Meiri, Masoret and Mnemonics

In Avot 3:17 Rabbi Akiva teaches a mishnah that is all to do with protective measures. It reads, in relevant part, as follows:

רַבִּי עֲקִיבָא אוֹמֵר: מַסֹּֽרֶת סְיָג לַתּוֹרָה, מַעְשְׂרוֹת סְיָג לָעֹֽשֶׁר, נְדָרִים סְיָג לַפְּרִישׁוּת, סְיָג לַחָכְמָה שְׁתִיקָה

In English: Rabbi Akiva used to say: “Tradition is a fence for the Torah, tithing a fence for wealth, vows a fence for abstinence; a fence for wisdom is silence”.

That the first-mentioned fence is מַסֹּֽרֶת (masoret, “tradition”) is almost unanimously accepted by the commentators, though inevitably there is some scope for discussion as to precisely what “tradition” Rabbi Akiva has in mind. It has been taken to be the written text of the Tanach, the canon of books that are holy to the Jewish people. Rabbi Yitzchak Magriso, in Me’am Lo’ez, takes the view that it applies specifically to the Five Books of Moses, tying the word masoret to the notion of the Masoretic text. Following the Bartenura, Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau (Yachel Yisrael) explains that Rabbi Akiva means the oral tradition of spellings and pronunciations of words contained in the written Torah. It may however also mean the oral tradition of the unwritten Torah, which is the very substance of Avot: this appear to be the view preferred by ArtScroll Publications’ Rabbi Meir Zlotowitz.

Browsing through the recently-published English translation of the Meiri’s commentary on Avot in his Bet HaBechirah, (details here), I spotted a quite different view of this teaching. While also endorsing the notion of masoret mentioned above, the Meiri initially reads the mishnah as teaching that it is מסרות (masarot, “mnemonics”) that are a fence to the Torah. They protect the Torah from being forgotten by providing handy ways for people to remember their learning with greater facility. Visually, the two words are almost identical: מסרת and מסרות.

My first thought was that the Meiri’s position here was unique, but subsequent investigation revealed that he was not alone. The same explanation is given by Rabbi Shlomo Adani (1567-1629) in his Melechet Shlomo, citing HaRav Rav Yehosef on this matter.

My second thought was that the suggestion that Rabbi Akiva had endorsed the use of memory aids was anachronistic, because memory aids seem to be creatures of the Talmud rather than the Mishnah. But here too I was wrong: while mnemonics are not common in the Mishnah, I have learned of the existence of two of them (Menachot 11:4 and Nazir 6:2). In both cases the Tanna in whose name the mnemonic was taught was a talmid of Rabbi Akiva himself—they were Rabbi Yehudah and Rabbi Yose respectively. I expect that there are other examples and hope to find them.

So can we deduce whether Rabbi Akiva, in teaching that something was a fence to protect the Torah, had in mind “tradition” or “mnemonics”? While both are feasible, my feeling is that tradition is the better bet. Rabbi Akiva lived, and died, in an era in which Torah teaching was prohibited and in which he and his colleagues carried on teaching at risk to their lives. Some, including Rabbi Akiva, were martyred for doing so. He surrendered his life for the principle that Torah should be taught and transmitted from generation to generation; without transmission there would be no Torah. If his words in this mishnah are read as an exhortation to others to follow his example and teach Torah wherever and whenever they could, Jewish life and Jewish values would be saved.

Life as a journey: Pirkei Avot, Waze and means

Within the annual cycle of weekly Torah readings, Masei is not among the most popular; nor is it one of the most enthusiastically studied. Masei is not associated with any festivals or pleasures. Indeed it is always read in the Three Weeks, a period of increasing solemnity that culminates with the great outpouring of grief that is Tisha be’Av. The few mitzvot associated with Masei have a solemn flavour too, since they include several laws that deal with the consequences of homicide, whether intentional or accidental. The haftarah, one of the three that warn Israel of impending disaster, is studded with words of vituperative criticism as Jeremiah lambasts his people for deserting God in favour of the vacuous pleasures of idolatry.

