Freedom of choice and lined writing paper

One of the most discussed statements in Avot is Rabbi Akiva’s apothegm (Avot 3:19):

הַכֹּל צָפוּי, וְהָרְשׁוּת נְתוּנָה

In English: “Everything is foreseen, but free will is given”.

Some commentators take it to refer to the apparent contradiction between God’s control of everything that happens in the world He created and the exercise by every human being of a free, uncontrolled and unfettered discretion to make their own decisions in life.  Others take it less seriously: Maharam Shik speculates that it is just a device to attract the attention of talmidim at the beginning of a shiur. All sorts of philosophical issues demand our attention. For example, is God’s foresight of what will happen tantamount to His control of it, or are there outcomes that He can foresee without the need for any intervention or control on His part? And is freedom of choice no more than an illusion, given that everything in the physical world can be traced back to an event that generates or determines it? And is Rabbi Akiva really telling us that, in order to accept both the omniscience and omnipotence of God and His role in guiding and subsequently evaluating our behaviour, we have to accept both propositions as true even though, at our level of understanding, it is impossible to reconcile the truth of them both?

There are other ways of looking at this teaching that do not depend on our view of an all-controlling God. For example, “everything is foreseen” can be taken as a nod to collective human conduct. A clue to the basis for this approach comes from the word “foresee” itself: the verb is formed from two elements: “fore”, meaning “in advance” or “ahead”, and “see”.  English has another word that splits the same way, one that comes from the Latin, and that is the verb “provide”.

We make advance provision for human conduct in so many aspects of communal life. Thus, in every civilised country, traffic proceeds on the same side of the road. It doesn’t matter if that side is the left or the right, so long as everyone does the same thing. No driver or pedestrian is deprived of the choice of which side of the road to occupy and, while laws may criminalise travel on the wrong side of the road, there is no physical or metaphysical barrier to the exercise of personal choice. In 2020 no fewer than 6% of road accidents in India resulted from traffic travelling on the wrong side of the road; the same practice causes an average of 355 deaths annually in the United States.

Life in human society furnishes countless further examples of provision that is made for others, not just through laws but also through customary behaviour, but which is somehow trumped by individual choice. Any parent who has thoughtfully laid out cutlery for a child who snubs the knife and fork provided in favour of fingers will know what this means. The desire to rebel against the foresight of others exists in Torah scholars too. In Visions of the Fathers (at Avot 1:6), Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski tells a story of Rabbi Shimon Shkop. The renowned Rosh Yeshiva once requested a sheet of writing paper so that he could write a letter. When handed a piece of lined paper, he is said to have quipped: “Why must I allow someone else to dictate where I should do my writing?”* The point is well made. Every part of a blank piece of paper can be written on, but the mere existence of lines will limit most people’s choice of where to place their pen.

So, literally speaking, Rabbi Akiva’s problematic mishnah can be stripped of its apparent conundrum and made to apply in even the most prosaic of circumstances. If we accept this view, we can contextualise it within Rabbi Akiva’s own life under the Roman occupation: even though the Romans provided for the banning of Jewish education, one still has a choice as to whether to comply or not—as Rabbi Akiva did, at the cost of his life. But this interpretation raises a fresh question: why would this teaching appear in Avot in the midst of other teachings from the same rabbi that appear to address humankind’s relationship with God and not with one another?

* For the benefit of members of Generation Alpha, I should explain: there was a time when emails did not yet exist and most personal correspondence was written by hand, on paper, using a pen. Stationers sold a choice of plain and lined writing paper, the latter for the benefit of purchasers like me who found it difficult to write straight across the width of the page. The same principle is used in the writing of gittin, Jewish religious divorces, where lines are scored on to the paper before the scribe writes the Hebrew text.

 

Does God accept bribes?

Parashat Ekev features one of the most majestic statements of God’s role as the God of din, strict justice: At Devarim 10:17, Moshe tells his brethren: “For the Lord, your God, is the God of gods and the Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes”.

This statement of God’s impartiality is paralleled by a Mishnah in which Rabbi Elazar HaKappar expands the catalogue of God’s judicial attributes: “He is the One who fashions, He is the Creator, He is the One who understands, He is the judge, He is the witness, He is the plaintiff—and He will judge. He is blessed since before Him there is no iniquity, no forgetfulness, no favouritism and no taking of bribes” (Avot 4:29).

