A thought for St Valentine's Day

Should Jews mark St Valentine’s Day by sending greeting cards and gifts to those whom they love or with whom they wish to enter a relationship?  

The practice of celebrating this day is of ancient provenance and, while it is recognized as a feast day in some Christian churches, it shares with Christmas the distinction of being widely observed in western society by people who do not practice Christianity and who may indeed belong to other religions—or no religion at all. Given the increased prevalence of sexually suggestive or explicit Valentine cards, the day may more closely reflect the celebration of the Roman Lupercalia from which it has been said to originate.

Writing on Aish.com, Dr Yvette Alt Miller (“Valentine’s Day Difficult History with Jews”) powerfully argues that Jews should have nothing to do with the day. She writes:

Prof. Beard notes that “ancient Roman religion (was not) particularly concerned with personal salvation or morality. Instead it mainly focused on the performance of rituals that were intended to keep the relationship between Rome and the gods in good order....” [citation omitted]. It’s a view that’s opposed to contemporaneous Jewish writings. Take the example of Hillel, the 1st Century CE Jewish sage who lived at a time when Lupercalia was a major event. Hillel – like many Jewish thinkers – focused intensely on the human struggle for self-improvement. “Be among the disciples of Aaron, loving peace and pursuing peace, loving people and bringing them closer to the Torah,” Hillel advised (Ethics of the Fathers 1:12), invoking the Biblical forefather Aaron, who was known to spend his time reconciling friends and relatives after quarrels. While Jewish writers were urging people to look inward for personal growth and improvement, Romans observing Lupercalia were relying on empty (and pretty bawdy) ritual to magically bring about improvements in their personal states.

After explaining why the day has not been a happy one for the Jewish people and advocating Tu be’Av as a perfectly adequate substitute for practising Jews, she concludes:

With so much about Valentine’s Day anathema to Jewish values, Valentine’s Day isn’t a holiday I feel comfortable celebrating. So this Valentine’s Day – like every day – I plan on enjoying a nice meal with my husband and son. I plan on texting friends and relatives to check in on them. I intend to reach out to friends who are having a hard time and ask how I can help. Because if there’s anything being Jewish has taught me, it’s that connecting with other people is paramount, that the world is full of blessings, and it's up to all of us to choose to see and appreciate them.

Cantor Cheryl Wunsch (“Laws of Love”, Alyth.org.uk, 2015) disagrees. Having argued that St Valentines Day as we know it today has no religious significance she writes:

[Valentine’s Day was originally] a celebration of faith, and today, it’s a celebration of love.  Which are, in essence, the same thing.  Faith in God means faith in each other, faith in ourselves, and faith in love and compassion to always lead us in the right direction.  And so on this Valentine’s Day, let’s remember that our laws are really all about love.  To paraphrase the famous passage from Pirkei Avot [Hillel, at Avot 2:6]; in a world where it often seems like there are few true human beings, we as Jews must always strive to be loving, compassionate people.  That is what the mitzvot truly teach us.

 So here we see mishnayot from Pirkei Avot invoked on both sides of the argument, both of which we learn in the name of Hillel.

I believe that neither citation hits the mark. Of course, loving peace and pursuing peace (Avot 1:12) are an integral part of a Jew’s self-development, but this is such a general proposition that it can be invoked in support of both sides of the argument. And as for the paraphrase of Avot 2:6 (“….and where there is no man, strive to be a man”), can it be said that “we as Jews must always strive to be loving, compassionate people” has anything to do with marking St Valentine Day or not? Is there only one day in the year in which we can be loving and compassionate? Is this not a daily demand that is made of us?

Two mishnayot in Avot seem to me to be worthy of closer consideration within the context of St Valentines Day.

The first is an anonymous teaching at Avot 5:19:

כָּל אַהֲבָה שֶׁהִיא תְלוּיָה בְדָבָר, בָּטֵל דָּבָר בְּטֵלָה אַהֲבָה, וְשֶׁאֵינָהּ תְּלוּיָה בְדָבָר, אֵינָהּ בְּטֵלָה לְעוֹלָם

Any love that depends on a specific thing, when that thing goes the love goes too. But where that love does not depend on any specific cause, it will never cease.

In other words, if your love is contingent on you sending the right card, choosing the right restaurant or selecting the optimal movie on a particular calendar date, then is it really love?

The second, admittedly, is of general application, but it strikes me as being particularly apt here. At Avot 2: R’ Yose HaKohen teaches:

כָל מַעֲשֶֽׂיךָ יִהְיוּ לְשֵׁם שָׁמָֽיִם

Let all your actions be for the sake of Heaven.

This is a litmus test, a way we can measure up the things we do. How far do our actions measure up to our aspirations, and those of God? Unlike Valentine, we are not saints. We cannot be perfect in everything we do, and most normal human beings don’t even try—but if they are sensitive to the wishes of Heaven, they usually do their best not to go out of their way to snub or ignore them. So let’s put aside the issues of whether St Valentines Day has any inherent or residual religious content, and of whether Jewish law permits or forbids its recognition—and let’s ask ourselves: “Why am I about to celebrate this day? Are my motives honourable? And how do I think God will feel about me?”

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Share the burden, feel the pain?

In light of the current crisis facing not just Israel but world Jewry I would like to share with you a passage I recently came across in “Lightening the load” by R’ Reuven Leuchter, Mishpacha, 23 January (full text here). He writes:

The suffering around us isn’t just a cause for weeping — it’s a call for avodah. Our times demand from us the middah described in Pirkei Avos as nosei b’ol im chaveiro; literally, sharing our friend’s burden. Being nosei b’ol means seeing everything that your friend is going through, including the subtle difficulties you wouldn’t notice with a superficial glance. This is a necessary step toward helping your friend or providing emotional support, but it’s also significant in itself. Even when we can’t help, we must not remain indifferent to our fellow Jew’s plight. If we can’t alleviate our friend’s difficulty, the least we can do is acknowledge it.

