Altar Ego

by Eliezer Segal

The Mishnah offers us a stirring description of the Sukkot celebration during the days of the second Jerusalem Temple. As is still the practice on joyous festivals, it was customary to recite the chapters from the book of Psalms that are designated “Hallel” [= praise] while the priests encircled the altar—once on each of the first six days, and then seven times on the seventh day.

The rabbis focussed on one particular verse in the Hallel, the one that goes “I beseech thee, O Lord! Save now! I beseech thee, O Lord, send now prosperity!” At this point the Mishnah inserted an alternative version: “Rabbi Judah [ben Ilai] says: “Ani Vaho, please save us!” 

In order to better understand this odd passage, it is helpful to explain a few basic facts about Hebrew usage and the norms of English translation. For one thing, the convention of rendering the divine name as “Lord” reflects traditional Jewish religious practice, but is not exactly what the Hebrew says. The original text employs the four-letter name of God [the “Tetragrammaton”] that is deemed so sacred that it is not pronounced, for which reason we substitute a less sublime epithet, usually “Adonai” [= Lord]. If somebody were to utter the actual four-letter name, it might have sound something like Rabbi Judah’s “Vaho.”

The standard English Bibles employ a rather cumbersome phrase “I beseech thee” to convey the Hebrew particle “anna,” which usually has the simple meaning of “please” or another such expression indicating a request or entreaty. Apparently, it is identical to the more common shorter form “na.” However, “anna” also sounds like the Aramaic pronoun for “I.”

If we combine all these factors, it appears as if Rabbi Judah was playing with the sounds of the Hebrew Psalm to produce a statement along the lines of: “I and he” or “me and him, please save us!”

What in Heaven’s name did he mean by this?

Rashi resorted to numerological mysticism to explain Rabbi Judah’s words. He calculated that the prayer was numerologically equal to the words in Psalms. Furthermore, he found in those words an allusion to the “seventy-two names of God,” an array of three-letter combinations derived by combining letters from three consecutive verses in the Torah (Exodus 14:19-21). Each of these verses contains exactly seventy-two letters. This obscure bit of arcane mysticism played a significant part in the spiritual and magical lore of medieval Ashkenazic Jewry, and was also known to Spanish scholars like Abraham Ibn Ezra.

A midrashic work taught that the seventy-two-letter name of God was the means through which the Almighty will redeem Israel. From ancient magical papyri and occult manuals, we learn that a similar name could be derived through graphic permutations of the four letters of the Tetragrammaton. Tales of its miraculous powers circulated in the medieval Babylonian schools, but the Ga’on Rav Hai advised that those reports should be treated with skepticism.

The Tosafot, not satisfied with Rashi’s verbal intricacies and apparent arbitrariness, proposed an alternate explanation that was far more poignant emotionally and theologically: The words, read as “me and him save please!” imply that God suffers personally in exile alongside his beloved people, and therefore is equating our redemption with his own — a boldly touching sentiment that had numerous precedents in the Bible and in rabbinic homilies. 

Maimonides cited a similar interpretation in the name of some Ge’onim—this is quite surprising, in light of his firm rejection of any notion that imputes human emotion or weakness to the Supreme Being. Indeed, in his Guide of the Perplexed he explained that when rabbinic texts mention lengthy names of God, they have in mind sublime metaphysical teachings; and only fools or charlatans would read them as magical formulas. 

Maimonides cited commentators who explained that “I” and “He” should be read as abbreviated biblical quotes that serve as epithets for God. He suggested that they were based on verses like “See now that I myself am he!” which appears in Deuteronomy in a promise of deliverance, making it an appropriate way of addressing a prayer for divine salvation.

Rabbi Joseph Engel derived a remarkable insight from the notion that “I” is a name of God. He noted that among the sages of rabbinic literature, Rabbi Judah the Patriarch, [= “Rebbi,” the redactor of the Mishnah] had a distinctive custom of beginning his statements with the words “I say.” For other persons this might be taken as a symptom of self-importance, and yet the Talmud states in several places that Rebbi was renowned for his extreme humility! 

Rabbi Engel therefore concluded that what Rebbi really meant was that he was not presenting his views as indisputable facts, but only as his tentative personal opinion, analogous to expressions like “in my humble opinion.” It is possible to understand Rebbi’s usage in light of a Hasidic teaching that spiritual giants do not speak by virtue of their own authority, but rather from the divine force—the “I”—that permeates them. Perhaps what he meant was: I cannot claim personal credit for the correctness or wisdom of my teachings, but attribute them to the divine “I” who speaks through me.

Rabbi Samuel Edels (Maharsha) objected that previous interpretations did not explain satisfactorily why Rabbi Judah related only to the Sukkot rites and not to other occasions when Hallel is recited. He therefore argued that the crucial factor here was the encircling of the altar. This, he noted, recalls the battle of Jericho where the Israelites also encircled the city once on each of six days, and then seven times on the seventh day. The ritual thus serves as an archetype of divine protection (for the Israelites, not the Jerichoans), as expressed by the psalmist: “The angel of the Lord encampeth round about them that fear him, and delivereth them.”

We can surely use all the protection we can get, as we are enveloped in the physical and spiritual shelter of our frail sukkahs.

My email address is: [email protected]

Vital Organs

by Eliezer Segal

Traditional Jewish theology affirms the belief in an omniscient deity. As formulated in Maimonides’ thirteen articles of faith, the creator “knows all the deeds of human beings and all their thoughts.” 

In the idiom of biblical Hebrew, one of the most common ways to express the idea that God has access to our innermost thoughts and desires is by means of expressions like Jeremiah’s “I the Lord search the heart, I test the kidneys.” 

Those readers who are more familiar with the classic King James English version might be better acquainted with the wording “I try the reins.” That, however, is not an allusion (figurative or otherwise) to the straps that are used to restrain a horse, but is rather an obsolete synonym for the kidney, derived from the Latin “renes,” the same root that gives us English derivatives like “renal,” and even “adrenalin.”

The premise that underlies those expressions is that the kidney, like the heart, is a locus of thought, emotion and especially moral judgment—a conception that may have originated in ancient Egypt. Of course, scientific physiology has long since reassigned those mental functions to the brain, which did not figure very prominently in that capacity in ancient literatures; although it is the cardiac blood-pump that continues to provide the favourite metaphors for love in valentine cards, bumper stickers and emojis.

Perhaps it is possible to write off those scriptural phrases as nothing more than convenient examples of interior parts of the human anatomy, an approach that was indeed favoured by Rabbi Abraham Ibn Ezra. The rabbis of the Talmud, however, were clearly of the opinion that the expressions were to be understood with literal precision. In a passage that enumerates the functions of the various human organs, no distinction is made between biological, mental or emotional functions, and the power of counsel is ascribed to the kidneys. A midrashic homily speculates that Abraham, who had no access to human teachers in his heathen environment, must have learned the Torah from the wisdom that was housed in his own kidneys. 

More specifically, the Talmud taught: “A person possesses two kidneys. One of them advises him for good and one advises him for evil. It stands to reason that the good one is on one’s right side and the evil one on the left, as it is written, ‘A wise man’s heart is at his right hand; but a fool’s heart at his left.’” I like to imagine them as those little figures of a halo-topped angel and a pitchfork-wielding devil who argue out moral decisions in cartoons.

Most rabbinical scholars in the medieval Sephardic and Italian realms received a thorough medical or philosophical training; so it would eventually come to their attention that the prevailing scientific theories did not support the traditional Hebrew understanding of the kidneys’ functions. 

As a rule, discrepancies of this sort did not provoke severe theological dilemmas among the faithful. After all, Maimonides had long since declared that the scientific pronouncements of the ancient rabbis should not necessarily be accepted dogmatically, since they were not essential parts of the received Torah tradition, but merely reflected the sages’ personal opinions or the scientific theories that were current in their environment. However, this solution could not be easily invoked for the kidney question, since its earliest source was not in the Talmud or Midrash, but in the Bible itself. We therefore find that several rabbis had to make special efforts to uphold the claim that the kidneys are a source of human thought and counsel.

This problem became particularly acute in Renaissance Italy. New experimental methods in medical research were overthrowing the long-entrenched systems of Aristotle and Galen.

