WHO WILL LEAD THE FOXES?

At Avot 4:20 Rabbi Matya ben Charash teaches:

הֱוֵי זָנָב לָאֲרָיוֹת, וְאַל תְּהִי רֹאשׁ לַשֻּׁעָלִים

Be a tail to lions, rather than a head to foxes.

Both lions and foxes appear elsewhere in Avot and it is safe to say that, since both animals were far more commonly found in the Middle East at the time of the Tannaim than they are today, allusions to them would have been mor meaningful to the Mishnaic sages of 2,000 years ago and to their audience than they are to us today.

Be that as it may, in this mishnah it is probable that Rabbi Matya ben Charash had in mind not the real animal but the symbolic one, the creature of the proverb and the parable. That sort of lion represents strength, intelligence and dignity, coupled with an element of noble self-restraint, while his companion represents deviousness, cunning, sharp observation and a dash of the instinct for self-sufficiency and survival in a world of bigger, stronger animals.

 If this is so, the message of the mishnah is clear. We are advised to keep the company of our betters, whom we can trust and from whose superior qualities we can learn. We should also avoid the company of low-lives, even if we can demonstrate that we are better at being low-lives than they are. According to Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski (Visions of the Fathers) this mishnah is actually a teaching on the topic of self-image. Those who associate with the foxes do so because they insufficiently value their capabilities and their potential to better themselves. I doubt that the earlier commentators would take issue with this.

But there is one issue raised in this mishnah that troubles me. We are told to be a tail to lions, not a head to foxes—but what does this mean for the foxes themselves? With no-one to lead them in the face of such explicit instruction not to do so, what will be their fate? It cannot be expected that the foxes will cease to be foxes just because they don’t have a leader or that, in the absence of a leader, they will all commit themselves to follow the (head of the) lions. So what is their fate?

I think the answer may be found within Avot itself. Hillel at Avot 1:14 teaches:

אִם אֵין אֲנִי לִי, מִי לִי, וּכְשֶׁאֲנִי לְעַצְמִי, מָה אֲנִי, וְאִם לֹא עַכְשָׁו, אֵימָתָי

If I am not for myself, who is for me? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when?

This mishnah has been so overused in recent years, regardless of its context, that one can easily disregard that it might have had a context when Hillel first taught it. At any rate, the first two propositions—if I am not for myself and if I am only for myself—place it firmly within the category of Avot teachings that deal with interpersonal relationships and the need to strike a balance between one’s personal needs and the needs of others.

By identifying and criticizing the polar opposites of absolute selfishness and total altruism, Hillel foreshadows the Maimonidean golden mean that forms a central plank of Hilchot De’ot in the Rambam’s Mishneh Torah. And as a pair of general maxims for life, Hillel’s guidance casts a clear light on our case of the foxes. We must not devote ourselves utterly to those who may live their lives at a lower standard than our own, and with lower expectations. But nor must we ignore them. We must take our inspiration from the lions and aspire to spread it among the foxes, even though both the lions and the foxes may ridicule our ethics and our efforts.

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FOR HEAVEN’S SAKE!

At Avot 4:14 Rabbi Yochanan HaSandlor teaches:

כָּל כְּנֵסִיָּה שֶׁהִיא לְשֵׁם שָׁמַֽיִם סוֹפָהּ לְהִתְקַיֵּם, וְשֶׁאֵינָהּ לְשֵׁם שָׁמַֽיִם אֵין סוֹפָהּ לְהִתְקַיֵּם

Every gathering that is for the sake of Heaven will endure; that which is not for the sake of Heaven will not endure.

This is not the only mishnah in Avot that refers to a person’s motivation being לְשֵׁם שָׁמַֽיִם (Leshem Shamayim, “For the sake of Heaven”) so it is worth our while to reflect on what this term means.

Literally, since Heaven is the notional abode of God, we can reasonably assume that any act that is done for Heaven’s sake is done for God’s sake. It is axiomatic that an incorporeal, omnipotent and omniscient deity does not actually need anything from us since He is self-sufficient. We therefore usually take “for God’s sake” to mean “in fulfilment with God’s commandments” and not for any other reason. We are not entitled to determine for ourselves what God wants from us. King Saul’s erroneous assumption that God would prefer animal sacrifices to the execution of His explicit instructions led directly to his downfall (1 Samuel 15).