The parashah however opens with a lengthy travelogue, listing the 42 places at which the Children of Israel encamped, however briefly, during their four-decade sojourn in the wilderness. While some of these places are unknown to us, many commentators on the Torah have commented on the significance of the journey which encompassed them. In short, the Jews are a people on the move. As has often been observed, the Hebrew term for Jewish law is halachah, from the root הלך, “go”. This is because life is a journey and the law consists of a collection of pointers that direct us along the route we are to travel in our lives as we head for our ultimate destination—a deeper understanding and appreciation of the God we serve through compliance with those halachot.

The Jew on a journey is a theme which is reflected in Avot, where the Tannaim discuss the path in life that a person is supposed to follow. Halachah is the journey we must undertake, but in order to do so we must find the derech, the actual path along which we travel and which best suits our abilities and our needs. Like the popular navigation app Waze, Pirkei Avot can help us find the right combination of paths to take us to our intended destination.

Effectively, halachah provides the framework within which we live, but it does not dictate how we live. A person can avoid transgressing every one of the Torah’s 365 prohibitions by locking himself away and doing nothing, and can tick the box for each mitzvah he or she performs, but without actually gaining any benefit in terms of personal development and certainly without bestowing any benefit upon the society in which that person lives.

Two great mishnayot in Avot discuss the need to select the right derech, but in very different ways.

Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi (Rebbi, at Avot 2:1) opens the discussion with a question: what is the right derech that a person should choose? He then supplies his own answer: it’s the path that best enables a person to gain credit with others while maintaining one’s own self-respect. We learn three things here: first, there is no one-size-fits-all derech and it is for everyone to weigh up their conduct for themselves. Secondly, we are free to choose this derech for ourselves, subject only to such constraints and boundaries as halachah lays down. Thirdly, from the fact that circumstances in life keep changing, we can infer that the process of weighing the prospects of pleasing both oneself and others is one that requires constant recalibration. Rebbi is not offering a philosophy for life but a compass whose arrow is in constant motion.

Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai widens the discussion (at Avot 2:12-13) by throwing it open to five of his most highly-regarded talmidim. He asks not one question but two. First, what is the good derech, the path to which one should adhere? Secondly, what is the bad derech, the path from which one should distance oneself? From the answers given here and Rabban Yochanan’s response to them it is clear that this discussion is not about choosing the right derech and does not therefore overlap with Rebbi’s teaching. Rather, it is about the attitude a person should have, or avoid. when travelling his or her derech. Suggested answers relate to the qualities of generosity, friendship, neighbourliness, piety, foresight and fear of sin, but the most highly approved answer, that of Rabbi Elazar ben Arach, is lev tov (literally “a good heart”), this being a sort of magnanimity of spirit that a person should evince in the course of his or her journey through life.

So, synthesising the propositions stated above, in travelling the journey of life in accordance with halachah, a person must select for him- or herself the right derech, this being the path dictated by Rebbi’s formula. Having done so, when pursuing that derech one should display an attitude of magnanimity of spirit as mandated by Rabban Yochanan.

Update on the availability of Pirkei Avot: A Users' Manual

A fresh batch of copies of Pirkei Avot: A Users' Manual has been printed. With a favourable breeze behind them, they should reach the shores of the United States before the end of August. Once they get there, they will be distributed by Ktav and it will be possible to purchase them via Amazon as well as in some bookshops.

Copies that have reached the UK can now be bought online, through Amazon UK. The Amazon seller is Judaism Reclaimed. You can access the sales page by clicking tinyurl.com/mtsdp8n3 and then waiting a few seconds for the "other options" panel to open up. There you will find Pirkei Avot: A Users' Manual on sale at the price of £70 for the three volume set.

Holding back and going forth: a visit to the Delphic Oracle

Our previous post here discussed Rabbi Akiva’s teaching in Avot 3:17 that “oaths are a fence against abstinence” and suggested that, despite the fact that neither oaths nor abstinence are topics of popular currency, this Mishnah still had something to teach us.

We briefly reviewed the concept of the oath or vow, which we analogised to the New Year Resolution in contemporary culture. Now it’s time to look at abstinence.

