A night of midrash

וְדוֹרֵשׁ מֵאֲרַמִּי אוֹבֵד אָבִי, עַד שֶׁיִּגְמֹר כֹּל הַפָּרָשָׁה כֻלָּהּ (משנה פסחים י׃ד)

The core text of the Passover Haggadah, an exposition of four verses in Deuteronomy (26:5-8), is a midrashic tour de force that places the rabbinic method of biblical interpretation on full display. With their well-honed sensitivity to biblical expression, the rabbis draw out a narrative of the exodus from a terse chronology in a completely unrelated context. We must admit, however, that some of the particular interpretations cited in this section of the Haggadah appear so fanciful as to test the very limits of midrash. 

The Haggadah certainly has little interest in the plain meaning of Scripture ("peshat"). The word "Haggadah" itself is an alternate form of "Aggadah," an interpretive style largely unconstrained by literal or contextual meaning (though subject to its own logic). 

Take, for example, the first verse from the passage in Deuteronomy, translated literally: 

My father was a wandering Aramean. He went down to Egypt with meager numbers and sojourned there; but there he became a great and very populous nation.

The rabbis read the verse differently, assuming the "Aramean" was Laban and that the word אוֹבֵד is a transitive verb, i.e., "(Laban) the Aramean was destroying my father (Jacob)." Taking this identification for granted, the Haggadah uses אֲרַמִּי אוֹבֵד אָבִי to show how Laban "sought to uproot the whole people," that is, to destroy Jacob and the nascent tribes of Israel.

But as a straightforward reading, this interpretation strains credulity (see Ibn Ezra and Rashbam) and I suspect the rabbis themselves would acknowledge that "Aramean," taken literally, refers to Jacob rather than Laban. Yet they crafted this midrash, not to undermine the simple meaning of the text, but to drive home a theological-historical idea. The idea is stated explicitly in the Haggadah at the beginning of Maggid and repeated at its conclusion with the catchphrase בְּכָל־דּוֹר וָדוֹר (in every generation): Persecution and redemption are perennial features of Jewish existence. Even before the Egyptian bondage, in a sign of things to come for generations, the nation's progenitor was threatened with annihilation.

By means of midrash, stretched to its elastic limit, the biblical account of bondage and redemption is transformed from a unique historical event into a metahistorical experience, to be reenacted at the Seder בְּכָל־דּוֹר וָדוֹר, even at times and places where Jews are free and prosperous. Only midrash can impart this metahistorical truth.

An even more startling demonstration of the gap between peshat and derash in the Haggadah is its interpretation of the last verse of the Deuteronomy passage: 

The Lord freed us from Egypt by a mighty hand, by an outstretched arm and awesome power, and by signs and portents.

The rabbis thought "the Lord" was superfluous -- from the previous verses, we already know that God is the subject -- so they took it to exclude all other agents, human or divine. God himself took us out of Egypt, without the use of intermediaries. The Haggadah states this emphatically, underscoring the point with metronomic repetition: 

"And the Lord took us out of Egypt" - not through an angel and not through a seraph and not through a messenger, but directly by the Holy One, blessed be He, Himself, as it is stated (Exodus 12:12); "And I will pass through the Land of Egypt on that night and I will smite every firstborn in the Land of Egypt, from men to animals; and with all the gods of Egypt, I will make judgments, I am the Lord." 

As to whether the Egyptian firstborn were killed by God directly or by means of an angel of death, Exodus is ambiguous, though references to a "Destroyer" (Ex. 12:13, 12:23), and the performance of a blood-ritual meant to dissuade it from entering Israelite homes, imply the involvement of an angel or demon. Shemot Rabba (17:5), for example, presents the question as open for debate: וְעָבַר ה' לִנְגֹף אֶת מִצְרַיִם, יֵשׁ אוֹמְרִים עַל יְדֵי מַלְאָךְ וְיֵשׁ אוֹמְרִים הַקָּדוֹשׁ בָּרוּךְ הוּא בְּעַצְמוֹ. 

