THE POWER TO SAY “YES”, "NO"--AND "BETTER NOT"

Pirkei Avot opens with a recital of how the Torah was passed down from Moses on Har Sinai to the Anshei Knesset HaGadolah (the Men of the Great Assembly), who kick-started the real content of Avot—mussar and middot—with three foundational teachings:

הֱווּ מְתוּנִים בַּדִּין, וְהַעֲמִֽידוּ תַּלְמִידִים הַרְבֵּה, וַעֲשׂוּ סְיָג לַתּוֹרָה

Be deliberate in judgement, and establish many pupils, and make a fence around the Torah.

To be מְתוּנִים בַּדִּין (metunim badin, deliberate—or careful—in judgement) was traditionally seen as advice given by judges, since the Great Assembly served as a sort of Supreme Court, to judges.

More recently, this teaching has been given wider scope. After all, we all act as judges, in an informal extrajudicial manner, when evaluating and assessing the behaviour and the worth of our friends, our families and even ourselves. An interesting example of this can be found in Ruchi Koval’s Soul Purpose (a recent Mosaica publication that has the look and feel of an inspirational “women-for-women” text but has plenty to offer men too). After pointing out that our personal judgements can affect others, Koval writes:

“As a parent, I find it so much easier to say “no” than “yes”, so I really have to work on myself to check that urge. Usually the easiest thing is to strike down someone else’s idea, but we need to be more measured than that. Are we saying no because it’s the path of least resistance? Because we are protecting ourselves? Or because it is truly right and good for society? Leaders must be deliberate in their judgements and truly consider all sides before making a decision that impacts the world”.

It is tempting to generalize from one’s own experience because it is at least something that we can subjectively verify. Yet its limitation is obvious. In a disciplined religious environment where respect for parents and teachers prevails and children are not conditioned to get their own way, it may well be easier to say “no”. But observation of humanity in general uggests that, particularly for parents, it is easier to say “yes” than “no”, since a “yes” will end the dialogue and buy time, space and relief for a parent—and it is the temptation to give in, to yield to children’s persistent demands, that must be resisted.

Nonetheless there is good reason to open a debate on the point that Koval raises. In several places the Talmud enunciates the principle of shev ve’al ta’aseh—choose the course of inaction where it is not clear whether one should do something or not. This position may have much to commend it when what is done cannot be undone, while that which is not done can still be done later. However, there are many situations in which action must be taken immediately, particularly in the case of medical matters.

Elsewhere in Avot we are cautioned to avoid a situation of doubt (Rabban Gamliel at 1:16). Taking careful thought ahead of making a decision and acting upon it is the way to remove doubt—or at least to reduce the size of its penumbra).  

For me, the area in which the need to proceed with caution before taking a decision, the need to remove a doubt and the maxim of shev ve’al ta’aseh come together is that in which a rabbi is asked to give a halachic ruling on whether something is permitted or prohibited—but receives the answer “better not”.  This answer complies with the principle of shev ve’al ta’aseh but only to the extent that it discourages action, but the doubt remains unless “better not” is interpreted as a reluctant “yes”.  A “better not” answer can have big consequences for others though. Think of a situation in which the question is “Can I rely on the kashrut of this shop, or restaurant, or licensing authority?” To say “better not” is quicker and easier than to investigate and weigh up the issues, and it may not be possible for a rabbi to gain access to the facts that enable an in-depth analysis to be made before giving a true and honest answer. But it is an answer that can have financial repercussions for a business or Beit Din that was not involved in the Q-and-A process.

