tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-90304661698053011322023-11-15T09:16:30.623-08:00ParshanutRunning commentaries on a featured commentator on the weekly Torah portion. This year: Rashbam.EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.comBlogger42125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-5163934543645817482009-01-28T17:54:00.000-08:002009-01-28T17:56:44.142-08:00Bo II: Deep Peshat<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;"></span><span style=";font-size:130%;" lang="HE"><span dir="rtl"></span>(ט) לאות על ידך - לפי עומק פשוטו יהיה לך לזכרון תמיד כאילו כתוב על ידך. כעין שימני כחותם על לבך:</span><span dir="ltr" style=";font-size:130%;" ><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span dir="ltr" style=";font-size:130%;" ><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" >In this comment on Shemot 13:9, Rashbam offers one of his most famous and controversial <i>peshat</i> interpretations on the Torah.<span style=""> </span>The verse says “It shall be a sign on your arm and a rememberance between your eyes, so that the Lord’s teaching will always be in your mouth…” Rabbinic interpretation understands this verse to refer to the very concrete <i>mitzvah</i> of <i>tefillin</i>.<span style=""> </span>One is to literally put the words of this passage—and three others with similar formulations—on one’s arm and head in the form of boxes containing written scrolls.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;">Rashbam comes along and offers a radical, straightforward alternative: The usage of arm and eyes here is figurative.</span><span style=";font-size:130%;" > </span><span style="font-size:130%;">The “sign” and “rememberance” refer to a desire that this powerful narrative be remembered and kept front and center in one’s consciousness.</span><span style=";font-size:130%;" > </span><span style="font-size:130%;">Rashbam cites a parallel usage from Shir Hashirim, where the female figure asks her male counterpart to make her like a seal on his heart and on his arm, which clearly does not refer to wearing some sort of <i>tefillin</i> item as a token of love!</span><span style=";font-size:130%;" > </span><span style="font-size:130%;">(For other examples of this sort of figurative usage, see Yirmiyahu 31:32, Mishlei 3:1,3, 6:20-22, 7:2-3.)</span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" >To have something as a “sign on one’s arm” means to have it so ubiquitous in one’s life experience that it is as if it is engraved on one’s body and thus unforgettable and unavoidable.<span style=""> </span>Indeed, this is the understanding of non-rabbinic sects like Karaites and Samaritans, who do not have a practice of wearing <i>tefillin</i>.<span style=""> </span>And, in fact, there seem to have been some of Rashbam’s contemporaries who were seduced by this reading of these verses.<span style=""> </span>R. Yosef Bekhor Shor, a younger contemporary of Rashbam, in his own peshat-based commentary on the Torah, explains in a comment on Devarim 6:8 how the details of <i>tefillin</i> can be derived from the various verses of the Torah.<span style=""> </span>He then goes on to say the following:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" ><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" >“There is no doubt in this matter [that the verses here refer to <i>tefillin</i> and all of the rabbinic specifications of how to make them], for so we have received from our masters, and such is the practice of our ancestors.<span style=""> </span>And one who claims there is some doubt is like one who claims that <i>alef</i> might be <i>bet</i> and vice-versa and will be yet be called to account.”<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" ><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" >It is fairly clear that Rashbam himself put on <i>tefillin</i>, however, leading us back again to the question of what exactly he thinks he is doing when he offers comments that diverge from traditional, practiced understandings of the Torah.<span style=""> </span>Here the phrase <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">עומק פשוטו</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>—deep <i>peshat</i>—that he uses here may be helpful, and, in turn, we can understand better what he means by that phrase, which appears in 5 different places in his commentary.<span style=""> </span>[The other 4 are Bereishit 37:2, 37:28, 49:16, and Shemot 3:14.]<span style=""> </span>My best sense of what he means by this is that “deep <i>peshat</i>” is that plain reading of the text that one can only come to after working very hard to peel away the layers of preconceptions that obstruct one’s direct appreciation of the text at hand.<span style=""> </span>In a way, the goal is to read the text like a novice, almost like a child, and to feel the power of what it has to say, unfiltered, as if it were being revealed for the first time today, with only its own language to explain itself.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" ><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" >Rashbam’s commitment to this sort of <i>peshat</i> seems to emerge from a conviction that without it, we would deprive the Torah of a major element of its essential character: its power to speak to us as a book.<span style=""> </span>Even if the Torah is also interpreted in other ways, the deep <i>peshat</i> must not be neglected, lest we minimize the Torah’s power.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" ><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" >So how does this interact with the rabbinic interpretations that ground Jewish practice?<span style=""> </span>David Weiss Halvini talks about this in his <i>Peshat and Derash</i>.<span style=""> </span>Here is a brief passage from page 82:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" ><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" >“Peshat and derash are two distinct levels of interpretation.<span style=""> </span>You follow the peshat when you are interpreting the meaning of the text…When peshat and derash contradict, one teaches the peshat but behaves according to the derash…one lives by the derash…Even when the peshat is not followed practically, one still has to study the text according to peshat.<span style=""> </span>The <i>theoretical</i> (emphasis mine—EMT) value of peshat ought never to be ignored.”<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" ><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" >I might soften this a bit and inject a bit more subtlety.<span style=""> </span>The power of <i>peshat</i> is not just theoretical, in the sense of a stimulating and interesting intellectual exercise.<span style=""> </span>It is <i>religiously</i> practical as well, if not <i>ritually</i> practical.<span style=""> </span>One might put on <i>tefillin</i> every morning while still recognizing that this ritual action is ultimately connecting us to deep places in our national memory and to God’s deep love for the Jewish people as expressed through the story of the Exodus.<span style=""> </span>Maintaining deep <i>peshat</i> helps us remember that the Torah retains a power to draw us into its message without need of accumulated layers of interpretation.<span style=""> </span>Even if those interpretations shape and define my entire religious life, Rashbam encourages us to revisit the power of the Torah again and again through <i>peshat</i>, in a way that can help us recover and maintain the kind of connection necessary to keep its ongoing interpretation alive.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" ><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <span dir="rtl" style="font-family: times new roman;font-family:";font-size:130%;" lang="HE">
</span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com17tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-22179909941936775922009-01-28T17:48:00.000-08:002009-01-28T17:53:54.555-08:00Bo I: The Essence of Peshat<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE"><span style="font-family:times new roman;">ראש חדשים - כר' יהושע שבניסן נברא העולם:</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE"><span style="font-family:times new roman;">לחדשי השנה - בכל מקום שאומר לכם בחדשים שמיני תשיעי, לחודש הזה הם. ולר' אליעזר האומר בתשרי נברא העולם, עיקר פשוטו כך. החדש הזה לכם. אעפ"י שאינו ראש חדשים לשאר אומות, לכם יהי' ראש חדשים למנות ששי שביעי שמיני תשיעי חדש שנים עשר הוא חודש אדר. ממנו תמנו להיות לכם זכרון [כי] בו יצאתם ממצרים. וכשנאמר בתורה ובחודש השביעי, לירח יציאת מצרים פירושו. וכן רגילים הפסוקים לקחת חשבונם ליציאת מצרים, כדכת' בחודש השלישי לצאת בני ישראל וגו', וכן בבנין הבית ויהי בשמונים שנה וארבע מאות שנה לצאת בני ישראל מ[ארץ] מצרים:</span><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;">
</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;">I am not even sure if that is the best translation of <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">עיקר פשוטו</span>, the phrase used in the above passage.<span style=""> </span>What is clear from this passage is that this term clearly does not mean, “the one indisputable meaning that the text obviously has to anyone who would read it closely.”<span style=""> </span>In the above passage, Rashbam refers to the well-known debate between R. Eliezer and R. Yehoshua, featured, among other places, on Bavli Rosh Hashanah 10b.<span style=""> </span>R. Eliezer argues that the world was created in Tishrei—a view that ultimately informs the dominant liturgical tradition of considering Rosh Hashanah to be the birthday of the world, <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">היום הרת עולם</span>—whereas R. Yehoshua maintains that the world was created in Nisan, and the Exodus is thus a kind of second creation act.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;">Rashbam then explains how the <i>peshat</i> here could be read as supporting either view.<span style=""> </span>For R. Yeshoshua, the phrase <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">החדש הזה לכם ראש חדשים</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> is almost descriptive: This month, which is the first of the months—because the world was created in this month—will serve as your initial month for your new national calendar.<span style=""> </span>In other words, the Jewish people are here being told that they will order their year in keeping with the history of the world.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;">R. Eliezer, on the other hand, will have to read the verse differently.<span style=""> </span><span dir="rtl" lang="HE">החדש הזה <b>לכם</b> ראש חדשים</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>.<span style=""> </span>For <b>you</b>, unlike the other nations of the world, this will be the first month of the year.<span style=""> </span>You will be different; you will reckon time by your own calendar and realize that your history is fundamentally different from that of the world.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;">This reading is potentially an interesting inversion of how I have always read the debate in Hazal.<span style=""> </span>Whereas R. Eliezer and R. Yehoshua can fairly be read on their own terms as debating the significance of world history in light of Jewish history, Rashbam seems to read them as doing the opposite.<span style=""> </span>Rather than taking the Jewish narrative for granted and then trying to understand where the global narrative fits into it, Rashbam’s reading of this debate back into God’s words to Moshe and Aharon has the effect of making this the moment when God tells the people how they ought to understand their emergent history in light fo the world context they take for granted.<span style=""> </span>Those are two very different approaches to universalism and particularlism.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <span style=";font-family:";font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-family:times new roman;font-size:130%;">As noted above, Rashbam has no problem suggesting that both of these readings might be </span><span style="font-size:130%;"><i style="font-family: times new roman;">peshat</i></span><span style="font-family:times new roman;font-size:130%;">, which adds another definitional element to our ongoing effort to explain this term.</span><span style="font-family:times new roman;font-size:130%;"> </span><span style="font-size:130%;"><i style="font-family: times new roman;">Peshat</i></span><span style="font-family:times new roman;font-size:130%;"> is not the search for a single, undisputed plain meaning.</span><span style="font-family:times new roman;font-size:130%;"> </span><span style="font-family:times new roman;font-size:130%;">It is rather a style of reading, one with certain guidelines and parameters, but one which, like </span><span style="font-size:130%;"><i style="font-family: times new roman;">derash</i></span><span style="font-family:times new roman;font-size:130%;">, can still produce multiple interpretations and theological possibilities.</span>
