The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth?

Anyone spending all or most of the day in synagogue on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, will have noticed how often the word emet (“truth”) and its derivatives crop up in the extensive liturgy that addresses the issues of confession, repentance and the quest for forgiveness. In short we are to acknowledge the truth of who we are and what we have done, to strip away the sheker(“falsity”) that can so easily insinuate its way into playing a major part in our lives, and to stand before God as our true selves with the sincere aspiration that we will seek to do better, to be better, in the year ahead.

Emet plays a key role in Pirkei Avot. It is one of the three qualities upon which the continuation of civilised life depends (1:18). Acknowledgement of the truth, however inconvenient it may be, is one of the seven signs of a wise person (5:9); setting oneself on the path of truth is listed as one of the 48 steps to acquiring Torah (6:6).

While the Yom Kippur liturgy contrasts emet and sheker, Pirkei Avot makes no mention of sheker at all. This is unsurprising if we remember that Avot is not a philosophical tract on the nature of abstract concepts but a set of practical guidelines for moral Jewish decision-making. Thus, while truth and peace are both shortlisted as values upon which the world’s survival depends, a mishnah in the first perek (1:12) advocates following the path of Aaron in loving peace and pursuing peace. Aaron famously accomplishes this path midrashically by falsely telling each of two adversaries that the other was sad to be in dispute and wanted to make peace.

If truth is accepted as a relative value rather than an absolute, we can accommodate the concept of the partial or incomplete truth, when words that are spoken are literally true but do not tell the whole story. But how far can not-quite-truth be acceptable? There is a countertrend towards promoting the absolute value of truth. This can be seen in the Sefer Chasidim, where Rabbi Yehudah HaChasid disapproves of the practice of improving even a true story by embellishing it—even if the story has didactic value which is enhanced by the embellishment. It can also be seen in the Chafetz Chaim’s important work on lashon hara (improperly telling tales of others, whether true or false). This work covers much of the same ground as Rabbeinu Yonah’s Sha’are Teshuvah, but effectively converting what were previously regarded as middot(discretionary canons of behaviour) into mitzvot (binding commandments).

A related area of truth and falsehood is that of midrashic teachings, many of which are fanciful and, in real-world terms, impossible. Are they emet because the message they convey is true, or sheker because they did not happen, could not happen or clash factually with other midrashim on the same subject? Here the range of opinions is wide, spanning those who accept as a matter of faith that all midrashim are true and those who discount their veracity—however plausible they may be—on the ground that they are midrashim. Many people adopt the position that many midrashim are literally false but metaphorically true, and that the metaphorical truth trumps the literal falsehood. However, this convenient solution is not, so far as I am aware, flagged by their authors except where the tales are described as mashalim (“parables”), such as Rabbi Akiva’s famous citation of a dialogue between a cunning fox and some remarkably self-aware fish (Berachot 61b).

This leaves us on Yom Kippur with a difficult decision: do we repent telling an untruth or half-truth because we have lied and thus introduced more sheker into the world? Or do we decide not to repent, even if by doing so we are effectively judging our own actions and pre-empting the decision of the heavenly court? Readers of this post now have a year to decide before Yom Kippur comes around again.

Eat, drink and be merry, for tomorrow we repent

Tonight the vast majority of Jews, practising or otherwise, mark Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. For some it is an intense and deeply moving day of prayer, fast, introspection and seeking forgiveness. For others it is one or more of those things. For all of us it is a chance to step out from our ordinary lives for a day and ask ourselves just what sort of people we are. Whether we take that opportunity or not is up to us.

Today is erev Yom Kippur—the eve of the Day of Atonement. It a very different day and often an extremely one. Since the fast commences in the late afternoon. Many of us rush home from work far earlier than usual to wash and eat the large festive meal that sets us up for rather more than 25 hours without food or drink. Numerous customs are associated with the day, including the giving of charity.

Not everyone knows that, just as it is a mitzvah to fast on Yom Kippur itself, it is also a mitzvah to eat well on erev Yom Kippur and someone who does so is regarded as though he has fasted twice. Some people take the opportunity to do just that, keeping a bag of nuts or raisins, a packet of sweets or some other tasty items to nibble at random across the day. Unlike Pesach, when it is a mitzvah to eat the unleavened matzah, the Torah does not specify any particular food ahead of the fast, so the choice is left to the consumer. Anyone who wants to suffer on Yom Kippur can opt for salty foods that leave them with a raging thirst. This may not however be the most efficacious way to approach the long, hot day that faces them.