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OUT OF ORDER

An anonymous mishnah at Avot 5:9 raises a curious conundrum. It reads like this:

שִׁבְעָה דְבָרִים בְּגוֹלָם וְשִׁבְעָה בְּחָכָם, חָכָם: אֵינוֹ מְדַבֵּר לִפְנֵי מִי שֶׁגָּדוֹל מִמֶּֽנּוּ בְּחָכְמָה וּבְמִנְיָן, וְאֵינוֹ נִכְנָס לְתוֹךְ דִּבְרֵי חֲבֵרוֹ, וְאֵינוֹ נִבְהָל לְהָשִׁיב, שׁוֹאֵל כְּעִנְיָן וּמֵשִׁיב כַּהֲלָכָה, וְאוֹמֵר עַל רִאשׁוֹן רִאשׁוֹן וְעַל אַחֲרוֹן אַחֲרוֹן, וְעַל מַה שֶּׁלֹּא שָׁמַע אוֹמֵר לֹא שָׁמַֽעְתִּי, וּמוֹדֶה עַל הָאֱמֶת, וְחִלּוּפֵיהֶן בְּגוֹלָם

There are seven things that characterize a golem, and seven that characterize a wise man. A wise man does not speak before one who is greater than him in wisdom or age. He does not interrupt his fellow's words. He does not hasten to answer. His questions are on the subject and his answers are to the point. He responds to first things first and to later things later. Concerning that which he did not learn, he says "I did not learn." He concedes the truth. With the golem, the reverse of all these is the case.

The mishnah starts by mentioning the golem—an unpolished, uncultivated individual who does not know how to behave—and then the wise man, the chacham. Would it not therefore be logical for the mishnah to list the characteristics of the golem first and then contrast them with the chacham? Indeed, the mishnah itself says that dealing with first things first and to later things later is one of the tests of the chacham, so why does its author not follow his own advice? Alternatively, if the qualities of the chacham and not the golem are to be listed, should not the mishnah have started by saying: “There are seven things that characterize a wise man, and seven that characterize a golem”?

The commentators have less to say about “first things first” than about the other six tests of a person’s status, and there seems to be a general feeling among them that dealing with things in the order in which they are raised is a general guideline and not in any sense a binding rule: Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau (Yachel Yisrael) points out that there are perfectly respectable exceptions to it. Rabbenu Yonah, for example, notes that it may be necessary to deal with the later matter earlier in order to make it easier to deal with the first one.

Perhaps the last word should be left with the Tiferet Yisrael. At base, any sign of organization of a person’s thoughts indicates the presence of a degree of wisdom. But we may not be in a position to judge whether there is any sort of order.  I tried to explain this in my book, Pirkei Avot: A Users’ Manual, in the following manner:

Why did God issue commandments in the order He did, rather than sorting them out the way we now do? Presumably He gave them in the order which, in His wisdom, He deemed most appropriate under the circumstances in which they were first revealed, bearing in mind the capabilities of the people to whom they were revealed. We actually do the same ourselves. A parent might be heard to instruct a young child in the following manner before he steps foot outside the family home: “Have you got your hat and gloves? Do take some spare tissues with you. Your lunchbox is on the middle shelf of the fridge. Don’t forget your keys! Do you have your travel pass? If you want an apple, there are some in the fruit bowl. You are not going out in your socks: put those shoes on!” These instructions are not categorized by subject-matter (i.e. clothing, food, travel logistics) and look quite random to us. However, a thoughtful parent may have headed the list with those things the child was least likely to bother with (hat and coat, spare tissues) and finished it with those things the child was least likely to forget (apple, shoes).

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MAN – MADE IN THE IMAGE OF MAN

One of the mishnayot in Avot that superficially appears to have nothing to do with middot and mussar—advice that guides our behaviour and addresses our less noble thoughts—is a teaching by Rabbi Akiva that starts like this (Avot 3:18):

חָבִיב אָדָם שֶׁנִּבְרָא בְּצֶֽלֶם, חִבָּה יְתֵרָה נוֹדַֽעַת לוֹ שֶׁנִּבְרָא בְּצֶֽלֶם, שֶׁנֶּאֱמַר: כִּי בְּצֶֽלֶם אֱלֹהִים עָשָׂה אֶת הָאָדָם

Beloved is man, for he was created in [God’s] image; with even greater love is it made known to him that he was created in the image, as it says, "For in the image of God, He made man" (Bereishit 9:6).

Knowing how much God love His human creations, a category to which we all belong, may inspire a warm feeling inside us, but it is hard to pinpoint a way in which this knowledge, of itself, is a game-changer in our daily lives.