But the Haggadah (and parallel midrashim) goes much further in claiming that the entire exodus was conducted by God without assistance. And this, we know, is far from the plain sense of Scripture. The evidence is in Scripture itself: In his message to the King of Edom, Moses himself says, "We cried to the Lord who heard our plea, sending a messenger (וַיִּשְׁלַח מַלְאָךְ) who freed us from Egypt." (Num. 20:16). Whether the "messenger" here is human (Moses) or an archangel (perhaps Michael or Metatron) is beside the point -- the fact remains that God employed a messenger. The Haggadah's repetitious insistence that the exodus occurred לֹא עַל־יְדֵי מַלְאָךְ, וְלֹא עַל־יְדֵי שָׂרָף, וְלֹא עַל־יְדֵי שָׁלִיחַ directly negates the verse in Numbers, almost to the word. A parallel version in some midrashim lacks the phrase וְלֹא עַל־יְדֵי שָׂרָף making the negation even more obvious (see Haggadah Shel Pesah, ed. E.D. Goldschmidt, Jerusalem, 1948, p. 40; Jerusalem, 1960, pp. 44-45). 

Here again, the Haggadah utilizes midrash to make an unequivocal, even extreme, theological claim which departs dramatically from a simple reading of the Torah.   

The Seder is meant to be an exercise in deep storytelling rather than a recitation of events. An historical timeline could only scratch the experiential surface and would be better accomplished by a few key passages from Exodus. The four verses in Deuteronomy, by contrast, were deliberately chosen for their extreme brevity. They are a springboard for interpretation, best delivered by the deep readings of midrash.

Proud tower, humbled man

The laconic Tower of Babel story is a renewable resource of interpretation. From the ancient period onwards, biblical interpreters offered a healthy variety of explanations for God’s ire at the Generation of Dispersion, all only hinted at in Scripture. Among them: They planned to breach heaven and replace God with a new deity; fearing another flood, they sought to buttress the celestial canopy, or to build a new (stationary) ark; the early Babylonians wanted a monument to their glory in the form of a great city centered around a mega-ziggurat, but violated God’s command to “multiply and fill the Earth” – dispersion was not so much a punishment as the fulfillment of their manifest destiny.

A recent iteration of the idea that God disrupted the tower project not to punish man, but for his benefit, reads the story as a rejection of totalitarian groupthink and a celebration of diversity. God prefers a “salad” of humanity over the conformist melting pot.

With its nod to cultural pluralism, this interpretation will resonate with modern audiences. As contemporary dersah, it works very well. But as an explanation for the scriptural purpose of the story, I think it falls short. Also, and this won't detract from the idea's value or appeal, it has antecedents in earlier Jewish interpretation.

Seforno writes that the dispersion was, indeed, intended to diversify mankind. And, in an ironic twist, he explains that God’s idea of diversity, at the time, was polytheism. Mankind wanted to replace God with a single false deity but, at this early stage of history, it was meant to worship many gods and by means of that error arrive, in the end of days, at the idea of one true God. In Seforno’s view, this was a primarily theological, rather than social dispersion, whose ultimate outcome will be the prophetic vision of humanity united under the banner of God.

An earlier version of the “groupthink” interpretation – in the sense of ideological-political conformism – can be found in the commentary of Netziv (R. Naftali Zvi Yehuda Berlin). Netziv’s Babel was an aspiring police state. First, the Babylonians allowed none of their citizens to leave. Later, the builders envisioned a watchtower designed to spy on the city’s inhabitants and thereby enforce their monolithic ideology. Dissent was punishable by death in the fiery furnace – the same furnace, of course, that baked the bricks for Babel's great metropolis – as illustrated by Abraham’s sentence for rejecting idolatry (This draws on two related rabbinic traditions: Nimrod was the founding ruler of Babylonia who instigated the tower project; Nimrod sent Abraham into the fiery furnace for rejecting idolatry). God foresaw, Netziv says, the inherent immorality of a totalitarian state and put an end to the plan. (Very likely, this is a veiled critique of the Tsarist Russian Empire in which Netziv lived.)

My own inclination is to look for the meaning of such biblical stories in their original scriptural setting (not to be confused with historical setting).