Rabbi Moses Provençal of Mantua (1503–1576) was asked how to reconcile the rabbinic statements about the kidney with the tenets of contemporary physicians and biologists who spoke of the brain as the centre of intellect and judgment. In his responsum, the rabbi submitted that in this case the teaching of the Jewish sages is to be preferred. To be sure, the scientists may be forgiven for getting it wrong; after all, unlike the sages of Israel, they do not enjoy the benefits of an unbroken chain of tradition that extends back via the biblical prophets and elders to the divine revelation at Mount Sinai.

In a very similar vein, his contemporary Rabbi Isaac Lampronti observed that even though the achievements of medical science might appear very impressive to us, their work is of necessity limited to observable phenomena; but as long as they are unable to grasp every aspect of the innumerable details that constitute reality, they will not have truly penetrated into the deeper meanings of the processes they are describing. As regards the specific topic of human biology, the secular scientists do not fully understand the systems of nourishment and growth, or the sources of bodily strength and vigor. 

Rabbi Lampronti therefore viewed the purely empirical knowledge of the scientists as essentially superficial, to be contrasted with the profound wisdom of the Jewish sages who were privy to the divine secret of creation. “Anyone who is intimately familiar with it will be capable of achieving wonders that are far more numerous than what the scientists can boast—wonders that they can accomplish by means of the science of alchemy or through natural magic.”

Rabbi Lampronti noted that of all the internal organs, the kidneys are the only ones that come in pairs. This ties in neatly with the Talmud’s statement about how they serve to advise the lone heart to pursue either virtuous or sinful options. The Talmud’s linking of the two kidneys with the good and evil inclinations supports those interpreters who regard the kidneys’ impact as rooted in sexual desire—which can take the form either of participation in wholesome family life or of destructive promiscuity. 

On further reflection, the linking of thoughts and moods with internal physical organs does not strike me as inherently irrational. True, for centuries western thinking was dominated by the doctrine of “Cartesian dualism” (named for French philosopher René Descartes) and its conviction that the human mind is an abstract entity that is essentially independent of the physical body that houses it. However, traditional religious thought, especially the kind that found expression in medieval Jewish moralistic writings, maintained a more nuanced approach, observing that the health or illness of one’s body can exert a powerful influence on a person’s intellectual abilities. Rationalists like Maimonides insisted that we must follow a strict moral discipline in order to rein in biological urges that are constantly tempting us away from our spiritual or intellectual missions.

Current medical science is more cognizant of how human behaviour can be influenced by the activities of various glands, hormones or drugs that are secreted or processed by internal organs. While there is no evident indication that the kidneys are counted among the organs that affect our reasoning, there was no prima facie reason for pre-moderns to rule such ideas out of hand.

Judah Halevi touched on this matter briefly in his Kuzari arguing that the relationship between the kidneys and human intelligence is analogous to the impact of physiological masculinity on men’s cognitive functions. In a definitive expression of chauvinism and political incorrectness, Halevi did not make reference, as a modern writer would likely have done, to testosterone-inspired belligerence or violence, but rather to the indisputable fact (according to the science of his time) that eunuchs are observably less intelligent—even when compared to creatures of limited intellectual capacity, such as… women (who also happen to be incapable of growing beards)!

Somehow I have a gut feeling (on the right side, of course) advising me that I should not accept such views unquestioningly.

My email address is: [email protected]

This article is included in the collection: Teachers, Preachers and Selected Short Features, Alberta Judaic Library, 2019.

This Little H1N1 Stayed Home

by Eliezer Segal

The spread of the lethal H1N1 influenza virus is a cause for concern, as new cases continue to crop up locally and around the globe.

The forces of political correctness have made it difficult to attach a name to the disease. The earliest occurrences stemmed from Mexico, and therefore it was understandable that it could be designated “Mexican flu”; however, the Mexicans took offense at this approach..

The new virus strain evolved from strains that were originally restricted to the pig family, leading to the the widespread adoption of the name “swine flu.” This, however, provoked vocal protests from the meat industry since it creates the impression that the disease can be contracted by eating pork products, which is not really the case. Several European or international bodies have opted for neutral names like “novel influenza”; and the Canadian news media have generally adopted the cryptic term “H1N1 flu” that is being promoted by the World Health Organization–though in unguarded moments the reporters often slip back into the more comfortable terminology of “swine flu.”

Israel injected its own distinctive spin on the debate over the naming of the illness, owing to a public declaration by Yaakov Litzman, the country’s Deputy Minister of Health. Litzman, who belongs to the Gur Hasidic sect and represents the Agudat Israel faction of the hareidi “United Torah Judaism” party, could not stomach the prospect of a prominent epidemic being named after a notoriously non-kosher animal. He therefore issued a pronouncement to the effect that the sickness should be officially referred to as the “Mexico flu.” This led to a flurry of diplomatic exchanges, as both the Mexican ambassador to Israel and the Israeli envoy to Mexico lodged indignant official protests with the Israeli foreign ministry, who subsequently denied that they had any intention of getting into the business of naming viruses.

As it happens, Litzman was following a time-honoured tradition of avoiding mention of the prohibited animal. Some ancient rabbinic texts preferred to sidestep the objectionable word (as well as several other terms that they considered unseemly) by substituting the circumlocution “davar aher“–“something else.” Nevertheless, in the present context some observers have noted that it might have made more sense for the Deputy Minister to emphasize the unsavoury association with the non-kosher animal as a way of discouraging Jews from partaking of what many Israelis enjoy illicitly as “the other white meat.”

In fact, not all our sages believed that we should be viscerally disgusted by the thought of swine-flesh. A well-known midrashic teaching states that the prohibition of pork should be accepted as an inscrutable divine decree that is not based on any logical reasoning or aesthetic repugnance. “A person should never say ‘I have no desire to eat swine flesh.’ On the contrary, one ought to say: ‘I would really love to eat it, were it not for the fact that my heavenly father has decreed that I may not.'”

Maimonides harmonized the apparent dissonance between the two approaches, writing that the “I would love to eat it” attitude is an appropriate one to adopt when dealing with ritual prohibitions whose primary purpose is to reinforce our internal discipline and obedience. We should, however, try to instill within ourselves an instinctive revulsion for things that are ethically or morally distasteful.

Talmudic law taught that in response to a real or potential disaster Jewish communities should declare public fast-days in which we express our contrition by refraining from physical pleasures and by participating in special penitential prayers. Drought, war, plague or infestations of wild beasts were enumerated as appropriate occasions for convening a communal fast. In principle, only the affected locality is expected to fast; however, if there is a solid reason to fear that the danger might spread, then the obligation would extend even to places that have not been directly affected.

The Talmud reports that the third-century Babylonian sage Rav Judah was once informed that a pestilence had broken out among the swine, and he thereupon declared a communal fast. The Talmud, assuming that the rabbi was not really concerned for the welfare of the pigs, inferred initially that Rav Judah must have subscribed to the general view that diseases can spread between different species, and therefore he anticipated that humans were also in imminent peril. In the end, they modified that conclusion, stating that even if we were to assume that diseases cannot be passed on to humans from other animal species, there is nonetheless a more substantial reason for anxiety in the case of pigs “because their intestines resemble those of humans.” Indeed, Aristotle made a similar observation about the resemblance between the human and porcine internal organs; and it is a fact that the current variety of “swine flu” does contain two strains of the influenza virus that are normally endemic in pigs.

The Tosafot commentary to that passage in the Talmud draws the conclusion that Jewish communities should observe fasts if they hear of outbreaks of disease among their gentile neighbours. This is not so much an expression of universalistic solidarity as it is a matter of straightforward Jewish self-interest: for after all, if the Talmud found reason to fear that humans might be infected by a disease that is plaguing a completely different species, then there must be a far greater likelihood that an epidemic could spread between two ethnic or religious communities.

The notion that swine are inherently unhealthy is one that has a long history among the Jewish commentators. The most definitive statement on the topic is that of Maimonides. In his Guide of the Perplexed (3:48) he argued that all the animals prohibited to Jews by the Torah are in fact injurious to our health, or at least they are lacking in nutritional value. Pork, writes the great physician, suffers from an excess of moisture and superfluous matter. In fact, our contemporary nutritionists concur in including bacon and pork among the meats that contain “empty calories.”