</span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-60813514053262467442008-01-02T22:35:00.000-08:002008-01-02T22:36:00.299-08:00Va’eira III: Hitpa’el<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">מסתולל - מתפעל מן סולו סולו המסילה. כובש אותם לעבדים כדכת' ויכבשום לעבדים ולשפחות. ולהודיעך שיטת המתפעלים כי כל תיבת המתפעלים באה תוספת תי"ו בראש חוץ מאותן שאוציא מן הכלל לבסוף. מן אמר יאמר יתאמרו כל פועלי און, יתברך, יתגדל, והתגדלתי והתקדשתי, יתהלל המתהלל, יתווכח, ויתחבא, לשוא תתיפי, והמסכה צרה כהתכנס, יתלכדו, ויתמודד, מתנשא, (ויתלקטו), התעללתי, מתפלל, מתרושש והון רב. הרי לך כל האלפא ביתא תי"ו בראשם חוץ משבעת אותיות הללו, דז"ט ס"ץ ש"ת. השי"ן וסמ"ך באה התי"ו אחריהם במתפעל שלהם. מן סל מסתולל, מן שר תשתרר עלינו, מן שבח ישתבח, מן שמר וישתמר חוקות עמרי, מן שכר משתכר. הצד"י והזי"ן לא יבא תי"ו במתפעל שלהם. אלא אחרי הצד"י תבא טי"ת במקום תי"ו של מתפעל. מן צדק יאמר נצטדק, מן צבע יצטבע בדניאל, מן ציד הצטיידנו ביהושע, מן צרף מצטרף. ואחר הזיי"ן תבא דל"ת במקום תי"ו של מתפעל. זמן הזדמנתון בדניאל. אבל תוספת הן בתיבות ט' של נצטדק, ד' של הזדמנתון ותי"ו של יתאמרו לעשותן מתפעל כמו שפירשתי, וכן כולם. אבל הם עצמם כשהם ראש התיבה לא היה בה תוספת אות להתפעל. כמו וישמע את הקול מדבר אליו, לא יאמר מתדבר. לא יטמא בעל, לא יאמר יתטמא. ועם עקש תתפל לא יאמר תתתפל. תתמם, לא יאמר תתתמם:</span></span></p> <span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: times new roman;">I won’t write much on this, but Rashbam’s commentary on Shemot 9:17 is another great chance to watch him work through the fundamentals of grammar that anyone learning Hebrew today takes for granted.<span style=""> </span>Here he takes on the reflexive <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">התפעל</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> form and all of its exceptional cases.</span></span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-49934455039984384842008-01-02T18:59:00.000-08:002008-01-02T19:09:20.744-08:00Va’eira II: No Replacement for Bekiut<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;"></span><span style=";font-size:130%;" lang="HE" ><span dir="rtl"></span>(יז) הערוב - אומר אני כי מיני זאבים הם שנקראים ערוב על שם שדרכם לטרוף בלילות כדכת' זאב ערבות ישדדם וכת' זאבי ערב לא גרמו לבקר. וכאשר יאמר מאודם אדום, כן יאמר מעמק עמוק מערב ערוב נויטריניר ב"ל, שהזאב ערוב הוא שהוא הולך בערב, עמק שם דבר, והמעשה קרוי עמוק [וכן] אדום שחור:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" >In the era of the CD-ROM, it is hard to remember how one functioned before the advent of searchable electronic tools, to say nothing of the concordance and the other trappings of modern scholarly research.<span style=""> </span>Rashbam’s commentary often reminds us of the importance—and power—of sheer mastery of the biblical corpus for solving difficult interpretive problems.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" >Our parashah features one classic example.<span style=""> </span>What is classically known as the fourth plague is described as <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ערוב</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> by the Torah.<span style=""> </span>Unfortunately, the word appears 7 times in <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0206.htm">Shemot chapter 8</a> but is never explicitly defined.<span style=""> </span>How do you figure out what a word like that means?<span style=""> </span>If you are a commentator like Rashbam, you reach for other parts of the Bible to unlock the obscure meaning.<span style=""> </span>In this case—almost certainly influenced by the earlier interpretation offered by Targum Yonatan here—he suggests that <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ערוב</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> refers to wolves.<span style=""> </span>Why are wolves called <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ערוב</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>?<span style=""> </span>Rashbam notes that there are two verses where the word <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">זאב</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> is linked to the root <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ערב</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>, in the sense of nighttime.<span style=""> </span>Wolves prowl in the dark (<span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ערב</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>) and therefore their adjectival form is <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ערוב</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>, just as other nouns like <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">עמק</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> (valley) generate adjectives like <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">עמוק</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> (deep).<span style=""> </span>Only a stunning mastery of Tanakh could really yield this sort of prooftext, which essentially requires knowledge of all places where the root <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ערב</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> appears in Tanakh (there are well over 300) such that one can think about the places where it is used in conjunction with animals that might be plausible matches for this plague.<o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" >I should also note that if we employ Rambam’s approach of <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">כפל לשון</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> (see earlier post), we might arrive at two very different definition of <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ערוב</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>.<span style=""> </span><a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt2678.htm">Tehillim 78</a> features a brief recounting of Israelite history, including God’s punishment of the Egyptians:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span style=";font-size:130%;" lang="HE" >(מד) וַיַּהֲפֹךְ לְדָם יְאֹרֵיהֶם וְנֹזְלֵיהֶם בַּל יִשְׁתָּיוּן</span><span dir="ltr" style="font-size:130%;"></span><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="ltr"></span>:
</span><span style=";font-size:130%;" lang="HE" ><span dir="rtl"></span>(מה) יְשַׁלַּח בָּהֶם עָרֹב וַיֹּאכְלֵם וּצְפַרְדֵּעַ וַתַּשְׁחִיתֵם</span><span dir="ltr" style="font-size:130%;"></span><span dir="ltr" style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="ltr"></span>:</span><span style=";font-size:130%;" lang="HE" ><o:p></o:p>
(מו) וַיִּתֵּן לֶחָסִיל יְבוּלָם וִיגִיעָם לָאַרְבֶּה</span><span dir="ltr" style="font-size:130%;"></span><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="ltr"></span>:
</span><span style=";font-size:130%;" lang="HE" ><span dir="rtl"></span>(מז) יַהֲרֹג בַּבָּרָד גַּפְנָם וְשִׁקְמוֹתָם בַּחֲנָמַל</span><span dir="ltr" style="font-size:130%;"></span><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="ltr"></span>:
</span><span style=";font-size:130%;" lang="HE" ><span dir="rtl"></span>(מח) וַיַּסְגֵּר לַבָּרָד בְּעִירָם וּמִקְנֵיהֶם לָרְשָׁפִים</span><span dir="ltr" style="font-size:130%;"></span><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="ltr"></span>:
</span><span style=";font-size:130%;" lang="HE" ><span dir="rtl"></span>(מט) יְשַׁלַּח בָּם חֲרוֹן אַפּוֹ עֶבְרָה וָזַעַם וְצָרָה מִשְׁלַחַת מַלְאֲכֵי רָעִים</span><span dir="ltr" style="font-size:130%;"></span><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="ltr"></span>:
</span><span style=";font-size:130%;" lang="HE" ><span dir="rtl"></span>(נ) יְפַלֵּס נָתִיב לְאַפּוֹ לֹא חָשַׂךְ מִמָּוֶת נַפְשָׁם וְחַיָּתָם לַדֶּבֶר הִסְגִּיר</span><span dir="ltr" style="font-size:130%;"></span><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="ltr"></span>:
</span><span style=";font-size:130%;" lang="HE" ><span dir="rtl"></span>(נא) וַיַּךְ כָּל בְּכוֹר בְּמִצְרָיִם רֵאשִׁית אוֹנִים בְּאָהֳלֵי חָם</span><span dir="ltr" style="font-size:130%;"></span><span dir="ltr" style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="ltr"></span>:</span><span dir="ltr" style=";font-size:130%;" ><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" >Verse 44 clearly features a parallel structure with each half referring to the transformation of the Nile into blood.<span style=""> </span>Verse 46 similarly features parallel descriptions of locusts devastating the land, and other verses in this passage seem to be in parallel structure as well.<span style=""> </span>Following this pattern, perhaps <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ערוב</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> is parallel to <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">צפרדע</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> and refers to some sort of amphibian or other creature similar to frogs?<span style=""> </span>Or, perhaps following Seforno’s interpretation of <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">צפרדע</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> as crocodile, we are dealing with something even more threatening?<o:p></o:p></span></p> <div style="text-align: left; font-family: times new roman;"><span dir="ltr" style="font-size:130%;">Another possibility is opened up by <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt26a5.htm">Tehillim 105</a>, which has a distinct account of this narrative:</span><span style="font-size:130%;">
</span><span dir="ltr" style="font-size:130%;"><o:p></o:p></span></div> <p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;"></span><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="rtl"></span>(כח) שָׁלַח חֹשֶׁךְ וַיַּחְשִׁךְ וְלֹא מָרוּ אֶת דְּבָרוֹ:
</span><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="rtl"></span>(כט) הָפַךְ אֶת מֵימֵיהֶם לְדָם וַיָּמֶת אֶת דְּגָתָם:
</span><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="rtl"></span>(ל) שָׁרַץ אַרְצָם צְפַרְדְּעִים בְּחַדְרֵי מַלְכֵיהֶם:
</span><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="rtl"></span>(לא) אָמַר וַיָּבֹא עָרֹב כִּנִּים בְּכָל גְּבוּלָם:
</span><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="rtl"></span>(לב) נָתַן גִּשְׁמֵיהֶם בָּרָד אֵשׁ לֶהָבוֹת בְּאַרְצָם:
</span><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="rtl"></span>(לג) וַיַּךְ גַּפְנָם וּתְאֵנָתָם וַיְשַׁבֵּר עֵץ גְּבוּלָם:
</span><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="rtl"></span>(לד) אָמַר וַיָּבֹא אַרְבֶּה וְיֶלֶק וְאֵין מִסְפָּר:
</span><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="rtl"></span>(לה) וַיֹּאכַל כָּל עֵשֶׂב בְּאַרְצָם וַיֹּאכַל פְּרִי אַדְמָתָם:
</span><span style=";font-size:130%;" lang="HE" ><span dir="rtl"></span>(לו) וַיַּךְ כָּל בְּכוֹר בְּאַרְצָם רֵאשִׁית לְכָל אוֹנָם:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style=";font-size:130%;" ><o:p></o:p>Here, each verse describes a single plague, whether that of darkness, blood, frogs, hail, locusts, or death of the first-born.<span style=""> </span>The only exception is verse 31, which seems to speak about both <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ערוב</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> and lice.<span style=""> </span>But what if this verse hews to the pattern of the rest of the section and <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ערוב</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> and lice are essentially the same thing, either different terms for the same plague or similar invasions of insects?<o:p></o:p></span></p> <span style="font-family: times new roman;font-family:";font-size:130%;" >Thoughts?</span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-19505653645583031402008-01-02T18:52:00.000-08:002008-01-02T18:58:50.848-08:00Va’eira I: Only What is Necessary<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">ובני קהת עמרם ויצהר וחברון ועוזיאל - על שלשה בני קהת עמרם ויצהר ועוזיאל מפרש בניהם ועל חברון לא פירש. ואם תאמר כי לא היו לו בנים, והלא בחומש הפקודים כתיב ומשפחת החברוני. ולמה לא פירש כאן בני חברון? לפי שאינן נזכרים בתורה לפנינו שמותם אבל אילו שלשה עמרם ויצהר ועוזיאל הוזכרו בניהם בתורה. [בני] עמרם בשביל אהרן ומשה ומרים, בני יצהר בשביל קרח דכתיב ויקח קרח בן יצהר וגו', בני עוזיאל בשביל מישאל ואלצפן דכתיב ויקרא משה אל מישאל ואל אלצפן בני עוזיאל דוד אהרן, ובני קרח אסיר ואלקנה לפי שכתוב לפנינו ובני קרח לא מתו, ובני אהרן על שם שכתוב ואל משה אמר עלה אל י"י אתה ואהרן נדב ואביהוא, ואלעזר בן אהרן וגו' בשביל פנחס בן אלעזר. אבל בבני איתמר לא פירש כאן שאין צריך להזכירן לפנינו בתורה:<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style=""><a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0206.htm">Shemot 6</a> features a genealogy right in the middle of the narrative of <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">יציאת מצרים</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>.<span style=""> </span>Seeing as it begins with Reuven and then shorts out with the completion of details on the Levitic line, the ostensible purpose is the introduction of Moshe and Aharon before they spring into action with Par’oh.<span style=""> </span>But this section is also full of other genealogical details that are not critical for the story at hand.<span style=""> </span>More important, Rashbam notes that while Shemot 6:18 enumerates Kehat’s four children, it only provides names for the children of three of them, withholding details on Hevron.<span style=""> </span>Why?<o:p> </o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">Rashbam, employing his exegetical category of <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">הקדמה</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>, astutely notes that the other three children of Kehat produce offspring who feature in subsequent stories in the Torah.<span style=""> </span>Amram’s children, Moshe, Aharon and Miryam, are obvious protagonists.<span style=""> </span>But Yitzhar’s children include Korah—Korah’s children are also mentioned because their survival is specifically pointed out after their father’s violent death—and Uzziel’s children include Mishael and Eltzafan, who play the important role of dragging Nadav and Avihu out of the inner sanctum after they are struck down by God.<span style=""> </span>Finally, not only are Aharon’s children mentioned—they will be important as priests later on—but so is his grandson Pinhas, who will play an important role of his own.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">This explanation is an example of one so powerful that it seems totally obvious once you have heard it.<span style=""> </span>It also provides important insight into how to read the Torah and the major advantages of a peshat approach.<span style=""> </span>The Torah is not a book of history that records all of the facts associated with the various characters involved.<span style=""> </span>[As I was pointing out to my daughter a few weeks ago, even the highly detailed stories about Yosef leave huge gaping holes both in the narrative of his life and in that of his father and brothers.]<span style=""> </span>Rather, it is a book that seeks to teach us specific things for specific reasons.<span style=""> </span>All the details that have been included play a role and they are chosen not simply because they happened, but because they are critical for setting up the unfolding drama.<span style=""> </span>Rashbam here—through a close reading of an apparently uninteresting genealogical passage—helps articulate the key difference between the Bible and an ancient chronicle, which underscores why so many people still bother to read it today.<o:p> </o:p></span></span></p> <span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: times new roman;">[For further expression of the idea that the Tanakh is not a complete repository of the happenings of—and even of the prophecies to—ancient Israelites, but rather a carefully selected set of texts that convey specific, sacred messages, see Kidmat Ha’emek, R. Naftali Tzvi Yehudah Berlin’s introduction to his commentary on the She’iltot.]</span></span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-54477294884885078092007-12-26T01:22:00.000-08:002007-12-26T17:40:24.249-08:00Shemot III: Peshat as Self-Defense<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">ושאלה אשה משכנתה - במתנה גמורה וחלוטה, שהרי [כתוב] ונתתי את חן העם. כמו שאל ממני ואתנה גוים נחלתך. זהו עיקר פשוטו ותשובה למינים:<o:p></o:p></span></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-family:times new roman;">Here, commenting on Shemot 3:22, Rashbam reveals another of his areas of concern: Christian use of Tanakh against the Jews.<span style=""> </span>This verse features God telling Moshe that at the time of the Exodus, the Israelites will ask for expensive items of gold and silver from the Egyptians as they depart, and they will receive all of this bounty.<span style=""> </span>The key question here regards the word <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ושאלה</span>.<span style=""> </span>This root often refers to borrowing, as it does in Shemot 22:13.<span style=""> </span>If so, then the Israelites claim to be borrowing these items from the Egyptians and then make off with them in the dead of night.<span style=""> </span>This was used by Christians to support the notion that Jews were inherently untrustworthy.<span style=""> </span>Rashbam fights back, arguing that context here implies that the Egyptians gave all of these items as gifts and cites proof from another verse in Tanakh where <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">שאל</span> can bear this meaning. He thus simultaneously deciphers the <i>peshat</i> and refutes the Christian claim.