Assuming that “for Heaven’s sake” bore this meaning I was surprised to read the following passage in Ruchi Koval’s inspirational lifestyle rendering of Pirkei Avot, Soul Purpose:

“How would you define an altruistic motive? Don’t we all get some sort of satisfaction when we do good things? The term used in Hebrew for this is l’shem Shamayim—literally ‘in the name of Heaven. In the words of Rabbi [Shimshon Rephael] Hirsch, this means ‘any endeavor for the promotion of a good thing for its own sake without any ulterior motive’”.

Here is a definition of “for Heaven’s sake” that omits God entirely. Feeling that this surely could not be right, I checked my copy of The Hirsch Pirkei Avos and found the quote, somewhat disappointed when I realized that I had read and noted it some time ago and then forgotten it. Reading on from the quote, I saw that Rabbi Hirsch’s short commentary carried on in the same vein, citing Abarbanel to the effect that any well-motivated organization will succeed because all its members bear allegiance to a good cause. Again, there is no mention of God.

This God-free exposition is not new. On this mishnah the Me’iri’s first explanation is much the same, though a further explanation draws on the Avot deRabbi Natan (40:10), where the denial of God’s Will is cited with regard to the gathering that is not LeShem Shamayim.

Not all modern commentators adopt the Hirschian approach, even in his native Germany. Thus Rabbi Marcus Lehmann goes straight to the Me’iri’s citation of the Avot deRabbi Natan, while the contemporary psychology-based commentary Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski in his Visions of the Fathers reverts to the literal approach we described above. Summarizing a generality of explanations and building on the God-free approach, Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau (Yachel Yisrael) seems to suggest that LeShem Shamayim is understandable in negative terms: if an assembly is not selfish (i.e. altruistic) and does not actually cross God’s will, it will succeed even if it is not in any sense spiritual or holy.

Is it right to regard LeShem Shamayim as a motivation that is neutral in terms of an appreciation of God and His will? I think so. Rabbi Ovadyah Bartenura (at Avot 1:1) famously asserts that the inclusion of Avot in the canon of Mishnayot is to distinguish our approach to middot from that of the nations of the world: we and they may share the same guidance on good behavior, whether as individuals or collectively. However, the nations of the world have worked the guidance out on the basis of their philosophies, while ours are derived from Torah miSinai. The notion of promoting altruistic collective action is therefore always to be encouraged, whether driven by an understanding of what God wants us to do or by a recognition of the inherent good of charitable and chesed-based conduct.

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SCATTERED RESOURCES

Hillel’s final mishnah in Avot is quite a catchy one. It opens with five things we should think twice about before desiring them because they’re not as beneficial as one might initially imagine:

מַרְבֶּה בָשָׂר מַרְבֶּה רִמָּה, מַרְבֶּה נְכָסִים מַרְבֶּה דְאָגָה, מַרְבֶּה נָשִׁים מַרְבֶּה כְשָׁפִים, מַרְבֶּה שְׁפָחוֹת מַרְבֶּה זִמָּה, מַרְבֶּה עֲבָדִים מַרְבֶּה גָזֵל

The more flesh, the more worms; the more possessions, the more worry; the more wives, the more witchcraft; the more maidservants, the more immorality; the more manservants, the more theft (Avot 2:8).

As for the second of these give items, the basic idea is that of a proportionality between one’s material wealth and the anxiety that accompanies it. This concept is beautifully illustrated by a story told by the Netivot Shalom about a king who suffered from an ailment that could only be remedied by wearing the coat of a man who was perfectly happy and had no worries. Eventually the king’s agents tracked down such a man and asked to borrow his coat so that the king might put it on and be cured. Said the man, who was blissfully contented with his lot: “But I don’t even have a coat”.

Rabbi Ovadyah from Bartenura adds a little story of his own. He relates that a chassid—a pious person—once prayed that God should spare him from pizur hanefesh, a scattering of his soul. This was because his wealth and material assets were spread across many places and it was consequently necessary to spread his nefesh, his serious attention, over all those places in order to pay attention to them.

