Parashath Yithro (Exodus XVIII,1-XX, 23) 2/10/12

A.

Our parasha opens with Yithro’s arrival in Israel’s camp, because וישמע יתרו כהן מדין חתן משה את כל אשר עשה אלקים למשה ולישראל עמן כי הוציא ד' את ישראל ממצרים: (“And Yithro, the priest of Midyan, father-in-law of Moshe, heard everything that G-d had done for Moshe and Israel, His people, that Ha-Shem had brought Israel out of Egypt”; XVIII, 1).

The Talmud (זבחים קט"ז.) records three opinions concerning what, precisely, Yithro had heard which galvanized him to seek out Israel’s camp and join their ranks: Rabbi Yëho-shua‘ suggests that he heard of Israel’s first war with ‘Amaléq (XVII, 8-16); Rabbi El‘azar ha-Moda‘i, that it was Mattan Torah (XIX, 16 - XX, 18); and Rabbi Eli‘ézer ben Ya‘a-qov, that it was Qëri‘ath Yam Suf (XIV, 21-31). This, in turn, leads to another question: Did Yithro arrive before Mattan Torah (as was possible in the opinions of Rabbi Yëhoshua‘ and Rabbi Eli‘ézer ben Ya‘aqov or afterward (the only possible conclusion of we hold according to Rabbi El‘azar ha-Moda‘i)?

This second question seems moot, at first blush, when we read, a bit later in our parasha: וישלח משה את חתנו וילך לו אל ארצו: בחדש השלישי בצאת בני ישראל מארץ מצרים ביום הזה באו מדבר סיני: ויסעו מרפידים ויבאו מדבר סיני ויחנו במדבר ויחן ישראל נגד ההר: (“And Moshe saw his father-in-law off, and he went to his land. In the third month of the exodus of the bënei Yisra’él from the land of Egypt; on this day, they came [to] the Sinai desert. And they traveled from Rëfidim and came [to] the Sinai desert, and camped in the desert; and Israel camped opposite the mountain”; XVIII, 27 - XIX, 1-2).

So how could Rabbi El‘azar ha-Moda‘i imagine that Yithro had arrived after the Torah was given, if he left before Israel entered the Sinai desert?

The fact is that this is a classic example of Rashi’s famous principle, אין מוקדם ומאוחר בתורה, that the events recorded in the Torah are not necessarily in chronological order. In our case, this becomes very clear when we read elsewhere, that in Israel’s second year out from Egypt, Moshe told his father-in-law: נוסעים אנחנו אל המקום אשר אמר ד' אתו אתן לכם לכה אתנו כו' ויאמר לא אלך כי אם אל ארצי ואל מולדתי אלך: (“...We are traveling to the place concerning which Ha-Shem has said, 'That one shall I give you; go with us....' And [Yithro] said, 'I will not go; rather, to my land and to my birthplace shall I go'”; Numbers X, 29-30). Whenever Yithro arrived, he was clearly still with Israel after Mattan Torah.

So if the Torah’s purpose in our passage is not chronological, what are we to learn from this odd, ahistorical juxtaposition?

B.

The Maharal mi-Prag (דרשות מהר"ל, הקדמה לדרוש על התורה) offers us insight.

He calls our attention to the beginning of the ‘Asereth ha-Dibbëroth: אנכי ד' אלקיך אשר הוצאתיך מארץ מצרים מבית עבדים (“I am Ha-Shem your G-d Who brought you out of the land of Egypt, from the house of slaves”; XX, 2). What a very peculiar way to introduce the infusion into the world of its fundamental organizing principle, the blueprint of the cosmos and its raison d’être; after all, Hazal tell us אסתכל קודשא בריך הוא באורייתא וברא עלמא (“The Holy One, Blessed is He, looked into the Torah and created the world”; בראשית רבה פ"א סי' ב'), and התנה הקדוש ברוך הוא עם מעשה בראשית וא"ל אם ישראל מקבלים התורה אתם מתקיימין ואם לאו אני מחזיר אתכם לתהו ובהו (“The Holy One Blessed is He made a condition at the act of Creation, and told it: 'If Israel accept the Torah, you exist; and if not, I am returning you to chaos'”; שבת פ"ח:); or, as the prophet Yirmëyahu proclaimed, כה אמר ד' אם לא בריתי יומם ולילה חקות שמים וארץ לא שמתי (“Thus has Ha-Shem said, 'If My covenant is not [in effect] by day and night, the laws of heaven and earth I did not put in place'”; Jeremiah XXXIII, 25).

In light of all of the above, we should rather have expected something a bit more grandiose, along the lines of אנכי ד' אלקיך עושה שמים וארץ (“I am Ha-Shem your G-d, Maker of heaven and earth”). Why, instead, does He lead off by mentioning the Exodus?

The reason, says the Maharal, is להורות לנו כי לישראל בפרט ובעצם נתייחסה נתינת התורה בהחלט ולא לזולתן מהעמים כו' תלה הדבר בהוציאו אותם ממצרים ולא אמר "אשר בראתי את כל" או זולת זה מהמעלות היותר כוללות ועליונות מההוצאה אלא שרצה לומר אחר שהוצאתי אתכם ממצרים מבית עבדים היא היא סבה מכרחת אתכם לעבדים לי ושמוכרחים אתם לקבל גזירותי ותורותי בעל כרחכם (“to instruct us that it is to Israel particularly and specifically that the giving of the Torah is decidedly related, and not to any of the nations outside of them... He made the matter depend upon His taking them out of Egypt, and did not say ‘Who created everything’ or anything else of the things more general and exalted than the Exodus, but rather wanted to say, 'Since I brought you out of Egypt, out of the house of slaves, his is the very reason obligating you to My service, and you are obligated to accept My decrees and My Toroth, [even] against your will...'”).