Ultimately, while we should stand in awe of God on the Day of Atonement and repent our sins, the day is not a day of sadness and mourning. It is—or should be—a day of happiness because we have the chance to relegate our bodily needs to second place and let our spirits soar. It is a day for setting the record straight, for drawing a line under our recent past and for starting again along the paths our lives are to take.

Does Pirkei Avot have a special message for Yom Kippur? Nothing is said explicitly about the day, and implicit in the teaching of Rabbi Eliezer ben Hyrcanus (Avot 2:15) is the key to why this is so. If, as Rabbi Eliezer says, a person should repent one day before he dies, he will be in a state of regular if not constant repentance by the time the Day of Atonement comes round. This is the religious equivalent of training daily before running a marathon and getting into good shape. If you do this, the event itself will be less daunting.

Do not be despondent if you have not been strenuously training yourself right through the year for Yom Kippur. The chances are that you will at least be in training for eating well on erev Yom Kippur, so make the most of it!

Do it deliberately!

Ahead of Yom Kippur -- the Day of Atonement and the occasion on which we think of God's judgement of us as being irrevocably sealed -- here's a short thought on the exercise of one's judgement, taken from Rabbi Reuven Melamed's Melitz Yosher.

The first actual teaching in Pirkei Avot, one that emanates from the Men of the Great Assembly themselves, is הֱווּ מְתוּנִים בַּדִּין, be deliberate in judgement. These words have a judicial flavour to them and many commentators emphasise how important it is for judges to be cautious and meticulous when seeking to reach a decision in the cases before them. This is because a judge's long experience of similar cases can lead him to favour a decision that is similar to those reached in previous cases even though the facts before him may be slightly but significantly different; there is also a danger that long-time familiarity with the relevant laws will result in them being misremembered if their words are not carefully rechecked.

Rabbi Melamed observes that being deliberate in one's judgement is actually the foremost principle that a person should employ in every walk of life. When thinking about performing a mitzvah, avoiding the transgression of a prohibition or just making routine decisions in one's life, we should stop and think, weighing up the wisdom and the real meaning of what we do.

In his seminal work, Thinking, Fast and Slow, Daniel Kahneman explains that we cannot in practice cogitate upon every action we undertake. Much of the time we act on autopilot. If we have to stop and think each time we take a step, life becomes intolerable, normal existence impossible. This does not however affect Rabbi Melamed's view of the advice of the Men of the Great Assembly, which is clearly addressed only to the sort of decisions we should make consciously (but often do not).

One final thought: can we presume that the decisions we make as to which decisions are the ones that we have to think carefully about are themselves decisions that require us to think carefully?

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 SEPTEMBER 2022: 

Friday 30 September 2022: Is a bur a boor, or something more? We look at the three-way relationship between learning Torah, having a day job and fearing sin.

Wednesday 28 September 2022: Don't just sit and learn! For God's sake get a job ... Pirkei Avot offers support to both sides of the learn-or-work debate -- and here's a fresh perspective on it.

Sunday 25 September 2022: Shanah Tovah! A happy new year to you all. For once, here's a post that is self-explanatory.

Friday 23 September 2022: Lions, foxes and a mysterious proof verse. Several classical commentators explain the mishnah about being a tail to lions rather than a head to foxes by reference to a verse from Proverbs that no longer appears in the Ethics of the Fathers.

Wednesday 21 September 2022: Portrait of a prophet: another reason for not judging by appearances; A midrashic "case study" of Moses shows the dangers of superficial assessment of others.

Monday 19 September 2022: Do good, feel bad? Fulfilment of a divine commandment should make us feel great about ourselves. Avot advocates the virtues of charitable giving, though that can have quite the opposite effect.

Sunday 18 September 2022: A vanishing hatred. We take a deeper look at Ben Azzai's warning that we should not regard any fellow human lightly.

