Hillel says: Do not opt out of society; do not believe in yourself until your dying day; do not judge your fellow until you reach his place; do not say something which it is impossible to obey, because in the end it must be obeyed; and do not say, 'When I get some free time I will study' – you may not get any free time.
17:
The last two items in our present mishnah are clearly concerned with Torah study. The first one is rather recondite in Hebrew and the translation given above is to a certain extent idiosyncratic:
Do not say something which it is impossible to obey, because in the end it must be obeyed. Clearly the injunction is addressed to sages and rabbis whose task it is to decide halakhah in novel circumstances. The verb that I have translated
obey usually bears in Hebrew the connotation of
hear, but that meaning is clearly not suitable in this case. The Hebrew verb "to hear" often has the connotation of "to obey": the oft-quoted undertaking of the Israelites at the covenant ceremony under Moses' direction [
Exodus 24:7],
Na'aseh ve-nishma is best translated
We shall observe and obey – despite the beautiful midrashim that have attached themselves to the other possible meaning of the Hebrew verb. (Indeed, it is even possible that in Moses' core injunction [
Deuteronomy 6:4] rather than "Hear, Israel" is that Israel should "obey" God's commands simply because He is "the Lord our God".
18:
The classical commentators have understood the recommendation of our mishnah to be that sages should pass on their teaching in as succinct a format as possible, so that there shall be no misunderstandings by their students. However, as I have already said, I can't help feeling that the true intention was to warn against exaggeration in the field of halakhah. There is a limit to what may be demanded of even the most devout of religious people. If the interpretation of halakhah demands of such people more than even they are capable of doing then a grave disservice is being done to Judaism, because, in the end, if the halakhic interpretation is correct "it must be obeyed".
19:
I feel that the advice given in our present mishnah is somewhat similar to the halakhic regulation [Bava Batra 60b] that
We do not impose a halakhic requirement on the community unless the majority of the community are capable of obeying it.
And the examples given in that source is a very good illustration, to my mind, of what Hillel is teaching in our present mishnah. With the destruction of the Bet Mikdash it was seriously suggested that, as a sign of Israel's grief, we should no longer eat meat or drink wine. In that same source it was seriously suggested that since the Roman authorities will not permit us to observe properly the week of celebration that comes after a wedding that we should no longer marry and procreate! But the same sage as made these suggestions also realised that they were supremely impracticable, since the majority of the community would not be able to obey such regulations. And this is what Hillel is teaching the sages as well:
If a word is worth one dollar, silence is worth two.
To be continued.
Mishnah 4 of our present chapter taught: "Do His will as your will so that He might do your will as His will. Nullify your will for His will so that He might nullify the will of others for your will." And you will recall that this gave us no small a problem.
Gabrielle Harris writes:
I have recently been reading Lawrence Fine's book Physician of the Soul, Healer of the Cosmos concerning Isaac Luria and the Community up in Safed in the 1500's. I have been much surprised by the weight this community gave (as described by Fine) to the potential for real mutual influence between God and man. I'm wondering whether the teaching in Mishnah Four of Chapter Two might have been a jumping-off point for this kind of idea? It's interesting that Rambam ignores it.
I respond:
I certainly agree that had Rambam known of Kabbalah – and I am certain that he did not – he would have dismissed it, condemned it and ridiculed it in a fashion similar to the way in which he related to the 'science' of astrology. Gabrielle suggests an interesting connection. Of course, it is not possible to prove the matter one way or the other; but the mishnah is quoted at least twice in respectable kabbalistic sources along the lines that Gabrielle is suggesting. I am thinking in particular of the quotation of that mishnah in such a context by the Shelah – Rabbi Isaiah Horowitz [1565-1630].
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