The description of God as a deity who does not take bribes immediately attracts our attention. It is axiomatic that the world runs on three things—truth, justice and peace (Avot 1:18)—and that God is the ultimate source of true justice (Devarim 32:4). If it is unthinkable that God’s justice is founded on anything other than His appreciation of the truth, why should both the written and oral Torah take the trouble to tell us that He does not take bribes?

Rambam addresses this question in his Pirush Mishnayot.  Since it is quite unimaginable that anyone can buy God’s favour by giving Him money, this cannot be what the Mishnah teaches. Rather, Rambam opines, it advances the important practical consideration that a person cannot “buy” God’s goodwill through the performance of good deeds: even if a person performs a thousand good deeds and just one bad deed, God does not allow the performance of those good deeds to provide a mechanism for overlooking that one bad deed. Rather, He will make a point of both rewarding the thousand good deeds and holding the person who performs them accountable for even the one bad deed. Rambam cites two examples of God’s judicial impartiality: the punishment of the otherwise impeccable Moshe for angrily striking the rock instead of speaking to it and, to contrary effect, the rewarding of Eisav, despite his generally execrable conduct, on account of the exemplary way in which he honoured his parents.

One might imagine that there was nothing further to say on the subject, but this is not so. Sforno links this mishnah to that of Rabbi Elazar Ish Bartota (“Give Him from His own, for you and your possessions are His…”: Avot 3:8). Even by performing a mitzvah, ostensibly as a bribe, one is only rendering unto God that to which He is already entitled. Another example of fine-tuning of Rambam’s position comes from Rabbi Liepman Philip Prins. Concluding Rabbi Marcus Lehmann’s commentary on Avot, Rabbi Prins felt that Rambam’s commentary itself required elucidation: individual good deeds and bad deeds cannot cancel one another out because the footprints of their personal and communal impacts are not coextensive. God must therefore address each on its own terms. Maharal (Derech Chaim) employs a similar metaphor: quite simply, the mitzvah does not cover the sin.

Other commentators frame this Mishnah within an entirely different Torah context. Thus Rabbi Yaakov Chagis (Etz HaChaim) sees it as a counter to the text of the Birkat Kohanim (Bemidbar 6:26) which, taken at face value, suggests that God indulges in favouritism, as does the Talmudic proposition (Pesachim 8a) that a person whose son is ill might purchase the favour of God by giving a perutah to a poor man. These matters, explains the Rabbi, relate to God’s active involvement in this world—not to His judgment in the World to Come.

More surprising is the statement of Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau (Yachel Yisrael) that “many commentators … disagree with Rambam, and state that the heavenly court can exchange sins for mitzvos, a position that is supported in many Rabbinic statements”. To support this proposition Rav Lau looks beyond the commentaries to considerably earlier sources: he cites a discussion at Sotah 21a to the effect that “a sin extinguishes a mitzvah”. With respect, neither this quote nor the passage in which it appears provide overt support the proposition that God takes bribes. Rav Lau does however point to a more persuasive source: a citation from Yalkut Shimoni Tehillim 670, where King David describes God as accepting bribes in the form of “repentance, good deeds, and prayer”. This midrash would however appear to be seeking to advocate the efficacy of repentance, good deeds and prayer rather than to be furnishing proof that God takes bribes.

Even if we do not speak in the emotive terminology of bribery and favouritism—two words that we should be reluctant to apply to God if we are uncomfortable at applying them to ourselves—the mere possibility of trading a good deed for a bad one raises issues that extend beyond the scope of this short piece. One is the status of the mitzvah haba’ah be’averah, an action that simultaneously encompasses the fulfilment of one command and disobedience to another.  There is also the status of the averah lishmo, where a transgressor pleads in mitigation his or her belief that the wrongful act has been committed, as it were, for God’s benefit. The relationship of God’s (non)acceptance of bribes to mitzvah haba’ah be’averah and to the averah lishmo are issues that are too large and complex to be developed here. If there is sufficient interest, I shall endeavour to tackle them in a separate post.