Friday 16 September 2022: Goodwill to all men. How can we ascertain whether the idea of greeting everyone with a cheerful countenance really does mean "everyone" and not just other Jews?

Wednesday 14 September 2022: Avot, Elul and repentance: it's not too late. A few simple thoughts about the best way to make use of the month that leads up to the High Holy Days of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.

Tuesday 13 September 2022: Does God accept bribes? A further comment. We look at the Meiri's contribution to this great debate.

Sunday 11 September 2022: Escape from captivity. Rabbi David Hazan's David BaMetzudah opens with a description of the unusual circumstances in which he came to write his commentary on Avot.

Friday 9 September 2022: Are you a man or a chameleon? Is a person's individuality compromised by the need to conform to norms and meet the needs of others, or is it determined by these things? 

Monday 5 September 2022: Left dangling: limits to free will revisited. Returning to one of Judaism's favourite topics, we suggest that there is a half-way stage between total free will and complete predestination.

Sunday 4 September 2022: Orphaned, Unloved: Another seemingly unwanted commentary on Pirkei Avot is unearthed. Information concerning it and its author is earnestly requested.

Friday 2 September 2022: Seniors and Juniors: One can learn a lot from those higher up in the hierarchy and those below, even though what one learns may be quite different in each case.

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Avot Today blogposts for August 2022
Avot Today blogposts for July 2022 
Avot Today blogposts for June 2022 
Avot Today blogposts for May 2022
Avot Today blogposts for April 2022
Avot Today blogposts for March 2022

Is a bur a boor, or something more?

This is the second of two posts with a common theme, based on the Tiferet Tzion commentary of Rabbi Yitzchak Ze'ev Yadler.

Hillel teaches (in the first part of Avot 2:6):

אֵין בּוּר יְרֵא חֵטְא

In English: “A boor cannot be a sin-fearing person”.

This apparently abrupt and dogmatic generalisation has invited much discussion over the years. This discussion can be conveniently divided into the consideration of three questions: (i) what actually is a “boor” in this context? (ii) what is meant by “a sin-fearing person” and (iii) why should the fact that a person is a boor deprive him of the ability to fear sin? These three questions are clearly related, inasmuch as the answer to question (iii) is contingent upon the way we understand that is meant by “boor” and how we view “sin-fearing”.

In Hillel’s mishnah the boor is one of five defective character-types, the other four being the am ha’aretz (variously understood as someone who, in Torah terms, is uneducated or uncultured), the bayashan (being timid, this person is afraid to ask questions and will not therefore learn well), the kapadan (irritable or irascible and therefore unsuited to teaching) and the marbeh vischorah (who is too greatly engaged in business and commerce to impart Torah to others). Since the boor and the am ha’aretz are adjacent and potentially overlapping concepts, discussion tends to focus on how the boor and the am ha’aretz differ and, if one reads all the commentaries on this issue, one could be forgiven for thinking that there is really very little difference between them at all.

Rabbi Yitzchak Ze’ev Yadler takes a different approach in his Tiferet Tzion. His starting point is an earlier mishnah in the same chapter (Avot 2:2) in which Rebbi’s son Rabban Gamliel teaches that it is a beautiful thing for a person to combine Torah study with a regular occupation since the exertion that is demanded of someone who combines Torah study with a day job will remove sin from that person’s consciousness.

The word בּוּר (bur) indicates something (or in this case, someone) that is empty. It is the capacity to pursue Torah and a worldly occupation that distinguishes humans from members of the animal kingdom. When engaged in both or possibly either of these activities there will be no room to contemplate sin. But if both are emptied out, a person becomes a bur and, like the animal, has no awareness of sin and therefore no capacity to fear it or its consequences.

It is possible that, while the mishnah refers specifically to learning Torah, it may be equally applicable to the learning of any system of morality that points to considerations of rewards for good behaviour and punishments for sins, thus embracing the moral basis of all three Abrahamic religions.

Don't just sit and learn! For God's sake get a job ...

