Pirkei Avot 3:16

Still catching up. I had some real difficulties presenting this particular mishna, so this is not exactly what I presented, but some thoughts I have had in the intervening days.

Rabbi Yishmael says: Be kal (easy, yielding) to a rosh, noach (restful, pleasant) to a tishchoret, and receive every person cheerfully.

I have purposefully not translated "rosh" or "tishchoret" because understanding these words is the crux to understanding this mishna. Turning first to the seifa or the concluding thought, it is easy to understand the admonition to receive each person cheerfully. Certainly, this is a key to civil society, to receive those we know and those whom we do not know with good cheer. Not always an easy task, but certainly one that is worth striving for.

How then to understand the first two parts of the Mishna. The word rosh literally means "head." It can be the head that siits on ones shoulders, though that is unlikely in this context. More likely, it is the head of some group or community. This is reasonable and the admonition to be yielding or easy to the head of one's group or community is a suggestion that, in most cases, is also worth following.

The whole mishna, it seems to me, hangs on how we translate and understand the word tishchoret. Our sages had difficulty with this word because it is not used with any frequency and has a very ambiguous meaning. Rashi suggests that this word means a young(er) person. He understands the root to be shin, chet, resh, which means "black." One who is young is one whose hair has not turned grey - it is still black. Therefore, the traditional interpretation is that one should be pleasant to the young. Look back at the beginning, we might then understand rosh to be an elder and this leads to the traditional understanding that one should yield to an elder, be pleasant to the young and receive all people cheerfully.

However, this translation of tishchoret, which reasonable, is apparently not correct based on the usage of the word in other contexts. Rather, the tischoret appears to have been what we would call a "press gang." This was a group of Roman soldiers who would waylay Jews and send them on errands for the soldiers. While the Jews were generally not pressed into military service, they may have been made to suffer at the hands of these gangs of Roman soldiers.

In this understanding, we may have a more historical view of Rabbi Yishmael's recommendation. Rabbi Yishmael was,as a boy, a slave who was enprisoned by the Romans and redeemed by Rabbi Yehoshua ben Chanina. Rabbi Yishmael may be giving the advice that in the face of the occupier one should act in a positive and cheeful manner, so as not to give offense to the occupiers.

This is a difficult lesson and one that we very much doubt we would apply today. With the history of the Holocaust still fresh in our minds, even three generations later, we are wary of those who would tell us to be pleasant and accommodating to those who would oppress us. We have learned from the heroes of the Warsaw ghetto and others that Jews must be willing to defend themselves rather than yield to those who would destroy us.

Understanding, as we do, the danger in kowtowing to those who would inflict evil, we are even more obligated not to be bystanders in watching those who would do so to others. Whether we are talking about the genocide in the Sudan and other parts of Africa or the growing anti-Semitism in Europe and elsewhere, Jews can not afford to receive everyone cheerfully.

Pirkei Avot 3.15

I've been a little lazy about getting these up. I will be posting the next several over the next few days.

Rabbi Elazar the Moda'ite used to say: One who desecrates sacred things, who disgraces the festivals, who humiliates his fellow in public, who nullifies the covenant of our forefather Abraham, or who perverts the meaning of the Tora contrary to Halacha - though he may have Torah and good deeds, he has no share in the World to Come.

The question that immediately confronts us is how can someone who has Torah and good deeds not have a place in the World to Come (Olam HaBa)? Surely, these are the key elements to right living: to know G-d through the Torah and to put that knowledge to use through good deeds (ma'asim tovim). Shall one who has lived rightly not receive his reward?

In its historical context, it is clear that R' Elazar's list is an injunction against the beliefs of sects of Jews that did not accept certain key elements of Jewish law. It is not hard to see that R' Elazar is likely attacking the early Christian decision not to require circumcision of Gentiles. Prior to the wholesale departure of the Christian church from the Jews, the turmoil created by the decision of Paul, Peter and the other early Christians to relax this rule is similar to our own turmoil over patrilineal descent.

However, we need to not understand this mishna solely through its historical lens, for it speaks to us today. R' Elazar's list of infractions all involve public demonstrations of community participation. We can understand this list as an example of MiPhrat L'Clal, the hermeneutic principle that a list of specific laws followed by a general summary is to be understood as exmplary of the general law and not complete. In this understanding, we understand that these and any infraction of Jewish communal law is sufficient to render Torah and good deeds insufficient for a place in the World to Come.

Jewish life and relationships stand on three legs. Our relationship with G-d, our relationship with the children of Israel (Jews) and our relationship as Jews with the greater non-Jewish world. To the extent that we are bound to each of these, to that extent are we assured of a place in Olam HaBa. Torah is what binds us to G-d; it is how we hear G-d's voice and what gives expression to us as a religious people. Good deeds are what binds us to the greater world; they are what makes us a "light unto the nations." Our communal practices - holidays, circumcision, tolerance to name but a few - are what binds us as Jews to each other. Without this third, we surely sacrifice part of the world. We diminish what we, as Jews, can be and that in turns diminishes the World that we are commanded to build.

(Presented to CAI on April 21, 2006)

shefa : Message: Davening -- My Personal Journey (from Dan Kimmel)

Normally, I read the Shefa group to make sure that my blood pressure doesn't drop too far. It is good to get riled up once in a while. To my surprise, there is an excellent post (excellent because I agree with it) about the suggestions that music and other innovations are needed to liven up the service.

shefa : Message: Davening -- My Personal Journey (from Dan Kimmel)

The author, Dan Kimmel, makes a very nice statement about his own growing observance and the connection that he has been able to make to the traditional service. Like Dan, as I became more and more familiar with the traditional service, the less I wanted it to change. The liturgy has become a well-trod path with landmarks that I look forward to seeing. There is much more that I could say, but I think that Dan's post does a good job of covering the ground.