What does "loving peace" mean?

At Avot 1:12 Hillel urges us to follow the example of Aaron in loving peace and pursuing it. But what does "loving peace" actually entail, in our daily lives?

Where peace does not exist – whether in a military, political, communal or family context – it is a state of affairs that a person can deeply desire. However, where we
have only experienced peace and cannot easily imagine what its absence feels like, it is difficult to love it rather than to take it for granted, because it is always there.

There is no perfect analogy, but one can make a comparison with the air we breathe: it is there all the time and we do not think about it. If anyone were to ask us: “do you love air?” we would probably be surprised at the question and likely to question the sanity of the person asking it. However, if breathable air is in limited supply, as is the case with submarine and space travel, one’s awareness of its importance increases, as does one’s appreciation of it.

In our lives, air is far more plentiful than peace, but the principle is the same. When peace is present, it displays itself as a series of negatives: no conflict, no hostility, no warfare and so on. This makes it hard for us to be aware of it and consequently to love it. Perhaps Hillel is challenging us in this Mishnah to love peace when it is actually with us, as well as to crave it and pursue it when it is not.

Praying for peace: not so easy

Many of us are praying for peace in Ukraine today, whether in general terms for the country as a whole or for friends, relations and Jewish communities who live there. Does Pirkei Avot have any guidance for us in this regard?

Rabbi Shimon ben Netanel (Avot 2:18) gives the apparently obvious and unnecessary advice to be careful when praying. He adds that, when we do pray our prayers should not be routine. Rather, they should be made with feelings and with compassion. Isn't this what prayer is supposed to be, so why bother saying this at all?

For people whose prayers are spontaneous and are not tied to any specific verbal format, this advice is relatively easy to implement. It is much more of a challenge, though, for the Jew who prays daily in accordance with the ancient, well-tried formula of the Amidah, a set of standard blessings and requests that goes back to the early days of the Second Temple period.

The Amidah contains a standard prayer for peace which is its final blessing (the last of 19 on regular weekdays, 7 on Shabbat and most festivals). It is also possible to insert personal prayers at certain points within the template and immediately after its conclusion. The challenge is to have the right thoughts in one's head and the right feelings in one's heart when saying the words provided and of remembering to add one's own prayers when one gets to the places provided for doing so.

By way of example, in the middle of the Amidah there is a prayer for the healing of those who are ill. A special provision exists for mentioning an ailing person by name. Many of us -- particularly since the onset of Covid -- have our own lists of names to pray for. Because this prayer is recited three times daily, it is easy to go on to autopilot and recite this blessing in its entirety before remembering to add a new name to those already prayed for. Later, one becomes practised in adding that name so it is no longer forgotten. Eventually, the mention of that name has become such a deeply ingrained habit that it is hard to remember NOT to pray for that person's recovery once they have either recovered or passed away.

Rabbi Shimon ben Netanel recognises this tendency, which is why he cautions us to pray with compassion, not to mention passion. This requires a degree of awareness of what we say and what we pray for that surpasses the average degree of attention to the things we say and do in the course of the day.

I have added my own prayer for the safely and well-being of everyone in Ukraine, and I am keeping in mind my understanding of its Jewish inhabitants, their anxieties and their state of mind at this time. The challenge for me will be to keep my thoughts fresh and focused on them both during the current conflict and beyond it.

May God grant them safety, security and peace of mind.

Worrying about the cure for worry?

Is having something to worry about part of the human condition? The answer probably depends on how you choose to define "worry". Some people appear to deny they worry at all ("I haven't a care in the world"; "I put my trust in God, so whatever happens is up to Him"; "If things are just meant to be, there's no point worrying about them" etc).  Others treat "worry" as one of those irregular verbs ("I have a reasoned and sincerely motivated concern"; "you worry"; "he is just a neurotic paranoid"). 