To work on being nosei b’ol, we have to dispel a common misunderstanding. Being nosei b’ol doesn’t mean feeling other people’s pain. If we understand the severity of their hardship, we will inevitably be emotionally affected. But if we try to approach the plight of our fellow with our heart alone, we risk getting sucked into the quicksand of despair. Becoming too emotionally involved actually prevents us from helping others, because when someone is sinking in quicksand, only someone standing on firm ground can help him.

The beginning of being nosei b’ol is not to feel for the other person, but to think about him. To take a moment to step into his shoes and just think about his world, without searching for solutions. What is it like to live in his situation, day in and day out? How does it impact him physically, emotionally, spiritually, and socially? We’re often blind to the difficulties our friend experiences because we don’t think about his life. Even caring comrades can be oblivious to the most painful aspects of their friend’s situation, simply because they never thought it through.

To be nosei be’ol im chaveiro, literally pulling the yoke with one’s fellow humans and sharing their burden, is one of the 48 qualities associated with acquiring Torah skills and living in accordance with its precepts (see Avot 6:6). You don’t have to judge another person before you share their load. Indeed, Avot 2:5 suggests that, since we never stand in another person’s shoes, as it were, we should not even try to do so. You do have to think about others—not just in the abstract or when reminded, but in way that the result of your thoughts may be helpful to them. Yes, it is a tall order, but when our brethren are so greatly in need of help we should at least make the effort, even if this means overcoming the myriad distractions that come between us and our thoughts for others.

R' Leuchter writes: “The beginning of being nosei b’ol is not to feel for the other person, but to think about him”. It’s easy to extrapolate from this a message that we should not feel for others, but that’s not what he is saying. Of course we should have feelings; we wouldn’t be human if we were devoid of them. But an increased awareness of other people’s predicaments is only the beginning. If we don’t think meaningfully about their plight, what value are our feelings—to ourselves and to others?

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Majority verdict

Mitzvot and middot do not always comfortably complement one another. Sometimes it seems that they are on course for a collision.

At Exodus 23:2, in Parashat Mishpatim, this week’s Torah reading teaches us:

לֹא תִהְיֶה אַחֲרֵי-רַבִּים לְרָעֹת וְלֹא-תַעֲנֶה עַל-רִב לִנְטֹת אַחֲרֵי רַבִּים לְהַטֹּת

“You shall not follow the majority to do evil; nor shall you respond to a grievance by yielding to the majority to pervert [justice]”.

In the course of his commentary on the verse, Rashi explains that a judge, though outnumbered by his fellow judges, should voice his opinion in accordance with his understanding of the law and the evidence, if he considers that his colleagues have mistakenly or intentionally reached a contrary conclusion.

Pirkei Avot appears to take a contrary stance, one that at first sight seems less principled. At Avot 4:10 Rabbi Yishmael ben Yose teaches:

אַל תֹּאמַר קַבְּלוּ דַעְתִּי, שֶׁהֵן רַשָּׁאִין וְלֹא אָֽתָּה

Don’t say, "You must accept my view," for this is their [the majority's] right, not yours.

One might jump to the conclusion that a judge who disagrees with the majority is therefore obliged to accept their reasoning, even if it is erroneous or even perverted. But is this so? Certainly, a single judge cannot outvote the majority, but what precisely Is he bound to accept?

Clearly Rabbi Yishmael cannot have been inviting the dissenting judge to drop his principled stance and connive with a majority who wish to pervert justice. But he must also have intended to teach more than simply that the stand-out judge should accept the decision of the majority, since that is an established halachah.

Arguably, this teaching in Avot is that, once the minority rabbi has explained his objection to the majority position, he should stop at that point and not be overcome by the temptation to assert himself through the force of his personality. Once the other judges have heard his argument, his job is done. “You must accept my view” is not an argument based on law or on fact; it should therefore not be allowed into the court’s discussion—however correct it may be.

There are other ways of explaining our mishnah in Avot that do not bring it into possible conflict with our Torah verse at all. The Me’iri gives us an extreme example of this in his Bet HaBechirah, where he astonishingly removes it from the context of judicial proceedings altogether and categorises it as good advice for businessmen that they should not assert their position against their colleagues without bringing some sort of proof to support it.

Returning to the application of  this mishnah to a judicial context, the Hebrew word דַעְת, which is translated here as “view”, has many shades of meaning. These include the following (per Jastrow and Brown-Driver-Briggs): knowledge, mind, temperament, intention, skill, perception and wisdom. Rabbenu Yonah picks up on this: the דַעְת here refers to the knowledge of an expert judge who is sitting with a panel of non-experts. He cannot say: “I know I’m right, based on my expertise in this area—and if I was judging the case myself I would do so on the basis of my expertise. It’s only my humility that caused me to hear this case with other judges in the first place”.  It would be a strange species of humility that enables a single judge effectively to overrule his colleagues in this manner. I leave the last word with Rabbi S. R. Hirsch:

“[O]ne who impudently seeks to force his own decision upon others only exposes thereby his deficiency in wisdom and scruples, as well as his foolish conceit”.  

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"You can't judge a book by looking at the cover"

You can't judge an apple by looking at a tree
You can't judge honey by looking at the bee
You can't judge a daughter by looking at the mother
You can't judge a book by looking at the cover

These lyrics, popularized by Bo Diddley, the Rolling Stones and many other performers, embody the teaching of Rabbi Meir at Avot 4:27:

אַל תִּסְתַּכֵּל בְּקַנְקַן, אֶלָּא בְּמַה שֶּׁיֶּשׁ בּוֹ, יֵשׁ קַנְקַן חָדָשׁ מָלֵא יָשָׁן, וְיָשָׁן שֶׁאֲפִילוּ חָדָשׁ אֵין בּ

Don’t look at the vessel, but at what’s inside it. There are new vessels that are filled with old wine, and old vessels that do not even contain new wine.