The Jewish position on bribing God invites comparison with early Christian practice relating to the grant of indulgences. This was a prominent feature of Catholicism until the Council of Trent began the process of bringing it under control in 1562. Although the purchase of indulgences by sinners was sometimes regarded as a means of paying for the privilege of committing a sin, it was technically no more than the purchase by the sinner of a reduction of the punishment incurred for the committing of a sin that had already been forgiven. Some indulgences involved the payment of cash, which may indeed have looked like a bribe, while others were granted in exchange for the sinner agreeing to make a pilgrimage, recite one or more prayers or perform such acts as the Church might specify. Initially granted at the request of martyrs awaiting execution and those who were unable to bear the full burden of penances imposed upon them, indulgences became an attractive source of income for the Church and were so frequently subject to abuse on both sides that they provided the centrepiece for Martin Luther’s blistering attack on the Church’s mismanagement in 1517.

To conclude, let us return to the verse from parashat Ekev which opens this piece and which clearly and unambiguously establishes that God is a just God, a fair and impartial judge who dispenses justice in a manner that lies way beyond mortal bribery. We can say that the mishnah of Rabbi Elazar HaKappar does not diminish this proposition. Together with the various commentaries on it, its teaching sensitises us to the need to recognise that God is not open to negotiation. Since we cannot trade off mitzvot for the sake of being allowed to escape punishment for the sins of our choice, it is for us serve Him in the manner that He requires; we should be content with the reward He sets aside for us in the next world in return for our own honest service.

  

Abarbanel in brief

The headline of this post, "Abarbanel in brief", may seem somewhat strange to anyone who knows him. This is because Rabbi Don Yitzchak Abarbanel is no miniaturist. Like his commentary on the Torah, his thoughts on Pirkei Avot, Nachalat Avot, are quite fascinating -- but they are also extremely long. The Abarbanel's preferred modus operandi is to front-load his discussion of each mishnah and baraita with a list of questions, often quite numerous, and then to address them. Nachalat Avot is not however just a pirush on Avot; it is also a window on to the world of government, monarchy and civic responsibility, reflecting Don Yitzchak's many and varied experiences as an influential court Jew.

The book I have before me, Be'Orcha Nireh Or, is a kitzur Nachalat Avot -- a shortened version of the massive original. Privately published and distributed free, it is dedicated to the memory of R' Baruch Neriah ben Zilpah veRachamim, who is also honoured by the reproduction of several pages of photographs and personal notices at the end of the volume.

With around 250 pages of large, clear Hebrew print, this kitzur is much shorter than the original (my Nachalat Avot runs to over 400 pages of Rashi font small print). Thus Don Yitzvhak's 26-side essay on Avot 4:29, in which R' Elazar HaKapar closes the perek with a warning about the impossibility of escaping the duty to give an account of oneself to God) is whittled down to half that length, 

Without running heads to tell you where you are when you open the book, this kitzur can be a little slow to navigate. Even so, it is an extremely handy means by which a person can dip into the Abarbanel's scholarship.

I picked up my copy at Pomeranz. If you don't live in Jerusalem but want a copy, there's a contact email: aterettifferet@walla.com.

Hedgehogs, Foxes and the "one great thing"

During the First Temple period, shortly after the wicked king Menashe ascended the throne, an obscure Greek poet living on the tiny island of Paros was busy composing his verses. His name was Archilochus and some fragments of his work have survived until today. One such fragment reads πόλλ' οἶδ' ἀλώπηξ, ἀλλ' ἐχῖνος ἓν μέγα ("a fox knows many things, but a hedgehog knows one big thing").

On one level this is a trite observation, drawn from nature. The fox, an opportunist omnivore who shares with the Jewish people a fondness for chicken, finds its food wherever it can. This task requires resourcefulness, cunning and the ability to learn from both successful and failed experiences. As its potential prey, the hedgehog need only know one crucial thing: how to roll into a prickly ball in order to ward off whatever stratagem the fox or any other predator might use.  

But there is a higher level too.  In The Hedgehog and the Fox, a celebrated essay published in 1953, the eminent philosopher Sir Isaiah Berlin wrote of the contrasting characteristics of these animals. He then proceeded to categorise many well-known personalities as sharing the outlook of one or the other. Sir Isaiah and his followers classed Plato, Nietzsche, Marx, George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and Sir Winston Churchill as “hedgehogs”, while Aristotle, Shakespeare, Freud, Warren Buffett and Benjamin Franklin were “foxes”.

Should a practising Jew be regarded as a fox or a hedgehog? In parashat Ekev (Devarim 10:12-13) Moshe says:

“And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God require of you? Only that you fear the Lord your God, to walk in all His ways, and to love Him, and to serve the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. To keep the commandments of the Lord, and His statutes, which I command you this day for your own good”.