<p></p>
Whether Rashbam is correct about <i>peshat</i> here is unclear.<span style=""> </span>After all, Shemot 12:36 suggests that the Israelites took advantage of the Egyptians through this “borrowing”, and this was hardly extravagant payback for hundreds of years of slavery.<span style=""> </span>[See also Shmuel’s comment justifying this class action on Pesahim 119a.]<span style=""> </span>Indeed, in the present case, we may have a fair degree of apologetics at work.<span style=""> </span>But what is clear is that <i>peshat</i> was used at times to battle Christian interpretation.<span style=""> </span>Rashbam’s commentary on Bereishit 49:10 also uses <i>peshat</i> to fend off a Christological interpretation of Tanakh, and one can imagine how a return to “the plain sense” of Scripture would have been an effective tool in parrying theological attacks fueled by highly allegorical and metaphorical readings of the Bible.</span></span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-73048273291310589822007-12-26T01:21:00.000-08:002007-12-26T01:22:42.336-08:00Shemot II: Peshat vs. Derash, Revisited<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">אל רעואל - רעואל אבי אביהן. אם כן שם אביהם יתרו, וחובב בן רעואל האמור לפנינו הוא חובב הוא יתרו. ואם רעואל הוא יתרו, אם כן בן יתרו היה. ומה שכתוב בנביאים מבני חובב חותן משה מוכיח שחובב הוא יתרו, שבכל מקום שמזכיר חותן משה מזכיר יתרו:</span><span dir="ltr" style=""><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">A number of my earlier posts have pointed on the ways in which <i>peshat</i>—at least as conceived of by Rashbam—is not always actually the best way of getting at the meaning of a text.<span style=""> </span>Let’s consider another example from this week’s parashah.<span style=""> </span>Moshe’s father-in-law is a recurring biblical personality, and yet much remains uncertain about him, most notably his name.<span style=""> </span>Here is a brief review of the evidence.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">Our first encounter with this figure is in Shmot 2:16-21 we learn of how Re’uel, the priest of Midian, gave his daughter Tzipporah to Moshe as a wife.<span style=""> </span>In chapter 3, we then hear about Moshe’s father-in-law Yitro, who appears in that role in numerous other places in the Torah.<span style=""> </span>Shofetim 4:11 refers to Hovav as Moshe’s father-in-law, and Bemidbar 10:29 has Moshe addressing <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">חבב בן רעואל המדיני חתן משה</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>.<span style=""> </span>Does this mean that Hovav was Moshe’s father-in-law and that Reu’el was the former’s father (which would accord with the plain sense of Shofetim but contradict that plain sense of Shemot 2)?<span style=""> </span>Or does it mean that Hovav was Moshe’s brother-in-law, with Reu’el his father being Moshe’s father-in-law (which would accord with the plain sense of Shemot 2 but contradict Shofetim)?<span style=""> </span>And how do either of these last two verses square with the traditions naming Yitro?<o:p> </o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">Rashbam, employing the assumptions of <i>peshat</i> and revealing his desire to read the Torah as a coherent, linear, literary work, decides the following: Shofetim established unequivocally that Hovav is Moshe’s father-in-law, and therefore he must be one and the same with Yitro.<span style=""> </span>These two names refer to the same person.<span style=""> </span>Reu’el, on the other hand, must have been Yitro’s father, and the term <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">אביהן</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> in Shemot 2:18—the subject of Rashbam’s comment here—must be taken loosely to mean “ancestor” or “grandfather.”<span style=""> </span>Like most <i>peshat</i> approaches, we see here a kind of binary choice that must pick winners and losers, emphasizing the plain sense of one passage at the expense of another.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: times new roman;">I wonder if, in this case, the midrashic approach taken in Mekhilta Yitro Amalek I—and cited in Rashi on Shemot 18:1—is not more insightful into the fuller meaning of these various traditions.<span style=""> </span>The Mekhilta says that Moshe’s father-in-law had seven names, including the ones enumerated above.<span style=""> </span>This sort of statement embraces the multiplicity of information relayed in Tanakh about this character and attempts to describe the rich tapestry that cannot be captured by trying to spin this material into a single thread.<span style=""> </span><i>Derash</i> eschews binary choices and, in doing so, sometimes gets at the deeper truth of Tanakh when read as a whole.<span style=""> </span><i>Peshat</i> indeed preserves a better linear narrative, but <i>derash</i> can sometimes help us see a richer plot.</span></span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-21251349497206285362007-12-26T01:19:00.000-08:002007-12-26T01:21:24.138-08:00Shemot I: Write What You Know<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">ותשם בסוף - אשר סמוך לשפת היאר, והטמינתהו יפה שההולכים על שפת היאר לא יכלו לראות התיבה, אבל הרוחצים בתוך הנהר יכלו לראותה, כי יוכבד לא נכנסה בנהר להצפינו מכל צדדיו היטב. ולכך ראתהו בת פרעה שהיתה רוחצת בתוך היאר, אבל נערותיה שהיו הולכות על שפת היאר לא יכלו לראותה:<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">The old saw about writing urges one only to tackle the familiar.<span style=""> </span>What is amazing about Rashbam is how much he thinks about the details of real life and how much this is able to enrich his commentary.<span style=""> </span>One example from this week’s parashah followed by a quick recap of a host of comments like this in passages I have glossed over:<o:p> </o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">Shemot 2:3—Moshe’s mother hides him in the reeds by the side of the Nile.<span style=""> </span>If she was intending to hide him, why was he so easily found by Par’oh’s daughter?<span style=""> </span>And why did no one else find him?<span style=""> </span>Rashbam: She hid him very well vis-à-vis the riverbank such that no one could see him.<span style=""> </span>But she did not wade into the river to be sure that the basket was covered on all sides.<span style=""> </span>Therefore, while Par’oh’s daughter’s servants could not see the basket, she, who was bathing in the water itself, was indeed able to see it.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">Bereishit 24:2—Avraham orders his servant to put his hand “under his thigh” when swearing to him that he will not bring Yitzhak back to lands of the east in order to find him a wife.<span style=""> </span>Rashbam: Whereas most agreements are sealed with a handshake, the master-servant relationship is like a father-son relationship and th specific ritual of placing the hand on the groin is intended to convey the notion that the slave adopts the totally subservient posture of a child vis-à-vis his master’s command.<o:p> </o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">Bereishit 27:45—Rivkah makes a cryptic comment to Ya’akov that he must flee Esav’s anger because she does not want both of them to die in a single day.<span style=""> </span>Rashbam: This assumes the biblical-era institution of the blood avenger; Esav would kill Ya’akov in rage but he would then in turn be avenged by Ya’akov’s closest of kin.<span style=""> </span>The result: both of Rivkah’s sons would die in a short period of time.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: times new roman;">Bereishit 29:29—The Torah provides us with the detail, important for the unfolding story, that Ya’akov encounters a very large boulder on the well near Haran.<span style=""> </span>Though this detail will later reveal how Ya’akov was overcome by a supernatural strength when he first met Rahel, the reason for having such a big stone in the firs place is not spelled out.<span style=""> </span>Rashbam goes out of his way to explain: The large rock was either their for safety reasons (if no one could remove it alone, then no individual would ever forget to put it back) or for security reasons, such that no individual would steal the water.<span style=""> </span>The latter possiblilty adds a whole other dimension to the story, as it casts the entire world Ya’akov is about to enter as a world of deception and mistrust, which will indeed be his dominant experience during his 20 years with Lavan.</span></span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-27404799062213168942007-12-25T23:56:00.001-08:002007-12-25T23:57:36.677-08:00Vayehi III: Pay attention to those notes!<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">מטרף בני עלית - את יהודה בני לאחר שעלית מלטרוף טרף באומות ותכרע ותשכב בעירך, לא יבא אויב להחרידך ולהקימך ממקומך. זהו עיקר פשוטו. בני כפילו של יהודה. והמפרשו במכירת יוסף לא ידע בשיטה של פסוק ולא בחילוק טעמים כלל:<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">Here, on Bereishit 49:9, Rashbam shows us the usefulness of cantillation in deciphering the meaning of verses.<span style=""> </span>The verse reads:<o:p> </o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE"></span></span></p><blockquote style="font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">גּוּר אַרְיֵה יְהוּדָה מִטֶּרֶף בְּנִי עָלִיתָ כָּרַע רָבַץ כְּאַרְיֵה וּכְלָבִיא מִי יְקִימֶנּוּ</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"><span dir="ltr"></span>:</span></span></blockquote><span style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr" style=""><o:p></o:p></span></span><p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">The verse has four main parts: 1) Yehudah is a young lion; 2) <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">מטרף בני עלית</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>; 3) He crouches and lies in wait like a lion; 4) Like the king of beasts, who can rouse him?<span style=""> </span>The precise meaning of part 2) is discussed here by Rashbam.<span style=""> </span>Rashi had explained this phrase to refer to Yehudah’s withdrawal from the plot to kill Yosef.<span style=""> </span>Picking up on the verb <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">טרף</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>, which is used in conjunction with Yosef’s feigned death, Rashi explains that Yehudah is here singled out for doing what he could to fend off Yosef’s murder.<span style=""> </span>To read the verse this way, the word <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">טרף</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> must be joined to the word <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">בני</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>, in that Yehudah is said to have “risen above” (<span dir="rtl" lang="HE">עלית</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>) the (potential) “murder of my son” (<span dir="rtl" lang="HE">טרף בני</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>).<o:p> </o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">Rashbam pounces.<span style=""> </span>A close look at the notes reveals that the word <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">מטרף</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> is matched with the note <i>tipha</i>, which belongs to the class of <i>melekh</i> notes, which end phrases.<span style=""> </span>That means that <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">מטרף</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> is in fact <i>separate</i> from the word <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">בני</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> and the phrase must be parsed as follows: My son (<span dir="rtl" lang="HE">בני</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>), you have risen up (<span dir="rtl" lang="HE">עלית</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>) from your prey (<span dir="rtl" lang="HE">מטרף</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>).<span style=""> </span>[Were Rashi to be right, there would have been a <i>merkha</i> or some other appropriate <i>eved</i> note on <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">מטרף</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> to indicate its connection with the word <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">בני</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>.]<span style=""> </span>The principle of <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">כפל לשון</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> further confirms that this phrase out to be conveying the same basic content as part 1) and thus is merely a praiseworthy comment about Yehudah’s power and dominion over his enemies.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <span style="font-size:130%;"><span style=";font-family:times new roman;font-size:12;" >[Rashi, Rashbam’s grandfather, is anonymously criticized here with some force as simply not understanding how cantillation plays into the meaning of a verse.