I recently had an opportunity to put this teaching into practice. Browsing the shelves of Jerusalem’s iconic Pomeranz bookshop, I came across a commentary on Pirkei Avot that had previously escaped my attention: Jewish Ethical Wisdom From Pirkei Avot by Rabbi Dov Peretz Elkins (Mazo Publishers, 2020). Unable to resist the temptation, I bought it.

My initial feeling about this book was not positive, since I started with the preliminaries. The front cover reminded me that the Americans and the English may share many common cultural characteristics—but they take quite a different view of self-promotion. As a generalization, Americans are very much more confident in their promotion of goods and services while the English are diffident and hide behind a wall of understatement. Neither approach reflects the Maimonidean norm that lies between the stridently boastful and the unhelpfully uninformative, but this book definitely falls on the American side of this border.

The cover eye-catchingly declares that this book is “The Only Pirkei Avot Edition According to Topic Themes”.  While there are not many Avot books that take this line, this one is not actually unique in that regard--even though four of this book’s five distinguished endorsers also seem to think it is. Torah Dynamics: Pirkei Avot Looks at Life, by Samson Krupnick and Morris Mandel, published in 1991, arranges its discussion of Avot under 24 topic headings. Then there is Rabbi Dan Roth’s Relevance: Pirkei Avos for the Twentieth Century (2007), which tackles topics while running them in the order they appear in Avot. Both are currently available on the Feldheim website and I wonder how these two books could have escaped everyone’s attention.

Now for the author. Rabbi Elkins is clearly a prolific author: the brief bio that faces the  Contents page describes him as having written over 55 books, no mean achievement. One of these, Chicken Soup for the Jewish Soul, made the New York Times bestseller list, and the cover itself proclaims Rabbi Elkins to be “Winner of the National Jewish Book Award”, which indeed he was in 1965 with Worlds lost and found; discoveries in Biblical archeology. Both these books are actually co-authored. The Englishman and the intellectual property lawyer in me are both uncomfortable with the absence of any mention here of co-authorship, but I imagine that this is something that troubles me more than it troubles others.

Anyway, once we get past these preliminaries, there’s still the book to consider. The first thing one can say about it is that it is highly accessible and easy to read. The text, including the footnotes, benefits from a large, clear font. It’s not a long work—just 160 pages inclusive of glossary and a short bibliography—and it spans over 30 focal topics. Most of these topics are covered in brief but one, Learning and Teaching, is disproportionately long, thus fairly reflecting the content of Avot itself.

Rabbi Elkins’ approach in general uses the mishnayot of Avot as a series of springboards from which to jump into issues that are of current interest or social relevance. He does so by drawing on quotations which span a wide variety of sources both religious and secular, which he deploys in order to elucidate points that are often based on his own experiences. Readers may not all feel happy at the choice of sources whose quotes appear, but this book is not addressed to readers who would rather take offence at the identity of a quoted source than give thought to the words quoted (cited authors Rabbis Louis Jacobs and Yitz Greenberg, both of whom have been known to raise the occasional hackle).

The content, length and drift of each essay make them collectively a handy reference point for anyone who finds him- or herself called upon to prepare a short and lively devar Torah. Also, with its tendency to prick consciences gently rather than destroying readers completely, as do some tomes on Avot, it’s probably a useful book to take with you to shul on the High Holy Days, to peruse when the going gets heavy and one’s concentration flags.

This work does not pretend to be a state-of-the-art scholarly treatise with doctoral pretensions, and that is a valuable selling point. While sages and scholars may write books of more lasting value, books written by congregational rabbis for ordinary people have a great advantage. A minister who is in daily contact with regular folk can usually be relied upon to have a firm grasp of their dreams and aspirations, their peeves and their foibles. Potential readers of books on Avot are not all striving to be saints or holy ascetics, but many of them would like to be better people if they could—and if someone could give them a few words of encouragement and advice. Books like this one, which talks of anger, doubt, friendship and responsibility, will always have a market and can do much good.

To conclude, I’m glad I didn’t judge this book by the cover and I’m sure that there are many people out there in the big wide world who will appreciate it.

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Name-calling: a call for respect

The very first word of the first mishnah of the first chapter of Pirkei Avot is a name: Moshe (“Moses”). This seemingly innocent mention of a name elicits a question from R’ Ovadyah Hedaya (Seh leBet Avot). How could R’ Yehudah HaNasi, when compiling this tractate, refer to Moshe as Moshe? Is there not a well-established principle of Jewish law that a talmid, a pupil, does not call his teacher by his personal name—even after his death?  (Shulchan Aruch, Yoreh De'ah 240:2 and 242:15). Moshe is the teacher of us all, which is why he alone of all our leaders in the Jewish bible, is given the epithet “Rabbenu” (“our teacher”). Is it not then disrespectful for the anonymous author of this mishnah to call this great man “Moshe”, and for R’ Yehudah HaNasi, when redacting it, to leave it unamended?

R’ Hedaya offers an answer. Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi is entitled to refer to the humblest of all men as “Moshe” because it is not his real name. Following his birth he would have received a name from his parents, and it is only once Pharaoh’s daughter has found and claimed him that he is given the name Moshe with the explanation Ki min hamayim mishisihu (“For I drew him from the water”: Shemot 2:10).