My personal belief, based on years of listening to other people talking about their feelings, is that everyone experiences a degree of worry but that (i) the level of worry is patently not the same as between different people, (ii) at different times in their own lives and (iii) when confronted by different issues. However, we do not all use the term "worry" for the same feelings. Also, many people who express the fact that they are worried find it annoying when others tell them "don't be so worried" or "there's nothing to be worried about" since these words do not remove the subject of worry but merely deny the validity of another person's feelings.

Hillel is the only contributor to Pirkei Avot to address the concept of "worry" full-on when (at Avot 2:8) he teaches, as part of a long and complex mishnah: "the more the wealth, the more the worry". These words, like many other teachings of Hillel, are brief and easy to understand. We know in our own lives that it is the rich who are more likely to live in homes that are protected by burglar alarms and security cameras, with barred windows and well-locked doors. These homes are often in areas where an additional level of protection is procured through the hire of neighbourhood security services, whose marked vehicles cruise slowly through areas where theft is thought to be more likely. The homes of those who are less affluent and have less to lose are, if protected at all, far less secure.

Yet Jewish tradition and practice do not condemn worry or the accumulation of wealth per se: these are, after all, only means by which an end may be achieved. Thus a person who works for a living is expected to look beyond the days of his productivity and to put aside the material resources that he will need in order to support himself in retirement. 

Writing a generation before Maimonides, Rabbenu Bachye ibn Paquda touches on the question of worrying about one's wealth in his Chovot HaLevavot, in the Sha'ar HaBitachon (Duties of the Heart, in the section on Trust). Citing Hillel's teaching, he reminds readers that there is an equation that links wealth to worry. In the case of putting aside enough to subsist through one's old age, this is a prudent course of action since it assuages one's worry about facing hunger and poverty when one is no longer able to help oneself. However, the very action of addressing this worry generates further worries: will the amount that a person has put away for this purpose be adequate for the purpose -- since we cannot predict how long we will live -- and will it be safe? In our own generation we have read so many times in the media of the actions of confidence tricksters who have parted pensioners from their savings, as well as of supposedly well-managed pension funds that have been tapped by those responsible for them or damaged by poor investment advice.

Where does all of this leave us? It is difficult to draw firm advice. The most obvious approach for anyone not yet of pensionable age may be to alleviate any worry by investing in a pension scheme -- and then to forget about it since no one knows the day of their death and they may run out of breath before they run out of investments. As usual, readers' thoughts and suggestions are invited.

Priestly blessings and an overdose of piety

In an ideal world where terms of praise are not laden with undercurrents of insult or abuse, it would be good to be called a chasid. This term, infused with the root meaning of chesed, kindness, epitomises the person who seeks to do God's bidding even before he has been commanded to do so (see eg Rabbi Moshe Chaim Luzzatto, Mesilat Yesharim). It is also a fit appellation for anyone who is unselfish with their assets (5:13), slow to anger and quick to calm down (5:14), positive towards the concepts of charity (5:16) as well as learning Torah in public (5:17) and for its own sake (Avot 6:1).

English translations of chasid often employ terms such as "pious" and "devout", which do not do full justice to the word.

Hillel (Avot 2:6) states that an am ha'aretz cannot be a chasid. But what is an am ha'aretz? Unlike chasid -- which is a term of praise -- am ha'aretz is almost always a pejorative term. It is often rendered "ignoramus", "unlearned person", someone who is "common" or "knows not Torah".

Over the years, Hillel's statement has attracted many comments and has been applied to many situations. I have just found another one.

The priestly blessings that the Kohanim administer to a Jewish prayer quorum are a practice of great antiquity, going right back to biblical times (see Numbers 6:22-27). By long-established custom and practice, the congregation do not stare at the Kohanim at the point of delivery of these blessings, but avert their gaze while they listen intently to the Kohanim's words.