As the Maharal goes on to say, that could not be said of Yithro. He had not been enslaved by the Egyptians, and liberated by Ha-Shem. This in no way detracts from the magnitude of what Yithro did; on the contrary, his acceptance of the Torah was entirely voluntary, entirely an expression of his free will. In this sense, his experience was utterly different from that of Israel, and it is to point this out to us and highlight it that the Torah ahistorically notes Yithro’s departure from Israel’s camp before the bënei Yisra’él entered the desert to approach that fateful encounter a the foot of the mountain.

C.

‘Ad kan ha-Maharal. The English word “nation” is derived from the Latin natio, itself derived fro the past participle (natus) of the verb nasci, “to be born.” The English and Latin words thus emphasize ethnic heritage, what the Germans call Blut und Boden, “blood and soil,” as the key to nationhood.

And the ethnic component is important; we are called Israel because of our eponymous ancestor. But ethnicity alone does not provide for any sense of national cohesion. Indeed, if a person becomes divorced or alienated from his national culture such that his only tie to his people is his ethnic heritage, anything can happen; witness all of the people with Polish, German, Italian or Japanese names who have become so completely American.

Shortly before Mattan Torah began, G-d told Moshe: כה תאמר לבית יעקב ותגיד לבני ישראל: אתם ראיתם אשר עשיתי למצרים ואשא אתכם על כנפי נשרים ואבא אתכם אלי: ועתה אם שמע תשמעו בקלי ושמרתם את בריתי והייתם לי סגלה מכל העמים כי לי כל הארץ: ואתם תהיו לי ממלכת כהנים וגוי קדוש אלה הדברים אשר תדבר אל בני ישראל: (“...Thus shall you say to [the women] and tell the bënei Yisra’él. You saw what I did to Egypt, and I carried you on the wings of eagles and brought you to Me. And now, if listening you will listen to My voice and keep My covenant, you will be more precious to Me than all the nations, for Mine is the entire earth. And you will be My kingdom of kohanim and holy nation; these are the words which you will speak to the bënei Yisra’él”; XIX, 3-6).

In short, Ha-Shem decreed that the Torah is Israel’s national culture. As Rav Sa‘adya Ga’on famously writes: אין אומתנו אומה אלא בתורה (“Our nation is not a nation, save through the Torah”; ספר אמונות ודעות הקדמה רביעעית), and the Meshech Hochma similarly emphasizes that Israel’s national survival is dependent upon our knowing that Yërushalayim is our capital, that Lëshon ha-Qodesh is our language, and that the Torah is our culture (שם, פרשת בחקותי). it is only because we clung to that knowledge through the 3324 years since that meeting at Sinai, despite all o the stresses and strains, the pressures and blandishments of far-flung exile across the world, that we have continued to exist as G-d’s eternal people. And it is the whole-hearted adoption of Israel’s national culture which makes possible the “naturalization” of members of other nations – such as Yithro – amongst us; just as the failure to internalize the knowledge and practice of our national culture, the Torah, is the reason for the inroads which foreign cultures have made on ethnic Israel.

Parshath Yithro (Exodus XVIII,1-XX,23) 1/20/11

A.

Our parasha tells of the culmination of Creation, the establishment of the Torah-nation, Israel, at the foot of Sinai. התנה הקב"ה עם מעשה בראשית וא"ל, Hazal tell us, אם ישראל מקבלים התורה אתם מתקיימין ואם לאו אני מחזיר אתכם לתהו ובהו (“The Holy One, Blessed is He, made a condition with Creation at the beginning: If Israel accept the Torah, you continue to exist; and if not, I am returning you to chaos!”; שבתפ"ח. יע"ע זוה"ק ח"ג קצ"ג. וחצ"ר:). The account of Mattan Torah begins with what may be termed an executive summary of the 613 mitzvoth, the ‘Aseereth ha-Dibbëroth or ‘Ten Utterances” (often mischaracterized as “Ten Commandments”).

In the ‘Asereth ha-Dibbëroth all Israel (indeed, Hazal tell us, all the world; זבחים קט"ז.) heard: אנכי ד' אלקיך כו' לא יהי' לך אלהים אחרים על פני: לא תעשה לך פסל וכל תמונה וגו' (“I am Ha-Shem your G-d... You will not have other god[s] before Me. You will not make for yourself a statue [pesel] or any image [tëmuna]....”; XX, 2-4).

Despite the facile appearance, this passage is remarkably difficult to translate accurately into English. Begin with the verb in the second sentence, yihyeh: The form is a third person masculine imperfective singular, and as such, would certainly imply a singular subject; both Onqëlos and the Targum Rabbi Yonathan ben ‘Uzzi’él do so read it, as “you shall not have another god”; yet, the fact remains that the subject, elohim ahérim, is a plural noun with a plural modifier, and Rashi, for one, clearly reads it that way: שאינן אלהות אלא אחרים עשאום אלהים עליהם כו' (“for they are not Divinity, but others have made them gods over themselves....”). Clearly this cries out for further explanation.

Next, we come to the odd phrase ‘al panai. I have here followed the commentators in translating it as though it were the far more common term lë-fanai, “to My face,” i.e., “before Me,” but the fact is that it does not read that way, but rather “on My face.” Even Rashi appears to sense that there is something unusual in the phrase, for he continues: ולא יתכן לפרש אלהים אחרים זולתי שגנאי הוא כלפי מעלה לקרותם אלהים אצלו (“and it is not correct to explain ‘other gods beside Me’ for it is derogatory toward the Most High to call them ‘gods’ together with him”). Were the meaning of the phrase crystal clear, Rashi would not feel the need to tell how not to read it.

Finally we come to the words pesel and tëmuna, which a dictionary will tell you mean “statue” and “picture.” There are certainly other Hebrew words denoting images (for instance, human beings represent the dëmuth Elohim, conventionally translated “likeness” or “image” (cf. Genesis I, 26). How do the terms pesel and tëmuna differ from these, and why do they appear here in our passage rather than the other two?