Although the Torah refers to him as Moshe throughout the rest of the Torah, this is out of respect for the noble life-saving action of his rescuer. In essence, however, it is only a substitute for the name that it would be disrespectful for us, his talmidim to call him. And what was his birthname? The Torah does not record it, but midrash puts forward no fewer than 10 of them. R’ Hedaya suggests Tov (per R’ Meir at Sotah 12a) or Tuvyah (per R’ Yehudah, ibidem).

Notions as to what constitutes respect clearly vary in time and space and as between the generations. When I attended school in London back in the 1950s and later in the more permissive age of the “Swinging 60s”, no child would dare to call a teacher by their first name to their face, though we all did behind their backs. Now in Israel I note that practices are very different, depending on the school, and its religious orientation.

Slightly changing the subject, I’d like to invite further exploration of the way we refer to one another.

Later in Avot we learn that one should not embarrass another person in public (Avot 3:15). Though it may not be immediately apparent, this has a good deal to do with names. Within the Jewish community there are many people who prefer to use their Hebrew name because their “English name”, which appears on their birth certificates and in their passports, causes them embarrassment. To call them by the name their parents chose for them may not only embarrass them but can cause considerable offence.

This same applies not only to Jews but to everyone, regardless of religion, race and nationality. Over the years I have had numerous friends who have sought to bury their awkward or unloved forenames or middle names, and I expect that I am far from alone in witnessing people being teased for having names that caused them grief.  

The use of an embarrassing if genuine name is not always intended to be hurtful. Often the offenders are parents who chose a child’s name with a very good reason and who, having always used that name, find it difficult or upsetting to switch to another.

Ultimately, it seems to me, our objective should be to avoid upsetting or annoying others. We should give them their due respect, however apparently trivial their feelings may seem to us.  This is part and parcel of R’ Chanina ben Dosa’s advice (Avot 3:13) that, if we want our actions to be pleasing to God, we should act in such a way as to make them pleasing to our fellow humans too.

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Out of one's depth

Hillel warns us (at Avot 1:13) that anyone who exploits the crown of Torah shall fade away. Or, to put it another way, in the sage’s inimitably succinct Aramaic: דְאִשְׁתַּמֵּשׁ בְּתַגָּא חֳלָף. This teaching has the distinction of being the only one in the whole of the tractate to be quoted together with a name check, by another Tanna, when Rabbi Tzadok (at 4:7) warms to Hillel’s theme:

אַל תַּעֲשֶֽׂהָ עֲטָרָה לְהִתְגַּדֶּל בָּהּ, וְלֹא קַרְדּוּם לַחְתָּךְ בָּהּ, וְכַךְ הָיָה הִלֵּל אוֹמֵר: וּדְאִשְׁתַּמֵּשׁ בְּתַגָּא חֲלָף, הָא לָמַֽדְתָּ, כָּל הַנֶּהֱנֶה מִדִּבְרֵי תוֹרָה, נוֹטֵל חַיָּיו מִן הָעוֹלָם

Do not make the Torah a crown to magnify yourself with, or a spade with which to dig. That’s what Hillel used to say: “Anyone who makes personal use of the crown of Torah will fade away”. So we learn this, that anyone who benefits from the words of Torah removes his life from the world.

While the main commentators on Avot often add supplementary explanations of their own, they generally agree with what Hillel teaches: one should not exploit one’s Torah knowledge, or any position secured through having acquired it, for personal gain or financial advantage.  

Curiously, the two earliest extant references that we find for Hillel’s teaching treat it quite differently. The first of these is the Babylonian Talmud, compiled around the middle of the fifth century of the common era, we find the following passage:

Observe now the difference between the rigorous scholars of the Land of Israel and the saints of Babylon. We have learnt in another place: “Whoever makes use of a crown fades away [from the world]” and Resh Lakish commented: “This applies to anyone who accepts service from a person who can repeat halachot [i.e. Jewish laws] , and Ulla said: “A man may accept service from one who can repeat the four [orders of the Mishnah] but not from one who can [also] teach them”.

This is illustrated by the following story of Resh Lakish, who was once traveling along a road. When he came to a pool of water, a man came up and put him on his shoulders and began taking him across. He said to the man: “Can you read the Scriptures?” The man answered, “I can”. “Can you repeat the Mishnah?” [He replied] “I can repeat four orders of the Mishnah”. Resh Lakish then said: “You have hewn four rocks, and you carry Resh Lakish on your shoulder?” (Megillah 28b, based on the Soncino translation).

In other words, once Resh Lakish estimated that the person who was carrying him knew enough Torah to be able to read the Tanach and repeat, presumably by heart, the first four orders of the Mishnah, he felt that he was deriving personal advantage from the Torah, which was personified by the man on whose shoulders he sat. Accordingly he wanted to be let down. A parallel tale (Nedarim 62b) relates how R’ Tarfon escaped an undeserved thrashing by revealing his identity to his assailant. The great teacher spent the rest of his life wrapped in remorse for having derived advantage from his reputation as a Torah scholar.

It is hard to reconcile these applications of Hillel’s teaching with the modern consensus. Resh Lakish was taking advantage of neither the man’s Torah knowledge nor his own, and R’ Tarfon could well be said to have let slip his identity in order to prevent the perpetration of a great injustice by a fellow Jew and thereby spare the latter punishment for his wrongful assault.

The second early reference to Hillel’s teaching is found in the Avot deRabbi Natan, reckoned to have been compiled during the Gaonic period, probably between 700-900 CE.  There (at ADRN 12:13) Hillel is taken to refer to the improper use of God’s ineffable name for personal benefit. Among modern commentators the kabbalist R’ Yaakov Hillel remains faithful to this explanation.

Both of these early explanations are adopted by the Meiri in his Beit HaBechirah, together with the modern consensus view—but he then states explicitly that the warning against accepting the service of a Torah scholar is the primary meaning.