Yehezkel Kaufmann wrote that the first few chapters of Genesis are a series of etiological tales attributing the origin of evil to man’s rebellion against God. Adam and Eve brought death to humanity by violating God’s command; by challenging God’s reign, the tower builders gave rise to idolatry and social conflict.

God’s response in both cases is to cut man down to size, reminding him that despite his achievements, he remains dust and ashes, a Not-God: וַיֵּרֶד ה’ לִרְאֹת אֶת־הָעִיר וְאֶת־הַמִּגְדָּל אֲשֶׁר בָּנוּ בְּנֵי הָאָדָם׃.

בְּנֵי הָאָדָם is an unmistakable reference, by opposition, to בְּנֵי הָאֱ-לֹהִים (see Gen. 6:2-4; Ps. 82:6-7; Job 1:6, 2:1), the divine council God consults before man is first placed, and later reminded of his place, in the hierarchy of being (the plurals imply collaboration with the angels: “Let us make man” just before man’s creation; “let us go down and confound their speech” just before his dispersion).

In each narrative, man has acquired a godlike talent and God intervenes to prevent a further rupture of the human-divine boundary. God blocks Adam’s path to the tree of life because the combination of morality and immortality would make humans nearly indistinguishable from angels. In our story, God “worries” that human civilization, unconstrained in technological skill and single-minded in language and purpose, might become omnipotent. A close look at two parallel verses highlights their structural and linguistic similarities:

וַיֹּאמֶר ה’ אֱ-לֹהִים הֵן הָאָדָם הָיָה כְּאַחַד מִמֶּנּוּ לָדַעַת טוֹב וָרָע וְעַתָּה פֶּן־יִשְׁלַח יָדוֹ וְלָקַח גַּם מֵעֵץ הַחַיִּים וְאָכַל וָחַי לְעֹלָם׃

(Gen. 3:22)

וַיֹּאמֶר ה’ הֵן עַם אֶחָד וְשָׂפָה אַחַת לְכֻלָּם וְזֶה הַחִלָּם לַעֲשׂוֹת וְעַתָּה לֹא־יִבָּצֵר מֵהֶם כֹּל אֲשֶׁר יָזְמוּ לַעֲשׂוֹת

(Gen. 11:6)

Whether this interpretation conveys a contemporary message (in fact, it does) is beside the point, at least for me. But as peshat, I find it satisfying, even inspiring, on its own.

 

The Torah abhors a curse

Then the officials shall address the troops, as follows: “Is there anyone who has built a new house but has not dedicated it? Let him go back to his home, lest he die in battle and another dedicate it. Is there anyone who has planted a vineyard but has never harvested it? Let him go back to his home, lest he die in battle and another harvest it. Is there anyone who has paid the bride-price for a wife, but who has not yet married her? Let him go back to his home, lest he die in battle and another marry her.”

The officials shall go on addressing the troops and say, “Is there anyone afraid and disheartened? Let him go back to his home, lest the courage of his comrades flag like his.”

--Deuteronomy 20:5-8

Why are the soldiers in the first three verses singled out for honorable discharge? Doesn’t the real possibility of death on the battlefield weigh equally on the minds of every combatant? Of all the innumerable tragedies, actual and potential, that may afflict fallen soldiers and their families, there must be something unique about these. No doubt, it’s especially heart-wrenching to imagine the death of a young man or woman which robs them of a new home, the fruits of a major investment, or a marriage, just before consummation. The occasional obituary for a young bride or groom killed accidentally, only days before their wedding, evokes deep sorrow, if not shock and horror. 

But aren’t all these things -- more precisely, the fear of these things -- implicit in the last verse’s catchall category of the “afraid and disheartened” who are dismissed from the battlefield? Are these simply examples, admittedly extreme examples, of distractions that can make a soldier ineffective (see Ibn Ezra and Nahmanides)?

The answer seems to lie in the fact that the Torah is less worried here about the soldier’s fear of death, or even about his death per se, than with its outcome. We send him home out of concern for the secondary impact of his death. Our fear is that if he doesn’t leave now, אִישׁ אַחֵר (“another”) -- the phrase is repeated in each of the three verses -- might reap what he has sown. And, in Rashi’s words, וְדָבָר שֶׁל עָגְמַת נֶפֶשׁ הוּא זֶה -- this is an unusually cruel circumstance, resulting in profound mental anguish.

