Avot181a

A lot of mail has accrued in my inbox so this week I am adding an extra shiur in an attempt to reduce the number of messages awaiting attention. Today's shiur contains two messages which arrived on my desk quite some time ago. Both of them are very long. I think that it would be unfair not to bring them to your attention just for that reason, but for future reference: please keep your comments and questions as short as possible; I shall not present long and/or verbose messages, however interesting they may be. Try to limit your messages – which are always very welcome – to 150 words or less.

In Avot 176, in response to a query, I mentioned that some of the prophets offer a monogamous marriage as a metaphor for the relationship between God and Israel.

Naomi Graetz writes:

The problem with the ideal monogamous relationship between God and Israel as described in Hosea 2 is that this attitude also can trap a woman in an abusive relationship, and when she seeks to get out, this model can work against her. I quote below some excerpts from chapter 3 of "A Prophetic Metaphor" of my book, Silence is Deadly: Judaism Confronts Wifebeating where I address this point.

The standard interpretations of Hosea sympathize with the husband, who has put up with so much from this fickle woman and who desperately promises his wife everything if only she will return to him. The midrash depicts the relationship between God and His people in a poignant manner as a husband/master/God who cannot send His wife/subjects/people away, nor can He divorce her, for she, like Hosea's wife, has borne Him children. God says to Hosea that if "Thou cannot even be sure that her children are yours, and yet you cannot separate from her, how, then, can I separate Myself from Israel, from My children…" (B. Pesahim 87a b). God is seen here as all forgiving, and the husband who cannot separate himself from his wife is the model after which Hosea is expected to pattern himself. In the Midrash, there are several fables that depict God as a king who is angry with his wife, or as a father who is angry with his son. In these stories, there are "happy endings": the king buys his wife some jewelry and they presumably kiss and make up, despite his previous statements that he will divorce her; the father scolds his son for not going to school and then afterwards invites him to dine with him (Numbers Rabbah 2:15).

Despite the sympathetic overtones in the midrash, we see that in the biblical text the "poignant relationship" is achieved at a price. The possibility of violence in this intimate relationship is stated. We see it played out in a midrash, on the verse "If thou Lend money to any of My people" (Exod. 22:24), which compares God to a wifebeater. This midrash describes how, after Israel was driven from Jerusalem, their enemies said that God had no desire for His people. Jeremiah asked God if it was true that He had rejected His children: "Hast Thou Utterly rejected Judah? Hath Thy soul loathed Zion? Why hast Thou smitten us, and there is no healing for us?" (Jer. 14:19). It can be compared to a man who was beating his wife. Her best friend asked him: "How long will you go on beating her? If your desire is to drive her out [of life], then keep on beating her till she dies; but if you do not wish her [to die], then why do you keep on beating her?" His reply was: "I will not divorce my wife even if my entire palace becomes a ruin." This is what Jeremiah said to God: "If Thy desire be to drive us out [of this world], then smite us till we die." As it says, "Thou canst not have utterly rejected us, and be exceedingly wroth against us! [Lam. 5:22], but if this is not [Thy desire], then "Why hast Thou smitten us, and there is no healing for us?" God replied: "I will not banish Israel, even if I destroy my world," as it says, "Thus saith the Lord: If heaven above can be measured…then will I also cast off all the seed of Israel…[Jer. 31:37] (Exodus Rabbah on Mishpatim 31:10)

Why should this concern us at all, since presumably the metaphor only expresses the social reality of the biblical period? However, the argument for an historical setting recedes if we realize that, because of the sanctification of Hosea 2 in a fixed Haftara, it plays a role in perpetuating biblical patriarchalism into our own day. Because of its morally flawed allegory, the message of the prophets can be understood as permitting husbands to abuse their wives psychologically and physically.

