Rabbi says: which is an upright path for which a person should opt? – One which is honourable for those who do it and which [also] brings honour from mankind. Be as careful with a simple mitzvah as with a serious one, since you do not know the reward for each mitzvah. Calculate the loss of a mitzvah against its reward, and the reward of a sin against its loss. Watch for three things and you will not come to sin: know what is above you – a seeing eye, a listening ear and all your deeds written in the book.
4:
The Roman emperor Hadrian survived Rabbi Akiva, the greatest of those who suffered from his policies in Eretz-Israel, by a bare two years. He was succeeded by Antoninus Pius. Antoninus was a very different kettle of fish: gentle, unassuming and philosophic by nature, he ruled the Roman empire with a very light – but firm – hand. When he assumed power he was already 57 years old and he ruled for some 23 years; thus when he died in March 161 CE he was eighty years old. He was succeeded by the even more famous (but no less liberal) Marcus Aurelius, who reigned until he died on March 17th 180 CE. He was succeeded by his son, Commodus, who turned out to be a megalomaniac and was murdered in December 192 CE. (The Hollywood movie "Gladiator" was very, very loosely inspired by the career of Commodus.) His successor, Septimius Severus reigned for nearly 18 years until he died (in the town of York, England) on 4th February 211 CE. He restored to the rule of the empire the liberal policies that were therefore in force (except for the unfortunate reign of Commodus) for more than seventy years – a truly Golden Age in Roman history.
5:
This period of liberal rule of course had repercussions in Eretz-Israel as well. The economic and social situation gradually improved, and the patience and gentle guidance of Rabban Shim'on ben-Gamli'el restored stability and a modicum of prosperity to the country. His son, Rabbi, was well off. Indeed, in modern terms he was probably a multi-millionaire. Like the Roman emperors of his time Rabbi was an "enlightened prince", generous, cultured, an example of the new "international man" who was, nevertheless, one of the greatest of the rabbinical scholars of his age.
6:
In his household Rabbi would permit only two languages to be spoken: Hebrew and Greek. A 'bastard' language, such as Aramaic, was frowned upon and despised. This rule of culture applied to all in his household, including the slaves and servants. Since the language that almost everyone else spoke at the time was Aramaic, the sages of the time would surreptitiously learn from the women servants in Rabbi's household the meaning of recondite Hebrew words found in our religious literature [Megillah 18a].
To be continued.
As part of the discussion concerning modern democratic government and Lashon Ha-Ra, in Avot 076 I wrote:
I am probably showing exceeding ignorance here, but I can't help thinking that the best solution would be that originally intended by the founding fathers of American democracy. As I understand it their original intention was the indirect election of the President and that the people would put the choice of the best person for the presidency in the hands of a popularly elected electoral college. This would mean that the 'voters' would approach the candidate and the candidate would not have to approach the voters.
Jim Feldman writes:
No reason why you should be familiar with the origins of the Electoral College. Few enough Americans are. The original rational was that in the 1790's, there was no way that a presidential candidate could campaign throughout the country. Thus it seemed necessary to delegate the task of getting to know the candidates to the select few who made up the Electoral College (1 member for each representative in the House and one for each senator. With each state having two senators and 1 or more representatives in proportion to its population, each state had a minimum of 3 electoral college votes.) It proved clumsy and unworkable and was later changed in several ways, the most important being that the electors are precomitted on how they will vote. There is much talk about eliminating the Electoral College altogether, but the states with tiny populations would then lose any impact on the election. (The huge state of Alaska, for example, has a population no bigger than any of Israel's major cities whereas our biggest cities exceed the whole population of Israel.)
Lest you think that the Electoral College reduced lashon hara, you need only consider the election of 1800 between Jefferson and Adams (incumbent.) I do not think anything worse has been said in the intervening 204 years than was said about the two founding-father candidates in that election. It is how politics gets done. That is not to condone it. It turns a lot of people off. But if one candidate starts down the lashon hara path, the other candidate is regarded as a weakling if he or she does not respond, more or less in kind.
I respond:
I thank Jim for this illuminating information. Concerning his last paragraph let me say just this: Quod erat demonstrandum (it proves my case) – unfortunately.
Discussion on this topic is now closed.