In this matter, Maimonides was tacitly contradicting his hero Hippocrates who had written that “of all kinds of flesh, pork is the best,” provided that one knows how to select the right cuts and serve it in the proper healthy manner.

Maimonides goes on to argue that the Torah’s antipathy to pigs derives not so much from the meat itself, but from the general culture that surrounds them. Because the creatures are so filthy and love to wallow in uncleanness, any community that cultivated them would necessarily be transformed into a disgusting swamp of grime and mud. “Their marketplaces and even their homes would be filthier than toilets, as you can see for yourself in the lands of the French”!

Maimonides’ medically based rationales for the biblical dietary laws have not fared well among more recent commentators. After all, it would seem to follow from his assumptions that if the animals can be raised and processed under hygienic, disease-free conditions, then the ritual prohibitions against them could be rescinded–an option that no Jewish traditionalist wants to seriously contemplate.

Whichever opinion you might hold with regard to the relationship between swine and sicknesses–the important thing is, of course, that you should all be healthy!

My email address is: [email protected]

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This article is included in the collection: On the Trails of Tradition: Explorations of Jewish Life and Learning, the Alberta Judaic Library, 2011

Shorter by a Head: Kosher Crime in the Roaring ’20s

by Eliezer Segal

When the concept of racketeering was first introduced into the American legal vocabulary in 1927 to describe the infiltration of criminal elements into the labour movement, the list of industries to which the term was applied included: construction, laundry and… kosher food. Evidently, the complexities of the production process and the vulnerabilities of the immigrant Jewish community to which it catered made the kosher marketplace especially attractive to nefarious interests. 

According to the report that was issued in 1929 by an American federal government investigating committee, a trade union bearing the impressive name the Official Orthodox Poultry Slaughterers of America had for some time been conspiring with gangsters to exploit the kosher chicken industry for purposes of extortion. The principal targets of their schemes were the operators of the New York chicken markets. 

The first stage in that unfortunate process was when the union elected as its representative an individual named Charley Herbert, a known criminal who had never actually worked as a slaughterer, kosher or otherwise. Charley was in partnership with his brother Arthur Tootsie Herbert, another convicted felon, who had applied similar tactics to the teamsters unions. 

Enforcers in league with the Herbert brothers would confront the sellers in the name of the Greater New York Live Poultry Chamber of Commerce and demand from them one penny for every pound of kosher poultry that was sold. In some instances, the merchants were pressured to hire superfluous union members to help with the loading. Sellers who refused to pay their share would coincidently find themselves plagued by labour problems as members of the slaughterers and teamsters unions would suddenly refuse to work for them. If necessary, physical violence was also directed against their persons or property. 

As the federal prosecutor characterized the situation, The conspirators made it as much as a man’s life was worth to go down to Washington Market in defiance of their regulations and attempt to buy poultry. For many, it was an offer they could not refuse. 

Those pennies added up, and at the height of the corruption the organizers were raking in up to $16,000 a week–hardly chicken-feed in those days. The Orthodox Poultry Slaughterers union found it convenient to sanction this activity, not only through their authorization of Charley Herbert but also by participating in the walkouts. 

When the case was finally brought before Judge John C. Knox of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York, eighty-four defendants were charged with the federal crime of organizing a conspiracy in restraint of trade. In order to accommodate such a swarm of defendants, special bleacher seats had to be erected, lending the trial the atmosphere of a public sports match. 

When the trial was over, the Official Orthodox Poultry Slaughterers of America, along with sixty-six assorted defendants, were found guilty, but the sentences that were handed down were not particularly severe. The leadership of the slaughterers union received suspended sentences. The punishment for gangster Charley Herbert amounted to no more than two weeks of hard time and fine of five hundred dollars that was subsequently suspended. The presiding judge voiced his hope that some day, somehow, some one high in the Jewish community of this town will take the poultry industry in hand. 

Not surprisingly, that slap on the wrist was not effective in halting the illicit activities of the Herberts, who quickly resumed their manipulation of the kosher poultry industry. In 1935 it was again necessary to remove them, but a year later they again seemed to be doing business as usual. It was not until 1937 that concerted prosecution succeeded in removing them completely from the scene. 

The involvement of felons in Canada’s kosher food business at that time did not, as far as I can tell, occur at the initiative of rapacious gangsters. On the contrary, the stimulus may well have been a clash between the egos of two imperious rabbis. Be that as it may, criminal elements and violent acts were an inescapable factor in the story. 

The background to these episodes was the chapter in the history of Montreal’s Jewish community known as the Kosher Meat Wars. Rabbi Hirsch Cohen had recently founded Montreal’s Vaad Ha’Ir, the Jewish Community Council, to serve as the umbrella organization for the manifold religious and educational institutions that existed in the immigrant community. A group of dissident ritual slaughterers refused to accept the authority of the Va’ad Ha’Ir and established their own supervisory framework under Rabbi Yudel Rosenberg’s auspices. Throughout the Kosher Meat War of 1922-25, the rival rabbis were certifying different butchers and creating serious impediments to the viability of the nascent and vulnerable Community Council. 

Though the skirmishes in this war usually took the form of financial, verbal and printed attacks, they also extended to physical violence. Shohetim who accepted the authority of the Vaad Ha’Ir were told that harm would come to them unless they desisted from their work. According to Rabbi Cohen, the dissidents were hiring goons to persuade the proprietors of various butcher shops to either close or remain open. 

Rabbi Rosenberg and persons who were presumed to belong to his faction were subjected to assaults on the street. On one occasion, an unruly mob pelted stones at Rabbi Rosenberg just before Yom Kippur, until he personally confronted them to shame them into withdrawing. A police report from 1923 related that a dissident butcher from Rabbi Rosenberg’s camp ambushed a competitor in the employ of the Vaad ha-Ir, striking him on the head and leaving him unconscious with serious injuries. Charges of attempted murder were brought against three officers of the Jewish Butchers’ Association. 

At one point in the struggle, the Vaad slaughterers had letters delivered to their homes informing them: If you will go and slaughter for the Canadian Packing Company, you will be shorter by a head. This served as written confirmation for verbal threats that had previously been pronounced in the slaughterhouse by a shohet attached to the opposing faction. 

Around that time, Montreal’s Keneder Odler newspaper reported that the dissident association had hired gangsters to remove their opponents, and threatening letters were sent to members of the Jewish Community Council. Rabbi Cohen published a dramatic indictment of the horrible things being perpetrated by the dissidents which no fantasy could eclipse. With the approval of certain rabbis, the slaughters had hired gangsters to clear away the competition. Mutual boycotts of the rival butchers and slaughterers became a standard feature of Montreal’s kosher marketplace for several years. Each faction urged the consumers to avoid purchasing kosher meat from their thuggish competitors. Typical of these entreaties was a handbill that was circulated in Montreal in 1933 and chronicled an incident in which a gang of butchers attacked innocent customers at a rival establishment, causing several of them to be hospitalized. The handbill pleaded Do not eat any meat. The meat is dripping with human blood! 

Thankfully, incidents of that kind belong to a distant past when organized crime was spreading its sinister net over much of North American society. As far as I know, you are no longer risking your life by paying a visit to the neighbourhood kosher butcher shop or deli –provided, of course, that you are not a chicken.

My email address is: [email protected]

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This article is included in the collection: On the Trails of Tradition: Explorations of Jewish Life and Learning, the Alberta Judaic Library, 2011

Non-Profit Prophet

by Eliezer Segal

Our ancient sages seemed to have an inordinate interest in Moses’ financial situation. At first glance, this seems to be a superfluous concern. After all, whatever material goods the people might have taken with them from Egypt, even if they amounted to considerable riches, would have been largely irrelevant in a desert where there was nothing to purchase, and where their sustenance was provided directly by the Almighty.

And yet the rabbis of the Talmud and Midrash insisted on embellishing the Torah’s narrative with detailed accounts of Moses’ affluence.

Take for example the following interpretation of the scriptural assertion that the man Moses was very humble (Numbers 12:2). The Midrash specified that this description refers only to his personality, but not to his economic circumstances; in that area, he was in fact quite well-to-do, as indicated by Exodus 11:3: Moreover the man Moses was very great…

The rabbis insisted that Moses had an independent source of income. This had come to him as a byproduct of his receiving the tablets of the covenant at Sinai. God instructed Moses (in connection with the second set of tablets, in Deuteronomy 10:1): Hew for yourself two stone tablets. The Hebrew word p’sol that is translated as hew is related to the word p’solet meaning waste, and this suggested to the rabbis that Moses was being authorized to keep for himself the chips or flakes that remained from the carving of the tablets.