<span style=""> </span>For another attack of this sort, see his comment on 49:16, where Rashbam reveals a general hostility to any interpretation that is overly associative and thematic as opposed to attending to the needs of the context at hand.]</span></span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-53117667653078702952007-12-25T23:54:00.000-08:002007-12-25T23:55:22.668-08:00Vayehi II: Biblical Parallelism<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">ורבו - כפל לשון של חצים שבפסוק כמו יסובו עלי(ו) רביו, חציו. ולכן הוא נדגש. אבל מגזרת מריבה יאמר אשר רבו בני ישראל. כמו מן קם קמו, מן שב שבו, כן יאמר מן הרב רב עם ישראל, רבו. ומדמה הפסוק לשון הרע של [אשת] פוטיפר לחצים כדכת' חץ שחוט לשונם מרמה דבר, וידרכו את לשונם קשתם שקר. ורבו מגזרת רבב כמו סבו מן סבב, צהלי ורוני מן רנן. רבו שיטרוט ב"ל:</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr" style=""><span dir="ltr"></span> <o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style=""><o:p></o:p>One of the things that every beginning student of Tanakh learns is the importance of parallelism in Biblical poetry.<span style=""> </span>Many verses are arranged according to a parallel structure (A, B), where the first part (A) essentially means the same thing as the second part (B).<span style=""> </span>This then becomes an extremely powerful tool for deciphering difficult words in poetic passages, provided they are used in parallel with more common terms.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">As we have seen before, Rashbam is among the pioneering voices developing these sorts of theories about biblical literature.<span style=""> </span>He uses the term <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">כפל לשון</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> to describe this parallelism and uses it here to great effect.<span style=""> </span>In Bereishit 49:23, Ya’akov says of Yosef: <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">וַיְמָרֲרֻהוּ וָרֹבּוּ וַיִּשְׂטְמֻהוּ בַּעֲלֵי חִצִּים</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>.<span style=""> </span>The word <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">וָרֹבּוּ</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> here is obscure.<span style=""> </span>The temptation is to see it as describing <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">מריבה</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>, some sort of tension or fight, such that Yosef’s adversaries—using their arrows—are described as dealing with him bitterly, fighting with him and resenting him.<span style=""> </span>Rashbam notes that the dagesh in the <i>bet</i> votes against this reading, since the plural third person past tense of fighting would be vocalized <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">וָרָבוּ</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>.<span style=""> </span>But what really forecloses this interpretation is the principle of <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">כפל לשון</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>.<span style=""> </span>Once we realize that the first and second parts of this verse are parallel, we realize that <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">וָרֹבּוּ</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> is likely synonymous with <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">בַּעֲלֵי חִצִּים</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>.<span style=""> </span>It thus must refer to shooting arrows, which then calls to mind <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt2716.htm">Iyov 16:13</a>, where we find the same root referring to archers surrounding their victim.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: times new roman;">This sort of lexical problem solving is at the heart of Rashbam’s work, and comments like this one show how effective it can be in elucidating <i>peshat</i>.<span style=""> </span>[For other uses of the principle of <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">כפל לשון</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>, see his comments on Bereishit 20:13, 25:23, 49:5 and 49:9.]</span></span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-19629706596847338842007-12-25T21:49:00.000-08:002007-12-25T23:53:26.296-08:00Vayehi I: Ya’akov and Shekhem<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">ואני - באותה הארץ נתתי לך חלק אחד יותר על אחיך, שמנשה ואפרים כראובן ושמעון יהיו לי לקחת שני חלקים בארץ אשר אני ובניי עתידים לקחת מיד האמורי בחרבי ובקשתי במלחמת יהושע. ואעפ"י שכת' ביהושע לא בחרבך ולא בקשתך, אותו פסוק בשני מלכי האמורי מדבר וכמו שאמרו חכמים צרעה לא עברה את הירדן, וכתיב ביהושע ואשלח לפניכם את הצרעה ותגרש אותם שני מלכי האמורי אשר בעבר הירדן לא בחרבך ולא בקשתך. זכותו של יעקב גרם להם:<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style=""><a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0148.htm">Bereishit 48:22</a> is a difficult verse.<span style=""> </span>Ya’akov, near death, tells Yosef that he has granted him <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">שכם אחד</span> over his brothers, which he took from the Amorites with his sword and his bow.<span style=""> </span>There are two main problems in the verse: </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman","serif";">A) What is the exact meaning of <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">שכם אחד</span><span style="">? B)</span> When did Ya’akov engage in a military battle</span></span><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style=""> with the indigenous Canaanite tribes?<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">Rashi already engaged with these questions and offered two main possibilities: 1) The term <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">שכם אחד</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> refers to the city of Shekhem, which in fact became the burial spot for Yosef’s bones (see <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0624.htm">Yehoshua 24:32</a>), and the military reference here represents an extrabiblical account of Ya’akov’s military defense of his clan after Shimon and Levi’s unwarranted slaughter of the peope of Shekhem.<span style=""> </span>This is a forced accounting of Ya’akov’s claim to have captured the city with military might.<span style=""> </span>Rashi thus offers the second possibility: 2) Ya’akov here is talking about giving Yosef a double portion, where <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">שכם</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> refers to some kind of stake (see Tehilim 21:13, 60:8, Hoshea 6:9, and Tzefaniah 3:9 for some roughly parallel usages).<span style=""> </span>The “military conquest” described here is metaphorical and actually refers to prayers and wisdom that were employed to secure Yosef this more prominent status by obtaining the birthright from Esav, who is her described as an Amorite because of his wicked acts.<o:p> </o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">Rashbam tries to get the benefits of both explanations by asserting that we are dealing with a double portion of inheritance <i>and</i> a military conquest, but said conquest is in the future, and Ya’akov is merely prophesying regarding its eventual fulfillment.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">I would like to suggest another reading that may in fact clear up what is happening in this verse.<span style=""> </span><a href="http://jewish.huji.ac.il/faculty/bible_faculty/schwartzb.html">Professor Baruch Schwartz</a> has argued that Bereishit 34 reflects a complex and multi-faceted narrative of Ya’akov’s relationship with Shekhem.<span style=""> </span>On the one hand, there are elements in the story that seem clear that Dinah was raped by Hamor, that Shimon and Levi exacted vicious revenge for this act, freed Dinah and were then condemned by Ya’akov, who feared for his life, claiming that </span>they had put him at risk by attacking the much larger and more powerful indigenous population. On the other hand, there are elements that suggest that a more timid Shekhem falls in love with Dinah and asks for her hand in marriage. The brothers—not just Shimon and Levi—seemingly with Ya'akov's approval, hatch a plot to what they perceive to be a plan to be overwhelmed culturally through intermarriage. They demand all the men be circumcised and then slaughter them. This ruse works and the young clan's distinctiveness is preserved. As noted, these elements seem to presume Ya’akov’s passive, if not active, assent to the proceedings.</span></p> <span style="font-size:130%;"><span style=";font-family:times new roman;font-size:12;" >Against this backdrop, we can see our scene here as amplifying the elements that reflect Ya’akov’s participation in the conquest of Shekhem. <span style=""> </span>In a lovely play on words, Ya’akov says to Yosef, "I have given you a leg up, in the form of the city of Shekhem, on your brothers, which I took from the Amorites, with my sword and my bow." In other words, I, Ya'akov, acting through my children, fought a battle to win the city of Shekhem and have given it to you as an inheritance. In this way, one can maintain what seems an obvious allusion to the actual city of Shekhem along with a biblical narrative that suggests some form of military involvement by Ya’akov.<span style=""> </span>To be sure, Ya’akov’s condemnation of that attack finds echoes in our parashah as well, when Shimon and Levi are singled out in chapter 49 as being unable to control their violence and therefore unfit to hold inheritable land.</span></span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-62195007299595252152007-12-25T19:06:00.000-08:002007-12-25T19:07:19.167-08:00Vayigash III: Can Peshat be Inspirational? (Part II)<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="rtl"></span><span style="" lang="HE"><span dir="rtl"></span>(ח) יעקב ובניו - יעקב מחשבון שבעים נפש כמו שמוכיח לפנינו לפי הפשט כל נפש בניו ובנותיו של יעקב ולאה הכל שלשים ושלש עם יעקב. ורבותינו פירשו זו יוכבד שנולדה בין החומות:</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="rtl"></span><span style="" lang="HE"><span dir="rtl"></span>(כו) יוצאי יריכו הבאים מצרימה כל נפש ששים ושש - כי יעקב שהוא מחשבון של שלשים ושלש של לאה אינו בכלל יוצאי יריכו, כי יוצאי יריכו לא היו כי אם ששים ותשע. וכי אמר משה בשבעים נפש ירדו אבותיך מצרימה, שיעקב ובניו היו שבעים:</span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">One of the problems that vexes a host of commentators is how precisely the genealogy given in <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0146.htm">Bereishit 46</a> yields 70 people.<span style=""> </span>In particular, Leah’s subclan is said to contain 33 people and yet only 32 are listed!<span style=""> </span>How can it be that a passage that seems to be so careful in building up to the number 70 can miscount?<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">In these comments, Rashbam reveals what, to my mind, is the indisputable plain sense of the verses here.<span style=""> </span>A close reading of the list of names here reveals the fact that none of the brothers except Reuven is mentioned separately; most are introduced by saying <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ובני שמעון</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> and then listing their children.<span style=""> </span>It is understood that this count includes both them and their children.<span style=""> </span>Similarly, when is says <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">בכר יעקב ראובן</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>, this is intended to make us count Ya’akov as one of the 70.<span style=""> </span>The other language in the passage bears this out: Whereas with the other three wives, it simply says <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">כל נפש</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>, thus totaling up how many people were contributed by each wife, the language when detailing Leah’s descendants is <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">כל נפש בניו ובנותיו</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>, the third-person possessive highlighting the fact that Ya’akov himself is included in that count.<span style=""> </span>This also neatly solves the problem above of Leah’s subclan, which led to the <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/b/l/l3501.htm">midrash </a>imagining that Yocheved, Levi’s daughter, was born as the family entered Egypt, thus contributing to the count of 70, but not being worthy of mention among those who came down to Egypt.<span style=""> </span>While this reading is intriguing, it obviously suffers from the fact that Menashe and Efraim are named despite the fact that they did not make the journey down to Egypt as well as from the fact that Dinah and Serah are mentioned despite being women.<span style=""> </span>If you just agree to count Ya’akov as part of the 70 and to recognize that the text is associating him with his first wife, all problems disappear.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: times new roman;">This, in contrast to the previous post, is an example of the power of <i>peshat</i>, and, I think, its inspirational possibilities in restoring the clarity of the text such that it can once again speak with a full voice.