There are 613 mitzvot in the Torah and a good many more beyond it, so a statement that one must obey them for love and fear of God would appear to reflect the policy of the hedgehog. An extreme version of the same reductionist position appears in the Talmud (Makkot 23b-24a) where we learn that King David was able to reduce this total of 613 to a mere 11. Not to be outdone, the prophets Isaiah, Micah (and Isaiah again) whittled down the number of principles of Jewish faith to 6, 3 and 2. Habakkuk (at 2:4) then founded the entire Torah on a single grundnorm: “But the righteous shall live by his faith”. This fragment of prophetic verse could very well have been a summary of the words of Moshe quoted above, since it is faith in God that generates every part of that great leader’s advice. Both offer us just one great rule to fit every situation—and that is very much the territory of the hedgehog.

But there is more. The considerations we have reviewed above all represent the Tanach, the fixed and immutable truths of the Written Torah. Is the Oral Torah for hedgehogs too?

A reading of the tractate of Avot as a whole suggests that the life of a morally responsible, ethically sensitive Jew requires the skills and the reflexes of the fox. Its dynamics reflect the tension of when to speak and when to remain silent, when to give respect and when to avoid it, when to act and when to stand aside, and so on. Three of its key mishnayot (Avot 2:1, 2:12 and 2:13) open with a Tanna asking which is the right path to choose (or avoid); they conclude with answers that tell us how to find those paths but not what they are in purely factual terms. The overriding principle in Avot is the exercise of discretion and personal initiative when ducking and weaving to escape the problems that block one’s passage through life.

Putting the Written and Oral Torah together, we can now see that we do not live in a binary world in which everyone is either a hedgehog or a fox. A Jew must be both. He or she must know when to emulate the hedgehog, batten down the hatches and take the path of security and caution, and when to take the path less travelled, or not yet travelled at all, sniffing out fresh sources of inspiration in prayer and learning, innovative solutions and creative devices for growing in one’s service to God.

Is any proof needed? Let us turn again to the animal kingdom. Since the dawn of creation the great knowledge of the hedgehog has been a brilliant and simple solution to the problem of fending off predators. However, it little avails the bold animal that, venturing beyond the hedgerow, aspires to fend off passing traffic as it crosses the road. Without innovation the hedgehog is just an endangered species, another victim of roadkill. In sharp contrast, the fox’s initiative and ability to learn on the job, as it were, have provided it with a host of new and exciting opportunities for urban living while its rural habitat diminishes. This is not merely survival: it is prosperity and growth.

To conclude: when we study the Torah and seek to implement its ways within our lifestyle, we seek to respect and observe the Torah’s eternal values and mitzvot while living in a world of constant change, change that lies beyond our power to control or prevent. In doing so, it appears that there is no alternative. We must be both hedgehogs and foxes.

*************************************************

Historical postscript: Sir Isaiah Berlin was a direct descendant of Shneur Zalman of Liadi, the Ba’al HaTanya and author of the Shulchan Aruch HaRav. It would have been interesting to know whether he classed his illustrious ancestor as a hedgehog or a fox—or as both.

Harry Potter and the Tractate of Truth

Sometimes it is good to seek the counsel of others. This is one such occasion.

A few days ago I was asked if I might consider writing another book on Avot. Unlike the usual commentaries, this book would be an appreciation of Avot viewed through the medium of the seven Harry Potter novels. At present I am very much in two minds about taking this suggestion any further. My thoughts on the topic can be divided as follows:

In favour of the book

• The seven Harry Potter books are probably the best-known novels in history. By 2019 their aggregated sales passed the 500 million mark and they have been translated into more than 80 languages. In discussing the morals and ethical positions taken by the characters, the writer can be assured of the familiarity of readers with its case studies and also be sure, at least initially, of a fairly high interest level.
  
  
• Many of the main characters in the series are quite nuanced, leading the reader to form an opinion of them which must later be revised. Likewise, many of the episodes represent opportunities in which characters have either applied principles from Avot or have conspicuously failed to do so.
  
  
• A considerable proportion of younger readers find traditional religious-interest story books hard to relate to, since they deal with kings, inn-keepers, wagon-drivers and tzaddikim who are not easily identified with figures in their own experience. Harry Potter however deals with schools and teachers, the problems faced in growing up and dealing with adults, and so on. 
  
