Naughty to be haughty

Our previous post focused on the concept of achdut (unity, togetherness), asking why the word does not appear in Pirkei Avot. But it's not the only thing that is ostensibly missing.

Jewish tradition makes no secret of the fact that we should be humble, not haughty. גאוה (ga’avah, “haughtiness”, “arrogance”, “pride”, “conceit”) seemingly has virtually no place at all in the repertoire of acceptable Jewish behavioural characteristics.

Essentially, there is no excuse for puffing ourselves up with airs and graces. In recent years rabbis, notably R’ Chaim Friedlander (Siftei Chaim: Middot veAvodat Hashem) and R’ Shalom Noach Berezovky (Netivot Shalom) have repeatedly hammered home the dangers of cultivating this undesirable personal quality, which is as repugnant to God as it is to ourselves. As the Talmud teaches us:

R' Hisda said, and according to another version it was Mar Ukva: Every man in whom is haughtiness of spirit, the Holy One, blessed be He, declares, I and he cannot both dwell in the world; as it is said: Whoever privately slanders his neighbour, him will I destroy; he who has a haughty high look and a proud heart I will not tolerate:— read not “he” [I will not tolerate], but “with him” I cannot [dwell] (Sotah 5a).

So why does ga’avah go unmentioned in Pirkei Avot? If we dip beneath the surface of the words of Avot we find that the concept is not ignored.

In the first place, the Tannaim take a positive stance. Rather than discourage arrogance and pride, they encourage humility. Since it is not in practice possible for a person to be characterized both as humble and as arrogant, the endorsement of the one automatically entails the rejection of the other.

Secondly, commentators on Avot throughout the ages have used the language of Avot in order to condemn arrogance.  The Bartenura and the commentary ascribed to Rashi both take the opportunity to warn against ga’avah in the context of Avot 4:4 (where R’ Levitas Ish Yavneh urges people to be extremely humble), as do the Rambam, Rabbenu Yonah, the Meiri, the Abarbanel and R’ Chaim Volozhiner. There are other opportunities to preach against ga’avah elsewhere in Avot. For example the Maharam Shik uses Avot 5:1 as a peg upon which to hang his comments about God creating the world with 10 utterances rather than a single one: by not showing off, as it were, God is demonstrating His own form of modesty or humility, setting an example that we too should emulate by avoiding ga’avah when we contemplate our own achievements.

None of this explains why none of the teachings of the Tannaim and Amoraim found in Avot mention the g-word. Possibly Rebbi, when redacting the tractate, considered that the subject had already been sufficiently covered by the mishnayot and baraitot on humility. If anyone has a better explanation, I do hope that they come forward and share it.

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Arrogance and humility: the dream team?

It is fair to say that, on the whole, arrogance gets a pretty bad press at the hands of Jewish sages. It's a shame that there's not much demand for arrogance, since it is usually in plentiful supply. Humility, in contrast, is highly praised for its efficacy both in our dealings with God and for how we relate to our fellow humans—but it would regrettably appear to be in short supply.

In his work Elef HaMagen, Rabbi Eliezer Papo (better known as the Pele Yo’etz) tells the story of a man who, when rudely insulted by another, refused to respond to this provocation. When asked how he managed what must have looked like a huge feat of self-restraint, he explained as follows:

When the man insulted me, I was not alone. On one side of me stood Arrogance, and he said to me ”how can you find it within yourself to pay any attention to this person? Surely it is well beneath your dignity to retaliate against a meaningless attack by a worthless individual! Treat him with disdain and just ignore him”. To the other side of me stood Humility, who said to me “is this not the time to demonstrate how meek and humble you are, bearing in mind the wise words of our sages who say that it is far preferable to be among the insulted than to be classed among those who do the insulting”.

The Pele Yo’etz ties this in with the first two teachings of Yehoshua ben Perachya (Avot 1:6):

“Aseh lecha rav, ukoneh lecha chaver”: עֲשֵׂה לְךָ רַב, וּקְנֵה לְךָ חָבֵר

These words are usually translated along the lines of “make for yourself a teacher (or master) and acquire for yourself a friend”. The word rav has the additional meaning of “great”, so the first part of this teaching can be taken at a pinch as meaning “make greatness for yourself”, i.e. “make yourself arrogant”. As for kaneh lecha chaver, the word kaneh—which means “acquire”—has the same three-letter root (קנה) as kanah, a reed. The reed is a symbol of humility since it bows and bends in the breeze. So the man who faces insult and abuse but follows the path to which this Mishnah alludes is able to summon up both arrogance and humility in order to reach the right behavioural conclusion.

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Illustration from Thesaurus.plus