In recent weeks I've made frequent use of a commentary on Pirkei Avot, Tiferet Tzion, by Rabbi Yitchak Ze'ev Yadler, which I picked up for 10 shekels in a street sale of unwanted and abandoned books. Before moving on to sample the approach to Avot another commentator, I'm posting two final pieces based on Rabbi Yadler's book which deal with different mishnayot but share a common theme. Here's the first:

The Talmud (Berachot 35b) brings a famous argument between Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai and Rabbi Yishmael as to whether it is better to sit and learn Torah full time, as Rabbi Shimon contends, or to work when it is time to work and learn when it is time to learn, as Rabbi Yishmael maintains. The passage, in full, reads like this.

Our Rabbis taught: “And you shall gather in your corn” (Deut. 11:14). What is to be learnt from these words? Since it says: “This book of the law shall not depart from your mouth” (Joshua 1:8), I might have thought that this instruction is to be taken literally, so it says: “And you shall gather in your corn”, which implies that you should combine the study of them [i.e. the words of the Torah] with a worldly occupation. This is the view of Rabbi Yishmael.

Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai says: “Is that possible? If a man ploughs in the ploughing season, sows in the sowing season, reaps in the reaping season, threshes in the threshing season, and winnows in the windy season, what will become of the Torah? No! But when Israel perform the will of the Omnipresent, their work is performed by others, as it says: ‘And strangers shall stand and feed your flocks…’ (Isaiah 61:5). and when Israel do not perform the will of the Omnipresent their work is carried out by themselves, as it says: ‘And you will gather in your corn’.  Not only that, but the work of others will also be done by them, as it says: ‘And you will serve your enemy…’ (Deut. 28:48). Said Abaye: “Many have followed the advice of Ishmael, and it has worked well; others have followed Rabbi Simeon bar Yochai and it has not been successful”.

As I mention in my book, this argument continues even today and both sides can cite the authoritative support of great sages on whom they rely.

Anyone taking the teachings in Pirkei Avot as a whole will find that this great chasm between the “nothing but Torah” and “Torah in its right time” camps is reflected there too. Much of the sixth perek is in effect an extended paean of praise for Torah and an affirmation of its rightful place at the summit of Jewish endeavour. Against that, Rabban Shimon ben Gamliel asserts that it is not learning but action that is the objective of Torah study (Avot 1:17) and Rabban Gamliel, son of Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi, praises the combination of Torah learning with a worldly occupation (Avot 2:2) on the ground that it is this that causes all sin to be forgotten; he adds that, in the absence of some sort of worldly occupation, one’s Torah learning is batelah (“of no effect”).

Commenting on what appears to be Rabban Gamliel’s harsh assessment of Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai’s position, Rabbi Yitchak Tzevi Yadler draws our attention to another mishnah (Avot 3:6) in which Rabbi Nechunya ben Hakanah  promises that anyone who opts for Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai’s stern regime and takes upon himself the yoke of Torah will find that two other yokes—those of government and of having to make a living—will be removed from him.

According to Rabbi Yadler, when Rabban Gamliel advises taking up a worldly occupation as well as learning Torah, he is not at odds with Rabbi Nechunya ben Hakanah. That is because Rabban Gamliel’s advice is addressed to the ordinary Jew in the street, as it were, and not the night-and-day Torah student. For the person whose head is totally immersed in his learning there is (or should at any rate be) no need to forget sin since such a person shouldn’t be thinking about it in the first place, never mind closing his Gemara and wandering off in order to commit it. But for the person who only studies Torah at the times fixed for doing so, the Torah content of his day is insufficient to blot out inappropriate thoughts and actions entirely and that is why it is good for him to engage in an worldly occupation as well as learn.

But what of those people who occupy themselves totally in Torah? They are the people for whom, Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai asserts, everything will be done by others.

Going back to Rabban Gamliel’s mishnah, we can understand it in two ways. One is that “Torah plus worldly occupation” means that a person learns and works. The other is that, while one person learns, it is not he but another person who works, in order to meet the needs of the one who is in learning. If we have a situation in which one person is ostensibly learning but no other person is working to meet his needs, we have “Torah without a worldly occupation” and it is this that appears to testify against Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai’s promise. As Rabbi Yadler puts it, there is, Heaven forfend, a chillul Hashem (a desecration of God’s name) because people will look at a person who dedicates his entire life and energy to learning Torah, receiving no support from others, and say “Is this the Torah and is this its reward?”