Rabbi Eliezer Papo (the 'Pele Yo'etz') in his book Chesed La'Alafim (vol 1, 128:16) notes that some people, in an excess of piety, do not merely avert their eyes from their priestly benefactors but actually turn their backs on them -- presumably to avoid any risk of inadvertently looking up at the Kohanim and watching them at work. Since all a person need do is to cast his or her gaze demurely down to the ground, this act of turning one's back on the Kohanim is a demonstration of an excess of piety -- and this constitutes the behaviour of an am ha'aretz. And that, concludes the Pele Yo'etz, is a practical example of Hillel's teaching that an am ha'aretz cannot be a chasid.

The Tablets of Stone and the invention of literacy

This week's Torah reading deals with the episode of the Golden Calf and Moses' breaking of the two tablets of stone on which were carved the Ten Commandments. This event is not discussed at all in Pirkei Avot, but there is a reference to the tablets of stone and their literary content.

While Avot is famously described as a mishnaic tractate that deals with ethics and moral chastisement, some of its content seems quite remote from that objective. One of the many teachings in the earlier part of the fifth chapter that ostensibly has nothing to do with the perfection (or at least the improvement) of human behaviour is Avot 5:8, which opens with a list of ten things that are said to have been created at twilight on the Sixth Day of Creation, just before the onset of the world's first Sabbath. This list of ten reads as follows:

The mouth of the earth [that swallowed Korach]; the mouth of [Miriam's] well; the mouth of [Balaam's] donkey; the rainbow; the manna; [Moses'] staff; the shamir [worm]; writing script, the manner of writing and the tablets [of the Ten Commandments]. 

Most commentaries on Avot are content to discuss them as they are, but do not look beyond them for any profound moral message. R. Travis Herford (Ethics of the Talmud) acknowledges this when he writes:

"It is not impossible that beneath this list of unique creations ... there is concealed some attempt at the solution of a philosophical problem; but I am unable to define what it was".

Leaving aside the question left open by Reverend Herford, it is pertinent here to consider the tablets and what they contain.

The final three eve-of-Sabbath creations of the ten listed in this mishnah are concerned with the writing and recording of God’s word, and that of man. The precise meaning of the mishnah is however unclear and there is some scope for flexibility in understanding it since the consonants of the Hebrew word for “the manner of writing” ( מִּכתְבָּ , michtav) can also be read as mechatev, meaning “stylus” or “writing implement" (both the commentary ascribed to Rashi and the Machzor Vitry take the word to be mechatev though most modern editions of Avot have michtav).  Ultimately, though, these three items are still all about literacy, and the universal benefits of literacy are so far beyond challenge that to record them here would be otiose. Their inclusion here may have been particularly dear to Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi (who redacted the Mishnah) and those like-minded scholars who reached the conclusion that the time had come to organize the Oral Law and set it down in written format as the six Orders of the Mishnah that we have today. 

While we take it for granted today that the entire Torah shebe’al peh (the Oral Torah tradition) is available in convenient printed and online versions, we should remember that it was at one time a punishable offence to commit the Oral Torah to writing (see Temurah 14b, per Rabbi Abba bar Chiyya in the name of Rabbi Yochanan; also discussion at Gittin 60b).

The significance of putting things into writing is manifold. This gift of God underlines the impermanence of human memory and the value of creating a transmissible record of things that should never be forgotten. In the Torah, God not only provides an authentic text of the Ten Commandments but ensures that Moses makes a verbatim copy of it, not a paraphrase. He also commands the Children of Israel to inscribe the words of the Torah on large stones covered with plaster before crossing the River Jordan and entering Israel, this being a statement to the seventy nations of the World of what it was that the Jewish people stood for (see Devarim 27:1-8 and Rashi there). Writing is thus shown to be both God’s way of making a statement and our own. If you say something and are serious about it, putting it in writing even today is the usual manner of acknowledging that this is so.