The Maharal (Derech Chaim) opens his commentary on this mishnah by citing the episode with Resh Lakish, but expands it: the problem, he explains, is that a degree of kedushah, holiness, attaches to anything that is subject to the shem Shamayim, the Name of Heaven. This applies both to the Torah itself and to things that are touched by Torah, such as a person who has learned it. In Megillah 28b we therefore find the corporeality of Resh Lakish benefiting from that which is eliyon, supernal and above the level of mere corporeality—and this is why he opts to be put down in the middle of the river. How many of us, I wonder, are so sensitive to this type of kedushah?

What does Hillel’s teaching mean to us today? It is now well accepted that a person can teach Torah for financial reward. There is a large literature on why this should be so, since we do not expect our teachers and our communal rabbis to starve. There is also a large literature on whether and, if so, to what extent, we should pay to support people who dedicate their entire lives and careers to learning Torah—and this too has become an established part of Jewish life. So we can conclude that neither teaching nor learning are now regarded as “crowns” that one exploits for personal advantage or pecuniary gain.  

This being so, and since we neither use God’s ineffable name nor ask Torah scholars to carry us on their backs, we must ask: do we need to recalibrate this part of the Mishnah and focus it on specific issues and examples drawn from contemporary life?

Suggestions, anyone?

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Two sides to the clouds

“I've looked at clouds from both sides now,
From up and down and still somehow
It's cloud illusions I recall:
I really don't know clouds at all” (from Joni Mitchell, Both Sides Now).

Clouds are fascinating things. Coming in so many different shapes and sizes, they occupy a curious position between heaven and earth, between the tangible and the intangible. They also occupy a significant place within the Torah, both written and oral.

This past Shabbat we read parashat Beshalach, part of the Torah narrative that is rich in miracles. The biggest of these is the kriat Yam Suf (the splitting of the Reed Sea), which the Torah describes at length and the significance of which has been embellished by generations of midrashim.

But in the desert the Children of Israel experienced other miracles too. Along with the splitting of the Reed Sea we read details the near-daily supply of mon (the manna from Heaven). We also get water from a rock which, some commentators explain, is a portable rock that travels round with the Israelites on their desert journeys. And, tucked away near the beginning of the miracle of the manna, we find mention of a third miracle: the ananei hakavod, the clouds of glory that provide shade by day and warmth by night. In the Gemara (Taanit 9a), R’ Yose ben Yehudah notes that these three miracles—the manna, the well and the clouds—are each associated with one of the three leading lights of the desert generation The manna is in the merit of Moses, the well in the merit of Miriam and the clouds in the merit of Aaron. When each one dies, the miracle associated with them ceases.

So far, so good—but where does Pirkei Avot fit into all of this?

In the fifth perek of Avot at 5:8, we learn of ten remarkable, if not actually miraculous, things that were created at twilight on Friday afternoon, just before Shabbat commences. These include the manna and also the well of Miriam from which we drank for 40 years.  But there’s something missing from the list: there’s no mention in our mishnah of the clouds of glory. Why isn’t Aaron’s miracle included along with the miracles attached to Moshe and Miriam?

R’ Moshe ben Yosef miTrani (the Mabit), in his Bet Elokim, notes that you can’t compare the clouds of glory with the manna and the well. We had to have the manna because, without it, we would have starved to death. Likewise, without the well, we would have died of dehydration. In other words, even if we had no Moses and no Miriam, God would still have had to give us food and water. The clouds, however, are of a different order because we could have got by without them. They were in effect a free gift, a demonstration of God’s chesed (kindness) and His love for His people. But this doesn’t answer our question as to why the clouds aren’t in our Mishnah. This is because some of the other things created at twilight were also optional extras and signs of God’s chesed—for example the keshet, the rainbow that serves as a sign and a reminder that we should behave ourselves.

Looking at our mishnah in Avot, we can ask how precise it is meant to be. It opens by saying that 10 things were created at that time, but then it goes on to list 14 since there is no consensus as to what those 10 were. On that basis it cites rabbinical opinions that add the mazikin (some form of destructive force), Moshe’s burial plot, Avraham’s ram and even tongs made without tongs.

But there is another explanation. In his Derech Chaim, the Maharal endorses the conclusion of the Rambam in the final chapter of his Shemonah Perakim that the list only includes things that were made at twilight but had no form of existence before then. Other things that appear to have been created after the Six Days of Creation were, Rambam explains, created in their incipient form during the world’s first week but only implemented in reality at a later time. This applies, says the Rambam by way of an example, to the kriat Yam Suf: when God separated the waters on Day Two, he incorporated into the water the potential for splitting when the need arose. A midrash in Bereshit Rabbah 5:5 dramatically depicts this as God negotiating with the sea to do just that if it didn’t want to be vaporized. R’ Yirmeyah ben Elazar widens this category to include other miracles that make no appearance until well after the Six Days of Creation.

So were clouds created before Friday afternoon with the potential to act as clouds of glory? The answer must be “yes”. In Gemara Sukkah 11b there’s an argument between R’ Akiva and R’ Eliezer as to why we sit in sukkot (temporary dwellings) on the festival of Sukkot.  R’ Akiva says it’s to commemorate the fact that we lived in such dwellings. No, says R’ Eliezer, it’s because we lived under the miraculous clouds, the ananei kavod. Resh Lakish, commenting, cites a verse from the second account in the Torah of the Creation, Bereshit 2:6, “ve’ed alah min ha’aretz” (“a mist rose from the ground”). On that verse the Targum Onkelos translates “ed”, mist, as “cloud”. This took place before the creation of Adam and must therefore have happened before twilight on Friday. That could explain why the clouds are not on the list of late creations in our mishnah from Avot.