Now, the rabbis related that the stone from which the tablets were made was not your garden-variety brand of worthless rock. No indeed. The holy commandments were inscribed on precious gemstone–sapphire to be exact. The sages arrived at this conclusion by creatively juggling several different scriptural texts. One verse (Exodus 32:16) stated and the tablets were the work of God, and another (24:10): and they saw the God of Israel: and there was under his feet as it were a paved work of a sapphire stone. Ergo, the work embodied in the tablets must also have been composed of sapphire! Thus, it was evident that the Almighty had allowed Moses to keep those priceless scraps for his personal use.

An alternative tradition, motivated perhaps by the rabbis’ discomfort with the notion of Moses making private use of the sacred tablets of the law, stated that God had actually revealed to Moses the location of a diamond mine that was conveniently situated beneath his tent.

The Torah itself provides us with some clues as to why the rabbis went to so much trouble to establish that Moses was wealthy. At the end of the book of Exodus, after the lengthy narration of the building of the Tabernacle, there is a time-consuming review of the accounts of the tabernacle… as they were rendered according to the commandment of Moses. Later, when Korach and his minions challenged Moses’ leadership, the prophet insisted I have not taken one ass from them, neither have I hurt one of them. Episodes such as these imply that suspicions were making the rounds that Moses had been skimming from the public funds that were entrusted to him.

The rabbis offered their own reconstructions of what some Hebrews were saying about their illustrious leader. When Moses would enter the Tent of Meeting to commune with the Creator, all the people rose up, and stood, every man at his tent door, and looked after Moses (Exodus 33:8). Rabbi Hama read this passage as a classic instance of talking behind a person’s back, with all the negative connotations that normally attach to such situations: They would taunt: ‘Look at his neck, look at those legs! He is eating the Jews’ goods, and drinking the Jews’ goods, and in fact everything he owns was taken from the Jews.’ And his companion would respond: ‘When a person is in charge of the construction of the Tabernacle, wouldn’t you expect him to become wealthy?!’

Evidently, the Babylonian rabbis found these comments so shocking that, when they cited the tradition, they buried the insulting accusations under an ellipsis. Rashi filled in the missing quotes from other sources. At any rate, the rabbis believed that it was in response to those insinuations that Moses insisted on ordering a full public audit of how he had disposed of the goods that were donated to the Tabernacle building fund.

Rabbi Joshua ben Levi went so far as to insert a suspenseful moment into the story, when Moses panicked at not being able to account for a certain expenditure of 1,775 shekels–until God himself reminded him of the purchases for which they had been used. In a similar vein, some of the sages observed that it would normally be perfectly acceptable for a manager to charge the costs of donkeys or other means of transportation to their expense account for use in the performance of their duties; but Moses had to be unusually scrupulous in this matter because of the allegations that were being made against his integrity.

Whenever we find a midrash taking such liberties with the literal facts of a biblical narrative, it is natural to inquire after its motives. The most plausible reason is that the ancient homilists were trying to make the scriptural text relevant to their own situations. Of course, for as long as there have existed organized communities, there have been ambivalent relationships between their leaders and their constituents. There is an advantage to appointing leaders who are independently wealthy, or to paying them generous salaries, in order to remove the temptation to pilfer from the public coffers. Furthermore, the ancients were far less embarrassed than many of us are by affluence, and few would have questioned the assumption that wealth was a desirable virtue in an ideal leader. The house of the Nasi, the Jewish Patriarchate, was famous–or notorious–for its ostentatious wealth, provoking criticisms that are echoed in the pages of rabbinic literature. In fact, most of the rabbis who were so concerned with expounding the details of Moses’ financial policies flourished in chronological and historical proximity to the centres of patriarchal authority.

It is therefore probable that the rabbis were projecting onto Moses the same kinds of tensions that prevailed in their own communities, where rabbis often took upon themselves the reins of leadership and earned much popular resentment for their efforts. They were trying to convince both themselves and their flocks that they were following in the steps of the noble prophet and faithful shepherd of his people. Accordingly, the criticisms to which they were subjected could be viewed as a latter-day incarnation of the incessant whining of those faithless and malicious Israelites in the time of Moses.

At the same time, the ancient sages were offering some very practical recommendations about how to avert potential frictions in the community–by pursuing a policy of fiscal transparency and honest bookkeeping.

My email address is: [email protected]

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This article is included in the collection: On the Trails of Tradition: Explorations of Jewish Life and Learning, the Alberta Judaic Library, 2011

A Heavenly Herald (… and Some Housework)

by Eliezer Segal

It is well known that the Shabbat preceding Passover has been given the special designation Shabbat Ha-Gadol– the great sabbath. Although numerous explanations have been proposed for that grandiose epithet, I tend to prefer the most prosaic of them, the one that links it to the concluding words of the special scriptural reading (haftarah) from Malachi in which the prophet promises his people Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. Based on Malachi’s vision, Jewish tradition has embraced a belief that the great day will first be heralded by a reappearance of Elijah; and this may have contributed to the widespread customs that give the prophet a role at the Passover seder.

These beliefs about Elijah’s coming in advance of the Messiah formed the basis of an intriguing technical discussion in talmudic law. The rabbis examined the case of a person who vows to become a nazirite (which includes abstention from wine) while adding the stipulation that the vow will take effect on the day when the son of David arrives.

Though this case is treated as an academic one, some scholars have argued that Jews in antiquity were accustomed to undertake such vows of pious self-denial as a means to hasten the coming of the Messiah.

Because we are never quite certain when the son of David will make his appearance, the rabbis declare that, just to be safe, the person who uttered such a vow must refrain from wine on any date for which there is exists some possibility of the Messiah’s arrival. Accordingly, though the prohibition must be observed on most normal days, the author of the vow is nevertheless permitted to drink wine on sabbaths or festivals.

The Talmud demanded a clear and precise explanation why the sages could beso sure that the Messiah will not come on those days. As a starting hypothesis, it proposed to link the assumption to the restrictions against traveling on holy days. After all, the Messiah is presumably coming from somewhere far-off, and Jewish law would prevent him from doing so on a Saturday or festival.

This hypothesis, however, proved to be more problematic than it appeared initially. For one thing, we are not all that certain what mode of transportation the Messiah will choose to make his entrance. Of course, if he were limited to conventional forms of ground transportation then there would be no question that these would be prohibited on sabbaths or holidays. However, a Messiah might well have other options available to him; indeed, who is to say that he will not choose to make his entry by flying–and not necessarily in an aircraft?

Legends about a flying Messiah were current among ancient Jews. The apocalyptic work known as Fourth Ezra described him as a mighty warrior who soars out from the sea to perch atop a great mountain, from which he will smite his foes with a stream of fire that issues from his mouth. Rabbi Joshua ben Levi stated in the Talmud that if Israel proves worthy, they will rejoice in the fulfilment of Daniel’s scenario of a redeemer who arrives on the clouds of heaven.

The rabbis, however, were interested primarily in the legal implications of the event. If it could be established that the Messiah may not travel on holy days even by air, then it would resolve an ongoing controversy about whether the halakhic restrictions on travel apply above the ground. Given the typical rabbinic reluctance to resolve juicy questions of that sort, they chose to approach their question from a different perspective.

The Talmud now suggested that it was simply out of the question for the Messiah to show up without warning. After all, did not Malachi state categorically that we will be notified in advance by Elijah! Presumably, to be of any use, that notification would have to take place at least one day earlier–and (as some of the commentators add) Elijah would not postpone his announcement unnecessarily after his arrival. Therefore, as long as we have not heard of the prophet’s arrival on the previous day, our dubious nazirite may confidently sip some sauvignon.

However, once the Elijah factor was injected into the discussion, it did not take the Talmud long to realize that it could undermine their entire premise; for if the Messiah’s arrival must be preceded by that of Elijah, then we may be confident of his non-arrival on any other day of the week or year unless we have actually heard reports of Elijah’s appearance!