A graphic account of Jewish ethics

I have only just heard of The Illustrated Pirkei Avot, published back in 2017. This is the handiwork of a US-based artist, Jessica Tamar Deutsch, and it clearly found favour with the reviewer who wrote it up for the Jewish Book Council in the following terms:

While there are many com­men­taries to choose from, one of the most inter­est­ing and engag­ing is the recent­ly released Illus­trat­ed Pirkei Avot by Jes­si­ca Tamar Deutsch. Nav­i­gat­ing between the seri­ous and whim­si­cal with equal mea­sure, Deutsch has trans­mut­ed every word of Pirkei Avot from the stuff of parch­ment and crin­kled pages to a hand­some, sin­gu­lar col­lec­tion of sequen­tial art and imag­i­na­tion. (For good mea­sure, the entire trac­tate is repro­duced at the back of the book, just in case read­ers want to refer to the orig­i­nal while reading.)

The review continues in the same vein, adding that

Deutsch’s work is a new par­a­digm. It would be too much to say that this work breaks all the rules of nor­ma­tive Tal­mu­dic com­men­tary; that was prob­a­bly nev­er her inten­tion. To the con­trary, the acces­si­bil­i­ty stems from the book’s appeal to all ages in a wel­com­ing way. One could be a schol­ar or a neo­phyte when it comes to learn­ing Tal­mud and still learn some­thing from this work. At times Deutsch inserts a thought that is sep­a­rate from the art (i.e. the sto­ry of Hil­lel and the skull) that adds an ele­ment of reader/​author inter­ac­tion where it might not exist in oth­er commentaries.

I am not averse to the use of graphic art as a means of promoting the message of Avot, as is obvious from the launch of Avot Today's Instagram account. I do however wonder how a young and female artist would handle some of the more sensitive content of Avot, for example Hillel's pronouncement on women in the second perek ("...the more women, the more witchcraft; the more maidservants, the more immorality...", 2:8).

If any reader of this weblog is familiar with the book, can he or she please share any relevant thoughts on it and on the extent to which it succeeds in opening up the content of Pirkei Avot to an audience of people who respond more to images than to the printed word.

***********************************

The Illustrated Pirkei Avot is available from Print-O-Craft Press, Philadelphia Pa. Details here: https://printocraftpress.com/.../the-illustrated-pirkei.../

Torah learning: a tale of pigs and rings

One of the more memorable metaphors in Pirkei Avot can be found among the baraitot with which the tractate concludes. There, Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi opens his teaching in Avot 6:2

Every day a Heavenly Voice emanates from Mount Horeb (i.e. Sinai), proclaiming and saying: "Woe to the creatures who insult the Torah!" For anyone who does not occupy himself in Torah is considered nazuf, as it is said (Proverbs 11:22): "A golden nose-ring in the snout of a pig, [is] a beautiful woman bereft of reason." ...

What is nazuf?

The baraita describes the person who is free to learn Torah, but doesn’t, as someone who is נָזוףּ (nazuf). What exactly does this word mean? No-one else in Avot is called nazuf and it is clearly not a term of endearment. The word is sometimes rendered “outcast”, which is quite good because of its connotations of being shunned or excommunicated. This seems right since the related word nezifah appears in the Talmud as a form of excommunication (see Moed Katan 16a-b, where a discussion focuses on the minimum period of nezifah in Israel and Babylonia. Another related word, nizufim, has been rendered “under divine displeasure”: see Yevamot 72a, Soncino edition).

Many alternatives to “outcast” have been offered. For example, ArtScroll favours “rebuked,” which sounds somewhat genteel: one might rebuke one’s pet dog for stealing a muffin from the tea-table. “Reprobate” (H. Danby, The Mishnah; R. Travers Herferd, The Ethics of the Talmud) has an antiquarian tone to it. “Censured” (Rabbis Avie Gold and Nahum Spirn, Alshich on Avos) suggests someone who has received a reprimand – but no more than that, though “under divine censure” (David N. Barocas’s translation of Me’am Lo’ez) has greater force to it, given the allusion to God's disfavour. “Reprehensible” (Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, Authorised Daily Prayer Book) is somewhat remote, indicating a fitness to be reprimanded or censured rather than a course of action that has actually been taken. All of this goes to show how the impact of a baraita can be increased or diminished by the translator's choice of words.