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Miracles: now you see them, now you don't

Those members of the Jewish people who follow the weekly Torah readings through each yearly cycle will know that we are right in the middle of the season for miracles. Over the past fortnight we’ve had all of the Ten Plagues and we are shortly to embark upon the splitting of the Reed Sea and the subsequent drowning of the pursuing Egyptian charioteers.  Later we encounter the provision of manna from heaven—and more besides.

These miracles share a common factor: they are all visible, perceptible to the naked eye.

At Avot 5:7 we meet a list of ten miracles which, our sages teach us, God provided for our forefathers in the Temple. The list looks like this:

לֹא הִפִּֽילָה אִשָּׁה מֵרֵֽיחַ בְּשַׂר הַקֹּֽדֶשׁ, וְלֹא הִסְרִֽיחַ בְּשַׂר הַקֹּֽדֶשׁ מֵעוֹלָם, וְלֹא נִרְאָה זְבוּב בְּבֵית הַמִּטְבָּחַֽיִם, וְלֹא אִירַע קֶֽרִי לְכֹהֵן גָּדוֹל בְּיוֹם הַכִּפּוּרִים, וְלֹא כִבּוּ הַגְּשָׁמִים אֵשׁ שֶׁל עֲצֵי הַמַּעֲרָכָה, וְלֹא נִצְּחָה הָרֽוּחַ אֶת עַמּוּד הֶעָשָׁן, וְלֹא נִמְצָא פִסּוּל בָּעֽוֹמֶר וּבִשְׁתֵּי הַלֶּֽחֶם וּבְלֶֽחֶם הַפָּנִים, עוֹמְדִים צְפוּפִים וּמִשְׁתַּחֲוִים רְוָחִים, וְלֹא הִזִּיק נָחָשׁ וְעַקְרָב בִּירוּשָׁלַֽיִם, וְלֹא אָמַר אָדָם לַחֲבֵרוֹ: צַר לִי הַמָּקוֹם שֶׁאָלִין בִּירוּשָׁלָֽיִם

No woman ever miscarried because of the smell of the holy meat. The holy meat never spoiled. Never was a fly seen in the slaughterhouse. Never did the High Priest have an accidental seminal discharge on Yom Kippur. The rains did not extinguish the wood-fire burning upon the altar. The wind did not prevail over the column of smoke [rising from the altar]. No disqualifying problem was ever discovered in the Omer offering, the Two Loaves or the Showbread. People stood crowded together but had ample space in which to prostrate themselves. Never did a snake or scorpion cause injury in Jerusalem. And no man ever said to his fellow "My lodging in Jerusalem is too cramped for me."

There’s a difficulty with some of these miracles in that they cannot be perceived in a meaningful manner. If you see a woman having a miscarriage, for example, this is likely to be an extremely unpleasant and probably unforgettable experience. However, if you see a woman not having a miscarriage, this fact is unlikely to impinge on your consciousness at all. The same goes with flies in the slaughterhouse: you will see them if they are there and may note their presence but, unless you are thinking about flies at the time, you may be quite unlikely to notice their absence. The same goes with several of the other miracles listed here: they may exist as quite remarkable statistical propositions, but not as something an onlooker can or need recognize through casual visual perception.

Maharam Shik comments on this. In effect, though we don’t see miracles manifesting themselves before our very eyes, that doesn’t mean that we can’t sensitise ourselves to the fact that something is happening beyond the merely natural, mundane operation of the world.  Even statistical propositions can take the shape of perceptions of hashgachah peratit—God’s personal supervision of a world that normally runs smoothly in accordance with the laws of nature. 

In short, according to Maharam Shik, all we have to do is to keep our eyes open. On any given occasion when we find ourselves in a fly-free slaughterhouse we may have no reason to spot anything unusual. But if it happens again and again, but doesn’t seem to happen in other slaughterhouses, the penny might eventually drop that something special is happening.

Being aware of hashgachah peratit takes many forms even today, even though there is no Temple service and most of us are far from holy. But you have to believe in its existence or you may not detect it. Here’s a trivial example: one occasionally hears a person, not necessarily Jewish, saying things like “I must have been doing the right thing when I decided to do X, because all the traffic lights on the way were green”. If things like this happen even once, it feels great but one is unlikely to read any great significance into it. But if they happen every time, one begins to wonder.

The standard daily Jewish prayer format of the Amidah incorporates within its text the idea that miracles come in different shapes and sizes, possessing markedly different effects. In the “thank you” section, in the blessing that opens with the words modim anachnu loch (“we thank you”), we express gratitude for “miracles that are with us every day” and for God’s “wonders and favours that are in every season—evening, morning and afternoon”. On this basis we say thank-you even for those miracles that are too small to notice, and for those that cannot be seen at all.

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Not in my name

This morning a friend of mine forwarded me a WhatsApp that he thought might interest me. The text, which appears to have been forwarded many times, is said to be a speech by Israel Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. I gave it my close attention.

The content of the speech certainly matched the Prime Minister’s views. It also struck an appropriately defiant note, being in places an almost Churchillian rallying cry along the lines of “it’s us against the world and against all the odds—and we will triumph”. There were however some puzzling aspects to this piece of rhetoric.

The preface to the speech suggested that it had been freshly delivered. It however mentioned Israel’s victory in the Six Day War of 1967 as having happened 35 years ago. That would suggest it was delivered in 2002 when the Prime Minister was actually Ariel Sharon. Elsewhere the reference to the State of Israel—which was founded in 1948—as being 60 years old would suggest that this piece was composed in 2008, when the same office was held by Ehud Olmert.  Also puzzling was the style. Whatever one thinks of Netanyahu’s politics or his leadership, there is general consensus that the one thing he is very good at doing is making speeches in the English language. This one just didn’t read like one of his and, in my opinion, almost certainly isn’t.