</span></span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-42715824133064959582007-12-25T18:51:00.000-08:002007-12-25T18:52:58.704-08:00Vayigash II: Can Peshat be Inspirational? (Part I)<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">אעלך גם עלה - כלומר ארד עמך וגם עלה אעלך, כמו וברכתם גם אותי. גם עלה. שנקבר עם אבותיו במערת המכפלה:<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: times new roman;">In an earlier <a href="http://parshanut.blogspot.com/2007/10/noah-i-idiom.html">post</a>, I commented on the ways in which <i>peshat</i> sometimes provides a convincing explanation that nonetheless deflates more inspirational and spiritual possibilities.<span style=""> </span>In his comment on <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0146.htm">Bereishit 46:4</a>, Rashbam provides us with another such example.<span style=""> </span>This verse’s promise of return to Eretz Yisrael seems—in the context of the Torah’s larger narrative—to refer to the eventual redemption of Ya’akov’s descendants.<span style=""> </span>The ominous buildup to slavery starts now and this verse hints at its eventual end.<span style=""> </span>[See <a href="http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/olam_hatanah/mefaresh.asp?book=1&perek=46&mefaresh=ramban">Ramban on 46:1</a> for this reading of the text.]<span style=""> </span>But Rashbam wants to see this promise fulfilled to Ya’akov himself, in a more local, less archetypal way.<span style=""> </span>So he proposes that the divine promise here is that <i>Ya’akov</i> will return to C’na’an, and he indeed does, albeit posthumously.<span style=""> </span>This sort of explanation sometimes takes some of the drama out of the text, even as it often preserves accuracy; here I think it may overreach altogether and sacrifice the larger narrative that the lives of the Avot seem intended to highlight in the first place.</span></span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-57254134183475447782007-12-25T17:59:00.000-08:002007-12-25T18:01:28.516-08:00Vayigash I: Philology<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">אל תרגזו - אל תיראו כלום בדרך מפני ליסטים, כי שלום לי מכל צד. וכן רגזו [ו]אל תחטאו, היו יראים מן הק' ולא תחטאו. וכן ונתן י"י לך לב רגז, דחיל כתרג'. וכן ירגזון יריעות, לשון ניענוע כאדם המתיירא. וכן רגזה בוטחות, המרגיז ארץ ממקומה. אבל רגזה של תרגום של דניאל ושל עזרא לשון כעס. טרנבלר לעז של רוגז של כ"ד ספרים:<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: times new roman;">Here in <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0145.htm">Bereishit 45:24</a> we have a fascinating sensitivity to different kinds of Semitic roots: Hebrew and Aramaic.<span style=""> </span>Rashbam notes that the root <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">רגז</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> in the “24 books”—which refers to Torah and Nevi’im (5 books of the Torah, Yehoshua, Shofetim, Shmuel, Melakhim, Yeshayahu, Yirmiyahu, Yehezkel and the 12 smaller prophetic books)—is different from<span style=""> </span>the same root used in the Aramaic portions of Daniel and Ezra in Ketuvim.<span style=""> </span>The Hebrew root used in the first 24 books of the Bible means “fear and trembling”, whereas the same root used in <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt3403.htm">Daniel 3:13</a> and <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt35a05.htm">Ezra 5:12</a> means anger.<span style=""> </span>Rashbam is here shadowboxing with R. Elazar on <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/b/l/l2801.htm">Bavli Ta’anit 10b</a>, who explains that Yosef was warning his brothers not to engage in halakhic discussions on their way back from Egypt, lest they fight with one another.<span style=""> </span>In keeping with his goal of not losing sight of the plain sense of the text, Rashbam reminds us that as a matter of <i>peshat</i>, such a reading is philologically unsound.<span style=""> </span>The best way to read the text in context is as an assurance from Yosef that Egypt controls all the travel routes back to C’na’an and thus they should not fear that any harm will come to them during the journey.</span></span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-18320765309695956032007-12-25T17:51:00.000-08:002007-12-25T17:54:06.705-08:00Mikeitz II: Intertextuality<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">ויפקד פקידים [וגו'] וחמש - שהממונים יגבו חומש כל התבואות לצורך המלך אשר משפטו בשאר שנים לעשר כדכת' בשמואל את שדותיכם יעשר, עתה יטול פי שנים. וכמו כן הנהיג יוסף לבסוף על אדמת מצרים לפרעה לחומש:</span><span dir="ltr" style=""><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: times new roman;">Sometimes Rashbam’s deep desire to have the Torah read as a linear book helps reveal the basis behind ancient exegentical disputes.<span style=""> </span><a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0141.htm">Bereishit 41:34</a> features Yosef counseling Par’oh regarding the seven years of plenty.<span style=""> </span>He tells him: <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">וחמש את ארץ מצרים</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>.<span style=""> </span>What does the word <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">וחמש</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> mean here?<span style=""> </span>Targum Onkelos renders this word as <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ויזרזון</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>, indicating a suggestion to prepare, or arm Egypt for the tough times ahead.<span style=""> </span>This approach makes perfect sense in context and matches the use of the word <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">וחמשים</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> in <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0213.htm">Shemot 13:18</a>, which describes the Israelites as armed when leaving Egypt. <span style=""> </span>But Targum Yonatan on this verse renders <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">וחמש</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> as <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ויפקון חד מן חמשא</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> (and the <a href="http://septuagint.org/LXX/Genesis/Genesis41.html">Septuagint </a>renders similarly) meaning that Par’oh should separate out a fifth of the produce during the years of plenty as reserves for the years of famine.<span style=""> </span>This interpretation is not suggested at all by local context, and the figure of 20% might even seem somewhat conservative in light of the disastrous famine that is to follow.<span style=""> </span>So why read this way?<span style=""> </span>Rashbam helps us here: The larger context of Tanakh suggests that a normal tax for the king was 10 percent (note the parallel of tithing for God’s servants in the Temple), and 20 percent represents a doubling in the face of national crisis.<span style=""> </span>But more important, Yosef’s association with fifths returns later in the narrative when he strikes a deal with the Egyptian population that they will sell their land to the crown in exchange for the right to be sharecroppers on those lands and retain one fifth of the annual produce.<span style=""> </span>Though that fifth has little to do with the narrative here, the association of Yosef with fives is unavoidable.<span style=""> </span>[See also <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0143.htm">Bereishit 43:34</a>, <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0145.htm">45:6</a>, <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0145.htm">45:11</a>, <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0145.htm">45:22</a> and <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0147.htm">47:2</a> for other examples.]<span style=""> </span><span style=""> </span>Rashbam helps us understand the associative and intertextual mindset that can affect interpretation.</span></span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-27159154165242965672007-12-25T17:12:00.000-08:002007-12-25T17:13:24.319-08:00Mikeitz I: Titles<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">פרעה קצף על עבדיו - כל פרעה בלשון מצרים מלך, וכן כל מלכי מצרים נקראים. ושל פלשתים אבימלך אפי' בימי דוד, בשנותו את טעמו לפני אבימלך. ושל ירושלים מלכי צדק. ביהושע אדני צדק מלך שלם. ובימי דוד "על דברתי" אני מבטיח שתהיה "מלכי צדק" מלך ירושלים. ושל עמלק אגג, בימי משה וירום מאגג מלכו, ובימי שאול אגג מלך עמלק. אף כאן פרעה לשון מלכות, כי בשמו של מלך אין אומרין לפניו "דוד קצף על עבדיו", אלא כך אומרין לפניו "המלך קצף על עבדיו". וכן לפנינו אני פרעה, אני אהיה המלך לבדי, כדכת' רק הכסא אגדל ממך. לכן נקרא יוסף אברך, אב למלך. ובספר לקח טוב פירש כמותי:</span><span lang="AR-SA"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">This comment on <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0141.htm">Bereishit 41:10</a> is a great example of Rashbam’s sensitivity to tone.<span style=""> </span>He notes that it is impossible that the butler would address his master, the king of Egypt, by his first name, or, for that matter, by anything less than the most honorific title.<span style=""> </span>Moreover, the seemingly ridiculous verse, “Par’oh said to Yosef, “I am Par’oh…” becomes instantly intelligible once we realize that the king of Egypt is saying “I am the king [and therefore I can empower you fully even as I will always be superior to you].”<span style=""> </span>This close readings therefore prove what we already suspected: Par’oh is not a name, but actually the Egyptian equivalent of “Mr. President”, or of the Vatican’s practice of assigning a new name to an incoming pope.<span style=""> </span>He cites further examples of this phenomenon throughout Tanakh: Avimelekh=King of the Plishtim; Malkitzedek=King of Jerusalem; Agag=King of Amalek.<span style=""> </span>This sort of range in Tanakh combined with a sense of how the world works makes Rashbam a particularly powerful and compelling exegete.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-8819234553212333792007-12-25T16:51:00.000-08:002007-12-25T16:56:53.659-08:00Vayeishev III: Sold or Stolen?<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="rtl"></span><span style="" lang="HE"><span dir="rtl"></span>(כח) ויעברו אנשים מדיינים - בתוך שהיו יושבים לאכול לחם ורחוקים היו קצת מן הבור לבלתי אכול על הדם וממתינים היו לישמעאלים שראו, וקודם שבאו הישמעאלים עברו אנשים מדיינים אחרים דרך שם וראוהו בבור ומשכוהו ומכרוהו המדיינים לישמעאלים, ויש לומר שהאחים לא ידעו, ואעפ"י אשר כתב אשר מכרתם אותי מצרימה, י"ל שהגרמת מעשיהם סייעה במכירתו. זה נראה לי לפי עומק דרך פשוטו של מקרא. כי ויעברו אנשים מדיינים משמע על ידי מקרה והם מכרוהו לישמעאלים. ואף אם באתה לומר וימכרו [את] יוסף לישמעאלים כי אחיו מכרוהו, אף כן צריך לומר שהם ציוו למדייני' סוחרים למושכו מן הבור ואחר כן מכרוהו לישמעאלים:<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">(לו) והמדנים מכרו אותו אל מצרים - מדן ומדיין וישמעאלים אחים היו, ומדן וישמעאלים אחד הם לפי הפשט. לכך הוא אומ' כי מדנים מכרוהו וישמעאלים הורידוהו שמה, כי שניהם אחד הם לפי הפשט:<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">Many of the narrative portions of the Torah are notorious for the difficulty they present the reader who tries to read them through as one consistent, linear text.<span style=""> </span>The narrative surrounding Yosef’s journey to Egypt in <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0137.htm">Bereishit 37</a> is one such text and it is instructive to watch Rashbam—who is so adamant about the possibility and importance of reading the Torah is a linear literary work—cope with this challenge.<o:p> </o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">First, a review of the difficulties in this story:<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">1) Do the brothers hate Yosef because of Ya’akov’s favoritism or because of Yosef’s presumptuousness and arrogance?<span style=""> </span>Obviously these two factors can be complementary; nonetheless, it does seem that one element of the story has Ya’akov favoring Yosef and finding nothing wrong in his character and providing him with a coat that is at the center of the drama whereas another element focuses on Yosef’s dreams, to which Ya’akov himself objects.<o:p> </o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">2) Reuven begs the brothers not to kill Yosef after their initial threat to do so.<span style=""> </span>His solution: throw him into a pit.<span style=""> </span>The brothers assume he will die there—especially given the lack of water—but Reuven will be able to come back secretly and save him.<span style=""> </span>But then Reuven seems to disappear, since the story moves on to Yehudah’s proposal to sell Yosef to the passing Ishmaelites.<span style=""> </span>When Reuven returns to the pit, Yosef is already gone.<span style=""> </span>Where was Reuven?<span style=""> </span>And why, when he tells the brothers that Yosef is gone, do they not respond and tell him what happened?<span style=""> </span>And how does the story proceed directly from Reuven’s confusion and despair to the ongoing plot of tricking Ya’akov with the bloody coat?