Shanah Tovah! A Happy New Year to You All

Tonight brings with it Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. Despite its special significance this event receives no special mention in Pirkei Avot, a tractate that shows no favouritism towards calendar dates.  That does not mean, however, that Avot has nothing to teach us.

Tasked with answering the question “Which is the good path for a person to follow?”, Rabbi Shimon ben Netanel (Avot 2:13) advises us that it is the path of looking to the future in order to look for likely outcomes. This is valuable counsel for anyone who wants to make something positive of the year ahead.

For better or worse, God has placed us in His world and has given us the choice of whether to believe in Him and how close or distant to Him we want to be. This means that, to make the most of our lives, we have to work out what sort of relationship with God we want. But there’s more to life than accommodating God. We also have to accommodate other people, each of whom is also endowed with freedom of choice and with whom we can cooperate or compete. Finally we have to live with ourselves, to be comfortable inside our own skin and to be able to look ourselves in the mirror without feeling that we are looking at someone who has routinely failed us and who will probably continue to do so.

There is no simple formula for life that can enable us to strike a perfect balance between these three sets of relationships. If however we follow Rabbi Shimon ben Netanel’s advice and try to look ahead and predict the likely consequences of what we say, what we do and what we let ourselves think and feel, we may be able to improve our chances of navigating the New Year in a state of relative equilibrium.

I wish all Avot Today blog readers a happy and prosperous year 5783.

כתיבה וחתימה טובה

Lions, foxes and a mysterious proof verse

Open any contemporary siddur or volume of mishnayot today and look for the teaching of Rabbi Matya ben Charash (Avot 4:20). There you will find the following text:

הֱוֵי מַקְדִּים בִּשְׁלוֹם כָּל אָדָם, וֶהֱוֵי זָנָב לָאֲרָיוֹת, וְאַל תְּהִי רֹאשׁ לַשֻּׁעָלִים

In English: “Be the first to greet all people—and be a tail for lions, not a head for foxes”.

This does not appear to be the text that the Catalan scholar Rabbi Menachem Meiri (1249-1315) contemplated when he authored his commentary on Avot. The Mishnah in his text continues with a proof verse from Proverbs:

הלוך (הוֹלֵךְ) אֶת-חֲכָמִים וחכם (יֶחְכָּם); וְרֹעֶה כְסִילִים יֵרוֹעַ

In English: “He who walks with wise men shall be wise, but the companion of fools will suffer for it” (Mishlei 13:20).

Rabbi Samuel ben Isaac de Uçeda states explicitly that this was the text before Meiri in his compendious Midrash Shmuel (1579).

The link between this mishnah and the proof verse was clearly understood to exist in earlier times, even among scholars who probably did not have it in their copies of Avot. Rabbi Simchah ben Shmuel (died 1105) quotes the first half of the verse in the commentary on Avot found in the Machzor Vitry; rather later, Midrash Shmuel cites references to it by Rabbenu Yonah (1200-1263) and Rabbi Matityahu Hayitzhari. It continues to be cited even today.

This post addresses the extent to which the proof verse supports the mishnah.

It seems to me that the plain meaning of the verse from Proverbs is directed to the company one keeps. This proposition is supported by commentators on Tanach Essentially, the company of the wise enhances one’s wisdom, while the company of fools has the opposite effect. If we learn the verse in this manner, we can make the following observations:

• The proposition that one can learn wisdom from the wise is already implicit in the axiom in Avot 4:1 that the person who is wise is one who learns from others. It is unclear why we should need a repetition of this proposition;
• Our Mishnah here appears to emphasise the significance of a person being a “tail” or a “head”, that is to say a leader or a follower. The proof verse makes no express reference this issue;
• The lion in mishnayot and midrash is associated with many positive characteristics (see e.g. commentaries on Avot 5:23, “be as strong as a lion”), but wisdom is not one of them;
• Likewise, the fox in mishnayot and midrash is associated with cunning, guile and natural craftiness (see e.g. Rashi, Sanhedrin 39a)—but not with foolishness.[1]

Rabbenu Yonah sought to read the Hebrew as indicating that, while a person trails along behind the wise and is therefore metaphorically their tail, he finds that the fools follow him and he is therefore their head. While this explanation has been accepted and amplified by the Vilna Gaon and Rabbi Ovadyah Yosef, it does not read convincingly and Ralbag implicitly rejects it in his commentary on Proverbs: there he writes of the subject of the verse pursuing either the wise or the foolish—and thus being the “tail” in each case. Malbim however expressly follows the tails-and-heads approach.