Many scholars accept the view of Rabbi Shmuel di Uceda, in his commentary-cum-compendium Midrash Shmuel, that this teaching constitutes a warning that the act of murder is deserving of capital punishment. Since every human being is created in the image of God, the killing of any human is a form of erasure or diminution of the image of God—whatever that term might mean in relation to an incorporeal deity.

But there are other approaches which make up with their originality for what they lack in terms of literal accuracy. Thus, citing the Venetian scholar Rabbi Moshe Chafetz, Rabbi Norman Lamm (Foundation of Faith, ed. R’ Mark Dratch) takes a slight liberty with the mishnah—part of the Oral Law—by shifting a comma of which Rabbi Akiva would surely have been unaware, since he lived around 600 years before any form of punctuation was introduced into Hebrew. Nevertheless, what he writes is thought-provoking.

In short, by shifting the comma so that instead of following Elokim it follows b’tzelem, the meaning of the verse from Bereishit shifts from the usual

“for in the image of God, He made man"

to

“for in [his, i.e. man’s] image, God made man”.

Rabbi Akiva is now taken to say that God creates each man in his own individual image, with his own essence, his own characteristic being. It is each person’s own tzelem that gives him or her their own metaphysical value, their differentness and their absolute uniqueness.

Now we can ask what is our take-away message in terms of middot and mussar? Arguably it is that, if God has gone to the trouble of creating each person as an individual, we should be careful to recognize their unique personal qualities and should take care not to commoditise them or judge them in general terms. Each person must be assessed on the basis of their individual qualities—and respected because those qualities and their potential to use those qualities are hard-wired into them by God.

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WHEN THE CHATTING HAS TO STOP?

Pirkei Avot speaks twice about what we might call ordinary day-to-day conversation. At Avot 1:5 Yose ben Yochanan Ish Yerushalayim cautions men engaging in too much casual chatting even with their own wives—and how much more so should they not converse overmuch with other people’s wives. The consequences, which are grim, are listed in this mishnah:

כָּל הַמַּרְבֶּה שִׂיחָה עִם הָאִשָּׁה, גּוֹרֵם רָעָה לְעַצְמוֹ, וּבוֹטֵל מִדִּבְרֵי תוֹרָה, וְסוֹפוֹ יוֹרֵשׁ גֵּיהִנֹּם

One who excessively converses with one’s wife causes evil to himself, neglects the study of Torah and ultimately inherits Gehinnom.

Responses to this teaching range from bristling hostility at its attitude towards women in general to warm endorsement of the need for a man to respect boundaries in his dealings with his own and other people’s wives. Some also focus on the word שִׂיחָה (sichah, here meaning “chatter”), urging men to treat women with respect as their intellectual equals rather than refuse to engage them on matters of a more serious nature.

Conversation also features in a later mishnah that focuses not so much on quantity as on quality. At Avot 3: Dosa ben Horkinas teaches

שֵׁנָה שֶׁל שַׁחֲרִית, וְיַֽיִן שֶׁל צָהֳרָֽיִם, וְשִׂיחַת הַיְלָדִים, וִישִׁיבַת בָּתֵּי כְנֵסִיּוֹת שֶׁל עַמֵּי הָאָֽרֶץ, מוֹצִיאִין אֶת הָאָדָם מִן הָעוֹלָם

Morning sleep, noontime wine, children's talk and sitting at the meeting places of the ignoramus drive a person from the world.

I believe that the children’s talk referred to here is children’s talk between adults, not between adult and child. Speaking to a child in a childish manner is so often a vital part of the child’s education in the use of language, the art of communication and the gradual acquisition of cognitive and conceptual understanding. But it can be an embarrassment to listen to adults speaking with one another as though they were children.

Avot returns to the theme of conversation in a context that is neither age- nor gender-specific, in the lengthy Baraita at 6:6 that lists the 48 boxes that an aspiring Torah scholar is to tick if he is to obtain and then retain his Torah learning. One of these is to practise ְּמִעוּט שִׂיחָה (miyut sichah, minimizing ordinary conversation). From the context it is plain that the problem with sichah is not one of inviting greater sexual intimacy or of grooming a prospective sexual partner, but rather of bitul zeman—wasting time that might otherwise be spent on more productive activities in the pursuit of Torah.