B.

The wording of our passage teaches us a great deal about the nature of the institution of ‘avoda zara, literally “strange or foreign service,” conventionally rendered “idolatry.”

Rambam famously tells us how ‘avoda zara began: בימי אנוש טעו בני האדם טעות גדול כו' וזו היתה טעותם אמרו הואיל והאל-הים ברא כוכבים אלו וגלגלים להנהיג את העולם ונתנם במרום וחלק להם כבוד והם שמשים המשמשים לפניו ראויים הם לשבחם ולפארם ולחלוק להם כבוד וזהו רצון הא-ל לגדל ולכבד מי שגדלו וכבדו כו' כיון שעלה דבר זה על לבם התחילו לבנות לכוכבים היכלות ולהקריב להם קרבנות ולשבחם ולפארם בדברים ולהשתחוות למולם כדי להשיג את רצון הבורא בדעתם הרעה וזה הי' עיקר עבודת כוכבים וגו' (“In the days of Enosh human beings made a grave error... And this was their error: They said, Since G-d created these stars and spheres to run the world and placed them on high and gave them honor, and they are servants who serve before Him, it is proper to praise and glorify them and give them honor; and it is G-d’s will to magnify and honour whom He has magnified and honored.... Since this thing arose in their heart, they began to build palaces for the stars and to offer them sacrifices and to praise and glorify them with words, and to bow down before them in order to ascertain the Creator’s will, in their evil opinion; this was the root of star-worship....”; הל' עבודת כוכבים פ"א ה"א).

If we understand that by kochavim, “stars,” is referring to kochvei lecheth, “planets,” the truth of this assertion becomes readily apparent: The modern names of the planets in English are those of the principle Roman gods, and archaeology has demonstrated that this is true of every other ancient people as well.

The term elohim, as anyone possessed of a חוש חי לשפה העברית, a “living sense of the Hebrew language,” will attest, is used here to refer both to the unique G-d of Israel and also to “other gods,” in both cases a plural noun. When it refers to the one, unique G-d, it occurs always with a singular verb, e.g., Bë-réshith bara’ Elohim, “In the beginning G-d created...”, not bar’u, the plural form. Yet, in our passage, elohim ahérim occurs both with a plural modifier and a singular verb, yihyeh, as noted supra. Rambam tells us that the basis of the error made by the human race was the concept that the planets were intended to run the world, a concept which bought them to assign responsibility for what were perceived as the disparate forces of nature to the various planets, which were understood to mediate between the Creator and His creation. Hence, an original unity, in which all of these disparate forces originate and emanate from one Divine Source, came to be fragmented into separate entities who were conceived to serve ‘al panav, and eventually masked and hid the ineffable G-d from His creatures in the fullness of time.

Such a phenomenon is evident from Mesopotamian sources, in which the gods, that is, the planets, were honoured and placated (each city in Mesopotamia being dedicated to a different god, whose temple was the focus of city life); yet even the gods were viewed as subject to melammû, an inchoate force or fate which (in my humble opinion) is all that was left of the Creator in Mesopotamian consciousness. The elohim ahérim which they had made for themselves stood before G-d’s “face,” as it were, hiding it from the world.

But that is not all that happened.

Also striking is that the dative pronoun which completes the expression translated “you shall not have” is second person singular, as are the verb and dative pronoun in the next sentence, “you shall not make for yourself.” Why?

The phenomenon of a “national god” was common in the ancient world (for instance, the national god of Mo’av was Këmosh; cf. Numbers XXI, 29), which does not mean that the Mo’avim did not acknowledge other gods, but simply that their god was Këmosh. This, I believe, is derived from the same phenomenon which divided up the Mesopotamian gods amongst the various cities (each of which, for most of the region’s history, was an independent state). Had the prohibition been expressed in the plural, it could have been construed as forbidding the nomination of a collective, national god other than Ha-Shem. The singular pronouns, I believe, are intended to prohibit something different.

The great scholar of ancient Mesopotamia, Prof. A. Leo Oppenheim, notes the curious fact that the Mesopotamians very, very often had names containing theophoric elements (i.e., the names of gods), but that these gods were almost never the “official” gods of the cities in which they dwelt. Prof. Oppenheim believed that the Mesopotamians conceived their psyches as consisting of four parts, each of which was governed by a different class of deity, and a different individual god in each individual’s case (again, for the reader with a חוש חי לשפה העברית it is most instructive that the name of one of these classes is šēdu; cf., Ancient Mesopotamia: Portrait of a Dead Civilization, pp. 198-206). Thus, in their view, there were “national” gods, and personal gods.

This, I believe, is what the singular pronouns warn us against: The human being, noted supra, is a dëmuth Elohim, a “likeness of G-d,” a unitary being with many different personality traits and talents. Each individual member of the Holy Nation is therefore warned that Ha-Shem is not merely our “national” god, such that we are free to imagine and adopt personal “deities” of the Mesopotamian sort, either. Israel has only one G-d.

C.

Which leads us to the second verse.

Why does the Torah here use pesel rather than dëmuth? Rashi provides a clue: Pesel, he tells us, is על שם שנפסל (“because it is nifsal”). Nifsal simultaneously means “carved, hewn” and also “invalid, illegitimate.” The fragmentation of the Divine consequently results in a view of the human likeness of the Divine which is illegitimate at its root; this is what we learn from the word pesel.

And tëmuna? Here the Ba‘al ha-Turim shows the way: The numerical value or gimatriya of tëmuna (501) is equivalent to פרצוף אדם, “the visage of man” (ע"ע עבודה זרה מ"ב:). A human being, no matter how great, how noble, is nonetheless only a dëmuth Elohim, an image, a pale reflection of G-d. No human being is worthy of worship, only the transcendant, unique Creator of all, Who cannot be pictured in any meaningful way.