Upon rethinking the matter, the discussants were inclined to dismiss the entire issue of Elijah’s advance arrival; since it is quite conceivable that he did show up but did not make his presence known immediately to the general public. From the rabbis’ perspective, it made better sense to assume that the prophet would first present his credentials before the Sanhedrin, the Jewish religious court, while leaving the general populace temporarily unaware of his presence. If we accept this premise, then the immanence of the Messiah’s arrival can be effectively divorced from our knowledge of Elijah’s coming.

So again the Talmud must reconsider its original question: what grounds are there for our certainty that the Messiah will never arrive on a sabbath or festival?

Unlike the rabbis’ previous suggestions that were based on subtle legal hairsplitting or procedural considerations, the answer that they now came up with was sublime in its simplicity: Israel have been duly guaranteed that Elijah will not arrive either on the eves of Sabbath or on the eves of festivals–out of consideration for the extra work that would be involved! Simply put, it is inconceivable that Elijah would show up on a busy Friday or on the day preceding a festival; which makes it impossible for the Messiah to arrive on the following day.

What a remarkable understanding of the Jewish redemption is embedded in this discussion! When Elijah finally comes to herald that magnificent milestone for which our people’s hearts have yearned throughout the centuries of the exile, he will arrange the scheduling so that that it will not interfere with our domestic preparations.

As the Talmud is quick to point out, if Elijah cannot come on a Friday or a festival eve, then presumably neither can the Messiah himself. This should ostensibly free up those dates for drinking wine. Why, then, did the rabbis not draw that inference with respect to the nazirite vow?

But no, the Talmud retorts, there is an essential difference between Elijah’s arrival and that of the Messiah. While the former, as a mere harbinger of the redemption, does not institute any substantial changes, the latter’s appearance will have a far-reaching impact in our status as a nation. Specifically, it means that once Israel is redeemed, we will be relieved of some of the drudgery of our household preparations, because these will now be delegated to heathens.

Some interpreters (though assuredly not all of them) were uncomfortable with this chauvinistic image of Jews lording it over other peoples in the redeemed world. Rabbi Joseph Hayim of Baghdad, the renowned Ben Ish Hai, took care to explain that the gentiles would not be serving their Jewish neighbours under any form of servitude, but would choose to do so voluntarily upon learning to appreciate the spiritual nobility of the Torah’s teachings.

All this might prevent the prophet Elijah from participating in our seder, at least on the year of the Messiah’s arrival. I confess, though, that this might be an eminently fair price to pay for the seductive convenience of having someone to assist in cleaning the house, hauling out the Passover dishes and preparing the festive table.

• First Publication:
  • The Jewish Free Press, Calgary, April 4, 2008, p. 17.
• For further reading:
  • Faierstein, Morris M. Why Do the Scribes Say That Elijah Must Come First ? Journal of Biblical Literature 100 (1981): 75-86.
  • Friedmann, Meïr, ed. Seder Eliyahu Rabbah. Jerusalem: Wahrman, 1969.
  • Milikowski, Chayim. Trajectories of Return, Restoration and Redemption in Rabbinic Judaism: Elijah, the Messiah, the War of Gog and the World to Come. In Restoration: Old Testament, Jewish, and Christian Perspectives, ed. James M. Scott, 265-280. Leiden: Brill, 2001.
  • Patai, Raphael. The Messiah Texts. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1979.
  • Urbach, E. The Sages: Their Concepts and Beliefs. Translated by I. Abrahams. Cambridge, Mass. and London, England: Harvard University Press, 1987.

My email address is: [email protected]

This article is included in the collection: For Signs and for Seasons, the Alberta Judaic Library, 2011.

Flocks, Fighters—and Forgiveness

by Eliezer Segal

The solemn liturgical poem “Untanneh Tokef,” chanted as part of the High Holy Days service, epitomizes the mood of momentous dread as the Sovereign of the universe sits in judgement over his creatures: 

“Like a herder leading his flock, who passes his sheep beneath his staff. So shall you cause to pass, count, measure and reckon the lives of all living beings.”

The source for this simile is in the Mishnah which describes the mood on the annual day of judgment when “all the denizens of the world pass before him like b’nei meron.”

I have left this last expression untranslated because its correct translation is indeed a matter of considerable doubt and controversy. Philologists, sages, lexicographers and poets have interpreted the words in very diverse ways.

The physical shapes of Hebrew letters tolerate a certain degree of ambiguity. Specifically, the letters that represent  the vowels “i” and “u” are easily confused; and it is not clear whether the text should be read as one or two words. As regards to  the correct reading in the Mishnah, there are two main options: “ki-ve-numeron” and “ki-vnei meron.”

According to the first possibility, humankind parades before their Creator like a “noumeron” — a military cohort being inspected by their commander. The Greek “noumeron” and its Latin cognate “numerus”  both denote military divisions; so that the Mishnah’s simile is of a contingent of soldiers undergoing an inspection before their commanding officer. The Babylonian sage Samuel specified that the comparison was not just to some generic army—but to the Hebrew soldiers under King David’s command. 

The other variant of the Mishnah’s text was subject to its own diverse readings and interpretations. The Talmud states that in Babylonia it was customary to explain “meron” with reference to a similar-sounding Aramaic word connoting sheep. Rashi explained this image with reference to the procedures for tithing livestock, when the  animals are paraded single-file through a narrow gateway and every tenth lamb is designated for sacred use. This analogy was employed by the author of the Untanneh Tokef.

Other talmudic teachers envisaged different situations that would necessitate squeezing through narrow spaces. Rabbi Simeon ben Lakish adduced the “Ascent of Beit Horon,” a strategic site that was the scene of military actions during the Maccabean and Roman eras. Rabbi Aha described it as a small, narrow mountain range that could only be traversed in single-file.

Saadyah Ga’on, author of the first known Hebrew dictionar, included an entry for “maron,” which he equated with an Arabic root that means “march past” or “pass in review,” especially in a military context.

The liturgical poet Yannai, who lived in Galilee during the Byzantine era, incorporated both interpretations in his poem for Rosh Hashanah. In one place he writes, “As we are passed under the staff like sheep by the one counting them, you will appoint for us an advocate.” A few lines further down it says, “The king will cause all the denizens of the world to pass before him like a noumeron.” 

Several medieval manuscripts of prayer books and liturgical poetry contain the vowel “u,” indicating “noumeron” —even though the word is split into two parts (as “kivnu-meron”). Though there is considerable debate and hesitation about the question, this has become the generally preferred reading in scholarly circles.

Moving beyond the lexicographic and academic questions raised by these texts, several authors strove to elicit spiritual insights from the different interpretations. 

Rabbi Samuel Edels (Maharsha) equated the three interpretations with the three classes of people who stand in judgment before the divine tribunal: The sheep, destined for slaughter, stand for the confirmed evildoers. The heroic soldiers symbolize the perfectly righteous. And those struggling to keep their balance along the perilous trail represent the average flawed individuals who strive to maintain their moral balance.

Rabbi Hayyim Joseph David Azulai and Rabbi Joseph Hayyim of Baghdad (the “Ben Ish Hai”) found in the three categories allusions to the Supreme Judge’s desire to tip the scales to the advantage of the Rosh Hashanah defendants. Thus, comparing us to sheep, who are utterly lacking in intelligence, allows us to plead that fundamentally we are no better dumb animals, and hence not of sound enough mind to deserve punishment. The Ben Ish Hai explained, “Even when sheep cause damage to the foliage, the owners do not hold them liable. And so it is with respect to Israel— even though they sin, the Holy One treats them like sheep.”

As regards that image of an ascent through a precarious mountain trail flanked by deep gorges on either side—this also works to the benefit of mortals, as a factor that would mitigate a severe verdict. It evokes the picture of an Everyman who is plodding cautiously, clinging to a narrow path enclosed on either side by barriers. Rabbi Azulai explained this imagery in the sense that, from one side, the physical constitution of our bodies impels us to pursue the vanities of the material world, while on the other side we are continually bombarded by temptations from the evil inclination (“The devil made me do it!”). 

The Ben Ish Hai noted that Jews are particularly vulnerable to negative influences when living amidst impure foreign cultures. Samuel’s analogy to the warriors of King David’s army also works to our advantage by urging God to give us some credit for our ceaseless daily battles to eke out honest livelihoods for our families. Furthermore, the merit of righteous ancestors like David can be invoked even if our personal virtues are not adequate for the purpose.