The sixth and final chapter of Avot, at 6:6, contains a list of some 48 features that either define a Torah scholar or enable him to become one. The last of these is this:

הָאוֹמֵר דָּבָר בְּשֵׁם אוֹמְרוֹ

One who says something in the name of the person who [first] says it.

Compliance with this rule not only marks a person out as someone who pursues and upholds the principles of the Torah. It even, as 6:6 continues, assists in bringing redemption to the world.

Now if indeed this speech was composed by Prime Minister Netanyahu, it would be incumbent on anyone forwarding it to credit him as its author. But does this also impose a correlative requirement of NOT crediting a person as the author of something that he or she did NOT compose?

I have checked out a number of commentaries on Avot but have yet to find any that discuss this issue within the context of 6:6. I do however recall that false attribution of authorship has sometimes been permitted where it has been felt necessary to do so in order to achieve a greater good—for example to persuade the Jewish population at large to accept an undoubtedly correct halachic ruling which, if they heard it in the name of the original author, would carry considerably less weight in their eyes and might lead to it being ignored or rejected. If my memory serves me well, I think that Marc B. Shapiro lists some instances where this happened and gives chapter and verse in his book, Changing the Immutable.

Thoughts, anyone?

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"If not now, when...?": a mishnah expands

Last year the most frequently-cited teaching from Avot on the English-language social media was that of Hillel the Elder:

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

“If I am not for myself, who is for me? And if I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when?” (Avot 1:14)

This teaching has always been well known in Jewish circles, and not only on account of its enigmatic nature and catchy words. Put to music, it has been joyously sung by chasidim and many composers and musicians, including such luminaries as Mordechai Ben David, Isaac Bitton, Benny Friedman and Shloime Gertner have given it their own personal treatment.

But this mishnah is known well beyond the concentric circles of Jewish culture.  It is known among non-Jews too, on account of the international success of a book, If Not Now, When (original Italian title Se Non Ora, Quando?) the prize-winning novel by Primo Levi. A studio album of the same name, released by Incubus in 2011 and loosely based on two of Hillel’s mishnayot from Avot, sold over 600,000 copies.

The mishnah has clearly spread in terms of public familiarity. It has also broadened the scope of its applicability.

The idea that Hillel is addressing himself as an individual is hard to deny. Of the 14 words in his three-part dictum, 5 of them are “I”, “me” or “myself”.  Both the Bartenura and the commentary ascribed to Rashi initially explain the mishnah in personal terms, almost as though Hillel is talking only about himself, but then allude to its wider application to humankind as a whole, a position endorsed by Rambam, Rabbenu Yonah and all subsequent commentators.

Can we take Hillel’s teaching further and apply it to corporate entities and even state actors?  I have been unable to find any commentary that answers this question but in principle it is hard to object to doing so. Individuals must balance their self-interest with the complementary or even conflicting interests of others; they must also act in good time—as many people who have made a late payment of tax have discovered. So too must local and national governments, businesses, schools, sports clubs and other collective bodies do likewise.

Writing in yesterday’s Jerusalem Post Eliot Penn does just that. His article,” Israel must take its security into its own hands”, opens as follows:

Hillel the Elder, the first-century sage, offered three insights for living as cited in the ancient book of rabbinic wisdom, Pirkei Avot (Ethics of the Fathers). The first two come as a pair: “If I am not for myself, who shall be for me? But if I am only for myself, what am I?”

Hillel’s first two maxims are often understood as directives to the individual to take personal responsibility for their life, balanced with concern for others. These astute ideas apply beyond individual living to fit the State of Israel quite well.

So far as I know, Eliot Penn is neither a scholar nor a sage, but I can think of no good reason why Hillel’s teaching should not apply to corporate entities as well as to individual ones. After all, the actions of collective and corporate bodies are all initiated by individuals. If Hillel’s teaching is addressed to each of them, surely it is fitting to address it to them as a whole.

If any reader knows of any commentary—traditional or otherwise—that has discussed this, can he or she please let me know?

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Eliot Penn’s article can be read in full here: https://www.jpost.com/opinion/article-782438

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Do you ever get that fuzzy psycho-spiritual feeling?

I don't.

I’ve been thinking a good deal recently about the following paragraph, which comes from Bracha Poliakoff and Rabbi Anthony Manning’s fascinating book on redefining tzniut, Reclaiming Dignity:

“The Gaon of Vilna stated that the main focus of a Jew’s life should be the perfection of the mitzvot bein adam l’chaveiro, the laws regulating interpersonal relationships. Although few would disagree with this sentiment in principle, in practice the interpersonal mitzvot normally receive a far less rigorous and structured halachic analysis and presentation to students. They are often pushed into the somewhat fuzzy psycho-spiritual category of ‘improving middot’, which, although (rightly) taken seriously by many, is still a convenient way of avoiding much of the tough intellectual or cognitive-behavioral work that is required in this area of our lives” (at p.255).

What exactly is meant by the words: “in practice the interpersonal mitzvot normally receive a far less rigorous and structured halachic analysis and presentation to students”? This looks like a criticism, the implication that the interpersonal mitzvot would somehow benefit from a rigorous and structured halachic analysis and presentation. But is this actually the case?

In their widest sense, some interpersonal mitzvot are quite suitable for a structured treatment. These include the laws that apply, for example, when we return our neighbour’s lost property, borrow his lawnmower or break his window when playing football. At the other end of the spectrum we find mitzvot that defy attempts to frame them within a structured halachic analysis. These include mitzvot such as loving others as one loves oneself (where the mitzvah is vague in itself), honouring one’s parents (where much depends upon the personalities of those concerned and on cultural considerations) and comforting the bereaved (where much depends upon minhag and on family tradition).