  
• The notion of discussing critically the conduct of fictional characters is by no means unprecedented and can be a powerful way of conveying a mussar message. A recent example is Into the Woods, a movie in which characters from children's nursery tales are dramatically called to account for their often wrongful or immoral actions.

Against the book

• There is a risk that, irrespective of the quality and nature of the text, the book may create the impression of seeking to trivialise Avot and its many teachings.
  
  
• The book might be judged as being no more than an attempt to cash in on the popularity of Harry Potter.
  
  
• While many major issues and topics are reflected in the text of one or more of the seven-book series, there are some mishnayot and baraitot that have no obvious relevance to them.
  
  
• The book might not so much attract readers to think more about Avot and internalise its message but instead drive them back to reading and re-reading Harry Potter and other works of juvenile fantasy.
  
  
• Many parents are uncomfortable about their children reading books which lack any specifically Jewish content but which do discuss practices of witchcraft and wizardry that are plainly not encouraged by the Torah. 
  
  
• On a personal note, when this proposal was put to me, I experienced an uncomfortably high level of pride at having been asked which left me wondering whether, if I were to write this book, I would be doing so with the right motives. 

There is already a haggadah with a Harry Potter theme -- Moshe Rosenberg's An (Unofficial) Hogwarts Haggadah -- which does not seem to have brought about the apocalypse. Children from the most strictly orthodox families will in the main not have seen it and they would probably know little or nothing of Harry Potter anyway. In contrast, children from the least religiously oriented backgrounds would almost certainly welcome it as a pleasant distraction from the traditions of what, for the young, often seems an interminable evening. But there are many children in the middle, who read Harry Potter books but are expected to buy into their Jewish heritage too. And while the Pesach seder is only only once or twice a year, Avot applies 24/7, all year round, so the potential impact of a Potter-oriented Avot book is greater, as is the responsibility of getting it right.

So, blog readers, do please let me know: should I take the path of prudent caution and avoid this project like the plague -- or should I go ahead and embrace it with all my usually infectious enthusiasm?

Kids' stuff

Many books on Pirkei Avot are tough going for the reader. They are often packed with mussar, designed to stir the conscience and to point to our shortfall in our behavioural standards. Children's books are an exception; they are designed to appeal to the young and growing child, both aesthetically and in terms of the accessibility of their content.

Genendel Krohn's Ma'aseh Avos was published by Feldheim last year and I missed its emergence, being submerged in the writing of my own book. Krohn is a writer of popular works that are addressed to a readership of kids who belong to the committed orthodox camp. As one might expect, this introduction to Avot teaches without being preachy and it illustrates principles drawn from that tractate in ways that children can easily identify with.

The author wisely does not attempt to cover Avot in full. She has selected three mishnayot or baraitot from each of the six perakim, illustrating them with memorable stories that will resonate particularly strongly with readers who can identify themselves or the main protagonists. In keeping with the spirit of Avot 6:6, Krohn even cites the source of each of her illustrative tales. Brightly coloured artwork by Tirtsa Pelleg literally completes the picture of a fun first book on Avot.

Ma'aseh Avos is published by Feldheim; it can be purchased in all good Jewish bookshops (inevitably I found my copy in Pomeranz's Jerusalem store) and on Amazon.

Slipping into holiday mode: what would Shammai say?

It's the height of summer and many Jewish families are either on holiday or actively preparing to go way. Does Pirkei Avot have a message for them?

At Avot 1:15, we have a mishnah that teaches:

שַׁמַּאי אוֹמֵר: עֲשֵׂה תוֹרָתְךָ קְבַע, אֱמוֹר מְעַט וַעֲשֵׂה הַרְבֵּה, וֶהֱוֵי מְקַבֵּל אֶת כָּל הָאָדָם בְּסֵֽבֶר פָּנִים יָפוֹת.

Shammai used to say: “Make your Torah fixed; say little but do a lot, and receive every man with a cheerful face”.

Most commentators assume, not without reason, that when Shammai says “Make your Torah fixed”, he means “Make your Torah learning fixed”. This can be taken in various ways. For example it can mean

• making the Torah the fixed point around which your life revolves (Rambam, Bartenura),
• fixing a regular time to learn (Rabbi Avraham Azulai, Ahavah BeTa’anugim),
• learning it from one teacher alone, to avoid uncertainty and confusion (Rabbi Shmuel de Uceda, Midrash Shmuel),
• fixing one’s good inclination so that it is in place at all times and can combat the evil inclination that encourages you to stop learning Torah and do other things (Rabbi Tzevi Hirsch Ferber, Hegionei Avot),
• fixing a regular routine for what you learn or fixing in your memory and in your heart the Torah that you are learning.

