rabbi Shimon ben Yehudah used to say in the name of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, “Beauty, strength, wealth, honour, wisdom, old age, venerable old age and children are fitting for the righteous and fitting for the world”.
It then breaks off into a string of proof verses that either do or don't prove the point of the Baraita, whatever that might be. The usual reading of this teaching is that the eight things listed in it are, well, fitting for the righteous (a class of people who are sometimes assumed to be rabbis).
Looking againat this Baraita,
I wondered whether it might actually convey quite the opposite meaning to the normal one. This would be the case if the eight things listed are not rewards or privileges, but instead impositions for anyone who posssesses them. In other words, this is a list of burdens that place responsibility on whoever is burdened with them. How does this work? Let us
take each term in order:
· Beauty: a person’s physical
beauty is a snare and a delusion, an external asset that deteriorates over time.
An earlier Mishnah (4:27) has already warned us of the danger of taking people at face value, and the
Book of Proverbs (31:30) emphasizes that it is a false value (“Favor is false and beauty is vanity”). Only a person with a strong moral backbone can be sure to cope with the
pressures and expectations placed upon them by the perception of others that
they are beautiful.
· Strength: As Ben Zoma
explains above (4:1), strength
is defined in terms of the ability to exercise self-discipline in controlling
oneself. Given the powerful pull of a
person’s evil inclination, having the strength to overcome it would seem to be
an essential and ever-present weapon in the tzaddik’s armory of middot.
The sad lot of the tzaddik is that his evil inclination is stronger than
that of others, so he has need of greater strength to combat it (Sukkah 52a).
· Wealth: Hillel the Elder
has already taught (2:8), “the more the wealth, the more the worry”. Again, strength of character and moral rectitude are required if a person is to
pass the test of affluence. While we can
all be rich—since the one who is truly rich is the person who is content with
his portion (4:1)—this
is something that applies to everyone, whether they are tzaddikim or otherwise.
· Honour: of the eight items
listed in this Baraita, none is as potentially toxic as honour: it is the only
one that has the potential to kill a man spiritually stone dead (4:28). An ordinary individual runs the risk of chasing honor when it is as yet
unearned, and of letting it get to his head even if it has been fairly earned.
A tzaddik will however be able to handle its toxicity and treat it in
the way Avot prescribes, by giving it to others (4:1 again) and by according it to the Torah (4:8)
· Wisdom: like honor, wisdom
can be dangerous in the hands of someone who lacks the requisite moral
framework within which to utilize it. Pharaoh invoked wisdom when deciding to
deal with his “Jewish Problem” (Exodus 1:10: "Come, let us deal wisely with them..."): this misdirected wisdom could have resulted in the extinction of the Children
of Israel but instead caused Pharaoh’s personal humiliation and the destruction
of his own fighting force. Balaam’s attempts at prophecy could not harm Israel
but his wise counsel did, when he advised Balak on how to break the desert
nation’s commitment to God (Numbers 31:16). Few men of their generation were as wise
as King David’s counsellor Achitophel (Chagigah 15b; Bemidbar Rabbah 22) and King Saul’s chief herdsman Doeg (Chagigah 15b; Tehillim Rabbah 52:4), yet their intellectual prowess was ill matched with their scheming
politics. The harsh reality is that wisdom is only safe in the hands of someone
who can be trusted—and that is a massive responsibility, as Moses discovered
when he was the only person who possessed the necessary wisdom to resolve his people’s
disputes (Exodus18:13-26).
· Early old age: 60 or
thereabouts is the time when a person becomes conscious of the fact that, while
he may feel no different on the inside, he is starting to look old. Without a
firm moral basis that supports a tzaddik, the drive to “have a final
fling” or to yield to what is euphemistically called a “midlife crisis” can be overwhelming.
· Venerable old age: the
Talmud (Shabbat 152a) reports the words of Barzillai the Gileadite (2 Samuel 19:35) to the effect that, on reaching the ripe old age of 80, there was no longer
much pleasure to be derived from life in the King’s court. The diminution of one’s senses of sight, taste
and hearing can weigh heavily on someone whose pleasures depend on them, but a tzaddik
will not complain to God about his sad and feeble state. Rather, he should be
well equipped to be able to take the disappointments and the tribulations of
advanced old age as a time to recall with gratitude his earlier days and the
opportunities he once had to serve others. Now is the time to reflect on the
opportunities that he can give others to do acts of kindness for him.
· Children: one does not
need a Torah source to support the proposition, evidenced by life itself, that
bringing up children can take its toll on even a loving parent. The price one pays
for parenting can be steep in terms of time, effort, frustration, sleep
deprivation, temper control and general inconvenience. Nor is there any point
at which one can predict that the responsibility for raising one’s children
will end. For a true tzaddik none of this is a burden.