We are left to contemplate the utility of verses that do not actually prove or clearly illustrate the point of a mishnah or baraita but which remains associated with them. There are many examples of such verses and the Judeophile Christian scholar R. Travers Herford points to several in his Ethics of the Talmud. While it would be quite wrong and thoroughly inappropriate to discard these verses, we are entitled to ask why they were chosen and what function they truly serve. It is improbable that their inclusion was solely for mnemonic reasons. Perhaps they are traces of earlier, deeper or more complex teachings that have been lost to us in the process of transmission through the generations. It would be good to know.

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[1] Even in Rabbi Akiva’s famous parable of the fox and the fish (Berachot 61b), where the fish call the fox “foolish”, they preface this jibe with a recitation that the fox is called pike’ach shebachayot (“the cleverest of creatures”).

Portrait of a prophet: another reason for not judging by appearances

Rabbi Yisrael Lifschitz’s Tiferet Yisrael commentary on tractate Kiddushin (at 4:14) tells a story that deserves our attention at a time when Rosh Hashanah, the Day of Judgment, is fast approaching. This story, as told by Rabbi Abraham J. Twerski in Visions of the Fathers, runs as follows:

A desert king heard of the greatness of Moses, and sent his finest artists to bring back a portrait of him. He then submitted the portrait to his physiognomists to study it and describe Moses’ character. They reported that the portrait revealed a man who was vain, arrogant, lustful, greedy, and degenerate. Inasmuch as this was in sharp contrast to what he had heard of Moses, the king went to the Israelite encampment to see for himself.

Upon meeting Moses, the king saw that his artists had indeed captured every minute detail, and he could not understand how his physiognomists could be so far off course. Moses explained to him, “Your physiognomists can interpret only the innate characteristics with which a person was born. All they said of me was true insofar as those were the traits that I was born with. However, I struggled to overcome them and to transform my character”.

In terms of Pirkei Avot, the story illustrates the following:

• The association of power with self-discipline and control of one’s yetzer hara (evil inclination) rather than physical prowess (4:1);
  
  
• The danger of judging by appearances (4:27);
  
  
• The importance of admitting the truth rather than denying it (5:9).

The story additionally reflects the notion that self-control goes further than making sure one does the right thing and forbears from doing the wrong thing. True self-control goes further because its proper exercise can help a person to change even his or her inclinations and inherent middot, personal qualities.

We generally assess people by reference to the way they behave. This can be misleading since humans tend to do their good deeds in public and commit their bad ones when they are out of the public eye (sadly the media have reported a string of examples in recent years of public benefactors who were also private predators). We never however see a person’s private desires and inclinations. These are the province of God alone, and it is He alone who judges us as the sort of individuals we aspire to be.

Do good, feel bad?

For the practising Jew it is axiomatic that one should serve God and do His will with simchah, happiness. Sometimes, though, it is hard to reconcile the reality with this ideal.

The commandment of tzedakah, the making of charitable gifts and donations, is a case in point. Throughout both the written Torah and its oral counterpart we learn of the importance of tzedakah. Pirkei Avot is no exception. Rabbi Elazar Ish Bartota (Avot 3:8) reminds us to give with a good conscience since everything we have in the first place belongs to God In the fifth chapter (Avot 5:16) we learn of the four different types of (non-)donors:

There are four types of givers of charity: (i) one who wants to give but does not want others to give is mean-spirited towards others [since he wants to retain all the glory for himself]; (ii) one who wants others to give but does not want to give himself is mean-spirited towards himself; (iii) one who wants both to give and that others should give is a chasid [essentially someone who is magnanimous]; (iv) one who wants neither himself nor others to give is wicked.

The sixth chapter (Avot 6:6) adds that love of tzedakot is one of the 48 means through which a mastery of Torah is acquired.

So what is the problem? It is one of ends and means.