Some of the more serious Torah scholars of bygone generations took the limitation or even the avoidance of ordinary conversation to extremes. Thus Rabbi Asher Weiss (Rav Asher Weiss on Avos vol.2) states, citing Midrash Shir HaShirim Rabbah, that for every piece of unnecessary speech that enters a person’s ear, a Torah matter leaves. But Rabbi Weiss then tempers this extreme position with an observation about life in the real world:

“…[T]his is not the way for most people. We may infer from Chazal’s expression “limited conversation” that we are only to lessen our involvement. … Human nature dictates that we cannot completely withdraw from light conversation and the way of the world”.

The need to speak to other people cannot be denied but, like so many other things in Avot, the difficulty lies not in the principle but in the practice. Here it is difficult to draw firm guidelines. One person’s being polite or friendly is another person’s being flirtatious or suggestive. And I would not be as brave as Rabbi Weiss as to write the words “human nature dictates…”, bearing in mind that so much of the challenge that we face in our own lives lies precisely in the battle to resist what human nature dictates.

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"YOU'RE A WASTE OF SPACE!"

One of the messages that Pirkei Avot most persistently hammers home is that it is unwise to judge other people—whatever we may be tempted to think of them. We can’t know why they do what they do unless we are standing in their place (Hillel, 2:5). If we do judge them, we should look at them favourably if at all possible (Yehoshua ben Perachyah, 1:6). In any event, judgement should be a collective exercise, not the prerogative of the individual (Rabbi Yishmael ben Yose. 4:10).

A further encouragement not to judge others, one that is not couched in the vocabulary of judgement but of vilification or scorn, is found in the words of Ben Azai (Avot 4:3):

אַל תְּהִי בָז לְכָל אָדָם וְאַל תְּהִי מַפְלִיג לְכָל דָּבָר, שֶׁאֵין לָךְ אָדָם שֶׁאֵין לוֹ שָׁעָה, וְאֵין לָךְ דָּבָר שֶׁאֵין לוֹ מָקוֹם

Do not scorn anyone, and do not disdain any thing, for there is no one who does not have his hour, and no thing that does not have its place.

Scorning other people, writing them off as what Basil Fawlty would call “a waste of space”, is in essence a judgmental process. We size someone up, we write them off as being worthless, we deem them to be literally “useless”.

In the real world, where humans are trained or expected to perform a multitude of functions, every one of us—if we are honest—is in most respects useless. A person may be generally useful as a spouse, a parent, a friend or community member, but useless if what you are seeking is a dentist, a plumber or a fourth hand for bridge.  We do not write each other off for being useless in this sense and it is fairly certain that this scenario is not what Ben Azai had in mind.

I believe that Ben Azai’s message comes to reinforce that of Ben Zoma at Avot 4:1, that a person is wise who learns from everyone. If everyone has something to teach you, you can hardly point to anyone and declare them to be “a waste of space”.

We do however have a problem. Let us suppose that someone appears to be useless. Ben Azai tells us that everyone has their hour. But what if that hour has already passed, and their usefulness has been spent, as it were? What happens if they have nothing left to offer?  May we not write them off even then? Or are we supposed to take them seriously and treat them with respect in case they still have another hour to come, another moment of significance? And how can we assume that they can no longer teach us anything?

These are not, possibly with justification, issues that trouble our commentators—but the Torah narrative in Sefer Bereishit may furnish us with an answer. After the Flood and the episodes that take place shortly after it, we hear no more of Noach, though he lives for hundreds of years. He is often characterized as a spent force, a man who had his moment but never succeeded in building upon it, a sad soul who sunk into an abyss of alcoholic obscurity from which he could not emerge—or chose not to.