But whose anguish? If he is killed, the soldier won’t feel the anguish of his loss.

As it happens, the Torah reintroduces this house-vineyard-wife triptych later in Deuteronomy within the "Tokheha," the dire warnings by Moses of severe punishments Israel will suffer if it disobeys God’s laws. Among the seemingly endless list of curses, we find identical images, down to the very same wording:

If you pay the bride-price for a wife, another man shall enjoy her. If you build a house, you shall not live in it. If you plant a vineyard, you shall not harvest it. Your ox shall be slaughtered before your eyes, but you shall not eat of it . . . Your sons and daughters shall be delivered to another people, while you look on; and your eyes shall strain for them constantly, but you shall be helpless. A people you do not know shall eat up the produce of your soil and all your gains; you shall be abused and downtrodden continually, until you are driven mad by what your eyes behold.

--Deuteronomy 28:30-34

Note the repetition of “looking” and “seeing with your own eyes” in the latter verses. The soldier killed in battle, in the earlier passage, is spared the sight of his loss; here, the victim sees his life unravel right in front of him. The loss itself is tragic, but even more cruel is having to helplessly watch the untimely death of loved ones, to experience it in real time and to suffer its aftermath; to grapple daily -- morally, philosophically, and psychologically -- with the injustice of young lives cut short, their dreams remaining unrealized.

As tragic as these events are for the victims, the brunt of the punishment strikes those surrounding them. The dead don’t feel any pain -- if we are to believe Kohelet, at least, they feel and know nothing. Instead, they may leave a legacy of suffering to their survivors, who must endure the idea of an untimely and unjust death. More than direct victims of evil, the Tokheha's curse falls on those who see evil, but escape it -- on the witnesses to events so morally repugnant, events which will haunt them for the rest of their lives, that they are driven to insanity. Their Hell is a living one. A fallen soldier doesn't live to see a stranger move into his new house, harvest his vineyard, or marry his bride -- these agonies belong exclusively to those who are left behind to comprehend how such cruelties could have happened in the first place.

In allowing these special exemptions, the Torah, to the extent that it can, seeks to minimize the most morally offensive consequences of war, beyond those on the battlefield. Not that any combat death or, for that matter, any death at all, is less tragic than what Deuteronomy describes. Whether the victim is nineteen or ninety-nine, every human death is tragic, every life taken is wasted potential. 

In a category apart, however, are circumstances of such immeasurable cruelty, that death is not only tragic, but obscene; the mourners feel not only bereft, but cursed; where death makes a mockery of justice, undermines our confidence in a basically decent existence, and shatters the belief that "God’s kindness permeates the world.” 

For such evils, the Torah has no tolerance. Given the opportunity, we are obligated to deny death, at its most sinister, a needless victory.

Orthodox drinking and gambling -- an unwelcome cultural shift

Please see my letter to the Jewish Standard.

For example: https://jewishlink.news/food/42632-the-jewish-link-wine-guide-2021

Jacob's stone(s)

 וַיִּפְגַּ֨ע בַּמָּק֜וֹם וַיָּ֤לֶן שָׁם֙ כִּי־בָ֣א הַשֶּׁ֔מֶשׁ וַיִּקַּח֙ מֵאַבְנֵ֣י הַמָּק֔וֹם וַיָּ֖שֶׂם מְרַֽאֲשֹׁתָ֑יו וַיִּשְׁכַּ֖ב בַּמָּק֥וֹם הַהֽוּא׃

וַיַּשְׁכֵּ֨ם יַעֲקֹ֜ב בַּבֹּ֗קֶר וַיִּקַּ֤ח אֶת־הָאֶ֙בֶן֙ אֲשֶׁר־שָׂ֣ם מְרַֽאֲשֹׁתָ֔יו וַיָּ֥שֶׂם אֹתָ֖הּ מַצֵּבָ֑ה וַיִּצֹ֥ק שֶׁ֖מֶן עַל־רֹאשָֽׁהּ׃

For students of Rashi's commentary on the Torah, these verses evoke the image of Jacob's quarreling stones. Each stone demanded, "upon me let this righteous man lie his head," until God fused them together (Rashi, Gen. 28:11 following Bereshit Rabba and Hulin 91b). 