The Hebrew word, perishut, which is usually translated as “abstinence”, really means “separation”. It has come to mean “abstinence” on the basis that the things most people most frequently give up or separate themselves from are things of a pleasurable nature. People rarely want to detach themselves from these pleasures but they are often characterised as being harmful to the body (e.g. cigarettes, alcohol, confectionery) or to one’s spirit or emotions (e.g. gambling, pornography). To many English speakers the word “abstinence” conjures up notions of adopting a harsh, ascetic life, possibly involving isolation from human company and celibacy.

The concept of abstinence may not always have had such miserable connotations. Reviewing the ambit of perishut in his classic Chovot Halevavot, Rabbenu Bachye ibn Paquda depicts a wide spectrum of practices that he regards as falling within its scope. At one end is the complete rejection of what one wishes to give up for good. The other end is however described in relative terms, as edging away from an extreme indulgence and moving towards the Maimonidean mean of “not too little, not too much”. The notion of perishut as simply avoiding extremes was not unknown in the world of the Tannaim who composed the mishnayot of Avot: they may well have been aware of the Greek maxim μηδὲν ἄγαν (“nothing in excess”), which was displayed in the Temple of Apollo at Delphi, a place visited by travellers from across the Eastern Mediterranean region and Asia Minor.

The scope of perishut as a measure of how far a Jew engages with the pleasurable or dangerously attractive facets of secular life works in two directions. Rabbenu Bachye’s concern, which may also have been that of Rabbi Akiva, lay with the detachment of the Jew from non-Jewish culture. However, in Seeking His Presence, Rabbi Aharon Lichtenstein discusses with Rabbi Chaim Sabato the opposite phenomenon: the extent to which it is desirable for a Jew who lives within his own culture and religious norms to experience and participate in the culture of the secular world. In Rabbi Lichtenstein’s case the attractions of the non-Torah world included the reading of Milton’s Paradise Lost, a 10,000-odd word poem on the subject of repentance.  For others, the pleasures of the wider world may be of a less noble nature.

How far need a Jew abstain from that which may be harmful and alien in order to protect his essential Jewishness, and how far dare a committed Jew edge towards the values and prospects of the wider world without jeopardising his religious commitment and identity? Ultimately there is no one-size-fits-all answer. Much depends on the strength of an individual’s self-knowledge, his self-discipline, his understanding of what Jewish values represent and what they mean to him. How does one assess these factors?

A second Delphic maxim, balancing the first, looks pertinent here: γνῶθι σεαυτόν (“know yourself”). Putting the two maxims together, we see that the visitor to Delphi is advised to use his knowledge of himself as the yardstick against which to measure moderation and excess. But the truth is that we cannot know ourselves with the sort of clarity that would enable us to judge our actions, or indeed feel confident that we can actually be the people we want to be. Hillel understood this when he urged us not to trust ourselves till the day of our death (Avot 2:5), the point at which we can no longer exercise our free will. So, while both we Jews and the ancient Greeks share the ideal objective of taking the line of moderation, we need a better compass with which to steer ourselves towards it than self-knowledge alone.

Upon my oath! Making a personal commitment

This week’s Torah reading of parashat Matot opens with the topic of solemn vows and oaths, their binding nature and the extent to which they can be annulled. In modern society the making of such oaths plays only a tangential role, so we tend to give it little thought. That does not mean that we cannot learn something useful from our ancient laws. After all, keeping one’s word and doing what one promises are important parts of civilised life everywhere—and this is the issue that underpins the making and breaking of vows and oaths.

Not only the Mishnah but the Talmud give considerable space to oaths, dedicating no fewer than three tractates to them: Nedarim (defining a neder vow and its application to vows concerning food and daughters), Nazir (on the making of Nazirite vows and their consequences) and Shevuot (oaths made in the course of commerce and litigation). But that is not all. Pirkei Avot mentions oaths too, on three occasions:

·         “Oaths are a protective fence to abstinence” (Rabbi Akiva, Avot 3:17)

·         “Don’t question your fellow at the time he is making a vow” (Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar, Avot 4:23)

·         “Wild beasts come into the world on account of vain oaths and desecration of God’s name” (Anonymous, Avot 5:11).