The pig with a ring at the end of its nose

Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi cites a piece of vivid imagery from the Book of Proverbs to support the notion of the person who insults the Torah being nazuf: “Like a golden nose-ring in the snout of a pig, [so] is a beautiful woman who has turned from reason" (Mishlei 11:22). This looks superficially as though it is a double imagery, since the person who has turned his back on the Torah is likened to a beautiful woman who has gone astray, and she in turn is compared to a pig with a golden ring in its snout. This is not quite the case, though: the pig and the woman are different metaphors. The pig has no idea that the ring has any inherent value or that it is held in high value by others; this symbolic woman on the other hand is presumed to know that the Torah represents a particular set of values but nonetheless rejects them. In each case the Torah is rejected, but the circumstances are quite different.

If we look at commentaries on this verse, we can see that it has been taken to refer to someone who has turned away from Torah (Rashi), presumably in contrast to someone who has never been exposed to the Torah in the first place, as well as to someone who uses his intelligence in order to deceive others (Metzudat David), and even to someone who does learn Torah but, in failing to do so in an appropriate manner, brings shame on his teacher (Malbim, Mussar Chochmah).

As an aside, the most famous ring in the snout of any pig is probably that which appears in Edward Lear’s popular nonsense rhyme, ‘The Owl and the Pussycat', which contains the following lines:

        And there in a wood a Piggy-wig stood
        With a ring at the end of his nose, his nose, his nose,
        With a ring at the end of his nose.
        “Dear Pig, are you willing to sell for one shilling
        Your ring?” Said the Piggy, “I will” …

Known today chiefly for his children’s verses, Lear was also an accomplished artist. Samples of his paintings are currently held in the Israel Museum, Jerusalem, and the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford, England. 

Lear was born into a religious Christian family and visited what is now Israel in the 1850s, making a number of sketches while he was there. It may be wondered whether his idea for incorporating a pig with a ring at the end of its nose into his verse was inspired by his own presumed familiarity with the Book of Proverbs.

Kohanim, clothes and the worth of a good name

Much of this week’s Torah reading of parashat Tetzaveh consists of highly detailed instructions for making, wearing and using the clothes worn by Kohanim when they perform their official duties. Of its 101 verses, a full 50 are dedicated to this theme.

Pirkei Avot makes just one mention of any item of apparel relating to the Kohanim: Rabbi Shimon teaches (Avot 4:17) that there are three crowns—the crowns of Torah, of the priesthood and of kingship—and that the crown of a good name rises above them all.

Many classical commentators do not connect this mishnah with priestly garb. Instead, they treat this teaching as an exercise in mishnah as metaphor. For example:

• The Bartenura regards the three crowns as epitomising virtues that are based on status alone: one should honour the wise, respect that sanctity of the holy and be in fear of the authorities. The crown of a good name is added when these qualities are backed up by good deeds. The commentary ascribed to Rashi agrees, adding that not all of these qualities is found in everyone, whereas the ability to perform good deeds is open to all. Citing Rabbi Moshe Alshakar, Rabbi Shmuel di Uçeda (Midrash Shmuel) offers a variation on this theme: the crown of a good name is a sort of validating factor. A person may be born a Kohen, master the Torah or inherit the kingship, but he cannot truly be said to bear the crown of any of them unless he has acquired a good name too, through his own actions.
  