D.

Our parasha is named for Moshe’s father-in-Law, Yithro. How is it that Yithro merited having this parasha, which contains the purpose of all creation, named after him? The Or ha-Hayyim asks our question, and answers: טעם הדבר הוא להראות ד' את בני ישראל כו' כי יש באומות גדולים בהבנה ובהשכלה כו' והכונה בזה כי לא באה הבחירה בישראל לצד שיש בהם השכלה והכרה יותא מכל האומות כו' הא למדת כי לא מרוב חכמת ישראל והשכלתם בחר ד' בהם אלא לחסד עליון ולאהבת האבות וגו' (“The reason of the matter is for Ha-Shem to show the bënei Yisra’él... that there are men great in understanding and enlightenment amongst the nations... and the intent in this is that chosenness did not come into Israel because there is amongst them more enlightenment and recognition than all the other nations... So you learn that it is not from Israel’s great wisdom and their enlightenment that Ha-Shem chose them, but rather for supernal kindness, and love of the Patriarchs....”; הערה לפ' י"ח כ"א).

Rashi tells us that Yithro came to meet Israel on hearing of the splitting of Yam Suf and the war with ‘Amaléq, i.e., before Mattan Torah. This remarkable man is given the title of kohén Midyan in our first verse, and the Or ha-Hayyim asks why that should be? Since he converted fully and accepted on himself all of the mitzvoth (whence, the Mëchilta tells us, he was called Yithro, meaning roughly “his addition,” i.e., addition of the rest of the mitzvoth to the seven in which he, like the other nations, was already obligated), surely mentioning that he was a priest to the ‘avoda zara of Midyan was no compliment!

He answers that Yithro was demonstrably a man of standing and stature, a leader amongst his people, and yet was willing to accept an Egyptian fugitive who had yet to achieve anything as a son-in-law. Such uncommon judgment, flying in the face of convention which demands regal titles and a solid yihus as the price of marriage into a prominent family, was an early indication of the wisdom, understanding and enlightenment which led Yithro to the foot of Sinai, where he was moved together with all of the other souls present on that awesome occasion.

Parshath Yithro (Exodus XVIII,1-XX,23) 2/5/10

A.

Our parasha tells of Ma‘amad Har Sinai, the climactic culmination of Creation when the bënei Yisra’él became the nation of Israel, accepting as their constitution the Torah, both the blueprint and purpose of Creation, as we learn: קב"ה אסתכל באורייתא וברא עלמא (“The Holy One, Blessed is He, looked into the Torah and created the world”; זה"ק ח"ב קס"א:); אם לא בריתי יומם ולילה חקות שמים וארץ לא שמתי (“If My covenant is not [observed] by day and by night, I shall not have set the laws of heaven and earth”; Jeremiah XXXIII, 25); אם ישראל מקבלין את התורה מוטב ואם לאו אני אחזיר אתכם לתהו ובהו (“If Israel accept the Torah, [Creation] becomes good, and if not, I shall return [Creation] to chaos!”; שבת פ"ח. וע"ע זה"ק ח"ב ר. וח"ג ז., במדבר רבה פי"ג סי' ט"ו ועבודה זרה ג.).

We are therefore not surprised to find that the event has a very dramatic mise-en-scène: a shofar blast growing ever louder, cataclysmic displays of thunder and lightning, וכל העם ראים את הקולת ואת הלפידם ואת קול השפר ואת ההר עשן וירא העם וינעו ויעמדו מרחק (“And all the people [were] seeing the voices and the flashes and the voice of the shofar and the smoke-wreathed mountain; and the people saw, and they moved and they stood at a distance”; XX, 15).

Nature was turned on its head once again, and sounds became visible. It was undoubtedly a very great miracle, but it begs the question: Why was this particular wonder appropriate to Mattan Torah? Pondering the question, we review the wording of our verse, and note the participle in the first clause, “seeing”, and the apparently unnecessary repetition of the verb in the second clause, “and the people saw.” What does that signify?

B.

The world knows the Divine pronouncements made at Mt. Sinai as the “Ten Commandments”. However, anyone endowed with a חוש חי לשפה העברית, a “living sense of the Hebrew language” (as one of my rebbe’im was wont to say), knows that the Hebrew word for commandment” is mitzva, of which there are 613, not ten (as we learn from Deuteronomy XXXIII, 4, תורה צוה לנו משה, “Moshe commanded us Torah”; the gimatriya or numerical value of Torah is 611, and two additional commandments, “I am Ha-Shem your G-d” and “You shall have no other gods” were taught to Israel directly by the Al-Mighty; מכות כ"ג:).

Since the mitzvoth are scattered throughout the written Torah, we refer to these introductory pronouncements as the ‘Asereth ha-Dibbëroth, the “Ten Utterances,” from the introductory verse: וידבר אלקים את כל הדברים האלה (“And G-d spoke [va-yëdabbér] all these words [ha-dëvarim ha-élleh]”; XX, 1). The verb dibbér, speak, is not a simple (qal) verb; it is in the factitive pi‘él conjugation. A factitive verb brings into being a state of existence; for instance, if one is mëchaddésh something, the result is a chadash, a new thing; if one is mëchakkém, the result is a chacham, a wise person; if one is mëqatzér, the result is a qatzar, a short thing. The pattern is clear, and examples could be multiplied. So, if one is mëdabbér, the result is a davar. As that person possessed of a lively sense of the Hebrew language will tell you, davar simultaneously means “word” and “thing,” a physical object.

With this in mind, we note that Rashi says that Israel saw את הקולות היוצאין מפי הגבורה (“the voices emanating from the mouth of the Al-Mighty”), and we turn to the Këli Yaqar.

C.

