Sanhedrin 038

נושא: Sanhedrin

Sanhedrin 038

BET MIDRASH VIRTUALI

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Today's shiur is dedicated by Sherry Fyman to the memory of her father, Fred Fyman, z"l, whose Yahrzeit occurs tomorrow, 21st Sivan.

לֹא יַרְבֶּה לּוֹ נָשִׁים, אֶלָּא שְׁמוֹנֶה עֶשְׂרֵה. רַבִּי יְהוּדָה אוֹמֵר, מַרְבֶּה הוּא לוֹ וּבִלְבַד שֶׁלֹּא יְהוּ מְסִירוֹת אֶת לִבּוֹ. רַבִּי שִׁמְעוֹן אוֹמֵר, אֲפִלּוּ אַחַת וּמְסִירָה אֶת לִבּוֹ, הֲרֵי זֶה לֹא יִשָּאֶנָּה. אִם כֵּן לָמָּה נֶאֱמַר "וְלֹא יַרְבֶּה לּוֹ נָשִׁים"? – אֲפִלּוּ כַאֲבִיגָיִל.

"He shall not have too many women" – no more than eighteen. Rabbi Yehudah says that he most certainly may have many, provided that they do not estrange him [from Judaism]. Rabbi Shim'on says that even one who could estrange him is too many and he should not take her. In which case, why does the Torah say "He shall not have too many women"? – even one as [righteous as] Abigail.

1:
Our mishnah continues to elaborate on the Torah text establishing the ground rules for a monarchy. The quotation which our mishnah starts is from Deuteronomy 17:17. I have translated "women" rather than "wives" since the noun, in its Biblical usage in context, would include all women taken into the king's harem, be they "legitimate" wives or what we might call "concubines". (Though there is one opinion that the Biblical term in this present context comes to exclude "concubines" whose number, presumably, is unlimited according to this opinion. Since it runs counter to the tenor of the rest of our mishnah, I think we can ignore it.)

2:
We must understand the extraordinarily high number of women permitted the king against its historical background. In the ancient Near-East a large harem was considered to be just as important to a king's international prestige as a large treasury and a large army. Usually the number of "legitimate" (or "real") wives in the harem was only two or three. The most prestigious of the women in the harem was the woman who was the mother of the prince who was to succeed his father: when he became king in his own right his mother would assume the title of "Gevirah" and would have great power and influence. This can not be said of the king's wives.

3:
There seem to be three opinions quoted in our mishnah: that of Tanna Kamma, that of Rabbi Yehudah [ben-Ilai] and that of Rabbi Shim'on [ben-Yoĥai]. The opinion of Tanna Kamma seems to be clear: the king may only have up to eighteen women in his harem. In what way the other two sages demur at the view of Tanna Kamma is not clear. The Gemara [Sanhedrin 21a] justifies the exact number eighteen on the basis of a rather dubious exposition of the number of women in King David's harem. I rather think that the number was reached through experience teaching at approximately what number the roster of women in the royal harem would become problematic – for whatever reason.

4:
In order to understand the views of rabbis Yehudah and Shim'on we must re-examine the Biblical text. The bald statement "He shall not have too many wives" is explained with the phrase "that his heart not become estranged". This Deuteronomistic law is obviously based on 'ex post facto' experience. Solomon, for instance, was a righteous and just king until he started taking many women into his harem. These women were part of peace treaties with foreign kings. In order to secure the peace it was customary to arrange marriages between the two royal households. This means that many foreign women were admitted into the royal establishment, and they, of course, would continue their religious customs as heretofore.

Now King Solomon loved many foreign women, including the daughter of the Pharaoh, Moabite, Ammonite, Edomite, Sidonian and Hittite women, women of those nations with which God had forbidden the Israelites to intermarry "for they will definitely estrange your heart after their gods". It was such women that Solomon lovingly embraced. Seven hundred princesses and three hundred concubines were there in his harem, and his women did indeed estrange him… Solomon strayed after Astarte the goddess of the Sidonians and after Milkom the abomination of the Ammonites… On a mountain top facing Jerusalem Solomon built a place of worship for Kemosh the abomination of Moab and one for Molekh the abomination of Ammon. He acted similarly for all his foreign wives…[1Kings 11:1-8].

The Deuteronomistic ambience of this passage is obvious and, as I have indicated above, the passage in Deuteronomy obviously reflects the extreme disquiet that the Solomonic experience generated in the hearts of the sages. (Moab and Ammon were kingdoms situated in what is now the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, and the name "Ammon" is reflected to this day in the name of Jordan's capital city, Amman. Sidon was a Canaanite city-state in what is now the coast of Southern Lebanon. Edom lay astride the present border between Israel and Jordan south of the Dead Sea and north of the Gulf of Aqaba. The Hittite empire was based in what is now Turkey.)

5:
The best way to understand the 'maĥloket' [difference of opinion] reflected in our mishnah seems to be as follows:

Tanna Kamma is of the opinion that up to eighteen in number the king may take women into his harem regardless of their religious ambience. Rabbi Yehudah agrees with Tanna Kamma that up to eighteen womenfolk is the king's prerogative regardless of their religion; but he is also of the opinion that the king may have even more than eighteen women in his harem as long as there is no danger that they will estrange him from Judaism. Rabbi Shim'on is of the opinion that the king may not take into his harem even one woman whose opinions might estrange him from Judaism and in any event more that eighteen, "even one as righteous as Abigail" is prohibited. (Abigail was one of King David's wives.)

Bayla Singer relates to something we mentioned in our Shiur of June 7th:

I have heard that some ultra-orthodox parties in today's Israel are pressing for the rebuilding of the Bet HaMikdash and even the re-institution of animal sacrifice. If the halachic order is "appoint a king; fight Amalek; build the Bet HaMikdash" have I missed hearing about a call for appointing a king etc?

I respond:

I think I have mentioned a couple of times already that the sages understand the Biblical term "king" to indicate "government", or the "officer administering the government". I believe that Israel's former Minister of Religions, Dr Zeraĥ Warhaftig, once said that each member of the Kenesset is one one hundred and twentieth part of a king.

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