A memorable story by itself -- with an echo of long-forgotten Israelite mythology -- this midrash is also an affecting metaphor for the twelve tribes of Israel uniting under the banner of their forefather Jacob (for the tradition of twelve stones and its explicit symbolism, see Bereshit Rabba and Pirke de-Rabbi Eliezer).

The peshat-oriented exegetes (e.g., Rashbam, Ibn Ezra, Bekhor Shor), of course, don't feel bound to read מֵאַבְנֵ֣י הַמָּק֔וֹם as multiple stones; Jacob took only one stone, they say, of many in the area. (Interestingly, the King James Version translation follows Rashi: "and he took of the stones of that place, and put them for his pillows, and lay down in that place to sleep.")

Why does the Torah go out of its way to tell us about an apparently random rock? Because of its special destiny. After sleeping beside it, and awaking from his famous dream, Jacob dedicates the rock as a מצבה (a stele or monument), anoints it with oil (an act of consecration) and vows that upon his safe return from Haran he will sacrifice thanksgiving offerings to God in that very spot, the site of a future temple.

But why did Jacob need a stone in the first place? וַיָּ֖שֶׂם מְרַֽאֲשֹׁתָ֑יו may seem to suggest he wanted to prop up his head on a stone pillow. And on one level, this makes sense. Jacob later says that he escaped from Esau carrying only his walking stick (Gen. 32:10); while this may be poetic hyperbole, Jacob would certainly not have had time to pack unnecessary belongings like cushions or extra garments to pad his campsite. A pillow of stone befits his desperate and spartan condition at the time.

Still, the word מְרַאֲשׁוֹת in the Bible doesn't always, or possibly ever, mean "under the head." Instead, it appears to mean "beside the head." The biblical usage includes, for example, the following (I Samuel 26:7, 11-12): וַחֲנִית֥וֹ מְעוּכָֽה־בָאָ֖רֶץ מְרַאֲשֹׁתָ֑יו -- "his spear stuck in the ground at his head" -- certainly not under his head! (see also Mandelkern's Concordance, p. 1065, which defines מְרַאֲשׁוֹת as "the opposite of מַרְגְּלֹתָיו," the latter meaning at the legs, rather than under the legs).

It's very likely that Jacob's stone, or stones, were for warmth. Ancient travelers sleeping outside in the cool night air, especially in the desert, could take advantage of the heat that radiates, well into the night, from sunbaked rocks. Jacob may have also deliberately avoided lighting a fire at night so as not to draw attention from Esau and his men who, Jacob would have feared, were already pursuing him. 

If so, then the Midrash, rather than the peshat commentaries, may have gotten it right after all. For maximum radiant heat, Jacob would no doubt have gathered as many large stones as he could.

Jacob's descendants, an imperfect union of often warring tribes, are fortunate that those honor-hungry, self-centered stones ultimately, if involuntarily, made peace with each other.

Tikkun Olam is a great idea. It's just not in Alenu.

Re. the correct spelling of le-taken olam in the Alenu prayer, Mitchell First has written convincingly on this topic. The earliest textual evidence certainly points to לתכן instead of the prevalent לתקן.

I would add, however, that the strongest proof for לתכן is contextual rather than from textual variants -- that is, from the Musaf prayer itself and from related biblical verses from which Alenu's author seems to draw.

The expression לתכן עולם appears to allude to the second Ketuvim verse of Malkhuyot (Ps. 93:1): 

ה' מָלָךְ גֵּאוּת לָבֵשׁ לָבֵשׁ יְהֹוָה עֹז הִתְאַזָּר אַף־תִּכּוֹן תֵּבֵל בַּל־תִּמּוֹט

More precisely, לתכן עולם במלכות ש-די is a compound phrase constructed from the last words of that verse -- לתכן עולם follows תִּכּוֹן תֵּבֵל -- combined with the biblical usage תכון מלכות (e.g., I Sam. 20:31; I Kings 2:12), the establishment of a permanent dynasty or kingdom. 