Shammai himself was a great Torah scholar and his commitment to learning Torah is unquestionable. However, the words of his Mishnah suggest that maybe something else remains to be learned here. This is because, though the word “Torah” may imply “learning”, Shammai does not explicitly mention that word.

Taking a wider view, we can see that Shammai’s teaching may mean that one can also fix the manner in which one observes the Torah’s laws. In simplest terms this can be practising what one preaches rather than laying down one course of conduct but behaving in a way that contradicts this course (Avot deRabbi Natan 13:2).

In terms of setting standards, this can mean demanding of a rabbi that he will not apply the halachah strictly upon himself and leniently for others, or vice versa (According to Rabbi Yisrael Meir Lau, Rav Lau on Pirkei Avos, the text of this Mishnah that was before Rabbi Shimon ben Tzemach Duran states explicitly “so that you will not be lenient with yourself and strict with others or vice versa ….”).

If the achievement of a level of consistency is what this Mishnah is about, it can also point a finger at practising Jews who maintain two levels of practice—one for home, the other for holidays. How careful are we to fix the same standards of kashrut when on vacation, in a resort where there may be no convenient kosher stores at hand? Are we as careful then as we are when we are back home, where supplies of religiously approved foods are readily available? The same applies to the clothes we wear and the way we behave.

Kashrut on holiday is just one aspect of a larger issue: the social dimension to fixing one’s observance of the Torah’s laws. This is an important matter that cannot be overlooked because it reflects a three-way tension between the demands of God, the power of peer pressure and the insidious effect of the yetzer hara (usually translated as the “evil Inclination” but sometimes just a manifestation of the forces of lethargy and indifference).

The clash of Torah and social priorities exists in two forms. In one, a person who is scrupulously observant of Torah mitzvot in the company of friends and family may simply not bother to keep those same mitzvot when he is alone and there is no-one else around to see what he is doing. In the other, a person who is scrupulously observant of Torah mitzvot, even when he is on his own, cannot face the prospect of performing them in the company of strangers or of people he knows but who, being non-Jewish or unobservant, might laugh at him or ask him awkward questions.

In the first of these cases, peer pressure works to encourage and maybe even enforce observance; in the second case it works in quite the opposite direction. Either way, Shammai’s advice is to make one’s Torah practice fixed: be consistent and, when seeking to establish the level at which this consistency should be maintained, remember that the real audience is not one’s peers or family, but an omniscient, all-seeing God.

Comforting us on Tisha be'Av: an application of Avot

Tisha be'Av (the 9th day of the month of Av) is the saddest day in the Jewish calendar. Apart from many other tragic events, we mourn the destruction of both the First and Second Temple as well as the dreadful loss of life, livelihood, freedom and human dignity that accompanied these momentous events.

Many customs, practices and rituals are associated with this day of national mourning. One of these is the insertion of a special blessing, Nachem, into the thrice-daily template of the weekday Amidah, the main prayer in the evening, morning and afternoon services.

How many times on Tisha be'Av should we recite Nachem? Rabbi David Abudraham, who flourished in the mid-14th century, cites a dispute between two Geonim as to the answer. Rav Amram Gaon maintained that it should be inserted into all three daily prayers, while Rabbenu Sa'adya Gaon said that it was required only once, in the afternoon prayer -- the third and final prayer of the Jewish day.

What is the ground of their difference? Rabbi Chaim Friedlander (Siftei Chaim: Rinat Chaim) offers the following explanation. On the view that Nachem is a request to be comforted, it is appropriate to recite it right through this tragic date since the entire Jewish people feels the loss and needs the comfort. However, there is a mishnah in Avot (4:23, per Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar) that teaches that we should not seek to comfort a mourner when the deceased (i.e. the object of the mourner's loss) is before him. On the night of Tisha be'Av and in the following morning, it is customary to sit on the ground in mourning but, once the afternoon arrives, the period of full mourning ends and it is only then that the time for offering comfort begins. And that is the time for reciting Nachem.