<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">3) Who actually brings Yosef to Egypt?<span style=""> </span>Yehudah’s proposal is to sell him to the Ishmaelites, and this seems to transpire, with the beginning of chapter 39 confirming that it was they who sold him to Potiphar.<span style=""> </span>But it also seems that it was a band of Midianites that actually removed Yosef from the pit, possibly even without his brothers’ knowledge and that <i>they</i> bring him down to Egypt.<span style=""> </span>In short, is Yosef <i>sold</i> by the brothers to the Ishamelites, or is he <i>stolen</i> by the Midianites as a result of his brothers’ abandonment of him in a pit?<o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">The story, on its own, does not resolve any of these problems.<o:p> </o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">Rashbam, in the two comments above, seems to struggle with these issues and even to contradict himself as he attempts an answer.<span style=""> </span>At first, he proposes that indeed the Midianites took him out of the pit and that <i>they</i> sold him to the Ishmaelites.<span style=""> </span>The brothers’ involvement in the sale is thus only second-hand, and the plot by Yehudah gets fulfilled only indirectly and incompletely.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">Needless to say, this is a somewhat unsatisfactory, and Rashbam, in the second comment above, seems to try to solve the problem by positing that Ishmaelites and Midianites (and Medanites, who are also mentioned in the story) are actually just different names for the same people, given that they are all clans that descend from Avraham.<o:p> </o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">I think this comment actually gets us at some of the limits of <i>peshat</i> in tackling the meaning of the Torah.<span style=""> </span>The simpler approach here would simply acknowledge that the Torah’s messages here defy a simple linear, literary analysis.<span style=""> </span>There are in fact two elements of Yosef’s journey.<span style=""> </span>On the one hand, the brothers’ malice leads to his vulnerability and subsequent theft by the Midianites.<span style=""> </span>Yosef himself describes this element when he tells Par’oh’s butler <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0140.htm">later in the parashah</a>: <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">כי גנב גנבתי מארץ העברים</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>—I was <i>stolen</i> from the land of the Hebrews.<span style=""> </span>On the other hand, we see a picture of the brothers actively selling him into slavery, which he confronts them with <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0145.htm">later in the story</a>: <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">אשר מכרתם אותי מצרימה</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>—you <i>sold</i> me to Egypt.<span style=""> </span>The meaning produced by each element is beyond the scope of this already overlong post, but embracing this complex meaning rather than stamping it out in the name of literary uniformity would seem to be truer to the Torah itself.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">All this raises the interesting question of the proper role of <i>peshat</i>.<span style=""> </span>Might the Torah do better being viewed through more of a cubist lens, whereby multiple messages and components make up a rich text that can fairly be described as a work with seventy faces?<span style=""> </span>Or perhaps we might consider the genre of magical realism, which invites the reader to imagine the ways in which the deepest meaning of our lives and memories can sometimes most accurately be related through a composite, non-literary, almost non-sensical narrative?</span></span></p>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-7811199902431370252007-12-25T16:49:00.000-08:002007-12-25T16:50:54.032-08:00Vayeishev II: Peshat to the Rescue<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">ואביו שמר את הדבר - מה צורך לכתוב זה? אלא כשבאה לו הבשורה ולא האמין לבניו שהוא חי וירא ישראל את העגלות אשר שלח פרעה, כי לא נשלחו כי אם על פי המלך כמו שכת' שם עגלות על פי פרעה, אז האמין על ידי החלומות שמוכיחין שסופו להיות מושל ועגלות הללו על ידי מלכות וממשלה באים, ומתוך כך אמר רב עוד יוסף בני חי, כי תימה גדולה היה היאך האמין אחרי שראה כתנתו מלאה דם? כמו שנחרד יצחק על יעקב בשביל שמצא שיער בחלקת צואריו:<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: times new roman;">I had always been bothered by <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0137.htm">Bereishit 37:11</a><a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0137.htm"></a> and its seemingly cryptic comment that Ya’akov “kept the matter” of Yosef’s dream in his mind after scolding his son.<span style=""> </span>And now I see Rashbam was as well; he provides a fascinating answer:<span style=""> </span>This, like all good Biblical details, is setting us up for a scene we will not encounter for some time.<span style=""> </span>When Yosef finally reveals himself to his brothers and orders them back to C’na’an in order to fetch Ya’akov, he sends a slew of wagons back with provisions and clothing to escort his father down to Egypt.<span style=""> </span>There, too, there is a cryptic verse (<a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0145.htm">Bereishit 45:27</a>) that notes that Ya’akov did not believe the brothers that his long-presumed dead son was alive <i>until he saw the wagons</i>.<span style=""> </span>Why did the wagons make the critical difference?<span style=""> </span>Rashbam ingeniously links these two cryptic verses and explains that Ya’akov, for all those years, suspected that something would come of these dreams.<span style=""> </span>He stored away that little piece of information—and hope—in his mind, such that when he finally saw royally appointed wagons coming to get him, he realized that these trappings of power were indeed evidence of what he had been imagining for years: that his son would indeed have the authority of a king with the power to rule over even his own father.<span style=""> </span>[See <a href="http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/olam_hatanah/tnh_text.asp?id=184">Rashbam on Bereishit 45:27</a> for the second part of this commentary.]</span></span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-86982025397424500212007-12-25T16:46:00.000-08:002007-12-25T16:48:44.442-08:00Vayeishev I: The Place of Peshat<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">אלה תולדות יעקב - ישכילו ויבינו אוהבי שכל מה שלימדונו רבותינו כי אין מקרא יוצא מידי פשוטו, אף כי עיקרה של תורה באת ללמדנו ולהודיענו ברמיזת הפשט ההגדות וההלכות והדינין על ידי אריכות הלשון ועל ידי שלשים ושתים מידות של ר' אליעזר בנו של ר' יוסי הגלילי ועל ידי שלש עשרה מידות של ר' ישמעאל. והראשונים מתוך חסידותם נתעסקו לנטות אחרי הדרשות שהן עיקר, ומתוך כך לא הורגלו בעומק פשוטו של מקרא, ולפי שאמרו חכמים אל תרבו בניכם בהגיון, וגם אמרו העוסק במקרא מדה ואינה מדה העוסק בתלמוד אין לך מדה גדולה מזו, ומתוך כך לא הורגלו כל כך בפשוטן של מקראות, וכדאמ' במסכת שבת הוינא בר תמני סרי שנין וגרסינ' כולה תלמודא ולא הוה ידענא דאין מקרא יוצא מידי פשוטו. וגם רבנו שלמה אבי אמי מאיר עיני גולה שפירש תורה נביאים וכתובים נתן לב לפרש פשוטו של מקרא, ואף אני שמואל ב"ר מאיר חתנו זצ"ל נתווכחתי עמו ולפניו והודה לי שאילו היה לו פנאי היה צריך לעשות פרושים אחרים לפי הפשטות המתחדשים בכל יום. ועתה יראו המשכילים מה שפירשו הראשונים:</span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><o:p></o:p>Here, on <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0137.htm">Bereishit 37:2</a>, we have Rashbam’s first major substantive comment about what his method of peshat is all about (with the exception of a very brief comment at the very beginning of his commentary).<span style=""> </span>He makes a number of important points worthy of explication and emphasis:</span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><o:p></o:p>1) The core purpose of the Torah is to provide us with rich narratives and detailed normative guidance so that we can lead religious lives.<span style=""> </span>The Torah indeed conveys this substance to us through the use of hints and indirect associations and classical rabbinic exegesis—which is very different from what Rashbam understands to be <i>peshat</i>—is designed to draw this out of the biblical text.</span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;">2) Despite the above, <span dir="rtl" style="" lang="HE">אין מקרא יוצא מידי פשוטו</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span style=""><span dir="ltr"></span>, which is here assumed to mean that an exoteric reading of a verse—the <i>peshat</i>—is never fully displaced just because a more esoteric interpretation is offered.<span style=""> </span>This other, admittedly non-central, aspect of the Torah remains a part of its essential character.<o:p> </o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">3) Ancient commentators were primarily interested in 1) over 2).<span style=""> </span>Rashbam, however, describes himself as part of an intellectually electric environment in which <i>peshat</i> is experiencing an intense revival and thereby, in his view, enriching appreciation of the Torah.<span style=""> </span>His language of <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">הפשטות המתחדשים בכל יום</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> conveys a feeling of scholarly discovery and excitement that plays out on a daily basis (see his <a href="http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/olam_hatanah/tnh_text.asp?id=172">comment on Bereishit 36:12</a> for another example and <a href="http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/olam_hatanah/tnh_text.asp?id=174">on 37:13</a> for an example of the collegial collaboration involved), and his description of the arguments he would have with his grandfather, Rashi, show how the new interpretations of this ancient text could spur tension and controversy.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">All of these dynamics are worthy of more consideration, and I hope to return to them throughout the course of the commentary.<span style=""> </span>For now, I will limit myself to one observation:<span style=""> </span>Rashbam reveals to us here the delicate dance required when advancing novel exegesis while simultaneously maintaining established norms and conventions.<span style=""> </span>On the one hand, he emphasizes here—almost to the point of the lady protesting too much—that all of his <i>peshat</i> explanations are not the <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">עיקר</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>, the essence, of Torah.<span style=""> </span>The purpose of Torah is real-time, detailed, normative guidance that cannot be fully contained in the literary boundaries of <i>peshat</i>.<span style=""> </span>On the other hand, his contempt for erroneous readings of Tanakh is palpable, as words like <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">משכילים</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> are trotted out to describe the enlightened <i>pashtanim</i> even as more traditional readers—including his grandfather!—are derided with terms like <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">הבל</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> and accusations of ignorance and unsophistication.<span style=""> </span>Which is it?<span style=""> </span>Is he truly a radical who simply wants to cover his tracks with occasional humble language, or is he truly a pious traditionalist who sometimes gets carried away in the intellectual moment?<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style=""><o:p></o:p></span><span style="font-size: 12pt;">I think the most honest answer to those questions is that these sorts of high-voltage intellectual pursuits—such as proposing alternative readings of the canonical word of God that is the supposed basis for all Jewish practice—inherently invite some degree of ambivalence and inconsistency.<span style=""> </span>Rashbam is not alone in this regard.<span style=""> </span>R. Yosef Bekhor Shor, a slightly more junior contemporary northern French exegete, displays similar vacillations.<span style=""> </span>Bekhor Shor viciously attack any allegorization of the verses that produce the commandment to wear <i>tefillin</i> (another Rashbam interpretation we will eventually get to!) even as he advances a radical reading on the supposed ban on cooking a kid in its mother’s milk that would, if halakhically applied, completely eviscerate traditional Jewish practices surrounding mixing meat and dairy.<span style=""> </span>Rashbam is best seen here, in my view, as exploring uncharted intellectual territory as he and others actually consider what it would mean to take the Biblical text seriously in its own terms.<span style=""> </span>Given that he and his colleagues in this enterprise are situated as religious, practicing Jews, that intellectual exercise sometimes has limits—albeit idiosyncratic, not always consistent, internally necessary ones.<span style=""> </span>Rashbam is indeed both a traditionalist and an intellectual risk taker; that is precisely what makes him so interesting.