Citing the Arve Nahal of Rabbi Dovid Shlomo Eibenschutz, another Hillel—Rabbi Yaakov Hillel (Eternal Ethics from Sinai)—contends that the possessions to which our mishnah refers are not merely material but embrace a person’s physical, mental and spiritual talents and energies too. These are given to us to help us fulfil the mission that God has designated for us. We can concentrate these special resources on the performance of mitzvot and the learning of Torah, or we can dissipate them—and that is pizur nefesh. Rabbi Hillel writes:

“If we disperse our energies heedlessly, wasting them on trivial or mundane pursuits rather than concentrating them on serving Hashem and perfecting our soul, we have ‘scattered our soul’. The choice is ours. It can be real estate, the stock market, wardrobes and cruises, or it can be Torah, chesed, mitzvot, and good mlddot. Will we choose this world, gone before we can even savor it, or the next world, which lasts forever?”

Rabbi Hillel backs this up by citing Tehillim 90:9 ( כִּי כָל-יָמֵינוּ פָּנוּ בְעֶבְרָתֶךָ; כִּלִּינוּ שָׁנֵינוּ כְמוֹ-הֶגֶה, “For all our days passed by because of your fury, we consumed our years like a fleeting thought”) and, referencing the Chida, adds

“If we scatter our words thoughtlessly, they are lost forever, along with the energy they consumed”.

This is a powerful notion. We do indeed often use up our physical resources in vain. But I am certain that this has nothing to do with Hillel’s teaching in our mishnah and that, if I am wrong and his words did once mean this, it is hard to imagine how it applies today. It makes sense to speak of anxiety being induced by material wealth because we see this all around us: it’s not the poor of this world who fret over share prices, purchase electronic security devices, bar their windows and keep guard dogs. But most people today expend their physical energy willingly and happily in the pursuit of social and leisure activities: going on holidays, working out at the gym, chatting with friends, and generally killing time in a manner that few find worrying and many find pleasurable.

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SELF-BELIEF AND DISBELIEF

We are supposed to believe in God. It is a fundamental axiom of Judaism, incorporated within the very fabric of the Thirteen Principles of Faith. Man is made in God’s image. Does this mean that we have to believe in man too?

No, says Hillel at Avot 2:4. Not only are we not supposed to believe in others; we are not even to believe in ourselves:

אַל תַּאֲמִין בְּעַצְמָךְ עַד יוֹם מוֹתָךְ

Do not believe in yourself till the day you die.

Since we don’t know the day we expect to die—a theme on which Rabbi Eliezer ben Hyrcanus elaborates at Avot 2:15—we should not believe in ourselves at all.  Many commentators, led by the Bartenura and Rashi, illustrate this point by citing the case of Yochanan Kohen Gadol, who served faithfully in this capacity for many decades before defecting to the Sadducees.  The Meiri endorses this citation but goes further, warning that one should not put oneself at risk of temptation and assume that one would be able to resist it, citing the tragic case of King Solomon who was led astray by his many wives.

Yochanan Kohen Gadol and Shlomo HaMelech provide extreme examples, but it seems to me that none of us can get through a single day without believing in ourselves one way or another. We believe in our capacity to live in accordance with our daily routines and in our ability to discharge the many simple, mundane functions that make up most of our day. They may be little episodes in the great scheme of things, but they are important to us: relying on ourselves to lock the front door, charge our cell phones, return borrowed objects, get to work on time, and so on. Perhaps we take ourselves for granted, but we do berate ourselves when we forget or fail to do them.

There is another way in which we have to believe in ourselves. In his sefer Shomanu Avoteinu, Rabbi Shimon Abo offers a plausible ground for distinguishing between what we have done in the past and what we still have to do. We cannot rely on our past performance as proof that we will continue to perform well, and we cannot even be confident that we will be credited for our past good deeds since we are not the judge of them. But we must believe in ourselves when we face tasks we have yet to perform for, if we did not, we might never attempt to undertake them.