Preparing to say goodbye

Earlier this week Tzohar put together an online program titled "Preparing to Say Goodbye" and subtitled "A personal, medical and ethical discussion on confronting end-of-life issues".

I was a little surprised to see this event advertised in the OU's Torah Tidbits magazine, where the advertisements tend to focus on catered holiday programs for the Jewish holidays and high-end property sales. However, the subject of "saying goodbye" is an important one, albeit one that has to be handled sensitively since many people are uncomfortable with it.

Israel has one of the longest life-expectancies in the world, which rather suggests that its inhabitants are in no hurry to say their fond farewells, and the lovely Jerusalem inner-city paradise that is Rechavia might almost be described as a senior citizens' residential campus.

What does Pirkei Avot have to say on the subject? It recognises that age is an issue and that, once people hit their nineties, we really shouldn't expect too much of them; one we hit the hundred mark, it's as though we're just not there any more (Avot 5:25). This curious mishnah is the subject of numerous commentaries that downplay the position of the seriously old, but none of them suggest that we should treat centenarians and near-centenarians with anything other than the utmost personal respect.

There is teaching that has something more practical about preparing for death. This is where Rabbi Eliezer ben Hyrcanus (Avot 2:15) urges everyone to repent today since they might be dead tomorrow. That proposition applies across the board, not only to the old, and therefore to people who have no expectation of imminent death at all, as well as those who do.

But that is not all. Taken across all six chapters, Avot contains over 20 mishnayot and baraitot that allude to death and the world to come in one way or another. That's around 15% of the tractate's total content. Such prosaic, if painful, issues as that of how to say farewell to family, friends and loved ones are not explicitly tackled; these are topics that are generally too personal to be subject to quick and convenient verbal formulae.

Though we do not know the details, we are taught to believe that there is a life to follow the one we now live and a world to follow this one. The significance of an after-world, whatever form it may take, does not lie solely in the area of rewarding the good and punishing the wicked. It also encourages us to recognise that, as we exit one world for another, for every goodbye, there is a corresponding hello. We should prepare ourselves for that too.

Avot in retrospect: a summary of last month's blogposts

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

Sunday 31 July 2022: Meiri, Masoret and Mnemonics: One of Rabbi Akiva's best-known teachings looks quite different if you delete just one letter.

Wednesday 27 July 2022: Life as a journey: Pirkei Avot, Waze and means: The week's Torah reading at the end of the Book of Numbers is not one of the most popular -- but it can still deliver a message for Avot fans.

Friday 22 July 2022: Holding back and going forth: Avot and the Delphic Oracle. Abstinence is only one facet of the Jewish response to keeping non-religious society at arm's-length. How does Avot's perspective on this topic compare with that of ancient Greece?

Wednesday 20 July 2022: Upon my oath! Making a personal commitment. One of Rabbi Akiva's least popular teachings in Avot turns out to have some genuine relevance to contemporary culture.

Monday 18 July 2022: Only Ten Shekel: one book, two commentaries. Can readers share information about this little tome?

Friday 15 July 2022: Be careful what you believe -- and how you believe it. The laws regarding lashon hara (impermissible speech) pose problems for the application of Pirkei Avot. How so?

Wednesday 13 July 2022: Mishnayot for mourners: a change in the air? The custom of reciting Mikvaot at a shivah is widespread and well established -- but some people have opted to recite a mishnah from Avot instead.

Tuesday 12 July 2022: Sages and Dreamers: A book notice on a recently republished collection of essays by Elie Wiesel, which feature many rabbis who contributed to Pirkei Avot.

Monday 11 July 2022: Avot online: a six-month review: which teachings from the Ethics of the Fathers are hot, and which are not? We take a look at Avot on the internet.

Friday 8 July 2022: Comparisons with Balaam: why Abraham, not Moses? Why does Avot 5:22 overlook the superficially more apt contrast between Balaam and his contemporary, fellow prophet Moses?

Thursday 7 July 2022: Abraham versus Balaam: how judgemental should we be? We know from Avot 5:22 that we should be like the disciples of Abraham, not like those of  Balaam -- but how can we tell them apart?

Sunday 3 July 2022: Thinking better of politicians: can it be done? Yehoshua ben Perachyah's teaching that we should judge others favourably makes no exception in respect of politicians. Should we therefore be cautious before casting aspersions on their wish to hold public office?

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Avot Today blogposts for June 2022 
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

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.