At base, tzedakah means giving to the needy. In theory we can eliminate all poverty (Devarim 15:4) but in reality (Devarim 15:11) the poor are always with us. With most other commandments, once the action in question is performed the task is complete. However, with tzedakah—unless we are able to make lifestyle-changing donations—the poor remain poor, the hungry hungry and the destitute destitute even after we have done our bit to help them.

Going back to Avot 6:6, another of the 48 steps to acquiring mastery of the Torah is that of not ascribing credit to oneself for the good things one does. This precept is more or less self-fulfilling in the case of tzedakah since it is difficult to pat oneself on the back and congratulate oneself on giving a poor person a good meal today when you know he or she will be foraging for food tomorrow.

On a personal note, I have been trying to help the Abayudaya community in Uganda. This community is struggling to recover from the devastating effects of recent floods. At every step of the way I am reminded of the needs that remain unmet, both at community and individual level, and of the personal suffering and anxieties that will remain even after the flurry of pre-Yom Kippur charitable donations abates.

Of the four types of donor mentioned at Avot 5:16, I am firmly in the camp of those who both give and want others to give. I give with reluctance since it is always hard to part with one’s money, and with a mind full of conflict since there are several other charities that I support and that are closer to heart and home than the Abayudaya, however great may be their suffering. Still, if anyone wishes to make a contribution, here are a couple of causes they may wish to consider:

Abayudaya Emergency Aid Fund: https://tinyurl.com/2p9393p5

Shalom Children’ Care Centre for Orphans: https://tinyurl.com/4eps48xf

A vanishing hatred

Ben Azzai teaches an important pair of principles at 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

In English: “Do not scorn any man, and do not be disdainful of any thing, for there is no man who does not have his hour, and no thing that does not have its place”.

This post discusses the first of these principles.

According to Rambam and Rabbenu Yonah, the point Ben Azzai makes is that, if you do not underestimate another person, even someone of no account, he will have no reason to hate you. Who might this person be? It could be someone who currently has no feelings towards you or (according to Me’iri) someone who hates you already. Either way, even if this person is utterly insignificant, don’t take his potential for hatred lightly since it may be in his power to harm you. Indeed, as all three of these eminent commentators accept, if you do take this person seriously, you may find that it is also in his power to benefit you.

Though there are some outliers (Maharal’s Derech Chaim, for example, links this teaching to the unique mazal of each individual), this understanding, shared by Bartenura and the commentary attributed to Rashi, appears to have shaped the consensus view of the meaning of Ben Azzai’s teaching from the days of the Rishonim until relatively recently, when it has been more extensively explored and the focus on the notion of personal animosity abandoned.

Is this drift away from the traditional explanation justified? Let us first see how it works. Examples of later, non-traditional approaches that violate neither the meaning of the words of the mishnah nor the ethos of Pirkei Avot include the following:

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  “The only way to earn esteem and respect for yourself is to esteem and respect other people, for in that way you are showing respect to your Creator.  … [A] man who is a criminal or a fool is a human being just like you and, if you cannot find anything to say in his praise, then rather say nothing, but you have no right to despise him…” (The Lehmann-Prins Pirkei Avoth);
  
  
• “Everything in life has its purpose, every person has a potential meaning (sic) possibility, however distant and remote it might seem from the superficial view. It is obligatory upon each individual to see the good and the potential of other individuals” (Rabbi Reuven P. Bulka, Chapters of the Sages);
  
  
• “[I]f everyone and everything that exists has time and space by Divine decree, in a universe governed by His will, each person, creature, and object is automatically due a certain respect and reverence” (Irving M. Bunim (Ethics from Sinai);
  
  
• “Each person and each object has value, even if that value is not always manifest. Each person, at some point in life, may rise to greatness…” (Rabbi Marc D.Angel, The Koren Pirkei Avot).

What then has happened to the notion of taking account of the hatred of others and the possibility of being harmed by them? Has this idea become old-fashioned and in need of replacement by a more relevant explanation of Ben Azzai’s words? Or do we now live within a society in which the need to avoid being dismissive of others and to underestimate their potential for hatred has become so deeply self-understood that it no longer requires to be taught?