  
• Rambam, Ritva and others enlarge upon the mishnah by alluding to inherited status, the point being that two of the three crowns were given to Israel as an inheritance. Thus Aaron was entitled by birth to the crown of priesthood and David the crown of kingship. In each case, as Maharam Shik notes, it was Aaron and David respectively who added lustre to their crowns. In contrast, the crown of Torah is open to all. Anyone can become entitled to it and deserve it through their efforts—and it is only through knowledge of Torah that the crown of a truly good name can be obtained.
  
  
• Other commentators take the word “crown” literally. In this mishnah the Hebrew word for “crown” is keter. This word is not found in parashat Tetzaveh or anywhere else in the Torah but it is recorded in the Book of Esther and gained popularity thereafter. Rabbenu Yonah and others treat keter as a synonym for zer—a word found in the Torah that is often translated as “crown” but which the three most popular modern translations—those of Rabbis Kaplan, Steinstalz and Sacks—all render as “rim”. According to this explanation (echoed by the Maharal and Alshich), the zer Shulchan (“rim of the table”) in the Mishkan is the crown of kingship, the zer mizbe’ach (“rim of the altar”) is the crown of priesthood and the zer hakaporet (“rim of the covering of the holy Ark”) indicates the crown of Torah because the Ark housed the two tablets of the Ten Commandments. This explanation, for all its attraction, does not however suggest a compelling basis for comparing these crowns with the crown of a good name.

While mainstream commentators on Avot steer away from linking the crown of the Kohen to any of the priestly apparel mentioned in parashat Tetzaveh, there are others who do. Rabbi Yosef Messas (Nachalat Avot vol 4b, derash 253) links the keter in our mishnah to the tzitz, the pure gold headplate worn by the Kohen Gadol as a means of atoning for the offering up of blood and sacrificial animal parts that were tameh, ritually impure. Having made this connection, Rabbi Messas’ discussion of the mishnah veers off into an investigation of the crown of the Torah, offering no explanation of what the tzitz—which is in any event placed on the forehead and not where a crown would sit—might have to do with the crown of a good name. The Notzer Chesed of Komarno also alludes to the keterbeing the tzitz, in a complex and esoteric kabbalistic explanation of the mishnah that is founded on the Idra Zuta.

So where do these differing approaches to the Kohen’s crown leave us? To summarise: (i) parashat Tetzaveh makes no explicit mention of a crown in its list of clothing and accessories worn by Kohanim; (ii) the parashah mentions two items of headgear only—the mitznefet (a cloth mitre, which is never, it seems, described as a crown) and the tzitz, a headplate that is worn on the forehead; (iii) the majority of commentators on Avot do not connect the word keter in this mishnah with the tzitz; (iv) those commentators who do make the connection do so only in passing and do not seek to relate the tzitz to the notion of there being a crown of a good name that is greater than the crowns of Torah, priesthood and kingship.

I would venture to suggest that the best way to approach Rabbi Shimon’s Mishnah is to start by asking what it is about. From his choice of words it does not appear that he was seeking to establish, as some commentators have suggested, that the crown of Torah was greater than those of priesthood and kingship, or to draw a distinction between inherited and acquired status. It also appears that his objective was to emphasise the value of a good name, regardless of a person’s status (as in the case of kings and Kohanim) or achievements (as in the case of Torah scholars). The selection of the word keter, which is not found in the Torah, suggests that the Tanna did not intend to import any reference to the Torah’s text, to the zer or to the tzitz of the Kohen Gadol. Rather, as both the Bartenura and the commentary ascribed to Rashi indicate, Rabbi Shimon was employing a metaphor.

If we take this view, our mishnah can be read together with the teaching of another Shimon—this time Shimon HaTzaddik (Avot 1:2)—that the world stands on three things: Torah, Temple service and acts of kindness. These correspond to the realm of the Torah scholar, the Kohen and the monarch (see Berachot 3b on the expectation that the king will provide sustenance for his subjects). Some Torah scholars, priests and kings have a reputation that is tarnished (eg the apostate scholar Elisha ben Avuyah; the early Kohen Gadol Eli; kings Achav, Menashe); others have a good name (eg Rabbi Akiva; Aaron; David). In the first case, it is the status that enhances the man. In the second, it is the man who adds lustre to the status.