The Këli Yaqar writes: שכל דבור ודבור שיצא מפי הקב"ה מיד נתגשם אותו דבור והי' בו כ"כ ממשות עד שהיו רואין באויר כל האותיות וכאילו הי' הכל כתוב לפניהם (“that each and every dibbur which came out of the mouth of the Holy One, Blessed is He, immediately became manifest, and there was in it so much substantiality that they were seeing in the air all of the letters, as if everything was written before them”). He adduces evidence of this from Scripture: בדבר ד' שמים נעשו (“By Ha-Shem’s word the heavens were made”; Psalms XXXIII, 6), evidence שכל דבור שיוצא מפי הקב"ה בורא בריאה חדשה (“that every dibbur which comes out of the mouth of the Holy One, Blessed is He, creates a new creation”). ולפיכך ארז"ל שכששבר משה הלוחות האותיות פורחות ואם לא הי' ממשות באותיות איך היו פורחות וראי' גדולה מזו שבלוחות האחרונות כתיב "וכתבתי על הלחת את הדברים אשר היו על הלחת הראשונים" כדברים אשר היו לא נאמר אלא את הדברים אשר היו למה שאותן אותיות שהיו פורחות מן לוחות ראשונות נקבעו בשניות וא"כ וודאי הי' ממשות באותן אותיות (“And therefore Chazal said that when Moshe broke the tablets [Exodus XXXIII, 19] the letters [went] flying. and if there was no substantiality in the letters, how did they go flying? And a stronger inference than this [may be drawn from the fact] that concerning the last tablets it is written: ‘And I shall write the words which were on the first tablets’ [XXXIV, 1] – ‘like the words which were’ is not said, but ‘the words which were.’ Why? Because the very letters which had been flying from the first tablets were affixed in the second ones; and if so, certainly there was substantiality in those letters”).

The Al-Mighty’s koach ha-dibbur, His factitive “speech,” functioned to bring the originally metaphysical words of the universe’s blueprint into physical existence. These now physical words were affixed to the tablets, והלחת מעשה אלקים המה והמכתב מכתב אלקים (“and the tablets were the work of G-d and the writing was the writing of G-d”; XXXII, 15). It was these dëvarim, brought into being through dibbur, which the people saw: קול אלקים המדבר אתם אותן קולות ראו בעיניהם (“the voice of G-d speaking with them, these voices they saw with their eyes”).

The direct voice of G-d is an ultimately terrifying thing. Chazal tell us that, on hearing the first word, the nëshamoth of those present, overcome with the overwhelming longing to return to their Divine source, left their bodies and they died. Restored to life, the next word did the same; and the next, and the next, and the next....(עיי' פרקי דר' אליעזר פמ"א וזה"ק ח"א כ"ח:). It was this, says the Këli Yaqar, which prompted the people to beg Moshe: דבר אתה עמנו ונשמעה ואל ידבר עמנו אלקים פן נמות (“You speak with us and we will listen, and let G-d not speak with us, lest we die”; XX, 16).

As the Këli Yaqar points out, one is generally able to see things at a longer distance than to hear them. This, he says, is the significance of the second verb: That the sight of the letters enabled the people to move back out of the effective ranger of that awesome and terrible voice.

For his part, the Ha‘améq Davar suggests that the repetition of the verb signifies Israel’s perception שהוא יותר מלפי כחם באמת. וה"ז כמו שהאדם נושא משא לפי שעה יותר מכפי כחו ואינו יכול לעמוד אלא מתנועע תמיד. כך הי' משא הקדושה עליהם יותר מכחם עד שנעו ממעמדם (“that [the experience] was truly beyond their strength. And this is like a man who for a short time bears a weight beyond his strength, and he cannot stand but is always moving. So was the burden of sanctity upon them beyond their strength, such that they moved from their position”).

D.

A wonderful suggestion which I heard years ago in the name of the second Gerer Rebbe, the Sëfath Emeth, offers a deeper explanation of why they were permitted to see the words being uttered, which has special relevance for our time.

We live in an age in which the tools of faith are being sorely misapplied. In Western Civilization, a very large number of people have lost all faith in ultimate things, and instead have come to put their faith in the claims of human science, which are neither eternal nor ultimate, but inherently provisional and ever-changing. Nonetheless, all too often, even trained scientists (who surely should know better) cling to positions which they have taken as though they were tenets of a religious faith.

In the Muslim world, we see that the moral ambiguity resulting from the West’s loss of faith in ultimate things is being used as an excuse by fanatical ideologues to warp religious concepts in such a way as to justify appalling and seldom-equaled savagery, so that “martyrs” (shahīdūn in Arabic, which literally means “witnesses”), for instance, become self-immolating mass-murderers.

The greater number of the ‘Asereth ha-Dibbëroth are negative statements, prohibitions of immoral acts: לא תרצח לא תנאף לא תגנב לא תענה ברעך עד שקר (“You will not murder, you will not fornicate, you will not steal, you will not bear false witness against your fellow”) and so on. As our person possessed of the lively sense of the Hebrew language will attest, the negative particle in each of these phrases, lo’, spelt lamed-alef, is identical in sound to the word lo, spelt lamed-vav, which means “for him” (this is also evident from the niqqud of the words in the verse quoted, in that the negative particle removes the dagesh from the initial tav of the verb, an indication that the alef is silent).

Says the Sëfath Emeth, the reason the words were visible was so that there not be any doubt whatever that G-d had said, for instance, “You shall not murder,” and NOT, chas vë-shalom, “You shall murder for Him.” The principles of yashruth and tëmimuth, of straight-forward honesty and simplicity in the acceptance and application of religious precepts, were thus articulated explicitly at the very moment that religion in its true sense entered the world.

Parshath Yithro (Exodus XVIII,1-XX,23) 2/13/09

A.