From debate in the Talmud as to whether oaths are good, bad or both, we can see that much depends on the circumstances and the manner in which people make them. At one end of the spectrum we see how a person can strengthen his or her resolve to do the right thing by making an oath to do so; at the other extreme we learn of people taking God’s name in vain when making oaths that are without purpose or meaning. There’s not much point in making an oath that a muffin is a muffin, but at least that proposition is true. To utilise God’s name when swearing that a muffin is not a muffin is an insult to human intelligence, whether one is troubled by invoking God’s name in vain or not.

Of all Rabbi Akiva’s teachings in Avot, “Oaths are a protective fence to abstinence” is probably the one we encounter least frequently, since not only oaths but also abstinence are very much out of fashion. There is however more to Rabbi Akiva’s teaching here than meets the eye. Taking a positive view, his teaching suggests that binding oral commitments like oaths and vows are clearly of value if they help to strengthen the resolve of someone who is motivated to distance himself from the pleasures and sensual experiences of the world—whether permitted or otherwise—for the purpose of gaining greater proximity to his Maker.

In the world at large, many people practise the popular institution of the New Year Resolution—a pledge to undertake the making of (usually) one major change in their lifestyle in order to produce some sort of improving effect. These resolutions often cover abstinence from substances that are pleasurably harmful if consumed in quantity (e.g. chocolate, patisserie, alcoholic beverages). Or they may relate to acts and deeds (e.g. making a greater effort to visit elderly relatives, or regularly clearing their email in-trays). One thing they generally have in common is that much of their power to bind the person making them depends on that person telling others that he or she has done so. This means facing shame and embarrassment if, having publicised a resolution, a person then admits in public that he or she has broken it.

Like New Year Resolutions, the oaths and vows of Mishnaic times raised the expectation that the person making them would respect and stand by them. However, unlike secular resolutions, the oaths and vows that the Mishnah discusses were made by people who, by invoking God’s name, reminded themselves that both their binding commitment and any breach of it were made before their Creator, giving extra power to the notion that it is important to keep one’s word and honour one’s promises even if their subject, such as limiting their consumption of chocolate and booze, affects non-one but themselves.

A further note on abstinence and what it means should appear later this week.

Only ten shekel

Last week I rescued a book on Pirkei Avot that contained two commentaries. I found it on a heap of publications that had been piled up in disorderly fashion in a Jerusalem street sale. It cost just 10 shekels.

This book was quite unfamiliar to me and I suspect that it was privately published with a small print run since it bears no information concerning the place and date of publication, or indeed of a publisher. I have never seen any reference to it in other commentaries and have never heard it mentioned as a source.

The first of the two commentaries is the Tiferet Tzion of Rabbi Yitzchak Ze’ev Yadler, author of the 18-volume Tiferet Tzion commentary on Midrash Rabbah and the Talmud. It comes with approbations from Rabbis Yisrael Moshe Dushinsky, Shabtai Shlomo Wigoder and Yitzchak Menachem Weinberg. Rabbi Yadler is the father of Rabbi Ben Tzion Yadler (1871-1962), a major figure in Jewish resettlement in Israel both before and after the founding of the state in 1948 and an early activist on behalf of education for girls.

The second commentary, the Kerem Chemed, is authored by Rabbi Yadler’s grandson, Rabbi Yehudah Rabinowitz. This commentary is shorter and focuses on a selection of mishnayot and baraitot.

If any reader knows anything about this book, can he or she please share it! I’d love to know more about its provenance and about its authors.

Be careful what you believe -- and how you believe it

We Jews enjoy conversation as much as anyone—and many of us virtually treat it as an art form. However, everything comes at a price. The laws of lashon hara (impermissible speech about other people) are many and wide-ranging; if you transgress them, you may fall foul of a possible maximum of 4 biblical curses, 17 prohibitions and 14 positive commandments, which the Chafetz Chaim lists with convenient references and explanations.

Many of these laws affect the person who listens to lashon hara, whether intentionally or quite by chance. This is because one is not supposed to give credence to it. This poses some obvious problems for the listener who is a keen student of Pirkei Avot and who is sensitive to its own issues. Thus we should always concede the truth of a statement that is true (Avot 5:9); however, the principle that we should judge other people favourably (Avot 1:6) governs information heard from a friend just as much as it governs things we can see for ourselves. Since we can’t unhear the things a friend tells us, what should we do when we are told things about someone we know, things that may well be true?