But no matter how you spell the word in Alenu, the current usage of Tikkun Olam represents a noble effort that, in manageable portions, is much more practical to implement than bringing God's kingdom down to earth. Quite possibly, the two programs are effectively the same.

For the Love of God

(Slightly revised version of essay posted on Times of Israel)

 

In a year defined by its compound anxieties — medical, racial, political, environmental, and economic — we are in last days of the most anxious month on the Jewish calendar. Without much of an independent identity, Elul is the final stretch of the religious year and a prelude to the impending Days of Awe. Traditionally, it is a time of increased religious vigilance, including heightened introspection, Selichot (penitential prayers), revisiting personal and communal moral standards, and stricter observance, all in anticipation of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. 

But there’s more to Elul, even in a year like this one, than brooding over the prior year’s shortcomings or worrying about the weeks and months ahead. For the sensitive religious soul, this season can also be a time of deep spiritual yearning and an intensified love for the divine. A memorable epigram, citing the Song of Songs (6:3), literally spells this out: “’I am for my beloved, and my beloved is for me’ — this is an acronym for ‘Elul.’”

Love and fear often come in tandem. And in Jewish thought, love of God and fear of God are considered opposite but conjoined poles of a unified response to divinity: “And now, Israel, what does the Lord your God demand of you? Only this: to fear the Lord your God, to walk only in His paths, to love him . . .” (Deuteronomy 10:12).

The traditional Siddur for children begins (right after Modeh Ani) with a declaration — “the beginning of wisdom is the fear of God” (Psalms 111:10) — that places awe and reverence for divinity at the epicenter of intellectual achievement. And the second verse of Shema, almost a credo of Jewish faith, is the commandment to love God.

While both mitzvot are somewhat amorphous, fear of God may be the easier of the two to grasp and to implement. But how can the Torah mandate loving God? What does it mean in practice?

In the very first chapters of his Mishneh Torah code, Maimonides lists love and fear of God as distinct but tightly coupled commandments. Characteristically, he intellectualizes the effort required to fulfill them. Maimonides states that love and fear of the divine, properly observed, arises from an appreciation of God’s majesty and man’s humility. And this can only be accomplished by means of study; specifically, training in physics and metaphysics: “One can only love God by the knowledge with which one knows Him. According to the knowledge, will be the love . . . a person ought therefore to devote himself to understanding those sciences and studies which will inform him concerning his Master” (Laws of Repentance 10:6). Such learning, Maimonides assures us, will ultimately result in an obsessive love for God (in an unexpected near-poetic flourish, he compares it to romantic infatuation) and a concomitant feeling of smallness within the vastness of the universe. This sense of humility is what the Torah means by fearing God.

Note that the type of fear that God demands, for Maimonides, is not the fear of punishment (in fact, he rejected the concept of divine retribution by suffering in the afterlife). He has little patience for those who worship exclusively out of fear, as commonly understood, or for the expectation of reward. Rather, he says, one who worships God as intended, out of love, “does what is true because it is true” (ibid., 10:2).

As always, Maimonides sets the bar high -- and in this case, by his own standards, possibly too high. His definition of love and fear of God is so consciously elitist as to be out of reach for most people: “This standard [to worship God from love],” he concedes, “is indeed a very high one; not every sage attained it.” (Note, however: Rather than the conclusion of an intellectual journey, the biblical meaning of “loving” God is to commit to worship Him exclusively, and to observe the mitzvot – in short, “to walk only in His paths”).

On this and many other matters, both philosophical and halakhic, Maimonides had his detractors. It also goes without saying that Maimonidean (unsurprisingly, largely Aristotelian) physics, as summarized in the earliest chapters of Mishneh Torah, is hopelessly out of date.

But the idea that loving God must begin, logically and practically, with a love for the truth, is a timeless one that must be at the foundation of our spiritual lives. In pledging their loyalty and love to God, religious people should never be asked, or ask themselves, to forsake science and fact. And if the beginning of wisdom is the fear of God, human wisdom itself, both secular and divine, is only possible with an irrevocable commitment to the truth.