Pirkei Avot focuses principally on middot, not mitzvot, and on how one should behave rather than on what one is obliged to do or refrain from doing. Middot are the stuff of which human relationships are built: they deal with kindness, with empathy, with constantly making judgement calls as to how to respond to others in a wide range of situations.  A person can meticulously observe every interpersonal mitzvah and still fail to make a single friendship or relate to another human being. This is because it is middot, not mitzvot, that define who we are as social beings who share their world with other people.

I’m not sure what exactly is meant by “the somewhat fuzzy psycho-spiritual category of ‘improving middot’” but I find it hard to believe that improving the way one relates to other people within the context of Pirkei Avot can be described as a “convenient way of avoiding much of the tough intellectual or cognitive-behavioral work that is required in this area of our lives”. Even the simplest of middot require careful thought and hard work. How many of us can claim to greet others, as Shammai requires (Avot 1:15), with a happy, smiling face? How many of can genuinely say that we judge others (Yehoshua ben Perachyah, Avot 1:6) on the basis of their merit and give them the benefit of the doubt if it exists? And how many people who manage to do this would regard it as a soft option to learning halachah?

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"A lamb for each father's house"

The title of this post is taken from Shemot (Exodus) 12:2, being the English translation of the words שה לבית אבות which form part of this coming Shabbat’s Torah reading. It is also, with a minor adjustment, the title of a book that has just come into my possession: ש”ה לבית אבות (S”H Lebet Avot).

The author of this book is Rabbi Shalom Hedaya (hence the initials ש”ה/S”H) and it is a fairly lengthy small-print work on Pirkei Avot. Published in Jerusalem in 1986, it is unusual for several reasons.

• First, the text of each Mishnah and Baraita is accompanied by hashe’elot (“the questions”) as well as a bi’ur (“explanation”).
• Secondly, this book does not appear on any of the lists of his writings that accompany his online biographies.
• Thirdly, it contains a portrait photograph of the author which shows him holding a cane in his right hand; the identical photograph appears elsewhere in reverse, with him holding the cane in his left hand (see illustrations below). Since R’ Hedaya was a mystic, I wonder whether this has any kabbalistic significance.

I found this book in a pile of discarded publications that one of the synagogues had left out in the open air, next to the Nachlaot shemot bin. Judging by its condition it has been read many times. IHad I not rescued it, last night’s rains would have ruined it.

Do any readers know of this work? I have never seen anyone make any reference to it. This may be because, like many late twentieth century commentaries on Avot, it only had a small print run and never reached a readership beyond the Rabbi’s friends and flock. It may also be because of its content. Rabbi Hedaya was not merely a scholar and a dayan: he was also a Kabbalist. If this commentary is rich in Kabbalah, it may inaccessible or at least hard-to-comprehend for those of us whose contact with Kabbalah has been brief or cursory.

I’m going to have a go at reading this commentary and will report on what I find. Meanwhile, if any reader can tell me more about the book and its illustrious author, I shall be very grateful.

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Is this why your pet hates your friend?

Many cat- and dog-owners have wondered why it is that their domestic pet sometimes takes an apparently irrational dislike to of your friends or family members. You find yourself wondering what was the problem: was the human in question using the wrong deodorant, or did that person give your animal a surreptitious swipe when you weren’t looking? Or is there more to it?

One person who clearly has no doubt as to the cause is Rabbi Yisrael of Kozhnitz.

At Avot 4:5 R’ Yochanan ben Beroka teaches this:

כָּל הַמְחַלֵּל שֵׁם שָׁמַֽיִם בַּסֵּֽתֶר, נִפְרָעִין מִמֶּֽנּוּ בְּגָלוּי, אֶחָד שׁוֹגֵג וְאֶחָד מֵזִיד בְּחִלּוּל הַשֵּׁם

Everyone who desecrates the Divine Name in secret is punished in public. When it comes to desecration of the Name, it’s the same thing whether one does it negligently or deliberately.

Why are wrongful acts a desecration of God’ name if they are done in secret? No-one else knows about them. Or do they? In his Ahavat Yisrael, R’ Yisrael suggests that a Heavenly Voice proclaims that a desecration of God’s name has been committed.

There’s an obvious problem with this suggestion. If this Heavenly proclamation does take place, how come we never hear it. R’ Yisrael has an answer. The Heavenly Voice is actually silent, which is why we don’t hear it. It’s a heart-to-heart communication which we intuit through our feelings. Since it’s not a verbalized statement it can be both perceived and comprehended not just by us humans—if we are sufficiently receptive and sensitive—but by animals too.

Is this why your dog becomes aggressive or frightened when certain visitors turn up, and why your cat warmly welcomes some friends but keeps a frosty distance from others? There is no hard proof to demonstrate that this is so, and anecdotal evidence of instances where this has apparently happened can generally be explained by other means. Though, while stories of sapient animals discerning the good from the bad are the stuff of which much good fiction has been made, Jewish tradition is broad enough to embrace them: thus we learn how the donkeys of R’ Chanina ben Dosa and R’ Pinchas ben Yair refuse to eat food that had not been tithed or which had been stolen by their new owners (Avot deRabbi Natan 8:8; Bereshit Rabbah 60:8).

Perhaps the real message of R’ Yisrael’s understanding has nothing to do with Heavenly Voices at all. The point he seeks to make is that we should be more sensitive to the activities of our fellow humans and not ignore any warning signs and misgivings we may have about their honesty and probity. If this is so, we face the challenge of synthesizing it with Avot 1:6, which demands of us that we should judge others on the basis of their merits and give them the benefit of the doubt.

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