The Chafetz Chaim explains that, in practical terms, we must create a sort of halfway house between believing a statement and disbelieving it. For example, if we are considering going into business with Reuven we may hear by chance from Shimon, a former business associate of Reuven, that Reuven is dishonest and can’t be trusted. This statement may be true, in which case we should want to believe it and act upon it. It is however lashon hara and was not spoken in the context of a legitimate response to a request for a business reference.

In a situation such as this, the listener should neither believe nor disbelieve the information about Reuven. Rather, he should merely bear it in mind as one of a number of possible factors to balance when deciding whether to advance his proposed partnership with Reuven. How might we do this? One way forward for us would be to do an internet search for Reuven: Is there evidence of public knowledge that he has been convicted of a crime of dishonesty? Does he have a presence on Facebook, LinkedIn or elsewhere that may give rise to concern? It may also be worth doing the same for Shimon, who may be bad-mouthing Reuven to distract us from his own wrongdoings. We might also proceed to do business with Reuven but be more circumspect about matters such as record-keeping and transparency of accounts. Ultimately it is a question of how accurately we can predict the outcome of the proposed business relationship, in accordance of the advice we receive from Rabbi Shimon ben Netanel at Avot 2:13.

The interface between Pirkei Avot and the laws of lashon hara is vast and complex. This short piece can hardly do more than to scrape the surface of this topic and, in doing so, invite further thoughts, comments and suggestions from its readers.

Mishnayot for mourners: a change in the air?

 During the shivah, the seven-day period of mourning that follows a Jewish burial, there is a widely observed custom of learning a mishnah after prayers so that the mourners can recite an extra kaddish. This custom reflects the fact that the Hebrew word mishnah (משנה) is made up of the same letters as the word neshamah (נשמה), a soul; the mishnah is therefore recited as a mark of respect for the soul of the departed.

The tractate from which mishnayot are recited is most usually Mikvaot, which deals with the process of purification that is achieved by immersion in water. Again, this reflects the notion that, whatever a person may do in his lifetime, his or hear soul remains pure.

While this tradition is laudable, my impression is that it is not always popular. Many of the mishnayot in Mikvaot are quite difficult and do not involve the sort of situations and experiences we encounter daily. When they are recited swiftly and without explanation, the exercise can give the impression of being perfunctory, meaningless and disrespectful. When however someone takes the trouble to explain these mishnayot properly, one sometimes senses the impatience those present at the shivah and who are anxious to get to work or to return home at the end of a long day.

Twice recently, when attending a shivah, I noticed that the mishnah recited for the extra kaddish was selected from Pirkei Avot -- the Ethics of the Fathers. My immediate thought was that the mourners had elected to do this because the content of Avot was easier to understand than that of Mikvaot. This was not however the case.

At the first shivah, the children of the deceased said simply that Avot seemed appropriate because they had lost a parent and the word Avot meant "fathers". In the second, the mourning children went further, saying that they had learned how to behave from their late father and that Avot was about the transmission of the right way to behave across the generations.

When I lost each of my parents (in 1993 and 2009) we recited a mishnah from Avot rather than Mikvaot. Some of those who attended raised their eyebrows, but none objected; most said nothing and expressed no opinion. I don't know if my two recent experiences are part of a trend and wonder what experiences other readers of this blog might have.

Sages and Dreamers

I have before me a copy of the recently-published Israeli edition of Elie Wiesel’s Sages and Dreamers: Biblical, Talmudic and Hasidic Portraits and Legends. This is actually a selection of essays culled from a series of lectures that Wiesel delivered to New York’s 92^nd Street Y between 1967 and 1991.

This book is not a commentary on Pirkei Avot but it does throw light on some of Avot’s major contributors. Lively biographical ske.tches cover the lives of Hillel, Shammai, Elisha ben Avuyah, ben Azzai and ben Zoma, not to mention Rabbis Chanina ben Dosa, Elazar ben Azaryah, Ishmael, Akiva, Chananyah ben Teradyon, Meir and Shimon bar Yochai.  Between them, these scholars contributed 28 teachings to Pirkei Avot, this being getting on for a quarter of the whole.