</span></span></p>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-46820966357173166972007-11-22T10:52:00.001-08:002007-11-22T11:00:24.838-08:00Vayishlah III: Be Thankful For What You Have<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="rtl"></span><span style="" lang="HE"><span dir="rtl"></span>(יא) קטנתי מכל - מלהיות לי [כל] החסדים וגו'. וכן קטן מהכיל את העולה ואת השלמים. ולפי שעשית לי חסדים ואמת יותר מן הראוי לי ואני עדיין לא קיימתי נדרי ולא עבדתיך כראוי, לכך אני ירא אעפ"י שהבטחתני. שאינך [דן] את האדם אלא לפי מעשיו, כמו שמצינו בחזקיה שאמר לו הנביא מת אתה ולא תחיה, ואחר כך בתפלת חזקיהו הוסיף הק' על ימיו חמש עשרה שנה:</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="rtl"></span><span style="" lang="HE"><span dir="rtl"></span>(יג) ואתה אמרת היטיב איטיב עמך - אעפ"י שאין אתה מחוייב לקיים לי הבטחתך שהרי קטנתי וגו' אעפ"י כן עשה למען כבוד שמך שתתקיים הבטחתך, כמו שאמר משה להק' כשרצה לכלות את ישראל (ו)למה יאמרו מצרים [לאמר] ברעה [וגו'], וינחם י"י על הרעה. ובמקום אחר מבלתי יכולת י"י וגו' וישחטם במדבר וגו', ואמר לו הק' סלחתי כדבריך:<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style=""><o:p></o:p>Rashbam in <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0132.htm">Bereishit 32:11, 13</a> highlights what is already evident in the Torah: Ya’akov’s deep gratitude to God even in the face of difficult circumstances.<span style=""> </span>Ya’akov recognizes that he is not truly <i>entitled</i> to anything that God has promised him, inasmuch as he has had plenty of failings of his own in his relationship with God.<span style=""> </span>He therefore merely asks God to act for the sake of divine glory, but not out of <i>obligation</i> to him.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <span style="font-size:130%;"><span style=""> </span></span><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span dir="rtl" style="" lang="HE"><o:p></o:p>I think this approach to the divine-human relationship has always appealed to me, and I have thus always had a problem with genres of post-Holocaust theology that focus on anger towards God and even talk about nullification of the covenant between God and Israel.<span style=""> </span>I don’t begrudge anyone the right to get angry at God—I have at times felt that way myself—any more than I would so for any relationship that features a range of emotions. But when people use personal pain as a fulcrum for leveraging a new theology, I become uncomfortable. Are we really <i>entitled</i> to anything such that we can really demand that level of divine compliance, particularly when we cannot possibly as humans transcend our own perception of the world and see a larger picture? Isn’t it one of the most striking features of being alive that we are so out of no action—and certainly not merit—of our own?</span> [In the words of R. Eliezer Hakappar in Mishnah Avot 4:22: </span><span dir="rtl" lang="HE" style="font-size:130%;">שעל כרחך אתה נוצר ועל כרחך אתה נולד ועל כרחך אתה חי ועל כרחך אתה מת</span><span style="font-size:130%;">.]</span><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style=""> How, then, can we ever see ourselves as anything but in the black as far as our lot in life goes?<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style=""><o:p></o:p>Perhaps I am overly privileged and optimistic.<span style=""> </span>And I don’t mean to suggest that there isn’t a <i>brit</i> between God and Israel that has terms.<span style=""> </span>But haven’t those terms more or less been met?<span style=""> </span>We still exist, we still have a relationship with God, and we still have a foothold in the Land of Israel.<span style=""> </span>I think Rashbam reminds us here, through his analysis of Ya’akov, that we sometimes forget the baseline of privilege that we enjoy nationally and personally, even if there remains a great deal of pain, uncertainty and fear.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-55688576675399838342007-11-22T08:59:00.000-08:002007-12-25T23:59:56.914-08:00Vayishlah II: Safety in Numbers<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">המחנה האחת - לשון נקבה הוא, כדכת' אם תחנה עלי מחנה:</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">הנשאר - לשון זכר. הרבה מצינו תיבות פעמים זכר פעמים נקבה. כמו השמש יצא על הארץ, ותך השמש. רוח סערה עושה דברו, ורוח באה מעבר המדבר ויגע בארבע פינות הבית:<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">עשו לקח את נשיו מבנות כנען - המדקדק יתן לב כי בפרשה ראשונה של תולדות יצחק נאמר יהודית בת בארי החתי, בשמת בת אלון החתי, מחלת בת ישמעאל, ובפרשה זו לא הוזכר בת בארי כלל, לא שמה ולא שם אביה, אבל [אלון] וישמעאל אביהן של שתי נשיו הראשונות הוזכרו, שהוחלפו שמות הבנות כאשר מצינו בכמה מקומות. בשמת בת אלון נקראת כאן עדה בת אלון, ומחלת בת ישמעאל נקראת כאן בשמת. לכן יש לומר יהודית בת בארי מתה בלא בנים, אבל בת אלון ובת ישמעאל היו להם בנים המפורשים כאן. ואהליבמה בת ענה בת צבעון החוי לקח אחרי כן אחר שהלך לו לשבת בהר שעיר ונתחתן בבני שעיר החורי כ[ד]כת' לפנינו כי אהליבמה היתה בת ענה בן צבעון בן שעיר החורי, וגם תמנע פילגש אליפז כתובה שם בבני שעיר. ולפי שאהליבמה אשתו אחרונה היתה, לפיכך מזכיר אותה ואת בניה בכל הפרשיות האילו לבסוף:<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style=""><o:p></o:p>A very brief comment on a strategy that I have already seen a number of times in Rashbam’s commentary, which strikes me as distinctive to a <i>peshat</i> and/or literary approach.<o:p> </o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">Rashbam notes that the phrase <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">המחנה האחת והכהו</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> in <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0132.htm">Bereishit 32:9</a> mixes male and female genders.<span style=""> </span>His response: There are many other cases of such gender imprecision in the Torah.<span style=""> </span>Similarly, in Bereishit <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0136.htm">36:2</a>, towards the end of the parashah, he notes that Esav’s wives as reported in that chapter do not match those detailed in <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0126.htm">26:34</a> and <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0128.htm">28:9</a>.<span style=""> </span>His response: Names are inconsistent all over the Bible.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">This strategy is interesting, in that it doesn’t actually solve the problem head-on; it questions the assumption behind the question and thereby dismisses it: Who says genders are always fixed for nouns?<span style=""> </span>Who says that people’s names are always recorded consistently?<span style=""> </span>It strikes me that this sort of strategy is particularly attractive to someone who sees there entire enterprise as an attempt to learn about a <i>text</i>, such that one is open to questioning one’s assumptions based on what one finds <i>in the text</i>.<span style=""> </span>Someone who is primarily interested in ideas and concepts, on the other hand, is more likely to stick with their premises and fi<span style="font-family:times new roman;">nd ways to generate meaning out of the problem at hand.</span></span></span></p><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-family:times new roman;">[For other examples of struggling with "anomalous" grammatical forms, see Bereishit 30:38-39 and Shemot 1:10.]</span></span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-88086606076214474262007-11-22T08:42:00.000-08:002007-11-22T11:00:39.764-08:00Vayishlah I: Confronting One’s Past<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;font-family:times new roman;"><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;">(ה) ויצו אותם לאמר - צוה אותם ואמר להם כה תאמרון. והשלוחים לא ידעו דאגתו של יעקב:</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;font-family:times new roman;"><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;">עם לבן גרתי - כאשר ידעת במצות אבי ואמי. שלא יחשוב בשבילי ברח:</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;font-family:times new roman;"><span dir="rtl" style="font-size:130%;">(ז) באנו אל אחיך אל עשו - ומצאת חן בעיניו כאשר אמרת, וגם הנה הוא מתוך ששמח בביאתך ובאהבתו אותך, הולך לקראתך וארבע מאות איש עמו לכבודך. זהו עיקר פשוטו. וכן גם הנה הוא יוצא לקראתך וראך ושמח בלבו:</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;font-family:times new roman;"><span lang="HE" style="font-size:130%;">(ח) ויירא יעקב - בלבו, שאעפ"י שהראה לשלוחים כי לכבודו מתכוין, הוא לא האמין שמחשבת עשו לטובה אלא לרעה:</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;font-family:times new roman;"><span lang="HE" style="font-size:130%;">(כג) ויקם בלילה הוא - נתכוין לברוח דרך אחרת ולפיכך עבר הנחל בלילה, כמו שמצינו בדוד בברחו מפני אבשלום בדרכים הללו של ירדן ומחנים שעבר יעקב ובלילה, כמו כן ויאמרו אל דוד קומו עברו [מהרה] את המים וגו' ויקם דוד וכל העם אשר אתו ויעברו את הירדן עד אור הבוקר עד אחד לא נעדר אשר לא עבר את הירדן וגו' ודוד בא מחנים ואבשלום עבר את הירדן וגו':</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;font-family:times new roman;"><span lang="HE" style="font-size:130%;">(כה) ויאבק - מלאך עמו שלא יוכל לברוח ויראה קיום [הבטחתו] של הק' שלא יזיקהו עשו:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span dir="ltr" style="font-size:130%;"><o:p></o:p></span><span style="font-size:130%;">Rashbam’s take on the encounter between Ya’akov and Esav is fascinating.</span><span style="font-size:130%;"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;">First, he emphasizes that there was no concrete evidence of Esav’s hostile intentions.</span><span style="font-size:130%;"> </span><span style="font-size:130%;">In fact, all indicators point in the direction of reconciliation!</span><span style="font-size:130%;"> </span><span style="font-size:130%;">When the messengers return to Ya’akov, reporting that they have met Esav, and saying, in <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0132.htm">Bereishit 32:7</a>, </span><span dir="rtl" lang="HE" style="font-size:130%;">וגם הלך לקראתך וארבע מאות איש עמו</span><span style="font-size:130%;">, they are reporting Esav’s <i>benign</i> intentions.<span style=""> </span>Rashbam notes that the <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">לקראתך</span> is also used in <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0204.htm">Shemot 4:14</a> to describe Aharon’s loving greeting of Moshe in the desert after the revelation at the burning bush.<span style=""> </span></span><span style="font-size:130%;"> </span><span style="font-size:130%;">The 400 men marching with Esav are intended to be a welcoming party to show Ya’akov honor.</span><span style="font-size:130%;"> </span><span style="font-size:130%;">[This interpretation is not at all necessarily as simple as Rashbam claims, as the word </span><span dir="rtl" lang="HE" style="font-size:130%;">לקראת</span><span dir="rtl" lang="HE" style="font-size:130%;"> is often used in hostile contexts—see <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0420.htm">Bemidbar 20:20</a> for just one of many examples.<span style=""> </span>But he does open our eyes to realizing that it <i>can</i> be read the other way here.]<span style=""> </span>And even though Ya’akov himself understands this, he still cannot believe that there is not a trap somewhere lying in wait.<o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;">Second, he casts Ya’akov’s nighttime crossing of the Yabbok stream—detailed in <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0132.htm">Bereishit 32:23-24</a>—as an attempt to escape.<span style=""> </span>Rather than read this story as narrating Ya’akov’s effort to keep his family out of the way while he braces for the inevitable moment of confronting Esav, Rashbam casts him as terrified and looking for any way out.<span style=""> </span><span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ויותר יעקב לבדו</span>—Ya’akov was the only one left, he being the last person to be evacuated, and at that moment, an angel is sent to cut off his escape route, to force him to have the encounter with Esav that he so desp<span style="font-family:times new roman;">erately wanted to avoid.</span><o:p style="font-family: times new roman;"></o:p></span></p> <span style=";font-family:times new roman;font-size:130%;" >This interpretation highlights a Ya’akov plagued by doubt, regret and fear.<span style=""> </span><i>Despite</i> the positive signs from Esav, he cannot believe that it will end well.<span style=""> </span>He doubts the divine promises to keep him safe, and tries to turn tail and leave.<span style=""> </span>Only an emissary of God is able to bring him back to his destined path.<span style=""> </span>Ya’akov ends up projecting outward his own insecurities, and Rashbam’s reading gives us insight into the ways in which Ya’akov must have had remorse about his earlier behavior and a fear that he could never make it right.<span style=""> </span>The story thus becomes as much about Ya’akov confronting himself and his own past as it is about his encounter with his brother.
[For more thoughts in this direction, see Rashbam's comments on 32:29, where he suggests that the injury that Ya'akov suffers at the hand of the angel is in fact a punishment for trying to evade God's master plan.]