An argument for the continuance of this fixed Haftara in the tradition might be that of its so called "happy end." If we examine God's declaration of love to "his" people superficially, it appears to be a monogamous declaration by God to "his" formerly faithless people. Hosea 2:16 22 goes as follows:

I will speak coaxingly to her and lead her through the wilderness and speak to her tenderly…. There she shall submit/respond as in the days of her youth, when she came up from the land of Egypt. And in that day — declares the Lord — you will call [Me] Ishi [husband], and no more will you call Me Ba'ali. For I will remove the names of the Ba'alim from her mouth, and they shall nevermore be mentioned by name. In that day, I will make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, the birds of the air, and the creeping things of the ground; I will also banish bow, sword, and war from the land. Thus I will let them lie down in safety. And I will espouse you forever: I will espouse you with righteousness and justice, and with goodness and mercy, and I will espouse you with faithfulness; Then you shall be devoted to [yadat et] the Lord.

One might claim that in a polytheistic society, the assumption of total faithfulness on God's part and the demand of faithfulness to a single God on the people's part was revolutionary. The prophet's use of the marriage metaphor, "You will call [Me] ishi [my man/husband], is a new vision of a God who will not tolerate a polygamous association. "And no more will you call me Ba'ali [my husband/lord/master]. For I will remove the names of the Ba'alim [pagan gods]…" The monogamous aspect of marriage on the part of the husband is clearly unusual, but it still does not address the problematics involved in monogamy when one side controls the other.

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In Avot 174 I wrote of two kinds of observant Jews: one who is obedient out of fear of sin; the other out of a rationalistic appreciation of his or her own perception of the validity of the mitzvah in question.

Michael Poretsky has written a very long message. My few comments are interspersed.

Your analysis leaves out those who follow mitzvot as the result of a belief that there is, in fact, a God Who has created the world, Who loves His creation and is, in some fashion, active in its management. Those who hold this position follow the commands of a commander with the knowledge that it is not always possible for human minds to understand why God has mandated some behaviors, permitted some and prohibited some. This understanding also enables one to develop a personal relationship with God, a concept we Jews unfortunately shy away from because it sounds too Christian.

You say, "The God-fearing person submits … because he or she … seeks the divine pleasure and fears the divine displeasure and its consequences. (Thus the person who fears God is to be distinguished from the person who loves God.) The sin-fearing person refrains from doing what is wrong because they are convinced that sins are inherently bad and wrong." Do you here equate the sin fearing person with those love God? Might it not be more accurate to say that those who love God submit in the belief/knowledge that God commands our behavior for our individual and corporate well-being?

You use the illustration of "(t)he sin-fearing man who refrains from murder because the idea of taking another human life is repulsive; the God-fearing woman refrains from murder because she is afraid of the consequences – divine punishment." What happens when the sin-fearing man is convinced that strapping on an explosive belt is a holy act? I submit that allowing each person to make their own moral decisions without anchoring those decisions to the Torah leads to chaos. One need only come up with a new definition of "murder."

I comment: Anyone who does such a thing cannot possibly be sin-fearing: that is a tautology. Such a person has allowed his obsession with his interpretation of God's will to override God's express command not to murder – for palpably evil (and possibly self-centered) purposes.

In 175 you equate the Takanot of Rabbeinu Gershom to the developing move in the Conservative Movement to give full rights (including ordination) to gays and lesbians. There is, I think, a great difference. Rabbeinu Gershom prohibited a behavior the Torah permitted (but did not mandate) when he prohibited polygamy. He modified the application of a Torah law when he mandated that the wife must affirmatively accept the bill of divorce and could not be forced to do so against her will. I may be wrong, but I can think of no takkanah that permits what the Torah prohibits.

I comment: The idea is discussed in Yevamot 89b, Gittin 36b and 83a, Ketubot 52b etc. "The sages may uproot something from the Torah". But see my last comment, below.

If you do not object to a rabbi who teaches that eating pork or a cheeseburger is kosher, than there can be no reason to object to a rabbi who teaches that "lying with a man as one would with a woman" is also kosher. If you believe there is a loving, Divine imperative driving the mitzvot, you follow all of them, even those you don't understand.

I comment: All Conservative rabbis object to eating pork etc. As regards "lying with a man" etc, see my responsum Dear David, where the issue is not to permit something which the Torah prohibits but 'Migdar Milta', a more accurate definition of what it is that the Torah prohibits.

Discussion on both of these topics is now closed.