Wiesel’s approach is populist rather than scholarly, seeking to express through mishnah and midrash the personalities and ideals of the featured rabbis, as well as giving a flavour of their interaction with each other and with less exalted mortals. This being the text of a collection of lectures, it is unsurprising that there are neither footnotes nor textual references. However, anyone with a passing knowledge of the subject will soon spot how widely Wiesel has read and how deeply he has delved in seeking to bring out the individual essence of each.

I must confess that, while Wiesel writes with passion and great intelligence, and his discursive, often emotive style of narrative is widely appreciated both within Jewish circles and beyond, I struggle to enjoy it. This may be because I am a stern, cold academic at heart and remain more interested in making up my own mind about the Tannaim featured here than in buying into Wiesel’s assessment of them. I wonder if I am alone in feeling so, and am prepared to accept that I may well be.

This title is published by Whirlwind Press, Jerusalem (a subsidiary of Pomeranz Booksellers). You can order it here.

Avot online: a six-month review

On 8 April we posted a summary of the citation of mishnayot and baraitot from Pirkei Avot in the online media for the first quarter of 2022. That summary revealed that the most popular mishnah online was Avot 1:6 (Yehoshua ben Perachya: “make for yourself a rav, acquire for yourself a friend and judge all people by their merit”); this mishnah was cited no fewer than six times. Second place was shared by three contenders with four citations apiece: Avot 1:14 (Hillel’s “If not now, when?”); Avot 2:21 (Rabbi Tarfon: “It’s not for you to finish the work, but nor are you free to desist from it…”) and Avot 4:1 (Ben Zoma: “Who is wise/strong/rich/honoured...?”). In fifth place, with three citations, was Shimon HaTzaddik’s teaching at Avot 1:2 (“The world stands on three things: Torah, service to God and acts of kindness”).

Overall, Hillel was most frequently-cited contributor to Avot, which was unsurprising given that he was named as the author of seven mishnayot in Avot, more than anyone else. He was cited a total of seven times, followed by Yehoshua ben Perachya on six, Rabbi Tarfon on five and Ben Zoma on four.

Now, at the half-way mark for the year, the total number of online references to Avot stands at 106 (up 60 from 46 at the end of the first quarter). Hillel’s mishnah 1:14 has taken the lead. The most frequently cited mishnayot, together with the number of times they were cited, looks like this:

Hillel (Avot 1:14) 18

Yehoshua ben Perachyah (Avot 1:6) and Ben Zoma (Avot 4:1) 11 apiece

Rabbi Tarfon (Avot 2:21) 9.

The popularity of Avot 1:14 may have something to do with the fact that it is convenient for use by authors who have little or no interest in Judaism or the Torah but who are generally exhorting their readers to do something now rather than at some later time.

More media citations of Avot come from the first perek than any of the others. In terms of popularity, the six perakim rank as follows:

Perek 1: 40 (37.7%)

Perek 2: 22 (20.7%)

Perek 3: 8 (0.7%)

Perek 4: 24 (22.6%)

Perek 5: 7 (0.7%)

Perek 6: 5 (0.5%)

I must admit some surprise at the relatively low level of references to the third perek of Avot, which contains some wonderful material (including all of Rabbi Akiva’s contributions).

Comparisons with Balaam: why Abraham, not Moses?

Yesterday I posted a piece on Avot 5:22, which contrasted the qualities exemplified by Abraham and Balaam and, by extension, by those who follow them.

Why does this Mishnah pick Abraham as the gold standard by which to evaluate Balaam and find him lacking? Would not Moses have been a better measure of comparison? There is nowhere any suggestion that Moses was deficient in the three areas of excellence associated here with Abraham: he too had a generous outlook (Shemot 32:30-32), a meek spirit (Chullin 89a) and a humble soul (Bemidbar 12:3). He was an exact contemporary of Balaam, while Abraham lived six generations earlier. Both Moses and Balaam had top-class prophetic talents (Bemidbar Rabbah 14:20; Berachot 7a). Further, the placing of this mishnah within the fifth perek almost invites comparison with Moses rather than Abraham: whereas the other mishnayot dealing with Abraham and his exceptional qualities come right at the beginning of this perek, the only other mishnah in it which deals with Moses is found immediately preceding this one.

