Sticking together: can it be too much of a good thing?

Much has been made of the remarkable degree of achdut, unity or togetherness, that we the Jewish people have experienced over the past three months, both in Israel and in the diaspora, in the face of the terrible threats and problems we still face. It has been exciting to feel this degree of togetherness, love and respect for each other. It has also been a big surprise. Why is this so?

Whether through nature, nurture or both, we Jews have a track record for arguing with one another, for fighting between ourselves and for going our own way which stretches back for millennia. Even having no-one around to fall out with is no bar to our capability to pick a fight and to assert how different we are from one another. Witness the tale, which we have all heard countless times but nonetheless persist in telling, about the Jew who, stranded on a desert island, builds himself two synagogues: one to pray in and the other in which he wouldn’t be seen dead.

This fissiparous streak in the Jewish character has so long been seen as a flaw, rather than a virtue, that it is surprising that Pirkei Avot has relatively little to say about putting it right. The word achdut appears nowherel in the tractate and, where cooperating with others is advocated, Avot points to doing so on a personal basis rather than as a nation. Thus we are counselled to have a rabbi or teacher (1:6, 16), to acquire a friend (1:6) and to stick with one’s friends as a means of preserving one’s Torah knowledge (4:18). To the contrary effect we are warned to distance ourselves from bad neighbours and not to join up with the wicked (1:7).

Perhaps the cautious attitude of the oral tradition reflected in Avot reflects a certain ambivalence elsewhere in Jewish thought. Thus, in the Torah, the first time we encounter true achdut, with humans joined in a single cause, God clearly disapproves of it because He takes steps to dissolve it. This is the account of the Tower of Babel (Genesis 11:1-9), where the whole earth was “of one language and one common purpose”.  If God’s response was triggered by His disapproval of the illegitimacy of humankind’s aims at that point, we may wonder at the message conveyed by Midrash that Ahab was victorious in his battles despite the fact that he was leading a nation of idolators. Why? Because of their achdut in never speaking a bad word against each other (Devarim Rabbah 5:6).  

Between these two instances we have a pair of similar but contrasting midrashic explanations of achdut, both addressed to the use in the Torah of a singular verb form with a collective noun. The first, brought by Rashi to Exodus 14:10, describes the Egyptians who were marching after the fleeing Israelite slaves as being belev echad ke’ish echad (With one heart, like one person”).  The second, also brought by Rashi but this time at Exodus 19:2, cites the nascent nation of Israel, camped at Sinai, as being ke’ish echad belev echad, “like a single person with a single heart”.  Again, there are contrasting outcomes to the achdut: Egypt was punished with ignominious defeat while Israel was rewarded by the gift of God’s own Torah.

Should we then stick together and preserve achdut at all costs? Again there is no clear consensus. No, says Rambam. If a community strays from the path of proper religious observance and cannot be brought back into line, it is preferable to go off and live by oneself in a cave rather than to remain with it. Yes, says R’ Eliezer Papo, the Pele Yo’etz. Stick with your fellows, however wrong-headed they may be, for the value of achdut is greater than that of keeping the mitzvot: witness the contrasting punishments received for the events leading to the destruction of the First and Second Temples.

Prima facie, Avot would seem to favour the approach of the Pele Yo’etz. Hillel the Elder teaches (2:5) al tifrosh min hatzibur, “Do not separate from the community”. However, if the tractate has already urged us at 1:7 to distance ourselves from a single bad neighbour, how much more should we distance ourselves from a community made up entirely of the wicked.

Perhaps there is another way of looking at the inherent conflict between our traditions. It is often said that the word צִּבּוּר, tzibur, is made up of the Hebrew letters צּ-ב-ר, these being the first letters of the words tzaddikim, benonim, resho’im (“the righteous, the ordinary person and the wicked”). Where the community is made up of the righteous, the ordinary person and the wicked, that’s when you should remain with it. But when it consists of the wicked alone—the classic Torah example being the cities of Sodom and Gemorrah—it is no longer a tzibur and Hillel’s teaching no longer applies. One is therefore not only allowed to leave it but can be compelled to do so.

Illustration by Frits Ahlefeldt

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