7:
I have received two comments that I think are so timely that I am going to bring my response as part of this shiur, rather than in a separate "discussion" section. This is because I think that the issue raised and, hopefully, my response are an integral part of the elucidation of our present mishnah. The two comments were saying more or less the same thing. One, from
Amnon Ron'el, was more mild-mannered; the other, from
Jim Feldman, more forthright. So I present here Jim's comment in full:
Does this contemptuous commentary not make you suspect of the whole lot of them? "We know what is holy and if you don't let us dictate to you all the hoops you must jump through, you are contemptible and unworthy." And of course, if everyone did jump through all the hoops, they would simply increase the number of hoops until they could once again hold all of us am-haAretz in contempt. This section of Mishnah has lowered my opinion of Hillel. He is both weak and unworthy.
The rest of today's shiur is my response.
8:
If contempt was perceived in what I wrote it would have been not for what Hillel has said but for the interpretation of his words given by much later worthies: I quoted Rambam and Rabbi Ovadyah of Bertinoro. It is true, that I find their comments excruciatingly condescending. Rambam was an out-and-out Aristotelian: to him Aristotle was almost on a par with the Israelite prophets of old! Rambam prefaced his commentary on Tractate Avot with a very long philosophical-psychological introduction which is so long that he had to divide it into eight chapters! (Rambam's introduction to Avot is often called his "Eight Chapters" [Shemoneh Perakim].) In this introduction he seeks to demonstrate how the ethical and philosophical teachings of the sages in Avot are, in fact, in the best tradition of Aristotelian philosophy and psychology. It's not Hillel's fault that Maimonides tried to present his teaching as meaning something that he never intended. To thoroughly mix my metaphors, the Great Eagle dressed Hillel in borrowed robes.
9:
What Hillel actually said is very simple. His dictum must derive from the premise that the commandments of the Torah are God's requirements of us – commandments, and not 'recommendations' or 'suggestions', as some moderns would have it. No other premise would have crossed Hillel's mind. It is axiomatic for him that 'leading the good life' means meeting God's 'requirements'. In order to observe the commandments you have to know what they are: it is therefore a simple truism from Hillel's point of view that someone who is ignorant of God's commandments cannot be sin-fearing. It is an intellectual impossibility. Such a person might observe some of the commandments, but it would be sheer happenstance and certainly not 'fear of sin' because they do not know what the sin is. This is the person characterized by Hillel as what I have translated as 'ignoramus'. (The original Hebrew denotes someone without of knowledge.)
10:
Someone who does their best to live up to the demands of the commandments because they hold that the ultimate source of these commandments is divine is striving for piety. Thus piety is an ethico-moral striving which is prompted by religious considerations. If a person knowingly chooses not to observe some or all of the commandments they may be good people in many ways but they cannot be called pious. It is a semantic impossibility. Such a person might observe some of the commandments, but it would not be as an act of piety because they have wittingly or unwittingly rejected piety. This is the person characterized by Hillel as what I have translated as 'fool'. (In my original shiur I gave a long explanation of the etymology of the original Hebrew.)
11:
Our modern problem with what Hillel has to say lies not in what he says but in his original premise. The moment we remove the certainty of a divine origin for the mitzvot we have introduced an ethical relativism which vitiates Hillel's dictum. That is not his fault.
To be continued.
In Avot 104 I gave my understanding of the implications of Hillel's dictum: "Do not say something which it is impossible to obey, because in the end it must be obeyed". My comments can be found there. However,
Marc Auslander has a different view of the meaning of the mishnah:
I understood it in more personal terms – do not make a vow that you will not be able to keep because in the end you are responsible for your vows. I wonder if there is any validity to this interpretation.
I respond:
I have not found any source which links this dictum to the whole business of vows. Not that that necessarily invalidates Marc's suggestion. The source that comes nearest to what Marc is saying is to be found in the Torah [Deuteronomy 23:22-24]:
If you promise God something do not delay payment, for God will certainly require it of you and you will be found to be sinning. It is no sin to refrain from making [such] promises, but what you have uttered you must fulfill and make the donation that you promised God you would make.
However, the context there is concerned with a person promising to bring an offering to the Bet Mikdash. I once [May 3rd 2000] commented on those biblical verses thus:
In moments of great joy it is not uncommon for people to make promises to God. These promises usually take the form of a donation to some institution which is presumed to have divine blessing. In ancient times it was almost universal that expressions of such gratitude to heaven be made through the offering of "a free-will offering" brought to the Bet Mikdash. One classic example is the reaction of Elkanah and Ĥannah to the birth of their long-awaited son, Samuel… However, even in the case of Ĥannah we perceive a certain reticence to actually fulfill the promise: she postpones payment until the child is weaned. One can imagine that less-motivated people would postpone the fulfillment of their promises indefinitely. It is to combat this tendency that the sages interpreted the verses from Deuteronomy 23 that we quoted above, as referring to the duty to make immediate payment of promises made to God.
Generally speaking, the sages disapproved of people making solemn vows, because there is always the danger that when the time comes it will not be easy for the person who made the vow to keep it. But, nevertheless, it must be kept. So, even though I have not found a source that corroborates Marc's suggestion it certainly makes good sense.