Because this mishnah is dealing with middot (character traits and qualities) rather than mitzvot and averot (positive and negative commands), we may have an answer. There is a qualitative difference between those who lived before the Giving of the Torah at Sinai and those who lived subsequently.

Before Sinai, there were two measures of a man’s worth: one was in the way he developed and acted in accordance with his personal qualities, the other being his adherence to the seven Noahide Laws to which all of mankind is universally subject. After the Giving of the Torah, the Jewish people could also be measured in terms of their service to God through the performance of mitzvot and the avoidance of averot that were revealed at Sinai. By comparing Abraham with Balaam, this mishnah compares like with like, contrasting two personalities who were ostensibly playing by the same Noahide rules.

There is another possible answer. Balaam is quite conscious of the role played by the Patriarchs Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in securing a permanent relationship between God and the Children of Israel. He makes a great show of setting himself up as being their equal. The Patriarchs between them built seven altars on which to make offerings before God, so Balaam instructs Balak to do likewise on the assumption that he must exceed or at least equal the performance of the Patriarchs if he is to obtain a chance to break the bond they had forged with God. Since Balaam is seeking to undermine the covenant first made with Abraham and only later confirmed with his descendants, it is with Abraham and not Moses that Balaam is to be compared.

The appropriate nature of the Abraham-Balaam comparison is suggested by two further considerations. The first, which appeals to scholarship, is the intertextuality of the stories of the Akedah, where Abraham is ordered to sacrifice his son Isaac, and the engagement of Balaam to destroy the Jewish people. Both Abraham and Balaam saddle their asses early in the morning and take two lads with them; both are stopped by an angel before killing their companion. In both episodes they climb mountains and there is a burnt offering. Finally, both episodes end with a blessing for the Jewish people.

The second consideration appeals to our affection for symmetry and balance: Abraham is the righteous person who appeals to God in order to save a wicked people from destruction, while Balaam is the wicked person who appeals to God in order to achieve the destruction of a righteous people. Further, while Balaam seeks a generous reward for cursing the Children even though he fails in this mission, Abraham spurns a generous reward that is his for the taking after he secures the defeat of the Five Kings.

Abraham versus Balaam: how judgemental should we be?

Mishnah 5:22 of Avot highlights the character of one of the most intriguing personalities in the Torah: Balaam, of whom we read a great deal in this week’s Torah portion. The Mishnah reads, in translation, like this:

Whoever possesses the following three traits is among the disciples of our father Abraham, but whoever possesses three other traits is among the disciples of the wicked Balaam. The disciples of our father Abraham have a generous outlook, a meek spirit and a humble soul. The disciples of the wicked Balaam have a malevolent outlook, a haughty spirit and an avaricious gross soul.

The Mishnah then goes on to contrast their respective fates:

What is the difference between the disciples of our father Abraham and the disciples of the wicked Balaam? The disciples of our father Abraham benefit in this world and inherit the World To Come [proof texts omitted].

There is more to this teaching than meets the eye, since it meshes in well with two earlier mishnayot and in a way highlights the difference between them.

Many commentators have pointed to the significance of the explicit mention in this mishnah of the number three, among them Rabbi Shalom Noach Berezovsky in his Netivot Shalom. Since we can all see that the Mishnah lists three positive character traits and their opposites, we don’t need a Tanna to teach us how to count. But we must understand what the Mishnah is telling us: “three” means “three and no more than three”. Why is this point so important?

As Rabbi Berezovsky indicates, all three of these signs by which one can distinguish a follower of Abraham from an adherent of Balaam are attitudes and therefore invisible to the naked eye. A person can look pious, dress modestly and go about the business of behaving him- or herself in a perfectly respectful manner and yet be rotten to the core.

Yehoshua ben Perachyah (Avot 1:6) tells us to judge our fellow humans on the basis of their merits. Rabbi Meir however (Avot 4:27) reminds us that we should look at the wine rather than the bottle, in other words that we should look to a person’s inner nature rather than to the outward signs of his or her character. Where we contrast the followers of Abraham with those of Balaam, we are therefore encouraged to give people the benefit of the doubt with regard to their motivation regarding any deed that may be either right or wrong—but neither are we to assume that a person is righteous simply on account of a failure to do anything that appears to be wrong.