A name made great...

At Avot 1:13, Hillel teaches that a name made great is a name destroyed (there are many nuanced translations of the original words, but this is their gist).

I have been reading today that Eric Lander, head of President Biden's Office of Science and Technology Policy, has stepped down from his important and high-profile position in the wake of the findings of a White House review that he had mistreated staff.

Although Lander was well-known in his field of expertise, genetics, he was unknown to many of us until June 2021, when he was sworn in on a 500-year-old edition of Pirkei Avot in preference to the more conventional choice of a bible. This decision attracted a great deal of publicity, and indeed much approval too. For, while the bible is a closed book to many people today, the choice of Avot -- a treatise on ethics and good behaviour -- sent out a message of commitment to its content.

While Avot calls for us to treat other people with respect and to control our anger, the findings of the White House review are reported to have found that Lander's conduct did not match up to those standards.

Now, sadly, the name of Eric Lander is all over the internet. He is not merely a high-placed official who has left his post on account of work-related issues. While the mainstream media do not pick up on Lander's commitment to Jewish ethics (or at least have not yet done so to my knowledge), the Jewish media have been quick to do so. Thus, for example,

• "Lander, who is Jewish, was sworn into office on a 1492 edition of Pirkei Avot ... and has spoken about Jewish values guiding his work" (Times of Israel)
• "White House science advisor who was sworn in on book of Jewish ethics steps down after review finds he mistreated staff" (Jewish Telegraphic Agency).

What should our response be? Avot tells us not to be hasty to judge others (1:1), to look on the conduct of others favourably where it is possible to do so (1:6) and to remember that we are not in the position of the person we judge (2:5). Had we been so, are we so sure that we would have done any better? This is not to condone any acts of wrongdoing, but rather to help us to focus on judging the acts and not the entirety of the person who commits them -- and also to strengthen our own commitment to compliance with the standards set by Avot whenever we are able to do so.

What the blazes! The fox, the scorpion and the snake

One of the three teachings of Rabbi Eliezer ben Hyrcanus in Avot 2:15 runs as follows:

Warm yourself by the fire of the sages, but be beware in case you get burned by its embers; for their bite is the bite of a fox, their sting is the sting of a scorpion, their hiss is the hiss a snake, and all their words are like fiery coals.

This is a curious mishnah because of its change of metaphor. If the words of the chachamim ("sages") are like fiery coals, the fire metaphor could have been sustained through a three-fold reference to pain that fire can generate: being burned, scorched or scalded. Instead, Rabbi Eliezer opts for metaphors from the animal kingdom. Why might he have done this?

The three creatures chosen by Rabbi Eliezer – the fox, the scorpion and the snake – are not exclusive to this mishnah: they also populate the books of the Jewish Bible as well as the oral traditions recorded in the Mishnah, Talmud and Midrash. Apart from the fact that the addressees of this teaching 2,000 years ago would have been considerably more familiar with them than we are today, the fox, scorpion and snake are redolent with symbolic significance. It is possible therefore that Rabbi Eliezer’s decision to select them for this mishnah is based on metaphorical or symbolic considerations.

If this is so, what might those considerations be, bearing in mind that snakes and scorpions are sometimes bracketed together (see e.g. Avot 5:7; Rashi at Bereshit 37:24 citing Bereshit Rabbah) while the author of this mishnah clearly distinguishes between them in terms of their threat to the person who is not wary of the words of the sages?

One possible explanation is that the choice contrasts the respective symbolic responses of the fox, scorpion and snake. The fox represents a crafty and resourceful mind. While we are cautioned about foxes elsewhere in Avot (“Be a tail to lions rather than a head to foxes”: Avot 4:20), they are favourably portrayed in the Talmud (Rashi to Sanhedrin 39a). The bite of the fox here may thus be taken as an allusion to the mental agility of the Torah scholar who, when arguing with others, baits his trap, waits for his adversary to fall straight into it – and then bites.