R’ Abo offers no proof for this proposition, but it seems to me that Yehudah ben Teyma supports it at Avot 5:23 where he teaches:

הֱוֵי עַז כַּנָּמֵר, וְקַל כַּנֶּֽשֶׁר, רָץ כַּצְּבִי, וְגִבּוֹר כָּאֲרִי, לַעֲשׂוֹת רְצוֹן אָבִֽיךָ שֶׁבַּשָּׁמָֽיִם

Be bold as a leopard, light as an eagle, swift as a deer and strong as a lion to do the will of your Father in Heaven.

It makes no sense to tell a person not to have any confidence in their ability to achieve an objective or perform a task and then expect them to wield the qualities listed in that mishnah.

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MUSSAR: DOES MOTHER KNOW BEST?

Parents don’t get much exposure in Pirkei Avot. Though God is described as our Father in Heaven (Avot 5:23), biological parents are not explicitly mentioned at all. Since Avot means “fathers”, many commentators across the generations have explained its content by the occasion reference to fathers—but of mothers there is just one small, oblique trace. This is found in Avot 2:11, where Rabban Yochanan ben Zakkai, praising each of his star talmidim in turn, says of Rabbi Yehoshua ben Chananya אַשְׁרֵי יוֹלַדְתּוֹ  (ashrei yoladeto, “happy is the one who birthed him”).  This can only refer to his mother.

How did Rabbi Yehoshua ben Chananya make his mother happy, and why is this facet of his existence singled out for praise? The commentary ascribed to Rashi, supported by Yevamot Yerushalmi 1:6, explains that his mother, while pregnant, made the rounds of all the local Batei Midrash and asked each of those who learned Torah there to pray for her unborn son to become a chacham. Following his birth, she would place his cradle within earshot of chachamim who were learning, so that he might imbibe the sweet incantation of their Torah learning even before he could understand it. This seems to be the most frequently cited explanations, but I want to look at another.

According to Rabbi Shmuel di Uceda (Midrash Shmuel), Rabbi Yehoshua’s mother taught him mussar, those principles of morality and good conduct that complement the mitzvot of the Torah. This explanation clearly appealed to Rabbi Tvi Hirsch Ferber (Si’ach Tzvi, vol.2) who wove it into his commentary on Eshet Chayil (“A Woman of Worth”)—the famous acrostic at Mishlei 31:10-31 that concludes the Book of Proverbs.

Writing on the verse קָמוּ בָנֶיהָ וַיְאַשְּׁרוּהָ בַּעְלָהּ וַיְהַלְלָהּ (“Her children rise up, and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her”) Rabbi Ferber references our mishnah of Rabbi Yehoshua’s mother and the explanation of Midrash Shmuel, which is itself based on another verse in our chapter of Mishlei, the line that opens it:

דִּבְרֵי לְמוּאֵל מֶלֶךְ מַשָּׂא אֲשֶׁר-יִסְּרַתּוּ אִמּוֹ

The words of king Lemuel [a.k.a. Solomon]; the mussar with which his mother corrected him (Mishlei 31:1).

I have two problems with the explanation of our mishnah based on these verses in Mishlei. First, the words ashrei yoladeto seem quite remote from the meaning taken here and are not obviously allusive to the case of the mother who taught her son mussar. Secondly, elsewhere in Proverbs there is a far better-known verse than 31:1 which suggests something quite different. At 1:8 we encounter a verse that is known to many as the lyrics of a song:

שְׁמַע בְּנִי מוּסַר אָבִיךָ וְאַל-תִּטֹּשׁ תּוֹרַת אִמֶּךָ

Hear, my son, the mussar of your father, and do not forsake the Torah of your mother.

This verse suggests, at the very least, that it is the mother’s job to teach Torah, that mussar is a task for the father, and that we should not imbue the Lemuel verse cited above with too much meaning.

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Here are some sample versions of “Shema Beni Mussar Avicha”:

·       Idan Dahari: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aaQozNe4tZg

·       Eli Herzlich: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCGOYpY_hIg (animated version)

·       Shlock Rock: https://www.zemirotdatabase.org/view_song.php?id=878

·       Mendy Worch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7WDcUFK4qB4