The preachers and poets who crafted these scenarios had to steer a cautious course. On the one hand, their audiences must be alerted to the grave consequences of their transgressions. And yet the prospect of severe judgment must not cause them to despair of repentance. 

Hopefully, we will all emerge from the experience with gleaming fleeces or spotlessly groomed uniforms, as the case may be—worthy of enjoying a blessed new year.

My email address is: [email protected]

When Mount Sinai Was Lifted Up

by Eliezer Segal

Traditional Judaism has always asserted that the Torah can be understood in an infinite number of ways, as it addresses itself to the individual abilities and concerns of every person in every age and locality. 

This principle has also been applied to the account of the giving of the Torah itself, which we commemorate in the festival of Shavuot. The events at Mount Sinai have been interpreted by Jews over the ages in a rich variety of manners, reflecting the concerns and approaches of the respective commentators, and their reactions to developments in the world around them.

By way of illustration, I would like to focus on one particular passage in the Sinai narrative that has lent itself to diverse interpretations.

In describing the preparations for the revelation, the Torah states that “Moses brought forth the people out of the camp to meet God; and they stood beneath the mountain (Exodus 19:17). 

The Hebrew phrase used here (be-tahtit ha-har) evidently means that they encamped at the foot of the mountain.

Hoever, looked at with a more narrow literalism, it can be understood as “they stood underneath the mountain”

A similar wording is employed in Deuteronomy 4:11: “And you came near and stood under the mountain [tahat ha-har].” 

The wording inspired commentary by a number of Jewish Sages.

Love for God

The renowned Rabbi Akiva, who dominated Jewish life at the beginning of the 2nd Century C.E., had a singular mystical approach to religious life. 

Central to his outlook was the Song of Songs, a unique biblical book which consists of sensuous love poetry. It was through Rabbi Akiva’s advocacy that the Song of Songs was ultimately accepted, with opposition, into the Hebrew Bible.

He believed that the eroticism of the Song was a symbolic expression of the highest degrees of individual and national intimacy with the Divine.

He was guided by the powerful love imagery in some of the decisive moments his life, including his own mystical experiences, and his ultimate act of martyrdom at the hands of the Romans, a fate to which he was condemned because of his own passionate commitment to Torah. 

He perceived martyrdom as the ultimate expression of his love for God. 

It was in keeping with such a religious outlook that Rabbi Akiva regarded the revelation of the Torah at Mount Sinai as precisely the kind of immediate religious ecstasy that was being poetically portrayed in the Song of Songs. 

In this spirit, some sages of the Midrash applied to the Sinai events the passionate words of the Song: “0 my dove, who are in the clefts of the rock, in the crannies of the cliff ” (2:14). This was expounded as if to say that God had lovingly lifted the mountain in order to offer a protective shield for his people. 

When the people encamped “beneath the mountain”, they were doing so in the most literal manner, and God was extending over them his caring protection. 

Accepting the Torah

A later rabbi adapted the same image to make a totally different point, as recorded in the following well-known passage from the Babylonian Talmud:

“And they stood in the bottom of the mountain”– This teaches that God overturned the mountain on them like a tub and said to them: “If you accept the Torah, fine. But if you don’t, then here shall be your burial!”

The implications of this passage were troubling to the other talmudic Sages. 

One rabbi argued that this would undermine the entire basis for adherence to the Torah, since according to Jewish law a commitment made under threat or duress is not considered binding. It could also be used by gentiles to deflate the pride that Jews have always taken in their willingness to obey the word of God. 

Interestingly, the noted Babylonian Sage Rava resolved the problem by asserting that the real acceptance of the Torah took place in the time of Mordecai and Esther, when “the Jews ordained and took upon them and upon their seed” (Esther 9:27). 

Rava seems to be saying that we should be suspicious of commitments made in the heat of ardor, to the accompaniment of thunder, lightning and assorted pyrotechnics. 

What is more important and lasting is the carefully considered decision made at a time when God’s glory is not so visible, as was the case in the time of the Purim story.

Two Torahs

A number of commentators were troubled by the fact that the above portrayal of the Israelites’ acceptance of the Torah under threat seems to run counter to the prevalent view that they had accepted the Torah with full willingness. First, before even hearing what was contained in the Torah, they had declared unconditionally “We shall do it!”; and only afterwards “and we shall hear” the details of its contents (Exodus 24:17). 

According to one medieval view, the about-face can be resolved by distinguishing between two different Torahs.

Jewish tradition recognizes that, in addition to the written text of the Pentateuch, God revealed at Mount Sinai the Oral Torah, which is of equal sanctity and authority. 

Following this approach, it was suggested that it was easy to get the Israelites’ unconditional consent to the finite-looking corpus of the written Torah. 

Not all the Hebrews, however, were so ready to commit themselves to the Oral Torah, a vast body of lore that encompasses the classical literature of the Talmud, commentaries and codes, infinitely expanding and developing through the generations. It was with respect to this branch of the Torah that the Almighty was required to resort to threats and coercion.

It is interesting to note that the first known appearance of this interpretation seems to be in a sermon preached in the early Middle Ages, aimed at underlining the interdependence of the Written and Oral Torah. 

It is clear that the homelist was responding to an actual challenge: This was the era which marked the rise of the Karaite movement, a Jewish sect that claimed to accept only the written Bible, and to reject the authority of the Rabbinic-Talmudic traditions. 

Our anonymous commentator was saying, in effect, that the same problem had existed in the time of Moses, and that the response had to be forceful and decisive. 

Cleansed at Mount Sinai

Other midrashic interpretations of the Sinai revelation have also been explained as reactions to sectarian challenges. 

For example, in one talmudic passage Rabbi Yohanan stated that when Israel stood before Mount Sinai they became cleansed of the filth that had been injected into Eve by the serpent in the Garden of Eden. 

This strange-sounding comment takes on new meaning when we contrast it to the Christian teachings of the apostle Paul, who argued that the Torah had no power to cure people of the “original sin” of Adam and Eve; only through the acceptance of Christianity could such purification be realized. 

In fact, according to this view, all the “Law” [i.e., the Torah] did was magnify people’s consciousness of sin.

Rabbi Yohanan is countering such arguments by saying that, whatever defilement may have attached itself to humanity, it was removed at Mount Sinai by virtue of the acceptance of God’s Torah. 

Ironically, in Rabbi Yohanan’s version only the Jews were cleansed. The heathen nations, who had not been present to accept the Torah, remained in their spiritual impurity.

A Place in the Qur’an

A final note: The legend of the lifting up of Mount Sinai makes its appearance in an unexpected place: the Qur’an. According to Muslim belief, this work, the sacred scripture of Islam, contains the revelations spoken to the prophet Mohammad (570-632 CE). It is a work that is deeply influenced by Jewish teachings. 

The Qur’an provides a lengthy description of the story of the Israelite Exodus. It includes this passage, in which God is said to relate: 

And then We took a covenant with you and raised the mountain over you: Accept forcefully what We have given you, and remember what is in it. (Sura II, 60)

Most of the Muslim commentators, who could find no basis for this story in the biblical text itself, and who were of course not experts in talmudic writings, insisted that the passage must be understood figuratively. 

The commentators might have been tipped off, however, to Mohammad’s use of a Jewish source by his choice of words. 

Thus in the sura cited above, for the word “mountain” he uses not the expected Arabic term jabal, but an Aramaic equivalent: tura. Tura is also the word that is employed to translate “mountain” in the standard Jewish Aramaic translations of the Torah. 

Jewish readers, at any rate, can easily discern the influence on the Koran of the Rabbinic traditions we have been discussing.

My email address is: [email protected]

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This article is included in the collection: In Those Days, At This Time: Holiness and History in the Jewish Calendar, University of Calgary Press, 2007.

Crowning Achievement

by Eliezer Segal

In retelling the events of the first Shavuot, as Moses stood alone with the Almighty on Mount Sinai, the Talmud introduces some astonishing new details to the story. 