But maybe Noach’s inactivity was itself teaching us a lesson. His sons and subsequent generations took up the story of human life on Earth, but Noach did not take any steps to interfere with them. For many if not most parents it is very difficult to let one’s children grow in terms of taking the reins of responsibility and leading their lives in directions that they have chosen for themselves. Yet this is what Noach did. Perhaps his apparent inactivity was the result of a conscious decision to trust his descendants to take their own decisions and to decide for themselves whether they wished to obtain his advice or not. And that is an important lesson for us all.

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WICKED!

Considering how few words the Tannaim used when teaching, it is hardly surprising that their teachings have generated so many comments and explanations. From our own experience, we see how words that are taken out of context—or which are never given a context in the first place—can be twisted, misunderstood or merely interpreted in so many different ways that the impact of their brevity is lost. In modern times, two “classics” come to mind. The first is the instruction “To avoid suffocation keep away from children”—which only carries a useful meaning when printed on a polythene bag. The second, “Stand in boiling water for two minutes”, requires a different context entirely, being a cooking instruction for a canned pudding. Fortunately, the words of our Mishnaic sages are less extreme cases but, even so, they demand some form of context or background—and may attract several competing explanations.

At Avot 2:18 Rabbi Shimon ben Netanel says:

אַל תְּהִי רָשָׁע בִּפְנֵי עַצְמֶֽךָ

Do not be wicked bifnei atzmecha (“before yourself”, “inside yourself”, “on your own”)

The precise meaning of this injunction, and of the words bifnei atzmecha, is unclear, as we see from our commentators. No context is supplied and the Tanna points to no particular objective. For the Rambam, this teaching means not judging oneself as a wicked person. The Bartenura (with whom the commentary ascribed to Rashi agrees) says it means not doing something today if tomorrow you will regard yourself as being evil for having done it. Rabbenu Yonah, author of the Sha’arei Teshuvah, puts a teshuvah-related spin on it: don’t regard yourself as being wicked since you always have the option to repent. He then adds, with an eye on Yom Kippur and Divine judgement, that you should regard yourself as half-guilty and half-innocent: your next action might then lead either to acquittal or condemnation. As for the Me’iri, his take on Rabbi Shimon ben Netanel’s words is that, if you regard yourself as being wicked when you are not, you may come to do things that are wicked. More recently, the Ru’ach Chaim reads here a caution against looking righteous and wrapping yourself in tallit and tefillin when you are inwardly seething with evil thoughts.

One can travel even further in a quest for an explanation. Thus Rabbi Yaakov Hillel (Eternal Ethics From Sinai) picks up on a Gemara (Berachot 8a) that teaches that anyone who has a synagogue in his city but prays by himself is a shochen ra, a bad neighbour. Perhaps this then is the clue: since bifnei atzmecha can also be understood as meaning “on one’s own”, Rabbi Shimon ben Netanel must have been cautioning against praying at home by home. Alternatively, according to Rabbi Hillel, a person who brazenly defies our Sages by praying by himself is automatically deemed “wicked”. Rabbi Yehoshua Heschel of Monstritch turns this idea on its head: one is only allowed to view oneself as wicked, sinful and downright inadequate if one prays with other people, by analogy of the blend of spices and herbs that made up the ketoret—the incense offering in the Temple—which would be invalidated by the absence of the foul-smelling chelbanah. In such a case, one can feel wicked in the safe knowledge that one’s wickedness is cancelled out by the company one keeps.

How much of this speaks to us today? These analyses do not reflect our way of looking at the world—or ourselves—in an era in which the vocabulary of obedience and deviancy has so greatly changed. Words like ‘sin’ are marginalized and have faded from daily parlance; ‘evil’ is now a convenient epithet for someone with whom one has a major disagreement and ‘wicked’ is now a popular musical-turned-movie (run the word through your favourite browser if you don’t believe me).  But our mishnah is not lost.

Coming to the rescue is Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski (Visions of The Fathers), who examines the Tanna’s pronouncement from his own perspective as a psychiatrist.  Do not think of yourself as an inherently bad person, he counsels. Rather, view yourself as a person who is fundamentally good but who has done bad things. Condemn the act, not the actor. This explanation might even be what Rabbi Shimon ben Netanel had in mind, and it is closer to his words than some of the explanations we reviewed earlier.

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