Having heard of Israel’s exodus from Egypt, Yithro, Moshe’s father-in-law, leaves Midyan with Moshe’s wife and two sons and rides to join the yotz’ei Mitarayim. When he arrives at the machaneh Yisra’él, the encampment in the desert, Moshe greets the new arrivals enthusiastically, and fills his father-in-law in on everything that had happened during the Exodus itself and subsequently.

ויחד יתרו על כל הטובה אשר עשה ד' לישראל וגו' (XVIII, 9).

The main verb of this verse, va-yichadd, is a fine example of what I have termed the “creative ambiguity” which is at times inherent in the Hebrew text. Onqelos understands the word to be an apocopated form of the verb chada, “to rejoice,” and hence translates the verse: “And Yithro rejoiced over all the good which Ha-Shem had done for Israel….” The Talmud records that the great Babylonian Amora Abba Aricha, known affectionately as Rav, was heir to a different tradition, and understood the verb to be chadad, “be sharp,” and hence held שהעביר חרב חדה על בשרו, “that he had passed a sharp knife over his flesh” (סנהדרין צ"ד.), i.e. he translated it: “And Yithro circumcised himself because of the good which Ha-Shem had done for Israel….”

The Minchath Chinnuch considers Rav’s version, and raises the question of whether or
not a gér tzedeq, a converted, “naturalised” citizen of Israel, is in fact permitted to circumcise himself (מצוה ב' אות י"ד ד"ה והנה גוי).

The question lands us smack dab in the middle of a controversy between Rabbi Eli‘ezer ben Hyrkanos, also called Rabbi Eli‘ezer ha-Gadol or often simply Rabbi Eli‘ezer, and his colleagues in the Sanhedrin: ת"ר גר שמל ולא טבל ר"א אומר הרי זה גר שכן מצינו באבותינו שמלו ולא טבלו כו' וחכמים אומרים טבל ולא מל, מל ולא טבל אין גר עד שימול ויטבול (“The Rabbis taught: A gér who has been circumcised but has not been immersed in a miqveh, Rabbi Eli‘ezer says, 'He is a gér, for so have we found amongst our patriarchs, that they were circumcised and not immersed….' And the Chachamim say, 'One who has been immersed but not circumcised, or circumcised but not immersed is not a gér until he is both circumcised and immersed”; יבמות מ"ו.).

In other words, Rabbi Eli‘ezer appears to hold that géruth takes effect immediately upon circumcision, and so would arguably agree that a gér is capable of performing his own brith mila. His colleagues, the Chachamim, require both mila and tvila, and so would not agree that the potential convert could perform his own circumcision.

Precisely why a non-Jew is ineligible to perform a brith mila, a valid circumcision either on a Jewish infant or on a candidate for conversion, is a matter of dispute elsewhere in the Talmud, this time between Rabbi Yochanan and Rav: דרב אמר "ואתה את בריתי תשמור" ורבי יוחנן "הימול תימול" (“for Rav said [that he justifies the prohibition because of] ‘And you shall keep My covenant [brithi; Genesis XVII, 9]’ and Rabbi Yochanan’s [justification is] ‘circumcising you shall be circumcised’ [ibid., 13]”; עבודה זרה כ"ז.). In other words, Rav holds that to perform brith mila one must first be subject to the brith, i.e., be Jewish, whilst Rabbi Yochanan holds that only one who has himself been circumcised may perform circumcision.

But wait a moment; it is Rav who says that Yithro circumcised himself, i.e. became a convert, on hearing of all the good which Ha-Shem had done for Israel, yet it is also Rav who holds that such a circumcision would be invalid, because Yithro was not Jewish, especially in light of the fact that the halacha (which Rav certainly does not dispute) follows the opinion of the Chachamim, that géruth requires both mila and tvila (עיי' רמב"מ הל' איסורי בואה פי"ג ה"ו).

So Rav appears to contradict himself. How can we to resolve this?

B.

Elsewhere in the Talmud, we find a discussion of the occasion of Yithro’s departure for and arrival at the machaneh Yisra’él. וישמע יתרו חתן משה את כל אשר עשה אלקים למשה ולושראל עמו כי הוציא ד' את ישראל ממצרים (“And Yithro heard all that G-d had done for Moshe and Israel, for Ha-Shem had brought Israel out of Egypt”) begins our parasha. What, precisely, had Yithro heard?

ר' יהושע אומר מלחמת עמלק שמע שהרי כתיב בצדו "ויחלש יהושע את עמלק ואת עמו לפי חרב". ר"א המודעי אומר מתן תורה שמע ובא שכשנתנה תורה לישראל הי' קולו הולך מסוף העולם ועד סופו. ר' אליעזר בן יעקב אומר קריעת ים סוף שמע ובא שנא' "ויהי כשמוע כל מלכי האמורי" ורך רחב הזונה אמרה לשלוחי יהושע "כי שמענו את אשר הוביש ד' את מי ים סוף" (“Rabbi Yehoshua says, 'He heard of the war with ‘Amaleq, for it is written beside [our verse] "And Yehoshua weakened ‘Amaleq and his people at sword-point" [XVII, 13].' Rabbi El‘azar ha-Moda‘i says, 'He heard of Mattan Torah and came, for when the Torah was given to Israel, His voice carried from one end of the earth to the other….' Rabbi Eli‘ezer ben Ya‘aqov says, 'He heard of the splitting of the Reed Sea and came, for it is said "And it was when all the Emori kings heard" [Joshua V, 1], and even Rachav the harlot said to Yehoshua’s emissaries, ‘For we heard that Ha-Shem dried up the waters of the Reed Sea’ [ibid., II, 10]”; זבחים קט"ז.).

It would appear thus that both Rabbi Yehoshua and Rabbi Eli‘ezer ben Ya‘aqov held that Yithro arrived at the machaneh Yisra’él before Mattan Torah, and experienced it subsequently with the bnei Yisra’él, whilst clearly Rabbi El‘azar ha-Moda‘i held that he had arrived after Mattan Torah, since he believed that it was that event which motivated him to come.