Maybe the real reason is that, being uncomfortable at the thought that our attitude towards others might cause them to hate us, we prefer to read a more congenial message into Ben Azzai’s admonition.

Goodwill to all men

A frequently quoted teaching in Avot is that of Shammai, that one should greet everyone with a cheerful face (Avot 1:15). Does this apply truly to everyone, or does it only apply to one’s fellow Jews?

The Hebrew term for “everyone” is אֶת כָּל הָאָדָם (literally “all the man”). The use of the word הָאָדָם (“the man”) rather than simply אָדָם (“man”) has generated considerable discussion as to the significance of the distinction.  In particular, if one term means “all men”, is the other limited only to Jews? And, if so, which is which? I discuss some of the sources on this discussion in Pirkei Avot: A Users’ Manual, vol 2 at pp 177-179.

In the context of this mishnah there is a serious justification for speculation as to whether Shammai intended his advice to apply to all humans or only to Jews. This is because there is a passage in the Talmud (Shabbat 31b) that portrays Shammai as speaking to potential converts to Judaism—who are by definition non-Jews—in a brusque, irascible and less-than-friendly manner.

In his Tiferet Tzion commentary on this mishnah, Rabbi Yitzchak Ze’ev Yadler circumvents the need to resolve this issue. He takes note of the famous proposition (Yoma 28b) that Abraham fulfilled every commandment, including even the rabbinical laws relating to eruv tavshilin (the correct manner of preparing food before the onset of a Jewish festival on which one intended to cook food for the Shabbat that immediately followed it). We can learn from this proposition that Abraham must himself have greeted non-Jews with a happy, smiling face since in his generation there were no Jews to greet.

Avot, Elul and repentance: It's not too late

Many years ago I worked with a major law firm which prided itself on the enthusiasm with which it dedicated itself to its clients’ welfare. The lawyers worked long hours and rarely used their generous holiday allowance. Only on 1 January did they all desert their desks and return to their families to celebrate the new year. During my first year with the firm I told the partners that, for the Jewish New Year, Rosh Hashanah, I would be unavailable for work for two consecutive days. “Wow”, said one of my colleagues, “two days? You must have one enormous hangover after that!”

But the new Jewish year is not like that. It opens with Yom HaDin, the Day of Judgement. We face God, as it were, and give an account of ourselves. This is an awesome prospect, but we do not stand before Him unprepared. The month of Elul is our time for reflection on what we have (or have not) done and how we plan to address the challenges of the year ahead.

Two mishnayot in Avot deal with giving God an account of our actions, but in contrasting ways: one addresses our past, the other our future. Rabbi Elazar HaKappar (Avot 4:29) reminds us that there is no escape. In our ordinary lives we can dodge court appearances, fail to submit tax returns, and take evasive action when our fellow humans call us to account. But from God there is no escape. Just as a life is created, is born, lives and dies, so too will we have to answer to God for everything we have done, said, thought and been. That’s a tall order—and when we make all our excuses, God quite literally has all the time in the world to listen and judge accordingly.

Akavya ben Mahahalel (Avot 3:1) takes a different line. The time to think about what you are going to tell God is actually before you contemplate doing anything wrong. That way, you will avoid wrongdoing, your conscience will be clean and you won’t be punished. No-one needs to make excuses to explain away something they didn’t do wrong after all.

Looking at the Jewish calendar, we see that Elul is a festival-free space in which we can practise justifying our wrongs and if—as is most likely—this proves impossible, it’s a time to practise repentance too. Rabbi Eliezer (Avot 2:15) kindly tells us we only need to repent the day before we die; but, since that could be tomorrow, we effectively repent each day. Elul is also prime time for turning the exercise of stocktaking of good deeds and not-so-good ones into a golden chance to improve our performance for the year to come.

Roughly two-thirds of Elul has passed and, for many people, Rosh Hashanah still seems a long way away. Some of us have not long returned from our summer vacation or have been busily settling in children for the new school year. There are bills to be paid and so many terrestrial priorities to see to. But there’s still time to pause, to reflect and ponder, to ask what sort of person we are and what sort of person would we like to be, if we were only prepared to make the effort to do so. Let’s invest in Elul ahead of the Day of Judgment that lies ahead.