</span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-23566258265256062612007-11-17T19:55:00.000-08:002007-11-17T20:06:59.772-08:00Vayeitzei II: What about the women?<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;font-family:times new roman;"><span lang="HE" style="font-size:130%;">ותקרא את שמה דינה - ולא נכתבה הודאה על לדת הבת לדעת למה נקראת כן, שאין מודים על הבת כמו על הבן. ולהודיעך בא, שכל בני יעקב היו זכרים חוץ מזו. וכן בת אשר סרח. בכל שבעים נפש לא היו רק שתי בנות, יוכבד וסרח:</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><o:p></o:p>One of the most jarring things about the Tanakh to a contemporary reader in Western society is the way in which it simply devotes far less time and detail to women than it does to men.</span><span style="font-size:130%;"> </span><span style="font-size:130%;">Whether one approaches this point critically or apologetically, it simply cannot be denied that this pattern neither matches our reality nor the commitment of virtually all—irrespective of religious perspective and lifestyle—to the spiritual life of women as a critical component of contemporary Jewish life.</span><span style="font-size:130%;"> </span><span style="font-size:130%;">This point begs </span><span dir="rtl" lang="HE" style="font-size:130%;">דרשני</span><span style="font-size:130%;">, some avenue of explanation, if the Tanakh is to be a guiding force in our lives today.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;">In the midst of a long narrative about the birth of Ya’akov’s children, 11 boys in all, we are told in <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0130.htm">Bereishit 30:21</a> </span><span style="font-size:130%;">that Leah also had a daughter, Dinah.</span><span style="font-size:130%;"> </span><span style="font-size:130%;">This announcement is almost a side point, with no etymology given for her name (unlike all the others), and her seeming irrelevance to the natal arms race going on throughout the parashah between Rahel and Leah.</span><span style="font-size:130%;"> </span><span style="font-size:130%;">More important, Dinah is often genealogically invisible.</span><span style="font-size:130%;"> </span><span style="font-size:130%;">She is indeed mentioned as part of the count of 70 who descend to Egypt with Ya’akov, but she is not reckoned as a tribe, never given a distinct blessing and <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0135.htm">Bereishit 35:22</a> (as well as <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt25a02.htm">I Divrei Hayamim 2:1-2</a>) simply states that Ya’akov had twelve children.</span><span style="font-size:130%;"> </span><span style="font-size:130%;">[I will never forget when my then three-and-a-half year old daughter exclaimed upon hearing this verse when I learned it with her last year, “But there are thirteen!”]<o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;">This is, in my mind, one of the first places in the Torah where one truly needs to confront the issue of gender in terms of who the protagonists in the narrative are.</span><span style="font-size:130%;"> </span><span style="font-size:130%;">The first couple obviously includes a man and a woman and Avraham, Yitzhak and Ya’akov are all paired with women with interesting and defining personalities that reach out at us from the story.</span><span style="font-size:130%;"> </span><span style="font-size:130%;">But with Ya’akov’s children, we get the first glimpse of a dynamic that will expand over time to phrases like </span><span dir="rtl" lang="HE" style="font-size:130%;">שש מאות אלף רגלי <b>הגברים</b></span><span style="font-size:130%;"><b><span style="" lang="HE"> </span></b></span><span style="font-size:130%;">(<a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0212.htm">Shemot 11:37</a>), the directive אל תגשו אל אשה </span><span style="font-size:130%;">(<a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0219.htm">Shemot 19:15</a>) and the general omission of women from the censuses taken in Bemidbar, all of which point to a marginal role for women, wherein they are largely ignored or viewed as adjunct players.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;">Again, departing from the assumption that women can no longer be treated as adjuncts in our contemporary religious world—quite independent of the question of whether an <i>egalitarian</i> approach is the solution or that of the Beis Ya’akov school system—how do we best relate to these passages and teach them to our children, especially our daughters?<span style=""> </span>I am always confronted with two main options: 1) I can note that there were many women present at the time, but the details of their lives were simply not considered important by the Torah.<span style=""> </span>We might approach things differently today, but the Torah reflects its own reality and historical context.<span style=""> </span>Dinah is mentioned here only because of the story we will later hear about her being raped (another instance of <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">הקדמה</span>!), but any number of other daughters of Ya’akov (some of whom seem to be referenced in <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0137.htm">Bereishit 37:35</a></span><span style="font-size:130%;">—<span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ויקמו כל בניו וכל בנתיו</span>—see R. Yehudah’s view on this verse cited by <a href="http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/olam_hatanah/mefaresh.asp?book=1&perek=37&mefaresh=rashi">Rashi</a>) were simply not significant enough to mention.<span style=""> </span>This approach has the advantage of being historically honest and accurate, though it runs the spiritual risk of distancing ourselves from the Torah by locating it in a time, place and idiom far from our own and thus jeopardizing an intuitive sense of its eternal hold on us.<span style=""> </span>2) I can claim, in a case like this, that Ya’akov actually had only 12 sons and one daughter, and no other children.<span style=""> </span>Similarly, in the count of 70 people headed down to Egypt, there were only three women: Dinah, Serah and Yokheved.<span style=""> </span>The Torah would always mention women when they were present; it just happens that there were none.<span style=""> </span>[One deals with Bereishit 37:35 by saying it refers to daughters <i>and</i> granddaughters, i.e., the three women named above (Ramban) or to daughters-in-law (see R. Nehemiah cited in the above Rashi).]<span style=""> </span>The advantage here is that I assert the Torah’s interest in women as principals, when they happen to be there, and thus the text is a model for the active engagement of female personalities that one can relate to regardless of gender.<span style=""> </span>The obvious disadvantage is that it is very hard to sustain this reading in light of the larger context of the Tanakh, especially the 600,000 figure given at the Exodus, which pointedly only counts the adult men.<o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;">Rashbam—without, I assume, any concern for the issue I am raising here—blends both approaches in his commentary here.<span style=""> </span>On the one hand, he explains unapologetically that the birth of a girl was simply not as celebratory an event as that of a boy and, therefore, we are given no record of Leah’s thanking God for this child and the corresponding naming.<span style=""> </span>On the other hand, he asserts that there indeed were only three women in Yitzhak’s clan (if we exclude daughters-in-law).<o:p></o:p></span></p> <span style=";font-family:times new roman;font-size:130%;" >I honestly don’t know which approach is better for raising Jewish girls who we want to self-understand as full participants in Jewish life.<span style=""> </span>In some ways, this problem is just part of the larger tension of <i>peshat</i> and <i>derash</i> that gets played out in Rashbam’s commentary.<span style=""> </span>The <i>peshat</i> is (almost) always more satisfying as a read of the text and as an honest assessment of where our own assumptions differ from biblical ones.<span style=""> </span>But <i>derash</i> is what makes the Torah relevant to us in an ongoing way, what transforms an ancient Near Easten text situated in the Iron Age and helps us understand it as God’s eternal Torah.<span style=""> </span>How can we be faithful to one while maintaining the goals of the other?</span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-92045858206117289002007-11-14T20:06:00.000-08:002007-11-14T20:12:32.444-08:00Vayeitzei I: Just the Facts, Ma’am<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed; font-family: times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="" lang="HE">ויקח - אחת:</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"><span dir="ltr"></span><span style=""> </span></span><span style="" lang="HE">מאבני המקום - כדכת' ויקח את האבן אשר שם מראשותיו:</span><span style="" lang="HE"><o:p></o:p>
על כן קרא שמו לוי - יש לומר שיעקב קרא לו שם:<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">I don’t want to jump the gun too early in this process (particularly since we haven’t yet gotten to Rashbam’s famous <a href="http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/olam_hatanah/tnh_text.asp?id=174">comment</a> at the beginning of Parashat Vayeshev), but I think we can begin to say some useful things about what <i>peshat</i> means for Rashbam.<span style=""> </span>As I mentioned in an earlier <a href="http://parshanut.blogspot.com/2007/11/toledot-ii-morality-independent-of.html">post</a>, it seems to me that one of his core criteria for considering something <i>peshat</i>, is that it requires only the facts and details of the Torah itself to understand it.<span style=""> </span>That is to say, once I need to interpolate external information in order to make my interpretation cohere, I have left the world of <i>peshat</i> for that of <i>derash</i>.<span style=""> </span>A <i>peshat</i> interpretation reads like a planned, authored work of literature, prepared with its reader in mind.<span style=""> </span>The <i>peshat</i> acts on the reader, who can passively absorb its meaning.<span style=""> </span><i>Derash</i> is an active process, whereby the reader acts on the text, exploiting its inconsistencies and lacunae to make points that find their origin outside of the text itself.<span style=""> </span><i>Peshat</i> is sacred Scripture, to be understood on its own terms, <i>derash</i> is religious language, where the text becomes the sacred lexicon for expressing broader religious insights and truths.<span style=""> </span>We will have to test this hypothesis as we continue.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">In any event, there are (at least) two places in our parashah where Rashbam implicitly assaults the midrashic read of the text cited by Rashi and offers a way of reading the text without any esoteric presumptions.<span style=""> </span>The first is in <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0128.htm">Bereishit 28:11</a>, where <a href="http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/olam_hatanah/mefaresh.asp?book=1&perek=28&mefaresh=rashi">Rashi</a> notes the discrepancy between the plural form <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">מאבני</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>, possibly suggesting that Ya’akov took multiple rocks and placed them under his head, and <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0128.htm">28:18</a>’s use of <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">האבן</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>, indicating a single rock.<span style=""> </span>This then becomes an opportunity to assert that a miracle occurred here, whereby the multiple rocks were fused into one after fighting over which one would merit supporting Ya’akov’s head as he slept.<span style=""> </span>Rashbam rejects this and asserts a reading that eliminates any need to posit this extracanonical story: <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">ויקח מאבני</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> can just mean that he took <i>one</i> of the many stones present, and this then matches perfectly with the subsequent description of Ya’akov’s removal of the single rock that lay under his head.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">Second, in <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0129.htm">Bereishit 29:34</a>, we are told that <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">קרא שמו לוי</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>, which distinguishes Levi, Ya’akov’s third child, as being the only child that is not named with the female form of <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">קרא</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>, suggesting that someone other than Leah named him.<span style=""> </span><a href="http://www.daat.ac.il/daat/olam_hatanah/mefaresh.asp?book=1&perek=29&mefaresh=rashi">Rashi</a> cites the midrash that this alludes to the angel Gavriel’s intervention in the naming of Levi, as a portent of the latter’s eventual priestly character.<span style=""> </span>But Rashbam turns us back to the text and suggests that it must be that Ya’akov is the anonymous male namer here, thus freeing us from engaging angels or other beings that have not been introduced as part of the story.<o:p> </o:p></span></span></p> <p style="font-family: times new roman;" class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="">For more examples of this sort of dynamic, see Rashbam on <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0121.htm">Bereishit 21:9</a> (where he claims that the word <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">מצחק</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> has no sinister connotation, but merely indicates an age of sufficient maturity such that Sarah realizes the time has come to act to secure Yitzhak’s primacy in the household), <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0125.htm">25:27</a> (where interprets the phrase <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">יושב אהלים</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span> to be a simple reference to shepherding, as opposed to a more esoteric reference to the study of some sort of primeval Torah), and <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0127.htm">27:1</a> (where he insists that Yitzhak’s poor eyesight is solely a function of age, as opposed to post traumatic stress disorder from the Akeidah or Esav’s intermarriages).<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: times new roman;">In none of these cases do I think that Rashbam is necessarily rejecting the alternative reading; it is just that it is not <i>peshat</i>.<span style=""> </span>He is invested in defending the notion that the Torah can <i>also</i> be read as a book without <i>necessarily</i> also seeing it as an esoteric repository of wisdom and magical tales.</span></span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9030466169805301132.post-60827134443182523602007-11-14T19:58:00.001-08:002007-11-14T20:06:19.431-08:00Toledot III: Enriching the Narrative<p class="MsoNormal" dir="rtl" style="text-align: right; direction: rtl; unicode-bidi: embed;font-family:times new roman;"><span lang="HE" style="font-size:130%;">אם לוקח יעקב - דרך חכמה אמרה רבקה ליצחק להרחיק יעקב מעשו ולא גילתה לו שבשביל שטימת אחיו עשתה כן:<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;">Why is Ya’akov sent away to Lavan’s house back in Aram?<span style=""> </span>According to Bereishit <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0127.htm">27:42-45</a>, it is in order ot run away from Esav, who, in his rage over having been robbed of his birthright and blessing, threatens to kill his brother.<span style=""> </span>But according to Bereishit <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0127.htm">27:46</a>-<a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0128.htm">28:9</a>, it is in order to find a wife from the old country and to avoid intermarrying with the local Canaanite women.<span style=""> </span>Indeed, two different verbs are used to command Ya’akov’s departure: In <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0127.htm">27:43</a>, Ya’akov is told <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">קום ברח</span><span dir="ltr"></span><span dir="ltr"></span>—run away, escape (a verb also used in <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt0135.htm">Bereishit 35:1, 7</a> and <a href="http://www.mechon-mamre.org/p/pt/pt1312.htm">Hoshea 12:13</a>)—whereas in 28:2, he is told <span dir="rtl" lang="HE">קום לך</span>—go, travel. These two modes of departure really stand independent of one another: in one, Ya’akov flees in fear from danger; in the other, he strides off with purpose and mission.<span style=""> </span>In one, he quickly abandons the land of his youth, in the other he walks in the footsteps of his ancestors, who also made purposeful journeys from one end of the Euphrates to the other.<span style=""> </span>Both are critical aspects of Ya’akov’s narrative and history, but each stands on its own.<o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:times new roman;"><span style="font-size:130%;">Rashbam, in keeping with his literarily sensitive approach to the Torah, links these two and introduces a marvelously complex dynamic into an already dramatic story.<span style=""> </span>In his comment here, he casts Rivkah as <i>concealing</i> from Yitzhak the fact that Esav was in a murderous rage, instead preferring to enlist his support for Ya’akov’s departure by invoking the trump card of intermarriage.<span style=""> </span>In this reading, the entire plot line about the fear of marrying Canaanite women is ultimately a tool Rivkah uses in order to get Yitzhak to play a role in hastening Ya’akov’s escape.<span style=""> </span>The drama of Yitzhak and Rivkah operating in parallel universes—she firmly rooted in the oracle she heard and he groping in the dark—thus sees itself through to the end.<span style=""> </span>They are never truly working as a team; even at this late stage in the story, Rivkah is still concealing things from him and finding ways to effect what she knows to be the divine will.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <span style="font-family:times new roman;font-size:130%;">Yet another great example of a more linear reading of the Torah as a unitary narrative and the ways in which it adds nuances that transcend the individual narrative components.</span>EMThttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05785903047024077129noreply@blogger.com1