As the rabbis tell the tale, Moses was so overcome by impatience that he could not restrain himself from complaining that the Lord was spending precious moments on what appeared to be decorative ornaments to the Hebrew letters of the Torah. To this the Creator replied that, while these ornaments–designated by the Hebrew word tag [plural: tagin]–might now appear superfluous, in a future generation there would arise a great scholar named Rabbi Akiva who would be able to derive heaps and heaps of new laws and teachings from those trivial-looking tags.

What, indeed, were those tagin that were important enough to cause God to postpone the giving of the Torah?

At first glance, the answer seems a simple one, well known to anyone with a cursory knowledge of how Torah scrolls are written. According to the traditional practice set down in the Talmud, there are seven letters–identified by the acronym sha’atnez getz–that are decorated whenever they appear in the Torah with a special embellishment attached to the top of the letter. 

If these ornaments were the tagin that Moses beheld on Mount Sinai, calligraphic features that are mechanically added to the form of the letters, then it is difficult to imagine how Rabbi Akiva could have ascribed to them exegetical importance. 

And in truth, when we examine the traditional commentators to the Talmudic passage, we see that they understood the matter quite differently.

Rashi calls our attention to a passage that is found elsewhere in the Talmud, a delightful anecdote about how a class of schoolchildren produced a sequence of ingenious new interpretations for the names and shapes of the letters of the Hebrew alphabet. 

According to these young prodigies, the letter kof stands for the word kadosh, and refers to the Holy One, whereas the resh represents rasha, the wicked. Accordingly, they ask “Why is the kof turned away from the resh? It is as if the Holy One is saying: I am unable to gaze upon the wicked.”

Rashi explains that that the children were basing their interpretation on the fact that the kof sometimes has a little tag ornament on its roof, like a miniature zayin, that faces away from the resh when the alphabet is written in proper sequence.

As we read Rashi’s comments, we sense that something is not quite right. After all, kof is not one of the seven letters included in the sha’atnez getz group, so why should it have a  tag on its top?

Furthermore, as we study other medieval compendia of Jewish law, it quickly becomes apparent that the conventions for writing tags in Torah scrolls are much more complicated than we first supposed.

One of the most important sources for the development of synagogue practice in medieval Europe is a work known as the Mahzor Vitry, a compendium of laws and customs that was composed by Rashi’s students in twelfth-century France. From various directives contained in the Mahzor Vitry we learn that the sha’atnez getz rule was not meant to apply to every occurrence of those seven letters in the Bible, but to specific texts that are inscribed in a Mezuzah. This approach finds independent corroboration in Maimonides’ Mishneh Torah, where he deals with the sha’atnez getz letters only in connection with the writing of the Shema‘ in Tefillin and Mezuzot. After specifying their locations and shapes, he comments “If one neglected to include the tagin or wrote more or less than the required ones, this does not disqualify it.”

Furthermore, we learn from the Mahzor Vitry that the tagin were not written in the way they are written today, by adding the same zayin-like appendage to the tops of the respective letters. Rather, there were special rules for how the letter was to be shaped each individual time it appeared.

The shin has five tagin: two on the first leg and two on the last, and one on the middle one. The ‘ayin has three on each leg. The tet has two on the first leg and three on the last. The nun and the zayin have three apiece. The gimel has three tagin. The tzadik has two on the first leg and three on the last.

In an addendum to this section, the editor of the Mahzor Vitry notes that he has witnessed the practice of decorating all the sha’atnez getz letters in a uniform manner, though such was not the dominant custom in his own community. Some authorities (such as Rashi’s grandson, Rabbi Jacob Tam), preferred to play it safe by following both practices: The individual rules should be followed with regards to the special shapes of specific letters, but in other cases the sha’atnez gatz letters should always be decorated with their uniform tags.

The Mahzor Vity actually incorporates a separate treatise devoted to the minutiae of writing tagin in sacred texts, a work that bears the title, appropriately enough, The Book of Tagin. Its opening lines bear witness to the author’s belief that he was in possession a most ancient and arcane tradition that was carefully passed from teacher to disciple from the earliest times: 

And this is the book of Tagin that Ely the Priest took up from the twelve stones that Joshua set up at Gilgal; and he handed them to Samuel, and Samuel handed them to Palti ben Laish, and Palti ben Laish handed them to Ahitofel, and Ahitofel to Ahijah the Shilonite, and Ahijah to Elijah and Elijah to Elisha and Elisha to Jehoiadah the Priest. And Jehoiadah to the prophets. And they buried it under the doorstep of the Temple. And when the doorstep of the Temple was uprooted during the reign of Jehoiachin King of Judah, Ezekiel found it and brought it to Babylonia. And during the reign of Cyrus King of Persia, when Ezra brought up the ten different castes, Ezra discovered this book and brought it up to Jerusalem, and it reached

Rabbi Moses Nahmanides accepted this claim at face value, and held the Book of Tagin in profound reverence, since he associated the tagin with the mysterious gates of understanding that had been bestowed upon Moses when God wrote out the Torah for him at Sinai. The significance of the special letters was a mysterious secret “…for these secret allusions can be known only through the oral tradition that originated with Moses at Sinai.”

The traditions surrounding the tagin were especially important to the Jewish pietist movement known as Hasidut Ashkenaz that flourished in Germany from the eleventh to the thirteenth centuries. The followers of this movement placed great emphasis on the mystical significance of words, and they meticulously reckoned the numerological values of each word in the prayer book. Evidently, the movement’s founder Rabbi Judah the Pious composed a treatise entitled the Book of Wisdom in which he expounded the mysteries of the tagin. The colophon to that book aptly reflects the reverence in which the tagin were held by those circles:

It is forbidden to add to [the authorized list of tagin], nor may one omit even a single tag, since they are precisely as they were given at Mount Sinai. They have been passed down as an oral tradition by Elijah the Prophet to Ezra the High Priest. And the person who is punctilious about them will be blessed in this world and in the next. One must take great care not to diminish or to add even as much a hair’s breadth, for several explanations and several mysteries can be derived from them, for each one contains several interpretations. Any Torah scroll that lacks them is not fit to be read from. Therefore, all God-fearing individuals should be scrupulous with regard to them, and their reward will be great from the God of Israel…

Maimonides also emphasized, in his rules for writing Torah scrolls, that the tagin should be written in their traditional manner:

One ought to take great care with regards to the letters that are to be written larger and the ones that are written smaller, and the ones that have dots and the ones that have unusual shapes, like the wrapped peh‘s and the twisted letters, as the scribes have copied one from another. And one ought to take great care with regard to the tagin and their proper number; sometimes a letter requires one tag, and there are shins that have seven of them. So too, regarding the tagin that have the shape of zayins, which are as thin as a hair.

It is evident that Maimonides’ contemporaries were mystified by the tagin, and he was questioned about their shapes and the whether they should be treated as a mere custom or as an indispensable requisite for kosher Torah scrolls or Mezuzahs. After providing a brief description of some of their forms, Maimonides stated that their purpose is no longer known, nor is it possible to deduce it; though that we can learn from the Talmudic account of Moses’ sojourn on Mount Sinai that the tagin had been part of Moses’ original Torah scroll. Nevertheless, their omission does not disqualify the scroll, and conflicting traditions have evolved concerning their precise forms and placement.

Seeing as there is much disagreement on this, and since according to the strict law their omission is not a grounds for disqualification, because their inclusion is only intended to imitate the scrolls that were written by our Master Moses, therefore the people of some countries preferred to omit them and to leave them out of the scrolls altogether, on account of the disagreements that surround them; for writing them would not be a faithful imitation of the above-mentioned scroll.

Maimonides himself was of the opinions that, notwithstanding the divergence of opinions, a normative practice could be formulated based on majority usage, and that it would be preferable, though not compulsory, to follow that practice. 

An attitude closer to our current practice was espoused by Rav Hai Ga’on, who headed the Babylonian academy of Sura during the eleventh century. He was asked whether every occurrence of the letter zayin (one of the sha‘atnez getz letters) in a Mezuzah or Tefillin required a tag. His questioners noted that they possessed old Mezuzahs in which only some of the letters had the tagin. The Ga’on nevertheless ruled that they were not fit unless every single zayin was decorated by a tag. 

