Judging others -- again

One of the most frequently-cited teachings in Pirkei Avot comes early on in the tractate, when Yehoshua ben Perachyah says:

"...judge everyone favourably" (Avot 1:6).

This, the standard ArtScroll Publications translation, is found in the same or highly similar form in many other translations (see eg Rabbis S. R. Hirsch and E. Prins, Irving M. Bunim)-- but is this the actual meaning? The Hebrew is a little longer and more nuanced, alluding to set of scales on which a person's merit is to be weighed:

וֶהֱוֵי דָן אֶת כָּל הָאָדָם לְכַף זְכוּת

 Many English translations pick this up. Thus Rabbi Shmuel Rabinovitz (Rabbi of the Western Wall) rendered it in the Jerusalem Post last week as

"Judge all men with the scale weighted in their favor".

while Chabad.org opts for the rather less idiomatic

"... judge every man to the side of merit"

Some scholars have produced not so much a translation as an explanation. Thus we find Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks offering

"...give everyone the benefit of the doubt".

There is a long and respectable tradition of taking this view of the mishnah -- and giving someone the benefit of the doubt is a noble sentiment. One wonders however if this is what the author of this mishnah really intended; he did after all speak of the "merit" of someone other than oneself, not "doubt", something we harbour in our own minds.

Commentators on this mishnah explain how important it is to see the good in others, how this is an essential part of learning how to see the good in oneself, how difficult it is to appreciate the motives that drive other people's actions, and so on. These explanations tend to be highly focused on Yehoshua ben Perachyah's teaching alone and sometimes fail to examine it within the context of other teachings in Avot.

The very next mishnah points to a problem in judging all others on a scale of merit. There (at 1:7), Nittai He'Arbeli urges people:

"Distance yourself from a bad neighbour and do not associate with a wicked person".

The very process of determining that someone is a bad neighbour or a wicked person involves not only having to judge them without first having been in their position (contrary to Avot 2:5) but also having to judge them unfavourably and in accordance with not their merits but their demerits. Additionally, the recognition and acceptance that a bad person is indeed bad is in line with the mishnah which teaches that one should concede that the truth is the truth (5:9).

Much of Pirkei Avot involves juggling conflicting ethical guidelines, and this is where the real challenge of humanity lies. There are times when it is right to judge favourably, to judge unfavourably -- and sometimes not to judge at all. There are also times when judging another person's state of mind is required in order to respond appropriately -- for example by being able to assess whether a person needs comfort and moral support, on the one hand, or solitude and personal space on the other (as in Avot 4:23). This is what makes the study of Avot so relevant today, as members of a society in which boundaries, attitudes and mores are constantly in motion.