In contrast with the cunning of the fox, whose position is carefully thought out with a view to getting the better of an opponent, the sting of the scorpion is a spontaneous reflex action, something that is so deeply ingrained in its nature that the urge to use it cannot be resisted. This sting is in the tail – you just don’t see it coming. In this mishnah we can imagine this to be the sharp response or penetrating repartee that we recognize in the unanswerable put-down or “one-liner” that leaves its recipient literally speechless, a verbal knock-out blow that may be out of the speaker’s mouth almost before he even realizes that he is saying it.

This leaves us with the snake. Bible readers will need no reminder that this is the creature which the Torah describes as “more cunning than any of the beasts of the field” (Bereshit 3:1), whose seductive arguments led to the Fall of Man. The punishment of the snake included the loss of its legs (Bereshit 3:14) but, notably, not to the loss of its cunning. In the context of this mishnah we can learn that one should not take liberties with the chachamim: with their carefully-chosen words they will get the better of you even if it first seems that, in pressing their case, they “don’t have a leg to stand on".

Incidentally, the “cunning” snake in Bereshit is termed in Hebrew a nachash, essentially a hissing snake, while this mishnah refers to a saraf, a snake which ‘burns’ with its venom. The nachash may however also be venomous, as is implicit from Avot 5:7, and a reference to a chacham as being a nachash might be taken disparagingly, as suggesting that what is assumed to be his Torah learning is in fact no more than his cunning. To call a chacham a saraf does not import the same implication.

Avot in Retrospect: a summary of last month's blogposts

In case you missed them, here's a list of items posted on Avot Today in January 2022:

Friday 28 January 2022: Sponges, funnels, strainers, sieves: Different students of the Torah (or indeed anything else) have different qualities -- which may be good or bad, depending on your view (Avot 5:18). 

Wednesday 26 January 2022: Slow and steady? Is it better to be quick to learn and quick to forget, or the other way round?The fifth perek of Avot discusses.

Sunday 23 January 2022: The Golem, speaking first and interrupting others: Avot 5:9 contrasts the golem with the chacham -- the person who is wise. One of the places they meet is in the field of dialogue. We discuss here a couple of key issues involving control of a conversation.

Friday 21 January 2022:  So long, Meat Loaf: the death of Bat out of Hell composer Michael Lee Aday marks the end of an era for rock music. Here we look at a line from one of his songs.

Thursday 20 January 2022: Something old, something new: a long-published book comes up for review: a 1993 work on modern Jewish ethics falls into our hands. We take a look at its treatment of Avot and the contextualisation of its commentary.

Tuesday 18 January 2022: When you are standing in my place... : What lesson does Hillel teach us about the Colleyville hostage incident?

Friday 14 January 2022: Fire that the rain won't extinguish: one of the 10 miracles that occurred in the Temple may convey a powerful message to us today.

Monday 10 January 2022: Buying a book: benefit of the doubt: Even a simple thing like buying a book from a second-hand shop can look like theft. Is the buyer entitled to be regarded as innocent when the circumstantial evidence is against him?

Thursday 6 January 2022: Conceding the truth: Why can it be more difficult to justify a mistake than to correct it?  Avot looks at truth.

Wednesday 5 January 2022: Whatever happened to the Ten Tests of Jacob?  The ten trials of Abraham are a popular feature of Avot, at 5:4 -- but why not mention his grandson too?

*********************************

Avot Today blogposts for December 2021 here
Avot Today blogposts for November 2021 here
Avot Today blogposts for October 2021 here
Avot Today blogposts for September 2021 here
Avot Today blogposts for August 2021 here
Avot Today blogposts for July 2021 here