Examination of actual Torah scrolls reveals considerable variation in the degree to which different Jewish communities tried to implement the traditions about the “strange letters.” Diverse traditions of writing “wrapped peh“s (variants of that Hebrew letter that had extra curls inside them) were maintained quite faithfully in Yemen, Bohemia and Germany, though we do not encounter them in texts from the Cairo Genizah. 

I suppose that it should not surprise us too much that the secrets of the tagin have been lost over time. After all, Moses himself was unable to comprehend them! Nevertheless, it is tempting to speculate how much we would be enriched–whether in the form of Rabbi Akiva’s “heaps and heaps” of laws, or Rabbi Judah the Pious’ mystical insights–if only we were able to reclaim that ancient tradition.

• First Publication:
  • Ha’Atid, the magazine of the Melbourne Hebrew Congregation, Summer 2000.
• For further reading:
  • Moses Gaster. The Tittled Bible: A Model Codex of the Pentateuch. London: Maggs Bros., 1929.
  • Menashe Manfred Lehmann, “‘Al Pe-in Lefufin,” Beit Mikra 30, no. 4 (1985): 449-55.
  • Yitzhak Razhabi, “Irregular Letters in the Torah,” in Torah Shelemah, ed. Menahem M. Kasher, 29, 1-234, Jerusalem: American Biblical Encyclopedia Society Inc., 1978.
  • I. M. Ta-Shma, “The Attitude to Aliya to Eretz Israel (Palestine) in Medieval German Jewry,” Shalem: Studies in the History of the Jews in Eretz Israel 6 (1992): 315-8.
  • I. M. Ta-Shma, “‘Al Tagin ve-Ziyyunin Shel Sefer Torah,”

My email address is: [email protected]

This article is included in the collection: In Those Days, At This Time: Holiness and History in the Jewish Calendar, University of Calgary Press, 2007.

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The Wise King Ahasuerus

by Eliezer Segal

Well, Australia is still in the Commonwealth, and Queen Elizabeth is still your official Head of State . As a Canadian, I welcome you back to our charmingly anachronistic political association.

In this democratic world, the role of the sovereign is indeed a questionable one, particularly in constitutional monarchies where their role is ceremonial and symbolic.

The story of Purim has provided Jewish scholars through the ages with occasions to contemplate the nature of government, and the place of the king within the mechanisms of power. Not surprisingly, their interpretations of the Biblical text often reveal a great deal of their own contemporary concerns.

I think that modern readers have tended to regard Ahasuerus as something of a comical buffoon. This is not only the result of the frivolity that has characterized our Purim celebrations, but it legitimately reflects the king’s ever-changing positions in the Esther narrative. Initially, he is a benevolent leader entertaining the populace with banquets and festivities. Quickly he is persuaded by Haman to support a genocidal massacre. And then, just as instantly, Esther turns him into an ally of the Jews, determined to execute vengeance on Haman and his collaborators.

It is difficult not to agree with the Talmudic rabbis who termed Ahasuerus a hafakhfakhan, an unstable personality easily influenced by his counselors and subject to constant changes of attitude.

A recurring argument in the Talmud concerns the evaluation of Ahasuerus’ intelligence. Was he a shrewd statesman, or an incompetent boob? Certain episodes lend themselves to either interpretation.

Thus, the opening verses of Esther recount two separate royal feasts. In the first, the king entertained the citizens of the provinces, and only afterwards did he convene celebrations for the residents of Shushan, the capital city. Some rabbi were convinced that it was a wise political move to curry the good will of the outsiders first; while others insisted that it was an act of folly to befriend the provincials, who might rebel at any moment, before he had properly secured his position at home.

Several Talmudic sages were quick to adduce examples of Ahasuerus’ stupidity and fickleness: in his abandonment of former allies, in his impulsive treatment of Vashti and in several other acts of dubious judgment.

In light of this critical attitude among the ancient Jewish sages, it comes as something of a surprise to observe how determined many of the medieval commentators were to paint the Persian king in flattering colours. This was particularly true among scholars who lived in Spain.

Even with regard to that most incriminating of passages, when Ahasuerus gives Haman a carte blanche to eradicate the Jews of the empire, several Spanish Jewish exegetes insisted that the king did not really intend that the Jews should come to physical harm. 

Thus, Rabbi Abraham Hadidah argued that the king only planned to destroy the Jews’ possessions, but not to kill the people. According to this interpretation, when Haman subsequently issued the order to “o destroy, to kill, and to cause to perish, all Jews, both young and old,” he was exceeding the authority that had been granted to him by the king. For this reason, Ahasuerus could sincerely claim later on that he had been completely unaware of Haman’s machination.

In as similar vein, Rabbi Isaac Arama wrote that Ahasuerus scheme had been to expel the Jews from his domains, rather than to murder them. Clearly Rabbi Arama had in mind the recent experiences of several European Jewish communities, in England, France and elsewhere who had been forcibly evicted from their respective lands.

Another Spanish interpreter, Rabbi Abraham Saba, could not conceive of the possibility that a great emperor of Ahasuerus’ stature would knowingly perpetrate a ruthless massacre. To do so would bring lasting shame upon his kingdom, and no self-respecting king would consider it. Rabbi Isaac Arama concurred, insisting that the very possibility of murdering an entire nature was so abhorrent to human nature that no monarch would have given such an order.

For other commentators, the king’s sympathies for his Jewish subjects was assured by their indispensable contributions to the royal coffers. It would be an act of economic irresponsibility to eliminate such a lucrative source of tax revenues. Rabbi Solomon Astruc argued that in the closing verses of the Megillah, when “king Ahasuerus laid a tribute upon the land, and upon the isles of the sea,” he was in fact following Mordecai’s advice in levying a tax on the Jews, as a way of underscore their fiscal benefits to the realm.

This irrational desire to defend Ahasuerus, to a degree that is unwarranted by the Biblical account or its Midrashic interpretations, seems to accurately reflect the attitudes of the Jews towards their own monarchs. Under the prevailing rules of medieval politics, the Jews were the “property” of the king, or of the royal treasury, and subject to the direct protection of the Crown. When anti-Jewish hostilities arose from other segments of the society, whether from the nobility, the clergy or the peasantry, it was the king who was responsible for guaranteeing the safety of “his Jews”. The monarchs usually lived up to their obligations, but not always.

At any rate, the ability of the Jews to maintain their fragile existence, as a despised minority amidst a hostile environment, demanded that they convince themselves of the faithfulness, not only of their current rulers, but of the institution of monarchy itself. If they could not depend on their kings, then who knows what might befall them?

In the end. as we all know, the latter-day Ahasueruses into whose hands they had placed their destinies betrayed them, and the glorious Jewish communities of the Iberian Peninsula were destroyed overnight, with the blessing of the monarchy, through expulsion, massacre and forced conversion.

Of course, from our post-Holocaust perspective the patriotic self-delusion exhibited by the Spanish Jewish commentator appears pathetic, if not pathological. It reminds us of the naiveté of those German and Polish Jews who upheld their faith in the decency of European enlightenment, until the bitter end.

And yet, it is difficult to know if we would have acted differently under the circumstances. Only in recent years have the Jewish communities of the United States and Canada become aware how our governments (unlike that of Australia), while maintaining public postures of liberality and benevolence, were in fact hard at work suppressing all reports of Nazi genocide, and insuring that no Jewish refugees would find refuge on our hospitable shores. At the same time, Her Majesty’s Government in the United Kingdom was making additional efforts to keep the Jews out of Palestine, for fear of alienating their Middle-Eastern allies. 

Through all those years of betrayal, the Jews of these enlightened lands continued to maintain unwavering faith in the uprightness of their leaders. Any alternative was unimaginable.

I expect that future generations of Jews will continue to examine the story of Purim from the perspective of their own experiences. Even after the last despicable Haman has vanished from the earth, the events and personalities of the Book of Esther will inspire us to insightful discussions about the ideals of good government.

• First Publication:
  • Ha’Atid, the magazine of the Melbourne Hebrew Congregation, Spring 2000.
• For further reading:
  • Barry Walfish, Esther in Medieval Garb: Jewish Interpretation of The Book of Esther in the Middle Ages, SUNY series in Judaica. (Albany, N.Y.: State University of New York Press, 1993)

My email address is: [email protected]

This article is included in the collection: In Those Days, At This Time: Holiness and History in the Jewish Calendar, University of Calgary Press, 2007.