The significance of this lies in the fact that Rav establishes in several places והא קיימא לן משנת ר' אלעזר בן יעקב קב ונקי (“it is established for us that the teaching of Rabbi El.i‘ezer ben Ya‘aqov is measured and clean”; עיי' למשל יבמות ס. ובכורות כ"ג. וע"ע תוספות שם ד"ה משום). “Measured,” as Rashi explains, because we have relatively few of his statements, but they are always clearly the halacha. So plainly Rav agreed with Rabbi Eli‘ezer ben Ya‘aqov, that Yithro arrived at the machaneh Yisra'él before Mattan Torah.

C.

Armed with the above information, we go on to confront yet another famous controversy which involved the same Sanhedrin as that of which Rabbi Yehoshua, Rabbi El‘azar ha-Moda‘i, and Rabbi Eli‘ezer ben Ya‘aqov were members. The controversy concerns the status of a tabor shel ‘achnai, a sort of collapsible, portable oven. The specific issue of the dispute is not important here, so much as the fact that Rabbi Eli’ezer ben Hyrkanos, also a member of that Sanhedrin, stubbornly clung to his opinion even after the Sanhedrin voted against it. He tried to convince his colleagues that he was correct by performing several (actual) miracles (none of which was immediately germane to the topic), which was climaxed when a bath qol, a voice from heaven, rang out, מה לכם אצל ר' אליעזר שהלכה כמותו בכל מקום (“What do you have beside Rabbi Eli‘ezer, according to whom the halacha is decided everywhere?”).

Rabbi Yehoshua, the head of that Sanhedrin, refuted the bath qol by declaring "לא בשמים היא" כו' שכבר נתנה תורה מהר סיני אין אנו משגיחין בבת קול שכבר כתבת בהר סיני בתורה "אחרי רבים להטות" (“‘It is not in Heaven’ [Deuteronomy XXX, 12]… for the Torah has already been given from Mt. Sinai; we pay no attention to a bath qol, for You already wrote on Mt. Sinai in the Torah ‘to follow after the majority’ [Exodus XXIII, 2]”; בבא מציעא נ"ט).

As I have noted several times in the past in these essays (עיי' ביחוד א"ז ישיר לפרשת חקת שנת תשס"ה), the implications of this passage are profound. Rabbi Yehoshua was, of course, right; the Torah was given to Israel at Sinai in a physical form for a physical world, to be administered by rabbinic authority and majority vote of the Sanhedrin. But the bath qol, emanating as it did from the ‘alma d’qushta, the “world of truth” which contains and encloses this one, in which חותמו של הקב"ה אמת (“the seal of the Holy One, Blessed is He, is truth”; שבת נ"ה. וע"ע זוה"ק ח"א ב). There, in the ‘alma d’qushta, the halacha agrees with Rabbi Eli‘ezer, regardless of the decision of the Sanhedrin here below.

D.

Therein, I believe, lies the key to reconcile Rav with Rav. Since, as we have established, he agrees with Rabbi Eli‘ezer ben Ya‘aqov that Yithro arrived at the machaneh Yisra’él before Mattan Torah, there was as yet neither Torah nor Sanhedrin in this world; hence, the halacha b’chol maqom, “everywhere” (as the bath qol asserted) would have followed the opinion later held by Rabbi Eli‘ezer ben Hyrkanos, that géruth takes effect immediately upon circumcision, and therefore Yithro could indeed have circumcised himself. (It is perhaps noteworthy that Rabbi Eli‘ezer himself drew his justification from the actions of the Patriarchs, before Mattan Torah).

Rav’s opinion that one must be subject to the brith in order to usher anyone into it is germane to his own time, after Mattan Torah, when the halacha had already been decided by the Sanhedrin in favour of the opinion of the Chachamim.

Parshath Yithro (Exodus XVIII,1-XX-23) 1/25/08

A.

ויהי ביום השלישי בהית בקר ויהי קלת וברקים וענן כבד על ההר וקל שפר חזק מאד ויחרד כל העם אשר במחנה (“And it was on the third day as it became morning, and there were sounds and thunderbolts and a heavy cloud on the mountain, and the very strong sound of a shofar; and all of the people who were in the camp trembled;” XIX, 16). So dawned the day on which Moshe began to receive the constitution of the nation of Israel, the Torah before all of Israel assembled, the day which has been celebrated ever since as the holiday of Shavu’oth.

The Talmud tells us of the great Amora, Rav Yosef: ביומא דעצרתא אמר עבדי לי עגלא תלתא, אמר אי לא האי יומא דקא גרים כמה יוסף איכא בשוקא (“On the day of Shavu’oth he would say, 'Prepare for me a choice calf;' he would say, 'Were it not for what this day brought about, how many Yosefs are there in the marketplace?'” פסחים ס"ח:).

Rashi offers an explanation of Rav Yosef’s sentiment: אי לא האי יומא שלמדתי תורה והתרוממתי הרי אנשים הרבה בשוק ששמן יוסף ומה ביני לבינם (“Were it not for this, because I have learnt Torah and been raised up, there are many men in the marketplace named Yosef; what difference would there be between me and them?”).

At first blush it seems that Rav Yosef’s gratitude for Mattan Torah lay in that it gave him the opportunity to learn, and thereby be exalted over the common “Joe.” A little reflection, though, will reveal that that cannot be his intent: after all, every one of those other Yosefs had the same opportunity as he did; as the Torah itself tells: תורה צוה לנו משה מורשה קהלת יעקב (“Moshe commanded us Torah, an inheritance, community of Ya’aqov;” Deuteronomy XXXIII, 4). Rav Yosef’s superior intellectual and spiritual gifts may have made him better able to take advantage of the opportunity, but the opportunity itself is common to all Israel.

So what did Rav Yosef really mean?

