Avot164

May He who blessed our ancestors Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel and Leah, bless Ariel ben Vera Sharon for whom all Israel is praying. May God have mercy upon him, strengthen him, and speedily send him from heaven a complete recovery, both mental and physical, among all the other invalids in Israel. And let us say Amen.

13:
The next task that the author of the midrash which is at the heart of our mishnah is to find a biblical verse which supports the idea that even when only two people are occupied with Torah study the Divine Presence rests with them. In this case his task is easier than in the previous cases. But before we explain how he uses the verse it would be useful to address the issue of aggadic midrash as a whole. The need to do this only became apparent to me after I received a comment from Amnon Ronel: "I find it difficult to become enthused by a didactic method which rips parts of verses from their context and meaning. These midrashim are too tortuous for my taste." I am sure that Amnon's words find an echo in the thoughts of many reading these shiurim.

14:
We must bear in mind that there is a difference between halakhic midrash and aggadic midrash. There is a prolonged and detailed description of the origins and methods of halakhic midrash in Avot 050 which continues, in fact, through to Avot 055. Halakhic midrash uses a method of logical extraction from the text in order to reach its conclusions. Aggadic midrash is a different kettle of fish. It is a common misconception that halakhah is concerned with actions whereas aggadah is concerned with thought. Already in Avot 003 I wrote: "The difference between halakhah and aggadah is a difference of content and type. Ultimately, halakhah is concerned with defining required behaviour, whereas aggadah is concerned with values." That being the case, the method of aggadic midrash is much more free from the constraints of pure logic.

15:
I am certain that in the vast majority of cases the author of an aggadic midrash starts off with an idea and only then seeks to ground that idea in a biblical text. The biblical verse is only a peg upon which he can hang his thought. Sometimes the chosen verse is very apposite; often it requires some tortuous mental acrobatics to reach the desired goal. But, it is important to remember that in aggadic midrash the important thing is the teaching itself, not the method used to anchor that teaching in the biblical text.

16:
If we ask why these sages saw fit to try to connect their teachings of values with a biblical verse I think there are many possible answers. Two which seem to me to be reasonable are:

1. by linking his teaching to a biblical verse the sage was making it easier for his teaching to be remembered: in a milieu in which study was oral study of the verse would entail a recital of all the teachings, both halakhic and midrashic, that 'belonged' with that verse;
2. if it could be shown that the value being taught was even just hinted at in the biblical text it would give that value a much greater importance: if the biblical text is divinely inspired and the value being taught is grounded in a biblical verse then some kind of divine 'approval' can be seen to be implied.

To be continued.

In Avot 159 I wrote: He [Rabbi Ovadya of Bertinoro] says that night time is the time when all the evil spirits, imps, pixies, nixies, hobgoblins, werewolves – the whole panoply of medieval superstition – are abroad, seeking to wreak their malicious intent on innocent people. He also acknowledges the possibility that danger might also be lurking in human form from robbers and bandits – which was also a medieval reality.

Art Kamlet asks:

Is this the origin of the evening hashkiveinu prayer, where we ask for protection from these evil demons – satan?

I respond:

The origin? – no. The superstitious belief that evil spirits abound at night long predates the middle ages! The sages of the Babylonian Talmud could give you the name and function of each of them! However, the hashkivenu prayer is concerned with dangers that beset us at night from human machinations and our natural plight: "enemies, disease, sword, hunger and sorrow". These are dangers which come from without. After that we ask also for divine protection from a danger which comes from within: "remove Satan from before and from behind us". Satan is the epitome of our miraculous ability to give way to temptation – especially when we should not. (The Masorti Siddur Va'ani Tefillati replaces 'Satan' with sitnah – "remove hatred from before and from behind us".)