Thinking better of politicians: can it be done?

My survey of frequency of citation of mishnayot from Avot on the electronic media shows that the second most frequently cited mishnah online is the teaching of Yehoshua ben Perachyah at Avot 1:6 that one should judge people favourably (this is often understood to mean that one should give others the benefit of the doubt if there is any uncertainty as to their motivation for doing something that might be either good or bad).

With the next round of elections coming up in Israel, the thought occurs to me that the injunction to judge others favourably is expressed in general terms. It applies to judging everyone. There is an exception in respect of people whose conduct is wrongful and whose motives can be established beyond doubt. There is however no exception in respect of politicians.

History can supply a long list of politicians who are corrupt, dishonest and "on the make" -- many of whom have been tried and convicted of criminal offences or who have been forced out of office for that reason. However, it seems to me that this does not give us a carte blanche to label all politicians as such, or to presume an improper motive in respect of those who enter the public political arena.

Pirkei Avot warns us to be wary of government and to avoid being involved with it if possible -- but it also urges to pray for the government to succeed in the establishment of peace and good order. We must also recognise that, much as we may harbour personal dislikes or suspicions of specific politicians, the running of any country is a task that necessarily has to be done by someone.

If this election is anything like its predecessor, the coming months in Israel will doubtless witness a great deal of abuse and insult hurled both at political aspirants and between them. This does no credit to the politicians or the electorate. It would be a great thing if we could refrain from attributing base motives to the politicians on all sides of the spectrum, concentrating instead on the merit -- if any -- of the arguments they propound and the policies they present.

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I shall shortly be posting my quarterly review of citations from Avot on the internet. The previous review, covering Avot citations from 1 January to 31 March, can be accessed at tinyurl.com/2p8erspy

Avot in retrospect: a summary of the past month's posts

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

Thursday 30 June 2022: When silence is better than speech: in his commentary on Avot 1:17, the Me'iri lists the categories of speech identified by Maimonides and ibn Gabirol, but does not compare them. Why?

Tuesday 28 June 2022: With great respect! Honouring others today. Does Ben Zoma's point about the reciprocity of honour in Avot 4:1 need widening?

Sunday 26 June 2022: After the Book Launch: link provided to full text and PowerPoints for the launch of Pirkei Avot: A Users' Manual.

Friday 24 June 2022: Diapers on the doorstep: how an unusual occurrence triggers a set of Pirkei Avot thoughts.

Wednesday 22 June 2022: Perek, Proverbs and Parallels: Rav Lichtenstein ztz"l draws a parallel between Mishlei -- the book of Proverbs -- and Avot. What is its significance?

19 June 2022: Iniquitous names and Torah titles: The Torah does appear to over-emphasise the names and status of the spies sent out to size up the land of Canaan. Is there a bigger message here than the plain narrative suggests?

 17 June 2022: Caravanserais on the road: can you spot the Avot? A single passage from Rabbenu Bachye's Duties of the Heart contains many allusions to teachings in Avot: can you identify them?

Tuesday 14 June: Curbing a "hearty" appetite. The importance of not forgetting one's Torah also involves taking care of one's diet. But does this mean that we should avoid eating hearts?

Sunday 12 June 2022: A word on the Avot deRabbi Natan: A reader's question on the Ask the Beit Midrash Facebook  group prompts a response and some further thoughts.

Wednesday 8 June 2022: Miriam's complaint: drawing the wrong conclusions?  Malbim's explanation of Miriam's complaint against Moses and her punishment with tzara'at fits in well with two teachings in Avot.

Tuesday 7 June 2022: Book launch: Please do come! Announcing Pirkei Avot: a Users' Manual.

Friday 3 June 2022: Taking a partner.  In his book on Jewish law, Chesed LaAlafim, Rabbi Eliezer Papo cites a mishnah in Avot on the rights and wrongs of choosing a business partner.

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Avot Today blogposts for May 2022
Avot Today blogposts for April 2022
Avot Today blogposts for March 2022
Avot Today blogposts for February 2022
Avot Today blogposts for January 2022
Avot Today blogposts for December 2021