B.

We begin by discussing the parameters of the principle גדול המצווה ועושה יותר ממי שאינו מצווה ועושה (“Greater is one who is commanded and does [mitzvoth] than is one who is not commanded and [yet still] does [mitzvoth]”). This principle is asserted and discussed in several places in the Talmud.

In one of those places (בבא קמא ל"ח:), we learn: מנין שאפילו נכרי ועוסק בתורה שהוא ככהן גדול? ת"ל "אשר יעשה אותם האדם וחי בהם" -- כהנים, לויים, וישראלים לא נאמר אלא האדם, הא למדת שאפילו נכרי ועוסק בתורה הרי הוא ככהן גדול (“Whence [do we learn] that even a non-Jew who involves himself with Torah is like a kohén gadol? The teaching is to say, ‘and a person will do them and live by them’ [Leviticus XI,]. ‘Kohanim, Leviyyim, Yisr’élim but ‘person;’ hence you have learnt that even a non-Jew who is involved with Torah is like a kohén gadol”). Even a non-Jew who is engaged in Torah is worthy of respect and honor, no less than a person occupying the office of kohén gadol.

However: אמרי, אין מקבלים עליהם שכר כמצווה ועושה אלא כמי שאינו מצווה ועושה דא"ר חנינא גדול המצווה ועושה ממי שאינו מצווה ועושה (“[The Rabbis] say, 'They do not receive a reward like one who is commanded and does, but rather like one who is not commanded and does, as Rabbi Chanina said, "Greater is one who is commanded and does than one who is not commanded and does"'”). Despite the respect and honor due him, his reward is not the same as that of Israel.

At first glance, this principle, as I have observed before, seems counterintuitive. After all, if a child offers to help set the table, for instance, how much more praiseworthy does it seem than if the child waits to be asked by his or her parents? A little consideration, though, raises the question: How does the child know to offer? It can only be because he or she understands the parents’ expectations, and wishes to please them.

The communication of those expectations to the child constitutes the tzivvuy, the commandment; the child’s offer is not based on the child’s own conception of what to do, but constitutes willing compliance with the parents’ expectations. Willing compliance is surely greater than unwilling or forced compliance, but in both cases it is compliance with expected norms.

So it is with Israel; G-d expects Torah learning and observance of us. Knowing that, we willing bend to the yoke. The nochri, the non-Jew, has no such expectations levied on him; accordingly, if he sees what Israel does, likes it, and tries to emulate it, for whatever personal reasons, the emulation is worthy of respect, but the reward is according to the expectation.

C.

A bit later in the same massechta (דף פ"ז.), we learn: אמר רב יוסך, מריש הוה אמינא, מאן דאמר הלהכה כר' יהודה, דאמר סומא פטור מן המצהת, קא עבדינא יומא טבא לרבנן. מ"ט? דלא מפקדינא וקא עבדינא מצות (“Said Rav Yosef, 'At first I used to say, "Whoever says that the halacha is like Rabbi Yehuda, who said, 'A blind man is exempt from the mitzvoth,' I would make a celebration for the Rabbis [on his account]." Why? For I am not commanded, [yet still] I do mitzvoth'”).

The Tanna Rabbi Yehuda holds that a blind man, whose impairment renders it impossible for him to perform many of the mitzvoth, is therefore exempt from their obligation. Rav Yosef, as Rashi ad loc. informs us, was blind, and it appears that he originally understood the relationship of obligation and performance according to the intuitive understanding which I detailed above, namely, that if he is exempt from the mitzvoth, but nonetheless learns Torah and acts accordingly, his reward must be greater than others.

However: והשתא דשמעית הא דר' חנינא, דאמר ר' חנינא, גדול המצווה ועושה יותר ממי שאינו מצווה ועושה, מאן דאמר לי אין הלכה כרבי יהודה עבדינא יומא טבא לרבנן. מ"ט? דכי מפקדינא אית לי אגרא טפי (“And now that I have heard Rabbi Chanina’s opinion, that Rabbi Chanina said, 'Greater is one who is commanded and does than one who is not commanded and does,' whoever says to me that the halacha is not like Rabbi Yehuda [will cause me to] make a celebration for the Rabbis. Why? For if I am commanded, I have a greater reward”).

D.

Unfortunately for Rav Yosef, though, the halacha is basically like Rabbi Yehuda: so many mitzvoth require sightedness that a blind person is pretty exempt from them (עיי' למשל רמב"ם הל' רוצח פ"ו הי"ד והגהות מיימוניות שם ).

So what did he mean when he said that, had it not been for Mattan Torah, there would be no difference between him and any other Yosef in the marketplace? The answer, I suspect, tells us much about the character of Rav Yosef, and the other chachamim.

If Rav Yosef was indeed exempt from the mitzvoth, the plain implication is that level of reward due him in the next world was relatively small, equivalent to that of the nochri who learns Torah, mentioned above, in that he was in the class of éyno m’tzuvveh v’ôseh.

The same, however, was not, and is not, true of the rest of Klal Yisra’él, most of whom, baruch Ha-Shem, are not impaired or handicapped, and hence fall into the category of m’tzuvveh v’ôseh.

But they only do so because of Mattan Torah. Had, G-d forbid, the Torah not been given to Israel, then there really would be no difference with regard to the level of the reward due any ordinary “Joe” in the marketplace, and Rav Yosef. They would all be nochrim; there would be no nation of Israel, no m’tzuvvim.

Far from suggesting that he had an exalted status (though one certainly suspects that the reward due Rav Yosef, based on the quantity of Torah learnt and mitzvoth performed, was quite considerable, regardless of the “reward per unit,” if we may put it in those terms), Rav Yosef was being m’lamméd zchuth, singing the praises of the ordinary Jew, who, as a m’tzuvveh v’ôseh, thanks to Mattan Torah, is thus distinguished from him.